The afternoon had remained fractious, everyone tired and grumpy. Gus had gone off on his own for a walk. Amy sulked in her hut. Jack and Sonny got lost trying to find food, arriving back furious and empty-handed only to be pointed in the direction of the beach by Vasco. ‘Why do you not come to me and ask?’ he said, all of them traipsing after him in silent exhaustion.
But as heads lifted, and eyes focused on where Vasco was pointing down the beach steps, everything began to feel a little brighter. The collective mood lightened. Jutting onto the sand was a little restaurant; rattan-thatched roof, strings of white lights, long bench tables and in the corner a huge sizzling barbecue. Gus raised a brow. ‘Things may have just improved slightly.’ Jack’s hand tightened round Stella’s. Rosie and Sonny scrabbled ahead down the steps. Even Amy’s pout tilted up at the corners.
They ate spicy piri-piri chicken charred to black and plump fleshy sardines, they drank chilled rosé, Sonny tried biscuit cake and didn’t like it. Rosie tried it and ate the lot. They talked a bit, they even laughed and then Jack said, ‘So, what’s the plan for the morning?’ and everyone suddenly seemed to remember why they were there. Everyone suddenly a little uncomfortable, as if now they were here it all seemed a bit ridiculous. That perhaps they’d got a bit too carried away and gone on an exciting but expensive and completely pointless wild-goose chase.
In the morning, they piled into the huge tinted-windowed SUV – the only hire car big enough to take the lot of them – all except Moira who didn’t actually want to lower herself to the search itself, she would talk to him when they found him. But for the others, there was nervous trepidation in the air because as far as Stella knew there wasn’t a plan beyond the pool in Portugal. Which, twenty minutes later, when they were lined up along the side of the flashy, newly rebuilt swimming pool complex, seemed a lot like clutching at a straw so tiny it was almost microscopic.
Jack, the only one of them who had a smattering of Portuguese from a gap year volunteering in Brazil, came back from showing the lifeguards a picture of Graham with a solemn shake of his head. ‘Nothing.’
Stella sucked in her top lip. ‘I knew it.’ She reached up and tied her hair in a knot on top of her head. She had expected to feel almost smug when no trace of her dad could be found. She’d known he wouldn’t be there.
But as she looked round at the others, at Amy’s face screwed up in a weepy frown, Rosie slumped down on the tiled bench behind them kicking her feet against floor, Sonny pulling his Wayfarer sunglasses on, face crestfallen, and Jack putting his arm around his shoulders – ‘We always knew it was a long shot,’ – Stella found herself equally dejected. And it wasn’t just that she felt bad for those around her or that she wanted all this just to get back to normal. The feeling stemmed from the part of her that had lain forgotten like a hedgehog in hibernation, the grinning girl in the regulation swimsuit in the photo in the attic, the Under-11 Regional Champion, the girl from before any of the serious training really kicked in, who had drunk tea from a Thermos and shared Marmite sandwiches with frozen fingers. The part of her that, while she might deny it if asked, had actually been quietly excited about finding him.
Shouts of kids playing in the pool echoed round the giant space. Sunlight glared in through the wall of windows, reflecting in ripples on the white-tiled walls.
Gus looked across at them. ‘This is not the attitude. It shouldn’t all be doom and gloom. He might still appear.’
Stella shrugged.
‘No, Gus is right,’ Amy said, hesitating momentarily when she realised what she’d just said. Gus was affecting a bit of a swagger at the statement. Amy moved swiftly on. ‘I mean, what do the lifeguards know anyway? When have you ever seen a lifeguard actually look at the people in the pool? Half the time they’re all too busy looking at each other.’ She pointed to where a pair of exceptionally good-looking Portuguese lifeguards seemed to be flirting at one end of the pool.
Sonny perked up a bit. ‘We could come back this afternoon? This might be too early for him.’
Amy grinned. ‘Yes, I agree.’
Gus held his hands aloft. ‘Maybe the guy likes an evening swim.’
Jack laughed, which in turn made Rosie smile.
Stella didn’t say anything. She was thrown by the strange sense of hope she was experiencing. It scared her that it was all becoming too big in her head, bigger than finding her father. Because what if he didn’t speak to her still. What if this wasn’t about any of them at all? What if he’d just wanted a bit of a holiday or was having an affair and was currently shacked up in some fancy woman’s bedroom? What if it wasn’t what she was psyching herself up for? She glanced around the pool. All of it unfamiliar, all of it new. Not one memory here of all those years, all those countless lengths. She looked out at the landscaped garden that had once been home to an old silver bullet caravan, the tyres melted into the dry earth, that sold chocolate milk in bottles, Portuguese bread toasted and buttered, and tiny custard tarts. Where she and her dad would sit under the shade of a sun umbrella and stuff their faces, exhausted, hot, calm, before heading to join her mother and Amy at the beach or the hotel. Those were her favourite bits. When the swimming and the shouting and the stopwatch checking were done. Both of them secretly putting the moment off when they would rejoin the family because it would always involve some stress, her mother annoyed that they’d taken so long, them lying and saying that was how long training took. Neither admitting to the little pockets of time they snatched just to sit, the pair of them.
Looking out she wondered if he remembered any of that. He probably just remembered the number of lengths she did or the split times. Or perhaps he’d erased it all, built over it and landscaped it like the silver bullet café itself.
Then another thought took hold. About her mother. About how she must have known they were lying. About how that must have felt. She glanced over at Jack with his arm around Sonny. Tried to imagine what it would be like to know that your husband preferred your child to you. To know you were now second best. Especially in the eyes of someone like her dad, to whom second best was worth diddly-squat.
‘So, what do you want to do now?’ Gus asked, to everyone but directing the question mainly to Stella because she always had the answers.
Not today though. Stella just looked at him blankly.
‘Can we get an ice cream?’ Rosie piped up.
‘If we’re on this trip we may as well make it a holiday,’ Amy said. ‘Let’s go to the beach and get ice cream.’
‘Yay!’ shouted Rosie. ‘Can I get a Twister?’
‘What is it with you people and Twisters? They’re disgusting,’ sighed Gus.
‘I think they’re gross too,’ Sonny agreed.
Rosie swung round. ‘No, you don’t. You’re just saying that because Gus says it.’
‘I am not.’
‘You are!’
Jack cut in, voice firm, ‘Don’t argue or no one’s having one.’
Stella looked over, surprised at Jack’s tone of command.
Jack shrugged like it was nothing, like he could be the bad cop given half a chance. Then slightly ruined it as they walked out by saying, ‘I’m going to have— Stella, what’s that orange lolly I like?’
‘A Solero.’
‘That’s the one.’ He winked to say what would he do without her to rely on.
Stella rolled her eyes, wondering if knowing each other’s favourite ice creams was on the Marriage MOT list. Then she shuddered at the thought of the article she still had to write, currently bottom of her list of priorities. She wasn’t even sure if she and Jack had passed or failed. The temptation to hide behind Potty-Mouth was getting ever greater.
‘I like those ice creams that are shaped like a shell,’ Gus said as they walked across the car park, sun dazzling on the melting tarmac. ‘I always had them as a kid.’
Amy paused. ‘An Oyster?’
Gus nodded.
‘Are you serious?’
Gus nodded again, this time more hesitant.
Amy glanced incredulous at Stella. Stella shook her head in sympathy for Gus but grateful for the lightness of a laugh.
Even Sonny frowned as he climbed into the car.
‘No one likes those,’ Rosie sneered with her trademark withering look.
Jack gave Gus a pat on the back. ‘You’ve got a lot to learn, mate.’