by Tina Seskis
I went out on one of the dhonis with Pascal and another of the dive staff earlier, but it seemed so futile, and I could tell we all felt the same, although of course no-one said it. I almost get the feeling from the Australian resort manager that he thinks there’s not much point to any of it, and that if my husband has drowned it’s his own stupid fault, and what can anyone do about it now? After all, they’d told us enough times that the reef could be dangerous, especially at night, and we’d all been warned never to go out alone, and certainly not when drunk, so in some ways I can see where the manager’s coming from.
Pascal’s attitude unnerves me, too. He is so unfriendly, and yet when we first arrived he was charm personified. It’s almost as though he’s blaming me somehow, and yet it’s more than that, too. He knows something. I’m sure he does, and I long to ask him, but I daren’t. The upshot is that everything feels so weird, as if the world is on pause and none of this is real, like it’s merely some kind of freaky B-movie where I’m unsure of my lines and have no idea how to play the role anyway. The polarity of my position is killing me. Inside I am distraught that it has come to this, whilst outwardly I cling onto hope, as what else can I do? Yet as the minutes drag by on this ghastly, interminable day and still there’s no news, the prognosis feels ever more bleak. The sun continues its obdurate descent through the unblemished sky, and I resent it, that it’s carrying on as normal, as if nothing has even happened. It makes me crazy that in a couple of hours it will be too dark for anyone to even keep looking.
Chrissy and Kenny have joined me at the beachfront bar area now, as Chrissy seems to have decided that, in the absence of anyone else, it’s her job to look after me. I’m still not sure of her motives, although I want to believe they’re benevolent. I find it hard to talk to her, and it’s not just due to these extraordinary circumstances. It’s also because I can’t seem to stop the interminable, jumbled spooling through my mind of our conversation on the beach last night, once the men had bailed on us. What had I said? I struggle to remember, even though it was definitely before everything went completely, zombifyingly blank. Surely Chrissy realizes I didn’t mean any of it though, that I was just upset, and drunk, and that it’s a coincidence. I clutch at straws, try to convince myself that the man I’ve just married isn’t dead, that instead perhaps has intentionally left the island. But if that were the case, how has he left? And why hasn’t he taken any of his things? I’ve checked, of course, and his passport, money, flip-flops, everything – apart from his mask and snorkel and flippers – are still in the bungalow.
No. It seems to me that the only plausible possibility is that he really has drowned. I think this thought calmly at first, but then I start to feel the hysteria rising inside of me again. I almost want to laugh, and then I really don’t. I try to think straight, work out what will happen next. I wonder whether Dad has told Veronica and Peter yet, and even the thought of them knowing fills me with despair. Surely the police will need to be involved too. If so, where will they come from? From Malé? Or might they even send police out from England – didn’t that happen sometimes, in these kinds of circumstances? But, either way, where on earth would they look for him?
I’m aware that I’m getting ahead of myself. I start to feel racked with panic again, and it bubbles inside of me, like sugar melting, and as I look at my skin, faint hives are forming. I attempt to flood my mind with optimistic eventualities. I try to imagine him just turning up, alive and well, with some kind of simple explanation. That’s what often happens in these kinds of cases, I think. There’s nothing more I can do now, except stick it out, try to keep my cool.
Chrissy beckons one of the waiters, then asks me and Kenny what we’re having, and even though I shake my head she orders me a Daiquiri, and when it arrives I take a long, chilled, painkilling draught, and I feel eyes on me, watching, as though they’re thinking, ‘There she is, her husband missing and she’s drinking cocktails.’ I ignore everyone, and I sit back in my chair, wordless and drawn, and I wait.
10
Seven years earlier
Life went on. Christmas approached, crept up in its insidious tinselly way. Jemma’s father and step-mother, Kay, hosted Christmas Day, and Kay’s parents, who were as sweet and charming as she was, came too, as did the neighbours – and the day was so sedate and good-natured, so utterly different to Jemma’s childhood Christmases, that it unnerved Jemma, and she found herself almost missing the drama. Dan rang in the evening to say hello, but when she heard his mother’s shrill voice in the background, calling him insistently to come and play charades, Jemma said she didn’t want to hold him up, and could barely get off the phone fast enough.
New Year’s Eve was as underwhelming as usual. Jemma took Dan to a mediocre party that Sasha had invited them to, where Dan stuck to Jemma’s side and she found it hard to enjoy herself. Her sleep that night was patrolled by nightmares, and on New Year’s Day she woke up at her boyfriend’s place with a feeling of unnamed dread, of murky apathy, of being there, in the wrong place, on the wrong date. She made a mental note to finish with him, again. Six months was quite long enough for a casual relationship with someone off the Internet, especially now there was a new year to get through, twelve more months of navigating the pitfalls of daily existence. It wasn’t fair on either of them – yet how could she possibly articulate how she felt? It wasn’t only that Dan didn’t fit her usual mould of what a boyfriend should look like. It was also as if Jemma had had enough of being treated well – and as she lay in bed, feeling wrong-footed and ashamed of her feelings, she wondered whether she should just do it now, get it over with.
