“What’s all this about Beverly Hills?” My words are falling over one another. “You’re moving to Beverly Hills?”
“Babe, calm down,” he says.
Babe?
“How can I calm down? Is it true?”
“So, Noah told you.”
My heart falls like a clanging thing. It’s true. He’s moving to L.A. and he didn’t even tell me.
“It’s Trudy’s work,” he’s saying now. “You know she’s in media law? This great opportunity arose for her, and I have dual nationality anyway.…”
His words carry on, but they fade to meaningless sounds. For some reason I’m remembering our wedding day. We had a very cool wedding. All ironic twists and fun details like custom-made cocktails. I was so concerned with making sure my guests would have a good time that I forgot to check the small detail of whether I was marrying the right man.
“… fabulous realtor, and she came up with this place under budget—”
“But, Daniel.” I cut him off in midstream. “What about Noah?”
“Noah?” He sounds surprised. “Noah can come out and visit.”
“He’s seven. He’s at school.”
“In the holidays, then.” Daniel sounds unconcerned. “We’ll make something work.”
“When do you leave?”
“Monday.”
Monday?
I close my eyes, breathing hard. The hurt I’m feeling on Noah’s behalf is indescribable. It’s physical pain that makes me want to curl into a ball. Daniel’s moving to L.A. with barely a thought of how he’ll maintain a relationship with his only child, our son. Our precious, charming, imaginative son. He’s putting five thousand miles between them in the blink of an eyelid.
“Right.” I try to gather myself. There’s no point saying anything else. “Daniel, I have to go. I’ll talk to you soon.”
I switch off and swivel round, intending to join the others. But something strange is happening to me. An unfamiliar, scary sensation. Suddenly a sound escapes from my lips. A kind of yelp, like a dog might make.
“Fliss?” Lorcan has got out of his seat. “You OK?”
“Mummy?” Noah looks worried.
The two men make brief eye contact and Richard nods.
“Hey, buddy,” Richard says easily to Noah. “Let’s go and buy some chewing gum for the flight.”
“Chewing gum!” yells Noah ecstatically, and follows Richard off.
I give another involuntary yelp, and Lorcan takes me by the elbows.
“Fliss … are you crying?”
“No!” I say at once. “I never cry in the daytime. It’s my rule. I never ever cryyy-eee.” The word disintegrates into a third of these strange, high-pitched yelps. Something wet is on my cheek. Is that a tear?
“What did Daniel say?” says Lorcan gently.
“He’s moving to L.A. He’s leaving us.…” I can see people looking over from other tables. “Oh God.” I bury my head in my hands. “I can’t … I have to stop.…”
I emit a fourth yelp, which sounds a bit more like a sob. It feels as if something is looming up inside me, something unstoppable and violent and loud. The last time I felt like this, I was giving birth.
“You need somewhere private,” says Lorcan swiftly. “You’re going to have a meltdown. Where shall we go?”
“I’ve checked out of my room,” I mutter, between gasps. “They should have a crying room. Like a smoking room.”
“I’ve got it.” Lorcan grabs my arm and leads me through the tables to the swimming-pool area. “Steam room.” He doesn’t wait for a reply but opens the glass door and pushes me inside.
The atmosphere is so thick, I have to grope for a seat. The air is dense with vapor and there’s a soft, herby scent.
“Cry,” says Lorcan through the misty air. “No one’s watching. No one can hear, Fliss. Cry.”
“Can’t.” I swallow hard. Everything in me is resisting. The odd yelp still escapes, but I can’t surrender.
“Then tell me. Daniel’s moving to L.A.,” he prompts.
“Yes. He won’t see Noah anymore, and he doesn’t even care.” A shudder overcomes me. “He didn’t even tell me.”
“I thought you wanted him out of your life? That’s what you said.”
“I did,” I say, momentarily confused. “I do. I think I do. But this is so final. It’s such a rejection of us both.” Something is rising up in me again. Something churning and powerful. I think it could be grief. “It means it’s over. Our family’s oooover.” And now the churning is threatening to consume me. “Our whole family is ooooover.…”
“Come here, Fliss,” says Lorcan quietly, and proffers a shoulder. Immediately, I recoil.
