There is a scream from somewhere else in the lodge and Alice’s heart jerks instantly, adrenaline flooding her from head to toe.
‘Grace?’ she shouts, because it sounds like her, and she turns on her heel, racing towards the bedrooms. She finds Grace shaking slightly, her hand clapped across her mouth.
She shakes her head at Alice, colour flooding her cheeks.
‘Sorry,’ she says, ‘it’s fine, I’m fine. It’s just a spider, that’s all.’ Alice follows her finger to where an admittedly huge black spider is sitting in a delicate cobweb inside the large wooden trunk at the foot of the bed. Seems Alice is not the only one looking in hiding places.
‘You’re fine, Grace,’ she says impatiently. ‘No sign of anything, I presume?’
‘No,’ she says, ‘you?’
‘No.’ Alice pauses. ‘There’s no need to scream like that for no reason, Grace. You scared me, you know.’
They look at each other, and something almost unmissable scrolls across Grace’s features – just a flash of it, that if Alice didn’t know her so well she would say was imagined.
Anger.
Grace
Something really weird is going on, and it’s obvious neither of the other two is prepared to listen to me. As I search the bedrooms, I am terrified – and I know it’s because I am dreading what I might see.
You’ve watched too many horror films, I tell myself as I pull back curtains and push open doors, but I can’t shake the image of Felicity’s body on the floor in front of me, the imagined sight of a pale, bloodless arm poking out from behind a bed. Strands of her hair caught in the sheets. Spots of blood on the shiny wooden floorboards. I can’t bear the thought of it – I’ve been angry with Felicity in the past, but the thought of her being hurt makes me feel physically sick. Of course, I can’t tell the others what I’m thinking – they will think I am mad. Despair flares briefly inside me at the endless catch-22; if I tell the truth, people don’t believe me. If I lie, nobody seems to care.
‘Grace!’ Alice says, and I realise I am staring into space, unsettled by the spider (I’ve never liked spiders – do they have poisonous spiders in Africa?) and the fact that she is irritated by me. Again.
‘Sorry,’ I say, although I’m not really, and she gives me a weird look, like she can see right inside my head to everything I’m thinking, all the little thoughts spiralling away in my mind.
But she can’t. Nobody can.
Hannah
It’s boiling hot out on the decking. Sweat is dripping down the back of Hannah’s neck, pooling at the base of her spine; she feels like she needs another shower already. The wooden slats surround the house and Hannah makes sure she’s walked around twice before giving up and accepting that Felicity isn’t here. Sighing, she leans her arms against the wooden railing that separates them from the Botswana plains. Tall, spindly trees dot the landscape, and in the far distance she can see movement – yellow shapes that dance under the heat. Her body tenses; are they lions? Cheetahs? She squints, but her eyes aren’t good enough – Chris is forever on at her to go get new glasses but what with baby Max and everything else, it’s slipped right to the bottom of her to-do list. Hannah watches the horizon, hoping to see more and yet not wanting to at the same time, and for the first time since being out here she begins to feel prickles of fear. The succulents out on the plains stare blankly at her, surrounding the lodges, hemming them in. Don’t come any nearer, they seem to say. Don’t look too closely, Hannah.
How safe is it out here, really? What is to stop the wild animals from approaching the lodge? There’s the water, but it’s not deep, and besides, most of the animals out here can wade or swim through, she’s sure of it. Hannah wishes desperately that she’d read up more on this environment before she came out here, that she’d concentrated on the guidebook properly on the plane rather than flirting with that sandy-haired man, Adam, and pretending to be a single, carefree woman. She feels embarrassment curdle inside her – what on earth was she thinking? Felicity, if she was here, would be laughing at her.
There’s a sound from inside and Hannah spins around, for some reason imagining that an animal will confront her, but of course it’s just the girls. Alice looks annoyed and Grace looks a bit shaken. She hopes they haven’t argued.
‘Look,’ Alice says, ‘there’s nobody here, obviously. I think we ought to get a taxi into the nearest village, or town or whatever – it can’t be far. We can get something to eat and perhaps find someone who might be able to help us – shed some light on where Felicity might be. At the very least, they’ll be able to tell us how to get back to the airport – without Felicity we haven’t even got a way of contacting the driver who dropped us off.’
‘OK,’ Hannah says, ‘that’s a good idea.’ If she’s honest, she’s a bit annoyed she didn’t think of it first, but then again she can’t be expected to think of everything, always be the one in the group who will sort things out. Sensible Hannah. Responsible Hannah. Everyone else do what they like because it’s OK, Hannah is here to sort out the boring bits.
I know what you did. She pushes the image of the note from her mind.
‘Do we actually know where we are, though?’ Grace pipes up, and the two of them stare at her. God, she’s right. They don’t have a proper address with a postcode or house number, just the name of the complex, and the area.
Hannah scrolls back through their messages with Felicity – the excited photos, her constant exclamation marks, her euphoria about them all coming out here. All that and then this. It doesn’t make sense, it doesn’t add up that she isn’t here with them. Hannah can’t shake the growing sense that something bad has happened.
