Sister Pact

by Ali Ahearn

  ‘Congratulations,’ he nodded. He looked into a nearby camera. ‘Frances, of the Feuding Heiresses, is our first contestant to place the amulet on the altar. But where is her sister? The rules of the challenge state both team members must be on the beach for immunity to be awarded.’

  Frances grinned and, without even looking, pointed in the direction from which she’d come.

  Down at the shoreline, Nick was staggering from the ocean with a floppy Joni in his arms. He had seen her getting into trouble as the cramp gripped her entire leg and hadn’t been able to turn his back on her. An unexpected breaker knocked him off his feet and they landed awkwardly in the wet sand, an exhausted Joni half sprawled over his chest. They were both breathing hard and neither moved for a few moments.

  ‘Interesting,’ Darryl murmured.

  Over at the camera bank, Sally hissed, ‘Get that,’ to a nearby crew member. ‘He’s on to the other one now. Jungle-snog sister is gonna go bonkers.’

  Frances frowned. Afterwards, the moment would be burned indelibly on her retinas in slow motion. Turning to face the ocean. The moment of confusion when she spotted the tangle of bodies, walking slowly on autopilot closer to make sense of it and then the awful, awful realisation as Joni laughed down at Nick. And he laughed back at her, his hand firmly ensconced on Joni’s pert arse.

  She was actually mute for a few seconds as a rush of memories accompanied the red mist and the all-consuming nausea which brought Frances to her knees.

  Oh God, it was deja vu. Except worse. Way worse.

  ‘Must you take everything I want?’ Frances demanded of the entwined couple in a voice that sounded as if it had come from the depths of her soul. Even to herself, she sounded possessed, and Frances waited for her head to spin round and the projectile vomit to come.

  Joni looked up from Nick, her smile dying a quick death. ‘Frankie?’ She frowned at her sister, then looked down at Nick.

  Frances watched as realisation dawned on her sister’s face. Watched as Joni scrambled off Nick as if he’d just confessed to having leprosy.

  ‘Frankie. No.’

  ‘Save it.’ Frances staggered, clutching her side. ‘I don’t want to hear any more of your lies!’

  Nick, who had also lumbered to his feet, looked from one sister to the other, plainly perplexed. ‘Joni had a cramp.’

  Frances snorted. Of course she did; Joni always had an excuse. ‘And there I was, just thinking how much you’d changed.’

  Joni’s eyes filled with tears. ‘But I … I have.’

  Her sister shook her head vehemently. ‘No. You haven’t. You’re still the same cheap slut you’ve always been. Always coveting someone else’s man ’cause you can’t find a decent one of your own.’

  ‘I say,’ Lex murmured.

  Joni took a deep breath. ‘Fuck you, Frankie.’

  Chapter 12

  Joni

  It was hot and still, the air thick with old injuries and new insults.

  They stood, frozen, Lex opening and shutting his mouth to the background call of seagulls. Frankie stared with mute hatred at her sister while the frothy surf lapped at her ankles. Joni studiously avoided all eyes as she rubbed her leg furiously. Nick was doing a passable impression of a bronze cast of an ancient god, even as his eyes flicked from one woman to the other.

  The echo of her fuck you rang in Joni’s ears. She inhaled the wild cocktail of sea hitting jungle – salt and lime. The sun dipped behind a cloud, sending the beach into shadow.

  It was so unfair.

  And yet, not.

  Joni saw the scene afresh, as if with her sister’s eyes. She and Nick, entwined, arms and hands everywhere, lying on the beach, laughing, while Frankie completed the hardest task she ever had. Empathy rose inside her. For Frankie. For how deep and still fresh her pain must be, for it to rise to the top of her heart at any given moment.

  Sister hurt.

  The most unkindest cut of all.

  Suddenly, the sun burst from behind a bank of cloud and flooded the beach in heat and yellow. Joni knew, in an instant of blinding clarity, that some things could never heal. And she suddenly felt cold and trembly all over. Because now she knew she hadn’t just come to the island for the money. She’d come for her sister. She’d thought, somewhere, deep in her subconscious, that if anybody could fix their relationship, G could.

