The Vacation

by T. M. Logan

  Daniel watched the brothers as they tried to get the big outdoor gas heaters lit. They were in the stone gazebo at the edge of the garden, which had two big shiny metal heaters, bigger and taller than he was, and Daniel didn’t really know why they wanted to light them because it was still boiling hot. But he didn’t want them to think he was a goody-goody, so he was content to sit back on his reclining chair and just leave them to it, watching as they pressed and prodded and turned the controls, swearing at each other as they tried to make the flames start.

  Odette said a lot of bad words, too. She’d called Daniel a bloody bastard yesterday when none of the grown-ups could hear, when he wouldn’t let her play with the beach ball. He wasn’t exactly sure what a bastard meant, what it really meant, but he knew it wasn’t good. It was the sort of word that would get him in trouble with his mum and dad. He tried to avoid getting into trouble if he possibly could.

  As he watched, a figure emerged from the woods, walking quickly.

  It was his dad. He thought maybe his mum might be there, too. He’d seen them go down there together not long ago, holding hands. He liked it when they held hands.

  He watched as his dad walked up the hill toward the house, coming in their direction. He was striding along, doing the fast walk that he did when he was cross. He didn’t get cross very often, but when he did, he would do what Mum called his angry walking. Daniel had to jog to keep up with him then. And he could be quite scary and loud. He certainly looked angry, a deep frown furrowing his forehead, his mouth set into a hard, flat line.

  He didn’t look behind him.

  Daniel looked back to the woods, hoping his mum might be there, following his dad.

  But she wasn’t coming.

  He wondered where she was.

  “Daniel.” Jake’s voice.

  Daniel’s head snapped round.

  “Eh?” He sat up in his recliner. “What?”

  The older boys had given up on the gas heaters and were now scrutinizing him.

  “So what’s it like?” Ethan said with a sly smile.

  “What’s what like?”

  “Having a sister?”

  Daniel hurried to put his glasses back on.

  “Rubbish,” he said. “She’s always moody and mean and never wants to play anything anymore. She’d rather talk about makeup or boys or stupid stuff at school.”

  “Has she got a boyfriend?”

  “Dunno.”

  “What about that rugby lad, Alex? She liked him, didn’t she?”

  Daniel nodded.

  “He came to the house a few times, before Mum and Dad were back from work.”

  “She likes boys, yeah?” Ethan flashed him an unpleasant smile. “Very popular with the Year Eleven lads, that’s what everyone—”

  Jake punched his brother on the shoulder, hard.

  “Shut the fuck up, Ethan! You have literally no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Just telling you what I’ve heard.”

  “You heard wrong. Way wrong. That’s total bullshit, what you just said.”

  Ethan held his hands up in mock surrender.

  “All right, all right. Calm down, bro.” He paused a beat. “So you still fancy her then?”

  Jake ignored his brother, turning to Daniel instead.

  He produced a packet of cigarettes from the pocket of his shorts. On the front was a picture of a lady dancing in smoke, and in big blue letters the word Gitanes. He opened the pack and offered one to Daniel. “Smoke?”

  But I don’t want to get cancer, Daniel thought, staring at the picture on the front of the packet.

  “A whole one?”

  “Yeah. Are you up for it?”

  “I don’t really know how to smoke,” Daniel said in a small voice.

  “We’ll show you.”

  Ethan held his hand out to his brother.

  “Let’s have one, then.”

  Jake checked over his shoulder and quickly shoved the cigarettes back into his shorts pocket.

  “Put it away,” he hissed.

  Ethan followed suit immediately.

  Daniel looked up as Jake and Ethan’s mum appeared in a wide-brimmed straw hat, holding two small bottles of water. He liked her. She had a bit of a funny accent that sometimes sounded like she was American and just pretending to do a British voice.

  “Hey there, boys,” Jennifer said. “Are you having a cool time playing?”

  Jake gave a grunt in reply.

  Jennifer held the bottles out to them. “I brought you some water to take with you when you go exploring.”

  “Not thirsty,” Jake said.

  “But you will be soon, in this heat.”

  “No thanks.”

  Jennifer turned to her younger son. “You need some water, Ethan, otherwise you’ll get sunstroke.”

  “I’m all right,” Ethan mumbled.

  She turned to Daniel, as if noticing him for the first time. She held one of the plastic bottles out to him. “Would you like a water, Daniel?”

  Daniel really did. He’d not had a drink since his apple juice at lunch and his throat was really dry with all the running about and exploring they’d been doing. His mum had said not to drink the water out of the tap here because it might give him an upset tummy and the French orange squash tasted funny so he’d not drunk anything for hours. He sneaked another look at Jake, who looked back out of the corner of his eye.

  “No thank you, Mrs. Marsh,” Daniel said. “I’m fine.”

  “Well, all right, then,” she said. “So what are you boys up to today?”

  “Stuff,” Jake said.

  “Exploring, are you? Super. Remember what I said about the gorge though, Jakey, won’t you?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “You can play wherever you want to in the grounds, but not in the woods down by the gorge, where the drop-off is, all right? There’s a man coming this week to fix the fence at the cliff, but until he does you’re to stay away from there. And away from the woods.”

