The slick and expensive-looking boat that Toby had hired for their day out was about as far removed from Alex’s beaten-up old craft as it was possible to be, and Kate smiled with excited anticipation as she kicked off her sandals and hopped on board.
Filippo, who was the designated driver, disappeared into the small cabin at the front and re-emerged with a life vest.
‘Where’s yours?’ she asked him, obediently zipping up. The vest was far too big for her and she clasped it to her chest with both hands.
‘There are straps at the sides to readjust it,’ Filippo instructed. ‘Make sure it is on tight, bambina. If you were to fall overboard, you don’t want the vest to stay on the deck without you.’
‘Is that likely?’ she replied warily.
‘Not if you hold on tight,’ quipped Toby, as he pressed a button to bring up the anchor.
‘Why do I have to wear one if you two don’t?’
‘Because you, my darling bambina, are far more precious than either of us,’ smoothed Filippo. ‘And if your brother fell in, he would not sink; he would float like a little satsuma.’
Chuckling, Kate slid onto a seat towards the back of the boat. Every edge of clean wood was soft and rounded, every white leather seat spotlessly clean. The glass windscreen above the steering area had been polished while the chrome fixtures shone. It was all so flawless, she thought, stretching out her legs, a blissful reprieve after several days spent in the chaotic, rubble-strewn hostel.
Filippo tipped the peak of his baseball cap at all the other drivers as he manoeuvred their boat past an array of fishing vessels, rowing boats and dinghies, while Toby busied himself tying ropes and stowing the bags of food and drink below deck. The boat also had a radio, which was soon tuned in and turned up, and shortly after they had cleared the line of buoys that ringed the harbour, Filippo opened the throttle and they sped off across the water.
Kate had thought the taxi boat that she’d taken to Jerolim was fast, but this vessel was in a different league. The boat bounced up out of the sea and scudded forwards so quickly that she yelped in surprised delight, grabbing her hat just in time to stop it blowing off her head. Great clouds of white froth churned out from either side as they cut through the water, flinging salty spray across her glasses until she had no choice but to take them off. As the engine roared and the music pounded, Kate was struck by an invigorating sense of freedom, the rapidly vanishing landscape of Hvar reminding her that she was moving, that she was away from anything and anyone that could harm her. She missed James so much that sometimes she was sure she could feel his absence as one might a severed limb, yet here, in this strangely wonderful moment, she did not want to be anywhere else – not even with him. The exhilaration had temporarily galvanised her heart against the pain and she wished she could somehow keep hold of it.
It took them another half an hour to reach their destination, by which time Kate’s emotions had run the full gauntlet from unbridled joy back to confused guilt, although she did not let on as much to the two men, merely pulling a face when Toby explained where they were.
‘Krk-whatty?’
‘Krknjasi Bay,’ he repeated, rolling his tongue easily over the complicated cluster of consonants. ‘But people also call it the Blue Lagoon, which is much easier to pronounce.’
‘It’s certainly popular,’ she observed, peering over the side towards where six other boats had moored up in a line, all of them spilling over with passengers. The sea here was darker than it appeared closer to shore on account of the added depth, but it still looked every bit as inviting. Now that they had slowed to a gently lapping crawl, Kate became quickly aware of how hot it was, and how much stronger and scratchier the sun felt out here in the Adriatic. She had applied her usual thick coating of factor thirty before they left, but now she started to lather up for a second time.
‘A lot of the tours come through here on the way to the Blue Caves or Vis,’ Toby explained. ‘It’s a good place to stop if you’re a fan of snorkelling. Now, shall we swim then eat, or eat then swim?’
‘Naughty boy,’ tutted Filippo, as he prepared to drop anchor. ‘It is always swimming first. If you get into cold water after a meal, it will give you the cramps.’
‘I might not swim,’ Kate told them, unzipping her life vest and laying it carefully on the floor of the boat. ‘It’s a bit deep for me.’
‘It’s the sea, not the Dalai Lama,’ joked Toby.
‘Funny,’ Kate deadpanned. ‘I can’t anyway, I’ve just put sun cream on. You pair go ahead – I’ll watch.’
