I Heart Hawaii

by Lindsey Kelk

  ‘I know that was Angela but, if I didn’t know better, I might say that one is more likely to be a “you” thing, Jen,’ Louisa said. ‘No offence.’

  ‘Thank you,’ she said with a smile, placing a grateful hand on Louisa’s arm. ‘That totally sounds like something I would do, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Right, let’s get you out of that dress and into the next look,’ Paige ordered. ‘Leave the Elie Saab on the hanger and do the striped, sequined Saint Laurent.’

  Striped, sequined Saint Laurent? Finally something I could wholeheartedly get behind.

  ‘Christ on a bike, are you stripping off again?’ James wandered out of the main house as Rachel helped me out of the blue gown, leaving me standing on the travertine tiles in my knickers. ‘Jenny, all this female nudity is making me feel very hashtaggy.’

  She presented her cheek as he worked his way around the women by the pool.

  ‘Which hashtag?’ she asked. ‘There are so many you could choose from.’

  ‘I’m not sure yet. Let me see what’s trending and I’ll jump on whatever bandwagon is doing best.’

  Holding a towel up over my bare midriff, I gave an unsympathetic sniff.

  ‘I don’t know what to tell you, Jim. I’m sorry you’re so offended by the female form.’

  ‘It’s not so much the female form as you,’ he said before handing his sunglasses to Jenny. He peeled off his Balenciaga T-shirt, eliciting the world’s most feeble wolf-whistle from Louisa, kicked away his Off-White flip-flops and, without warning, broke into a run, coming straight at me as fast as he could.

  ‘James, no!’ I wailed as I realized what was happening, altogether too late to do anything about it.

  Six foot something of matinee idol launched itself off the ground, tackling me around the waist and hurling us both into the swimming pool. I heard myself scream right before we hit the water, only to have my protestations cut off by the impact. The shock of it all knocked the breath, and very nearly the wee, right out of me.

  ‘I told you I’d get you back!’ James spluttered, both our heads breaking the surface at the same time. ‘That’s for trying to drown me on the beach on Friday.’

  ‘You’re evil,’ I panted, wiping my eyes and leaving long sooty black trails on the backs of my hands. ‘And honestly, this really is the worst mascara ever made. I thought it was supposed to be waterproof?’

  ‘Supposed to be,’ Jenny agreed, holding out her hand to drag me from the water. ‘Whatever. We both know it sucks but you got a free trip to Hawaii out of it so maybe don’t be a dick?’

  ‘Smile for the camera!’

  I wiped my hand over my eyes and saw Paige waving from behind her phone. Oh good, she was filming the whole thing. And there I was, worrying I wouldn’t be able to relive the moment over and over for all eternity.

  ‘Jenny, any chance we could go for another ride on the horses this afternoon?’ I asked as Paige backed away quickly, pocketing the offending device.

  ‘Nope,’ she replied as I wrapped myself up in a towel and looked longingly at the striped, sequined Saint Laurent. My makeup was ruined, I was sopping wet, and this photoshoot was clearly well and truly over. ‘We have one last group activity and then it’s all free time until we leave, baby.’

  ‘But we’re bloody leaving tomorrow,’ I said as Louisa wailed with dismay in the background. Truly there was so little difference between my actual child and my friends after they’d had a few, it was alarming. Rachel was dead right on that one. ‘I really should try to find time to work on the book proposal. Any chance I can sit this one out?’

  ‘You won’t want to,’ Jenny assured me with a worrying grin on her face. ‘We’re gonna get your creative juices flowing. It’s all going to be very spiritual.’

  The closest Jenny came to spiritual was making an annual pilgrimage to the designer outlets at Woodbury Common.

  ‘Oh my god,’ I watched her gleeful expression grow as I hopped up and down on one foot, trying to get the pool water out of my ears. ‘You’re taking us to drop acid or something, aren’t you?’

  ‘Oh, Angie,’ Jenny laughed as she walked away towards the main house. ‘I can’t believe you think I would do something like that to you. Again.’

