The tincture he’d supplied worked for now, but when we had seas between us, its powers would fade.
“It’s good to be home.” Lala sank down into one the outside sofas, her new friend having gone for a sleep.
“Why do you think of here as home?”
She smiled. “Because it’s the place I always come back to. In ten years I want my own place here. I want to bring my children up knowing the freedom of being able to be who you want here, to know the sea and the sky. I don’t want them to grow up in London or another big city. Here is home. But I know it isn’t for you.”
“I don’t think I have a home yet. I haven’t found it.” I sipped the iced coffee that had been freshly brewed and crossed my ankles. “I’m still looking.”
“Can home not be where your family is?”
I thought for a moment, considering my words. “I know I’ll always have a home wherever you are, but this island isn’t the place for me. I love it, but I need somewhere else.”
She nodded. “I understand. I do.” Lala looked up at the sky. “When are you leaving?”
I couldn’t watch her while I spoke. “The day after tomorrow.”
She didn’t move, she didn’t sit up straight or bolt to her feet. “Does it have to be so soon?”
“I’m meeting Gav over in New York. He wants to help me find an apartment and start getting it furnished.” I’d booked the flight yesterday, just before Tommy came round.
It was one way.
“I get why you want to leave – what happened was crazy shit – but can we not have another few weeks like we’d planned? What about Tommy?” She sounded sleepy.
“It was never going to last, Lala. It was a summer romance, the whole idea of them is that they last for a summer.”
“The summer isn’t over yet.”
“You could come see me in New York in a couple of weeks.”
She looked to the sky, lying down on her back. “I’ll come for Thanksgiving, or before. But I want to see out the season here.”
“Even when you’re sixty you’ll be that party girl on the party island.”
Her laugh was light. “When I’m sixty I’ll be fawning over grandchildren and telling the bouncers not to let them in the clubs until they’re thirty. I’ll be making clothes and selling them at the Hippie Markets. Maybe I’ll learn how to make silver jewellery to sell to tourists and maybe I’ll live in a house you designed.” Her gaze fell back on me. “I love knowing I have a future, but not quite knowing what that will be.”
I felt her excitement, that lust she had for living every moment and I wondered how we could be so close in age and so different.
“I need a plan.”
“I know.” She sat up. “I wish you didn’t. I wish you trusted the universe a little more.”
I tipped my head back and wondered how it would feel to cast off the ties I applied myself and fly free and high like Lala. “I want to be the person who designs those houses.”
“Who makes other people’s homes,” she interrupted. “But don’t forget about your own home, Jay Jay. You need to design that too, and sometimes you don’t get the say on every detail. Like who you share it with.” She stood up, casting off the kaftan she’d been wearing and jumped into the pool with a delighted cry.
“Come in, the water’s lovely.”
When you were Lala, the water was always lovely.
I spentthe day at Safir, milling about the place, dipping in and out of my book and ordering the textbooks I’d need to be delivered to the suite Gav had rented in New York. The days were getting hotter, reaching their peak before the summer started to morph into autumn. It was these sorts of days that made me feel as if I was living in a film, an old Hollywood film where the women had the glamour which never really faded and everything was shot through a filter that took inspiration from the golden hour.
Livi found me, as Livi did, by bringing fresh cut flowers to the table next to where I was reading.
She sat in the opposite chair, curling her feet under her and watching me. I wondered what she saw when she did that, what she really thought when she took stock of me and Lala, and I knew she’d never tell.
“Why don’t you find your apartment and come back for another couple of weeks? Relax a little more. I feel that you need another holiday after what happened.”
