‘I’m alive!’ I scream over and over until I cough up blood. But really, the words come out as Help me…
Today is a looking-after day, I’ve decided. Over the years, I’ve become very good at taking care of my little space. It’s the only home I have, after all. Sometimes I ask for things like soap and polish and ornaments to make it more cheerful. My mother always kept a well-run house. ‘Ship-shape and Bristol fashion,’ she’d say, though no one ever knew what that meant. She’d tell us off for charging about inside with our muddy boots on or not tidying up at the end of the day. My father would mumble an agreement but then, when she wasn’t looking, he’d pick me up and swing me round. ‘Let’s go rock-pooling instead, Lenni,’ he’d say. ‘Clearing up is boring.’ We’d giggle and escape by the back door, leaving my mother to get on with the housework. I’d do anything to help her tidy up now; anything for my dad to take me rock-pooling.
‘I wish you’d stay a while,’ I say, all excited, clapping my hands when I get a surprise visit later on.
‘I’ve got the weight of the world on my shoulders,’ I’m told, and I breathe in the scent of sweat, worry and antiseptic, reminding me of the time I was in hospital. ‘Will you rub them for me?’
And so I do, digging my pencil-like fingers into the knots of muscle, causing a symphony of moans.
‘Will you ever let me go back home?’ I say, kneading hard. Last time I asked this, I didn’t get a visit for days and ran out of food. I wish I hadn’t mentioned it again because the nice noises turn into a red face, impatient growls and shallow breaths. ‘Sorry, sorry,’ I say, and the breathing soon steadies as I work my way down.
Anyway, I’m not even sure I have a home, if it ever existed. All that’s left is a mysterious family occupying a strange dreamscape in my mind, making me jolt awake at night tangled in a sweaty sheet. It’s hard to know what’s real any more, though I still have the scar on my left knee from when I fell out of Jason’s tree house. And the ring I wear on my right hand was a Christmas present from my uncle and aunt, and my little toe still bends awkwardly from when Claire took me riding and the pony trod on it. Sometimes I get a whiff of Goose the dog after he’s been charging along the beach, splashing in rock pools and running through the waves. His fur stinks of seaweed and the mouldy old cupboard under the stairs. I hang on to these things, checking in with them every day. But this is my real life now, as though everything before was just pretend.
Chapter Thirty-Two
The teens had made their own beach camp up near the rocks away from the adults. Two of Marcus’s friends were attempting to surf – hardly a match for the crowd Rain had hung out with at Bondi last Christmas when her father succumbed to her mother’s pressure and coughed up for the trip.
Rain scuffed the sand, wondering how it felt to go through life drilling into someone’s conscience for cash. But then she thought about the number of times she’d hammered Maggie for money, demanding designer labels and high-end beauty products to keep up with her rich school friends, many of whom had unlimited credit cards, and reckoned it was the same thing. It was only because of what had happened that she was thinking too much, trying to block it out.
She stretched out her legs. Her whole body hurt, and not just because of all the alcohol she’d drunk last night. She watched Marcus bobbing about in the water, unable to decide if he looked like a drowning newborn foal or a dying octopus. She reckoned, as she weighed everything up, narrowing her eyes behind the cover of her huge Chanel sunglasses, some people needed teaching a lesson. He was as good a place as any to start.
‘So, you’re actually happy living here?’ she asked Marcus a minute later. He was standing dripping wet above her, making her flinch as if she expected him to shake like a dog. She didn’t feel like talking to anyone after last night, him included, though she reckoned she ought to act normal. The other girl hanging out with them – Poppy or Pip or something – glanced up from her magazine.
‘Yeah, ’course I am,’ he replied. His face was cherry-red and his body pure white.
‘But it’s sooo boring.’ Rain lay back on her elbows on the stripy beach towel, tilting her face to the sky. She was wearing her tiny pink and gold bikini and the sun was warm on her skin. Her stomach was flat today, almost concave from losing last night’s meal before they’d gone to the club, and skipping breakfast earlier had made a difference. Her belly button bar glinted in the sunlight. Purging was the only control she had, and she wasn’t about to give that up for anyone. It felt even more important now.
