Lying About Last Summer Read online

  To my sister, Clare, who inspires me

  contents

  Cover

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgements

  Copyright

  one

  Yew Tree House, last summer

  My sister doesn’t use the word disappear but that’s what she means. She squats barefooted by the side of the swimming pool and says, “Go to your room, Skye, and stay there until I say.”

  She’s had an argument with someone who’s on his way over, and she says it’ll be easier to sort out if I’m not around. I’m not impressed. Too much of the summer has been about keeping out of the way when she’s on the phone or meeting her new friends.

  “Why can’t I carry on swimming?” I ask her. “You have the whole house to yourself until Mum’s back.” I place my elbows on the smooth stone that edges the pool and adjust my goggles. Through the black-tinted lenses, she looks as if she’s in an old film, her face flawless and her figure perfect in shorts and a tie-waist top. “I think you’ve forgotten this is my house too,” I say to her glossy two-colour toenails.

  “Get out of the pool,” says Luisa. She grabs the towel and my clothes that I dumped on the paving slabs. “This guy’s being an idiot and I don’t want you involved. I don’t know how he found out where I live, but he’ll be here soon. Please.”

  The edge in her voice makes me lever myself out of the pool without any more fuss, and pull off my goggles. “What was the argument about?” I ask as I take the towel from her, flip it round my shoulders and use the corner to wipe water from my face.

  She shoves the clothes at me. “It’s more of a misunderstanding.”

  We hear a car swerve on to the driveway at the front of the house, the crunch of the gravel, the slam of a car door and the faint ring of the doorbell. Luisa doesn’t move.

  I stamp a perfect footprint on to the warm paving stones and watch it fade before my eyes. “Are you going to let him in?” I ask.

  “Maybe I’ll pretend I’m not here,” she says.

  “Is the misunderstanding something to do with Nico?” This summer would be so much better if Luisa wasn’t going out with him.

  She checks her mobile. “Sort of.”

  We hear footsteps on the gravel and Luisa looks at me. There’s panic in her eyes. The side gate’s not locked. There used to be a combination lock on it but it broke.

  “Quick,” she says. “You’ll have to go into the changing room instead.” She pushes me towards the little building next to the pool. “Don’t come out until it’s over. Promise?” She squeezes my shoulders and I nod; then I’m inside and she’s slammed the door behind me.

  My eyes take a couple of seconds to adjust to the gloom, and my nose to the smell of chlorine and plug-in pine air freshener. I place my clothes and goggles on the nearer of the two wicker chairs. I could have a long shower. Spend a while letting the conditioner soak in and use up all the hot water. I could flip through the wrinkled magazine that’s been left on the little table to dry out, but I wouldn’t be able to concentrate. I want to know what’s going on.

  I go back towards the door and stand next to the gap where it doesn’t quite meet the door frame.

  “Don’t try to intimidate me,” I hear Luisa say. She’s speaking in her I’m-the-eldest-and-I’m-in-charge voice. Very slowly, I push down on the door handle. When I can’t move it down any further, I push gently against the door and open it a crack. She’s lying on a sunlounger on the other side of the pool, tanned legs bent, doing something on her phone. “Just say what you want to say, then leave.”

  I can’t see the person from this angle. I hope he’s having trouble with the gate to the pool area. His words aren’t clear; then there’s the click-clack of the gate as it closes, and he says loudly, “I’ve given you chances. I warned you. I’ve been very reasonable.”

  I inch the door open further and I see him, striding towards Luisa. Black jeans, tight green T-shirt, dark glasses, older than her and Nico. He looks vaguely familiar.

  What did he warn her about?

  Luisa shrinks away from him, and my heart speeds up. What am I going to do if things get ugly? I don’t have a phone on me. If I run to get help at the farm, I’ll have to go past him.

  “You’re pathetic,” says Luisa.

  No, Lu. Please don’t wind him up.

  He swears close up to her face and mutters something about respect. Luisa scrunches up her eyes, and I close mine too.

  Make him go away.

  There’s a cracking, smashing sound, closely followed by a scream. I open my eyes. Luisa is off the sunlounger, staring at something on the paving stones. “Look what you’ve done to my phone!” she yells.

  She needs to get rid of him. Now he’s gripping the top of her arm.

  “Let go of me,” Luisa shouts. Her voice is wavy. Fear flutters in my throat.

  “You’re ruining everything,” he says.

  She bites him, and he swears. I know as my heart thumps out of control, just know, that he’s about to do something terrible. I back away from the door, into a wall.

  Time bends out of shape into slow and confusing motion as my mind tells me to do something but my body doesn’t respond. Don’t come out until it’s over says a voice in my head. I slide down the wall on to the dusty tiles, push my face into my knees and breathe in the chlorine from my skin. There are shouts. An ear-splitting scream. A thud. A splash. A dog barking in the distance. Birds cawing.

  two

  Now

  I need to get away. But maybe a holiday for bereaved kids isn’t the answer.