  “Sure,” Jake grunted.

  “I’ll leave you to it, then. Have fun.”

  She turned and headed back across the garden to the villa compound, the older boys snickering as their mother walked away.

  “She’s so embarrassing.”

  “She’s, well, clingy,” Ethan added.

  Jennifer turned and waved when she reached the gate. Daniel gave her a little wave back, but dropped his hand when he saw that neither of the bigger boys was acknowledging their mother.

  As soon as she was out of sight, Jake stood up. “Come on,” he said. He set off down the hill, his brother following him.

  Daniel fell in behind them. “Where are we going?”

  Jake turned and grinned over his shoulder. “Down to the woods, of course.”

  30

  Sean

  K suspects

  —Shit. What has she said to you?

  She knows something is going on

  —Specifics?

  Not yet. Need to see you

  —Yes but not today

  When?

  —Will come back to you

  I can’t stand lying to her. She knows something

  —You need to calm down. Remember what is at stake

  I know what’s at stake. That’s why I can’t be calm

  —Meet tomorrow?

  When?

  —Will message you

  OK, sooner is better x

  —Remember to delete all messages as soon as you’ve read x

  31

  Rowan

  Rowan didn’t have long.

  She locked the door behind her and looked quickly around an en suite bathroom that was bigger than her entire bedroom back home. Perched on the edge of a marble bathtub, she checked her messages in silence, scrolling quickly through her in-box. Deal with, delegate, or delete. Rowan was the queen of the six-word email. She cleared what needed to be done urgently before switching to a couple messaging apps and listening to a voice mail th
at had dropped in while she was in the pool. Sent a nine-word email in response. Done.

  The way things had worked out, it was pretty awkward that the vacation had fallen on this week, of all weeks, considering everything that was going on in her life. It was fabulous to see the girls again—putting the gang back together; seeing Kate, Jennifer, and Izzy always reminded her of all the good times they’d shared, but the timing was rather … unfortunate.

  Who was she kidding? She’d been looking forward to this for months. It wasn’t great timing, but—fuck it—that couldn’t be helped.

  And besides, when was anything ever the perfect time? Was there ever a perfect time to take a break from the office, to step away from the business? No. Was there a perfect age to get married, or divorced? Depended which of your marriages you were talking about. Was there ever a perfect time to have a baby? No, not really. Especially not when you were trying to get a new company off the ground and you were both working stupid hours to keep the mortgage rolling, the exorbitant school fees covered, and the nanny paid in full.

  If you waited for the perfect time, you’d wait forever, so when you saw something you wanted, you had to go out there and take it. Sometimes you just had to trust your instincts and jump right in.

  Rowan had always had good instincts—aside from that one time with her first husband—and she was a great believer in the move fast and break things mode of doing business. Who was it who said that? Mark Zuckerberg, she thought, or one of those other Facebook guys. She’d met Zuckerberg once at a client’s event in New York, couldn’t remember much about him apart from how ridiculously young he looked. And short. But she liked his mantra, because he was right—when you were running your own company you had to keep moving, like a shark. If the shark stayed still for too long, it was dead. If you let yourself get slower, you got into a rut, you got into bad habits, and soon enough you found yourself eaten alive by the competition. Better to be the one doing the eating, had always been Rowan’s philosophy.

  You could never stand still. Not in business, not in relationships, not in life. Not in anything. Especially now, when there was so much at stake.

  Move fast and break things.

  For all his faults—and he had a few, bless him—Russ would understand that better than most. At almost eight years together, their relationship was already the longest she’d had by quite some margin. But sometimes life threw things at you, complications that you couldn’t plan for, and you had to just roll with them rather than fighting them all the time. Especially if they were nice complications. With that thought in mind, leaning against the lip of the bathtub, she quickly thumb-typed a final message and pressed Send.

  She had always been good at keeping secrets.

  But she would tell Russ, sooner or later.

  At a time of her choosing. No one else’s.

  Small footsteps reached her through the door.

  “Mummy?”

  “What is it, Odette?”

  “Are you coming out now?”

  “I’ll come out in a minute, darling.”

  A pause.

  “Are you coming, Mummy?”

  “Yes, I’ll be right there.”

  Rowan locked her phone, flushed the pristine toilet—just for effect—and ran both taps noisily into the Italian marble sink for good measure.

  She unlocked the door of the en suite and reached for the handle.

  32

  I don’t know how long I stayed there at the edge of the gorge. Long enough to watch as the sun sank slowly toward the horizon, turning from blinding white to blistering gold and then a deep, burning orange as the dark hills rose up to meet it.

  Did it stack up, Sean’s denial?

  I don’t know what you’re talking about.

  I swear I’m not involved with Rowan.

  It’s the truth.

  How could I still believe in him? Because I may not have seen the fire, but I could certainly smell the smoke. I could almost taste it, harsh in my throat. His refusal to explain, his silence, was deafening and incriminating, all at the same time.