  Cheryl, who had spent a long moment or two, koalas thrust forward, assessing the situation, gave her ex-husband a long look and stormed up the beach, kicking powdery sand in his and Joni’s faces. Joni felt for her too. Cheryl obviously still loved her ex-husband.

  ‘Fark you, you farking sleaze,’ she’d hissed at Nick as she went. ‘Make up yer mind, wouldja? Which sister do you want?’

  Kazuki, who had finally arrived, near dead, in the shallows, launched himself up the beach and fell like a lover into his master’s arms.

  And then there was The Stapler.

  She motioned rapidly to a close-up crew, hissing directions in the ear of the technician as she urged him closer. The whole thing felt like hours, but was actually, in The Stapler’s opinion, going to be the best thirty-five seconds of reality television the world had ever seen.

  Joni snaked her arm out to grab her sister’s in a fierce hold, pulling her up the beach. ‘You know, Frankie,’ she whispered fiercely, heedless of the mike pack that had been thrust back onto her. ‘You think you’re so together. So independent.’

  Frankie just looked at her mutely, the vitriol gone.

  ‘You think you’re the only one who doesn’t have a crutch. Poor Joni. Well, you know what, Frankie? Everyone’s got a crutch. But you know what? I’d rather shoot up forever than be dependent on your drug of choice.

  ‘Men. You’ve always needed a man. First Edward, now Nick. You take the whole thing so seriously. You talk about me and men. You just don’t get it. I liked them, sure. Sometimes I even loved them. But you needed … what? Was it security? Another daddy? You clung to Edward like he was your lifeline, and he was just …’

  Joni could feel she was going too far but Frankie’s eyes challenged her.

  Go on. Say it. I dare you.

  ‘A …’

  Be careful. Everyone’s watching.

  ‘Creep.’ Joni fingered the mike pack as she spoke again. ‘And boring. Mostly very bloody boring.’

  Not mostly. That’s not what he mostly was.

  ‘How dare you speak that way about my husband?’

  Joni was surprised to hear Frankie defend Edward so fiercely. She was sure her sister had been getting closer to Nick, and had hoped it might mean Edward’s hold on her was loosening. ‘Who are you kidding, Frankie? You told me, remember? And I know you.’

  ‘You. Know. Nothing.’

  Frankie’s words mashed Joni’s heart.

  Oh, God.

  The pain of being rejected by Frankie, of not being allowed in her life, was too great to bear.

  Joni had to get away.

  So she ran. She pushed her legs hard, propelling herself up the length of the beach, away from it all, if only for a few minutes. She ran until the campsite was a smudge behind her. Then she wheeled around and ran back again, pushing her screaming muscles almost beyond the point of endurance.

  By the time she reached the clearing with the shelters, Joni still felt sick and guilty, but resignation had replaced the desperation of moments before.

  She was still here, at the arse end of the earth, with Frankie, who hated her.

  And with no ticket home.

  But at least they had immunity.

  Even before Joni entered the clearing proper, she heard and smelled the now-familiar things of this place. First, the low buzz of people trying to keep their scheming and whining undetectable. The noise had become a friend. It was like the background hum of insects – constant and almost hypnotic.

  Then there was the smell. The charcoal richness of the lunchtime fire registered first. Joni could see the contestants taking food from the fireplace a
nd retreating to their shelters. So strange, just a handful of them out here, forced into aloneness by a game.

  She realised she was ravenous, having been unable to eat that morning, her stomach a knot of nervous tension. Joni stretched her legs, propping a foot on a log and hugging her knee to her chest. As she did, she thought what thoroughly serviceable knees they were. How attached she was to them. How much she needed to stay here, to try to get G’s money.

  Because without it, she was toast.

  As she entered the clearing, she saw Nick and Cheryl first, hunched together. He had one brown arm tightly around her shoulders and they were deep in conversation, heads bowed. He was patting her back softly. Like a friend, not a lover.

  Beyond them, Lex was showing Nigel something attached to a tree. It appeared to be some kind of flowering vine, lush with outrageous purple blooms. Joni smiled to herself. She loved to listen to his deep, sonorous tones as he became worked up about a new tropical blossom, or the scent of a shrub.

  Nigel looked deathly bored.

