One Endless Summer

by Laurie Ellingham

  Narith smiled. ‘Yes. Everyone jumps.’

  ‘Including you?’ Samantha frowned.

  Narith chuckled, his slim frame shaking up and down. ‘Elephant no jump. I walk with elephants down there.’ He pointed to the path ahead of them, leading into the undergrowth.

  ‘We –’ Samantha pointed to each of them in turn ‘– could walk down with you.’

  He stared back at her for a moment, his face struck with a bewilderment that transcended the language and cultural barriers between them. ‘You don’t want jump?’ he asked. The tone of his words, just so, that he might as well have asked: ‘You don’t want to have this amazing, life-altering experience?’

  Lizzie looked at Jaddi. An excited anticipation sparked in her friend’s eyes and she hopped from foot to foot. Then there was Samantha, her forehead wrinkled with concern, her eyes wide and flitting.

  ‘I have to do this,’ Lizzie said.

  ‘Great.’ Jaddi grabbed her hand. ‘Let’s do it. Samantha?’

  Samantha backed away from the edge. ‘No. Absolutely not. Do you know how many people break their legs and their backs doing stupid things like this?’

  ‘He said it was safe, Sam,’ Jaddi said. ‘Everyone does it.’

  Samantha shook her head and stared at Lizzie. ‘Do you remember, in the dressing room at Channel 6, when I said, I’d follow you anywhere, except off a cliff? This is a cliff.’

  ‘You don’t have to do it, it’s OK.’ Lizzie smiled. ‘We can meet you at the bottom.’

  ‘But you’re still going to do it?’ The crease in Samantha’s forehead deepened.

  Lizzie smirked. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Come on, Samantha,’ Jaddi coaxed. ‘We went to jump out of an aeroplane that time for the charity parachute thing, remember? You were willing to do that.’

  ‘You tricked me into that one,’ Samantha replied, taking another step away from the edge. ‘You got me drunk and made me sign the consent form.’

  ‘Yes, but you came with us.’

  ‘I never would’ve done it.’

  Jaddi nodded. ‘Yes, you would have. If that fog hadn’t come in and it hadn’t been called off, you would have. We all would’ve. This is our chance for redemption.’

  Samantha stared open-mouthed at them. Lizzie could almost see the risk assessment running through Samantha’s head.

  ‘Sam,’ Lizzie said, ‘ignore Jaddi, you don’t—’

  ‘Come on then.’ Samantha sighed, stepping alongside Lizzie and gripping her other hand. ‘If we’re doing this, we might as well do it together.’

  They unhooked their microphones, stripped off their packs and shoes, and placed them in an empty rice sack Narith handed to them. ‘I take.’ He nodded.

  Lizzie looked one more time at Ben and the camera, flashed a smile and stepped, in one long stride, to the ledge. Adrenaline pulsed through her body, throbbing around her like a chiming church bell.

  ‘On the count of three,’ Jaddi said. ‘One.’

  Lizzie stepped closer, the soles of her feet scraping the rough surface of the rock.

  ‘Two.’

  Her toes found the edge. She pulled in a breath, keeping her head high.

  Lizzie bent her knees and launched herself from the cliff. If Jaddi had said three, Lizzie didn’t hear it, all she heard was the shhh of the air around her as she lifted her feet from the rock and pushed herself forwards, releasing her hands from Jaddi and Samantha.

  Cold and darkness surrounded her body as she plummeted into the water, stripping her of the excitement she’d felt moments earlier. The water gurgled in her ears and forced its way up her nose and into the back of her throat. Lizzie flapped her arms and kicked with her legs until the water began to lighten and she broke through to the surface.

  ‘Oh my God!’ Jaddi shouted. ‘That was the most exhilarating thing I’ve ever done in my life.’

  ‘The most stupid,’ Samantha said, swimming closer. ‘It’s a miracle we’re all alive.’

  ‘Ben!!!’ Jaddi shouted, staring up to the ledge. ‘Stop being a wimp and jump!!’ She laughed and turned to Lizzie. ‘I am seriously going to take the piss out of him for missing this.’

  ‘Liz,’ Samantha said, ‘what do you say, exhilarating or stupid?’

  ‘Both.’ Lizzie coughed, squinting in the sunlight and staring up at the ledge they’d just dropped from.

  ‘Hey,’ Samantha said. ‘You OK, hon?’

