‘Yeah, but Tom? Where’d they go?’
‘Back to his place, I think.’
‘So they just left me here?’ He blinks.
Gordon reaches out a hand to pat Luke’s shoulder, just as Len pushes past on his way down the stairs, ploughing through the mass of people, towards the bar, then disappearing from view. Gordon tilts his head and pulls a sad expression.
‘Fuck off, Gordon,’ Luke stammers, and, feeling the bile rising in his throat, he forges through the crowd in search of the exit.
The path is dark and long, as Luke stumbles away from the lights and music of the Ryde Queen, past screaming tangles of nightclubbers who perch on the edges of rusting girders, or stagger in and out of the shadows cast by the dry-docked dinghies and restoration yachts. His mind is fixed firmly on his target: to make it back to Tom’s house and confront him. He pauses by the rusted fencing of the yacht-brokers to vomit on the gritty path, glad to be unseen as he grips his knees, bent over the dust, trying to pull himself together. It’s gone midnight and yet it’s still so warm; Luke imagines stripping off his clothes and dropping into the Medina, letting the water carry his naked body out into the Solent, to take him away, over to the other side where his new life can begin. He wishes he knew how to cry, as he did when he was a kid; as he did when his Grandad died, or when his cat Zsa-zsa was put to sleep at the vet’s.
A buried memory surfaces in the stagnant air, of Len curled up under the canvas tarpaulin of their den in America Woods, red-eyed and exhausted. He’d been missing for two days, after his dad had left again, and it was Luke who eventually found Len and brought him back. They’d shared Luke’s chocolate bar – it was Fruit and Nut, he remembers clearly – then he’d given him a backy, with Len sitting on the saddle, gripping on to Luke’s belt loops as he stood and pedalled him back to his seafront home.
Luke starts to walk again, knowing he’s miles from Blake Avenue, his anger growing with each drunken step. On the Fairlee Road he sticks out his thumb, and before long he picks up a lift that can take him as far as the outskirts of Sandown, where he thanks the bemused driver and stands beneath a lamppost as he tries to get his bearings. Realising he’s just a street away from Martin’s house, he heads in that direction, suddenly inspired to put things right. The roads are empty, but distant music whispers in the air, drifting up from the seafront where sleepless revellers party through the night on the hottest day in August. Luke steadies himself along the high hedge at the side of Martin’s garden, patting it with his hand in a rhythmic motion. When he reaches the break in the hedge, he steps carefully through the narrow black passage and comes out into the garden, with the large workshop to his right and the house to the left. The darkness of the garden is broken by the lights from the workshop, and from the little window at the top of the house. The back door is ajar. Luke remains in the shadows, his back pressed against the hedge, his breath coming in small, shallow gasps; it’s gone one in the morning, and he hadn’t really expected anyone to be up and about.
As he wonders about Martin, the workshop door swings open and Mr Brazier, looking bent and exhausted, walks slowly along the path that joins the workshop to the house, stopping with his wheelbarrow at the large dry bonfire that now dominates the middle of the lawn. He tips a load of sun-crisped foliage on to the pile and stares at it a moment, wincing as he returns to the edge of the lawn to fetch more garden debris to add to the heap. When he’s placed a final offering of orange crates and offcuts around the edges of the bonfire, Mr Brazier stoops to pick up a small can, which he sprinkles around the circumference of the unlit mound. Instinctively, Luke steps back into the shadows of the hedge, as Martin’s dad lights a match and drops it on to the lighter fuel. The bonfire ignites with a roar, flashing a sudden light across the garden as the flames engulf the dead leaves and branches, firelight snaking rapidly to the heart of the stack. Mr Brazier steps back from the flames, his face shifting in the flickering light. With his long arms hanging limp at his sides, for the first time Luke can see Martin in him. He stays like this for minutes, the old man, staring at the burning waste until the light diminishes so completely that he appears to fade into the garden, to disappear altogether. With his heart beating hard against his breastbone, Luke eases his body back through the passage in the hedge and runs, dashing through the empty streets of Sandown, his mind fizzing in the balmy night air, until finally, gasping and weary, he arrives on the pavement outside his own house.