“I can’t cry on you,” I say, my voice jerky. “Look away.”
“Of course you can cry on me.” He laughs. “We’ve had sex, remember.”
“That was sex. This is far more embarrassing.” I gulp. “Look away. Go away.”
“I’m not looking anywhere,” he says steadily. “And I’m not going anywhere. Come on.”
“I can’t,” I say desperately.
“Come on, you stupid woman.” He holds out his suited arm, pearlescent with steam. And finally, gratefully, I descend on it in a volcano of sobs.
We’re there for a while—me shuddering and sobbing and coughing, and Lorcan rubbing my back. For some reason I keep remembering Noah’s delivery. It was an emergency C-section and I was terrified, but, all the way through, Daniel was beside me in green scrubs, holding my hand. I never doubted him then. Back then I never doubted anything for a minute. And that makes me want to cry all over again.
At last I look up and push my hair back off my sweaty face. I can feel that my nose is swollen and my eyes are puffy. I haven’t cried like that since I was about ten, probably.
“I’m sorry—” I begin, but Lorcan holds up a hand.
“No. No apologies.”
“But your suit!” I begin to become aware of exactly what we’re doing here. We’re sitting in a steam room, both fully dressed.
“Every divorce has casualties,” says Lorcan calmly. “Think of my suit as one of the casualties of yours. Besides which,” he adds, “steam is good for suits.”
“At least our skin will be clean,” I say.
“There you go. Loads of pluses.”
A concealed mechanism in the corner is puffing fresh steam into the tiny chamber, and the air is becoming more opaque. I pull up my feet onto the mosaic-tiled bench and hug my knees tight, feeling as though the steam is a protective barrier. It’s intimate in here. But it’s private too.
“When I got married, I knew life wouldn’t be perfect,” I say into the mist. “I didn’t expect a rose garden. And then, when I got divorced, I didn’t expect a rose garden there either. But I hoped I might at least get … I don’t know. A patio.”
“A patio?”
“You know. A little terrace. Something small with a few plants to tend. Something with a tiny bit of optimism and love. But what I have is a post-nuclear war zone.”
“That’s good.” Lorcan gives a little laugh.
“What do you have? Not a rose garden?”
“It’s kind of alien territory,” he says after a pause. “Like a moonscape.”
Our eyes meet through the murky atmosphere and we don’t need to say any more. We get it.
The steam is still puffing and wreathing around us. It feels healing. It feels as though it’s lifting troublesome thoughts up away with it, leaving behind a kind of clarity. And the longer I sit there, the clearer things are to me. There’s a growing heaviness in my stomach. Lorcan was right. Not just now, but last night. He was right. This has all been a mistake.
I have to give this mission up right now. It’s flashing through my brain like a TV headline. Give up. Give up. I can’t carry on. I can’t risk losing Lottie.
Yes, I want to protect my little sister from the same pain I had. But it’s her life. I can’t make her choices for her. If she break
s up with Ben, so be it. If she goes through a divorce, so be it. If they’re married for seventy years and have twenty grandchildren, so be it.
I feel as though a kind of madness has been propelling me down a crazy path. Was it really about Lottie, or was it about Daniel and me? Is Lorcan right? Has this been my own Unfortunate Choice? Oh God, what have I been doing?
I’m suddenly aware that I muttered those last few words aloud. “Sorry,” I add. “I just … I realized …” I raise my head, feeling abject.
“You’ve been doing your best to help your sister,” says Lorcan, almost kindly. “In a totally deluded, fuckwit, wrong-headed way.”
“What—” I clap my hand to my mouth. “Oh God. What if she found out?” The thought is so horrifying, I feel almost faint. I was so determined to succeed, I never considered the downside. I’ve been an absolute fool.
“She doesn’t need to,” says Lorcan. “Not if you turn round and go home and never say a word. I won’t tell.”