  Lizzie stared back at them. Was she OK?

  All of a sudden the water around her closed in, pressing against her chest and crushing her lungs. She couldn’t breathe, she realised, fighting to draw in one ragged breath after another as she swam to the edge.

  ‘Lizzie, wait up!’ Samantha shouted.

  Lizzie held up her hand. ‘I’m OK,’ she said. ‘Give me a minute.’

  Lizzie clawed her arms across the water until her fingers reached the bank and she scrambled upwards. Leaves and twigs slapped and scraped at her body as she plunged into the undergrowth, only stopping when all she could see was dense foliage. Only then did she allow the panic to take over.

  This is it, I’m going to die. Lizzie dropped down onto the log of a fallen tree, her shoulders shaking as sobs wracked her body.

  A minute passed, then another. Her tears stopped, leaving a rawness inside her.

  ‘Lizzie?’

  Lizzie lifted her head from her hands. ‘Hi,’ she said, wiping her fingers across her cheeks as Ben stepped alongside her. His camera was nowhere in sight.

  ‘Jaddi and Samantha are looking for you,’ he said. ‘We all are. It’s time to go back to camp.’

  She nodded and stood up. ‘Sorry, I needed a minute alone.’

  ‘Are you feeling ill?’

  She shook her head. ‘That was the craziest thing I’ve ever done.’

  ‘I bet.’ Ben rubbed his hand over his beard and continued to look into her eyes. ‘Although you wouldn’t catch me doing it.’

  ‘I’ll remember it forever.’ She choked, turning her back to Ben as the tears streamed once more down her cheeks.

  ‘Hey,’ Ben said, ‘what’s going on?’

  ‘I’m sorry. I hate feeling like this,’ she whispered. ‘I want to be happy, but there are times when it feels like it’s crushing me. All this fuss over me. This … this ridiculous documentary. All the people watching. What difference does it make? I’m dying. In a few months, I won’t exist. What difference will I have made? I’m … I’m no one. I’m utterly insignificant to the world—’ she broke off, her shoulders heaving.

  She closed her eyes and allowed her body to sink to the ground. The earth was clammy and warm and all she could think about was Ethan, the one person she knew who had gone through all of this before. She hadn’t understood it then, but she did now.

  ‘Have you ever felt like you’re dying?’ Ethan had whispered once, climbing into her bed. Sometimes they’d talked about heaven and sometimes they’d talked about the kids in their classes who annoyed them. That’s how it was in hospital. One minute they were normal kids in a bad situation, the next they were different.

  ‘I dunno.’ She’d shrugged, shifting herself around to look at him. ‘I’m still here, aren’t I, so I guess not.’ The light in the corridor had shone through the gap in the curtain and bounced off his head. Two beds away a machine had started to beep, signalling an empty IV bag. They didn’t have long, she’d thought. One of the nurses would be in soon. She’d hoped it was Maggie. Maggie was younger than the other nurses and had freckles just like Lizzie’s. Maggie had tried to be stern and always told them to get back to their own beds, but she’d always said it with a smile, and they knew she’d let them keep talking for a little while more.

  ‘What colour hair did you have?’ Lizzie had asked. ‘Sometimes I think you were blonde, like your mum and your brother, but then other times I think maybe more gingery.’ She’d given him a wicked grin and readied herself for a teasing match.

  Instead, Ethan had rolled his eyes. She’d known
she was being stupid but she didn’t want to talk about death tonight.

  ‘What do you think dying feels like?’ he’d asked. ‘I think it feels like this.’ Tears had built in his eyes.

  A sharp pain had hit her chest, right in the middle, and all of a sudden the backs of her eyes had started to swell as if she was going to cry too.

  ‘I mean it,’ he’d said, gripping her hand suddenly. ‘I think I’m dying.’

  ‘You know what the docs say, Ethan. Chemotherapy is the worst, but it means you’re getting better.’

  He’d shaken his head but hadn’t replied.

  Lizzie had flopped her head onto her pillow. ‘I’m tired. We should go to sleep.’ Ethan would feel better in the morning, she’d thought, then they’d go back to being normal again.

  Ethan had slipped out of her bed but didn’t leave. ‘Lizzie?’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Do you ever think, like, if I die today, then I haven’t done anything? That all we’ve done is made our mums and dads be upset the whole time.’