Filippo had stopped fussing with bits of rope now and tugged off his shirt and shorts to reveal a waxed chest the colour of strong tea and the smallest pair of red Speedos that Kate had ever seen.
Toby clocked her expression and grinned. ‘It’s the Italian in him,’ he said. ‘Exhibitionism runs through their blood like awkwardness does through ours. He can’t help it any more than we can help saying sorry to someone when they walk into us.’
‘Oh my god!’ exclaimed Kate, as Filippo turned and bent to fasten his flippers. ‘You could have warned me that it was a thong.’
‘Now you know the real reason Alex didn’t want to come with us,’ cackled Toby, raising an arm to shield himself from the splash as Filippo executed a perfect dive into the water.
‘I thought it might have been because he was avoiding me,’ Kate confessed, filling her brother in on her boat faux pas from a few days ago. ‘I feel so bad about it,’ she groaned. ‘I had no idea he even had a boat of his own.’
‘Oh, don’t stress over it,’ Toby replied, pinching her bottle of sun cream. ‘Alex is a chilled individual. He is not going to care about something as trivial as that.’
‘Are you sure he doesn’t hate me?’ she badgered.
‘Don’t be daft. Al doesn’t have it in him to hate anyone. He’s a bit of a happy hippy, but in the good way, you know. Comes and goes when he pleases, lives his life to nobody else’s schedule but his own, works when he needs to, travels when he wants to.’
‘Where does he live when he’s not staying on site somewhere?’ Kate asked.
Toby chewed on his bottom lip.
‘I’m not sure if Alex has a home base, as such,’ he said carefully. ‘He has that little boat, as you know, so I imagine he spends a fair few nights on that when the weather is behaving, and I’m pretty sure he mentioned a tent once.’
‘So, what you’re saying is that he’s homeless?’ Kate clarified.
‘Not exactly, no.’ Toby squirted some lotion onto his hands and rubbed them across the peach fuzz covering his head. ‘I wouldn’t classify him as homeless. It’s more a lifestyle choice – Alex is a nomad because he wants to be, not because he needs to be.’
Kate tried to imagine that way of living, of flitting from place to place, never knowing for sure where you would be from one day to the next; of having no walls to hang photos or drawers and cupboards to fill with the things that you had collected. Then again, a life like that would also mean no Internet bills or council tax, no loan repayments, TV licence or monthly phone tariffs.
‘What do you think happened to him?’ she said. ‘Something must have, to have caused him to leave wherever it was he grew up in England. People aren’t just born into nomadity.’
‘Pretty sure “nomadity” is not a word,’ Toby pointed out. ‘To be honest, sis, I’ve never thought to ask him about his living arrangements. I figured if there was anything that Al wanted to tell us, then he would. I don’t see how it’s any of our business how he chooses to live or why.’
‘I can’t help thinking it’s a bit sad,’ she said wistfully.
‘Why sad?’ asked Toby, removing his sunglasses in order to clean them with the edge of Kate’s towel. ‘Alex isn’t sad. He has a lot of friends, keeps himself busy. He has a good life, as far as I can tell. Not an ordinary life, perhaps, but then, what is ordinary? And what makes his way wrong and ours right?’
Kate fell silent, stung by his wor
ds and by her own need to categorise Alex and his life choices. All it proved was that she was naive at best, small-minded at worst. But there was something about Alex that niggled; a sense she couldn’t shake that there was more to him than the version he put out into the world.
What that might be though, Kate had no idea.
Chapter 14
They lunched on the boat as the sun continued to beat down, Filippo proudly handing out Tupperware boxes still clad in only his small red thong.
Prising off the lid, Kate laughed.
‘What is the matter? Have you never eaten octopus before?’ asked Filippo, frowning as Toby eased the cork out of a chilled bottle of sparkling rosé.
‘It’s not that,’ Kate said. ‘I’m laughing because I’ve gone from barely encountering octopus to having it twice inside a few days.’ She told them about the pizza, to which Filippo looked horrified.
‘Cooked? On a pizza? Buon dio.’
