Page 21 of Someone in the Water

Frankie

I don’t take my eyes off Lola as I continue towards the waterfront hut.

I can see from the white tips on the waves that the wind is strong out there, and Lola will be taking full advantage, pushing her body, taking risks, just like I did at her age.

Lola is a very talented windsurfer – taught by my obsessed mother as soon as she was strong enough to pull up a sail – but right now, that’s little comfort.

Lola’s sail is white and red, and it reminds me of the dying eagle owl’s bloodstained feathers from my dream in the airport car park.

I turn my head away, exhale slowly. Remind myself that it was a stupid, meaningless nightmare.

Lola is not going to die.

I pause ten or so metres away from the hut.

Jack is pulling another sail down from the rack while a young woman in a bright turquoise bikini and orange buoyancy aid hovers nervously by his side.

When he and Archie worked together, Jack would sort out the equipment while Archie covered front of house, charming the guests with his smooth Scottish brogue.

Jack has got no one to hide behind now, and I wonder if that has softened him at all.

If such a thing is possible for a man like that.

I watch him slide a sail to the water’s edge and attach it to a board.

He gives the guest a demonstration – showing her how to stand up by planting one foot and using it to drag the board towards her.

When she nods her understanding, he gives the board a gentle push into the shallow water and turns his back on her – his job done.

I watch the woman clamber on, then tentatively rise up to standing.

The board wobbles, but she stays upright. The first battle won.

I take a deep breath and walk up to the hut. ‘Hey.’

Jack freezes for a moment, then slowly turns around. He assesses me, and I do the same to him. Age has damaged him, but not in the same way as Raphael. The coarse dyed hair and jagged crow’s feet. More scarred than faded.

‘Frankie Torre,’ he finally says, his tone difficult to gauge. ‘I didn’t think I’d ever see you again.’

‘I didn’t think I’d come back,’ I murmur, looking away, back out to sea, where Lola is still flying across the water. ‘But my daughter needed me.’

‘I heard. But still, it’s brave of you.’

I turn back to face him. ‘Brave?’

‘You know,’ he says, not looking at me. ‘After everything you did. And didn’t do.’

I catch sight of the catamaran in my peripheral vision, and suddenly a memory of Izzy flashes up. Her tearful face and frozen body as I did what I could to save a little boy’s finger.

‘She looks like you.’

Jack’s comment snaps me back to the present. ‘Thank you.’

‘A natural on the water like you too.’

‘I watched you put Lola’s rig together.’ I realise my tone is more accusing than grateful, and Jack’s face sours.

‘What, you think I tampered with it?’

‘No, sorry, that came out wrong.’

‘How dare you come back here after twenty years and start throwing accusations at me again?’

I swallow down the comeback that wants to spill out.

That I know all about him, his past. And that he can blame me for Archie’s death all he likes, but it won’t change who’s really responsible.

I look back at Lola. She’s still on her board, flying back out to sea now.

The wind direction is clearly side shore, the best conditions.

I hope she gybes soon, turns her nose back to shore. I want her back on dry land.

‘It was a surprise, hearing that you never left,’ I say, trying to sound civil.

He shrugs. ‘I had nowhere else to go. And I wanted to help. The hotel barely survived that summer. Did you know that? Almost all the bookings got cancelled. Madly, it was Anna who saved it. Turns out she wasn’t as pointless as Izzy liked to make out.

Raphael was a mess – maybe being the one to find the body, or maybe …

I don’t know. Anyway, Anna took the helm.

She had all these contacts in the UK, God knows how, and suddenly Hotel Paoli was popping up in lots of fancy travel magazines.

It got things back on track.’ He shrugs.

‘And it feels like Anna’s been in charge ever since. ’

‘I got that impression too,’ I murmur. ‘But I’m amazed Raphael allowed it to happen.’

Jack shrugs. ‘He lost a lot that night. His hotel, his status, his father too because Salvo bought a vineyard in Sartène soon after. It changed him. Permanently. It changed us all, I guess.’

Jack looks out to sea, pretending to check on the smattering of guests on windsurfs. Most of them are floating on their boards, feet set, knees bent, hands gripping the rope as they try to pull the sail up without toppling over backwards.

‘Does Lola know?’ I ask quietly. ‘Have you told her?’

‘She said that you’d told her, but I worked out pretty quickly that she was lying. You’re too ashamed, I suppose, to tell her the truth about your past.’

Heat burns my cheeks. I feel too weak to stand, so I lower myself onto the sand, feel its soft July warmth against the backs of my legs.

God, I want to see my daughter. To hold her.

For fourteen years, I have left Lola on her birthday.

I’ve always thought it was for the best, that I was protecting her, but maybe that was bullshit.

Because right now, I’m desperate to be with her.

Is that how Lola has felt over the years?

Abandoned. Longing for her mum to be there for her.

‘So did you tell her anything?’

‘No,’ Jack says. ‘But that doesn’t mean I won’t. I’m not here to keep your secrets.’

I feel tears threaten again, a mix of relief and fear. ‘I know,’ I whisper.

‘Anyway, keeping things inside fucks you up,’ he continues. ‘Everyone knows that.’

It’s an accepted truth, that you should talk about your problems. But it has never been that way for me. Every time I confess my darkest fears, I get labelled insane and locked up. It’s better when I handle things in my own way.

‘Lola was my therapy,’ I say quietly. ‘She wasn’t planned, but when I found out I was pregnant, I knew she would save me.’

‘So you leant on your kid from day one. That doesn’t sound like something to be proud of.’

His words slap so hard that they sting. Because I know he’s right. I should never have expected so much from my daughter. Especially when she was the one who ended up suffering for it.

‘Anyway, it looks like you’re about to have the chance to make it up to her.’

Jack nods towards the water’s edge and I turn to look. Lola’s board and sail are lying on the beach, and she is walking towards us.

But not with the welcoming smile I was hoping for.