She read the email again. It was so concise. So cold. Where were the stories? Where was the teasing and the joking? And – she felt a hairline splinter through her heart – where was their usual sign-off?
Say hi to the ocean for me.
Jacob x
Just Jacob.
‘Olivia!’ Cece gave her a firm nudge. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Sorry. It’s just an unexpected message, that’s all.’
‘Unexpected in a good way or a bad way?’
‘Both, I guess,’ she answered honestly, staring at the message once more. ‘It’s from a friend I met out here. I hadn’t heard from him in two weeks, and he’s just replied but it feels … I don’t know.’ She wanted to shove the phone under Cece’s nose as evidence, and at the same time toss it straight into the ocean and never look at it again. ‘He said he’s been sick – that’s why he didn’t reply – but the whole message feels a little cold.’
‘Can I take a look?’
‘Sure.’ Olivia passed the phone, too consumed by her ownthoughts to care about Cece reading her previous messages to Jacob.
‘And you two are just friends?’
‘Yeah.’ The truth hurt to say out loud but, based on that message, there could be no denying it now.
‘Well’ – Cece handed the phone back to Olivia – ‘I think it’s a boy being his usual emotionally unaware self, and we shouldn’t read too much into these things. Plus, he said he’d been sick, which, as a seasoned traveller myself, I know can knock you for six.’
‘That’s true.’ The toilet in Jaipur came flooding back to mind.
‘I say reply as though nothing’s wrong, talk to him exactly how you usually would, and if he carries on being weird then ask him directly. Life’s too short not to eat sugar, and it’s too short to play games.’
Olivia was direct in many aspects of her life, but somehow asking Jacob why he wasn’t being his usual self with her felt terrifying.
‘Maybe.’ She shoved the phone into her pocket.
‘Actually, you know what youshoulddo?’
‘What?’
‘You should invite him out here for a few days. Get him doing some yoga by the ocean with the sun on his face. It’s the cure for almost anything.’
‘I can’t do that!’
‘Why not?’
‘Because …’ Olivia ran through the litany of reasons why that would be an incredibly foolish idea. Number one, she could be rejected. Number two, those godforsaken dice. ‘He doesn’t like to plan anything. It’s all very spur of the moment.’
‘I think booking a random trip to Goa because a friend asks you to come is pretty spur of the moment.’
‘I know, but it’s a bit more complicated than that.’
‘If you say so.’ Cece shrugged, stretching out her body so the ends of her toes broke the boundary of shade and peeped out into the sun. ‘Ah, this feels so nice, but if I don’t move now, chances are I’ll be stuck here all day, and I don’t think my client will appreciate sunbathing as an excuse for missing class.’
‘No, probably not.’
‘You coming?’
Olivia knew she should head back, get herself ready to tour some more churches, but something was keeping her seated, and for once in her life, she decided to go with the urge. ‘I think I’ll stay here a little longer.’
‘No problem. I’ll see you tomorrow for class?’
