by Karen Swan
PS Joke to follow. Sorry.
‘I still can’t believe this is a lake and not a sea,’ Meg said, her eyes on the distant horizon as they walked down the boardwalks of the Outer Harbour Marina together, each carrying a tote – Meg’s contained rolled-up towels and a change of swimwear; Ronnie’s had a bottle of wine, some olives, pastrami, crackers and a selection of dips.
Sunlight winked on the still water, as bright as pennies, as darting as fishes, the chandlery rigging reels clanking like tin cups in the breeze. Both Jack and Hap were already there, Jack bare-chested and wearing navy shorts as he wound in the mainsail, prompting Ronnie to whistle under her breath at the sight of his toned physique.
‘I bet he saw you coming and he’s doing that on purpose,’ Meg whispered.
‘Yeah? Who cares? Hold me back!’ she whispered excitedly, shooting Meg a mischievous look.
Meg rolled her eyes and groaned but in truth, she was happy to see her sister falling for someone at last. Nervously, she watched Hap, who was checking the bow ropes were clear, pulling them out of the water with a pole. He had his back to them and was wearing jeans (rolled up, natch) and a grey T-shirt and looking rather less metrosexual than last night.
The boat was bigger than she had anticipated. Jack’s modesty had led her to imagine it was just big enough to buzz about in the bay, but this was a six-metre motorized sailing boat with a navy hull and turquoise pencil line, although it looked fairly old, the paintwork dull, and she supposed it had been bought as a refurbishment project.
‘Balm, huh?’ Ronnie called out, reciting the boat’s name. ‘I’m guessing that’s a deliberate antidote to “trauma”?’
Jack turned and smiled at the sight of her and Meg thought that if he had seen them coming, then he was a good actor. ‘Exactly! I told you it’s my escape,’ he said, ducking under the boom and jogging carefully over the deck to them. ‘I’m glad you could come,’ he said to them both, hands on hips, but his eyes returning to Ronnie.
‘Well, we’re glad too,’ Ronnie replied after a pause.
‘Good morning!’ Hap called, coming to join them. ‘How are you?’
‘Great,’ Meg nodded shyly, feeling his eyes upon her. It didn’t matter what excuses they’d used to make their escape last night, he knew perfectly well that she had bolted the moment he’d touched her backside.
‘How’s the budgie?’
Meg froze as she realized she and Ronnie hadn’t agreed a story in advance.
‘Dead.’
She turned in astonishment to find Ronnie pulling a sad face.
‘You’re kidding?’ Jack asked.
Ronnie shook her head. ‘Flew into a window and broke her neck.’
‘Oh, my God. I’m so sorry,’ Jack sympathized.
Meg had to keep from laughing. Did budgies even have necks?
‘But at least it was quick,’ Ronnie said gravely. ‘It’s something to know that she didn’t suffer.’
‘Sure,’ Jack nodded, looking handsome and so earnest as he stood there, hands still on hips. ‘Well, I’m glad you’re not so upset you didn’t come out here.’
‘Oh, hey, we’re doctors. Death’s just an everyday part of life for us, right?’ Ronnie said lightly, dismissing the non-existent, now-dead budgie from all their minds.
Meg stole a glance at Hap, but he was already looking at her and the expression in his eyes told her that he wasn’t buying the story for a second.
‘Well, here, let me take the bags,’ Jack said, reaching out for them. The girls swung them into his grasp and Hap held his hand out to take them by the arm as they stepped on board. He held Meg’s arm a fraction longer than she thought was necessary and as she looked up at him, she felt that jolt again that she’d felt last night when their eyes had met.
She pulled away quickly, eyes down, as she followed Ronnie down to the cabin to stow their bags. If he thought something was going to happen between them, that this was a date between them, he was wrong. She was going to have to make that patently clear.
‘I guess we do have to do this sooner or later, right?’ Ronnie giggled, pulling off her T-shirt and shorts to reveal her tiny black triangle bikini with neon trim.
Meg took a deep breath and pulled off her own top and shorts – she was in one of Ronnie’s spare bikinis, an Aztec-print, blue-and-white bandeau style, after Ronnie had deemed her navy racing swimsuit too ‘Victorian’.