  Truly I had the best friends in the world.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  My hair was still wet when I met up with the rest of our group two hours later. A quick shower, a massive coffee, half a bacon sandwich, a five-minute chat with Alex and Alice, visual confirmation of him throwing his mother’s latest headband monstrosity directly into the bin, and I was a new woman. I closed my eyes, tilting my face upwards to feel the warmth of the sun on my skin. Bliss. Whatever this next activity Jenny had planned, it would be over in the next couple of hours and then I would settle myself down and write like the wind. My unrequested benefactor, Perry, had left me another message, checking in on my phone call with Luka and casually wondering exactly how many backstage passes she could get for Alex’s show. But I tried not to worry. Perry and The M.O.B. were something to think about when I got home, not when I was safe on an island, thousands of miles away.

  ‘Any idea what’s going on?’ Lou asked in a hushed voice.

  ‘Not the foggiest,’ I answered. ‘Maybe we’re doing an art class or something? She said it was creative.’

  Before anyone else could come up with a better suggestion, a small wooden door creaked open behind us. I turned to see an opening in an old, vine-covered wall I hadn’t noticed before. One by one, the other half of the group poured out, Pearl, Darcy, Elodie, Violet and the rest, each and every one of them in floods of tears.

  ‘Is it too late to make a run for it?’ I asked, grabbing Louisa by the hand.

  ‘Yes,’ Jenny replied, sticking her head out of the door. ‘Don’t even try it.’

  ‘Where are we going?’ Paige asked, frowning at Lily as she took out her camera to film the other girls.

  ‘Inside your soul,’ Jenny replied in an eerie voice. ‘And, in a more literal sense, into this garden.’

  ‘This garden is a very special place,’ Kekipi explained, as we filed inside, Louisa crossing herself as she went. ‘It was built and cared for by Jane Bennett, Bertie’s wife, before she passed. Jane had a spot like this on each of their properties, somewhere to hide away when their parties got a little too much.’

  ‘Did that happen a lot?’ Eva asked.

  Kekipi turned with an eyebrow arched so high, it could almost be considered his hair.

  ‘Honey, too much was just the beginning.’

  Last through the doorway, I wasn’t expecting much. Both of my parents were big fans of the National Trust but when you’ve seen one walled garden, you’d seen them all. And I had seen so very many fancy gardens, because what teenager didn’t like being dragged around Clumber Park during the school holidays?

  But this? This was something else entirely.

  I didn’t know the names of many flowers. Roses, daisies, peonies and that was about my lot. My dad was the hands-on gardener in the family and even he couldn’t keep a daffodil alive for more than one season, but what I did know was that this garden was extraordinary. Behind the stone wall, hidden from the rest of the world, was something so perfect I didn’t even know how to describe it. The lush green lawn was surrounded by hundreds of plants, bushes and trees, blooming with flowers in colours I’d never seen before. There were baby-pink trumpets that faded into a soft coral at their edges, star-shaped blossoms so saturated they were almost neon, tall palm trees, short shrubs, red, blue, green, yellow and every colour in between. It was magical, there was no other word for it.

  ‘They say the eyes are the window to the soul,’ Camilla Rose announced, closing the door to the garden behind us. ‘To celebrate our new mascara, we’ll be taking a look into our own souls.’

  Another woman entered through the wooden door. She was wearing a lot more tie-dye that I was usually comfortable with and, since Jenny had a blanket ban on white women with culturally inse
nsitive hairstyles, I had to assume she and her blonde deadlocks were with Camilla.

  ‘This is Truth,’ Camilla said, waiting for us all to settle down on the grass with our blankets before she began. ‘She is going to be our spirit guide this afternoon.’

  ‘I really like the garden but I think I’m ready to go back to my room,’ James whispered into my ear.

  ‘Thank you, Camilla,’ Truth said, lowering her head and pressing her hands together in front of her heart. ‘I am grateful for you.’

  I bit my lip as I caught the look James gave Jenny across our circle. This was definitely going to go well.

  ‘I’d like everyone to take a mirror from the centre of the circle,’ Truth instructed, waving at a wicker basket full of pale pink hand mirrors. ‘Now settle into a comfortable position. We’re going to spend some time getting to know ourselves a little better.’

  ‘Angela, I’m serious, if she tries to make us look at our vaginas, I’ll be over that wall like a rat up a drainpipe,’ Louisa hissed.

