Acts of Kindness

by Heather Barnett

  She went bright red and muttered, ‘Shut up!’

  Ben continued as if Oscar hadn’t spoken. ‘That gives us plenty of scope. Anyone got any good lamb recipes?’

  ‘Bella does a lovely lamb tagine. Don’t you, Bella?’ enthused Lauren.

  ‘We’ve got two and a half hours, enough time to do a quick cheat’s version I guess,’ Ben said. ‘Could be a winner – things with a bit of heat often go down well.’

  ‘Well…’ Bella could just about remember the recipe, but all their hopes would be pinned on her, what if it went wrong?

  They all looked at her.

  She put the card down on the table. ‘Lead me to the lamb.’

  Making thirty portions of tagine in competition conditions was a considerably different undertaking to knocking up a dinner party dish at home. The vast quantities of meat in the fridge struck fear into her soul but the others helped with the calculations, their previous cook-off experience coming in useful. Two hours of chopping, stirring and tasting later, they were ready. Bella was surprised at how delicious it was, better than the one she made at home although she didn’t volunteer that information.

  ‘This is a winner, mark my words,’ said Ben, after the final tasting. ‘We’ll be flying home with the Cupule in our hand luggage.’

  ‘I don’t want to pour cold water on your enthusiasm,’ Oscar remarked, ‘but you say that every year.’

  Ben shook his head. ‘No doubt about it. This one’s a winner.’

  Bella finished plating up the last dish.

  ‘I’ll help you get these loaded onto the trolley, Bella, and we’ll take it over to the service area,’ Ben said. ‘It only needs two of us, the rest of you can get changed and go and get the drinks in.’

  A metal trolley had been left for them outside the entrance to the hut. As Ben finished washing up the last enormous pan, and the others trooped off towards the bar, Bella carried the cloche-covered dishes outside. On her final trip to the trolley, something crossed the edge of her vision. She strained her eyes in the direction of the movement. It was pitch black between the pools of lamplight. There – she saw it again. Someone was moving between two huts on the other side of the path. Something in the way the figure was half-crouching, as if trying to avoid observation, caught her attention. A light snapped on in one of the huts and lit up the figure of The Librarian. Bella missed her footing and dropped the metal dish with a clatter.

  Tagine spattered across the ground. When she looked up, The Librarian was gone.

  ‘Are you okay?’ Ben stood in the doorway.

  ‘Shit! Shit! Oh God, sorry.’

  Taking in the scene, he touched her on the shoulder.

  ‘Don’t worry. We can sort this.’

  He got another dish and a spoon from the hut. The dish had dropped the right way up, and about a third of it remained unspoiled. They set about taking the tops off the other dishes on the trolleys and pinching a bit from each to add to the reduced portion.

  ‘Everyone will get a smaller portion – which is ideal. Always leave them wanting more,’ he said with a smile.

  ‘Thank you, I can’t believe I did that. Something gave me a fright.’

  ‘What was it?’

  She hesitated. ‘I thought I saw The Librarian. Over there, by that hut.’

  Ben frowned. ‘The Librarian? He’s not here. He never comes on these trips.’

  ‘I know he wasn’t on the plane with us, but I’m sure it was him.’

  She thought alarm flashed across his face for the briefest moment but then he turned away to grab the trolley. ‘Better get the food to the dining room, we’ll be disqualified if we don’t hurry.’ He looked at her again, one hand on her arm. ‘It must have been someone else. Trust me, he’s not here.’

  It was late, or perhaps it was early by now. Everyone else had faded away. The little gold cup shone in the rays of the citronella candles on Bella’s beachfront terrace. An empty bottle of champagne stood on the table in front of them, beside a half-full one which Oscar grabbed, swigged from, then passed to Bella.

  As she reached for it, she noticed the cigarette in her hand. ‘Shit! I’m smoking!’

  Seeing that she wasn’t immediately taking the bottle, Oscar swung it back towards his mouth, clashing it against his teeth as he did so. ‘Ow! Fucking bottle.’

  ‘Look, though. I’m smoking!’ To illustrate the fact, Bella took a drag, eyes wide.