‘What’s so bad about that?’
‘Octopus is best served cold, as it is in my salad,’ he told her. ‘The technique is to freeze it, boil it, remove the skin, then chill and chop it. And if you don’t freeze it first, it will very quickly become stringy and chewy.’
Kate stared down into her container. As well as chopped purple and white tentacles, the salad consisted of tomato, boiled potato, slices of red onion and finely chopped fresh parsley. Glancing up at the two men, she saw that Toby had already finished his own tubful and was now mopping up the leftover juice with a chunk of bread.
Picking up her plastic wine glass, Kate took a large gulp of the rosé and followed it down with a spoonful of the salad.
‘Oh,’ she said, when she had chewed and swallowed. ‘I see what you mean – it’s delicious.’
‘It’s nice to see you trying new things,’ appraised Toby. Then, seeing the look on Kate’s face, ‘What? It is!’
‘You make it sound like I’m a gastronomic heathen who survives on tins of baked beans and McDonald’s Happy Meals. I’m not as unadventurous as you think I am.’
‘The last five times Filippo and I came for dinner with you and James, he served us the same thing – Spaghetti Bolognese. Every. Single. Time.’
‘That’s because it’s his signature dish,’ she said, compelled to leap to her absent boyfriend’s defence. ‘He knows he can do it well, and he was always so keen to impress the two of you that he didn’t want to risk letting me loose in the kitchen. Don’t you remember that time I made us a Thai soup using those dried mushrooms I’d bought from a stall in Camden Market and all four of us ended up hallucinating?’
‘That was a great night!’ said Toby. ‘James was convinced that he was a jellyfish and wouldn’t let anyone touch him in case he stung them accidentally.’
‘See,’ she said resolutely. ‘He is all heart – even when he’s tripping out.’
‘He was that night, I grant you,’ Toby agreed. ‘But after his recent behaviour, I would have to argue that “all heart” is a bit generous.’
Kate lowered her fork, but her rebuttal was interrupted by the sudden arrival of a large, beady-eyed gull, which chose that moment to crash-land in the middle of the foldout picnic table and make a desperate lunge for the remaining chunk of bread.
‘Shoo! SHOO!’ screeched Filippo, jumping to his feet and flapping his hands at the bird. Startled, the gull hopped from the table onto Kate’s lap, sending what was left of her octopus salad over the edge of the boat, along with the tub.
‘Bloody hell!’ cried Toby, turning red with suppressed laughter as an enraged Filippo dived over the side in pursuit of his Tupperware. Kate, who had jumped up to rid herself of the bird, promptly slipped over in a spilt puddle of rosé and went down hard on her bottom.
‘Oof!’ she yelped.
‘Kate!’ exploded Toby.
‘I have it!’ cried Filippo, and the next second, the empty tub was launched back onto the deck, narrowly missing Kate’s head before rebounding off the white leather sofa and landing on Toby’s bare foot.
‘Shit!’ he swore, hopping sideways into the table and knocking over the bottle of sparkling wine. There was a crash, followed by a swift volley of far ruder swear words from Toby. By the time Filippo had pulled himself back up the ladder, he found his husband and sister-in-law laughing so much that they could barely breathe. But no sooner had Kate gained control of her hysterics did she find herself overwhelmed by a flood of tears – a shift so dramatic that it caused the still-hovering gull to squawk in alarm.
‘Sorry,’ she managed, waving a hand in front of her face. ‘I don’t know why I’m crying. Just ignore me.’
‘Poor little bambina,’ crooned Filippo, easing himself down slowly in his Speedos so as not to inadvertently flash any escaping body parts. ‘Your heart has been broken. Of course there must be tears.’
‘He’s right,’ agreed Toby, who was busy mopping up rosé with Kate’s towel. ‘The crying stage is a horrible yet unavoidable part of the break-up process.’
‘I guess, just for a moment or two there, when we were reminiscing about old times with James, I forgot that I’d lost him. I thought I would turn and find him sitting there, all red in the face because we’d embarrassed him with the jellyfish story. The fact that he isn’t here just feels so . . . wrong. I feel guilty that I’m having fun, when what I should be doing is working out how to get him back.’