“Nico won’t tell either. He’s my guy at the hotel.” I’m breathing hard, as though I’ve had a narrow escape. “I think I’m OK. She’ll never know.”
“So the honeymoon-sabotage campaign is off?”
“As of this moment.” I nod. “I’ll call Nico. He’ll be relieved.” I look at Lorcan. “I’m never going to interfere in my sister’s life again,” I say with emphasis. “Hold me to that. Hold me to my vow.”
“It’s a deal.” He nods seriously. “And what are you going to do now?”
I shake my head. “I don’t know. Get to the airport. Take it from there.” I tug at my sweaty hair, remembering again that I’m sitting in a steam room in my clothes. “I must look a sight.”
“I agree,” says Lorcan seriously. “You can’t get on a plane like that. You’d better go under the cold-drench shower.”
“The cold-drench shower?” I stare at him disbelievingly.
“Closes up the pores. Invigorates the circulation. Gets rid of snotty tearstains.”
He’s teasing me. I think. Is he?
“I will if you will,” I challenge him.
“Why not?” He shrugs. I feel a rising giggle. We cannot be planning to do this.
“OK, here goes.” I push the door open and hold it politely for Lorcan. I can see the stares and nudges from hotel guests at the sight of two fully-clothed people emerging from the steam room, one in a business suit.
“After you.” Lorcan gestures politely at the cold-drench shower. “I’ll pull the lever, if you like.”
“Go on, then.” I start to laugh as I step underneath. A moment later a blast of freezing water descends on me, and I give a tiny scream.
“Mummy!” A piercing voice hails me in delight. “You had a shower with your clothes on.” Noah is watching from the table with Richard, his face bright with disbelief.
Lorcan takes his turn and lifts his face up to the drenching shower.
“There,” he says to me when it’s finished. “Isn’t that refreshing? Doesn’t life seem better?” He shakes out his wet suit sleeve.
I pause a moment, wanting to answer him honestly. “Yes,” I say at last. “Much better. Thank you.”
21
LOTTIE
I don’t quite know how to react. Here we are. Back at the guest house. And it’s just as it was. Kind of.
As soon as we descended from the water taxi, Ben took a call from Lorcan, which really annoyed me. I mean, this is our big, romantic, meaningful moment—and he takes a call. That’s like Humphrey Bogart saying, “We’ll always have— Sorry, love, just got to take this.”
Anyway. Be positive, Lottie. Relish the moment. I’ve been thinking about this place for fifteen years. And here I am.
I’m standing on the wooden jetty, waiting for waves of nostalgia and enlightenment to engulf me. I’m waiting to cry and maybe think of something poignant to say to Ben. But the weird thing is, I don’t really want to cry. I feel a bit blank.
I can just glimpse the guest house, far above, from where I’m standing. I can see the familiar dusty ochre stone and a couple of windows. It’s smaller than I remember, and one of the shutters is drooping. My gaze lowers to the cliff. There are the steps cut into the rock, forking halfway down. One set leads to the jetty where we’re standing and the other leads to the main beach. They’ve put in metal barriers, which kind of ruin the look. And a railing across the top of the cliff. And there’s a safety sign. A safety sign? We never had a safety sign. Anyway. Be positive.
Ben rejoins me, and I take his hand. The beach is round a jutting outcrop of rock, so I can’t see yet if that’s changed. But how can a beach change? A beach is a beach.
“What shall we do first?” I ask softly. “Guest house? Beach? Or secret cove?”
Ben squeezes my hand back. “Secret cove.”
And now, at last, I start to feel ripples of excitement. The secret cove. The place we first undressed each other, shaking with hot, insatiable, teenage desire. The place where we did it three, four, five times in a day. The idea of revisiting it—in all senses—is so exciting that I shiver.
“We’ll need to hire a boat.”
He’ll sail me round to the cove like he always used to, my feet up on the side of the boat. And we’ll drag the boat up onto the sand and find that sheltered patch of sand, and …
“Let’s get a boat.” Ben’s voice is thick, and I can tell he’s as excited as I am.
“D’you think they still hire them out at the beach?”
“Only one way to find out.”