‘Hey!’ Jack said, his smile widening as they reappeared, scantily clad. ‘Let’s cast off then.’
‘Can we do anything to help?’ Ronnie asked casually. ‘We’re not complete strangers to boat life.’
‘No?’ Jack asked, throwing the rope onto the boardwalk as Hap untethered the bow line.
‘Our dad took us sailing a few times when we were little,’ Ronnie said. ‘I may even be able to remember my bosun knots,’ she grinned.
‘Now that’s just a challenge to my authority!’ Jack cried, clambering across the deck and jumping down by the wheel, beside Ronnie. She gave a small yelp of delight. ‘I don’t believe this, Hap – we’ve not even left harbour and already there’s mutiny!’
Hap grinned as he made his way to the stern as well, his eyes lingering on Meg. ‘I have a feeling we’re going to need to keep our wits about us, Jack,’ he quipped as the engines puttered softly beneath the water, propelling them away from the moorings with the wind in their hair – smiles on all their faces.
The bay was deep, so deep they couldn’t see the bottom, although the depth reader was saying it was sixteen metres. Balm bobbed gently on the water’s surface, only the wake from occasional boats further out in the lake rocking them every now and then.
They had eaten all the food – in addition to Ronnie and Meg’s offering of dips, Hap and Jack had brought chicken drumsticks and a ‘very metrosexual’ salad with at least three different types of seeds in, that Meg hoped had been made by Hap – could he be less her type? – as well as a six-pack of beers.
‘Well, I’m with you on the whole “living the dream” thing. I’m not sure a Sunday could be more perfect than this,’ Ronnie sighed from her position lying on her back on the cabin roof.
‘No? Not even a pfannenstiel incision laparotomy?’ Jack teased, watching the way her stomach rose and fell with her breath. Meg knew this because she was watching him watch her sister.
Ronnie sucked in through her teeth, conflicted. ‘Oh, that’s not fair!’ she cried and the two of them fell into laughter again. The creation of their very own in-jokes had already begun.
Hap looked over at Meg. ‘Doctor humour,’ he muttered with a sardonic expression. He was sitting on the captain’s chair, one foot up on the controls, and Meg had been trying very hard not to notice the blond hairs on his legs. Mitch’s had been dark and she’d always liked how masculine they’d looked, perhaps because they were so completely the opposite of her own.
‘So listen, I’ve been thinking about you,’ he said.
Meg’s head jerked up. He’d what? Why? In her peripheral vision, she saw Ronnie’s attention was caught too.
‘About your design portfolio, I mean,’ he added, but that look in his eyes that he seemed to get when he looked at her . . . she felt like he was testing her, provoking her, trying to establish how easily she startled – to which he now surely knew the answer was ‘very’. ‘I’ve got a friend who works for Kate Spade. You know her? The handbag and acc—’
‘I live in Banff, not Billericay. Of course I know who Kate Spade is.’
He nodded, amused by her prickliness. ‘Well, they’re looking to do a rebrand – everything from the store fronts to the tissue paper to the purse linings. It’s a big gig.’
Meg stared at him, her stomach feeling empty, in spite of the huge lunch she’d just devoured. (She didn’t know what was going on with her appetite. Since getting here, she’d been ravenous, as though her body had woken up to the fact that she’d been eating at a subsistence level for four months.)
‘Anyway, I think you
’d have a great shot at it. After you . . . uh, left last night –’ he made his gaze more pointed, bringing them both back to that moment, the one that had made her run – ‘I went back to my hotel and looked at the Titch boards in more detail. I mean, I was obsessed with the Crush series but I didn’t really know your other stuff.’ He looked impressed. ‘You should definitely speak to her.’
‘But . . . but they’re in New York and I’m in Alberta.’ Panic wrapped around her like a comforting cardigan – familiar and well-used.
His eyes danced. ‘You’ve heard of planes, right?’
She laughed and looked away, feeling foolish.
‘Listen, it’s still early days – they’d want to see your portfolio first. But they’d fly you in if things got serious. Or they could do video-conferencing. You don’t necessarily have to be in the same room as them to fulfil the brief.’
