The Lie (10 page)

I’ve wrapped a blanket around Al and forced an extra pair of socks onto her feet, but she still won’t stop shaking. In desperation, I pull her into my arms, cocooning myself around her.

“Sssh,” I whisper, even though she hasn’t said a word since she ran from the meditation room and into the girls’ dorm. “Sssh, Al, it’s okay.”

She presses her head into the nook between my neck and my shoulder and shivers violently. After a couple of seconds, she pushes herself away from me, her eyes flashing with anger

“Did you see that? Did you see what that fucking arsehole was doing to Leanne? He was making her … he was trying to get her to say …”

“I know.”

“We need to get back in there.” She throws off the blanket and rises to her feet. “He’s fucking with her head.”

“It’s okay.” I tug at her hand. “Daisy’s with her.”

“And? She won’t do anything.” She twists her wrist out of my grasp. “Isaac’s playing you all for fools. It’s embarrassing, the way the three of you hang off his every word.”

“That’s not true.” I’m stung and incredulous.

“Isn’t it?”

“No.”

“Did
you
know one of Leanne’s mum’s boyfriends raped her?”

I shake my head.

“No, neither did I, and I’m supposed to be her best friend. Why would she tell that to him and not me? What is it with everyone keeping fucking secrets from me? As if it wasn’t bad enough that Simone lied to my face and slept around behind my back, now I find out that my best friend can’t bring herself to confide in me about one of the most awful things that can happen to you, but she’ll spill everything to that fucking twat – who’s a complete stranger. How is that supposed to make me feel?”

“No one’s keeping secrets from you, Al. Well, yes, Simone did, but that’s different. And you know what Leanne’s like. She gets wrapped up in this hippy bullshit and it was really intense in there. Isaac pretty much forced her to talk about her childhood.”

Al glares at me and, for a second, I think she’s going to hit me. Instead, she twists and lands a punch on the cherry-red wall behind us. There’s a crack as her knuckles make contact with the wood, and she winces with pain as she sinks to her knees.

“Let me see that.” I reach for her right hand but she pulls away, her fingers cradled to her chest.

“You’re not the only one who’s wary of Isaac,” I say.

“You’re just saying that.”

“Am I? Kane and Isaac swapped places during my massage without telling me, and Isaac felt me up.”

Her jaw drops. “You’re kidding?”

“I’m not.”

“What did he do?”

“He touched my tit.”

“He grabbed your tits? Fuck, Emma.” She immediately pulls herself back to her feet. “That’s sexual abuse.”

“He didn’t grab them, it was more like …” The base of my throat grows warm. “… he tweaked one of my nipples as he was running his hands up my sides.”

“Tweaked?” She makes the motion with her left hand. “Deliberately?”

“Well, no, it wasn’t rough, it was … I don’t know … it was probably an accident.”

“You wouldn’t have mentioned it if you really believed that.”

“I …” I shake my head. “I don’t know.”

“Have you told Daisy?”

“No. I thought she’d go off the deep end at him.”

“And so she should.”

“Please, Al.” I gesture for her to sit down on her mattress. The mood she’s in, she’ll storm into Isaac’s study and swing for him. “Can we drop it? I don’t want to spoil our holiday by making a fuss about something that might have been an accident. Seriously, if I were scared of Isaac, would I really have just sat in a room with him?”

“If you’re sure?” She looks at me intently but sits down as requested.

“I’m sure. Can we just forget I said anything? And please don’t tell Leanne or Daisy.”

She looks thoughtful. “You know Daisy slept with Johan because she was pissed off with Isaac, don’t you? And I think she’s a bit pissed off with you, too, for flirting with him at the welcome meeting.”

“I didn’t flirt with him.”

“That’s not what she thinks.”

“Oh, for God’s sake.” I knew there was a reason Daisy’s been a bit off with me. I pick up one of her discarded vest tops, fold it up and place it next to her backpack. “If anyone should be pissed off, it should be me. She was trying to tell me the other night that Elliot, the guy I pulled before we left London, tried to kiss her while I was in the toilet at the Love Lies nightclub – when actually it was the other way round. When I got back from the loo, he asked me to go to the bar with him and told me, and I quote, ‘You want to watch out for your mate. She was all over me like a rash as soon as you left the room. It was embarrassing. I had to push her off.’”

