All Inclusive (16 page)

Sadie laughed. ‘No, you're right there. Mark's more of an all-action type.'

Nick picked up more than a hint of nudge-nudge in that reply.

‘That'll be a good thing then, seeing as you're marrying him in a few days' time,' he said. He nodded his head and it seemed not to want to stop. Giggle-man, noddy-man. He could see, beneath the low rim of the umbrella, the white foam of the sea's edge trickling up the sand and back again. Scary stuff, sea. Why did it do that going-in-and-out stuff? There must be a reason. That was the thing with dope – sometimes you
got just this close to working out the meaning of everything, and then it slipped away.

‘Yep. We're getting married.' Sadie was nodding too. Nick watched her, wondering if she was getting the nodding-too-long thing as well.

‘
Why
are you getting married?' Nick had to ask. He was genuinely puzzled; they weren't much older than him. Sadie wasn't pregnant; at least he assumed not, she was all flat and smooth down the front. Girls didn't drink rum punch and smoke dope when they were pregnant either, did they? Even if they were stupid and didn't care and were completely selfish cows, wouldn't it make them feel sick?

‘Dunno. We just planned it all and then suddenly it was happening.' Sadie turned and glared at him. ‘We do love each other, you know.'

‘Hey, I never said you didn't. It's just, all that “forsaking all others” or whatever it is in the contract.'

Sadie was silent for a moment, then, inhaling a bit more of the joint, said quietly, ‘Well that depends if there's been any others to forsake.'

‘Huh? Whoa! What, like it's just been you and Mark? Like, you've never . . . not with anyone else . . . ?'

‘Yeah. So? What's wrong with that? Though I only meant me. I know Mark'd been around a bit before we got together.'

‘Ah!' Nick whispered to her. ‘So you don't know what you're missing. You know what, Sadie?' He moved closer across the lounger towards her. ‘You know, you're going to wonder about that for evermore. You're going to be asking yourself, and I promise you this, you're always going to be asking yourself if there's something you're missing out on.'

Sadie shifted towards him and chucked the roach down in the sand between the lounger's slats. ‘You
know what, Nick?' she whispered, so close now he could smell her perfume. It was Ghost, the same as Felicity's. It was causing some serious stirring.

‘You're, like,
so
wrong,' Sadie murmured, so close now he'd barely have to move a centimetre to kiss her. ‘I won't be wondering
at all
.'

Oh God, old people dancing. Her own parents. How could they do this to her? Delilah sat on a stool at the bar beside Nick and felt utterly mortified. Her toes literally curled in horror. It wasn't that they looked worse than anyone else – in fact they weren't too dire for people who should be old enough to know better. At least they didn't clear acres of space around them by waving their arms over their heads like Len. Looks like a sheep, dances like a sheep – that was Len, with whoopy sound effects thrown in now and then in case it hadn't been noticed that he was enjoying himself. It was just that, really, there were some sights that a vulnerable teenage girl shouldn't be compelled to witness.

‘Did you think it would be like this?' she yelled into Nick's ear over the blaring of the Rolling Stones.

‘Yes. Especially when they got all tanked up with that punch earlier,' he shouted back. ‘And it's always the same when “Honky Tonk Women” gets played. There's something in those opening notes that gets the oldies remembering their down-and-dirty days.'

‘Ugh.' Delilah shuddered. ‘They should have forgotten all that years ago!' She was beginning to appreciate her bridge-playing grandmother. That was what grown-ups should be doing: sitting around quietly in places like Madeira playing calm card games, not jumping around like they were in the
Glastonbury mosh pit and embarrassing themselves and everyone else.

‘You're right there. Or possibly not . . .'

What did he mean by that? Delilah looked at where her brother was looking. Gina seemed to be the one on the sharp end of his focus. You couldn't miss her in the shiny, tiny white halter-necked dress and with that long pale sheet of hair. In the half-dark with the disco lights flashing (disco lights! Another weird old-people thing!) you could hardly see her hypertanned flesh, just her teeth now and then as she smiled, so the dress gave the impression it was slinking around as if by itself.