‘She just said the driver would get us from the airport, she never gave more details, no postcode or anything. It’s just Deception Valley Lodges,’ Alice says slowly, and Hannah feels something sink slightly in her gut because she’s right. They fall silent, all of them remembering that strange, quiet car ride, the moment the man dropped them off outside the lodge complex, leaving them alone in the unknown, in the heat and the darkness.
Hannah imagines Chris back at home, scolding her for not taking more precautions, for not taking her safety more seriously – but then again, she thinks with a flicker of annoyance, it’s not like he asked her for an address of where she was going. He was preoccupied on the morning she’d left, in a rush on his way to work. There was a piece of slightly burned peanut-butter toast poking out of his mouth as he said goodbye, leaving Hannah to take Max to his mother’s house for the day until Chris returned from the office. He told her to have a good time, but he didn’t ask her for any details of where she would be staying. He called goodbye quickly, the door slamming behind him. Maybe he was a bit annoyed that she was going at all, Hannah thinks – possibly even jealous that she was daring to leave him with his own son. Perhaps if he had shown more of an interest, they wouldn’t be in this situation – but no, she thinks, it’s not fair to blame him. He’s the one at home looking after their baby, after all, whilst she is stuck in the African wilderness with no bloody idea where they are. Hannah thinks of the two wine glasses. One problem at a time, Hannah.
‘Let’s look on Google Maps,’ she says at last. ‘We should be able to pinpoint our location that way. We know the name of the complex, it must be a popular tourist spot, surely.’
The three of them gather around Hannah’s phone and watch as the app loads, slowly – the signal is poor out here on the decking and she edges closer to the lodge in an attempt to speed it up. They all stare as the colours fill the screen – a vast expanse of green surrounded by a river of bright blue. No detail, no clarity – just wide, anonymous terrain. There are no names, no identifying marks, nothing that could be used to show anyone where they are.
‘It’ll work if you zoom in,’ Grace says, and Hannah tries but all that happens is more green, more blank space with their tiny red dot flailing desperately in the middle. For a second, the three of them stare at it in silence, th
e reality of the situation sinking in. Hannah’s mouth feels dry; she is desperate for a drink.
‘Let’s try inside the house,’ Alice says, and she pulls out her phone.
‘I don’t think you’ll have any more luck than me, I’m not doing it wrong,’ Hannah says snappily. She can feel herself becoming defensive, like she always does when things aren’t going her way. It’s far too hot out here and she’s so thirsty – she’d pictured them having the time of their lives this morning, taking some amazing photos of the animals to show Max and Chris back at home, feeling stimulated by a brand-new experience that wasn’t feeding a baby or listening to mindless cartoons that she prays will keep her son calm. But no – thanks to Felicity, instead they’re stuck out here in the middle of nowhere and she has to put up with Alice thinking she’s better than her – like she always has, despite their closeness, despite their past professions to be best friends forever and ever.
As they troop back inside, Hannah feels tears begin to prick her eyes. Her breasts hurt, and she has a sudden desire to be back at home, safe with her family. Something strange is going on here, and despite trying to keep calm and stay level-headed, be sensible Hannah who the others can rely on, she feels panic beginning to creep into her, blur the edges of her vision.
‘Surely the party prep needs to start soon,’ Grace is saying as they head into the living room of the main lodge, which feels even darker in contrast to the bright heat of outside. Neither of them bothers to reply. It doesn’t feel like there’s a party starting in eight hours – it doesn’t feel like that at all. It doesn’t feel as though more guests will be arriving, as if the champagne will start flowing and music will play – it feels as though they’re stuck here, the three of them, alone. The sunshine feels incongruous – the opposite of how they’re all feeling. Hannah feels stupid, frustrated tears prick at her eyes. This morning was supposed to be exciting – she’d looked forward to the rush of adrenaline that would come with seeing one of the Big Five game animals, she’d longed for the sensation of being alive, of doing something other than breastfeeding in a quiet baby’s room. But no. Felicity has taken that chance away from her too.
Is this Felicity’s way of punishing her?
‘Mine isn’t working either,’ Alice says, shaking her phone in frustration. ‘Maybe there’s something written down in the lodge itself, an address book or a brochure or something? Something with more details on, the name of the nearest town? Or a taxi number even?’
‘Let’s look in the hallway,’ Hannah says. ‘That’s the obvious place.’
Her arm is itching and she scratches it, finding a hardening red lump under her nails. She’d doused herself in mozzie spray before leaving her lodge this morning but clearly, it wasn’t enough. She imagines the poison seeping inside her, entering her bloodstream, the skin frantically trying to resist it, forming the bump. Too late, too late. The damage, such as it is, is done.
To get to the hallway they have to head back through the dining room. Alice enters first and Hannah hears her give a little gasp of horror that prompts Grace to run after her, barrelling into her as she stands in the doorway, one hand clamped over her mouth.
‘Someone’s laid out a meal,’ Grace says, and her voice is wobbly now, beginning to shake in that way she has when she’s frightened. Hannah pushes forward, peers into the room. She is right.
