Siobhan Curham - Dark of the Moon

‘Oh no!’ My knees give way and I sink down on to the wet sand. My mind flashes back to the moment when I was left alone on the deck and I thought the waves were going to sweep me away. The idea of that actually happening to the others is so unbearable I can barely breathe.

The Flea starts pacing up and down.‘I don’t get it. I just don’t get it. There hasn’t been a storm. There hasn’t been a storm!’ he yells up at the sky, like he’s hollering at the weather gods.

‘Can someone please help me?’ Belle calls.

I wipe the tears from my eyes and clamber to my feet. We’d told Belle to wait by the trees but she’s stumbling blindly down the beach toward us.

‘I’ll go get her,’ the Flea says.

I nod. Dan and Cruz begin inspecting what’s left of the boat. For a second, fear has me frozen to the spot. I don’t know if I want to see any more. I force myself to walk over to them. The sea water feels icy against my warm feet and sends an instant chill through my body.

‘How – how bad is it?’ I ask them from the other side of the boat.

‘It’s bad,’ Dan replies. I’ve never heard him so serious.

I look at Cruz and he shakes his head.

Bile burns at the back of my throat and I fight the urge to retch. As I walk round the battered hull, water sloshes up to my knees.

The inside of the boat is an empty shell. The deck has been ripped out and only the floorboards of the hold remain. I look at Cruz frantically. ‘How did this happen? Is it storm damage? I don’t understand.’

Cruz frowns. ‘I do not know. They could have been caught in a storm but I don’t see how we wouldn’t have known about it. They would not have got that far from here with no engine. And for the boat to be so badly damaged . . .’ He crouches down and examines the hole in the hull. ‘It looks like it is caused by rocks. But how?’

We all look at each other blankly.

‘Well, the life jackets are gone so they must be wearing them, right?’ I look at Dan hopefully, like he’ll know exactly what’s happened.

But Dan’s looking past me, at the sea. ‘Uh-oh.’

‘What?’ I turn and follow his gaze.

Something square and white is bobbing towards us. We watch as a wave rolls in and deposits it on the sand, as if to say, You think the boat’s bad, look what I got for you this time.

My heart plummets. It’s a case – a vanity case. Jenna’s vanity case. I stride back out of the water and grab the handle. Then I collapse down on to the ground, hugging the case to me as if it’s Jenna herself.

‘Why did you have to leave?’ I cry. ‘Why?’

In a flash Cruz, Dan, the Flea and Belle are surrounding me.

‘It’s okay,’ Cruz says gently. ‘You’re right, there are no life jackets. They could have been rescued.’

‘Yeah,’ Dan says, ‘for all we know they could have been picked up from the boat before it even got wrecked.’

‘There’s no way Jenna would go anywhere without her vanity case,’ I sniff.

‘True,’ the Flea says.‘But hey, they might have been rescued in a hurry. She might not have had time to get it.’

I nod, desperately hoping that he’s right.

‘So, what do we do now?’ the Flea says.

‘What do you mean?’ Belle asks nervously.

‘Well, do we really want to go anywhere in a boat after this? I mean, hello, we don’t even have any life jackets.’

We all look at Cruz. He frowns. ‘The boat we found is in much better condition than this one though . . .’

‘No kidding,’ Dan says, looking at the wreck.

‘No, I mean, even before they left, this boat was not truly seaworthy,’ Cruz says. ‘Why do you think I didn’t already take you guys in it? There was a lot of structural damage after the storm. But the boat we have now,’ he nods, ‘it is in great condition.’

‘But what if we get hit by a storm too?’ the Flea says.

‘We can’t stay here!’ Belle yells, making us all jump.

The Flea looks at her, concerned. ‘We have to be careful, honey.’

‘ We can’t stay here! ’ Belle’s practically screaming now.

We all look at each other.

‘It’s okay,’ I say. ‘We’re going to leave as soon as sun’s up, right?’ I call over to the others.

‘Right,’ Dan and Cruz say, followed by a slightly reluctant Flea.

I look at the silhouette of the volcano looming above the rainforest. The sky behind it is turning purple. ‘It won’t be long now,’ I say, taking hold of Belle’s hands. They’re still cold as ice. ‘Come on, you’re freezing, let’s get back to the fire.’

Picking up Jenna’s case, I lead Belle back to the fire and put some fresh sticks on it. The flames leap up hungrily.

‘I have to get out of here, Grace,’ Belle whispers. ‘I have to get back to my mom.’

‘I know. And you will.’ I sit down next to her and put my arm around her. Then I look up the beach to the shadowy outline of the rainforest. My skin feels prickly with fear. Are you there? I say to Hortense in my head, but the only reply I get is the sudden squawk of a parrot.

‘Cruz will get us all out of here,’ I say firmly, trying to convince myself just as much as Belle. ‘Listen, the birds are waking up. It’ll soon be sunrise.’

‘Come on, Beau-Belle, let’s go get your stuff together,’ the Flea says, coming over and helping her up.

Dan and Cruz start pulling the wreck of the boat further up the beach. I look down at Jenna’s case and feel the sudden urge to open it. As I undo the zip, water trickles out on to my fingers. Inside is surprisingly messy for Jenna, but then I realise that she must have had to pack in a hurry once they decided to leave without us. Hurt crushes my heart. I guess years of friendship don’t just disappear over night, no matter how bad things had become between us.

I think back to the last time I saw Jenna, looking down at me from the boat while I pleaded with her to stay. Will that be the last time I ever see her? I shove the thought from my mind and take her hair straighteners from the case. Just the very notion of hair straighteners seems crazy now. What does any of that stuff matter – hair straighteners, make-up, the latest look – when, at any moment, life can hurl you face to face with death?

I rummage further and feel the cover of a small, hardback book. I pull it out and open it. The first page is covered in Jenna’s handwriting but the water has caused the ink to run so the words are just one long bumpy line. Is it her journal? I feel a weird mixture of guilt and longing. I know it’s wrong to read another person’s private thoughts but it might be the only way I get to hear Jenna’s voice again. I carefully turn to an inside page. Once again most of the words have bled together, but one line remains unspoilt:

I can’t believe I almost told G I slept with Todd, especially now we’re stuck on this

What the hell? I hold the writing up to the firelight. But my eyes aren’t playing tricks on me. It’s there in black and white. Jenna slept with my boyfriend. But when did she sleep with him? My mind starts rewinding furiously. Was it here on the island? Or back at home? It can’t have been here – it would have been physically impossible for them to sneak off without being noticed. So that means . . .

I feel sick as I think of how she questioned me over and over in the couple of weeks before we left about whether I was going to sleep with Todd on the cruise. My hands start shaking so hard I have to put the notebook down. I remember huddling next to Jenna in the hold of the boat after the storm hit. ‘I have to tell you something, Grace,’ she’d said, right after she asked me if we were going to die. Was that what she was going to tell me? Did she want to clear her conscience? I hug my knees to my chest and take a couple of slow, deep breaths. Even though Todd and I have broken up, it’s like Jenna’s reached out of her journal and socked me right in the stomach. I pick up the notebook and stumble to my feet. All that time I spent stressing about what I’d done to make her act so weird, and it was because she’d slept with my boyfriend. It was bad enough when I figured out she liked Todd, but this is the ultimate betrayal. So what if Todd and I weren’t right for each other. She was supposed to be my best friend.