“And you believed him?”

“Yeah.” I pick up another T-shirt, fold it neatly and place it on top of Daisy’s vest. “It’s not like it’s the first time it’s happened. A few weeks before that, we met a couple of guys at Heavenly and went back to one of their houses. The guy she pulled went home after a couple of drinks, and I passed out on the sofa. When I woke up, she was rolling around on the floor with the guy I’d kissed.”

“No!” Al looks aghast. “Did you say anything?”

“Not then, no. I pretended to go back to sleep, but I confronted her about it the next day in the taxi home, and she just laughed and said, ‘You said in the club that you didn’t like him that much.’ She acted like she hadn’t done anything wrong.”

“It’s like she’s in competition with you.”

“I know. It’s weird and embarrassing and I need to talk to her about it, but—” A shadow passes across the open doorway to the girls’ dormitory.

“What?” Al follows my gaze.

“Someone was out there, listening.”

Neither of us says anything for several minutes as we stare at the doorway. Nothing happens.

“Who do you think it was?” Al asks.

“No idea. Hopefully not Daisy. I can’t deal with another argument.”

“Another argument?”

“It’s not important.” I pick up a pile of Daisy’s necklaces, lying discarded and tangled on top of her backpack, and start unpicking them. I forgot I didn’t tell her about the argument I had with Daisy before she stamped on the lizard. Al was having such a good night. It was the first time in weeks she hadn’t mentioned Simone. “By the way, I don’t suppose you know if Johan gave Daisy a psychic reading during her massage?”

“What? Where did that come from?”

“Kane said a couple of things to me before my massage that were a bit close to the bone, but he didn’t pretend to be psychic.”

“What do you mean ‘pretend’?”

The curt tone to her voice makes me look up. “You don’t believe it, do you? That Isis is actually psychic?” I know Daisy and Leanne both denied telling Isis about Tommy, but someone must have. “I think it’s really cruel, giving you false hope that Tommy’s watching over you, and—”

“Stop.” She stands up awkwardly, cradling her hurt hand to her chest. All the colour has drained from her face. “I’m not talking about this any more.”

“I’m sorry, Al.” I reach for her. “I didn’t mean … please … sit back down. Let me look at your hand.”

“No.” She shakes me off, stepping past me. “Leave me alone.”

“Al, wait!” I hurry after her as she sprints out of the dorm and across the wooden walkway to the main building, but the toe of my flip-flop catches on something and I hit the ground with a thump. If Al heard me fall, she doesn’t turn back.

“Shit.” I sit up gingerly and peel back my trouser leg. My knee is bleeding.

“You okay?” There’s a hand at my elbow. I vaguely recognise the small, dark-haired woman at my side, a mop and bucket lying discarded beside her. She’s called Sally; she’s one of the Ekanta Yatra community members.

“It looks worse than it is.” My flip-flop, the leather thong ripped from the base, lies half a metre from my foot. “My sandal must have broken.”

Sally wipes her hands on her pale blue apron, crouches down and takes hold of my calf between both her palms, gently tugging it towards her. “Shout if it hurts.”

She twists my leg clockwise, then anti-clockwise, revolves my ankle around and then asks me to bend and straighten my knee as she checks to see if I’ve broken any bones. Finally she nods.

“It’s not broken but it’ll need a clean. Can you walk?” She stands up and offers me an arm, clutching the mop and bucket with her free hand. “There’s a first-aid tin in the kitchen. You can lean on me, if you like.”

As Sally helps me along the walkway and through the hallway to the kitchen, we pass a man and a woman on their knees, sweeping up the devastation Al created after she ran out of Isaac’s session. Broken glass and shards of pottery clink together as they brush the mess into their pans. Neither of them looks up as we walk past and into the kitchen.

“Here.” Sally pulls a rickety wooden chair out from under the heavy kitchen table and I lower myself down onto it. A thin streak of blood winds its way down my calf to my foot.

