This Way to Paradise (6 page)

‘So you and Chaz go and let me stay here,' I said, thinking that if I was on my own in his flat at least I could keep it clean.

‘You know they'd never allow it,' he said.

I did. Even my liberal parents weren't that liberal.

When I got home later that afternoon, I could hear the sound of doors slamming and someone cursing as soon as I stepped into the hallway where Dylan was sitting on the floor with about twenty pairs of shoes in front of him.

‘What are you doing?' I asked.

‘Shoe polishing. Got any to be done?'

I shook my head as a female voice up above let out a curse.

Dylan jerked his chin up towards the ceiling.‘Kate,' he said.

‘Something happened?'

Dylan shrugged. ‘Aunt Sarah called earlier but it's probably PMT.'

‘Like you'd know.'

‘I read,' he said.

‘Have you ever thought of reading something normal for your age? Like a horror book or
Harry Potter
or something?'

‘I need to know these things if I'm going to be a doctor,' said Dylan.

‘Thought you were going to be an archaeologist.'

‘That was last week. You feeling better about going to Greece?'

‘No,' I said. ‘Like you care.'

‘Actually I do,' he replied. ‘Least you won't be on your own out there any more.'

‘Why? You coming now?'

‘Nope,' said Dylan, then jerked his chin towards the ceiling again to where the sound of angry stomping and crashing continued.

‘Kate?' I asked.

Dylan nodded.

‘How come?'

‘Her dad's got to go to the States on business or something so she can't go and stay with him, plus Aunt Sarah found out she hadn't been home last night.'

‘Ah.'

‘So that makes two sulky teenagers on route to Greece,' said Dylan.

I raced up the stairs to Kate's room where she had stopped
crashing about and had lit up a cigarette. ‘You heard then?' she asked.

I nodded and crossed her room to open the window.

‘You don't need to do that,' she said. ‘Mum's not here and I wouldn't care if she was.'

I sat on the end of her bed as she puffed away on her cigarette.

‘I'm not going,' said Kate. ‘They can't make us. And anyway, it's probably a non-starter – I doubt they'll be able to get flights at such short notice. And if they do, we'll stage a sit-in. Protest. Go on a hunger strike. There's no way I am going out to holier-than-thou-land for a crap summer. No way.'

Great,
I thought. ‘Me neither,' I said.

‘Flight B345 to Greece is now boarding at Gate 23,' came the announcement over the tannoy.

It was six in the morning. Aunt Sarah had managed to get some last minute flights, which had meant getting up at what felt like an ungodly hour. Neither Kate nor I were in a very good mood.

Mum was about to set off towards the gate. ‘Right, girls,' she said as she beckoned us forward. ‘Let's go.'

‘We'll be fine from here,' said Kate through gritted teeth. ‘We're not going to do a runner at this point in the game.'

Mum ignored her.‘Now, let's go through it all again. Tickets?'

Kate rolled her eyes, but I nodded. ‘Yep. And I've got my passport and my boarding pass. You can go. We'll be fine.'

Mum began fishing in her bag. ‘In a minute,' she said, then thrust a couple of cartons of vanilla yogurt towards us. ‘I brought these for you for the journey.'

‘No thanks,' said Kate.‘I don't do yogurt.'

‘You take them, India Jane. I know you like vanilla.'

‘There will be food on the plane, Mum, and in Greece,' I said. ‘Especially yogurt.'

‘Just in case there's nothing you fancy on the plane,' said Mum and pushed the cartons into my bag.‘Now, anything else?'

‘We'll be OK from here,' I said. ‘You can go.'

Mum stopped and glanced at her watch. ‘OK, if you really think so.' Suddenly her eyes filled with tears. ‘You sure you're going to be OK?'

‘Like it would make a difference if I said no,' I said. I still felt angry that I was being sent off like an unwanted dog being confined to a kennel and all for
Dad's
convenience. He couldn't even be bothered to come with us to the airport. He had taken off this morning with a cheery wave goodbye to go to a meeting with his new orchestra. That was all he cared about now. I don't think he'd even noticed how mad I was with him this last week. He was too wrapped up in his latest venture to notice anyone or anything else.

