Paige dropped her head onto the sunlounger and laughed out loud. My fingers, not connected to my brain, carried on taking pictures. My brain, not connected to anything, packed its bags, waved goodbye and tried to make a hasty exit out ofthe fire escape.
‘Classy line, isn’t it?’
Thankfully, Paige couldn’t see my face for my massive black camera. It was a classy line. It was also one I’d heard less than twenty-four hours earlier.
‘Thank God I came to my senses, laughed in his face and went home alone. But for some reason I’ve always sort of regretted it. Maybe that’s why he says it ? gets girls’ backs up. Makes him a challenge. And of course every time I’ve seen him since, he hasn’t been the slightest bit interested in me.’
‘Yeah, but you wouldn’t be interested in him either, surely?’ I crawled over to the sunlounger next to Paige and sat down for a moment, camera in my lap. ‘You must have loads of blokes wanting to go out with you.’
‘We always want what we can’t have, don’t we?’ She sat up and hugged her knees. ‘Or at least what we know is bad for us. I’ve been more or less single since Stefan. Still can’t believe he did it.’
‘I’m sorry.’ I turned my attention to the screen on the back of my camera. Those last few pictures were so pretty. The ones when she was talking about Nick. ‘Really.’
‘I know you’re pretending to be Vanessa, but you’re not her, remember?’ She rested a hand on my wrist and squeezed. ‘You didn’t shag my fiancé a month before my wedding, did you?’
‘No?’ I probably should have sounded more certain about that.
‘I had my dress and everything.’ She let go of my wrist and wrapped her arms around herself. ‘We’d have been married three years this September. I thought I’d have kids by now.’
I thought back to three years ago and wondered whether or not Vanessa had ever brought Stefan to our apartment. Had I met him? Had I made awkward conversation with him in my kitchen on a Saturday morning? It was more than possible.
‘But who wants babies when they’re trapped in Hawaii with a really hot man and endless cocktails?’ she said, snapping out of her trance and clapping her hands on her thighs. Which did not even quiver. ‘Totally going to bang Nick, totally going to break my curse.’
‘I don’t think that would be a very good idea,’ I choked, wishing we had some of those cocktails to hand. ‘He’s clearly got some problems.’
‘Yeah, and I want to be one of them,’ she replied with a sly smile. ‘Don’t worry, I won’t go falling in love with him. But he might accidentally fall head over heels for me.’
‘Shall we take some more pictures?’ I suggested with forced brightness, scrolling through the terrible posed pictures and deleting them as quickly as I could ? anything to distract myself. ‘Just a couple?’
‘Can I have a look at what you’ve done so far?’ she asked. I nodded, nervous. Not only was I dealing with a woman who disliked having her picture taken, I was also dealing with my boss.
‘Oh God, I look awful.’ She screwed up her face and kept clicking through. I knew what she really meant was ‘your pictures are awful’. ‘I look like my mum.’
‘Not a good thing?’ I asked.
Paige shook her head, skipping through the shots too fast to really take in just how terrible they were. Until she reached the ones on the sunlounger. Finally she slowed down.
‘This one is quite pretty.’ She paused on a shot of her laughing, halfway through her Nick story. ‘And I don’t hate this.’
Slowly, she cycled through all the shots we’d taken until we got to the first few, the ones she didn’t know I’d been shooting at all.
‘Oh, Tess, these are beautiful.’ Paige looked up at me with something new in her eyes. It looked strangely like respect. Mixed with surprise. ‘Like, really, really beautiful. The light, the expression you’ve captured. These are great.’
Carefully she handed me my camera and smiled.
‘You’re going to be great at this,’ she said, nodding. ‘I’m not worried at all.’
‘Are you just saying that so you can go and have a nap?’ I asked, blushing.
‘A little bit,’ she replied. ‘But those pictures are genuinely beautiful. They are so hot, I would totally let you tag me in them on Facebook.’
Wow. Now there was a compliment.
‘Aloha, Vanessa,’
A couple of hours later, still bathing in the glow of not quite hating myself as much as I had when I woke up, I opened my cottage door to find Kekipi standing on my doorstep with a giant wicker picnic basket in one hand and a white envelope in the other.
