Stranded (8 page)

‘No. I’ve vaguely thought about it, but I haven’t stirred myself to do one. You?’

‘Well, I’ve been planning to do one. I was talking to Samad about it; you know, one of the guys who works here?’

I nod. ‘The one with the little baby.’

‘Yes. Well, he’s actually thinking about setting up as a trip operator himself. He says that’s where the money is. He also says the trips available here are all pretty identikit. He’s planning a different one, something that shows you new stuff. He made it sound amazing.’

‘Well, that sounds good. Can we go?’

She drops her voice. ‘The best part? He wants to do a trial for the trip he’s planning. Snorkelling, fishing, lunch on a deserted island. We can be his practice customers. How’s the day after tomorrow for you?’

I look at her, and feel a smile spreading across my face.

‘I wasn’t going to tell anyone this,’ I admit, ‘but the day after tomorrow, I am pretty sure, is my fortieth birthday.’

Katy laughs and touches my arm.

‘Then that’s perfect,’ she says. ‘I’ll talk to him again. We’ll get it set up.’

Cathy

June 1988

They told us! I have never been happier. Everything I was worrying about has vanished, faded away. It is the truth, I know it. The truth is far better than anything I could possibly have imagined.

I no longer have to worry about a niggling desire to explore the world. I don’t have to dread the mechanics of what marriage to Philip might hold for me. I do not have to pine about not being allowed to have a job, let alone a career, and wanting to go to university. None of that matters any more. I am completely free and I can look forward with happiness and excitement to unimaginable joy. Thank God for that – literally.

I am in the best place I could possibly be, the only place in the world. I looked at Martha’s face last night, and I loved her. How could I ever have found her irritating and petty? I saw my feelings reflected in her: she loved me too, for the first time in her life. We are the luckiest people in the world.

Everything is about to change. ‘Change’ is too small a word for it. Everything is going to be transformed beyond all recognition.

Our arch-Father, Moses, the leader of our community and also biological father to many of us (including me), gathered the whole community together. All of us, eighty-three people, in one place. Children sat on the floor, adults on chairs, and Father Moses stood on the platform. Then he climbed up on to his chair and then stepped on to the table, and he stood on the table and put his arms up and shouted out.

I cannot repeat his words exactly, not even in my head, because they are too holy. But this is the Truth that he told us.

The Rapture is coming. The Lord is coming to earth to reclaim the faithful. On June the 21st, midsummer night, He will come. If I am worthy (and I know I am not, though I will try to be between now and then, a manoeuvre He will no doubt be expecting, but I believe him to be kind to repentant sinners, so it could go either way), I will be taken with the others to heaven, to dwell with Him for eternity. If I am not, I will be left on earth with the other sinners, and we will bear the effects of His wrath, which will be well deserved.

I would like to wish away all my previous heretical thoughts, but since God has seen them, of course, there seems no point. I am truly, truly repentant and I hope He sees this too. I wish I could control my mind completely. Sometimes I find myself thinking bad thoughts purely because I know it is of the utmost importance that I don’t. I’ll suddenly realise I’ve been daydreaming about going to university, and then I will kick myself. I don’t mean to do it. I hope God realises that.

If I am left behind, I will know that it is what I deserve, and I will do my best for the other sinners when the Apocalypse happens.

What’s more, Father Moses has given us work to do.

We have to tell the world the truth, to give the sinners a chance to repent. Father Moses says that Jesus, who visited him when he was watching the news on the television, told him that each one of us has to bring at least one former sinner into the compound. They have to be saved, to want to be saved. Each of us children has to bring someone from school, even Martha and me, who are just about to finish our exams and leave. ‘No exceptions!’ he roared, and we jumped in our skins, because it was the voice of Jesus speaking through Moses’ mouth. At least, I think it was.

I am going to go to school tomorrow and give it my very best shot. A week ago, I would have felt myself being crippled with embarrassment at the very idea of trying to bring someone from school, a sinner from the outside world, into our Village. I wanted to belong in their world, not to bring them to ours. Now I know that it is the only way to save them. I cannot wait to get to school and talk. They will laugh, and for the first time in my life I can truthfully say that I don’t care. I have never been this happy, never in my sixteen and a half years.