  ‘They’re not going to make you look at your vag in front of everyone,’ I whispered back before glancing over at Jenny. ‘But if they do, I’ll give you a leg up then you pull me over, yeah?’

  ‘First, we’re going to take a deep breath and find our silence,’ Truth cast Louisa and I a warning look before resting her palms on her knees and closing her eyes. I took a mirror and cleared my throat, suddenly overcome with the urgent desire to laugh. ‘Now, you’re going to make contact with yourself in the mirror.’

  ‘Bloody knew it,’ Louisa said under her breath.

  ‘I’m having Sixth Form French trip flashbacks and I don’t like it,’ James growled.

  I squawked loudly, turning my hysterics into a cough. ‘Sorry,’ I squeaked. ‘Something in my throat.’

  ‘Open your eyes and make contact with yourself,’ Truth repeated. ‘I want you to look at your reflection as you would your lover or your best friend. I want you to show yourself love and compassion and desire because you are a strong, powerful, beautiful soul.’

  And now I knew where Jenny had got her sodding affirmations.

  ‘Now, I want you to look into your eyes,’ Truth said. ‘That’s all. Just stare into yourself and look for something deeper than the now. What do you see?’

  I took a deep breath and sighed, holding the pink mirror up to my face. Blue eyes, bit bloodshot but no more than to be expected given the circumstances. My eyebrows needed plucking, something Jenny would likely mention before the end of the day, and my right eyelid seemed fractionally lower than the left. Hmm. Weird.

  ‘You’re not looking for imperfections,’ Truth called, somehow reading my mind. ‘I want you to find your own truth. I want you to learn something new about yourself.’

  Find something new, I told myself, find my truth. I already knew I had blue eyes. But had the ring around my iris always been so dark? And had I always had those tiny green flecks? I’d read something somewhere that your baby leaves its DNA in you after she’s born, so you’re actually physically altered by becoming a mother. I wondered if it was possible Alice had left the green flecks. They were almost the same colour as her eyes, as Alex’s eyes. I spent so much time searching for myself in her but I’d never thought to look for her in me.

  A sharp sniff at the side of me broke my concentration. Glancing over my shoulder, I saw Jenny wiping away a tear, before realizing, to my surprise, I was crying too. Christ, this woman was good.

  ‘Today we are going to learn that we are all enough, exactly as we are,’ Truth said as we lowered our mirrors, all of us with damp, misty eyes. Well, all of us except Lily. ‘I would like everyone to tell the circle one thing they are afraid of. Our fears hold us prisoner. They build walls between our soul and the next when the reality is, we are all one. Fear, shame, hatred, these are false constructs designed to disempower us. There is nothing to be afraid of in this universe once we all understand that very simple fact. Now, who would like to share something that scares them?’

  Strangely enough, no one volunteered to go first.

  ‘I guess someone has to start,’ Jenny said, wiping away a tear. ‘Eva?’

  ‘Thanks, Jenny,’ Eva grumbled. ‘Um, I guess I’m afraid I’ll never find a boyfriend.’

  ‘And why is that?’ Truth asked.

  ‘Because I haven’t had a boyfriend in, like, two years?’ she replied.

  Our spirit guide nodded encouragingly.

  ‘And why is that?’

  ‘Because I go on dates and they’re great but then it never turns into anything serious?’

  ‘And why is that?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Eva said, her confident voice beginning to break. ‘Because New York is full of cute skinny white girls and I’m not a cute skinny white girl? And my mom always said I’d end up alone if I moved to the city and none of these guys I go on dates with want anything long-term with me, they just want to date a black girl for a hot second and I’m afraid my mom was right.’

  With that, she burst into full-on, body-rattling hysterics.

  Louisa reached out, took my hand and squeezed it tightly while Truth closed her eyes and breathed out.

  ‘And why is that?’

  ‘Because why would they?’ Eva croaked through her tears.

  ‘Do you believe everyone else here deserves love?’ Truth asked, opening her eyes.

  She nodded.

  ‘Then you must realize you also deserve love,’ she said. ‘Your mother speaks out of fear, you believe her because of fear. Love is on its way to you but it won’t arrive until you’re ready.’