  Mum turns into the driveway of Morley Hill Activity and Adventure Centre, and I remove my earphones. “This looks lovely, Skye,” she says. She’d have said that even if the place resembled a refugee camp, because she wants this holiday to work out.

  From the outside, the centre looks pretty much as it does on the website, although the colours aren’t as brochure-bright. The grounds are tucked away behind a fence but I can see some of the buildings. There are two main styles going on: fake wooden chalet and budget hotel chain.

  As the car crunches up the thick gravel drive, a dog barks far away somewhere and Mum launches into a frenzy of instructions. “Text me at least once a day, won’t you? I hope you’ll make the most of having counsellors around. Try and go to the optional talks. Are you sure you packed your phone charger?”

  I nod in the right places and discover I have a new phobia: dogs barking. More specifically, the sound of a dog barking in the distance. Inside the reception building there are four checkin desks, two of them open for business. My letter says to register at Yellow Desk. The woman there (short grey hair, old but not that old, unfortunate choic
e of pink glasses) beams enthusiastically, introduces herself as Pippa and says she’s in charge of the Bereaved Aid for Kids charity, that everyone calls BAK-up because its tagline is Providing great backup for those who need it most. She ticks me off a list, tells me my accommodation block is D and my room number is four, and the code for the entry door. That should be it, except Mum insists on checking she has the correct emergency numbers in her phone, and rereads the parental consent forms one last time before handing them over.

  It means I’m still there when a small skinny girl registers after me. She was dropped by taxi right outside the door. She speaks so quietly I don’t catch her name until Pippa searches through her list and says, “Ah, Fay, one of your room-mates is right here.” She holds out an arm towards me. “Skye, meet Fay.”

  “Hi. Yes. I’m Fay.” She speaks in short breathy bursts, and does a lot of blinking. Her navy-and-white polka dot sundress emphasizes her flat chest, and she has sunburn-edged strap marks from another top. “I’m so nervous about this holiday. I’m rubbish at any sport.”

  “Really?” I say, acting surprised, even though she looks completely like she’d be rubbish.

  She over-smiles and tugs at her ponytail. If she’s on this holiday she must be fifteen or sixteen, but it’s hard to believe. “Let’s team up!”

  I wonder who died in Fay’s life.

  When I was offered a place on this holiday camp a few months ago, it seemed like a great idea. Six days and five nights away from everyone. Back-to-back activities, so there’d be little time to think about the stuff in my head. Fully funded. Perfect, given the family finances. Until today I conveniently ignored the fact that every person in the group would have had someone close to them die. That I’d have to interact with them and be nice.

  “I’ll round up an instructor to show you to your room,” says Pippa.

  “You go ahead,” I say to Fay. “I have to say goodbye to Mum.”

  Two people hurt in one go. I don’t want to be lumped together with Fay. Not straight away. And I know Mum wants to see our room, but I’m doing her a favour. Seriously. She’ll find it hard to leave otherwise. After seeing the room, she’ll want to do a tour of the grounds, and then she’ll want to hang around so she can meet the other people in the group.

  Fay sets off with a twenty-something in a yellow T-shirt. All instructors for our group wear yellow T-shirts, Pippa explains. There are three separate groups at the centre this week. Yellow, Blue and Red. The Reds, the biggest group, arrived yesterday. They’re teenagers from some music organization. In the mornings they practise their instruments in the hall. Blues are normal kids whose parents booked them into summer camp.

  Yellow is the colour of bereaved teenagers. The colour that doesn’t suit anyone.

  I leave my suitcase in the reception building, near Pippa’s desk, and walk with Mum to the car. We have a lingering hug and I let her squeeze me too tightly, and I breathe in floral perfume fumes without choking. She climbs into the car, but she can’t drive off yet, because another car is inching its way up the driveway and there’s no room to pass. It means we have to chat through the open car window.

  “I hope you have a fabulous time,” Mum says. “It’s a great opportunity.” She has high hopes that I’ll return home a better person.

  “Yeah.”

  I accidentally catch the eye of a boy in the front passenger seat of the car. Dark eyes, brown skin, wild black hair, and a pale blue polo shirt collar. He gives a little wave. To me. There’s no one else around, so it has to be to me. By the time I think of waving back, the car’s moved on, towards a parking space.

  Mum’s playing about with the satnav. She thinks I don’t know what she’s doing. We’re not that far from Pitford here. She’s making sure her route home doesn’t take her anywhere near our old house, just like she did on the way here. She reads her self-help books and bangs on about closure but she can’t walk the talk any more than I can.

  I take a deep breath but the image of the swimming pool at Yew Tree House is already there in my head. The red water. Luisa underneath the surface, face down, her hair fanned out like seaweed.

  “I’d better go, while the drive is clear,” says Mum. “I love you.”