  Eventually I looked at my watch. It was getting late and the kids would be wanting their tea soon. I stood up and began the walk back up the hill.

  By the time I reached the villa, the kitchen was a hive of activity, Alistair in an apron making a big bowl of paella while Russ poured drinks and Izzy set the dining table. Rowan put a glass of white wine in my hand, informing me it was one of the local varieties and was chilled to absolute perfection. I studied her as I took a sip, the chilled Faugères like ice on my tongue, trying to discern any sign of deceit in her eyes, any sign of treachery. But there was nothing. I reminded myself that she worked in PR, that presenting a story—an image—to the world, was what she did every day, and that she was very good at her job.

  “You all right, honey?” she said. “You look as if you could use a bigger glass.”

  I pushed down the anger, forcing a smile to the surface.

  “Just a bit hot. You’re right about this wine, though, it’s exactly what—”

  Daniel ran up the steps to the balcony, squealing past me, with Lucy in hot pursuit.

  “Mum! Dad! Help, she’s gone mad!”

  Lucy stalked after him, her face flushed with anger.

  “Give it to me!” she shouted. “Now!”

  I stepped in between them, holding my hands up like a referee stopping a boxing match.

  “Whoa!” I said. “What’s going on?”

  “He’s filming me!” Lucy shouted, jabbing a finger at her brother. She swiped at him, trying to grab the camcorder from him as I held them apart.

  Daniel dodged away from his sister’s grasp, still squealing with nervous laughter.

  “She’s crazy!”

  “Tell him to stop filming me!”

  “Daniel,” I said, “you shouldn’t film people unless they’re OK with it. Give me the camera, please.”

  “She’s just being moody. No one else minds when I do it.”

  “Well, your sister minds. Did you ask her permission?”

  “Yes. Sort of.”

  “Liar!” Lucy said. “You never even said you were filming! I was just sunbathing and then you were there with the camera!”

  “Daniel, you’ve been told not to film her, but you did it anyway. Why did you do that?”

  “I was just doing a funny video. It’s only for fun.”

  “It’s not fun for Lucy, is it?”

  There was a tremor in Lucy’s voice. She was on the verge of tears.

  “Tell him to delete it, Mum.”

  I took the camera from my son’s hand. “Go and help Izzy lay the table for dinner, Daniel. I’ll come and talk to you in a minute.”

  He skipped off toward the kitchen with a quick backward glance to make sure he was no longer being pursued. But Lucy had collapsed onto a chair, all the fight gone out of her. She put her head in her hands and started to cry.

  I sat down on the arm of the chair and put an arm around her. “What’s up, Lucy? It’s just your brother being silly.”

  “Don’t like people having pictures of me, ones I don’t know about.”

  “Look. We’ll tape over what he’s just done, OK? I’ll delete it, no one will see it.”

  “No one?”

  “I promise.”

  Her voice was so low it was almost a whisper. “Thanks, Mum.”

  “Is it just that, Lucy? Is there something else going on?”

  She shook her head but said nothing.

  “Are you sure?”

  She disengaged from our embrace and wiped a tear away with the heel of her hand. “I’m going to my room for a bit.”

  I watched her go, still wondering about her reaction. There was regular friction between Lucy and Daniel, who were no different from siblings the world over, and Daniel seemed to get a kick out of winding his sister up, but her reaction this time seemed to be on a different level.

  I went upstairs and sat down on my bed with th
e video camera, opened out the little viewing screen on its side, and pressed Play, then Rewind. The screen came to life as the tape ran backward showing the pool, the loungers, then Lucy in her lemon-yellow bikini. I let the tape run back for a few more seconds, then pressed Play again. Daniel had filmed his sister as she sunbathed, going in for extreme close-ups of her belly button, the big toe of her right foot, and then a shot up her nose that zoomed in right up one nostril. The crash zoom was so fast it made me dizzy just watching it. Finally, she seemed to realize he was there, jumped up, and began chasing him. The picture zigzagged crazily as he ran away, his squeals of panic loud on the soundtrack.

  It wasn’t very flattering but it did seem a bit of an overreaction on Lucy’s part.

  I pressed Stop and then Rewind to take it back. The tape whirred as it spun backward, the digital counter on the screen running down. I glanced out the window. From our bedroom you could see out to the poolside, where Sean had sat Daniel down on a sun lounger and was talking to him at length, the boy nodding solemnly every so often.

  It hadn’t always been like this. When we had first brought Daniel home from the hospital, six-year-old Lucy had been absolutely ecstatic to have a sibling—a real baby of her own to go along with the assortment of toy babies she lined up in her bed every day for feeding, stories, and bath time. But by the time he had learned to talk—and answer back—the sibling novelty had worn off and they had settled into a relationship that veered between grudging tolerance and open warfare on a daily basis. Daniel delighted in winding her up and Lucy delighted in taking offense—even more so now she was a teenager. It was an exhausting combination.

  But I didn’t want them to grow up apart, to be separated, to have to be ferried from one parent to the other and back again every weekend, or however custody arrangements worked. And however much they fought, they would want to be together, too. They belonged together.