Ronnie, Meg noticed suddenly, was sitting bolt upright. ‘Oh, my God, this is amazing. Meg! You’ve got to go for it.’
Did she? Did she really? It had been one thing designing the boards for the boys. They’d given her the vaguest of briefs – ‘something cool’ – and left her to it. It was no brief at all, in fact. Carte blanche. Free rein. That was a very different thing from taking a world-famous brand that all the chic, rich Park Avenue people knew and loved and . . . and completely redesigning it! What did she know about style? She was the girl who wore Patagonia T-shirts and the closest she came to a heel was on a welly boot.
‘Hap, she’s in!’ Ronnie said, answering for her. ‘Don’t let her fret her way out of it. She’ll always find a reason to push it away. Put her name forward.’
Hap looked pleased. ‘I’m glad you said that. I suspected as much myself so I emailed my contact this morning.’ He looked back at Meg. ‘They should be in touch with you sometime in the next few weeks – just for a preliminary chat.’
‘Oh, my God, you didn’t!’ Meg wailed, her hands pulling down on her cheeks.
But everybody laughed – as though her anxiety was amusing and already entirely predictable to this new-found group of four.
‘Last one in does the washing-up!’ Ronnie cried suddenly, running towards the side and launching herself into the water with a perfect dive. Jack, lying on the stern deck, was in barely a moment later.
Meg gasped – forgetting all about her panic for a moment – as she saw it was between her and Hap and she scrambled up onto her feet. Hap, already sitting upright, lost his advantage in that he had to swerve round the main mast, giving Meg just enough time to grab the giant inflatable ring from the side as she took a flying leap. Her feet made contact with the water only a split second before Hap’s, both of them surfacing with gasps as Ronnie and Jack declared her the winner.
‘Ha!’ she crowed, pleased to have got an advantage over him for once, wriggling into the inflatable so that her legs, arms and head lolled over the sides. She gave a heavy sigh as she allowed her body to lie heavily and limply; she’d been so tense since getting on the boat, worried that as things intensified between Ronnie and Jack, Hap might take it as a cue to make his move.
Well, she’d put him straight if he so much as—
Hap swam slowly over, his nose and mouth submerged below the water so that only his eyes – glittering, full of predatory intent – were visible.
Oh, God.
Meg couldn’t help it. She squealed as he ducked underwater, unable to see where he was as she wriggled about in the ring, looking for him. A pinch on her bottom two seconds later pinpointed his whereabouts exactly.
When he surfaced, her mouth was still open with surprise. He laughed again. ‘You’re very easy to shock.’
She closed her mouth, not sure what to say but aware that she looked daft. She glanced at him, away again, at him, away again. She didn’t trust him, wasn’t quite sure what he was going to do next. Her heart was racketing along at full pelt.
He drifted over to her, holding onto the side of the inflatable and pulling himself up slightly, his eyeline straight at her breasts, although he had the decency to look her in the eye. ‘Tell me – there’s something I really have to know.’ His voice was low, as though he was asking her for a secret.
She swallowed, aware that his fingers were mere centimetres from her thighs, skin on skin. ‘What?’ Her voice was barely more than a croak.
A moment passed as he held her gaze, both of them bobbing lightly on the lake’s surface, the hot sun already drying her stomach and his shoulders, beads of water travelling on brown skin.
He smiled wickedly. ‘Where, in God’s name, is Billericay?’
Chapter Twenty-one
Monday 31 July 2017
It was a date. It didn’t matter what Ronnie or even Hap had said – ‘You gotta eat, don’t you?’ – him coming over to take her to lunch was a date. Ronnie had been called into the hospital at first light, her pager vibrating so loudly on the mezzanine floor that Meg had incorporated the sound into her dream as chainsaws. Something bad had happened – a train had been derailed and there were multiple casualties, with all doctors in the immediate vicinity recalled to help, even those on annual leave.
Ronnie had been deeply apologetic as she hopped around on one foot, trying to pull on her trousers and scrape her hair back into a ponytail, as Meg watched from the sofa-bed, feeling glad that Dolores never called her in the middle of the night.
