The Heatwave

by Katerina Diamond

  I pull out my phone to text Chris. It’s unusual for me to open my phone and not find a supportive message from him there, although in recent months I have noticed a change in the way he is with me. He’s been less tolerant of my idiosyncrasies lately and it’s as if I want to push him even further, to see how far I can before he stops loving me. I miss him. I can tell he is unhappy because I have no notifications at all. I just message the word ‘here’ along with a kiss and turn my phone off. For now I want to sleep.

  I brush my teeth, desperate to get rid of the sugary coating from the Coke I had in the car. I look at my reflection for what feels like the first time in days and wipe the heavy black liner from my top lid and what remains of my red lipstick. It’s one of those lipsticks that lasts for hours. I’m not even sure why I put it on for the journey. Habit, I suppose. I don’t go anywhere without my war paint on. I pull my hair into a ponytail on top of my head and wash my face, then I moisturise. My little routines are often what get me through when my anxiety starts to creep to the surface – which is why social situations are so hard; I don’t have a routine for those.

  The bed is huge, a super king I suspect, and just magnifies my loneliness as I climb in, sticking to the left hand side because that’s where I always sleep. I try to shuffle to the middle but it just feels wrong somehow. I put my phone on the bedside table even though it’s off and I lie down and count backwards from a hundred in my head. It’s a method I contrived to stop myself from thinking too much before I fall asleep, otherwise the night terrors come and those are something you never quite get accustomed to. In the back of my mind I can see faces from my past that I have tried to forget so I concentrate on the numbers.

  Seventy-eight. Seventy-seven. Seventy-six. Seventy-five. I see hands claw at me for help but I pull away. Seventy-four. Seventy-three. Seventy-two. I watch helplessly as the sea swallows them. Seventy-one. Seventy. Sixty-nine. Sixty-eight. I stand for a moment at the cliff’s edge and watch for them to reappear, but it never happens. I close my eyes tighter and focus harder on the numbers. Sixty-seven. Sixty-six. Sixty-five. Stop thinking. Please stop thinking …

  Chapter Seven

  Then

  It turned out that Jasmine’s parents knew Tim from when Lisa worked in the shelter last year. Tim was homeless and staying with the Burgesses for a while until he got back on his feet. He was going to work on the Burgess house in return for a reduced rent. Until then, Tim had painted elderly people’s homes in exchange for a hot meal. Since he’d started doing that, lots of people had paid him to do odd jobs for cash and he’d largely managed to turn his life around, though he’d been living out of his car until now.

  Jasmine helped her father in the garage. They had both woken up at the crack of dawn, the sun already shining. They were putting all the boxes that didn’t need to be unpacked just yet in there. Considering they had moved from a smaller house it was amazing how much stuff they had brought with them.

  ‘Can Flick come over when you go away next weekend?’

  ‘She’s always welcome here, I hope she knows that.’

  ‘I suppose Tim will be around as well?’ she said, almost spitting his name.

  ‘I don’t know what you’ve got against him. Has he said anything to upset you?’

  ‘No, he hasn’t said anything. It’s not that. Don’t you think he’s weird?’

  ‘People say I’m weird, Jasmine, doesn’t make me a bad guy. No one besides you has a bad word to say about him. He’s done a lot of good things for people for no payment. He’s ex-military so I know we can trust him. This is no different to us helping the people when we go abroad. Charity begins at home, Jasmine.’

  Jasmine handed her father another box to put on the shelf. She knew when her parents got it into their minds to help someone there was no deterring them. She just resented not being consulted on something that would impact her life just as much as theirs.

  ‘Why isn’t he doing this then if he’s so brilliant? I thought he was staying to help around the house.’

  ‘He’s not going to be our personal slave, Jasmine. You can’t spare twenty minutes away from the television to stack a couple of boxes?’

  ‘He’s just always there, you know? He’s not very approachable either.’