Delilah watched her brother watching Gina. Gina was dancing with Sam, quite competently too, Delilah would have to admit, which was pretty agonizing for her. Such a fit bod, he had, that Sam. She seemed to be sliding herself up and down his body – it must be an American thing – either that or she was a pole dancer back home. How to compete with that? Beside her, Nick inhaled hard on his cigarette while Delilah planned making a move on Sam.

‘You could grab her for the next one – but if it's a slowy, be warned – she slicks glitter all over her skin and it'll come off all over you,' Delilah suggested, nudging him. ‘But get me a drink first, won't you? I fancy some of that fake champagne.'

‘How many have you had?' Nick asked, his eyes still on Gina.

‘Only one. I like it. Go on Nick, please, the barman knows I'm not eighteen and he keeps offering me lime soda.'

‘Aah, poor baby! OK, just the one. Go and sit over there where he can't see you.' Nick indicated a group of vacant sofas and went to the far end of the crowded
bar, returning a few minutes later with an opened bottle of Cava. Delilah perched on the arm of a sofa, fearing she'd disappear from Sam's view if she was low down in the seat.

‘This should keep us going for a while,' he said, pouring a glass for each of them.

‘God, look at them all,' Delilah said, watching Michael now as he was doing what he'd probably call ‘groovin' on down' with her mother. ‘You know what, Nick? These holidays where they all get together every year, I reckon they're all a bunch of swingers.'

‘Swingers! That's a good one Del, excellent thinking!' he laughed. ‘Do you think that us being here is cramping their style?'

‘God I hope so,' she groaned. ‘But I can't speak for the others. I mean look at Angela.' Angela, whose dress had been soaked by drink earlier in the evening, was now wearing what looked like a huge silk sarong. She must, Delilah decided, have believed all those magazine articles about how a large square of fabric, carefully folded and tied, can make a Stylish Dress. Perhaps she hadn't read the instructions properly – it seemed to be working its way loose as she flailed about to ‘Ride a White Swan'.

When the music slowed, the inevitable ‘Lady in Red' almost had Delilah, in spite of her Sam quest, heading for the door, but, oh joy, he and Gina were suddenly there by her sofa.

‘Are you two available for dancing?' Gina asked, grabbing Nick's hand and tugging him to his feet.

‘Oh go on then, twist my arm.' Nick gave in, though not unwillingly. His hand, Delilah noticed, instantly slid down on Gina's naked shimmery back to where her tiny dress ended. She wouldn't be surprised if
more than just his hand ended up covered in glitter. What a schmoozer.

Sam expertly moved Delilah across the floor and slid his arms round to the small of her back, making her tingle. She looked around, to check her parents weren't watching, and gave herself up to being clamped deliciously close against Sam's body. Oh perfect, she thought – if it could just go on like this the whole night. Could he tell how she was feeling? She must be giving off stacks of hormonal messages. He definitely was. As his mouth brushed softly against her ear, she could feel something that was a lot more scarily impressive than the contents of Oliver Willis's boxers being pressed against her.

Across the floor, she watched Angela attempting to crush Ellis the dive master to her ample front. When the music stopped and he pulled away, her dress finally gave up the fight and fell to the floor, revealing a full-on-frilled and laced black basque and matching French knickers. Cheers and whistles broke out and Angela gave a plump and gracious curtsey to her audience.

Oh Jeeze, and I joked about swingers, Delilah thought, I really wish I hadn't.

56 ml amaretto

168 ml cranberry juice

56 ml orange juice

14 ml strong rum

What a horrible dream. Delilah woke with an aching head and a dread of opening her eyes and facing what she'd seen in her sleep: hordes of ancient,
truly
ancient people going crazy on an Ibiza club dance floor. What a collection of creased, flecked skin, sparse grey hair and wizened limbs all flailing around through her sleep hours. One of them had been Gina's mother Dolly, only with a pale, hollow skull instead of a face: a dancing skull, wrapped in sparkly black stuff, whirling thin, glittery arms in the air.

