Under the Sun

by Lottie Moggach

  ‘No, sorry. Not Gatwick. Manchester,’ she corrected. She heard Marie-Anne draw breath to begin interrogating, and cut her off. ‘I’ll explain everything when I get back, promise. I’m in such a rush.’

  The bag she was taking was small enough to carry on. As for the rest of the stuff in the flat: the rubbish she would chuck, but what about the clothes and clutter? She found a piece of paper and wrote a note.

  Dad, here are a load of old clothes and things that might fetch something. Ask Mattie if she wants to sell them at the car boot sale.

  All that remained was the Josef Frank chair: the only relic from her old life. She looked sentimentally at its riot of flowers and jewel-coloured fruit. It would be wasted on her dad. It was certainly not going to the car boot sale, to be prodded and joylessly haggled over.

  She wrote another note.

  This chair is for Rose, the elderly woman in the apartment next door. Could you take it over to her and say it’s a gift from me?

  She tucked the note in the side of the chair and sat down to wait.

  Her alarm went off at 3am, but Anna didn’t need it: she was already lying awake in the dark, alive with nerves. She sprang up, and in a few minutes was washed and dressed. The previous evening she’d prepared as much as she could for her departure; the only thing she’d forgotten was to strip the bed for Derek. Tearing off the sheets she hadn’t slept in for weeks, she considered making it up for him, but no – she felt too on edge for such time-consuming niceties. She dumped a pile of clean bedding on the bare mattress. Then she grabbed her bag and turned off the lights. Audrey gazed down from the wall, hand on her chin; at last, here was some action to reward her patient fascination.

  She stepped out onto the silent square. The clock on the church bell tower read 3.17am. The moon was nowhere to be seen, the darkness complete and uncompromising: only the fluorescent pink of the bougainvillea and the white marble fountain base glowed dimly. Leaving her bag beside the car, Anna crossed over to the You Chic shop and reached through the security grille to post her set of keys, with a note instructing the woman to give them to Derek.

  She went back to the car and eased open the boot. She put in her bag, and took out a plastic can containing two and a half gallons of petrol, the one she’d kept there during the finca days, in case of emergencies. Finally, after checking her pockets to make sure she had everything she needed, she closed the boot as quietly as she could and set off towards the beach.

  She knew her mission might fail. The boat might not be there. Maybe she’d be unlucky and Paco was at this moment dropping men off at the next bay, the one that wasn’t overlooked by hotels, hitting them on their backs as they scurried up the sand to take shelter in the bushes until dawn. The boy had said that the crossings were only once a week at this time of year, so the odds were in her favour, but it was possible.

  Reaching the steps, she looked down to the end of the beach. It was too dark to see whether the boat was there. She crept down the stairs, clutching the container with both arms, and started walking along the back of the beach towards where the boat should be. The sloshing of the petrol next to her chest sounded to her so loud, she felt the whole town must be able to hear it; it drowned out the waves lapping to her right.

  As she neared the rocks, the shape of the boat started to emerge from the blackness, like a long-sunken ship being finally encountered in the murky depths. She felt a rush of exhilaration; simultaneously, the thought occurred to her that Paco might be sleeping in the boat. Although he wasn’t the homeless bum he pretended to be – he probably had a nice three-bed villa somewhere in town, bought cheap off his nephew Simón – the old man seemed to have a genuine affinity with beach life. It wasn’t impossible to imagine him occasionally bedding down in his boat, exhausted after a night ferrying.

  Anna stopped a couple of metres away and listened for a few moments. There were no signs of life, but that didn’t mean that Paco wasn’t in there.

  To get a proper look, she’d have to get closer and light a match. At the thought, the container felt unbearably heavy in her arms. She heard herself expelling air from her mouth, too loudly, and pressed her lips shut. Lighting a match was a risk. She imagined leaning in and scraping the match against the box; Paco’s face suddenly illuminated, twisted in fury.

  But she had no other option, except to wait here until the clouds passed and the sun came up, and then it would be too late for anything.

  She put the petrol can down on the sand and took two steps forward, until she felt the wooden ridges of the boat press against her thighs. She took the matches out of her pocket. Holding her hands above the void of the boat, she struck one, wincing at the rasping sound.

  The match flared for a split-second before the flame shrank to a nub. Anna glimpsed a tarpaulin, neatly folded, at the bottom of the boat, and the empty paella dish. No Paco.

  Her relief flared, as brief as the match flame. She must act fast. She reached back for the petrol container and fumbled with the safety lid, squeezing and twisting it hard in her fist, making several attempts before it came free. Then she lifted her arm and swung the contents of the container over the boat. She couldn’t really see what she was doing, how much petrol was reaching its target and how much was getting lost on the sand, but she kept on swinging the container until it felt empty. Then she threw in the container too. The fierce petrol fumes filled her lungs and made her eyes water; she tried to breathe through her mouth.

  She reached for the matches and paused, the tip of one pressed against the box. Before she could lose her nerve she struck it and flung the flame into the dark interior of the boat. And then she ran.

  There was a surprisingly gentle whoomp behind her and she felt heat thump her back. She kept going, focusing only on her feet, refusing to let the sand slow her down, not letting herself turn around, feeling the air around her being sucked into the flames in her wake. It was only when she reached the beach steps that she allowed herself, finally, to turn and see what she had done.

