Harm's Way by Celia Walden Page B

– I sank down into a chair.
    â€˜You look great,’ I said, as airily as I could.
    â€˜Really? It poured with rain the whole week.’
    â€˜You’re joking.’
    For a second I thought I might be spared: the week had been a disaster, her fantasies of a romantic beach idyll dashed by bad weather.
    â€˜Of course I am. Although it wasn’t actually that hot, which was fine really, because you know what I’m like in the heat,’ she went on, ‘but God, did we have fun.’
    She launched into an effusive account of the holiday, sparing no detail, from the exact layout of Christian’s uncle’s house to the exhausting cycle rides they endured to get anywhere on the island, and for a moment I found myself enjoying it with her, encouraging her description of their long siestas every afternoon. And then the loud chunterings of a group of Englishmen at the bar distracted me.
    â€˜Hey – boring you, am I?’ Beth joked.
    â€˜No, no, sorry. I was just thinking what idiots the English always are abroad.’
    I smiled weakly, gesturing with my chin towards the group of men and wondered if now was the right time. Beth made a small, acquiescent ‘o’ with her mouth and in its hardened contour I read disappointment at what she had interpreted as my lack of enthusiasm. I encouraged her to continue, fixing on a tiny scratch by her mouth as she told me that she was in love with Christian, that she felt closer to him now than she had ever thought possible. I realised in an instant that I could not tell her. I remember, at fifteen, breaking a boy’s heart while he was halfway through a bowl of spaghetti carbonara. He’d stared at me incoherently, tears welling up in his eyes, while I’d wondered whether to point out the creamy smear on his chin. I didn’t, and he will have returned home, bruised, to discover it himself in the mirror.
    Until that moment I’d imagined that my confession to Beth would come easily, a simple person-to-person discussion about a man neither of us even knew two months ago. It would have been uncomfortable, but honest, and the idea of honesty appealed to me with such sudden force that it might just have been invented. The incident would, perhaps, even bring us closer than we had been before. Besides, I was not too young to appreciate the transience of someone like Christian in both of our lives. But my logic had omitted those details that made Beth, like everyone else, human, fallible – able to bleed and hurt. In the face of that small, hurt mouth, I felt weak. A second round of drinks arrived and I brightened: it had only been a kiss. Why on earth did I feel I had to tell her? I would forget about Christian – let this thing go. After all, it wasn’t as if I was in love with him. The trouble was that at eighteen, I’d never renounced anything in my life: I just didn’t see why I should have to.
    My resolve was aided by the arrival of a childhood friend, Kate, for the weekend. The truth was that I had forgotten all about her coming until a knock on my door late that Friday night. It had been impossible for my heart not to miss a beat; I was foolishly hoping that it might be Christian. When I saw Kate’s expectant face, masking her weariness from the trip, I nevertheless felt a rush of happiness. Like cicadas, we spent the following days engaged in the sort of meaningless patter that is incomprehensible to outsiders.
    â€˜So how’s X? Is she still with Y?’
    â€˜Oh yes.’
    Languidly drawn circles on the sand, their only purpose was to maintain a current of inconsequential chat. Theweekend had flown past this way: in a blizzard of semi-confidences. Kate had been curious to meet Beth, joking that she’d felt increasingly put out by my emails, which were peppered with references to ‘my friend Beth’. And she was intrigued by the age gap.
    â€˜Isn’t it weird going out to clubs and