Hurt (28 page)

As they lie side by side against the pillows, their warm, naked bodies washed white by the moonlight, Lola turns her head so that their faces are only inches apart. He barely has the strength to speak – exhausted yet more alive than he can ever remember. She raises her hand and runs her fingers down the length of his arm. ‘Sweetheart, you’re trembling . . .’

He smiles at her concern, waits a moment to catch his breath. ‘I’m OK.’

‘Sure?’

He can’t stop smiling. ‘Yeah. More than OK. More than everything.’

‘Breakfast?’ Bare-chested, in his swim shorts, his hair still wet from the pool, Hugo turns from the cooker as Mathéo walks through the living room and into the kitchen. He is brandishing a sizzling frying pan and the air smells of bacon.

‘Oh, cheers, but I think I’ll pass.’ Mathéo takes a seat at the breakfast bar, across from Isabel, who’s wearing an orange sarong. She holds out the cereal box, but he shakes his head and takes an apple from the fruit bowl, forcing himself to bite into it. He wishes last night could have lasted for ever, just he and Lola together in their own private bubble, all other thoughts and memories banished to the outside world. But now it is morning, he has returned to the real world with a jolt, and the sun seems too garish today, its violent brightness cutting in through all the windows, illuminating the chrome kitchen, its light refracting from the silver cutlery. A warm cross-breeze, billowing gently through the open French doors of both the kitchen and the living room, carries with it the smell of sulphur and cut grass and roses. The wide window at the front of the living room reveals a sea as smooth as a sheet of glass, and gulls gliding in circles against a vast expanse of deep blue sky. There is a stillness in the air, a sense of time being suspended, of reality being put on hold. Even Hugo and Isabel, chatting and arguing and laughing at their joint culinary efforts, seem different here – too perfect, too contented to be convincingly real.

‘Mattie!’ Isabel’s raised voice makes him start and he almost drops his apple.

‘What?’

‘You OK, mate?’ Hugo asks, both he and Isabel regarding him with a faintly quizzical expression.

‘Yeah, why?’

‘Hugo was talking about going hiking,’ Isabel explains. ‘And you seemed to totally zone out.’

‘Where?’

‘Along the cliffs,’ Hugo responds. ‘Last time, Izzy and I found a brilliant picnic spot really high up the cliffs, overlooking the sea. And from there it’s a fairly easy climb down to the water for a swim.’

‘Cool,’ Mathéo replies with a bright smile. ‘Let’s do it.’

Once Lola is up and finishes breakfast, Mathéo and Hugo load the rucksacks in the kitchen. Mathéo glances out at Lola and Isabel standing at the edge of the garden, in deep discussion. Isabel has changed into a pair of cotton trousers and Lola is wearing denim shorts with a strappy white top, her feet weighted down by a pair of solid hiking boots and oversized socks that fall down round her ankles. Isabel has handed the binoculars to Lola now and is pointing out the picnic spot on the neighbouring cliff across the sea.

The four of them swing their rucksacks onto their shoulders and, with the girls following more tentatively, leave the garden and begin the hike along the wide chalk road flanking the coast. For the first half-hour or so the road is smooth and flat, snaking its way round rocks and inlets, keeping them aligned with the sea. It is still early – the forecast for today is clear skies and temperatures reaching forty. The plan is to reach the plateau by midday, then picnic in the shady enclave, thus avoiding the sun at its most powerful, then climb down for a swim. But right now, it is still cool and slightly damp, the air still. Alone on the wide swathe of road, beneath the morning sun, Mathéo feels as if they are the only ones on the planet – the empty road stretching out ahead: no houses, no people, no sound, except for the soft calls of fishing gulls and the distant wash of the sea below. It feels both eerie and strangely beautiful – the early morning light turquoise, making him feel like a stranger in this unusual hue. The bowl of sky above is a glaucous blue, splinters of white light emerging just above the horizon. They are in one of France’s most beautiful regions, and it is so different to London or even Paris that Mathéo feels as if he might as well have stepped into a whole new world.

Now and again he feels himself shiver, as much from excitement as from the sea breeze now brushing his bare arms. Sleep has not entirely left him, its aura still surrounding his head, and his limbs feel stiff from yesterday’s swimming. A tuft of hair refuses to lie flat at the back of his head and he feels light-headed and insubstantial in his blue T-shirt and faded shorts, as if only the weight of his hiking boots is keeping him attached to the ground.