  The boat was in full blaze. The fire illuminated half of the beach, like an upstart rival to the sun as it prepared to emerge from beyond the horizon. She wondered whether the other captains of illegal boats, the other Pacos who silently ferried migrants across these waters, were seeing the flare, like a warning beacon.

  Anna allowed herself only a moment to gaze at the sight before turning and scrambling up the stairs. At the square, she forced herself to slow down to a walk, in case anyone in the surrounding buildings was now awake and watching. She got in her car, started the engine with shaking hands and crawled through the deserted streets.

  Past Jaime’s flat. The caravan park. The police station. The road to Tommy’s urbanization. Onto the coast road. The entrance to the Playa del Sol. As Marea fell away behind her, she felt a rush of triumph. Yes, Paco might get a new boat. And even if he didn’t – if the blaze somehow aroused something buried deep in his conscience and he decided to jack in his nocturnal trade and concentrate solely on making paella for tourists – someone else might take his place as a night ferryman, for people thinking they were heading for a better life. But she’d done something; all she could. It would have an effect.

  She reached the airport within fifteen minutes, and parked in the long-stay car park. As the engine cooled she sat motionless, in the perfect silence. Then she got out, leaving the keys in the glove compartment and the car unlocked.

  The airport was nearly empty, run by a skeleton crew. Anna checked in and sat on a row of seats in the departure lounge. The man seated opposite was asleep, his head leaned back uncomfortably against the chair. From his sandals, yellow toenails and puce complexion he was almost certainly British. His arm was draped protectively over a large bag. Too large for carry on, Anna noticed. It occurred to her that maybe this was the mythical airport expat, the man she’d heard about, who, having lost his home in Spain, and burnt his bridges in Britain, had made his home at the airport, living in a permanent limbo.

  Looki
ng at him, Anna wondered whether he had made his peace with his situation; whether he had learned how to live somewhere between the life he wanted, and the one he had.

  Her flight was called. She took out her phone; there were two texts to send before she left.

  The first was to Tommy. Hi, I’ve gone home. Derek is having my apartment. Sorry about the villa – but he wouldn’t have been able to buy it, anyway. Good luck with it all. Anna.

  Then to Jaime. I’ve left my car in the airport long stay car park. Registration ends 7XY. Door open, key in the glove box. It’s for you, dismantle it as you wish! Anna.

  She and a handful of others, sleepless zombies, boarded the plane. Anna sat by the window, looking out at the mountains beyond the runway as the sky lightened behind them, and then realized she’d forgotten something. She took out her phone, and wrote again to Jaime.

  Also, you remember how to get to my finca? Well, that’s yours too. Live in it, strip it of materials, do whatever you want with it. Key under the paint pot to the right of the door. X PS thank you.

  The flight took off. Anna watched Spain fall away below her as the plane rose into the tinted clouds. The greenhouses glinted like mosaic tiles under the sun. Someone in a row behind her unwrapped something meaty; the smell made her queasy and she closed her eyes. She was getting used to the nausea now.

  Finally, there in her window seat, en route to a city famous for its rain, Anna could allow herself to consider what she had half-suspected for a fortnight, since that night with Jaime. What she really had to thank him for, and what he would never find out. If what her body was telling her was true, she was leaving Spain with something, after all; another life.

  She leaned her cheek against the grainy moulded plastic of the plane wall, folded her hands over her stomach and smiled, as they were taken to their new home.

  Acknowledgements

  I am indescribably grateful to my editor, Francesca Main, my agent, Antony Topping, and my mother, Deborah Moggach. Without them, this book would not have been possible; or certainly not publishable.

  I’m also indebted to the team at Picador – Paul Baggaley, Claire Gatzen, Saba Ahmed; Emma Bravo and Amy Lines; Susan Opie and Fraser Crichton; to everyone at Greene & Heaton, and to Matthew Bates at Sayle Screen.

  Love and thanks to:

  Tom Moggach, Larushka Ivan-Zadeh, Sathnam Sanghera, Susannah Price, Chris Atkins, Mark Williams, Alex O’Connell, Laura Yates, Flora Bathurst, Lucy Bathurst, Rebecca Rose, Vita Gottlieb, Caroline Maclean, Ben Markovits, Mark Watson, Daniel Pemberton, Leanne Shapton and Danielle Stevens. Also, to Malika and Drew McCosh for the wall in Istanbul; Sarah and Johnny Robinson for the view from Caserio del Mirador; and Joe Palmer, whom I met in Torremolinos and who knows how to live well. And, always, to my son Kit.

  Under the Sun

  Lottie Moggach lives in north London. Her critically acclaimed debut novel Kiss Me First was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award and the Specsavers National Book Awards, and won the Portsmouth First Fiction Award.

  Also by Lottie Moggach

  Kiss Me First

  First published 2017 by Picador

  This electronic edition published 2017 by Picador

  an imprint of Pan Macmillan

  20 New Wharf Road, London N1 9RR

  Associated companies throughout the world

  www.panmacmillan.com

  ISBN 978-1-5098-1554-8

  Copyright © Lottie Moggach 2017

  Cover image © Don Klumpp/The Image Bank/Getty Images

  Author photo © Alexander James

  The right of Lottie Moggach to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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