The Island (16 page)

‘!'

My fingers grip the sand as I try to turn. Dying is forgotten.

‘!'

It can't be. Can it be?

And there he is, in a shiver of sand, all butting nose and hot licks, and his little hard head ducks away from my groping hand and he's –

all wet
.

I press my finger to his fur and lick it.

It's fresh. A tiny, tiny burst of coolness in my parched mouth. A shiver of water sprays me cool as he shakes. Dog is wet and tired from the cave. His fur holds a million drops of water and I bury my face in his warm, breathing flank and suck. It is fresh, not salty. Dog sighs as I try not to waste a single drop.

It's only after I'm wiping fur and sand from my mouth that I see it. See something

so strange, so miraculous

that it's all I can do to

remember to

breathe.

 

Virgil Will Deliver

The message is tied securely to the front of Dog's collar with fishing wire. It hangs, a little folded square, tied like a parcel.

With trembling fingers I untie it, Dog watching me solemnly. He knows this is a momentous occasion.

I curse. There's no way I can undo all those tiny knots. I make Dog wait while I get my knife.

‘Sit still. Don't want to hurt you.'

Dog knows not to move.

I finally cut through the fishing wire, and stare at the little note-parcel in my hand. Its edges are neat and precise. One more cut with the knife, and I'm through.

I start to unfold it. It's made from a weird sort of shiny paper, like it's waterproof. For a moment I wonder where I've seen this sort of paper before, and then I remember the water-resistant notebook from the Red Nylon Bag. I have a vague memory of ripping pages out and watching them soar into the gull-filled, wave-tossed sky a million years ago.

It's been folded loads of times, like Whoever was aiming for a Guinness World Record in paper-folding. Eventually I get to the final layer, and open it to reveal the message. It's in tiny, neat, cramped writing, in a sharp pencil, on a tiny piece of paper, as if Whoever is reluctant to waste even a scrap of vital resources.

EST POS 47°25.0'S, 52°59.5'E
APPROX 200 KM DRIFT FROM SOA
RETURN VIA VIRGIL

I blink, then reread. Then I start to get angry.

Like, what the frick does that even mean? Who the hell's Virgil? What's the point in writing in code, when it may be your only chance to give vital information?

On wobbly legs, I reach over to the wood pile and chuck a couple of could-be nut husks and some sticks on to the fire. Watch it whoosh as it lives again. I feel like hurling the stupid message into the flames too, to make those crabbed numbers crinkle and shrink.

But 'course I don't.

Instead I sit on my hammock and stroke my finger over the paper. Stare at the message, like it'll start to speak.

Probably not a bird hunter then, not with a water-resistant survival notebook.

Maybe it's the pilot. Of all the people it could be, please make it be the pilot. I can't even remember his name –

the co-pilot's name was Derek
–

but the last thing I remember him shouting was,

‘BRACE!' and everyone's screaming now, everything's tilting
…

I lie down with Dog, and prop the note up on a rock so that I can see it. Tomorrow I'll write back. Maybe in some random code, or Elvish or something.

Ha.

The sky feels different today, sort of bruised and angry. There's an edge to it. And, settling over the mountains, something I've not seen since I've been here.

Clouds.

 

Weymouth

I swoop Johnny up into a hug and we both run into the sea. Cassie's just behind us, free and happy with her shoes off. She's enjoying the feeling of the cold water on her swollen feet because it's a hot day, hotter than any we've had this summer.

Everyone's in families but we're a family too.

Like that mum with her two boys, all three of them in wetsuits and gleaming like seals while their dad takes a picture.

‘Smile,' he's saying. ‘Smile.'

Like that pair of old ladies sitting in their camping chairs, sharing a packet of Doritos with their sudoku on their laps. They're sisters, I suppose, and they come here all the time, to hear the seagulls, to nod in the sun.

Like that teenage girl sitting on the bench on the edge of the beach. She's with her little dog and he's up on the bench beside her, head cocked. He's hoping for one of her chips but her dad gets in there first. She pushes him off, pouting. He laughs and gives her a cuddle.