It was a clear day, with the sky so blue that Rain could almost have believed it was the Med. But the closest civilisation to the farmhouse was the village with its crappy pub and tiny shop selling packet tea and tabloid newspapers. Why, then, was she even considering what it was like for Marcus and his mates to have grown up here, to hang out at the beach in summer and chill by the pub fire playing cards in winter? And what the hell was that feeling inside, she wondered, as though she’d got something pressing down on her heart?
‘We like living here,’ Poppy-Pip said. ‘Our friends are only a bike ride away.’ The girl had on a lilac one-piece with shorts that looked as though she’d borrowed them from her grandmother.
‘That’s so fucking Famous Five.’ Rain lay flat on the sand but couldn’t get comfortable, so she sat up again. ‘Let’s go for a swim,’ she said to Marcus, feeling something stirring inside. She got to her feet, making sure he got an eyeful of her long, tanned legs. She knew Poppy-Pip wouldn’t join them as her nose was stuck between the pages of a history book. ‘Will you teach me how to surf?’ She adjusted her bikini top, hoping the waves would wash everything away.
Marcus dragged his eyes away from her and grabbed his battered board, lugging it down to the shore. Rain wasn’t far behind, but instead of diving straight into the water like Marcus, his chest all puffed out, she took it step by slow, painful step, allowing the chilly breakers to tumble around her ankles, her knees and her thighs before raising her arms high and shrieking that it was too cold. She knew Marcus was watching her every move.
‘Come on!’ he called out. He hauled himself onto the board, paddling out to where the other surfers waited for the perfect wave. Rain didn’t really understand the need to go to all that effort only to be dumped under a load of crashing water and end up with a ton of sand in her hair. But it was a means to an end and, apart from anything, she needed something to text the girls. Something to take her mind off everything.
‘Marcus, will you help me?’ She pouted, hugging her arms around her chest as he paddled extra hard before allowing himself to be carried to her side on the swell. ‘It’s so freaking cold!’ She jumped high to avoid being soaked by a huge wave. Her skin was covered in goose bumps. When she saw him staring at her bikini top again, she forced a laugh through chattering teeth, even though happy was the opposite of how she felt.
‘Climb on behind me,’ he said, clearing his throat when his voice squeaked. He reached his arms around her tiny waist and hauled her up, but another wave came crashing over them, knocking them both off the board sideways. When they emerged, he grabbed on to her again. Rain squealed as he stood behind her trying to get her on again She wasn’t making it easy.
‘One, two, three, jump!’ he called above the noise of the surf, lifting her by the hips as she slid onto the board on her front.
‘It’s so wobbly. I’m going to fall off again!’
‘Lie still and hang on to the sides.’ Marcus steadied the board for her. ‘Keep your body down the centre line. Slide forward a bit. That’s it, now reach out and paddle.’
Rain did as she was told but then the next wave broke and the board rolled sideways, dumping her on top of Marcus. And there they were, underwater, water whooshing in their ears, him grappling with her, her hair billowing everywhere and bubbles churning between them. Marcus dragged her to the surface and they both came up laughing and spluttering. He had her tightly in his arms.
‘I’m hopeless,’ she sai
d, stringing her arms around his neck and thinking how true this was. ‘Maybe we could, you know, hang out later.’ She had to do something to take away the pain.
‘Hang out?’ was all Marcus managed to say as another wave dragged them sideways.
‘We could get some vodka. Maybe come down here and light a fire and watch the stars or whatever it is you lot do around here for kicks.’ Rain hated that it actually sounded quite nice. And more than anything, that was just what she needed right now.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Nick towelled himself dry, lying back on the sand. He closed his eyes, exhausted from swimming. He’d wanted to wear himself out until it hurt, until his muscles burned from pain and his heart begged him to stop. Even then he’d carried on, pushing his body to the limits. The water had chilled him to the core but now the sun was breaking through the salty layer on his skin, warming him from the outside in. He felt good. He felt alive. He actually felt for the first time in a long while.
