Danny’s head pounds as he heads for the shore. It’s this island, it’s messing with his head. Honor probably wasn’t even talking about him just then. There are a hundred things she could have whispered in Meg’s ear. Why did he have to assume the worst?
He stops walking and rubs his hands over his face then stares up at the cloudless sky. He’s tired and he’s hungry. No wonder he can’t think straight. He’ll go back to the girls, grab whatever fruit he can cram in his mouth and find somewhere to have a nap. A good nap and he’ll be thinking straighter again.
Yes, that’s what he’ll do. He blinks, the bright sun burning his retinas, and lowers his gaze to the beach. He blinks again.
There’s a message, written in the sand less than a foot away from him, on the very edge of the sea.
One of you will die.
Chapter 25
JESSIE
I resurface, my chin clearing the water, then glance back at the beach. Milo’s walking along the sand holding an armful of huge banana leaves. I tread water as he places two leaves on the sand, one vertically, the other crossing it horizontally.
T
He selects three more leaves and puts them next to the first two.
A
I wait for Milo to look out to sea but he doesn’t. He continues to walk across the sand laying leaves down, one after another.
TALK
Arms empty he walks back into the jungle then returns after a few minutes, arms loaded up with banana leaves again. He spells out another word.
TO
He takes a step to his left and lays down more leaves. Only when he’s finished placing the last leaf does he look out to sea.
TALK TO ME.
I stare back at him, my heart twisting in my chest. I don’t know if I can talk to him. I haven’t talked to anyone about what happened last year. Not to Mum and Dad, not to my teachers, not to my friends at school, no one. My parents tried to get me to go and see a counsellor. I made it as far as the chair in her office but, as soon as she tipped her head to one side and asked me how I was feeling, in a voice like warm honey, I was out of the door.
Mum drove me home and I locked myself away in my room. I knew my parents were worried about me but I couldn’t drag myself out of the dark pit in my head. I didn’t want to talk to them. I didn’t want to talk to anyone. I just wanted the world to stop so I could get off.
Love wasn’t a good thing, it was the worst thing in the world. If I hadn’t loved Tom as much as I had then I wouldn’t feel as though my heart had been ripped from my body. The answer was to stop caring. To shut myself down emotionally. For ever. I even googled ‘how do you turn off your feelings?’ but I didn’t like the answers. I didn’t want to go on medication or learn to meditate. I didn’t want to dial my feelings down or learn to deal with them. I wanted to stop feeling. Full stop.
I knew psychopaths and sociopaths were in control of their feelings so I googled ‘films about psychopaths and sociopaths’ and watched every film on the list. Not one taught me how to turn off my emotions… until the last one. It was Dangerous Liaisons starring John Malkovich and Glenn Close. It was a period drama about a man and a woman battling each other for control and playing games with other people’s lives. I was going to turn it off because… how could it be relevant to my life? But then Glenn Close’s character had this scene where she talked about how she might appear calm on the surface but inside she was battling her emotions. She said that when she was fifteen and coming out into society she’d appear cheerful during dinner but, under the table, she’d stick a fork in the back of her hand. I don’t know why that image lodged itself so firmly in my mind but it did. That’s when I started twisting the skin on my forearm. It wasn’t a fork in the back of my hand but it was near enough.
I look back at Milo, standing on the beach behind a row of banana leaves.
He just wants to talk.
Milo’s eyes don’t leave mine as I walk up the sand towards him, rubbing my hands over my biceps, even though it’s not cold.
‘That’s um…’ I incline my head towards the sentence made out of leaves, ‘interesting.’
He half smiles. ‘Nothing’s ever easy with you, is it, Jess?’
‘Ha! Says you.’
‘So…’ There’s a shift in his expression. The sparkle disappears from his eyes and it’s replaced with a strained seriousness I’ve rarely seen. He’s nervous too. I can tell from the way he’s repeatedly clenching and unclenching his hands. He’s torn. He feels like he should talk to me about what happen to Tom but he’s scared to.
I don’t know what I’ll do if I open up. I could cry, I could rock, I could scream, I could pinch myself, I could run away. Or maybe all of them, one after another. I’ve been holding myself together for so long I’m scared that if I lift the lid on my emotions all the pain and the fear and the guilt I’ve been suppressing will bubble over and scald us both.
‘Milo,’ I say. ‘I’ll talk to you, but not about Tom.’
I can see the relief in his eyes. ‘OK, that’s fine. Whatever you want, Jessie.’
‘Shall we sit down then?’
‘Sure, ’course.’
We pretty much sit where we’re standing – a good foot or so separating us. I run my hands over my hair and squeeze out the seawater. Then, not sure what to do next, I inspect my fingernails. Now we’ve agreed to talk we’ve both been struck dumb.
Out of the corner of my eye I see Milo rub a hand over the back of his neck. ‘There’s um… there’s something we need to clear up.’
‘What’s that then?’
‘I’m not in love with my ex.’
He raises his gaze from the sand and looks at me, as though challenging me to disagree with him.
‘OK.’ I cross my arms over my chest and hang on to my shoulders, suddenly, weirdly aware that, other than a bra and knickers and khaki shorts, we’re pretty much naked. ‘Your sister seems to think you are.’
‘Meg thinks I’m in still love with Bella?’ His brow furrows. ‘But I was the one who split up with her. It wasn’t working. We were arguing all the time and it was stressing me out.’
‘She told Danny that you’re infatuated with her. I think she told Jeffers, too.’
‘Oh God.’ He blows out his cheeks in frustration. ‘Bella was – is – Meg’s best friend. And she’s pissed off with me for dumping her. I guess when we came here, she saw that I was…’ He drifts off, suddenly unable to maintain eye contact with me.
‘That you were what?’
My heart’s thudding against my rib cage and I’m breathing so shallowly I feel faint.
‘That I was…’ He swallows uncomfortably and looks back at me. ‘That I was spending a lot of time with you. And… I guess she… she…’
My stomach lurches uncontrollably. I feel like I want to cry or run or cover my ears and shout LA LA LAH! at the top of my voice but I’m rooted to the spot and I can’t tear my eyes away from him.
‘I guess she…’ He swallows again. ‘I guess she realized that I was… I am…’ He takes a shaky breath. ‘When my mum told me what had happened to Tom, I wanted to get on the Tube and come and see you. I wanted… I just wanted to hold you. I couldn’t bear to think of you going through all that pain on your own.’