With a sudden lightness of heart, I take hold of his hand and pull him toward the steps. We’ll go straight to the beach, we’ll get a boat; it’s all going to happen.
“Come on!” I’m leaping up the rocky steps, my heart thumping with excitement. We’re nearly at the fork in the steps. We’ll see that familiar stretch of beautiful golden sand at any moment, waiting for us after all this time—
Oh my God.
I’m staring down onto the beach in shock. What’s happened to it? Who are all these people?
When we were staying at the guest house, the beach seemed a massive, empty space. There were about twenty of us at the guest house, tops, and we used to spread ourselves over the sand so no one was crowded.
What I’m staring at now looks like an occupation. Or the morning after a festival. There are about seventy people filling the sand in disheveled groups, some still cocooned in sleeping bags. I can see the remains of a fire. There are a couple of tents. Most of them are students, I guess, appraising them. Or eternal students, maybe.
As we’re standing there uncertainly, a young guy with a goatee comes partway up the steps and greets us in a South African accent.
“Hi. You look lost.”
I feel lost, I want to retort, but instead I muster a smile. “Just … looking.”
“We’re visiting,” says Ben easily. “We came here years ago. It’s changed.”
“Oh.” The light in the guy’s face changes. “You’re one of those. From the golden age.”
“The golden age?”
“That’s what we call it.” He laughs. “We get so many people your age coming back, telling us how it used to be before they built the hostel. Most of them spend the whole time whinging about how it’s been ruined. You coming down?”
As we follow him, I’m prickling a little at his words. “Whinging” is a bit aggressive. And “your age”? What does that mean? I mean, obviously we’re a little older than he is, but we’re still, broadly speaking, young. I’m still in the same category.
“What hostel?” asks Ben as we arrive on the beach. “Don’t you stay at the guest house?”
“A few do.” The guy shrugs. “Not many. It’s a fairly ropy outfit. I think the old guy’s just sold it. No, we’re at the hostel. A few hundred yards behind. It was built maybe … ten years ago? They had a big advertising campaign. Really worked. This place is so amazing,” he adds as he walks away. “The sunsets are unbelievable. Take care now.”
Ben smiles back, but I feel like exploding with fury. I can’t believe they’ve built a hostel. I feel livid. This was our place. How dare they advertise it?
And just look at the way they treat it. There’s rubbish everywhere. I can see cans and empty crisp packets and even a couple of used condoms. At the sight of them, my stomach turns. They’ve been having sex all over the place. That’s so gross.
I mean, I know we used to have sex on the beach, but that was different. That was romantic.
“Where’s the boat guy?” I say, looking around. There used to be a lizard-like man who hired out his two boats every day, but I can’t see him anywhere. There’s a tall strapping guy pushing a boat out into the water, and I hurry over the sand to the sea.
“Hi! Excuse me! Hold on a minute.” He turns, his smile white in his tanned face, and I plant a hand on his dinghy.
“Could you tell me, do they still hire out boats here? Is this a hire boat?”
“Yes.” He nods. “But you have to get in early. They’re all gone. You could try tomorrow? The list is at the hostel.”
“I see.” I pause, then add plaintively, “The trouble is, we’re here only today. My husband and I. It’s our honeymoon. And we really did want a boat.”
I’m silently willing him to be gallant and offer us his boat. But he doesn’t. He just keeps pushing it out into the water and says pleasantly, “That’s tough.”
“The thing is, this is very special to us,” I explain, splashing after him. “We really, really wanted to go sailing. We wanted to visit this tiny secret cove we used to know.”
“The little cove that way?” He gestures round the headland.
“Yes!” I say. “Do you know it?”
“You don’t need to sail there.” He looks surprised. “You can get to it via the walkway.”
“The walkway?”
“It’s farther inland.” He points. “A big wooden walkway. They built it a few years ago. Opened up the whole area.”
I stare at him in horror. They built a walkway to the secret cove? This is desecration. It’s a travesty. I’m going to write a furious letter to … someone. It was our secret. It was supposed to stay secret. How are we supposed to have sex there now?