‘Jemma?’
‘Yes?’ She turned over in bed and looked at him. His eyes were bright, and hopeful. His hair was unkempt, and she wanted to touch it, smooth it. Did he not feel the despair that she felt?
‘I said, do you want to go to Suffolk, to the beach?’
‘What? When?’
‘Now? We can find a place to stay overnight. It’ll be fun.’
Jemma’s heart jumped at the idea, and then she drew her thoughts in again.
‘I thought you were broke?’
Dan looked away for a second. ‘No, I’m fine. It’s New Year’s Day – we should celebrate. We can have fish and chips on the beach.’
Jemma laughed. ‘You’re crazy.’
‘Oh, go on, Jem. There’s nothing like an icy blast of sea air to get the new year off to a good start.’
‘Has it occurred to you that I might have something else on?’ she said, arching her eyebrow, trying to keep her tone light.
‘No,’ said Dan. He turned and placed his hands on her face and looked deep into her eyes, and she felt her resolve slipping. As he kissed her, she was surprised at how natural her body’s response to him was, almost as if their relationship were inevitable, that they fitted together. But sex wasn’t everything, she tried to tell herself as his attentions roamed downwards. Solvency and status, and amenable relatives, counted too.
‘Well, are you up for it?’ he said, afterwards.
Jemma sat up in bed, pulled the duvet up to her chin. Perhaps spending New Year’s Eve together had been commitment enough. ‘I’m not sure. I … I need to tidy up the flat, get some washing done before I go back to work. Maybe I’d better just go home.’
He looked at her then, and it was as if he could see right through her. ‘Jemma, you don’t always have to run, you know.’
‘What d’you mean?’ Jemma stared at her fingernails.
‘You know exactly what I mean. What are you so afraid of?’
Jemma looked up at last. What could she say? She ran her right middle finger across her eyebrow, massaged the bone beneath it. It was one of those moments that could go either way.
‘Nothing. I’m not afraid of anything, Dan,’ she said softly. ‘Suffolk sounds great. I’d love to go.’
11
Now
The first night since my husband’s disappearance descends, dark and fast, and af
ter a dismal meal in the restaurant, where I’d circled the buffet as if it were a dangerous wild animal, trying to ignore the curious looks from everybody, I decide I can’t take any more. The tension, the unrelenting worry, is finally too much. It doesn’t help that the seven-star resort has become like a circus, and I am its star act, to prod and whip, see what movements I make, monitor how I respond. I just hadn’t known what to do, though – whether to go back to my room and order room service, or else stick around the restaurant and try to eat dinner, attempt to show everybody how desperate I’m feeling. It’s so hard to judge the situation, but I’m pretty sure my presence is no longer helping anything. I dab at my eyes self-consciously, and suddenly long for my mother. The futility of the thought torpedoes me.
Chrissy and Kenny are still sitting with me, which is nice of them, I suppose, but the atmosphere is tense. Maybe it would have been anyway, after last night, but right now it feels impossible. What is there to say? I don’t like Kenny’s hooded eyes any more, and he frightens me somehow, as if there is rage lurking beneath his pink sunburnt skin, although before last night I’d adored him. He keeps scowling at me, as if he’s blaming me for everything, and I wonder briefly what he saw, what he knows. When Chrissy heads off on yet another sortie to get him more food, I take my chance to escape. I stand up, mutter a clumsy, tearful goodnight, and bolt from the table before Chrissy has a chance to offer to come back to the bungalow with me, which I wouldn’t put past her.
I feel too scared to cycle home alone through the dark woods after dinner, as though the fear that my husband’s vanishing has raised in me is swelling in the moonlit ocean, swooping through the bat-swarming jungle. Instead Moosa, my once-friendly butler, drives me to our bungalow in the cream-canopied golf buggy. He seems almost resentful when I ask him to wait until I am safely inside, which is a bit off, I think, under the circumstances, and I stress about why. It’s almost as if he thinks this is my fault, and I dread what he might have heard on the grapevine. I give a brief wave of thanks and then I shut the door and turn the lock – and it’s only as I lean back against it that I realize I’m hyperventilating.
The bungalow is not secluded or luxurious to me now; it is remote and lonely, full of terrors. I sink to my haunches and try to breathe. I can feel eyes on me, although surely I must be imagining it? But what if there really is a maniac on the loose, watching, waiting until I’m alone, planning to come back to get me too? I try to tell myself I’m being crazy, yet still I stand up and go over to the huge plate glass doors and pull the curtains across, shutting out this lost corner of the world where the sea plummets into the deep and I am marooned. I want someone to hold me in their arms and tell me that it will all be OK, but I am alone. I get into the beautiful super-king-sized bed, which has been turned down as usual, although it doesn’t have the petals laid out in heart shapes on the pillows tonight, and I wonder whose decision that was, not to do it. I pick up the phone next to my bed and call Reception, to check again if there’s any news. Leena answers, and her voice soothes me, especially as she sounds more composed than this morning, but she’s embarrassed that she has nothing to say. I’d known, of course – otherwise they’d have called me – yet the confirmation of the absence is like another sick kick in the stomach.