Flopping his arms over the wall pillar that separates his drive from Tom’s, Luke stares at the two properties, searching for signs of activity. His own bungalow appears to be sleeping; the lights are all out, with every window propped open in the hope of drawing in some cool air. The street lamps cast a white blush across the dead and fractured lawn, illuminating the various discarded toys and buckets that Kitty has dragged out over the course of the day. Luke quietly steps across the lawn to pick up the wooden cigar box he spots pushed under the drooping hydrangea bush. He opens the lid and turns it to the light, appalled to find dozens upon dozens of tiny, shrivelled ladybirds, collected up by Kitty over a month earlier.
A stream of light catches his attention, coming from next door’s alleyway, and in a rush of adrenaline he drops the wooden box, scattering the ladybirds far and wide, and sprints across his drive to hurdle the low neighbouring wall. Silently he makes his way to the side door, and stands with his back against the brickwork, hoping to hear the murmur of voices; of Tom and Samantha’s voices. The glass panel of the door is ribbed, frosted to obscure its inhabitants. He strains to listen in: there’s the snap of a cupboard door opening, the chink of a glass being set down on the side – but no voices. Luke peers round the corner, attempting to see through the screen, not realising in his drunkenness that his face is now fully pressed up against the frosted door panel.
Inside there’s a short shriek and the sound of glass hitting the tiles. In a moment of clarity, Luke recognises the voice as Diana’s, and he raps on the glass, calling her name softly to reassure her.
‘Diana. Diana, it’s me – Luke.’ He presses his flat hand against the clear panel in a gesture of friendship.
The light of the room shrinks as Diana comes close, and speaks through the door. ‘Luke?’
‘Yes – it’s me.’
He hears the clunk and slot of the bolt being drawn, and the door edges open. Diana is standing in the utility room doorway in a full-length kimono, her face stripped of make-up, her wavy hair falling softly over her shoulders.
‘Luke? What are you doing here? I thought you were out with Tom tonight?’
‘He’s not here?’ he asks, feeling trivial in the bright glare of the bulb light. He turns and looks along the alleyway to the street beyond, then back up at Diana. She appears years younger without her make-up, more like a pretty teenager than a sexy older woman. Her face crumples in concern as an unexpected sob catches in the back of his throat and he brings his hand up to stifle his mouth.
‘Oh, darling!’ she exclaims, stepping out in her bare feet, drawing him inside. She leads him through the house and into the soft comfort of her fawn-coloured living room. ‘Sit down,’ she says, sitting close beside him on the chaise longue and clasping his hand. ‘What can I get you?’ She tips his chin up with a long, manicured finger and regards him earnestly. ‘How about a drink?’
Luke is astounded by the beauty of her denuded face, smooth and sensuous in the radiance of the dimmed side lamps. For a moment he’s outside of himself, looking in, as he sits there in the middle of this night of madness, close beside Diana, in her flimsy robe, with her naked face. Just him and Diana. Delicious Diana.
‘A scotch?’ he replies.
He watches as she rises and crosses the room to the drinks cabinet. The silk of her floral kimono clings to her curves as she bends to take a glass from the bottom shelf, and Luke is certain she’s wearing nothing beneath the gown. She removes the lid from the plastic ice tub and picks out three dripping cubes with a pair of sil
ver tongs, dropping them into the cut-glass tumbler and pouring out a generous measure of whisky.
‘Aren’t you having one?’ he asks, when she returns to the sofa.
She plumps up the cushions and crosses her legs, carefully tucking her gown beneath her upper thigh to prevent it slipping open.
‘I’ve had plenty.’ She smiles. ‘So, tell me what’s happened? Why aren’t you with Tom?’
Luke swirls the melting ice chunks, and takes a cautious sip. ‘He went off with Samantha.’
‘Samantha?’
‘We all work together, up at Sunshine Bay.’
‘And you like her?’
Luke blows out slowly through pursed lips. ‘Yup. And Tom knew it. He knew I liked her.’
Diana makes a sad face.
He takes a braver gulp of scotch and laughs harshly. ‘I can’t believe I thought I was in with a chance.’