There are only seven days left until the End of the World, and that, it transpires, changes your perspective somewhat. I will go to school tomorrow and spread the word. Martha and I and Eve and Daniella will work together, talking to all the girls, while Philip, Simon and the others are going to talk to the boys. We sat in a huddle after the meeting, working out our strategy. It is important that every child in the school hears the future from one of us directly, because that will give each of them a chance to respond and it will leave less to the sort of stupid rumour that we can all too easily imagine.

We sat on the wooden floor in the vestry, all talking at once, all of us united, for the first time ever. I have never been as happy in my life as I was this evening, working together with my friends and colleagues. It would be lonely to be the only one at school. But we are going to work in pairs, and Martha and I are taking care of every girl in the fourth, fifth and sixth forms. Martha is my half-sister, although we are one big family here so the biological connection is less important than it is for people out there in the sinful world. We are not at all alike. I am taller than her, with light brown hair that used to be blonde when I was a child (and until now I have wished it still was, in my vanity). Martha is small and (though it doesn’t matter, I am just describing her) fat. She has dark brown hair, which her birth mother, Judith, cuts in a pudding-basin cut, though I have always thought long hair would suit her better. But again, nothing matters now.

Oh, the months and years I have spent yearning for such shallow things as make-up and a stylish haircut: the best I have ever been able to do is to grow it long, and straight, and while I am supposed to have a centre parting, at school I part it on the left and pull it slightly over my face. Martha has enthusiastically reported back to the leaders and I have been in trouble for that.

I forgive her – of course I do, just as Moses and Cassandra forgave me my vanity. Because we are the only people who know the truth. The whole compound is filled with excitement and anticipation. The world is not going to end, but everything is going to change, at sunrise on the 21st of June. I cannot wait.

I wake up feeling happy, roll over in the semi-darkness and stare at the chinks of luminescent sunlight that are squeezing through the gaps around my shutters and making geometric patterns on the ceiling of my jungle hut. I can hear the rustle and chirp of the wildlife around me, and something scampers across the roof. That is probably what woke me up.

I sit up in bed in the tent of the mosquito net, and grin. This is my fortieth birthday. It is the day of the big trip. I am relaxed and languid, which is exactly the way I wanted to be when I reached this point.

I check the time – half past seven – and pull on my bikini and sarong for a quick swim before we leave at half past eight. I hope Katy has kept her promise not to tell anyone else about my birthday. I do not want the attention. I was delighted to be able to escape ‘turning forty’ at home. My well-meaning friends and my enthusiastic daughter would have demanded parties and fuss. I will telephone Daisy, at massive expense, much later in the day, when she is up. This will involve an exchange with Chris, who, although he is forty-three himself, I know will take the opportunity to mention middle age in a mocking tone as many times as he can possibly manage.

I unbolt my door. Every night, I carefully lock myself in, even though there is no glass in the windows – the very idea of glass in the windows of a cabin like this is ridiculous – and the shutters can only be closed by pushing them up against the window until they stick. Nobody could get in through the door without an axe or a battering ram, but anyone could push the shutter and saunter through the window. I make a conscious effort to dismiss those thoughts. This is a safe place and there are plenty of cabins nearby, and people would hear me if I screamed.

I love the feeling of the early morning. Everything is still and fresh. The air is warm, but cooler than it will be later. I walk down to the beach and stand on the sand and breathe. I close my eyes, and savour the warmth on my cheeks. The sea is pulling against the sand, making the most gentle lapping sound. It is completely different from the grey Channel at home, which, when it feels the urge, crashes against noisy, stony sand. This sand is so fine, so many millennia old, that the water barely whispers on it.

My sarong is crumpled on the white sand. I am in the embrace of the warm sea. I swim out, feeling the occasional tiny nips of whatever it is in the water that bites or stings almost imperceptibly, until I am level with the jutting rocks at the side of the bay.

Then I flip over on to my back and float at the mercy of the small waves, looking up at the sky.

‘Happy birthday,’ I whisper to myself. And I smile. It is going to be a very happy birthday indeed.