I hate this island now. Exactly this time last night I was dining in an over-water gourmet restaurant, drinking too much champagne. Now I am lying by myself, barricaded in my honeymoon bungalow, and I feel as scared and alone as I ever have. Where is he? The island feels so different after dark tonight, and it is cloudy, rendering the blackness so rich and velvety that when I get up and peer out from behind the curtains I can see tiny strata of stars behind my eyes. It’s almost as if I’m making up a vista, in the absence of one. Trying to make up a husband, in the absence of one. There is someone out there, I am sure of it, and I call his name, but no-one replies. Fear and sorrow battle in my throat. A shriek gets swallowed. But who would my screams be for anyway? For him? Or for me?
I am becoming ever more paranoid. I check the locks on the sliding patio doors, yet again, and I bolt the door to the luxurious bathroom, outside in the trees on the opposite side of the bungalow to the beach, and I push a chair up against it, in case someone scales the high white walls, comes and gets me. Even the geckos pinned to the plaster like pictures frighten me now. I lie awake for hours, not even attempting to sleep. My mind is tricking itself into knots and loops, and I can’t unthread where it starts, or is destined to end. I can’t even remember what is truth or fiction, the fine details of last night, no matter how hard I try. It is almost as if I am traumatized, and maybe I am. But had I really said, and in the restaurant, that I hated him? That I wished I’d never married him? I can hear his voice now, can feel his hands on me, but what did he do? What did he say? And, more to the point, who’d heard? As I writhe on the bed, my fist in my mouth to suppress my screams, I so desperately want to go home it becomes a physical pain of longing. I imagine the sea stretching out across the myriad islands like a watery, unnavigable prison. And then I imagine how far a dead body could travel across it, before it disintegrated …
I sit bolt upright, hold my breath until my ears are popping, attempt to drag my thoughts elsewhere. Briefly, I try to imagine him hiding out on one of the many desert islands here in this ocean, with a big bushy beard and an insurance policy. I even picture him turning up jaunty in Rio, a flower garland around his neck and dancing girls in the background. The fact that that scenario feels like the best possible outcome is telling. Yet, really, nothing matters now, apart from knowing the truth. As far as everything else is concerned in this sorry debacle, I don’t care any more. What will be will be. Let the repercussions roll.
I lie still, hug a pillow, pretend I have a husband. When I finally slip into sleep, I dream that he’s watching me, out beyond the window, and he is screeching with laughter as his skin grows hair and he howls at the moon, and then he is disembowelled, turned inside out like a glove, and I wake up and decide I am going insane. At last, I am going insane, like his mother always said I would. Perhaps I should see the resort doctor tomorrow and ask for something.
Hours stall and dither, but eventually pass. Even as the light starts pestering the curtains I’ve still barely slept, and so I turn on the television, and its pictures and sounds are such a relief, I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before. I no longer feel so scared, so alone. The made-for-TV movie is company, and I am grateful to the American actors and actresses, who look so tanned and coiffed and stereotypical: the suave silver businessman, the feisty old lady, the beautiful heroine, the archetypal baddie. I am none of those things, and yet I share something with all of them. They become my only friends, here on my island of smashed dreams. Finally, the inevitable end creeps up, and they leave me, too. I make the screen swallow itself and drift into mercifully blank sleep, at last. Later, when I wake, I look to see him there, beside me, but he’s not.
12
Six-and-a-half years earlier
It was Saturday morning and the midsummer rain was chucking itself ostentatiously at the windows, as though purposely reinforcing the fact that there was never any guarantee with the British weather – and that, plus the fact that Jemma was jet-lagged, was the best excuse ever for her and Dan to stay in bed. In the six months since their spontaneous New Year’s trip to Suffolk, where they’d marched along a stony, windswept beach, before finding a gorgeous pub to stay the night in (which had cost more than they’d wanted to spend but had been totally worth it), they’d finally settled into a steady, easy relationship which was a complete contrast to the tempestuous ones she’d had before. And although she was still convinced that it would never be serious with Dan, she finally began to realize that at least he appreciated her, unlike most of her other boyfriends, and she was happy.
Jemma’s professional fortunes had taken a turn this year, too, which may or may not have been a coincidence. In March she’d been put on a great project at work – the total renova
tion of a palace in Saudi Arabia, no less – and consequently she felt more valued and was therefore less likely to flip out at her boss, which had never done her any favours. In fact, she’d just come back from her very first overseas trip, to said palace, and her excitement at travelling business class, and staying in a posh hotel, and getting a blacked-out-windowed Mercedes to and from the palace compound had sent her self-esteem rocketing. If she played her cards right, she thought now, she might even be up for a promotion quite soon. She stretched luxuriously, like an over-indulged kitten.