‘Don’t meet any other girls and forget us, will you?’ Maur called out of the open side of the tuk-tuk as they wobbled away, and Alice did her best not to cringe.
The next thing that held them up was the tuk-tuk driver. As was customary, he began to barter with them as soon as they got to the main road, telling them with confidence that it was ‘much better’ to stay in his tuk-tuk all the way to Kandy, and that he would give them a ‘special price’.
‘No, thank you,’ Alice repeated, smiling as she shook her head to emphasise the point. He may have only been asking for 3,000 rupees, which amounted to around fifteen pounds, but the bus would cost only 400 rupees for all three of them – less than two quid. Plus, Alice had assured the other girls, taking the bus would afford them so much more in the way of culture and experience. She wanted to sit amongst the Sri Lankan people, talk to them and hear them speak to one another. She had watched the overcrowded buses hurtle by in Colombo and yearned to be a passenger – it felt like a far more authentic thing to do than hire a driver.
‘Sorry!’ Alice yelled back at the still-pleading tuk-tuk driver, her rucksack in her arms because she hadn’t had time to put it on her back. The bus was sitting idle by the kerb, and the young conductor, who was dangling out on one arm from the open back door, was beckoning to them to hurry up.
‘Come on!’ she urged Steph and Maureen, who were still dawdling by the tuk-tuk. ‘We’re going to miss it!’
At last, sensing that Alice was going to get on this bus with or without them, the two girls hurried down the road after her, exclaiming in surprise as the conductor leaped down and tossed their backpacks unceremoniously into the luggage area, where they landed with a thud on top of some giant sacks of vegetables. The three of them thundered up the steps, only to almost fall back down them seconds later as the bus shuddered into life and sped off down the road, barely pausing to wait for a gap in the steady flow of traffic.
‘Bloody hell!’ shouted Maureen, laughing as the other two fell against her. ‘This is mental!’
Alice knew at once that they had made the right decision. The bus was old and rickety, with rows of worn seats upholstered in cracked red leather. Sri Lankan music blared out of speakers that were fixed all along the walls, and at the front, a large TV screen hung precariously right above the driver’s head. There were decorations inside the bus – colourful strings of paper flowers and posters of Buddha, and the atmosphere was one of joy and frivolity.
Alice pulled the other two towards three empty seats right at the back, then rooted around in her daypack for some fare money.
‘Thank you, ladies!’ the conductor yelled over the music, and they watched as he sauntered off down the central aisle with an easy swagger.
‘I love it!’ Alice declared, beaming at her friends. ‘Isn’t it brilliant?’
Steph was waving at a small child sitting across from them, the little girl’s dark eyes serious above her shyly smiling lips. Two long plaits of shiny black hair fell over her shoulders, and her fingers were tightly entwined with those of an older woman who was wearing a bright-orange sari.
‘It’s nuts, is what it is,’ said Maureen, but Alice could see that she, too, was captivated by the spectrum of colour and noise that was exploding all around them.
‘Come on, girls,’ she added, leaning her head against Alice’s shoulder. ‘Photo!’
Alice thought of the inevitable Instagram post, and how happy Richard would be to see a nice photo featuring the three of them. She smiled widely, even throwing in a thumbs up for good measure. It was a good photo – they all looked happy and kissed by the sun, so different with their blonde, dark and light-brown hair, but so in tune and comfortable with each other that they could be sisters. Alice had often lamented not having a sister. She loved Freddie fiercely, but she wondered if another girl would have changed the dynamic at home. Would Alice have been less of a tomboy tearaway if she’d had a sensible elder sister, rather than a big, strapping brother? Alice had to conclude that she probably would have been. Freddie had never scared his parents to the same extent that Alice had, though, and so he had grown up less mollycoddled. While Alice’s mum had been thrilled to welcome her back to Sudbury after university, saying at the time that she relished the opportunity to keep a close eye on her daughter, she had encouraged Freddie to move down to the capital. His ambition and drive undoubtedly came from the same place as Alice’s reckless tendencies once had, but while Freddie’s urges led him towards success and financial security, Alice’s had landed her in hospital.