For a while everyone is quiet, still fuzzy from sleep, as if afraid of breaking the fragile web of silence that surrounds them. Despite Hugo’s warning about pacing themselves, Lola is striding ahead, her long legs moving soundlessly across the gritty road, her hair tossing about behind her. Holding hands and talking in hushed voices, Isabel and Hugo are not far behind. Mathéo wants to catch up with Lola and take her hand – aches for the feel of her skin against his – but is afraid of coming across as possessive since right now she appears to enjoy walking alone, face turned towards the gathering light in the distance. Watching her fills Mathéo with a strange kind of longing. For all her tall, slender frame, there is something robust about her. With long legs lithe and strong, she seems to move effortlessly despite the heavy rucksack, and he senses within her a healthy, durable energy, as if she could walk like that for ever.

By the time the sun’s rays have reached every corner of the sky, turning it a bright, startling blue, they meet the coastal path. Here there is rough, uneven ground beneath their feet: dry, dusty soil that their thick soles send cascading away. The cool air has turned hot and dry, the sun pounding down relentlessly from a cloudless sky. Up on the cliff edge, there is no shade and they are at the mercy of its unforgiving rays. The pace has slowed substantially now, Mathéo and Lola hanging back from the other two as they begin to pick their way up through the forest. The first two or three hundred metres from the road are the hardest. The gaps between the trees are covered in rambling bushes, and the only way past them is to push through. As the ground begins to rise, the trees change into tall, ivy-choked columns, with massive gnarled roots that fan out across the earth. The air dips into shaded coolness, the vegetation thinning out from lack of sunlight. Occasionally the canopy of trees and bushes becomes too thick to pass through, forcing them to get down on their hands and knees and crawl along some animal track.

After nearly an hour of hiking, they find themselves at the bottom of a particularly steep slope. It is a tough climb, pulling themselves up by the thick fern stems to keep themselves from slipping back on the mud and dead leaves. Hugo is the first to reach the top, and almost immediately disappears over the ridge. As soon as Mathéo and the girls catch up with him, they stop with a collective gasp. The slope extends out onto a narrow shelf jutting out from the edge of the mountainside. Above them the cliff stretches up almost vertically into a canopy of trees.

The drop beneath them is enough to take Mathéo’s breath away. So used to heights, yet he has never experienced anything as spectacular as this one: the drop to the deep blue sea below is the height of a tall building. At the foot of the cliff, the waves break into white froth against a cluster of rocks set back close to the shore. He can see why Hugo was so determined they hike to this spot: the view is spectacular. From here they can see right out across the bay, along the undulating coast and all the way to the nearest village, its houses nestling beside and above each other, stretching up the slope of the mountain. Matchbox cars crawl along the weaving coastal road, disappearing into the forest in the distance. Below them and to their left, Hugo’s villa looks tiny yet deceptively close, surrounded by rows of cypress trees dwarfed by the dramatic landscape. Mathéo can just about make out the glint of turquoise of the swimming pool, the great lawn now just a tiny patch of green, and, below it, the narrow stretch of sand left behind by the high tide.

Moving towards the edge of the plateau, knee deep in bushy plants, Hugo gazes around with his hands on his hips, head cocked with a triumphant smile. ‘Pretty awesome, hey?’

Isabel lets out a loud gasp and retreats back into the trees, Lola drops to her knees and shuffles forward to peek down, and even Hugo keeps well back from the edge.

‘I’m starving,’ Hugo declares. ‘Shall we have lunch now and then climb down for a swim?’

‘How do we get down?’ Lola asks, sounding uncertain.

‘Look, there are steps.’ He points to the side of the plateau, where protruding rocks create the illusion of a giant staircase. ‘The rocks go all the way down. I’ve tried it – it’s easy enough. Like climbing down a ladder.’

Lola bites her lip and moves hastily back from the edge. ‘It is an amazing spot! I’m going to take some photos!’

‘It’s scary,’ Isabel counters. ‘I think we should move further back inland. What if this rock crumbles or something?’

‘It’s perfectly safe!’ Hugo mocks her gently, jumping up and down to prove his point. ‘When the tide was higher, a bunch of daredevils from the next village used to drive over here on their motorbikes and dare each other to jump. Rumour has it that one of them hit a rock and died.’