A shadow above him eclipsed the sun.
‘You realise she’s still in love with you, don’t you?’
Nick opened his eyes, his forearm shielding him from the glare behind her. Maggie’s hair was silhouetted with a crazy candyfloss corona.
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Claire. She still loves you.’
He screwed up his eyes again. It was safer that way. Maggie sat down next to him, straightening out the rug.
‘She always has been, ever since we were teenagers.’ She sounded matter-of-fact, as if everyone knew except him. Did this explain the way he’d been acting – the way his body didn’t do as he told it when she was around, the way his mouth took his words and muddled them up when she looked him in the eye?
‘Is that the conclusion you reached on your walk, Mags?’
‘Yes,’ she said without hesitation. ‘Seeing you two together again made me realise how nothing much ever changes.’
‘Firstly, Claire is happily married. Secondly, we never had a “thing” in the past anyway. And thirdly, we’ve barely had a chance to speak yet, so I don’t know how you think you can tell.’
‘My point exactly. Since you arrived, you’ve both avoiding each other. It stands out a mile.’
‘And that means she’s in love with me?’ Nick rolled his eyes, making sure Maggie saw. But he wondered if there was some truth in what she’d said. It did feel as if they’d been skirting around one other, deliberately sidestepping conversations.
‘You’re a dark horse, Malone,’ Maggie said, unrelenting. ‘You’ve barely said a thing about your personal life.’
‘That’s not entirely true.’ Although Nick knew it was. ‘I told you I was getting divorced, didn’t I?’
‘You only told me, no one else, and even then, I had to wring it out of you. Claire asked me if I knew why you’d come without Jess and Isobel.’
Nick flinched, taking a swig from his water bottle. He didn’t want to talk about it but knew Maggie too well. She wouldn’t let up. ‘Jess and I didn’t work out, that’s all.’ He pushed his heels into the hot sand, wondering how much to tell her. ‘A lot’s happened, Mags.’
‘I’m a good listener.’
‘The divorce has been bitter,’ he said, hoping she wouldn’t push further.
‘You want to try screwing a married politician.’ She patted his thigh with a friendly shove before delving in the cooler bag and taking out a bottle of wine. ‘For emergencies,’ she said. ‘I think this is one. Besides, I couldn’t feel any worse.’ She cracked the screw top and shook water out of a couple of plastic cups lying on the rug. She poured two measures.
Nick took one. ‘Do you ever wonder if your childhood shaped you into…’ He hesitated. ‘Well, into the wrong shape?’
‘Sometimes,’ Maggie said thoughtfully. ‘Though I’d have been a lot more misshapen without those two.’ She stared down at the shore where Patrick was standing in the breakers holding Shona’s hand.
‘Isobel died.’
‘Nick, shit.’ Maggie gripped his arm. ‘Oh God, I’m so sorry…’ He saw the tears gathering in her eyes, her hand come up to her mouth. It was all normal, nothing he hadn’t seen before. He always tried not to look them directly in the eye, not until the shock had subsided. Then came the sympathy, which always felt a lot like pity.
‘It’s not been the best couple of years.’
‘When? Do you mind me asking what happened?’
Only a couple of people had ever asked him this. Most waited for him to volunteer the information, which he rarely did. But this was Maggie. ‘A year and a half ago. No one knows exactly what happened. We probably never will.’ It was his stock answer. ‘We think it was an accident.’
‘What kind of accident?’ She was certainly more probing than most.
‘She fell down the stairs and hit her head. She was alone at the time,’ Nick blew out sharply.
‘How utterly awful.’
