Five Years From Now

  I don’t go back and join Van for the rest of the evening, but I’m always aware of where he is and I know he’s never on his own, mostly talking surf with the other guys.

  As the minutes count down to midnight, I’m surrounded by my friends on the dance floor. Drew is close by, as are Ellie and Brooke, but Van is on the other side of the room with Nick and Max.

  ‘Ten, nine, eight…’ The crowd begins to chant. ‘Seven, six, five…’ Van and I lock eyes with each other across the jam-packed space. ‘Four, three, two, one…’ Everyone erupts with cheers and I’m engulfed by Ellie, followed by Brooke, and then Drew is in front of me, smiling and flashing his dimple.

  I’m immune to it. He cups my face with his hands and bends down to kiss me, but at the last second, I turn my face away so his lips land on my cheek. When he withdraws, I’m staring at Van.

  ‘Do you want to use the bathroom first?’ I whisper when we arrive home, kicking off my shoes in the hall and attempting to act normally.

  ‘No, go for it,’ Van replies, also in a whisper so we don’t disturb Dad.

  I walk straight ahead, pulling on the light switch and closing the bathroom door behind me. I take off my make-up and brush my teeth as quickly as I can, knowing that he’s out in the hall, waiting his turn.

  My heart stutters when I open the door to find him right there. His night-sky eyes penetrate mine as the moment draws out. And then my heart does an about-turn and speeds up. He takes a step towards me and I slowly back into the bathroom. Without breaking eye contact, he closes the door behind him and locks it, his hand reaching for the light switch. There’s a click and the room falls into darkness.

  I am intensely aware of the sound of our breathing. He edges closer so we’re hip to hip, my lower back pressed against the cold, hard edge of the basin. My eyes adjust enough to see the shape of him, so I know that when he bows his head he’s going to kiss me, but it still comes as a shock to feel his lips on mine.

  I’m effervescent as I kiss him back, my hands twisting in the fabric of his shirt as my knees turn to jelly. He clasps my face and deepens our kiss, and my head spins as our tongues entangle. Out of the blue, Ellie and Brooke’s shocked faces assault my mind and I slide my mouth away, panting. But Van is still there, pressed up against me, and the pull is too strong. I shut out Ellie and Brooke and Dad and everyone else, and return my lips to his.

  A week and a half later, I lie in bed, experiencing the strangest, most confusing mix of emotions. Tomorrow morning, Van flies home to Australia and I am devastatingly, crushingly sad at the thought of him leaving. As soon as Dad is asleep, I’m going to him.

  Over the last ten days, our relationship has fast-forwarded at a whiplashing speed. It’s been near impossible to keep our hands off each other when Dad has been in the room, and we’ve stolen kisses and caresses at every opportunity – behind doors, down on the deck, even on the sofa when Dad has been in the bathroom. But in the two hours between Dad leaving for work and Ellie’s mum picking me up for school, we haven’t had to hide.

  At first, we stayed in the house, kissing and cuddling in the living room, but the last few days have seen things getting increasingly heated, and as soon as Dad’s car has pulled away from the drive, we’ve retreated to Van’s bedroom, where we’ve been getting to know each other on a much more intimate level.

  Yesterday, we came scarily close to going the whole way. The same thing happened this morning, with us only just managing to stop. We haven’t had any protection and it has been agonising, but we couldn’t buy condoms from the village shop without fear of Dad finding out, and although Van has been surfing with Nick and Max on a few occasions, he hasn’t found any on his ventures.

  Then, this evening, he discovered that the sailing club has machines in the men’s bathrooms…

  We are taking that final step tonight.

  I always thought that I’d have a boyfriend for months, maybe a year, before I’d consider going the whole way, and I certainly didn’t think I’d lose my virginity at the age of fifteen.

  But I desperately want Van to be my first – in every way – and he wants me to be his.

  I’m excited, apprehensive, miserable about him leaving, and I still have lingering feelings of guilt and shame. Van and I may not technically be siblings, but we lived like brother and sister for five years and I hate to think of people judging us. Dad, without a doubt, would be horrified at how our feelings have developed.

