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Chapter Thirty-Eight

Darien

‘I wasn’t sure if I should be glad or disappointed that was

non-alcoholic, but I think I’m just glad now. Italian soda .’ Shantal helps herself to another full glass of the carbonated water I’d brought out with a contented sigh, drizzling pineapple syrup on top. ‘Rich people, I tell you.’

‘We need to get you onto more de la Fuente yachts,’ I remark with a sip of my own drink – mango. Can’t beat a Guaraná, but it’s delicious.

‘Without permission,’ she adds.

I bring a finger to my lips. ‘He doesn’t have to know.’

She rolls her eyes, but she laughs that beautiful uncontrolled laugh. I watch her smile, looking out across the rippling water at the yachts beyond. Straight out of a dream. Her toothy grin, the satisfied little sounds she makes with each sip of soda. Indescribable.

‘I’m aware alcohol isn’t something you drink during the season, but what if you had to choose a go-to drink?’ asks Shantal, swirling her glass idly.

‘Probably … I think it has to be rum.’ I scratch my jaw as a fond memory creeps into the back of my mind. ‘Was my v? , my grandpa’s, favourite, and then my dad’s. He’d bring it home for my mom all the time. It’s one of those things I remember.’

‘When’d you lose him?’ she asks, which catches me only slightly off-guard. People like to tiptoe around the topic. I think part of it is just because it used to make me really upset that I didn’t recall the important things, what he was like and all of that. All I’ve got is foods and cars.

‘I was about six, maybe. Don’t really know too much, just that it was pretty sudden.’ I have to struggle to bring back what Tio Julio told me, because it was so freaking long ago. My mom never talks about him, ever. ‘It was weird because he raced so much, you know, in the street and stuff. And then he was on the way to an interview – he was gonna get a real job, get us out of the city – and it just …’ I shrug. ‘I don’t think I’ve got any kind of recollection of that. It’s all stuff I was told.’

Shantal nods. Her eyes have gone misty. I wonder how we got straight to the most depressing topic in the book like this, but it doesn’t seem to be treating her too well. She holds her glass gingerly, no longer too interested in its contents.

‘Do you ever just feel bad?’ she says. ‘For moving on?’

I take a big gulp of my soda to keep myself occupied for a good minute. It’s like she knows exactly where to get me, the parts that need healing. Then, ‘Every day.’

‘Why?’

‘I feel bad I didn’t know him, mostly.’

‘What do you do about it?’

‘Nothing, I guess.’ I finish off the last of the drink and set the glass aside. ‘I’ve grown up with everyone telling me my dad was my best friend. What do I do about that? Can’t turn back time and get to know him all over again or something.’

‘Would you, though, if you could? Turn back time?’ she asks.

I think about that a lot. What would it change, knowing Pai? I want it more than anything. ‘Yeah.’ And just because the curiosity gets me, ‘Would you?’

‘Would I …’ Shantal looks away, towards the coastline. ‘I never said I had anyone …’

I can feel the melancholy filling the space between us. I had to go there. Guilt heavy in my stomach, I lie down, staring directly into the sun, the picnic blanket warm against the back of my perpetually sore neck. Voice soft, I whisper to her, ‘I’m sorry.’

Back when I first met her, I remember thinking I wanted nothing more than to know about Shantal. To know her reasons, know why she looked at Ipanema that way. As I watch her now, following my motion and lying back on the blanket, I start to very slowly find out why.

For a moment I don’t think she’s going to say anything. She’s gazing up into the sun just as I am. We’ll burn our corneas out like this. But she turns to me, and her eyes are heavy with tears. She tucks a curl behind her ear with a sigh. ‘I’d give everything I have, Darien. For my sister.’

Her sister.

Someone she grew up with, did everything with. I picture two little girls with matching hairstyles chasing each other around a park or kicking around a football. I always wanted a brother, though I never got one. Would have killed to have somebody to share my life with.

‘My mom says the same thing about my dad.’ My chest is suddenly tight with grief for her, even though I’ve experienced none of it, and can scarcely call back my own. ‘That’s why we moved to America. He’s everywhere for her in Rio. She never found anyone else, either. Said if Pai wasn’t there by her side, no one else would be.’

‘That is just how it feels.’ Shantal’s hair brushes my cheek as she struggles to put the same damper on her emotions as she has always done. But she can’t do it this time.

I watch her eyelashes flutter like the paper-thin wings of a butterfly. ‘I was spoiled by Guyana and by my family’s love. When we came to England, I lost Guyana. And when Sonia died, she took all the love with her. All of it, every last drop. And so if someone were to shackle themselves to me, Darien, I’m scared I would have no love left to give.’

My heart aches so hard that I can physically feel it. Is this what my beautiful mother went through, what I know nothing of?

I remember something my mom said once, in one of the fleeting moments when she was able to talk about Pai. They were few and far between, but this, I can recall clear as day.

‘Once you’ve felt so much for someone and they leave, all you wanna do is feel that again.’

I don’t know what’s in my head, but I reach out and wrap an arm around her, and she leans into me. I want to close the distance between us and take away everything that’s hurting her. I don’t want her to ever, ever feel a shred of pain again. I’d fight off the first person that so much as attempted to cause her the slightest harm. I know we’re humans, all of us, breakable by nature, but if anyone deserves to be free from the threat of breaking, it’s Shantal. It’s always going to be Shantal.