Page 41

She had to do so much of it, all the time, relentlessly. Pretending to give a shit about people’s dreary, humdrum problems; acting as if they were telling her something completely new and different and unique and special every time, when in truth, everybody complained about the same old crap.

They were all the same, really, people’s wounds. You’d seen one, and you’d seen them all. She wanted to scream at the thought of it: the memory of the fifty-minute slots, one blurring into another, the same thing, all day, every day, without end.

Hannah.

She’d hoped the source of the noise Scott had heard earlier in the trees was Ben, but it was still amazingly lucky that it was, and that she’d stumbled across him when she did – they must have all ended up close together when they were going after that helicopter.

She’d not said one word before slamming the knife – which she’d snuck out of Naya’s bag when she was looking for painkillers for Scott – hard into the side of Ben’s chest. It filled her with guilt and horror – none of this was his fault – but what else was she supposed to do ?

Then just a moment ago, she’d been lurking in the trees with the satellite phone, trying to find out how far away the rescuers were, when she’d seen Scott limp into the clearing, move towards Ben, lay an ear to his grey lips.

Finally Scott spoke. ‘Did you do this, Carly? Did you stab Ben? And what about Hannah – was that you too?’ He leaned over to one side, away from Ben, and retched onto the ground; nothing much seemed to come out, they were all too dehydrated for that, she supposed.

Carly watched as he wiped his mouth, then turned to look back at her. ‘But... I don’t get it. Why ?’

Carly pondered for a moment how much to tell him. He didn’t need to know every detail, sure, but it might be good for him to understand some of it. She wanted him to know that she’d had a good reason for coming here to confront Hannah; for doing everything she’d done.

‘I lost someone,’ she said eventually, her voice soft, wistful – the way she always sounded when she thought about Robyn. Those three little words could in no way sum up the enormity of her pain, her grief. ‘Then after I lost her, I lost everything else.’

And it was true. After Robyn died, Carly had spiralled.

She’d found she could no longer be a therapist; could no longer listen to people talk about their nightmare dates or low self-esteem or how much they hated their boss.

She could no longer kid herself that she was any good at helping anyone with their struggles; if she couldn’t even save the person she loved most in the world, what the hell was she doing trying to support anyone else?

So, she’d stopped practising, found herself unable to work – unable to function – for months, until she’d defaulted on her mortgage.

Eventually she’d taken a crappy customer service job at a local tech company, reading robotic scripts instructing people on how to set up their new devices, because it was the only thing her traumatized brain could handle.

Not that any of that could compare to the loss of Robyn.

Scott shifted then on the jungle floor; Carly turned to look at him. He was watching her, eyes full of confusion.

‘But what’s that got to do with Hannah?’ he said.

Carly shook her head; a strange, bitter sound emerged from her throat, somewhere between a laugh and a sob. ‘What’s it got to do with her? Everything, Scott. Robyn’s death was Hannah’s fault,’ she said. ‘Hannah killed her.’

Robyn had told Carly about her bipolar disorder in Peru, the first night they met.

Her diagnosis had come a few years earlier, when she’d ended up in a South London hospital after a manic episode that saw her survive on nothing but cigarettes and Red Bull for nearly two weeks, before collapsing at Denmark Hill station.

‘There’s no point in me hiding it anyway, not with those group leaders watching me like a hawk,’ she’d said, laughing, in her South London accent.

She’d been taking a mood stabilizer for eighteen months now, quite a high dose, and sometimes it made her a bit flat – sort of numb, she said, like she wasn’t really feeling her emotions.

But it was worth it. ‘Keeps me from going doolally,’ she said.

‘Trust me, babe, you don’t want to see me thinking I’m the next artistic prodigy or trying to buy the whole of the bleeding internet on my credit card again.

Don’t reckon you’d be so keen on me after that. ’

But Carly would have been. She’d thought Robyn was wonderful: funny and clever and strong.

And sexy as hell, with her hourglass figure and wavy balayage bob and deep, gurgling laugh.

When they got back from the rainforest, things moved fast. Within a couple of months, fed up of long train journeys and unsatisfying Zoom sex, Robyn decided to rent out her studio flat in Camberwell and move up to Cardiff, into Carly’s flat.