Diana nudges him and he smiles reluctantly. ‘Forget her!’ she says, smacking his knee and snatching away his empty glass. She sashays from the room, calling back from the hallway, ‘Tell you what, Luke, I will join you in a drink after all. Hang on a second!’
Moments later she returns with a chilled bottle of champagne, which she holds aloft in a pose not unlike the Statue of Liberty. He narrows his eyes, smiling, enjoying the way the light shards appear to bounce around the room in the soft radiance of Diana’s movements.
‘We’ll not let your big birthday pass by as a disaster!’ she says, returning to the drinks cabinet, where she unwraps the foil and expertly pops the cork. ‘Your mum phoned earlier to say the chaps arrived home just after twelve, and now Mike’s crashed out on your sofa next door. He’ll be out for the count till the middle of tomorrow, if past drinking adventures are anything to go by.’
Luke laughs, shifting in his seat, his body at last relaxing into the cushions.
‘So, we can’t let them have all the fun, can we?’
She pours the champagne and joins him on the sofa, where they drink and talk and refill their glasses as Diana’s gown shimmers and sways before Luke’s increasingly bold gaze.
‘This is a strange night,’ he says, noting the soft chime of two o’clock from the hallway. ‘Out on the marina – on the beaches – it’s as if everyone is awake, but at the same time it’s as if everyone is sleeping – dreaming…’ He trails off, trying to make sense of his thoughts.
‘And it’s not even a full moon,’ Diana says, sharing the last of the champagne between their glasses.
‘Do you know what I mean?’ he asks, the throb of his heart steadily pounding inside his chest.
She inclines her head in thought. ‘It’s the heat; the endless summer. We live on this tiny island, and no one knows what to do about the sun when it just won’t stop shining, so we all go a little mad, because it feels like it’s just a dream that will be gone when we wake up tomorrow.’ She looks at him for a long time, and he doesn’t look away, and at once he knows that she does understand, that she’s like him, that she knows his every desire. ‘Shall we take these into the other room?’ she asks, holding her glass in one hand, slipping the other along the sofa to lace her fingers between his. He pushes his hand against hers so that no space remains between the valleys of their fingers; she presses back, hard, her eyes never leaving his. With a slow, cat-like blink of her soft brown lashes she moves closer still, allowing her gown to fall open, pushing the hair away from his neck to gently kiss behind his ear.
The chatter of house sparrows beyond the window wakes Luke early, forcing him to rise up from the heavy blanket of his hangover. His head feels encased within a tightening shroud of pressure, and his dry tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth. With a lurch of exhilaration he remembers where he is, and he slowly turns his head to see Diana’s face, sleeping on the pillow beside him. Her bare shoulder is exposed; his pulse accelerates as he recalls the slip of her skin against his, the smooth strength of her thighs as she pulled him towards her in the darkness of the night.
Arduously, he props himself up on his elbows, flopping back down as the pain screams through his temples. ‘Jesus,’ he whispers.
‘Morning,’ she says, sleepily pushing the hair from her face. ‘What’s the time?’
He wants to reach for her again, and he blushes at the thought, so unimaginable in the cool light of morning. He knows he might never touch her again. Luke checks his watch, and is relieved to see it’s still early, too early for Mike to return and find him in his bed. He closes his eyes and releases a long, slow exhalation of breath. ‘Five-thirty,’ he replies.
Diana slips into her kimono, and disappears along the hallway, while Luke gingerly gathers his discarded clothes, wondering what to do next. When he’s dressed, he follows the smell of coffee to the kitchen, where Diana greets him with a slow smile.
‘Hungover?’ She hands him a mug of sweet black coffee.
‘Yup,’ he groans. He holds up the cup, giving her a nod of thanks. ‘I guess I’d better get going soon, hadn’t I?’
She pulls out a chair, indicating for him to take a seat at the kitchen table. ‘Don’t worry about Mike. He’ll still be dead to the world. You’ll be off well before he gets back.’
Luke nods, sipping his coffee, every nerve in his body jangling. He glances up at Diana, shyly, her body still vivid in his memory. ‘Thanks,’ he says.