The table is once again laden – four champagne glasses are full to the brim, ready and waiting, and there are four sets of cutlery and plates laid out for lunch, the silver glinting in the sunlight that is pouring through the huge windows. A huge bouquet of flowers sits in the centre of the table; blue irises, their open mouths mocking them all, their green leaves pointing straight upwards into the air like sharp blades of knives.
‘Did you do this?’ Hannah says, finding her voice and turning to the others. Both of them are gazing at the table, as though transfixed.
‘No,’ Grace says, shaking her head vehemently, ‘of course not!’
Alice glares at her. ‘I didn’t either. Obviously.’
Hannah can’t help it: she doesn’t believe them.
‘Why are there four settings now?’ Grace asks, a tremor in her voice, and Hannah shrugs, trying to think.
‘Felicity could have come back and done it?’ Alice says hesitantly.
The atmosphere in the room feels different, charged. A coldness has settled between them, and as Hannah looks at the two of them, her oldest friends, she starts to really wonder. Are they telling the truth? Does one of them know more than she does about why they are here? Did one of them leave her that horrible note?
She thinks of Alice, first in the door to the living room. Her gasp, her throwing a hand up to cover her mouth. Genuine surprise – or an act? She always was good at performing; they used to say that about her at school. She used to star in every play – Sandy in Grease, Maria in West Side Story, whilst Hannah sat in the audience and, afterwards, told Alice she was proud. And Grace, cowed in the corner, always submissive to Alice – to all of them. Does it ever get on her nerves? Would she have a reason for playing a trick like this?
‘It must be a trick,’ Alice says, breaking the silence. ‘You know how Felicity liked to play games sometimes. The real Felicity. You must both remember.’
And then Hannah thinks of another day, an evening, of Alice’s bare white shoulder exposed, her red top halfway down her arm, her mouth open wide, laughing. The scent of wine and cigarette smoke in the air. She thinks of Felicity’s eyes flashing, of Grace crying small, animal-like sobs. She remembers the cold sensation of the ground on her bare feet, the feel of Nathaniel’s arms around her. That was the night they stopped trusting one another, but if she’s honest, the cracks were formed long before. Perhaps they had always been there, ready to splinter, just waiting for the right moment, the point at which all four of them saw each other for what they were.
‘Felicity!’ Grace shouts suddenly, her voice whiny but loud, echoing back at them as if the walls too are playing a trick, amplifying the sound yet never letting it leave the room. The mirror seems to bounce the cry back at them, and Hannah stares at their reflections, the three of them standing stock-still, their eyes on each other.
She doesn’t think any of them trusts the others now, not really.
Alice steps closer to the dining table, runs a hand across the high ornate wooden back of a chair, her long, manicured fingers casting dust motes into the air.
‘She must be here somewhere,’ Grace says, and her voice is desperate now. ‘I’m going to go look for her. It’s part of the birthday thing, it’s some sort of surprise.’
She sounds like she might be going to cry, and Hannah feels frustration brim inside her. The last thing they need now is Grace’s hysterics – unless she is putting them on? Hannah has always thought of Grace as someone who would be incapable of deception, but she knows Felicity didn’t always agree. As Hannah looks at Grace, she is reminded of the trapped zebra in the photos in the hallway that she knows they all spotted – of prey, waiting to be caught. But by whom? Who is here in the lodge with them? Or is the table setting a deliberate trap, to make them think a fourth person will be coming, when in reality they’re here alone? Botswana is one of the most sparsely populated areas of Africa – there could be nobody else around for miles.
‘Let’s all look one more time,’ Hannah says, eventually, and the three of them disperse, going their separate ways into the huge building. Hannah hangs back slightly, wanting to see where each of them goes. If one of them is in on this – on whatever weird joke is being played – she wants to know which one. She sees Alice’s hair flick behind the doorway of the living room, hears Grace’s tread as she pads over to the bedrooms.
‘Felicity!’ Hannah yells, as loudly as she can, but her throat feels hoarse and scratchy because of the heat. The insect bite on her arm itches and she scratches it impatiently, not noticing until afterwards that she has made it bleed. Dots of bright red blood stand out on her arm; whe
n she puts her fingers to her mouth, she tastes iron on her tongue.
They reconvene ten minutes later in the hallway.
‘She isn’t here. It’s pointless,’ Alice says. She looks angry, flustered, her fringe sticking up at odd angles from her sweaty forehead.
‘Did one of you set this table to freak us out?’ she says then, looking directly at the other two, making eye contact with first Grace and then Alice. They mutely shake their heads. Hannah resents her now for having the bravery to ask what she herself could not – she bets Alice wouldn’t be keeping quiet if she’d had a note pushed into her door.
‘Alice,’ she says, ‘it’s not helpful to make accusations. Why would we want to freak each other out?’
Alice raises her eyebrows, without saying anything, and Hannah feels a surge of frustration. Is this how she is with Tom, refusing to answer questions, playing little mind games? If so, perhaps it’s no wonder that they don’t seem like love’s young dream.
‘Let’s go outside, out to the front,’ Grace says. ‘I want to get out of this place. It’s stifling. We can walk to another village perhaps, or flag down a passing car.’
The Wild Girls Page 12