Robyn worked remotely – she could do her web design job online from anywhere – so it was easier for her to move than Carly, who had rented her therapy room on a long-term contract and had clients to think of.

For one blissful year, they had everything: lazy Sundays in bed, scary movies on the sofa, laughter and fun and electrifying sex and a deep, heartfelt connection; a belonging. They fitted together; they were each other’s person.

And then someone, one of her work colleagues – someone well-meaning but stupid, so fucking stupid – had told Robyn about Hannah.

Scott stirred from his spot sitting on the ground, winced as the movement jarred his ankle. ‘Hannah killed someone you loved – I don’t understand... how?’ he said.

Carly looked at him, saw shock, disbelief even – but also genuine sadness in his face.

She closed her eyes for a second; saw Robyn’s last moments on earth behind them, as she so often did.

‘Robyn watched Hannah’s videos. She actually believed all that rubbish Hannah preached – that stuff about how Western medicine shouldn’t be trusted and antidepressants mess up your brain for ever.

About how we should allow our bodies to heal themselves by coming back into energetic balance – all that shit,’ she said.

Then she told him the rest of the story.

About how it was as if Hannah had cast a spell on her; Robyn was enchanted.

She’d taken Hannah’s word as gospel when she said that mood-stabilizing medication was harmful and unnecessary.

Hannah had even made an entire twenty-minute TikTok special on lithium carbonate, the drug Robyn had been taking for years, the medicine that kept her on an even keel.

The day after she’d watched it, Robyn told Carly she was going to lower her dose; see how she felt.

‘I’ve been on thirty mil a day for years, doll,’ she’d said.

‘It’s the highest dose. God knows what it’s doing to my body – or my brain.

I reckon it’s about time I give it a go, try to see how I am on a bit less.

If I start getting a bit wobbly, I’ll go back up. ’

Carly had been terrified. She knew the risk of a manic episode was at its peak in the days after stopping or reducing mood stabilizers; she was afraid for Robyn, for what she might do.

But she had no choice except to trust her; she knew it wasn’t her place to force drugs down her partner’s throat, or to speak to Robyn’s GP on her behalf, asking them to break patient confidentiality, for simply cutting back her dosage.

Carly should have put more stock in her first instincts; she would never forgive herself for not having fought harder against Robyn’s decision.

Because when the love of her life had taken a flying leap from the balcony of their sixth-floor flat, believing the angels would save her, Carly had been the one to run to her, desperate and praying, ignoring the screams of horrified pedestrians floating up to her as she rushed down the stairs.

And then she had been the one to find her cracked and shattered on the concrete pavement, a mashed, bloodied pulp where her beautiful face had once been.

Carly hadn’t known when, or how, she’d make Hannah pay for what she’d done to Robyn.

She’d just known that she would. She’d waited, and watched, and pretended from the sidelines, following all Hannah’s channels, offering nothing but heart emojis and comments like ‘Love this – and YOU – so much!’ as Hannah spouted her dangerous nonsense online to more and more unwitting followers on TikTok and Instagram and anywhere else people would listen to her.

She’d known it was time to act when she saw Hannah’s giveaway. The chance to come here, to see Hannah in person, to confront her in the presence of people who admired her – it was too precious to pass up. She knew she had to at least try.

She’d spent hours planning what she’d say in her application video: describing the passion she had for healing, for spiritual discovery.

She’d spoken about all her experiences with plant medicine; how comfortable she felt in the jungle; her love for the rainforest. How much she wanted to serve people, to make an impact on a bigger scale by learning from Hannah then spreading her message to help vast numbers of people at once, not just one struggling client at a time.

She could hardly believe it when it actually worked .

Carly had obviously become much better at pretending than she’d realized; she’d been able to guess exactly the kinds of things that would win her a place on the trip.

Hannah genuinely seemed to believe that Carly wanted to come and learn from her, be a part of her retreat.

Unless, perhaps, Hannah’s ego was just so big and so keen to be flattered that she’d simply wanted to believe it.

More fool Hannah.

‘I’m... I’m so sorry, Carly,’ whispered Scott, his voice a sad husk. ‘For what you’ve been through.’