  ‘Yeah, yeah. You’ve done that what-a-shock-I’m-smoking bit already.’

  ‘But you don’t understand. I haven’t smoked…’

  ‘…for ten years. You said that too.’

  ‘Oh.’ She took another drag, deep into her lungs, then tilted her head back and watched the smoke plume into the air. She looked tenderly at the cigarette. ‘I’ve missed you.’

  ‘Swap.’

  ‘Eh?’

  Oscar grabbed the cigarette from between her fingers and thrust the bottle at her.

  She took a swig. ‘Okay, that’s enough. My fag back, please.’ Reaching out to take the cigarette she found herself grabbing his fingers instead.

  ‘That’s not… Oh.’

  All was silent for a moment until Oscar broke the kiss and yelped, looking down at his left hand where the cigarette had burned down to the filter. He flicked it away.

  ‘Come on,’ she said, leading him through the patio doors into the bedroom.

  Chapter Eleven

  When she was thirteen, Bella had gone on an ‘outward-bound’ trip with her school. Despite the fact that her aptitude for sports was on a par with a cat’s ability to mastermind a hostile takeover, she’d embarked on this adventure full of naïve optimism. She was convinced that she would be the first to climb the mountain, the one kindly urging on fellow pupils too scared to step out over the precipice on the abseil rope.

  It had been a brutal lesson in self-knowledge.

  Twenty minutes into mountaineering, in horizontal wind and sleet, she had confided to the perky camp leader that she thought she had frostbite. This information had been greeted with an exhortation to keep her pecker up but no material aid of any kind. She had struggled up to the top of the mountain, last, with fellow pupils shouting back condescending encouragements at her through the, by now, swirling snow. She had hoped to redeem herself on the abseiling, but while shrieking, excited teenagers went for their second or third giddy descent (‘Would you like to try it facing forward this time, Sammy?’ ‘Why not, Miss!’), Bella had trembled at the edge of the cliff for half an hour before being lowered, screaming, over the edge, by two coaxing instructors.

  Broken down, her shining mental image of herself lying in shattered pieces, she held on to the thought of the final day’s activities to pull her through that bitter week. Orienteering. An activity which required no mental toughness or physical agility. Trudging through a dripping forest with a plastic map was something even she could attempt without tears.

  By this stage, her optimism had vanished and she had the good sense to acknowledge that her map-reading skills were unlikely to be stellar. The memory of losing her way in a department store a couple of weeks before and having her mother summoned over the PA system still stung. Fortunately, she had been put in a team with Ryan, the most popular, sporty boy in the class and Freya, a pretty girl who was new to the school, but, crucially, had lived in the Lake District. She was bound to know all about rambling and using a compass.

  Freya may well have done, but Bella never got the chance to find out. At the first opportunity, while Bella was thrashing around in some bushes looking for a well-hidden place to go to the loo – calling out, ‘Just a minute! Won’t be a minute! Don’t go without me!’ – Ryan and Freya had slipped off together for an extended snogging session. Bella had emerged from the bushes to an ominous silence and the dawning realisation that she was going to have to try to find her way back without a map or compass, as her companions had taken these with them.

  She got up on a rock and yelled. Help had not been lo
ng in coming, and when it did, she had the grim satisfaction of seeing Freya and Ryan sent back on separate minibuses with the promise of two weeks of detentions. Since that day, she had accepted her limits and never attempted any kind of outward-bound activity, particularly orienteering.

  Until now.

  Someone – Theresa, maybe, she wasn’t sure – had decided that a fun team-building activity would be to drop them all in the middle of the island in pairs and let them race to find their way to designated locations.

  Bella had been paired with an earnest US colleague called Marvin. She contemplated his stocky calves, taut and bulging beneath the flapping Bermuda shorts as they trudged down the jungle path ahead of her.

  ‘You okay back there?’ Marvin swung round with the pack on his back, his teeth gleaming in the shadow thrown by his wide-brimmed hat. The jungle was quiet, dimly green and humid; they were hemmed in by glossy leaves. When they stopped walking the only noises she could hear were small things scurrying around in the undergrowth. She didn’t like to think what the small things might be.