  I’m also sad that I’m about to jump over this huge milestone and I can’t even tell my best friend. Ellie already feels snubbed because I haven’t invited her to hang out with us after school.

  I crane my neck and listen. Dad must be asleep by now. It’s not the first time we’ve taken a risk, but there is a very big difference between those early days when I lay in Van’s bed and we innocently talked to what we’re doing now.

  We both feel terrible about going behind Dad’s back and deceiving him, but tonight we’d do just about anything to deaden the pain of Van’s impending departure.

  I slip out of bed and creep over the floorboards, carefully avoiding those that creak. Moments later I’m in the hall, slipping on my shoes and hurrying through the freezing night air to the annexe. I tap lightly on the door and it opens.

  All the emotions I’ve been experiencing intensify when I stare into Van’s eyes. He tugs me into the room and closes the door before pressing my back up against the wall. His jeans are rough against the soft material of my PJs, and when he breaks our kiss to stare at me, his eyes are black with desire.

  Past his shoulder, I catch sight of his packed bags and tears spring up in my eyes. His expression becomes tormented as he rests his forehead against mine. I blink back tears, not wanting to waste precious moments by crying.

  We undress each other and move to the bed, kissing and caressing and getting closer and closer to the point of no return. I feel crazily on edge – like something inside me will snap if it doesn’t happen soon.

  ‘Are you ready?’ he whispers, his breath hot in my ear.

  I nod and he sits up, the duvet falling from his back and leaving me exposed.

  ‘You’re so beautiful,’ he murmurs, running his hand along the curve of my waist.

  I shiver with the cold, but reach up to touch him, too, tracing my fingers over the contours of his chest.

  ‘You are,’ I reply and he smiles such a sweet smile at me before reaching for the condom on his bedside table.

  My eyes are as round as saucers as he rolls it on, nerves ricocheting around my stomach.

  And then I blink and wake up in a nightmare.

  The door has flown open, the lights have gone on and Dad is standing in the middle of the room. He shakes his head quickly, as though he can’t believe his eyes.

  Van jolts backwards, accidentally leaving me uncovered. He realises his mistake and hastily tries to repair it, but in doing so, Dad catches sight of Van’s own exposed frame and, I swear, I never again want to see that look on my father’s face.

  ‘What the HELL is going on?’ he shouts, his eyebrows practically hitting his hairline as Van wilts in front of him. ‘What are you DOING?’

  It’s a rhetorical question. There is absolutely no doubt about what we’re doing.

  ‘She’s like your SISTER!’ he yells, shock and horror streaking across his features.

  I realise with a pang that his fury is, at this moment, entirely directed at Van.

  Dad’s eyes are wide as he advances, Van hastily reaching for his hoodie and pulling it on. ‘I brought you here!’ Dad yells in Van’s face. ‘I paid for your ticket! You were – you are! – like a son to me! And you’re doing this here,’ he looks around the room, ‘with my daughter… under my nose… in your mother’s studio?’

  My heart splits in two as Van jolts viciously.

  ‘Dad, please!’ I interject, knowing that the damage my father is doing to him is irreparable. I grab Van’s hand. ‘Don’t blame him!’

  Dad looks at me
as though he can’t believe I’m actually here, but he breaks eye contact almost immediately.

  ‘Put some clothes on,’ he spits in my general direction, gathering up my pyjamas from the floor and hurling them at the bed. ‘How could you?’ He sounds so hurt that I burst into tears, weighed down with regret and remorse.

  ‘I’m sorry!’ I blub as I slide my arms into my pyjama top. Van comes out of his daze and pulls on his jeans.

  ‘You two were supposed to be brother and sister!’ He can’t even look at me. It’s all of my worst fears realised.

  ‘But we are not brother and sister!’ Van raises his voice angrily. ‘I love her!’ He shakes his head rapidly and points at me. ‘I’ve always loved her, but what I feel for her now is not the same as when we were ten. I am in love with her.’

  Dad’s eyes rest on me and I nod, my heart squeezing excruciatingly.

  ‘We love each other,’ I whisper, willing him to understand, to accept this for what it is. ‘I’m in love with him.’

  He stares at me for a long moment, but then his confused expression clouds over with dismay and disappointment.