‘Aloha.’ I eyed the picnic basket like a rabid Yogi Bear. I’d been so busy editing Paige’s pictures, I had completely forgotten to eat lunch. ‘How are you?’
‘Since Mr Bennett cancelled once again, there was a suggestion that you might enjoy a tour of the property. The boat is ready and I have a picnic.’ He waved the basket at me and my eyes followed it, tongue almost hanging out of my mouth. ‘Sound like fun?’
‘Sounds amazing!’ I clapped my hands together like a little girl and jumped from foot to foot. ‘Can I just run in and change my battery pack? I want to take my camera.’
‘Wiki wiki,’ he said, handing me the envelope. ‘That means be quick. I’ll wait right here.’
I nodded and wiki wiki’d myself into the house. The note was from the main house and confirmed that Artie would have everything ready for the fashion shoot tomorrow. So things were actually happening. Confidence buoyed by my test shoot with Paige, I left the card on the kitchen top and didn’t think any more about it. The only thing on my mind was how many awesome selfies I could take to post on Facebook with the caption, ‘Hey, Charlie, you wanker, I’m in Hawaii having the best time of my entire life and not even thinking about you at all.’ Or something.
I was already suffering from sunburn so I pulled on a long black T-shirt over my bikini, but abandoned my shorts. There was nothing more disgusting than sitting in damp denim ? I’d learned that lesson the hard way after one too many turns on the log flume as a kid. It was Amy’s favourite ride. The T-shirt wasn’t fooling anyone into believing it was a dress, but I figured Kekipi wouldn’t be that offended by the sight of my arse. Or at least he’d be too professional and polite to say otherwise. Piling my hair on top of my head and grabbing my camera bag, I was ready to go. Just as I was about to leave, my phone started beeping. I yanked it out of my bag and stared at the screen, frozen to the spot.
Charlie Wilder.
I looked at the screen for a moment, looked at the letters in his name, looked at the tiny photo that had popped up, the whole situation so unwelcome. Unable to take another second of it, I pressed answer and felt three days of progress disappear.
‘Hello?’
‘Tess?’
‘Who else would it be?’ Well, perhaps I had managed to hang on to a touch of attitude.
‘I … I just wanted to call you. It’s been ages.’
‘Right.’
Standing in the middle of a kitchen that wasn’t mine, on an island in an ocean that was far, far away from the island and the ocean I had grown up on, I didn’t know quite what to say. If I’d been in my kitchen, on my island, in my ocean, I had a feeling I’d be crying by now. But something was stopping me.
‘You wanted to call me to say what?’ I asked, reaching out to steady myself on the kitchen counter.
Even though I knew the smart thing to do would be to hang up, there was a sickly softness in my stomach that was begging him to tell me he loved me. No matter where I was or what I was doing, ten years weren’t that easily undone. If he would just say that he needed me.
‘Just to say, you know, hello and everything,’ he said, laughing with nerves. ‘I think this is the longest we’ve gone without speaking since we met.’
‘It is the longest we’ve gone without speaking since we met,’ I replied, picturing him rubbing his eyebrow, biting his lip. ‘I’m sorry, I’ve got
to go.’
‘But I wanted to tell you …’ he said hurriedly. ‘I meant to say …’
‘Meant to say what?’ I asked, holding my breath and hoping.
‘About work. I’ve heard the company is in loads of trouble. Apparently it’s not the economy or anything; it’s just that Michael has pissed loads of money away and we’re going under. Or something. And they didn’t have the budget for the job he’d promised you any more. Anyway, that’s what I heard.’
‘That’s what you wanted to say?’ I couldn’t quite believe it. My grip on the kitchen top tightened and I watched my knuckles turn white. ‘That’s all you wanted to tell me?’
‘Yeah?’ He didn’t sound quite sure. ‘I know you’re really upset about your job and stuff and I don’t want you to be. Upset.’
‘Charlie?’ I squeezed my eyes tightly together and ignored the prickling tears. ‘Please don’t call me again.’
‘But I miss you,’ he said in a broken whisper. ‘I miss my best mate.’
And that was enough to make me hang up. I unclenched my fists and placed my palms on the cool kitchen counter. Leaning forward, I fought the sick feeling in the back of my throat. I fought the desire to get into bed and never get back out. I was better than this. The things he was talking about were Old Tess problems. New Tess didn’t care. New Tess had better things to do. Like eat loads of cheesy snacks on a boat.