‘Cliff-diving, you mean?’ Suddenly Hugo has Mathéo’s attention.

‘No, they weren’t divers. Just nuts!’

‘Have you ever tried jumping?’ Mathéo asks him.

‘Me?’ Hugo snorts with laughter. ‘Do you think I’m crazy? Hitting the water from this height – Jesus! And look how close the rocks are below!’

‘Only at the foot of the cliff. You could clear them with a running dive.’

‘Yeah, right.’

As Hugo and Isabel spread out the picnic blanket beneath the trees and Lola starts unpacking the sandwiches, Mathéo feels overcome by a rush of heat and nervous energy; a kind of invisible adrenalin that seems to fill the air around him. For the first time since he first set foot on the ten-metre platform all those years ago, he feels overcome by vertigo so strong it dizzies him: looking down makes him feel unsteady, light-headed, almost nauseous. Memories of his last dive come rushing back – the humid, chlorinated air, the echoing screams from the kiddie pool, Perez’s booming voice. He remembers how scared he was, how disorientated, how rattled, and how convinced he was that he wouldn’t succeed, filled with that deep pit of certainty that something was about to go seriously wrong. And suddenly, on the edge of this cliff, the feeling is back, even though there is no coach here, no impatient father, no panel of judges or even an audience of squealing teenage girls. There is no one here to judge him, to put pressure on him; nor is there a complex sequence of twists and somersaults he has to memorize visually and kinaesthetically. Up here he is free to just dive – it’s so easy that it’s almost laughable. A simple, pure dive from this height would be accompanied by the sensation of weightlessness, the feeling that you were flying . . . Back when he was seven and first took up diving, he used to feel like that too. That’s why he wanted to join the club, start training every week. But now, ten years later, falling through the air at high speed has become a daily occurrence, more familiar even than brushing his teeth or packing his school bag. Gone is the adrenalin rush, the sense of flying, the feeling of being both everywhere and nowhere all at once.

As he kneels down on the dry earth to unlace his hiking boots and peel off his socks, he notices the others glancing over from their safe haven, well away from the plateau. Lola is saying something, holding out a sandwich wrapped in tin foil.

‘What are you doing?’ she asks him as he unbuckles his belt, slips off his jeans and pulls his T-shirt over his head.

‘I’m gonna dive,’ Mathéo informs them all quietly, turning to face the rising breeze, the bottoms of his swim shorts flapping around his knees.

Hugo stops mid-chew, one cheek bulging comically. ‘What did you say?’

‘With a running dive I’ll clear the rocks.’

Hugo snorts and begins to laugh, but then breaks off when Mathéo fails to join in. ‘You’re joking.’

‘No.’

Hugo hesitates, as if unsure whether to start laughing again. ‘You mean you’re going to kill yourself?’

Lola wipes her hands absent-mindedly on the side of her shorts. ‘Mattie, that’s not even funny.’ She waves the sandwich at him. ‘Do you want egg or ham?’

Suddenly he is fed up. Fed up with their disbelief, with their refusal to take his proposition seriously. They think he is being ridiculous, but what do any of them know about diving in the first place? What do they know of the risks he takes day after day, diving off a ten-metre board and plummeting towards the water at thirty-four miles an hour, twisting and turning and somersaulting through the air? What do they know of the pain of missing an entry by a tiny increment and landing on your shoulder or your chest, having the wind knocked out of you as if being slammed up against a wall? What do they know about having to climb out of the pool in front of thousands of spectators, trying to hide the fact that you are injured so as not to give the other competitors a psychological advantage? Trying to hide how utterly gutted you are that, after all those long hours at the pool, the dive that you had perfected in training went wrong at the exact moment it most mattered and the morning’s press will label you a ‘choker’? What do they know about the long hours before and after each competition at the Aqua Centre, trying out a new dive, missing it, climbing out of the pool and going straight back up to do it again, and again, and again – mistake after mistake, the fear growing so vast you feel you will never escape it? What do they know about a tiny wobble on takeoff that fails to clear you of the board by a few millimetres – nothing noticeable to the naked eye, but enough to have your head clip the side of the board on your somersault, and leave you gunshot and unconscious as you smack against the water’s unforgiving surface? What do they know of doing all that, and then being led to a wood by one of the few men you have ever trusted, slammed against a tree, thrown onto the ground and assaulted in the most heinous way imaginable . . .