‘Oh, bambina, you have nothing to feel guilty about,’ Filippo said soothingly.
Kate removed her glasses so she could wipe her eyes. She could never remember feeling so utterly conflicted, so torn between anger and pain, bewilderment and determination. Everything had changed so quickly, and it did not seem real that she was here, on a boat in Croatia, a world away from the life that had, up until just a few weeks ago, felt so set in stone. OK, so there had been a few thickets to scythe through along the way, but nothing bad enough to warrant such adamant rejection.
Even though it hurt to do so, she allowed herself to picture James, to see the two of them laughing together as they prepped the vegetables for a Sunday roast, or scrolled through Netflix looking for a new series to binge over a rainy weekend. He had been for her there on the evenings she came home bemoaning yet another terrible day doing whichever job she had stumbled into next, frustrated by her lack of skills and the inevitable shunning by colleagues that followed. James had made her see the funny side, pointed out that it hardly mattered if she’d messed up yet again, because to him, she was perfect regardless.
And he had been right. It hadn’t mattered to her, not really. Because she’d always had him – had the promise of their future happiness and his unconditional love. But now that both had been snatched away, Kate felt exposed; lost in a way that frightened her. She hadn’t been lying when she spoke up for James’s big-heartedness – he had showcased this trait time and time again, ever since she had known him – but it was precisely this that made his betrayal so much more difficult to accept. The James she knew would not hurt her in this way; the James she knew was a good person, a loyal person, a courageous person.
There was something he wasn’t telling her; Kate could feel it. And if she wanted to win him back, she had to find out what it was.
Chapter 15
In a bid to distract herself from thoughts about James or from spiralling into Internet searches for a viral video in which she was the unwitting star, Kate spent the next few days throwing herself into the refurbishment project at the hostel.
Sul Tetto was beginning to resemble a tangible residence in which paying customers would be happy to stay, but there remained much to do in the way of decoration. Toby and Filippo were nearing the bottom of their modest budget, but there were still pieces of furniture to source, kitchen crockery and utensils to buy and bedding to order. While the two men were content to leave the walls in the dorm rooms and communal areas blank, Kate harboured a far more aesthetically pleasing plan for the building – a theme that would be in keeping not only with the hostel’s owner
s, but with the island on which it stood, too. She was convinced that with a few small additions here and there, they would be able to transform the interior from something understated and uninspiring to a real home from home.
Toby might have been joking when he talked about the dolls’ house Kate had so loved as a child, but it had got her thinking. It was true that she had always been a fan of interior design – an avid viewer of the BBC home makeover series Changing Rooms and consumer of glossy tomes such as Elle, Ideal Home and Living Etc – but aside from overhauling her childhood bedroom numerous times and being permitted very limited rein to redecorate the house left to James by his grandparents, she’d not had many opportunities to flex her creative muscles. Kate couldn’t even be sure if she had a good eye for such things – all she knew was what she liked, but there was no saying Toby and Filippo would agree. Eventually, she concluded that what she should do was create a mood board of ideas to show them, and it was with this in mind that she had slipped out of the hostel before breakfast that morning and set off on a mission to find inspiration.
After picking up a coffee-to-go from the same café she had visited with her brother on her first morning in Hvar, Kate headed west along the coastal path, only stopping when she had crossed to the opposite side of the town port. The view across the water was enchanting, and she smiled as she took in the terracotta rooftops and spiky palms, sweeps of mountainside blanketed by scrubby trees, and above it all the sky, a propped-open umbrella of the purest blue. Boat masts bobbed with pendulum rhythm in the harbour while crickets sang along from the brush, and all the while the breeze scurried around her, its whispering voice soft as silk.
The pale gold pathway snaked ahead of her and she followed it, tracing the dome of the far horizon down to its distant blurry line. She had awoken not long after dawn, agitated by a bad dream that soured her thoughts, but out here Kate felt calmer, her emotions subdued by the clean air and the promise of a task she would relish getting done.
The Getaway: A holiday romance for 2021 - perfect summer escapism! Page 8