  ‘Go back to bed,’ he tells me in a choked voice before looking at Van. ‘If you weren’t already leaving in the morning, I’d be booking you on the next flight home.’

  Van slumps on the bed and buries his head in his hands as Dad waits for me to leave the room.

  I didn’t know it was possible to feel this bad. Obviously, we all went through worse five years ago, but this is a different kind of agony. This humiliation, this level of remorse… I don’t know how I’ll ever recover.

  Two weeks have passed since Van left and I’m still not sure how I’m getting up and functioning each day. Ellie thinks I’m heartbroken over my ‘brother’ leaving, and the thought of her finding out what actually happened fills me with dread. I come home from school each day and retreat to my room. I can barely eat, I barely sleep, and on top of all that, I feel absolutely heartbroken – because I’ve lost Van, too.

  ‘Nell.’ Dad is outside my bedroom door.

  I don’t reply, but he comes in anyway. It’s Saturday so I don’t have to drag my bones from bed, and I don’t intend to.

  ‘I thought we might take Scampi for a walk on the beach,’ he says quietly.

  I shake my head.

  ‘Nell, we can’t keep living like this.’

  I roll away to face the wall, pulling the cuddly koala Van gave me for Christmas against my chest.

  Dad sighs heavily and the end of my mattress compresses as he sits down on my bed.

  ‘It’s time to move on,’ he tells me in a husky voice. ‘What’s done is done.’

  My chest heaves as I begin to shake with silent sobs.

  ‘Nell,’ Dad murmurs.

  ‘I miss him!’ I cry.

  This time he doesn’t say anything, but after a minute I feel his hand on my shoulder. He gently but firmly turns me to face him.

  ‘I love you, darling,’ he says in a voice racked with emotion, his eyes brimming with tears as he brushes hair away from my face.

  I feel like it’s the first time he’s looked at me properly since he found us together.

  ‘This is for the best. You’re too young to be doing that sort of thing. You’re only fifteen!’ he says imploringly, squeezing my shoulder. ‘I know this might be hard to believe right now, but one day, maybe five years from now, you’ll look back and understand why this happened.’

  A feeling of déjà vu comes over me and I flash back to Van and me, aged five, at the top of the stairs. We were eavesdropping on our parents and Ruth said something similar.

  But no. I’ll never understand this, not in five years, not in twenty, not when I’m an old lady, shrivelled and grey.

  The only boy I’ve ever loved is halfway round the other side of the world. And God only knows when I’ll see him again.

  Twenty

  ‘Thanks for driving.’ I reach across and run my fingers through the short dark-brown hair at Joel’s temple. He yawns and gives me a sleepy smile.

  ‘Yeah, it’s a long one, isn’t it?’

  ‘Now you understand why I don’t do it very often.’

  He rubs at his right eye with his knuckle. ‘Do you reckon your dad is still up?’

  He sounds knackered. I doubt he’s in the mood for meeting my father for the first time.

  I glance at the whitewashed cottage ahead and shrug. Light glints through cracks in the living room curtains, but that could be the lamp that’s left on at night.

  ‘Let’s find out.’ I open the car door and step out into the cold air, stretching my arms over my head to release some of the tension after the long car journey. Eight hours, door to door – but we did travel through rush hour.

  We’re in Cornwall for the Easter holidays. Joel and I go to university together in Liverpool where we’re both doing media studies. I wasn’t sure about him at first. He was always cracking jokes and making quips during lectures and I thought he was a bit too cocky and overconfident, but then he helped me out with some coursework and I found that he had a sweet side. Sparks flew one night at the student union and we ended up back at his place. We’ve been together for about seven months.

  His parents live in Stoke-on-Trent, which is only about an hour away from our campus, so I’ve met them a couple of times. I feel bad that Joel still hasn’t been introduced to Dad. I haven’t been home since Christmas and it felt too soon to be bringing my boyfriend back then.

  I was supposed to be going to New York to see Mum, but she and her husband, Robert, decided to go on a cruise at the last minute. She only ever puts pressure on me to visit when it suits her. I hate leaving Dad alone at Christmas, anyway, so I was relieved when she made other arrangements.