She goes into the pantry and returns with a small plastic tub. She places it on the table then roots through it for some cotton wool and a crusty-lidded bottle of TCP.

“It should stop stinging in a minute,” she says as she dabs at the blood. “Do you need anything for the pain? I think we’ve got some paracetamol, if you need it.” She glances up at me from her kneeling position on the wooden kitchen floor. “Or I could find something stronger?”

“No, I’m fine, honestly. It doesn’t really hurt.”

I look away from her smiling, friendly face to the red plastic bucket and grey tatty mop propped up against the wall, and a question forms in my mind.

“Sally?”

“Yes.”

“Where were you? When you heard me fall over? There wasn’t anyone else in the dorm.”

“I was in the shower block,” she says as she reaches for another piece of cotton wool and crosses the room to the sink. “I was cleaning.”

She holds the cotton wool under the tap and turns the faucet. If she was in the shower block then she wasn’t cleaning very vigorously or we would have heard her. You can hear
everything
that goes on in there – every splish, every splash, every flush. Everything.

So if she wasn’t cleaning then she was listening. She heard me tell Al that Isaac felt me up during my massage. She heard me call Isis a fake psychic. She heard every word we said.

“Emma? Are you okay?” Sally glides across the room, the damp cotton wool outstretched. Black spots appear in front of my eyes and a rush of nausea makes me slump forward over my knees.

“Emma?” She crouches in front of me. “Emma, are you okay? You look a little green. Would you like a glass of water?”

“I’m sorry,” I say as she floats back to the sink and returns with a glass of water. She presses it into my hands and I gulp at it. “I’m really sorry if you heard us talk—”

She’s about to reply when Rajesh the chef bowls into the room, his white apron splattered with red, orange and brown stains, and wraps Sally in a huge bear hug, sweeping her off her feet. “Ah, my beautiful Sally.” She squeals in surprise and his big, dark face lights up with delight as he gazes down at her. His expression morphs into horror when he notices me watching.

“What’s
she
doing here?” He pushes Sally away from him.

“This is Emma.” Her smile falters. “She’s one of the new girls. She fell over on the walkway. I was dressing her knee.”

“You should have warned me you had company. I need to talk to you.” He glances back towards the hallway. “In private.”

“Okay.” Sally swallows noticeably. “What … where?”

“In there.” He points towards the pantry then glances at me. “I’ve made a new spice mix. It’s experimental and I need a second opinion.”

I don’t believe a word he’s saying. What’s going on?

“You’ll be okay now, Emma. Just stick this on.” Sally hands me a plaster then follows Raj across the kitchen to the pantry. They both disappear inside and shut the door.

My knee aches as I rise to my feet but it doesn’t buckle and I’m able to hobble my way out of the kitchen and into the hallway. It’s empty, the man and woman and their dustpans and brushes long gone. The photographs Al swept onto the floor when she ran out of Isaac’s talk have been replaced on the table, in their frames but minus their glass. The statue of the Hindu goddess Kali is still in its usual place, and the only tangible sign of her destruction is a small space between two wooden candlesticks where a white china skull previously sat.

The door to Isaac’s study is ajar. The rumble of voices drifts towards me.

“Everything’s under control,” Isaac is saying. “No one’s going anywhere.”

“But what about Al?” It’s a female voice this time, possibly Cera’s. “She’s really volatile.”

“It’s fine. Johan’s going to deal with her.”

“But what if Paula talks to her? You know she’s been threatening to tell the new girls all about—”

“I told you, it’s under control. She’ll be fine after her detox.”

“That’s what you said about Ruth.”

“Paula won’t refuse. And besides …” Isaac lowers his voice to a whisper and I can’t make out a word.

I take a step closer to the door. I know who Paula is. Cera introduced us to her when she gave us the guided tour. She’s the red-haired girl who looks after the goats. She was swearing like a trooper while trying to fix some broken fencing with an old ladder. She barely made eye contact when Cera introduced us. And that’s the second time someone’s mentioned this Ruth person in as many days. Raj said yesterday that she’d gone to Pokhara to get supplies with Gabe – whoever that is.

I take another step towards the study door. A heavy hand on my shoulder yanks me back.