  “I love you too,” I say. It’s easier to be the daughter she wants me to be when I know she’s leaving. I watch until the car disappears on to the main road and ignore the hollow feeling in my stomach.

  The reception area is busier when I walk back in. There are people registering, and the Reds are gathering for an outing with full-on shrieks and shouts. It means I can loiter for a bit before I have to find room D4 and hang out with Fay.

  The walls are covered with giant photos of smiling kids in helmets, kids dangling from ropes or in life jackets on rafts. There are smaller photos of groups with school names underneath, everyone throwing shapes and doing peace signs.

  They remind me of a photo that’s tucked away in a still-to-be-unpacked box in our new flat, taken on the school residential we did in the Isle of Wight when I was eleven. We swam, did obstacle courses, played endless games of rounders, and I got to kiss Jay Morris in a game of forfeits. I was a super-sporty kid back then. People wanted me on their team. Jay Morris wasn’t embarrassed to be kissed by me.

  When I go to retrieve my suitcase, Pippa’s registering the boy I saw in the car. His spotless polo shirt, with massive designer logo, is a mismatch with his scruffy shorts. Trying too hard to be different. Before Pippa can pair us up, I grab my suitcase while she’s not looking. But as I walk away I feel his gaze on me, and rearrange my baggy top, shifting it downwards over my denimed thighs.

  I manage to find D4 with the assistance of a map on the wall of the reception building illustrating what to do in the event of fire. It’s not hard. There are only four accommodation blocks, one after the other, each with a separate entrance. After trying the door handle of D4 and finding it locked, I knock and there’s a short wait and some clumsy attempts at unlocking it before it opens.

  “Hi!” says Fay. “Welcome to our room.”

  It’s mostly – one wall, the curtains and the duvet covers – orange. There are three single beds in a row, closer to one another than I’d have liked. On the wall there’s a metal-framed map of the site. The en-suite bathroom is white and gleaming, though the non-slip rubber mat, grey floor and extra handrails make me think of hospitals.

  Fay has already taken the bed under the window, and placed on her pillow a soft-toy rabbit that looks as if it’s been run over several times. I take the bed nearest the bathroom, and furthest away from her. We each have a small wooden chest of drawers by our beds, and a shelf to place our suitcases on in the narrow gap between the ends of our beds and the wall. I unpack some of my things and place them in my chest of drawers while Fay talks about her journey as if I might be interested in coaches and taxis.

  “I think it’ll be all right here,” I cut in and tell her. “If it’s not, it’s only six days and we’re almost halfway through the first one.”

  She smiles and doesn’t feel the need to yabber on quite so much after that. When she goes to arrange her toiletries in the bathroom, I find my phone and settle myself on the bed, up against the headboard with a pillow behind my back. I log on to the free wifi and flick through various sites. But I end up, like I usually do, scrolling through my photos of Luisa.

  three

  When somebody dies, you view photos of them in a different way. You want a reminder of how they looked, but you also search for hidden truths in their eyes, answers to questions you can no longer ask them.

  My favourite photo of Luisa is her star-jumping into the pool at Yew Tree House, but only she and the cloudless sky are in the shot. The sun is shimmering, her hair is half out of her ponytail and she’s laughing. It was taken a couple of years ago by Toby, our neighbour at the farm next door. It was just before they broke up. He must have known his days were numbered. Even I knew that he couldn’t contain her for ever.

  I enlarge t
he photo on my phone so that I can study Luisa’s face. Happy, carefree and beautiful. It still seems impossible that she’s dead when she was once so in-your-face alive.

  Fay comes out of the bathroom and informs me that there are three shelves in there and she hopes it’s OK but she’s taken the bottom one because she’s not very tall.

  She looks over my shoulder, tilting her head. Not even trying to hide that she’s looking at my screen. I exit my photos. They’re private.

  “I’ll show you a photo of me and my dad,” says Fay.

  Lucky me.

  She unzips an inside pocket of her suitcase and brings over a silver frame. She polishes it on her T-shirt before handing it to me. It was taken in a restaurant, the two of them scrunched together for the photo. Her dad is a thin man without much hair. He has a serious face and small, dark eyes, like Fay.

  “You look like him.”

  “Thanks. Everyone says that,” says Fay. “I try to pretend he’s not dead. I tell myself he’s working as a professor on the other side of the world.”

  “Does it help?” I ask as I hand the frame back to her.

  “A bit,” says Fay. She polishes it again before zipping it away.

  Lunch is various salads followed by a chocolate brownie with a crispy crust and a squishy inside. The best type. We sit at two long tables in what’s called the yellow dining room because it’s been assigned to us, the Yellow Group. In actual fact, the walls are a dreary mushroom-soup colour. Apart from breakfast, which is in the main dining room, this is where we eat and have exclusively Yellow activities. Everywhere else is multicoloured territory.