  ‘Maybe I’ll reinstall Bumble,’ she sniffed, wiping her face with her sleeve. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Gratitude is beauty,’ Truth replied, smiling at the group. ‘Now, who’s next?’

  Everyone stared at each other, in stony silence.

  James broke it first.

  ‘I use humour as a defence,’ he wailed.

  ‘My life is boring,’ Louisa sobbed.

  ‘I feel selfish for missing my old life since I had Alice,’ I admitted.

  Everyone turned to look at Lily.

  ‘What?’ She sat up, shoulders prickling. ‘I don’t have anything.’

  ‘Nothing?’ Eva asked, smearing her supposedly waterproof mascara across her face. ‘There’s nothing you’re afraid of?’

  She sighed and rolled her eyes, lips pursed in concentration.

  ‘Red meat?’

  ‘We’ll come back to you,’ Truth said kindly. ‘Now, let’s close our eyes and fold over into child’s pose. If anyone isn’t familiar, raise your hand and I’ll assist you. After a quick breath break, we’ll delve deep into our fears and work on overcoming them, together.’

  Rolling forward, I stretched my arms out ahead of me and pressed my face into the grass. It smelled gorgeous, like any other grass I’d smelled before was an inferior imitation. Charlie Red to Chanel No. 5.

  ‘Breathing in for ten,’ Truth said, her voice moving around the garden above me. ‘And breathing out for ten.’

  A quiet, scuffling sound at the side of me was enough to break my concentration and I looked up to see Jenny crawling over to the door and out of the garden.

  ‘Breathing in for ten.’

  Truth’s choice of hairstyle aside, all this self-help bollocks was right up Jenny’s alley but she hadn’t offered anything up to the group. She might seem fearless but I knew there were lots of things Jenny was afraid of. Open-water swimming, giant subway rats, doing her taxes on time, she could have said any one of those things but, no, she stayed silent.

  ‘Breathing out for ten.’

  Enough was enough. Hadn’t she promised me a fantasy weekend of the two of us hanging out in a hot tub, getting rat-arsed and indulging in some serious BFF time? Wasn’t the fact we’d barely seen each other over the last few months the actual guilt trip stick she’d used to beat me into coming here? This was the final straw. The proverbial camel’s back was well and truly broken and I was de
termined to get to the bottom of whatever was going on.

  Slowly, stealthily, I waited until Truth’s back was turned before crawling off my blanket, across the grass and out the door. I staggered upright, rubbing the feeling back into my thighs, and set off for the villas at a brisk pace.

  ‘Jenny!’ I called, catching sight of her curls bouncing along the path ahead of me. ‘Jenny, wait.’

  ‘Go back in the garden,’ she ordered without turning round. ‘You’re missing the session.’

  ‘You’re missing the session,’ I countered, picking up my pace until we were shoulder to shoulder. ‘What’s going on?’

  She stopped in front of her villa, her whole body shaking with sobs.

  ‘I’m totally OK,’ she said, holding her key in a shaky hand. ‘I just didn’t want to do it.’

  ‘You look it,’ I replied. ‘Jenny, what’s wrong?’

  ‘Low blood sugar?’ she muttered. ‘For real, go back to the garden. You don’t wanna know how much I spent bringing that crackpot out here.’

  I took the key out of her hand and opened the door to the villa, guiding her inside while she swept away the last few tears. Her villa was exactly the same as mine. If I’d invited fourteen backpackers to bunk down and leave their shit absolutely everywhere.

  ‘I’ll be good to go in a minute,’ she insisted, shutting herself in the bathroom as I picked up a thong from the arm of her sofa. I had forgotten what a joy she was to live with. Poor Mason. ‘And don’t touch anything, I know exactly where everything is!’

  ‘How?’ I asked myself, taking in the piles of paper, makeup, clothes, room service plates and Précis-branded everything, from Swiss exercise balls to sanitary towels. Picking up a particularly nasty-looking napkin with my fingertips, I turned to drop it in the bin by the desk. And that was when I saw it. Wrapped in a bag, wrapped in tissue, it was barely visible at the bottom of the bin but, once I had seen it, I couldn’t pretend I hadn’t.

  ‘Jenny?’ I marched across the room, not sure what I was going to say but knowing I had to say something. ‘Jenny, open this door right now.’