  ‘Shut up.’ She’d tried to snigger but it had come out a cough. ‘Look, if one of us dies and the other one lives, then the one who lives has to promise to do something amazing with their life. Really amazing, OK?’

  ‘Like fly a hot air balloon around the world?’ he’d said with a smile.

  ‘Yeah, and help loads of people who need help.’

  ‘Like my teacher, Mrs Briggs.’ He’d nodded. ‘She helps tonnes of people.’

  ‘See. It’ll be fine. Everything will feel better in the morning.’ That’s what her dad always said, anyway, whenever she’d had a bad dream or was sick.

  Ethan had smiled at her. ‘Goodnight, Lizzie.’

  An hour or two later she’d awoken with a start. She’d thought someone had cried out, but the ward was eerily quiet for a change. She’d dropped her feet to the cool floor and, checking the coast was clear, had scurried to Ethan’s bed.

  ‘Ethan?’ she’d whispered, fiddling with the curtain until she’d found the gap and her way inside. His eyes had been closed but his face was scrunched up and gleamed with moisture. She’d stepped closer and reached her hand out. A second later she’d lurched back with a yelp. Ethan was hot. Burning hot. Like touching a saucepan boiling on the hob. She’d leapt to the other side of the bed and stabbed at the nurse call button. ‘Ethan, Ethan, talk to me, please, Ethan!’

  He never did answer her.

  ‘Lizzie.’ Ben’s voice cut through her thoughts.

  He gripped her arms and pulled her upright, drawing her into his body until her head rested on his chest. She didn’t pull away.

  A second later she felt his chin rest on the top of her head.

  Confusion and something else, something oh-sodistracting, whipped around her body. She pulled her face back and stared into the depths of his brown eyes. They drew her in, his eyes, pulling her closer, like a tug of war that she was losing, but didn’t care. Her mind cleared, the memory of Ethan stopped. Everything stopped.

  Slowly, very slowly, she moved closer. She could smell his skin and his breath, warm and sweet. A final wrench and her lips pressed against his and they were kissing. All at once fire crackers popped inside of her. She was eighteen again and on a rotating dance floor, spinning her head around and around, whilst her stomach dropped like the dip of a rollercoaster.

  It was Ben that broke the spell. He moved, just a fraction, destroying the hold he’d had on her. Lizzie leapt back, stumbling a little as her feet landed on a stick that wobbled under her feet.

  ‘I … I’m so sorry.’ She shook her head. Her entire face flamed with embarrassment. What had she just done? ‘I shouldn’t have done that.’ She continued to step backwards whilst Ben remained rooted, his mouth open, staring back at her.

  ‘Forget it ever happened.’ She waved her hands in the air as if she could erase the last minute like erasing the writing on a whiteboard. ‘I was having a moment. Dying girl and all that.’ She tried to laugh but it sounded wrong, more like a ‘ha’.

  ‘Liz …’

  ‘Like I said, I’m sorry, forget it happened. Please, let’s not speak about it again.’ She spun around and dove into the undergrowth. He said something else, she was sure of it, but she didn’t hear him, she didn’t want to hear him. They were barely even friends. She was meeting Harrison in a few weeks’ time. It was just the distraction she’d been drawn to. A moment of forgetting that she’d clung to with both hands.

  Lizzie fought her way back to the path and the others.

  Jaddi raised her eyebrows and smiled at her. ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost.’

  ‘Sorry.’ She shook her head. ‘I just needed a moment to collect my thoughts. I’m fine. Come on, let’s go back to camp.’ She glanced back as Ben joined the group.

  ‘Oh, Ben,’ Jaddi said, ‘there you are. At last! I can’t believe you were too scared to jump.’

  Ben mumbled a reply, but Lizzie didn’t hear it. Whatever it was, it wasn’t enough to stop Jaddi continue her teasing.

  Lizzie felt Samantha move alongside her. Samantha dipped her head close before she spoke, ‘Are you really all right?’

  Lizzie’s cheeks were still glowing, she was sure of it, but she nodded. ‘Totally.’ What else could she say? There was no point in telling Samantha and Jaddi what an idiot she’d been. Even if they found a minute without the microphones, without Ben, she couldn’t tell them. Jaddi and Samantha would read something into it when there was nothing to read. Nothing at all. It was a blip, an insane moment caused by the exhilaration of the jump and the need to escape from her own thoughts. It wouldn’t happen again.