Fishing out her phone from her bag, Alice fired off a quick message to her brother, telling him that Sri Lanka was wonderful and that she would be sure to bring him back something made from elephant dung. She missed her smelly-footed, kind-hearted, mickey-taking plank of a sibling. Freddie worked too hard these days. Aside from their monthly lunches at the family home, Alice barely ever got to spend quality time with him, and their sporadic phone calls were not enough. When she got home, she would go and visit him, she decided.
‘Messaging your brother?’ Maureen asked, her voice raised so that Alice could hear her over the chaotic combination of bus radio, roaring engine and bursts of the horn, which the driver was leaning on with rather alarming regularity.
‘Uh-huh,’ Alice confirmed, amused that her friend had blatantly been snooping.
‘Is he still as fit as ever?’ Maureen had a familiar glint in her eye.
Alice pictured her brother, with his straight teeth, short, tidy hair and wide, welcoming green eyes. He’d grown a beard last year, but then wisely concluded that it looked bloody awful and shaved it off again.
‘It is never not going to be weird that you fancy Freddie,’ she informed Maureen. ‘It’s just … wrong.’
‘Oh, but he is so far from being in any way wrong,’ Maureen went on. ‘And he’s rich, too, right? The dream.’
‘I’d ask you to stop making plans to seduce and then fleece my brother,’ Alice scolded jokingly.
‘Boo.’ Maureen stuck out her tongue. ‘You’re no fun!’
‘On the contrary,’ Alice grinned. ‘You should be thanking me for saving you from the stench of his feet. Seriously! That man could give Limburger a run for its cheesy money.’
‘She’s not joking,’ Steph put in, fanning herself with a folded map. The bus had braked forcefully to pick up more passengers, and the heat when the air stopped flooding in through the open windows was intense. It was another beautiful day, and Alice luxuriated in the patch of sunlight that was shining across her seat. The temperature here really did make it hard to feel too stressed. At home, Alice found herself on edge constantly, her sleeping often erratic and her head buzzing with an anxiety that could only be tempered by diving off the highest board, or by running down dark, wooded pathways so fast that her lungs burned in protest. Here, in Sri Lanka, she felt as if all the warmth and joy had enveloped her in a comforting hug.
Steph was now telling Maureen a story about the first time she ever stayed at Alice’s house, and how Freddie had insisted on sticking his putrid feet in her face while they were watching The Nutty Professor.
‘I almost threw up my Butterkist,’ she said earnestly, her blonde curls bouncing up and down as the bus barrelled along at speed. Steph’s hair was a bit less like Doc Brown’s in Back to the Future now, mused Alice – her friend must be acclimatising to the humidity at last.
‘I’d wear a peg on my nose,’ declared Maureen, refusing to be dissuaded.
‘Just what every man wants to see on a girl while they’re having sex with her,’ Steph deadpanned.
‘Oi!’ Alice clapped her hands over her ears. ‘Do not talk about sex and my brother in the same sentence, please!’
‘Do you think Max is still able to … you know?’ Maureen pondered, just as Alice removed her hands.
‘Have sex?’ said Steph. ‘I don’t see why not.’
‘Well, we don’t know how badly he was injured, do we?’ Maureen went on.
‘I don’t think it’s any of our business,’ she told them, folding her arms. ‘He’s not exactly going to tell a bunch of girls he’s just met all his most personal information, is he?’
‘That is a good point,’ Maureen allowed, before adding slyly, ‘I’ll let you both know if I find out.’
‘Maur!’ Steph chastised. ‘You can’t just sleep with him out of curiosity.’
‘That’s not the reason I want to,’ Maureen insisted. ‘I know you both think I’m some sort of sex addict, but I think he’s cool. It’s been ages since I genuinely felt a connection with a guy as well as simply fancying them, and I really do like Max.’
Alice turned to the window and watched as a stray dog lolloped along the pavement, one of its paws held up as if it was hurt. A coconut stall sagged under the weight of its load, palm trees swayed in the wind, and the dust from underneath the bus wheels danced in the air in between them.