Nick nodded. If he and Jess had ever discussed it, it always ended in a searing row. She’d either turn grey with sadness, melting into a puddle of grief, blaming him, or she’d take to comprehensively smashing up their home before setting to work on Nick. Once, she’d broken both his nose and wrist on the same day. He’d told the hospital he’d fallen over. Those who’d pushed as deep as Maggie to find out details, those bold enough to tug a bit harder on the unravelling thread of their lives, soon backed off when they realised the sheer depth and danger of Jess’s misery. For a tiny person who’d wasted to skeletal proportions, she could certainly wreak destruction.
Even with the wine, Nick’s mouth was dry. ‘The cause of the accident was inconclusive in the coroner’s report. I was the one who found her at the bottom of the stairs. The police eventually ruled out suspicious circumstances.’
‘Eventually?’ Maggie said, not pressing for an answer when Nick remained silent.
They stared out to sea. Greta and Claire were deep in conversation at the water’s edge – Greta standing with her hands settled in the small of her back, and Claire rocking from one foot to another, gesturing with her arms.
Did he love Claire? He watched as she turned to escort Greta back up towards where they were sitting. Facing the sun, there was something ethereal about her, as if the brilliant light had coloured her in with hues not normally visible to the human eye. With Isobel on his mind, it felt wrong to be thinking these things. But he couldn’t help it.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Callum hated the beach. However hard he tried, sand always got everywhere, and the sea was rarely warm enough to make swimming enjoyable. He couldn’t understand why Claire spent so much time down there, either with the kids or friends or simply on her own with a book.
As he sat alone in the kitchen, he wondered if a freezing swim was now exactly what he needed – to feel the surf crashing over him, washing away his thoughts, extinguishing whatever it was that had been ignited. Life was suddenly chaotic, out of control – exactly the way he didn’t like it.
Goddam that fucking girl!
The others had gone out while he sat and went over and over what had happened last night. He needed to get it straight, but he couldn’t remember it all. What he did know, though, was that Rain was entirely culpable for what had happened. What time had he gone to bed? He needed to get that right. Sometime after midnight, he reckoned. Asking Claire was tantamount to admitting he’d had a skinful (which he had), but the booze was only to numb the dull conversation. Why did they insist on dragging up the past continuously?
Whatever the reasons for Rain setting upon him like she did in the night and what happened next, he was certain it was all because of this stupid reunion – not to mention the pressure he was under at the hospital. A job like his didn’t leave room for this kind of thing. He had enough to deal with without teenagers throwing themselves at him.
Callum gathered himself, breathed deeply. He was a good man – a neurosurgeon with a reputation to uphold – and this was just a little blip. Eve
ryone had one from time to time, didn’t they? No stupid girl was going to ruin his life, he was certain of that. He had a family and a career. He was solid. Solid as a fucking rock. She’d come into his room uninvited, made him take her clothes off – pretending to be helpless when she was clearly quite the opposite – and then forced herself upon him, refusing to leave. If it came down to it, it was her word against his.
At least the news of Patrick discharging himself had taken the heat off Rain’s whereabouts last night. How would he explain being taken advantage of by a teenager? No one would believe him. Not that the girl’s irresponsible mother seemed particularly bothered. Maggie was as stupid as her daughter. Always had been.
In fact, the only one he’d ever hit it off with in their group was Claire. From the moment he’d set eyes on her as a kid, he knew there was something about her, something rare and special, something untouchable that he’d… wanted. Had to have. Was it so wrong to notice her uniqueness when she was just a child? Back then their age difference had been too great, he knew that. But now, her at nearly forty, him approaching fifty… a decade was nothing.
Goddam! He thumped the kitchen table.
What had actually woken him? Had he even been asleep? He remembered soft skin and hair brushing the length of his naked body, alerting him to either the best dream he’d ever had, or that someone had actually got into his bed.
It certainly hadn’t felt anything like Claire.
Where had his wife been anyway? Some rubbish about not wanting to leaving Shona alone at the farm…
Callum forced himself to remember, go over all the details. He’d taken a coffee up to bed to help sober up, but the room was still spinning when Rain had come in. She’d not even knocked, had she? No. Of course she hadn’t.
The Reunion: An utterly gripping psychological thriller with a jaw-dropping twist Page 14