  ‘Sometimes when people are afraid or shy, they can appear a bit awkward. He’s been through a lot and it’s our duty to help him. You’re just projecting when you say things like that. I think you’re feeling guilty for being unfriendly. You’re being a bit selfish and unreasonable and I’m not sure I like this side of you. We didn’t bring you up like that. I’d suggest you make more of an effort because he’s staying and you need to get used to it.’

  ‘Fine.’

  She knew better than to push the point with her father. He was a small man but he could be fierce when he wanted to.

  ‘Pass me the fishing rods and you can go back to whatever you were doing before I disturbed you. I’ve got to get off to work anyway.’

  Jasmine found it hard to believe that the person her father was talking about was the man living in their guest house. There was no warmth about him at all. But her parents weren’t the kind of people who took risks, so they must have been pretty sure about Tim to let him live with them.

  Jasmine’s room caught the sun for most of the day, and even with the curtains drawn the heat seeped in. She was tired that morning because she’d stayed up late reading a true crime book about women who killed. She found things like that fascinating, but her parents hated that she was into the macabre so she tried to read when they weren’t around. She wanted to read another chapter but it was just too warm in there and there probably wasn’t enough time before she went to school anyway.

  Jasmine had just settled in the kitchen with a bowl of muesli and her summer art project – meant to build her portfolio for college – when Tim knocked on one of the French doors. She felt she had no choice but to nod that it was OK for him to come in, remembering that her father had told her to be nice to him. So far, Jasmine had no reason to question her father’s judgement of character and if he trusted Tim then she had to as well.

  ‘Your dad told me he wanted me to work on the lounge today. Do you mind if I get started now?’

  ‘Why would I mind?’ Jasmine asked, a little more aggressive than necessary.

  ‘I just don’t want to disturb anyone. Is your dad here?’

  ‘No, he left for work already. Mum’s still in bed,’ she replied, wondering if she shouldn’t have let him in after all.

  Tim looked up as though he could see through the floor into her parents’ room. When there was no movement from upstairs, he relaxed a little, the deep furrow in his brow disappearing as he pulled a dining chair out and sat opposite Jasmine, almost reclining, his backside on the edge of the seat and one leg stretched out in front of him.

  ‘What you drawing?’

  ‘If you can’t tell then I’m doing it wrong,’ Jasmine said flippantly. She saw him smile and it was like looking at a different man; softer somehow, kinder.

  He placed his palms on the table then stood and leaned over, tilting his head to look at the drawing. She couldn’t take his eyes off his forearms; they were strong and tan and still sported those tiny white flecks. From this distance she could hear him breathing.

  ‘Is it the fruit bowl?’ he asked, still leaning over, his face just inches from Jasmine’s. She made the mistake of looking up and their eyes locked. For the first time she noticed his eyes properly; they were grey with a deep blue ring around the outside. Her pulse quickened, but Tim broke eye contact first and slumped back in the seat, taking the apple from the top of the bowl, the one she was sketching. She was drawn to his mouth as he bit into the apple, his lips moistening with the juice. She snapped her eyes away and stood up. Jasmine left her soggy muesli on the table, grabbed her art homework and stuffed it into her bag, suddenly wanting to get out of the house. When she looked back he was smiling, a different kind of smile this time. He pulled h
er bowl of muesli over and started to eat it.

  Chapter Eight

  At dinner that night, Jasmine’s parents talked about the group they usually went away with for the summer holidays. Guyana had been picked as their destination this year. Jasmine had never been there before. It was never much of a holiday for her family, if she was honest, as they went to do charitable work in underprivileged communities. Both of her parents saved up their annual leave and they usually stayed for several weeks and helped with the completion of a charity project – they’d been every year since before Jasmine was born. This year they couldn’t go, though, because her father had had hip replacement surgery earlier that summer and the doctor had advised against a long-haul flight. Jasmine knew he was devastated to cause them to miss their trip. He had always been so active and full of energy that she felt sorry for him. He had spent several months in pain before finally conceding to going in for the operation and his posture hadn’t seemed to have recovered. It hadn’t helped that he had a fear of hospitals that they didn’t really talk about, something from his childhood that had left an emotional scar. This was the first time she had really considered his age; seen the way his stature had changed in just the last year. He wasn’t a tall man to begin with and he had lost a little weight so it seemed he’d almost shrunk somehow.