Confused and close to tears, I stumbled out of the door, slipping my sunglasses over my reddening eyes and hoping Kekipi wouldn’t mind if I went in for a hug. But instead of finding my presumed boat buddy, I found Nick. Holding the picnic basket. And a huge bag of Cheetos.
‘Can’t have a picnic without crisps, can you?’ he asked.
‘Where’s Kekipi?’ I asked, glad I’d grabbed my sunglasses ‘You’re not coming?’
‘Kekipi has gone back to do whatever it is Kekipi does, and, yes – yes, I am,’ he said, looking impossibly pleased with himself and dangling a set of keys from his thumb and forefinger. ‘You’re with me, kid.’
‘Because you know how to drive a boat?’
He nodded.
‘And you know your way around Hawaii?’
He nodded.
‘There’s no way I’m getting in a boat with you.’ I crossed my arms and gritted my teeth. ‘I saw Shirley Valentine.’
‘Then you’ll know exactly why you should get in a boat with me,’ he said, slipping the keys into his pocket and holding out his hand. ‘For fuck’s sake, Vanessa, I’m not going to feed you to the sharks.’
‘There are sharks in there?’ I eyed the ocean suspiciously, pushing all thoughts of Charlie, of Donovan & Dunning, of the Old Tess right out my mind. ‘Now I’m really not sure about this.’
‘I am and you’re coming.’ He grabbed my hand and started to pull me along the beach. ‘Because I need some company and you need a shag.’
‘I do not need a shag,’ I replied, trying to shake off his hand and ignore the way my skin burned as soon as he touched me. ‘And if you need company, why not take Paige?’
‘Why would I take Paige?’ he asked, seeming genuinely nonplussed, as he dragged me along to the little pier beside our cottages. At the end, the world’s smallest motorboat bobbed up and down on the ocean. ‘Can’t think why I’d take her.’ I couldn’t take my eyes off his arse as he leaned over to drop the picnic basket into the boat. He looked so big and manly as he unravelled the rope that tied the boat to the pier I was worried my ovaries were going to burst. Traitors. ‘I’ve got a feeling she might be mad with me anyway.’
My brain and my vagina hadn’t quite reconciled on where I stood with the whole Paige thing. Nothing had happened between them and it really didn’t seem like anything ever would. But I still felt as though I should have told her about this. Whatever this was. Obviously, because I was a massive wimp and didn’t want her to hate me, I hadn’t, so the natural conclusion would have been just not to hang out with Nick again. That was easier said than done. ‘Maybe because you were a complete cock at breakfast?’
‘I don’t like being messed around.’ A brief darkness crossed his face before it was replaced with his annoying grin. ‘Hope you don’t get seasick.’
‘How come you’re suddenly in such a good mood?’ I let him take my hand and help me into the boat, trying to ignore the sudden flashbacks to the night before. ‘Forget to take your meds this morning?’
‘I never forget to take my meds,’ he replied, and I had no idea whether or not he was joking. ‘I lost my temper earlier, I know. It was unprofessional, but it’s been a pretty stressful few weeks. I didn’t need Baby Bennett’s shit.’
‘He was actually quite nice about you after you flounced off like a little girl,’ I said, remembering, after my bottom hit the wooden bench, that I wasn’t wearing any shorts. Oh cock. ‘So you might not get fired after all.’
‘And if they fire me, who’s going to do their interview?’ He jumped behind the wheel of the boat and slipped the keys into the ignition. I hated the fact that both his arrogance and ability to operate a small seafaring craft were epic turn-ons. Maybe he didn’t just look a little bit like Daniel Craig; maybe he actually was James Bond. ‘Not that I give a shit. When I’m done here, I’m going home to do a real job.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ I grabbed hold of the side of the boat as the engine sputtered into life.
‘Don’t talk to me while I’m driving,’ he said, Wayfarers down, eyes on the horizon. ‘Unless you want to end up in an episode of Lost, I need to concentrate.’