A pair of hands grabs my face then. Johnny's on my hip and pulling my face towards him, so that I'm looking just into his eyes.

A woman who's paddling turns to us and laughs.

‘Wants to look at his sister, don't he!'

But it makes me sad, that Johnny needs to do that, at two years old. That it's the only way to get a whole person to himself. I am his whole world.

We're in Weymouth and it's the first and last time Cassie's taken us to the seaside.

We stare into each other's faces, Johnny and me, and around us the wind flaps, and dark spots are on the beach; dark spots that blur and bleed and everyone's laughing and rushing under their beach-tents and pulling plastic bags over their heads, and Cassie's tugging us and we're laughing and running, running over that churning sand before we get

wet.

 

Storm

The splats of rain darken the sand like ink blots. More and more of them, till I sit up and crawl forward on my hands and knees. Feel them splash on my hands, cheeks, forehead.

Dog leaps up and I fall forward and lift up my face and open my mouth.

Let me at it, let me at it, let me at it.

Sweetest, warmest, fattest rain ever.

Filling my mouth. Plumping out my fat, thick tongue.

It began with a warm shiver that lasted all day. Me and Dog felt it as we plaited more palm leaves; dragged driftwood for the fire. When we waded in deep to pull in our bottle-net, even the fish seemed to bristle with some sort of knowing energy. Their eyes fixed the sky as their mouths gaped and ungaped.

Dog doesn't like it.

When we've drunk our fill, he sits and mopes on our bed, front paws burying his nose. His eyes follow me as I heave boulders and rocks to weight down what remains of the life raft.

Then the sky seems to heave as it crackles and unzips itself.

I leave the log I'm pulling and go and sit by Dog.

‘!' he says, but in a small voice.

‘Oh my God.'

Already our camp is soaked. Dog pants and presses against me whilst I stuff all my treasures into my bag: broken shells, my Ray-Bans, fishing line, all the pebbles that Dog has brought me.

The fish that's hanging on the washing line is swaying and getting pulpy; I hope it won't waste.

The sky howls, and cracks its jagged teeth. Me and Dog sit shivering. We watch the palm trees bend double and hiss, their fronds flapping wildly like a crazy wino's hands. The sea is bruised and blue; its waves bash the shore, breakers big as juggernauts.

All at once One Tree cracks and sails across the beach in slow motion. It lands metres away from our shelter.

‘We can't stay here,' I shout. ‘Come on, Dog, we can't stay.'

I gather up our stuff any old how, in a panic, Dog running loops around my feet.

Shoes, I need my bra-shoes. And where the frick's my knife?

The storm snatches branches and leaves and shelter poles and flings them into the sky. As me and Dog race to grab our cooking tins and bottle-net, a branch soars over and crashes in front of us, missing Dog by millimetres.

‘Run, Dog. Run!'

I'm screaming and shouting but my voice goes nowhere; it's caught and tattered by the wind.

A gust scoops me up like a pulsing hand and throws me sideways. I land on my hands and knees in the sand, terrified for Dog.

‘Dog.
Dog!
Where are you, for frick's sake?'

I pick myself up and the sea's hurling itself against the shore; behind it, the sky is purplish and bruised like a horrid flower. The storm spins the sea; spins the sky; wobbles its way towards our camp and I watch in horror as it shrieks and shreds Home Camp to pieces; bits of palm roof whirl.

There is no sign of Dog.

And I'm running, running, back towards camp, back into the forest. I have no idea if it's safe to be near all these trees in a raging storm but all I know is –

oh God, oh God
–

I've got to find Dog because

I can't be alone, can't be alone,

not on a night like this.

The rain smokes and sighs. In front of me a tree snaps, barring my way, and I scrabble over its fallen log, sobbing now.

‘Dog?
Dog
,' I scream. ‘Oh, please come back.'

I break through into the Poison Pool clearing and it lights up white-sudden, a stage full of screaming trees. Splash through its muddy waters, claw my way over branches. Trees are crashing

–
snapping like a fistful of twigs
–

hissing, steaming rain,

twigs and thorns stabbing my hands, face,

tearing my legs.