  As Joni passed Nick, Cheryl brushed past her, her face streaked with dirt and tears. But it instantly hardened into a sarcastic mask as she saw Joni, and she pulled her out of Nick’s earshot.

  ‘You better keep that horny sister of yours away from my Nick,’ Cheryl hissed. ‘He’s just explained to me what happened back there with you in the water, and I believe him. But he didn’t say squat about that sister of yours, and I’ve seen the way she’s looking at him. And her with all that shit about someone else’s man. He’s someone else’s man, all right. He’s mine. And you make sure that little slut knows it. We might be having some troubles but we can work it out.’

  Joni’s breath caught at the extent that Cheryl was in denial. ‘I thought you and Nick were divorced,’ she breathed gently.

  ‘Yeah, well, that’s just a word.’ Cheryl drew herself up to a not-very-intimidating five foot four. ‘Let me explain some things to you. Nick and me, we’ve been working the property together till we can sell it. He let me talk him into coming on this show so we can stop them foreclosing. We’re a good team, and he’ll see that.’ A pause. ‘I know he will.’

  Joni was silent, unsure of the most appropriate response.

  ‘Haven’t you got anything to say? Maybe you really are the stupid one.’

  This ridiculous woman, standing there with a koala on each breast, telling her she was stupid. There was something about the way she had said it.

  Maybe you really are the stupid one.

  Like she had heard someone else say that. But who?

  Joni remembered being compared with her sister a thousand times. Unfavourably. The younger one. The scatty one. The lazy one.

  ‘You ridiculous little woman.’ Joni was trying not to cry. ‘If you think you can stop my sister from getting Nick, you are even stupider than you think I am. There is nothing on God’s green earth that Frankie could not have, or do, or be, if she set her mind to it. So, if she wants your man …’

  Joni paused for effect before driving the knife in.

  ‘… you might as well start saving up for their wedding present.’

  Joni barely felt the blow, it came as such a shock.

  Her hand involuntarily made its way to her jaw, which was opening and closing like a rusty gate swinging on its hinges. Not broken, but she could feel the bruise forming as she fell over backwards into the bark and leaves in the centre of the campsite.

  She felt rather than saw the all-seeing electronic eye trained on her indignity. Joni looked up to see Nick holding Cheryl back while she kicked and writhed and yelled obscenities that Joni no longer comprehended.

  Please don’t hit me again.

  With all that had happened in her life, Joni had only ever been this scared once before. But, as always, she tried not to think about that time.

  And then Lex was there. He drew Joni up out of the loamy muck, and she could smell Acqua Di Gio and some kind of ironing starch as she buried her face in his shirt and sobbed like a three-year-old. He patted her hair sympathetically at the same time as he started barking orders.

  ‘Sally, get First Aid over here asap. Get Crew Two to take Cheryl and Nick, and get the psych on the two-way. See if she needs an assessment.’

  Then he called to Sally’s assistant, ‘Miranda – get Central Legal on Skype, as soon as you can. We need to check liability.’

  Before anyone could move, Nigel joined the circle.

  ‘Did you get that punch? All of it? The lezzers in telly-land will love it,’ he asked one of the camera crew.

  Joni felt Lex freeze around her. He withdrew his arm and she watched him step towards Nigel, who was smirking in amusement as he approached Joni.

  ‘You okay there, Joni? Can’t have hurt too much, hey, love? Cat fight and all that. If only there’d been mud, the ratings’d go through the roof.’

  Joni could feel the slick shift in the quality of the air that warns all things warm-blooded that trouble is brewing.

  Lex and Nigel stood facing each other, with Sally, Joni, Cheryl, Nick and Miranda forming a semicircle around them. The air, thick and tight, seemed to congeal around Nigel and Lex like two gunfighters on Main Street in an old western.

  Nigel was barefoot, in chinos and a beautiful, soft white cotton, button-up shirt, undone down the front to expose a taut, lean chest and impressive six-pack. His mint-jelly eyes looked an altogether different shade of green as he eyed Lex.

  Joni wondered why on earth Nigel would be afraid of Lex.

  Then she looked at Lex properly.

  ‘What did you just say, young man?’