‘I asked Jamal,’ Steph said then, lowering her voice conspiratorially. ‘You know, if Max was seeing anyone.’
‘And?’ Maureen was practically foaming at the mouth.
‘And he’s definitely single,’ Steph told her with satisfaction.
‘Good work, Stephie!’ said Maureen. She was clearly delighted. ‘I have caught Max looking at me a few times, you know. I thought I might have been imagining things, but maybe not – maybe he has been checking me out.’
‘I’m sure he would have,’ Alice said. ‘He’s only human, after all.’
She hadn’t meant to sound quite so sarcastic, and Maureen turned to her at once, confusion narrowing her eyes.
‘I thought you’d be pleased,’ she said. ‘Better Max than Freddie, right?’
What could she say to that? Alice tried to laugh Maureen’s comment away, but her insides churned as she realised that the thought of Maureen and Max hooking up was actually far worse than the idea of her and Freddie – and the implications of that were far too much for Alice to process.
‘I think you should go for it with Max if you reckon he’s up for it,’ she said, her mouth dry. ‘I’ll even put in a good word for you, if you like?’
‘You will?’ Maureen kissed her on her rigid jaw. ‘I do love you, you know, Alice – even if you won’t let me shag your brother.’
Alice shook her head in mock despair, deliberately avoiding both of her friends’ eyes.
She was doing it again, she thought. She was making promises that she had absolutely no intention of keeping. Lying to Richard and her mum was bad enough, and now she was telling lies to her friends, too.
16
Despite heeding the warning in their guidebook about the Goods Shed bus station in Kandy being one of the busiest stop-offs in the entire country, Alice, Steph and Maureen were still shocked by the scene that greeted them as they arrived.
‘This place is absolutely bonkers!’ Steph exclaimed, almost stumbling over sideways at the bottom of the bus steps as a surge of people pummelled her out of the way in their haste to board.
Alice didn’t answer, because she was too busy legging it round to the back of the bus to collect their rucksacks, all three of which had been tossed on to the tarmac almost as soon as the driver applied the brakes.
‘Give me a hand,’ she called out to the others, dragging two of the bags and kicking her own forwards with one foot. There didn’t seem to be a designated area for disembarking, and they were in genuine danger of getting flattened by whichever bus was due to arrive next. All the people who had been on the journey with them had vanished, and Alice looked around in vain for a sign that would tell them which way to go. The air was thick with the smell of diesel and the heat was stifling, and all Alice could hear was car horns, shouting and engines being revved. She had thought the capital Colombo was busy, but Kandy was something else. She could barely think straight, but rather than feeling wary, she found that she was exhilarated by all the unfolding chaos.
‘Yes, please,’ she heard Maureen saying, and she turned to find a Sri Lankan man standing in front of them, a grin on his face and a bright-red polo shirt straining over his round belly. He was already holding Maureen’s rucksack, and now reached his hand out towards Alice.
‘I carry for you,’ he offered, but she shook her head.
‘I can manage, thank you.’
The man nodded, the wide smile never leaving his face, then took off at speed in the direction of a tall, concrete clock tower.
‘He’s our tuk-tuk driver,’ Maureen explained helplessly, before hurrying off after him through the crowds and leaving Steph and Alice with no choice but to follow in close pursuit. They weaved in and out of groups of schoolchildren, jumped over dogs, sidestepped sacks of vegetables and rice, and narrowly avoided toppling over a stack of cages containing cramped, squawking chickens. A thick wave of tuk-tuk drivers parted to allow them through, each one shouting out a greeting of ‘Ayubowan’ and a rival fare price as they passed.
It only took them five minutes to reach their designated three-wheeled taxi, but it was long enough in the intense afternoon heat for Alice to feel her back dampen with sweat. It was such a different heat here in Sri Lanka from what she was used to on the beaches of Spain or Greece – it felt almost as if someone had shut them inside a vast sauna and cranked the temperature dial around to the highest setting. Out of nowhere, her mind went to Max – how would he fare in amongst all this pushing and shoving? Since he had told her how he lost his leg, Max had become more vulnerable in her eyes, the reality of what he had been through something that she could not overlook, however much she guessed he would want her to. He was a man who had been broken, both physically and mentally, and Alice’s feelings of concern were only natural. What kind of person would she be if she didn’t feel empathy towards him, if she didn’t want to protect him from further hurt? Anyone who met him would feel that way, surely?