  ‘You can leave your bag here,’ I say to Joel, dumping my own on the annexe doorstep.

  ‘Are you sure your dad is okay with us sleeping together?’ he asks.

  ‘I think so. He said he was.’ It was an uncomfortable conversation, to be honest, but it would have been a little odd for us to sleep in separate rooms when we’ve been practically living together for the last few months.

  I unlock the front door and lead the way. The hall and living room lights are on, but the TV is off and the cottage is silent. I poke my head around the door of the living room and grin. Dad is fast asleep on the sofa.

  ‘Dad!’ I whisper loudly.

  He stirs, blearily opening his eyes and gasping at the sight of me. ‘Nell!’ he exclaims in a croaky voice, slowly removing his tired limbs from the cushions.

  Smiling, I go and help him to his feet. Joel hovers by the door as we embrace.

  ‘Dad, this is Joel.’

  Dad steps forward to shake his hand. ‘Hello, Joel. Sorry I’m not more awake to welcome you.’ Has my father shrunk since I last saw him? Joel is five foot ten, but he seems quite a bit taller than Dad. ‘What time is it?’ Dad asks me.

  ‘Eleven,’ I reply.

  ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ Dad’s eyes dart between us.

  ‘Joel?’ I ask.

  He nods. ‘Sure.’

  I have a feeling that my boyfriend would rather go straight to bed, but he’s being polite. I squeeze his jumper-clad forearm as we follow Dad through to the kitchen.

  ‘I’ll give you a tour in the morning,’ I tell him.

  ‘It won’t take long,’ Dad pipes up.

  ‘Nell told me you’ve lived here all your life.’ Joel tries to make conversation as we sit down at the table.

  ‘Fifty-five years,’ Dad confirms.

  ‘He’s always said he’ll be leaving in a coffin,’ I state wryly.

  ‘I don’t blame you.’ Joel grins. ‘I’ve seen pictures of the view.’

  This is the right thing to say to my father.

  We retire to the annexe after not too long. Dad looks absolutely exhausted – we all are.

  ‘I’ll see you in the morning.’ I press my lips to my father’s warm, gravelly cheek and he kisses my forehead
in turn.

  ‘It’s good to have you home, darling.’

  Joel uses the bathroom while I grab the keys and let myself into the annexe. My heart always speeds up a little when I come in here – it’s almost as though the place is haunted, squashed so full of memories that it overwhelms me. I’ve never slept in here before, but friends have when they’ve come to stay. I’m hoping it’ll help, being here with Joel.

  Joel falls asleep almost as soon as his head hits the pillow, but I lie there for a while, staring over at the wardrobes.

  Ruth’s work still lies within, along with Van’s paint set. He didn’t take anything with him five years ago, but he left a letter on his bed for Dad. Dad disclosed that he’d asked if we could keep his mother’s artwork safe for him until he was in a position to take it home, but that was all he revealed about the letter’s contents. I searched for it on and off for a few months, but never found it.

  I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to block out the past. It still hurts when I think about it. Luckily I’ve learnt not to do it very often.

  The next morning, I awake to see Joel over by the window, in his boxer shorts, peeking out of the curtains.

  ‘Morning,’ I say groggily.

  ‘Hi.’ He casts a smile at me over his shoulder.

  ‘Some view, huh?’

  ‘Incredible.’ He kneels on the bed and leans forward to plant a kiss on my lips. ‘I was about to nip to the loo.’ He stands up and grabs his clothes from the chair he threw them on last night. ‘You could do with an en suite in here.’

  ‘Tell me about it.’

  ‘Do you reckon your dad’s up?’ Joel asks, buttoning his jeans.

  ‘Probably. He wakes at the crack of dawn.’

  He looks nervous and I smile. ‘Do you want me to come with you?’

  He nods, so I get out of bed and dress quickly.

  Dad is at the kitchen table with his usual cup of tea when we enter the cottage. Joel says good morning, then goes to take a shower.

  ‘Have you any plans for today?’ Dad asks when we’re alone.

  ‘Not today – we’re all yours. Tonight, though, Ellie and some of the others are going to The Boatman for a few drinks. Do you mind if we join them?’