It wasn't light yet; the clock told her it was only 5.30. So she wasn't over the jet lag then. By the time she was, it would be time to go back home. She snuggled down into the bed and closed her eyes, trying to give herself something to think about that would send her back to sleep. Thoughts of Prince William usually worked but she'd now discovered a rival for
him. Tricky one for Delilah, this. Who would she rather wake up next to? Prince William or hunky Sam the Mango-fitness-man? They were such opposites: fair William with his baby-pink, puddingy English features and his innate gawkiness, contrasted with brown-skinned, gleaming Sam with his super-toned body and utter elegance. She loved the way he moved – kind of lazy but certain. Simply watching him walk across a room made her feel quite limp and heated. William she now pictured as something of a clumsy puppy, appealing and sweet but a bit annoying. Sam was more like a lean, lithe cat. It was no contest – she'd never been a dog person. She would be sad to see William go, but it seemed to be time. He'd been up there at the front of her wish list for so long she felt as if she was losing a much-treasured childhood friend. She thought of his big, eager smile and tried to get back the feeling she'd had for him, but it just wasn't there any more.

She supposed, as she lay stretched out on her back staring at the treacle-coloured roof slats, that this was a growing-up moment. It was goodbye to juvenile fantasy and bring on the real-life experience. There was just one small niggly thing that got in the way. Sam was fit, buff, desirable, no question, but it was totally stupid that as a couple they'd be Samson and Delilah. What had her parents been thinking of when they named her? Were they being completely loopy? Were they
on
something? Didn't they
think
? How come Nick got a perfectly normal – even boring – name, chosen after an ancient uncle, yet she got the biblical nutcase? Surely there'd been women in the family that they'd admired, or whose names they liked a tiny bit? Helena would have done perfectly well, after Grandma, or even just Helen to avoid
confusion, but
Delilah
. She could just see the wedding, hear the splutters of laughter echoing all round the church as the stupid words came out: ‘Do you, Samson, take thee, Delilah . . .'

Delilah now came to the really big question, the one that was about reality this time. If she got the chance, say she was on the beach late at night all by herself with Samson, bit of a moon shining but not too much, no-one around, they'd had a couple of drinks, would she go with him to that big old sofa she'd seen at the back of the water-sports hut and actually
do it
? She might. She just might. Thank goodness for that fumbled practice run with Oliver Willis back in the summer. She'd never imagined, the day it all went off in his scuzzy bedroom with the curtains closed against the dusty August daylight, that she'd be really glad they'd had that quick and slightly disappointing non-event. After the great build-up (two months of going out, loads of intense snogging, some quite exciting groping) all she'd got out of it had been glandular fever and a certainty that sex would have to get better than that. This could just be the chance to give it another go.

‘OK so who's coming over to Dragon Island this afternoon for a snorkelling session?' Ned was in the dining room, where those who could face it after a surfeit of rum punch the night before were tucking into breakfast. Beth sipped her pineapple juice, spread a dollop of guava jam on her toast and watched him ambling from table to table, rounding up a boatload, looking like a scout leader in determined search of volunteers. He started with Gina, fresh from the early stretch class (and where had she disappeared to the night before? One minute slinking about on the dance floor and the
next, simply vanished – no goodnights, nothing) and did the rounds by way of Len and Lesley and on towards Bradley and Cyn.

There was no sign of Angela. Beth guessed that a vicious headache was being nursed in a room darkened by firmly closed blinds. Amazing underwear that woman had been wearing – had she meant it to be displayed to the entire Frangipani bar like that? It seemed she had – it was hardly the sort of thing you wore with simple personal comfort in mind. Strange.

Sadie the bride sat by herself in a corner, reading a magazine and munching toast. She was looking decidedly sulky and her choice of a faraway corner table had ‘Do Not Disturb' written all over it. Beth hoped fervently the sulk was entirely to do with her mother's drunken near-strip and nothing to do with Nick. She'd seen the two of them emerge from their snug nest of beach loungers, giggling and too close to each other. Being dumped by Felicity was no excuse to go making free with other people's fiancées: that way lay a well-deserved thumping from the prospective bridegroom.

‘We don't have to go out to the island in one big party,' Beth reminded Ned, when he eventually returned to the table carrying a hangover-blasting plate of bacon and eggs. ‘Carlos will run the boat over to the island and back whenever anyone puts up the blue flag.'