  Marvin pushed his hat back and wiped sweat from his forehead, flicking it to the ground. ‘You don’t look too good. You need to rest?’

  God, she would love to rest. On a super-king-sized bed with cool, crisp sheets, in a darkened room. With a jug of iced water beside her.

  ‘No, let’s keep going.’ She took a swig from her tepid water bottle and Marvin crashed off again through the undergrowth, having checked his map and compass. At least he seemed to know how to use both of them, meaning she wasn’t required to think. She trudged on, keeping her eyes on his dusty black walking boots. The main thing was to get back so she could collapse on her bed and sleep. Sleep was what she needed, that and a time machine to go back to last night and not kiss Oscar. Or do anything else with Oscar. What the hell had she done? For the umpteenth time, she went over what she could remember. Hazy recollections of kissing on the terrace. Tumbling into bed. A blank. Waking up when the alarm went off at 6am and stumbling to the bathroom to be sick. Returning to the empty bed and wondering if she’d had a vivid dream. Lying on her side, head pounding, and noticing a golden gleam out of the corner of her eye: the Cupule. Starting to feel the nausea rise again as she realised it had all definitely been real.

  Bella stumbled over a tree root, grabbed on to a trunk to steady herself and felt something gash her hand.

  ‘Shit! Ow! Oh, for fuck’s sake!’ Could this day get any worse? She examined her palm. Bright red blood flowed out of the raggedy wound. She swayed and then Marvin was beside her, lowering her to the ground with careful hands.

  ‘Woah, steady there. Sit back against this tree. That’s a nasty cut, hold on.’ He lifted his hat, unknotted the bandana he wore underneath, padded it up then pressed it into her palm. A whiff of scalp entered her nostrils as he bent over her, and her stomach churned. He took her other hand and made her hold it over the makeshift bandage while he slipped off his backpack. Rummaging around, he found a first aid kit.

  ‘You’re not having a good day, huh?’ He smiled at her, concern in his eyes. She couldn’t find the energy to think of anything to say and instead shook her head. Her hand hurt and she was concentrating on not being sick. Even shaking her head made it worse. Marvin peeled away the bandana. The blood pumped out again, but less vigorously. ‘Okay, let’s hold that on there for a little longer. Then we’ll clean it.’ He was kneeling in front of her on one knee, holding her injured hand up in a firm grip. She felt like he was about to propose. Closing her eyes, she knocked her hat off her head and let it flop back against the tree. She didn’t care what insects might be taking advantage of her position to take up residence in her hair. She wished she knew what Oscar was thinking. At the briefing that morning he’d traipsed in looking as pale and ill as she felt. They’d caught each other’s eyes and both glanced away. There hadn’t been a chance to talk, even if they’d wanted to, before they all got sent in different directions for team-bonding fun.

  She felt Marvin pulling the bandana away and opened her eyes. The bleeding had slowed to a bulging red line along the wound. He took an antiseptic wipe and cleaned it then applied a bandage from the first aid kit, securing it with some surgical tape. She lifted her hand and inspected his work.

  ‘You’ll make a great doctor someday, Marvin. Have you got any super-strength painkillers in that kit?’

  He pulled out a blister pack and popped two ibuprofen into her left, uninjured hand. Swallowing them with more tepid water, she let her heavy eyelids close.

  ‘Listen.’ Marvin’s voice was a jolt, had she been asleep? ‘I’m worried about you. Could be heatstroke, could be the shock of that nasty cut. Either way you need to rest up for a bit.’

  She wasn’t about to disagree with that.

  ‘There’s no phone signal out here but I reckon we must be thirty minutes’ tramp from home. Maybe less. I’m going to leave you here while I go and get some help, okay?’

  A thrill of panic ran through her at the thought of being abandoned, faint and bleeding, among the unknown critters that rustled around her. She started to shake her head and attempt to get up, but as she moved, she felt a sensation like a giant ball bearing rolling from one side to the other of her skull and she froze.

  ‘I know you’d rather not be left alone but I think it’s our best option right now. I’ll be as quick as I can. Here, I’ll leave you my spare water bottle.’