I twist round because there's only one place he'll have gone, only one place that he'll be safe in this storm, and that is the place that I hate most of all –

it's dark, it's dark, it's dark
–

and somehow I'll have to squeeze through that craggy tunnel into whatever's on the other side.

But I have no torch.

Oh God.

There is a knotted palm leaf, and another; through my rain-blinded eyes I see them and follow.

 

Monkey

Johnny is wailing outside the front door and when I let him in his head is covered in blood.

‘Ow, ow, ow,' he screams.

‘Oh Jesus, ohmyGod. Johnny, what happened? What happened?'

Angela is hovering, white-faced.

‘Get a towel,' I hiss.

‘It's all right, Johnny. It's all right.'

I hug him to me and he's heaving and there's blood everywhere, on my top and on my hands and in his tears and eventually we get him to sit down on the kitchen stool and he calms down enough to talk to us. There's a nasty gash on the side of his face and I'm glad there's a towel pressed against it because
Idon'twanttolookIdon'twanttolook
.

‘Monkey?'

‘What happened, love?'

Johnny buries his face into my chest and I kiss his head and stroke his hair.

‘Tried to jump off the swing,' he mumbles.

‘Oh, Monkey.'

‘Think there was some glass on the floor. It hurts, Frannie, it
hurts.
'

‘I think he'll need to go to A and E with that,' says Angela. ‘Would you like me to drive you both?'

I nod numbly. Johnny is calmer now, his little shoulders shuddering.

Angela clears her throat.

‘Do you think one of us should wake your mum?'

 

Flash

The sea spits and lashes over the rocks as I climb.

Once, twice, the sky splits.

Once, twice, I slide off the rocks' slimed shoulders and have to swim, choking and gasping in the churning water. It's difficult to climb back up then. I cling to drenched ledges, face pressed into shivering stone. And my legs are liquid and the sky shudders again as if it's taking a photo of itself.

Flash. There's Fran on the rocks. Flash. There she is in the black water; can you see her dark head bobbing?

The crack in the rocks is there, where it's always been. This time its walls are slimed by rain. Eyes tight against the rain, fingers slipping and grasping, I squeeze through. And this time I push further. A faint light now, green ghost-mist. I climb through into the cave that lies beyond, with its dripping, sighing walls.

And there is Dog waiting for me, nose in paws, shivering.

‘?' he says.

I laugh and cry and hughughug him.

We cling together, Dog and me, in that dripping cave of sighs.

 

Stars

Johnny is leaning so close his breath is warm on my ear. We're reading his favourite picture book,
The Little Boat.

I turn the page and now Johnny is almost asleep; his head sinks heavy on my shoulder.

We're sleepy, Monkey and me; the lull of the words rocks us.

So at first we don't hear the car outside or the footsteps on the stairs or the rap of the letter box. We are with the boy and his boat as he plays by the side of the water.

I turn the page but we never get to the end because then the rap comes loud and clear.

‘Wait there, Johnny. I'll see who it is.'

I settle him on my bed and go to answer the door.

When I peer through the chain I see Angela, but her smile looks all bendy today.

‘Can we come in, Fran?' she says.

When I open the door, I see that Angela has brought a tall man, who looks like another social worker, and two police officers.

‘Can we sit down?'

There's nowhere to sit so Angela perches in her usual spot next to Cassie's feet on the settee and the rest of us remain standing. After a while, one of the police officers draws the stool in from the kitchen.

‘This is my colleague, Lee Jackson,' says Angela.

Lee nods. He's got dreads tied back in a headband and his eyes don't meet my face.

‘Fran, is your brother here?'

I nod, and Angela gestures to her colleague.

‘Would you wake your mum for us please? And then would you go and fetch your brother?'

‘He's asleep,' I say.

Something about her face, about all of their faces, is scaring me.

I push Cassie's shoulder.

‘Cassie – wake up. There's people here.'

‘Mmmm?' mumbles Cassie.

I shove her hard and she gasps and opens her eyes.