Mum wrapped her arms around me and gave me a hug. She smelled lovely, of roses and lemons.‘Call as soon as you get there and e-mail regularly. Sarah's got broadband so it won't be a problem.' She hugged Kate too. ‘Give your mum my love.'

‘Yeah, right,' said Kate. ‘Bye Aunt Fleur.'

‘And look after my baby,' said Mum.

‘Mu-um,' I groaned. ‘Just go.'

‘And remember your sun screen . . .'

This time I rolled my eyes although I was feeling wobbly inside about leaving my family behind. It so wasn't fair.

Mum took a deep breath, gave me a sad look then turned on her heel and went. For a brief moment, I felt like sitting on the floor and having a good blub, but Kate had taken off in the direction of our departure gate and I didn't want be left behind.

‘Ridiculous,' she muttered when I caught up with her. ‘First your mum, then an escort on the flight. What do they think we are, a pair of convicts? In fact I wouldn't put it past my mother to have arranged for us to be handcuffed into our seats.'

I was about to ask her what she meant about an escort for the flight when I spotted two policemen standing outside a duty free shop.

‘Ah yes, there are our escorts now,' I said as we passed them.

Kate almost smiled, which would have been a first that week. She'd actually managed to out-sulk me. Not that anyone took much notice of either of us – plans for our trip went into full swing despite all our objections. And Kate's hunger protest only lasted half a day. ‘Why should I impose suffering on myself when everyone else on this planet is already doing such a good job,' she said as she made both of us a cheese toastie on the evening of the first day of her fast.

When we got to our gate, people were sitting about waiting to be called to board so we found a couple of seats and sat down with them. Kate pulled out her phone and got busy texting her mates. I was about to do the same to Erin when I noticed a boy in jeans and a black T-shirt with a rucksack slung over his shoulder enter the waiting area. My breath caught in my throat.

‘Ohmigod,' I gasped and Kate glanced up and over to where I was staring at Joe.

‘Oh, him,' she shrugged. ‘Yeah. Mum said he'd be on our flight when I spoke to her last night. I was about to tell you. Can you believe it?
He's
the escort. My mum asked his mum to tell him to keep an eye on us. Joe Donahue. As if !' She went back to her texting for a minute, then glanced up at me.‘Sorry I didn't tell you before. I forgot you fancied him.'

I felt myself blush.‘I so do not.'

Kate laughed. ‘Whatever,' she said. ‘He may be a few months older than me but if he tries to play the prefect for even one second, I'll tell him where he can stuff it.'

I glanced over at Joe. Somehow, I couldn't see him playing the head boy or chaperone even if he'd been asked to. He hadn't seen us or if he had, he wasn't acknowledging the fact. He made his way over to a row of seats in front of Kate and me and sat down away from us, facing out towards the runways and the planes. I liked the look of him even from behind – the way his hair curled up at the back of his neck, his broad shoulders, nicely toned arms, not too muscular but not puny
either . . . Then I remembered what Kate had said about him being bad news with a trail of broken hearts behind him. I made myself look away and resolved to be cool if I saw him when we were on board.

As Kate continued with her texting, I noticed a couple of boys enter the area and clock Kate. They looked about eighteen; one was tall and slim with dark spiked-up hair, the other was fair with a heavier build like a rugby player. The fair one nudged the other as they walked past us and took the seats to our left. The dark-haired guy couldn't tear his eyes away from Kate's legs (she was wearing a tiny denim mini with peeptoe navy espadrilles with high wedges which made her legs look longer than ever).

She saw the boy looking and gave him a brilliant withering look. ‘Seen enough or would you like me to hitch my skirt up some more?' she asked.

The boy wasn't put off at all and grinned back cheekily.‘Oh, some more, I think,' he said in a posh voice. ‘You've got crackingly good legs.'