  PART II

  CHAPTER 18

  Day 17

  The Sun, TV Picks

  The Girl with Three Months to Live, Saturday 8pm

  Make sure you have your popcorn and tissues ready for another emotional instalment from Lizzie, Jaddi and Samantha this Saturday. The Channel 6 documentary, which topped the ratings for two weeks running, has been moved to the earlier slot of 8pm to take Saturday’s prime-time spot.

  In tomorrow night’s episode, the girls will be leaving the elephant sanctuary and heading by boat to Vietnam. Hopefully they won’t find themselves stranded by any roadsides (or riverbanks) this week! But the question on everyone’s lips this week has to be – are there romantic rumblings going on between Lizzie and cameraman Ben?

  Day 25

  The Mirror, TV Picks

  Columnist Jo Herrington talks about her TV choices for the weekend

  There is only one show I’ll be watching this weekend, and that’s the show everyone is talking about – episode 4 of The Girl with Three Months to Live! It seems everywhere I go people are chatting to me about Lizzie and the girls, and for good reason. This show is seriously addictive viewing. I’ll admit to being on the fence about The Girl with Three Months to Live when it first aired in January, but after watching Lizzie tell her heartbreaking story of losing her best friend, Ethan, aged 9, (episode 2), I was hooked. If the sneak peeks from Channel 6 are anything to go by, then this week we’ll be watching Lizzie, Samantha and Jaddi’s last week in Southeast Asia. I can’t wait to see what’s been happening with Ben and Lizzie. Even from Ben’s position behind the camera there are some serious sparks flying between that pair. Join me on Twitter tonight to share your thoughts about the show. #TGWTMTL

  Day 28

  The Daily Star

  The Girl with 2 months to Live

  One month has already flown by for Lizzie Appleton – the star of Channel 6’s The Girl With Three Months to Live – who was diagnosed with an untreatable brain tumour and given just three months to live. Lizzie and her friends, Samantha Jeffrey and Jaddi Patel, will now travel from Southeast Asia to Australia for the next leg of their journey.

  It was a rocky start to their travels with Lizzie collapsing from a seizure in episode 1, and the girls being stranded by the roadside in episode 2. But things have calmed down in the last two episodes as the girls
spent a week working at an elephant sanctuary in the Cambodian jungle, trekking the Ho Chi Minh trail in Vietnam, and snorkelling off the coast of Thailand. Far from seeing a dip in viewing figures, the show’s popularity has continued to climb ahead of their time in Australia and Lizzie’s plans to meet with old flame, Harrison Kelly.

  CHAPTER 19

  Day 30

  Lizzie

  ‘Welcome to day thirty. We’re just about to touch down in Sydney, Australia, and if you look out the window right now –’ Lizzie turned the screen of the camera and aimed it over Samantha and Jaddi to the oval-shaped window ‘– you’ll see Sydney Harbour Bridge in the distance.’

  Lizzie angled the lens back to her sun-kissed reflection and tried to remember what else she needed to say. For a fleeting moment, she thought about the millions of people watching at home, and the insanity of it all – the popularity of the documentary, what they were doing. Her head began to throb. Blobs of red and orange floated lazily across her eyes like the gloopy stuff in a lava lamp. They’d disappeared for a while – the colours, and the churning in the pit of her stomach that accompanied them. The experiences, the fun they’d had, the sheer exhaustion of their long days, had made it easy to forget what they were doing, the millions of eyes on her, but nine hours sitting on an aeroplane had allowed it all to creep back again.

  Lizzie blinked several times until the colours disappeared and forced her hi-mum-hi-dad smile. Forgetting would be just as easy in Australia. It had to be.

  ‘For those counting, namely Caroline and Ben, you’ll notice that I’ve skipped a day of my video diaries. I meant to do this last night during the flight, but after weeks of sleeping on camping mats and in beds with springs digging into my ribs it’s amazing how comfortable an aeroplane seat can feel.’ She smirked as Ben tutted from the seat in front.

  ‘Thank you to everyone who has posted suggestions on our Facebook page of where to stay and things to do in Sydney. We’re reading them when we can. We met so many lovely Australian travellers in our final week island hopping around southern Thailand. It’s so nice to know we’ll be spending the next part of our trip in such good company.’