The Lamplighters by Frazer Lee

Marla, so I don’t need to tell you to be careful of that one. Hey, was he complaining about not being allowed to go swimming in the sea again?”
    Marla nodded.
    “Oh I wish he’d change the damn record.”
    “It’s his passion though, isn’t it?”
    Jessie scoffed. “One of them, maybe.” Her smile shrank. “But anyway, the lovely island walks, they soon get old.”
    “I really can’t imagine that.”
    “Oh, you can’t imagine it now. Just like you couldn’t imagine booking into the Cabin Fever Motel when you first arrived here—trust me, everything reaches boredom point here. The question is; what can we do about it? What can we possibly do to liven things up around here?”
    She looked pointedly at Marla, who was now feeling like a school kid who’d been caught staring out of the window. Her mouth fell open, dumbly.
    “Secret party. That’s how.”
    “Beg your pardon?”
    “That’s how we liven things up. With a fucking party. And you dear—well, I need your help to pull it off. How’s your yoga?”
    “My yoga?”
    “Yeah. Ever indulged?”
    “No, well I went to a pilates class once, but…”
    “Follow me, look and learn. Come on, the lawn awaits.”
     
    Marla plummeted towards the ground again, as her belly dipped causing her legs to give way. As her outstretched palms skidded across the grass, she tried to twist her head to one side and ended up rolling onto a garden sprinkler. Arching her back and sitting up painfully, Marla rubbed her lower back with one hand. It was very tender where she’d pivoted onto the sprinkler valve. Both her hands were stained green from the grass and began to sting furiously with friction burning. Yoga, it seemed, was not very relaxing.
    The complicated move that Jessie had assured her was “beginner-level stuff” was called “Downward Dog”. Marla honestly thought “Collapsing Cow” would be more apt a description. Jessie did too, clearly, as she spent the next five minutes rolling around with laughter on the lawn watching Marla fail. Her student gave up, lying back down on the soft grass breathless, remembering to avoid the sprinkler head this time round.
    “Giving up already?” Jessie was still laughing.
    “I’m glad to be the source of so much amusement,” Marla said dryly as Jessie lay down next to her, shielding her eyes from the sun with a saluting hand.
    “You’ll get the hang of it. Takes practice, that’s all. Just wait ’til I show you ‘The Wheel’.”
    Whatever “The Wheel” was, it sounded downright painful and Marla wanted no part of it. She rubbed at the tender spot in her back and quickly changed the subject.
    “Are you serious about what you said earlier—about throwing a secret party?”
    “Deadly serious.”
    “Who would we invite?”
    Jessie gave her a stern look.
    “Jesus, you’re so transparent. You can invite Adam if you want, I think we can trust him. But none of the others, especially Anders—he’s a total slime.”
    “Where would we have the party? The houses are off-limits right? And the rule about gatherings—Fowler was pretty adamant about that.”
    “The whole point of having a party is to stick it to The Man. And where there’s a will, there’s a way.” Jessie lowered her voice. “There’s a mansion on the other side of the island, around the coastline from Pietro’s place but off the beaten track, surrounded by huge old trees. We call it The Big House.”
    “The Big House?”
    “Damn straight. The place is fricking massive, and really cool, it looks like the oldest house on the island. Thing is, it’s all locked up with shutters and shit. The security defenses are all computerized. I’d love to find out what’s so precious they lock it up in there.”
    “So how are we going to get in?”
    “Simple, I hack into the computer network and modify the house’s security parameters. If I do it behind the scenes, the Chief and his boys won’t notice a thing; it’ll look like everything is