‘So, you did it, then,’ I said.
She caught her breath, as if she had half expected it to be someone else. ‘Mike,’ she said. ‘Yes. You heard. I told you I would.’
‘You certainly did.’
‘Oh, you know I always get what I want.’ She laughed, then began to talk about the apartment, how she had booked a table for the night of my return at a restaurant that it was near-impossible for mere mortals to enter. Her voice was light. She always spoke a little too fast when she was excited. ‘I’ve pulled a few strings, and we’re eating at eight thirty. That should give you plenty of time for some sleep and a shower.’
‘How?’
‘How did I get a table? Oh, you’ve just got to know the right—’
‘How did you persuade your dad to turn everything round?’
‘Oh, you know Dad. I can twist him round my little finger. Always could. So, are you still on the Qantas flight? I’ve taken time off to meet you. I think I’ve got the number written down.’
‘Must have been hard, though – him having convinced Vallance to go so far down the line.’
‘Well, I just . . .’ She sounded vaguely irritated. ‘I went over the reasons you and I had discussed and by the end of it he saw sense. He listens to me, Mike, and we had the alternatives ready, as you know.’
‘How did Vallance take it?’
‘Fine – look, can we talk about your flight?’
‘No point.’
‘Don’t you want picking up? I was going to bring you a surprise, but I can’t resist telling you. It’s the new Mazda two-seater. The one you ordered – I managed to get it off the dealers at the original price. You’re going to love it.’
‘I’m not coming, Ness.’
I heard a sharp intake of breath.
‘What?’
‘How long had you known when you rang me? I just checked the emails that went to Vallance from our end, and I guess you must have known for, oh, two or three days at least that the development was to be shifted.’
She said nothing.
‘So, you thought, I’ll capitalise on this little opportunity and make myself out to be the great saviour. Earn Mike’s undying gratitude.’
‘It wasn’t like that.’
‘Did you think I wouldn’t find out that it wasn’t down to you? Do you think I’m stupid?’
There was a long silence.
‘I thought . . . by the time you found out we’d be happy and it wouldn’t matter any more.’
‘Our whole relationship would have been based on a lie.’
‘Oh, you’re a fine one to talk about lies. You and Tina. You and that bloody development.’
‘You would have let me come all the way back, uproot my whole life, on a—’
‘On a what? Uproot your whole life? Oh, don’t make yourself out to be some great victim, Mike Dormer. You’re the one who did me a wrong, if you remember.’
‘Which is why I’m not coming back.’
‘You know what? I didn’t even know if I really wanted you back. I would have let you come back and chucked you out on your ear. You’re worthless, Mike, a lying, worthless piece of nothing.’ She was raging now, the discovery of her duplicity having sent her over the edge. ‘I’m glad you know. I’m glad you found out. You saved me a bloody journey to the airport. And, frankly, I wouldn’t touch you again if—’
‘Good luck, Vanessa,’ I said icily, as her voice rose another octave. ‘All the best for the future.’
My ears were ringing when I flipped my phone shut.
It was all over.
I stared at the little phone in my hand, then hurled it as hard as I could into the sea. It landed with a half-hearted splash thirty feet out. I watched the sea close over it, and felt such extreme emotion erupting inside me that it was all I could do not to roar.
‘God!’ I shouted, wanting to punch something. Wanting to turn cartwheels. ‘God!’
‘I’m not sure he’ll hear you,’ came a male voice from behind me. I spun round to see Kathleen and Mr Gaines sitting at the end of the whalechasers’ table. He was wearing a blue fleece and his bush hat, and they were watching me calmly.
‘That was a very nice phone, you know,’ Kathleen told him. ‘This generation is so wasteful. They’re all the same.’
‘Emotional too. We didn’t do all that yelling in my day,’ said Mr Gaines.
‘I blame the hormones,’ said Kathleen. ‘I think they put them in the water.’
I took a step towards them. ‘My room,’ I said, trying to slow my breathing. ‘Any chance . . . any chance I can keep it a little longer?’
‘Reckon you’ll have to check your books, Kate,’ Mr Gaines said, leaning in to her.
‘I’ll see if it’s still available. We’ll be getting busier now . . . now that we’re the only hotel in the bay. I’m not normally a stickybeak,’ she added, ‘but you were yelling some.’
I stood there, my heart-rate slowing, grateful for the two gently mocking old people before me, and for the sun, the benign glinting blue of the bay, the prospect of creatures dancing joyfully unseen below the water. For the thought of a carefree young woman in a battered old cap out somewhere chasing whales.
Kathleen motioned to me to sit down and pushed a beer towards me.
I took my first delicious gulp. I loved this beer, I thought, as I lowered the cold bottle from my lips. I loved this hotel, this little bay. I loved the prospect of my future life, which was unfolding before me, with its reduced income, its cranky teenagers, bad-tempered dog and houseful of difficult women. I was unable quite to grasp the magnitude of what had happened.
Kathleen caught it. ‘You know,’ she said, after a few minutes, lifting a crêpy hand to her forehead, ‘all sorts of people are pro-shark these days. They’ll tell you that sharks are misunderstood. That they’re the product of their environment.’ She curled a lip. ‘I say a shark is a shark. Never yet met one that wanted to be my friend.’
‘That’d be right.’ Mr Gaines nodded in approval.
I leant back in my seat and the three of us sat in silence for a while. Down the coast I could see the building site with the glossy boards, which would soon be redundant. I could hear the music upstairs in Hannah’s room, the roar of a distant motorboat, the dull, conspiratorial whispering of the pines. I would stay here for as long as they would have me. The thought filled me with the closest thing to contentment I have yet known.