There are a few people having breakfast in the café by the time I get there, and I wish them all a good morning. The German couple whose names I have forgotten return my greeting, while the man out of the bickering Australians grins at me, and Katy invites me to join her. The excitement is written all over her face.

She leans towards me and stage-whispers: ‘Happy birthday!’

‘Thanks.’

‘Ready for the day out? Have you got everything you need?’

I nod at the little bag by my feet. It is sagging emptily. This is because I cannot think of anything much that I will need at all.

I see that Katy has the remains of scrambled eggs and fruit on her plate, and I order the same. Katy’s porcelain skin is tanned, and she looks relaxed and happy.

The German couple, the woman with the lemon-print bikini and her partner with the springy hair, are standing with their bags on the beach. As I watch, a water-taxi pulls up and they walk into the shallow water and throw their bags into it. The woman, whose name I have never learned, is wearing a short sundress decorated with pictures of cherries. Her hair is tied back to reveal a long, curved neck. She turns and waves to us.

‘Have fun today!’ she yells.

‘We will!’ Katy calls back. She looks at me. ‘They wanted to come too, but they’ve got a plane to catch. Helga was really cross about it.’

‘Who else is coming, then?’ I ask.

‘Oh, I’m not sure. Edward, the Scottish guy – he was keen.’ Katy stands up. ‘Anyway, shall we find out? Have you got everything?’

‘Sunglasses,’ I say. ‘Sunscreen. Phone just in case Daisy sends me a birthday text. A bottle of water.’

She nods. ‘That should do it. Travelling light.’

We meet at the end of the beach, close to my hut. Samad looks up as Katy and I approach across the sand, and gives us a huge grin.

‘Katy!’ he says. ‘Esther! Thank you.’

The others all turn to us, and I am slightly dismayed to see that both the shouty Australians and Mark and Cherry, the amorous Americans, are here; apart from them, there is just Edward, Katy and me. It never occurred to me that either couple would join in a trip like this.

However, out of everyone on the beach, I would have chosen Edward and Katy to spend my birthday with. The others I will live with.

‘Hi!’ I say to everyone, and I make myself smile broadly around the group.

‘G’day,’ says the shouty Australian woman, though from her tone she might just as well have said ‘I don’t like you’. The others greet me in a more friendly way, and Katy grins and claps her hands.

‘Everyone – it’s Esther’s birthday!’ she announces, and they all smile and say the right thing. I look at her, annoyed, because she knew I wanted to keep it secret. There is nothing I can do now, so I force a smile.

‘All are here,’ says Samad, and he turns and walks off. I follow at the back of the group. As we pass my cabin, the last one in the resort, an enormous lizard comes out of the jungle, makes a sharp left when it sees us and lopes off down the path.

‘It looks like a dinosaur,’ I say.

‘They’ve been around since those days,’ says Edward, turning in front of me. ‘I’m sure I read that somewhere.’

I stop and stare at it. It is at least as long as Daisy would be if she lay down next to it; its legs are chunky, more like cats’ than lizards’ legs, and it is mostly powerful tail. It looks at me with a beady eye and stays absolutely still, as if frozen into place. The others walk on a little way. I am transfixed by the expression on its face. Daisy would have adored it. I take a quick photograph with my phone.

‘Thanks,’ I say. Then I realise I have been left behind. ‘Bye then,’ I say to the lizard. ‘See you tonight.’

It turns and ambles back into the forest, moving more laboriously than you would expect from a lizard.

As I head around the corner and away from the cabins, someone behind me calls my name.

‘Esther!’ he shouts. I stop and look back, scanning the huts for the source of the cry. There are a couple of people on the beach. Then I see Rahim, who I think owns the resort, waving from the steps of the café.

He wants to talk to me. I lift a hand and wave over my head, then hurry after the others.

They are already on the next beach, climbing into a small fishing boat. It was clearly not built for eight, and the benches along the sides are already cramped. The cross Australians are on one side, the beautiful Americans on the other, and Katy and Edward are still on the beach. Katy has a collection of hut keys in her hand, all of them tied to large pieces of wood to make them unlosable.