He said it with such enthusiasm that Kate couldn't help but break a smile, although she quickly made her face go disdainful again.

His mate leaned over. ‘Deffo,' he said. ‘I'd agree with Tom. Good legs.'

Kate raised an eyebrow, then turned away as if dismissing them. She was really good at being cool and I resolved to
practise the ‘one eyebrow up' look as soon as I next got in front of a mirror.

‘So, where are you going?' asked the blond boy.

Kate glanced up at the sign about the gate. ‘Duh,' she said.

‘Oh right,' said the boy. ‘Obvi. Yes. Of course. Stupid question. Greece.' He didn't seem very embarrassed though. ‘I'm Robin.'

‘And I'm Tom,' said his better-looking mate.

‘And
I
am not interested,' said Kate.

Tom looked over at me.

‘And neither is she,' said Kate.‘Want a Coke, India Jane?'

‘India Jane,' said Tom. ‘I'd like a Coke.'

‘I wasn't asking you,' said Kate. ‘Ignore them, India Jane.'

Robin reached over and hauled his travel bag on to his knee and lifted the lid so that Kate and I could see inside. ‘Got some of this to put in it,' he said as he slightly lifted what looked like a bottle of vodka.

Kate did the one eyebrow raise again but this time looked into the boy's eye in a smiley kind of way as if to say she approved.

‘Couple of Cokes coming up,' she said. ‘Got some change, India?'

I nodded. Mum had given me some spare change before we left the house. I got up to go over to the machine to get the Cokes and although I didn't like suddenly being treated as Kate's private slave, I wasn't too bothered. Even though the boys
looked like fun, I was more interested in the boy sitting with his back to me a few rows away. I figured that, if I got the Cokes, I could walk down his row on the way back and hopefully he'd notice me and say something.

I got the Cokes and walked towards Joe. He seemed to be engrossed in a magazine and I could see by the little white earphones that he was also listening to an iPod. I also noticed that he was wearing a pair of Converse All Stars. Black pinstriped ones. Cool. I walked as close as I could but he still didn't look up. I walked past and was about to go back to my place with Kate when I heard his voice.

‘Excuse me . . .'

I turned around ready to do the ‘one eyebrow up' cool look, but, not having had time to practise it, I think both eyebrows went up making me look like I'd just had a fright.

‘Oh, it's you!' said Joe.

‘Was last time I looked,' I replied, thinking I'd made quite a clever answer.

Joe looked distinctly underwhelmed. He pointed to my bag. ‘Er . . . I think you're dripping something?'

‘Drippi-
uh
?' I trailed off as I looked to where he was pointing. Oh. My. God. There was a trail of white gloop all along the aisle behind me. There were
spots
of it on my jeans. It seemed to be coming from my bag. I looked inside. One of the vanilla yogurts had burst and gone all over everything and was leaking out of the corner of the bag.‘Oh
nooooooooooooo
. . .'

Joe was watching me with the same amused look that he'd had on his face in the chemist's on the day that I'd first seen him.

I scanned my brain for something earth-shatteringly brilliant and witty to say as I pulled out the yogurt carton and held it up in front of him.‘Yogurt. It's the one with friendly bacteria. Um. Those darn bacteria! They're so friendly they follow me everywhere.'

Joe smiled weakly and raised one eyebrow perfectly. (He must have been to the same ‘learn to communicate with your eyebrows' morse code training school as Kate.) Then he went back to reading his magazine.

So much for my new cool image,
I thought as I sloped off towards the nearest Ladies. I was about as cool as a tandoori curry with double chilli.

‘There are the most amazing deserted beaches to skinny dip on,' said Kate as we got up to board the plane. ‘I'll show you guys one night.'

She was like a different girl by the time our flight was finally called and Robin and Tom were her long-lost best buddies. As I'd witnessed all week, Kate could have won an Oscar for her sulky princess act, but, clearly from the way she was throwing her head back, her guffaws of laughter and her animated body language, she could change her mind on a whim, decide to make the best of things and be party animal supreme.