She tips her head, her pretty curls falling loose around her neck. ‘For the coffee?’
‘Well, yes,’ he says. ‘But also – well, last night. I shouldn’t have just turned up like that. I probably acted like an idiot. Sorry.’
Diana reaches out to touch his wrist, and shakes her head with a warm smile before returning to the sink to refill the kettle. They remain like this a while, in comfortable silence, with Diana pottering about the kitchen as the dry chill of the early morning drifts in through the open window, and the sparrows chatter on. Luke feels the life returning to his limbs.
He breathes deeply, as the jumbled mess of his parents’ lives rears up in his thoughts, unwelcome and bewildering. He thinks of his father, shuddering at the possibility of him and Diana together – or, worse still, of his mother paired off with Mike.
Diana returns to the kitchen table, a tiny vertical line crinkling her brow as she spots the change in his expression. She places a fresh cup in front of him and sits, folding her arms, casually leaning on to the table.
‘Are you alright, darling? You’re not sorry about last night, are you?’ She gives him a crooked smile and reaches out to rub his forearm.
He hesitates, running a finger around the rim of the hot cup, before lifting his eyes to meet hers. ‘Diana, can I ask you something?’
She brings her cup to her mouth, blowing on it gently before taking a sip. ‘Of course.’
‘Promise you won’t be offended?’
‘I’ll try not to be.’
‘It’s the parties, the ones at the McKees’. And all these photos that keep turning up.’
‘Oh,’ says Diana. Absently she pinches her kimono together at the chest.
‘Well, I know you’ve been to some of the parties, like Mum and Dad. It’s not exactly a secret any more. Apparently, everyone’s been talking about it – even before the photos came out.’
She nods.
Luke drums his fingers on the table, feeling his chest throb with toxic poisoning. ‘It’s just, I don’t know – it’s just lately Mum’s changed so much, it’s like she’s terrified of everything. She used to be out and about all the time, down the beach with Kitty, chatting with friends in the town – but now, she hardly leaves the house.’
Diana’s eyebrows pucker. ‘I had no idea it was that bad, Luke.’
‘She’s pretty good at putting on a brave face in public, but the minute she’s on her own she sort of balls up inside herself again.’
‘What about your dad?’
‘He’s the same as usual, pretending everything’s normal. But they’re hardly talking. It’s like this has pushed them so far ap
art, they don’t know how to get back. And it doesn’t help that Simon’s staying with us. He’s not the best influence on Dad.’ He rubs his hands across his face, wearily groaning at the uselessness of it all. He leaves the table to run his cup under the tap, filling it with cold water which he drinks down before filling it again. ‘Sorry. I don’t know why I’m even telling you all this.’
‘God, it’s so ironic,’ Diana sighs. ‘Not long before that last party, Marie told me that if Richard and Jo didn’t get more involved she was going to stop inviting them.’
‘What do you mean?’ he asks, placing his cup down and turning to face her. ‘What do you mean, “more involved”?’
She looks surprised. ‘Oh. Well, it seems they’ve not exactly been “full participants”, if that makes sense.’
‘None of it makes any sense.’ Luke fetches his new boots from the doorway, and perches on the edge of the seat to lace them.
‘Marie said your mum and dad have been to lots of her parties over the years, and they’ve always been great fun to have around. But apart from once or twice in the early days, when it came to picking partners your mum and dad always stuck with each other. I think it had started to grate a little, with Marie. There were plenty there who would have been very happy to hook up with one or other of them – they’re a very attractive couple. But every time it was the same: they’d turn down all offers and choose each other.’
With clarity, Luke recalls the soft coral toenails of Dad’s mystery woman on that party night, the woman who’d stayed concealed behind the rockery. He looks at Diana across the table as the light from the window casts pretty ripples around her hair. ‘I don’t understand why they’d keep going – if they only want each other?’
Diana stands, holding her empty cup aloft as she walks away, across the kitchen to open the side door to the alleyway beyond. ‘Boredom, I should think, Luke. Good old-fashioned boredom. Sometimes love just isn’t enough.’
‘But if they’ve got nothing to hide, what are they so afraid of?’
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