  ‘How’s your drama club going? What’s the big play that you’re doing this year?’ Frank said, asking the obligatory parental questions about her interests.

  ‘Drama is going well. I might even get a part in the college production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream this year, what with us not going away. Lots of rehearsals going on over the summer.’

  ‘Oh, that’s exciting,’ her mother said in a way that made Jasmine think she wasn’t particularly excited at all. They loved travelling all over the globe and this would be the first summer that Jasmine could remember staying at home. She could tell both her parents were deeply disappointed about this.

  ‘Because I’m here for the rehearsals over the summer, Miss Cotterel said I should audition for the role of Titania, the fairy queen. I said I would happily help with the set design as well. The production isn’t until Christmas but because I already have a place on the drama A Level I can attend the auditions in August,’ Jasmine said, rubbing it in a little. Normally Jasmine’s interests came last. Not this time though; this time she could do all the summery things that had been denied to her in previous years. She knew her friend Felicity was jealous of all the places she had been and all the experiences she had had, yet she had prayed something would happen to stop them from travelling. She felt responsible for her father getting sick, as if his illness was somehow a manifestation of her resentful thoughts.

  ‘That’s wonderful, Jasmine, I’m proud,’ her mother said, and her father nodded his approval.

  ‘Is Felicity doing the play?’

  ‘Yes. Actually, I wanted to ask if you would mind giving her a lift to rehearsals with me and dropping her off.’

  ‘She still having problems at home?’

  ‘You know what her mum’s like.’

  ‘She’s back drinking then?’

  ‘She’s got a new boyfriend who is a complete nightmare apparently. Flick doesn’t like being there.’

  ‘Well, she is always welcome here as much as she wants over the summer. Poor girl.’

  Jasmine smiled to herself at the thought of all the fun she and Felicity could have over the break. She couldn’t help but feel guilty for being glad to be home this year. She had met so many people with much less than her who were more than content with their lives, happy even. Jasmine thought of the tobacco ladies in the tiny village in Peru. They would get paid to sit all day in the blistering heat, threading tobacco leaves onto a long string which would then be hung to dry in large rickety wooden sheds. Her family had visited the village when she was nine years old and she had made friends with the girls from the local area. They often went to sit with the tobacco ladies and help thread the leaves onto the string. A full day’s work there was brutal, the big flat needle often cutting or stabbing your fingers. The seasoned workers had yellow calloused hands and the smell of fresh tobacco permeated every item of clothing Jasmine wore on those days. There were very young girls working there too, younger than her, day in day out, in August heat. Jasmine wondered if some of those little girls she saw threading tobacco with their grandmothers were still working there today.

  ‘Did you see what Tim’s done in the lounge?’ Lisa said to Frank.

  ‘No, is it good?’

  ‘It’s not finished yet, but it’s going to be. He’s built low level cupboards in the alcove.’

  ‘I always wanted to be a carpenter. Maybe I should get Tim to teach me,’ Frank said.

  ‘We should see if we can interest him in coming away with us next year. A man with his skills could cut the building time of our projects in half.’

  ‘We hardly know him,’ Jasmine said, concerned with how quickly her parents were incorporating Tim into every aspect of their lives. Her parents’ mention of ‘next year’ made it sound like they were planning on making him a permanent fixture. Even though they had travelled all over the world they could be quite naive sometimes about people and their intentions. Jasmine had seen them get hurt before when they trusted the wrong people. She hoped they weren’t wrong about Tim. For all of their sakes.

  ‘Well, we don’t want to put that kind of pressure on him anyway. Especially when he is doing us such a huge favour.’