  A small nerve jumped at the angle of Lex’s jaw and, in that instant, Joni could see how he had developed such a fearsome reputation as a director.

  ‘Have you ever been beaten?’

  Nigel swallowed carefully, and shook his head. ‘No, I haven’t. I’m sorry, I was only joking, really. Just trying to make light of the moment, you know.’

  ‘Well, I have. And, let me say, it is very painful. And terrifying.’

  No-one moved as the cicadas ticked and the distant sounds of the beach crew packing up echoed through the jungle.

  ‘I’m sure. Bloody hell, I wouldn’t want to be … Sorry, all right?’

  Nigel gave Lex’s hand a firm shake and the moment seemed to dissolve. He reached across to pat Joni’s shoulder, and then, a little awkwardly pull her into an apologetic hug, before turning to go.

  He turned Joni’s body away from Lex and the others to deliver a parting salvo in a tiny whisper. Unfortunately, Joni was still miked up and the sound crew had chosen that moment to return from the beach with their amplifiers. As a result, his comment rang through the clearing.

  ‘Jesus, Joni. Why didn’t you tell me you two were fucking?’

  Like Cheryl’s blow, what happened next was too quick for anyone to intervene. Lex tore Nigel from Joni’s side and planted an elegant fist on his handsome young face. Unlike Joni, Nigel did not buckle, but his face crumpled in confusion.

  ‘Now,’ Lex intoned smoothly, ‘I trust no cameras were rolling.’

  Joni’s gaze flicked around the now-larger circle of onlookers, as cast and crew hastily fiddled with settings on the various cameras they were holding and collectively shook their heads. Nigel began to splutter in fury, but Lex held up one manicured finger.

  ‘Now, Nigel, please don’t start all that silly business about lawsuits again. Nothing happened here. And, I’m afraid, if it had, we would have to look at your breach of contract in attempting to involve yourself in editing decisions, and your firm would be very unhappy about such unprofessional conduct. You, apparently, came here to check on Joni and Frances, and please remember that that remains your only role.’

  Nigel looked in disgust and fury around the group. He appealed with his eyes to Sally Staples, who, standing still, silent and beautiful on the sidelines, looked exactly like the kind of angel to whom one would direct appeals for clemency.

  She smiled
as she whispered, ‘Don’t look at me. No help from the lezzer.’

  Finally, Nigel appealed silently to Joni, who lowered her head.

  Later that night, Joni’s limbs felt as though they weighed a tonne as she made her way to the beach to say goodbye to Nigel. The events of the day kept replaying themselves in her head.

  The swim. The cramp. The fight with Frankie.

  Being punched by a woman with a broken heart.

  Then Nigel’s stupid comment and Lex’s fury.

  When she weighed it all up, gingerly touching the bruise on her jaw, she felt she owed Nigel an apology. What had he done that was so bad? Made a stupid crack?

  Plenty, including her sister, had said and done much worse to her.

  She understood why Lex had been so furious. The comment had been cruel, given its timing and the shock of what had just occurred. But she knew Nigel hadn’t meant to hurt her. He was just a shitkicker baby lawyer, protecting the interests of his firm. He hadn’t deserved to be beaten for it.

  Even if it had felt good to have someone defend her honour for once.

  Rather than questioning it.

  As she, with Des nestled in her shirt, picked her way down to the jetty, the boat that belonged to Nigel’s firm bobbed softly under an almost-set sun. The twilight was indigo and pink, and the merest breath of breeze ruffled Joni’s green hair as she tramped over the still-warm sand.

  Nigel was standing on the deck of the boat, wearing another soft white cotton shirt, this time teamed with lovely chinos and dark brown leather sandals that showed off his tanned feet. He looked like a yachtsman, and she caught her breath at the beauty of the man and steeled herself to apologise for not standing up for him earlier in the day.

  But he was first.

  ‘Joni,’ he breathed in that lovely voice of his. ‘I am sorry for what I said today. I was thinking of the firm, not of how you must have been feeling. And then, I just felt … I don’t know. A bit jealous, I suppose. Pathetic of me, really.’

  Yes. Yes, it was. How can you be so pretty and so disappointing?

  ‘It was okay. I’m sorry I wasn’t nicer after … you know.’