  Dear old Marvin, standing there with his anxious expression and his pink polo shirt with its dark V of sweat.

  ‘You’re a brick, Marvin,’ she said, taking the proffered bottle.

  ‘Oh, hush now,’ he looked pleased and embarrassed. ‘Sit there and take it easy. I’ll be back before you know it.’

  And then she was alone. Thoughts seemed to swim into view from nowhere and then disappear with a hollow pop. The Librarian swam through first, bloodshot eyes glaring. Ben and Oscar splashed by together, arm in arm, making her feel uneasy. Oscar’s face was turned away while Ben winked, maliciously. Her childhood bedroom loomed up from the depths next, with its flowery wallpaper border. Lauren was floating above the bed making notes in a book. When she saw Bella looking, she peeled back the covers and passed the book to Maggie Thatcher, who was lying stiff as a corpse beneath the sheets.

  She woke up with a start. How long had she been there? Nothing seemed to have changed but it was hard to sense time passing in the humid gloom. Marvin should have been back by now. Taking care not to make any sudden movements to jolt her head or the throbbing cut in her hand, she reached into her rucksack for her phone. Dead. She hadn’t remembered to put it on charge before going to bed. And she wasn’t wearing a watch.

  Clinging to the tree trunk, she hauled herself to her feet. If Marvin had sprained his ankle or toppled into a swamp, there might be no help coming. If she set off down the path at least she’d be nearer civilisation when they finally came looking.

  Her progress was slow. She cursed team-building activities. She cursed alcohol. She cursed oak-leaf-shaped tropical islands. None of it made the trek any easier. At least there was just the one path, heading inexorably downwards. If she kept descending, she had to clear the jungle at some point. After about ten minutes she hit a fork in the path. Both ways looked identical. What Others Might Think of Her slid out from behind an enormous fern and bared its teeth, delighted. This would, no doubt, be what would be reported in the press when her body was found. How, at the critical point, when any normal person would have used her sense of direction to choose the correct path, Bella Black had gone the wrong way. She hesitated, then at random took the right-hand path. For a while it continued downwards then, almost imperceptibly, it began to ascend. Oh God. What now? Go back to the fork? Carry on? Sit down on the floor and cry? She decided to go for the third option, followed, a few minutes later, by the second.

  Another fifteen minutes’ walk and the jungle seemed to be thinning ahead. She increased her speed. Yes, the trees were undoubtedly getting spar
ser. And then the jungle was behind her and she was holding herself back from dropping to her knees and kissing the earth. There, at the foot of a steep slope, was what looked very much like the outskirts of the main OAK compound.

  As she approached the nearest hut, she allowed herself to acknowledge how awful she felt, like her knees might buckle at any moment. She tried the door; it was locked. Peering into the window on tiptoe she saw a large, empty training room. There was a more substantial-looking building across the way, perhaps she’d have more luck there. The door was unlocked and she went inside.

  Utter silence. There were two rows of desks and chairs but no sign of any people. A door at the far side of the room opened on to a corridor, also deserted. She tried a door to her left and found herself in a miniature version of an observatory back home. The screens were all dead and Bella started to feel a little spooked. It reminded her of a horror film about a post-apocalyptic world where to all appearances humanity had been wiped out – until mutant survivors started popping up from dark corners. She tried to pull herself together. These were just empty buildings and there would no doubt be a reasonable explanation as to why no one was here.

  Of course! As she closed the observatory door behind her, she realised. There must have been a satellite alert. She needed to find the entrance to the bunker from this building. After a few false turns, she found herself in a stairwell. Her walking boots clanged on the steel steps as she went down two flights. At the bottom was a small lobby and, facing her, a door. Forcing the heavy handle up she swung the door open.

  Instead of the vast space she’d been expecting, there was a small cell-like room, lit by strip lighting. To the left was a narrow bed, clamped to the wall, beside it was a steel unit with taps and a basin. Over against the back wall was a table with tubular metal legs and a wooden top, one chair drawn up to it. She couldn’t see much to the right as the door blocked her view, plus she was finding it hard to drag her eyes away from the body which lay motionless in the middle of the floor.