  ‘How is he doing us a favour?’ Jasmine asked, trying to keep the snark out of her voice.

  ‘He’s going to fit our new kitchen for us – it’s costing us about a quarter of what it would if we used a professional kitchen fitter. The things we want done in the house would take years and years to save for, so Tim really is a godsend.’

  ‘But you’re letting him live here,’ Jasmine pointed out.

  ‘And he’s paying us.’

  ‘With the money you’re paying him. How does that make sense?’

  ‘When you have a house and children of your own, you will understand how much things cost. He’s also continuing his work with the charity in town and doing jobs for elderly people. We really want to help him out. Charity begins at home. I’m surprised at you, Jasmine,’ her mother said, her pride in Jasmine disappearing.

  ‘I’m sorry. I think I’m just really tired. School was a bit hectic today,’ Jasmine said sheepishly, trying to win her mother’s approval again. She hated disappointing either one of her parents. The older she got the more it seemed to happen.

  ‘What if Tim had heard you?’ Frank asked disapprovingly. Jasmine could see that she was outnumbered. ‘I want you to make an effort to be nice to him, he’s a good guy.’

  ‘Look, I know why you’re nervous – it’s because of what happened at school. Not all men are like that,’ Lisa said, reaching across the table to comfort Jasmine, but she pulled her hand away from her mother.

  They just wouldn’t let her forget about the incident.

  ‘So, because of what happened last year I don’t know what I’m talking about? Don’t I deserve a little more credit than that? You want me to be more mature but then you treat me like a child.’

  ‘You can’t just go around being suspicious of everyone, Jasmine. He hasn’t done anything to warrant this attitude from you. He deserves a chance, at least.’

  ‘I guess my feelings matter less than the feelings of some stranger you’ve just let move in with us.’

  ‘That’s enough,’ Frank said in a voice that indicated he was done talking. He rarely snapped at Jasmine but she knew enough to know that she had lost this argument.

  ‘I’m tired, I’m going to bed,’ Jasmine told them and stood up quickly, the chair making the angry scream she wished she could.

  ‘Jasmine! Come back!’ her mother called after her, but she was already halfway up the stairs.

  Chapter Nine

  Now

  I wake up confused, slightly pani
cked at my unfamiliar surroundings before I remember where I am. I am still on my side of the bed, still locked in my old routine. I look at the clock and see that it’s after lunch. Without the children or Chris to tend to I feel aimless. I go to the window and look out towards the seafront and see the people walking from the centre up towards Jacob’s Ladder. It’s weird being this side of the looking glass. I glance at my phone and see Chris hasn’t called. He’s still annoyed at me, but what can I do? I have spent more than a decade just being available, changing my plans to accommodate his deadlines, having nothing better to do. Well, for once I have something better to do.

  After my shower I put on a grey summer dress that touches the floor when I walk. I feel very monochrome with my black hair and white sandals. I add my trademark red lipstick – I feel uncomfortable without it and it pulls the outfit together – and I take a small bottle of vodka from the minibar and drink it. I need some courage before I venture outside.

  I completely missed breakfast and so my first task is to find some food. I decide to walk via The Triangle, where the main bus terminal for the town is located. That was the last place the missing girl was seen. There won’t be anything there but it’s as good a place as any to start. The closer I get to my destination the more my stomach turns. I walk up the road past the Bedford Hotel and The Triangle comes into view. Nothing has changed about it. It’s strange how you can spend so long away from a place but still know it so well. I sit on the wall opposite the actual terminal and watch the buses come and go, the drivers a mix of men and women. The drivers were all very familiar with us kids, going up to town and back hundreds of times a week. There was one old driver who would offer the girls free bus rides if they would touch his crotch. As far as I know, no one ever did, but that didn’t stop him from asking. We all referred to him as Pervy Pete and that was all there was to it. No big deal. The thought of my Daisy dealing with guys like that really makes my skin crawl but she is the same age as I was back then; it would be naive of me to think she lives in a bubble of innocence.