A prominent vein popped up across the forehead of the tuk-tuk driver as he attempted to squash their three huge backpacks into the small space behind the seat, but instead of swearing with frustration, he seemed to find the whole scenario hilarious.
‘Too many shoes!’ he laughed, pointing with spooky accuracy at Maureen’s bag. ‘Ladies always have many, many shoes.’
‘We can have one bag under our feet?’ suggested Alice, stepping forwards before Maureen had a chance to lecture the driver on the importance of having a pair of kitten heels for every occasion. This seemed to please him, and a few minutes later they were off, wobbling through the seething throng of traffic, Alice, Steph and Maureen all with their knees up to their chins.
‘You like music?’ yelled the driver.
‘YES!’ they all chorused, and the next second their backs were vibrating with the bass coming from a massive speaker hidden in the panel behind the seat.
‘No wonder there’s no room for our bags,’ shouted Steph, over what could only be described as banging drums and chanting. ‘He’s got an entire Dolby sound system rigged up in here.’
‘I like it,’ declared Maureen, punctuating her comment with a yelp as they almost collided with a motorbike. The young guy steering it bellowed something friendly-sounding at their driver, flashed two rows of teeth, and zoomed off ahead. Alice’s eyes widened as she peered around the edge of the tuk-tuk’s black awning and saw the hairy face of a goat staring back at her out of an open car window. I love this crazy place, she thought, happiness tugging up the corners of her mouth.
The centre of Kandy was a hive of activity, but once they’d negotiated their way through and were chugging noisily up a steep hill, the whole atmosphere transformed into one that was far more serene. As there was so much of Sri Lanka to cover on this trip, the three girls had agreed to split the task of booking their accommodation between them, and the choice for the next two nights had been made by Steph. Like Alice, she favoured homestays over hotels, and Alice was pleased to see that her friend had clearly done her research
on Kandy. As soon as they pulled up in a cloud of dust outside the beautiful two-storey house that they would temporarily call home, she breathed an audible sigh of relief. It was totally worth the money they’d have to spend on tuk-tuk trips to be staying this far out of the city. Down there was mayhem, while up here it was tranquil.
Alice paid the driver as the others dragged out their wedged-in backpacks, her buoyant mood leading her to give him a huge tip.
‘Thank you, thank you,’ he said gratefully, putting his hands together. It was refreshing the way men spoke to you here. There was never a hint of flirtation or sleaziness, just pure friendliness with a hint of mischief – especially when it came to bartering down a price. Alice had not expected to feel safer here than she did back home – specifically on her rare trips into London, where she had been pummelled into by short-tempered, disdainful men too many times to recall.
‘Shall we?’ she said to Maureen and Steph, as the tuk-tuk wobbled off down the hill. Shouldering their packs, the three girls pushed open the white wooden gate and stepped into an immaculate garden. Flowers of all colours and sizes burst out of neat beds, an idle sprinkler sat mute in the centre of a pristine lawn, and above them tree branches groaned with the weight of ripe coconuts. Even the heat felt less oppressive up here, the air somehow cleaner and alive with the rich fragrance of nature. Down in Kandy, you were more likely to inhale petrol fumes than floral scents, and now Alice took deep, hungry breaths as they made their way along a stepping-stone path towards the front door.
‘Shoes,’ Maureen said, pointing down to a discarded pair of men’s sandals and some smaller, more delicate slip-ons. Alice, who was wearing trainers, knelt slowly to untie them, careful not to let the weight of her backpack cause her to keel over sideways. Before she had time to stand up again and knock, the door was flung open in front of them and an elderly Sri Lankan man held his hands out wide.
‘Stephanie, Melissa and Alison,’ he declared, stating rather than asking.
One Thousand Stars and You Page 8