Staring at him from behind my sunglasses, I narrowed my eyes and fought the urge to kick him in the back of the knee. Why had I got into the boat? Kekipi was going to pay for selling me out. We pulled away from the pier and away from the beach and headed out onto the clear blue seas, but instead of looking out at the beautiful, breathtaking scenery, I couldn’t take my eyes off the captain. I quietly wondered if Amy would fancy him. He was definitely more her type than mine. Stocky, solid. Not so much buff as just really well put together, like he played a lot of sport rather than worked out. And he wasn’t terribly tall ? maybe five ten, five eleven if he was lucky ? but he did definitely have that rugged, hot blond thing going on. There weren’t many men who could get away with being so impossibly arrogant. Maybe Michael Fassbender, possibly Bradley Cooper, but that was it. But still, really not my type. So why was I imagining repopulating the world with him after a zombie apocalypse and simultaneously resisting a strong urge to kick him in the balls so badly that he turned into a lady? With a resigned sigh, I reached over to the picnic basket and grabbed the Cheetos. If in doubt, cheese was always the answer.
We were only on the water for fifteen minutes or so, but it was quite long enough. I peered over the edge of the boat pretending to be absorbed in the sealife under the waves. In reality I was just trying to avoid an embarrassing vomming situation. It turned out I did get seasick. I really was learning something new about myself every day. Thankfully, Nick barely acknowledged me while he captained our teeny vessel, though to be fair to him, sitting together in silence was a lot more companionable than any conversations we’d had so far.
Eventually we slowed down and began to head inshore. I leaned over the edge, hoping Nick wouldn’t push me in and sail away. The water was crystal clear, just like on TV, and I could see tiny fish darting around the sides of the boat. Brighton never looked like this. My bath water never looked like this. Further out, the ocean was dotted with smaller, rocky-looking islands jutting upwards and occupied by an assortment of interesting-looking birds. Back towards the mainland, the huge green mountain behind Bennett’s estate dominated the skyline, towering above the coconut palms and banyan trees. I couldn’t believe how breathtaking Hawaii looked from the water, and every time I blinked or wiped away some spray, I was slapped in the face by the soft, sweet smells of the island. The edge of saltwater just made the delicate floral breeze that much more wonderful, like sea-salt caramel ice cream. It smelled
so clean. I wanted to bottle the scent and wear it for ever. Or bottle it, sell it and make so much money I could come and live here for ever.
‘Do you actually know where we’re going?’ I asked Nick as he jumped out of the boat, barefoot, into ankle-deep water and dragged us both onto the beach. Manly. Hot. ‘Because I saw that film where Madonna got cast away on a beach for ages.’
‘No one saw that film,’ Nick replied. ‘And yes, of course I know. I’m not about to get stranded on a deserted beach with you, love.’
It took me a moment to decide which insult to deal with first.
‘Lots of people saw that film,’ I grumbled and held out my hand for him to help me out of the boat, but instead he just grabbed me round the waist and hauled me onto land without getting my feet so much as damp. My heart pounded and my knees felt weak. Colour me a lost cause. ‘Why did you bother bringing me in the first place?’
‘That,’ he said, wading back to the boat and recovering the picnic basket. And the half-empty bag of Cheetos. Two-thirds empty, ‘is a very good question.’
‘Just fancied having someone around to take the piss out of?’ I suggested. ‘Or maybe there’s something heavy you need me to carry?’
Nick stood three feet in front of me and frowned. ‘I wanted to come here. I thought you would like it. Zero ulterior motive. Why did you get in the boat?’
‘Vitamin B deficiency?’ I suggested from the safe place behind my sunglasses. ‘Jet lag? Morbid self-hatred?’
He took a step closer. I took a step back.
‘Are you always like this?’
‘Like what?’
‘An unrelentingly cynical bitch?’
It was fair to say I was a little stunned. Nick just stood there waiting for an answer. His blond hair was all mussed up from the water and I badly wanted to smooth it down. Sailing hair looked a lot like sex hair and it was incredibly distracting, but he had just called me a cynical bitch so I wasn’t feeling quite so weak at the knees any more. Just inches apart, I stared at him. No one had ever called me a bitch before in my entire life. Not even Amy. Doormat, yes. Walkover, on occasion. Regularly a martyr. Admittedly I was hardly Pollyanna, but a cynical bitch? Me?