‘Look, it’s not your fault,’ Meg had reassured her, but inside she felt daunted. What was she going to do here all day? Her first instinct was to see if she could rebook her flight, due for tomorrow, to this afternoon. But then Hap had called – no doubt alerted by Jack, via Ronnie, that she was at a loose end – and now lunch was happening and Ronnie wasn’t here to vet what she should wear. She wasn’t here to vet him and make sure he didn’t make any moves that would send Meg flying back to Alberta without the need for a plane. Because this was all too soon; far too soon. She’d gone for the drinks at Soho House and the day on the boat purely to chaperone her little sister. But now she was the one needing chaperoning. Somehow, without intending it, without wanting it, she was going on a date, going through the motions of dressing for another man when her head and heart still throbbed to the beat of Mitch’s name.
He buzzed on the dot of eleven, just as she was staring at her outfit in the mirror for the umpteenth time. Was there anything about it that Ronnie would object to? She was wearing the white boot-cuts Ronnie had worn on Friday night (because if they were good enough for Ronnie . . .), a pair of Stan Smith sneakers found down the side of the sofa (which meant they must have been worn recently, a sign that they were acceptable too), and a plain black T-shirt (because it was a black T-shirt, so how bad could it be?).
‘Hi,’ he grinned as she stepped out of the apartment building a few minutes later, her face half-hidden behind an enormous pair of Audrey Hepburn-style shades she’d found in the desk, all the better for avoiding eye contact. He was leaning against a black Mercedes AMG and looking ‘full urban’ again, wearing skinny dark jeans, no socks, moccasins, a pale blue shirt and a navy blazer. She gave an inward sigh of relief that he had reverted to type. The type that wasn’t ‘her type’. The type she could resist. ‘You look beautiful.’
She almost asked, ‘Do I?’ but that would be to open up a moment between them. Instead she stared at the car. She knew nothing about cars but a Buick this was not. ‘This is yours?’
He nodded.
‘And you drove it here all the way from BC?’
‘Well, wouldn’t you?’ he smiled, opening the door for her. ‘Besides, I make a lot of stops en route, visiting clients. Are you happy to have the roof down or would you prefer it up?’ he asked, his eyes flitting to her high ponytail.
‘Down’s fine.’ She’d never been in a car like this before – sleek, expensive, as beautiful as it was powerful. In Banff you drove cars that could cope – cope with the terrain, the weather, the elks (their truck had been badly dented last year by two rutting elks that had wande
red too close to town).
Hap climbed into his side and switched on the ignition. Meg felt the power surge beneath her, barely restrained, and she felt a quiver of nerves and excitement arrow through her.
‘You ready?’ he asked, somehow still pinning her gaze even behind the shades.
‘Born ready,’ she nodded with a sudden flash of courage and then instantly regretting that she didn’t regret it.
He glanced at her, a grin on his lips. ‘My kind of girl,’ he winked, pulling away with a squeal of rubber.
The journey was wild, the wind whipping her hair as they sped along the highway, David Bowie blaring from the speakers, and by the time they’d arrived at their destination – ‘a small beauty spot’, he’d said – she felt as exhilarated as if she’d run here herself. He was right – it was worth driving cross-country in that car. It was worth moving to Canada in order to drive cross-country in that car.
Two hours later and she was soaked.
‘Can you believe one fifth of the world’s entire fresh water volume is falling here?’ Hap shouted, his face becoming steadily wet from the mist.
‘Yes!’ she shouted back, barely able to hear herself over the roar. ‘Right this second, I really, really can!’
He laughed, tugging the hood of her pink waterproof poncho forward and tucking a damp tendril behind her ear. She looked quickly back at the view, telling herself it was a kind gesture, a friendly one – much like driving all the way out to Niagara for lunch.
The boat was moving towards the horseshoe falls on the Canadian side – the larger of the two falls. The US falls were supposedly louder on account of the rocks at the bottom, although it felt hard to believe that anything could be louder than this right now; it was like standing beside a jumbo jet. She tightened her grip on the handrail as the boat ferried closer, her eyes steady on the monumental cascades in front of them, the mist billowing like silk skirts so that the sky, land and the thousands of observers looking down at them were obscured from view as they moved through pockets of varying thickness. The water was rougher here as they got to within seventy metres of the base of the falls and Hap stood behind her, his arms either side of hers.
