The Trouble with Flying (13 page)

Aiden jumps to his feet. “And that’s when the monsters come out, right?”

“Hey, are you making fun of my overactive imagination?”

“Not at all. Cows can be very dangerous when caught in a bad mood. I’d better walk in front, just in case.”

We follow the barely-there path as it leads away from the stream. My wet socks squelch uncomfortably inside my shoes, and my drenched clothing sticks to my skin. I rub my hands up and down my arms, but the goosebumps aren’t going anywhere. It turns out getting caught in the rain isn’t as fun as I thought it might be. At least, not when you wind up lost in the cold at the same time.

After about ten minutes, Aiden stops and says, “Hey, look what I spotted.”

I look up, and between the trees ahead of us, I see— “The lake!”

“You see?” Aiden says. “We’re not lost. We just took a detour.”

Our detour seems to have brought us down the left side of the lake instead of the right. It’s the side with the bench and the little wooden jetty. The side that
doesn’t
lead to the hiking trail we started on earlier.

We step off the rough path and make for the trees, then walk around the edge of the lake. By the time we reach the other side and climb up the hill towards the farmhouse, it’s almost dark. We cross the lawn we used for the party last night and climb the veranda steps. Through the glass sliding door, I can see the lounge is full of people, most of them standing, some talking on cell phones, all with anxious expressions on their faces.

“Oh! There they are!” Nan points at us, then hurries to the sliding door and opens it. “What happened?” she asks, pulling us both into a hug even though we’re still soaking wet. She says something else, but her words are lost amidst the expressions of relief and Elize saying, “I’ll go get towels,” and Matt’s mother saying, “Call Matt and the others and tell them to come back.”

When Nan lets go of us, Aiden raises his voice and says, “Hey, sorry to worry you all. We ended up on the wrong path.”

Someone groans, a few people laugh, and Matt’s mother is suddenly beside me saying, “We were so worried about the two of you. All I could think of were those horrible stories of people getting lost in the mountains.”

Elize returns with two towels. Nan takes them from her and hands us each one, then says, “Make sure you dry up properly. We don’t want you getting sick. And now that you’re both back, we should have dinner ready in about fifteen minutes.”

“Oh! The stove!” Matt’s mother dashes off in the direction of the kitchen, and Nan hurries after her.

I pull the towel around my shoulders while everyone who was gathered in the lounge gets back to whatever they were doing before they started panicking about us. I hear the front door open, and moments later Matt appears in the lounge doorway, his brother and father behind him. “Sarah,” he says, his expression collapsing in relief. He crosses the room and wraps his arms around me, then lets go quickly once he realises just how wet I am.

“I’m sorry,” I say. “I didn’t mean …” My voice trails off as I look up and find anger in his eyes.

“What the hell happened, Sarah?” he demands. “You never should have gone off like that on your own, especially with a storm coming. That was a seriously stupid thing to do.”

“Matt,” I say quietly, glancing about awkwardly, “I’m fine. Everything’s okay. And I wasn’t alone.”

“Oh, like getting lost with a foreigner in these mountains is any better than being on your own. What were you doing? Following the fairies in your head again? Why couldn’t you just stick to the path?”

“Hey, it wasn’t her fault,” Aiden says, taking a step towards us.

“Oh, so does that make it your—”

“Oookay.” Elize puts her arm around my shoulders and directs me towards the stairs. “You should probably have a shower so you aren’t shivering the whole way through dinner. And you too, Aiden,” she calls over her shoulder. “Although not
together
, obviously.” Elize laughs at what she obviously thinks is a hilarious joke while flames of embarrassment engulf my face. I quicken my pace, dragging her up the stairs with me.

We reach our bedroom, and several seconds later Aiden walks past without looking at us. Elize leans in the doorway and watches him. She sighs. “I can’t believe you got stranded in the rain with him.
Jy is so gelukkig
.”

I pause in my search for some dry clothes and look up at her. “You do remember you’re related to him, right?”

“But if I were you, I wouldn’t be,” she says, turning her longing gaze on me. “How unfair is it that a totally hot and perfect guy shows up and it turns out he’s my cousin?”

“Nobody’s perfect,” I say, though I think Aiden is pretty close. Or at least pretty close to being perfect for
me
. “I mean, he doesn’t eat fish, which means he can never enjoy the gloriousness of sushi. And there’s his over-the-top fear of heights and flying.”

“Well, you can’t exactly blame him for that, can you?” Elize says with wide eyes.

“I … can’t?”

“Of course not. Not after what happened to his dad.”

I frown. “What happened to his dad?”

“You don’t
know
?” Elize says, somehow managing to look horrified and gleeful at the same time.

“No, Elize, that’s why I asked.”

She closes the door and jumps onto her bed. “
O my genade
, it was
so
terrible. Well, it’s not like I remember it happening, but the story sounds terrible. Aiden’s dad was a pilot, and he was flying one of those small planes, and something went wrong when he was trying to land, and the plane just … crashed. Like nose-dive crashed. The whole thing exploded and Aiden’s dad and the three passengers were all killed.”

I stare at her, my mouth open and my hand loosely covering it. “That’s … that is
horrible
.”

“I know.”

My hand drops to my side. “How old was Aiden?”

“Mmm … I think he was seven.”

I shake my head as I think back to the way Aiden acted on the plane. No wonder he never wanted to get on one. I wouldn’t either if that’s how one of my parents died.

I gather my things and head to the bathroom. The hot water is deliciously warm against my cold, damp skin, but it doesn’t distract me from the story I just heard. I’m still thinking about it when I leave the bathroom, and instead of going left towards the room I share with Elize and Simone, I turn the corner of the passage, walk to the end, and knock on the door.

“Yeah,” Aiden calls out, which I take to mean ‘come in.’ I push the door open and find him sitting on the edge of a bed pulling socks on. His hair is wet, but he’s wearing dry clothes. He must have used a different bathroom instead of waiting for me to finish. “Oh, hey,” he says, looking surprised to see me standing in the doorway clutching a towel and a bag of toiletries.

“I … uh … Elize told me what happened to your dad, and … I just want to say I’m really sorry.” I feel like I need to say something else, but I’m not sure what those words are supposed to be. So I end up standing awkwardly in the doorway wondering if I should wait for Aiden to respond or simply leave.

He gets to his feet and pushes a hand through his wet hair. “I probably should have told you. Then you wouldn’t have had to wonder why I was being so weird on the plane.”

I shake my head. “I didn’t think you were being weird. I liked the fact that you weren’t all cool and confident.”

He raises an eyebrow. “You don’t think I’m cool?”

Damn that mouth of mine. I look down at the carpet as my face heats up. “I just mean that … it made it easier for me to talk to you.”

When I peek up again, he’s smiling at me. “I know,” he says. “I’m just teasing you.” He takes a deep breath. “Anyway, I’m glad Elize told you.”

“You are?”

“Yes. It’s not something I really like to talk about. I mean …” It’s his turn to look at the carpet now, but not because he’s embarrassed. It’s as if he’s looking through it, seeing something that isn’t there. “I have memories. My mum tried to shield us from it all, but we saw things. Videos on the news. Photos in the newspaper. And talking about it brings up all those images in my head.”

Crap, and now here I am talking about it!

“But I wanted you to know about it. So, yeah, I’m glad she told you.”

I smile at him as a shout from downstairs informs us that dinner is ready. “I’ll see you down there,” I say, twisting around. I head back to my room with a lighter step. I don’t know why, but it makes me happy that Aiden wanted me to know about his dad. It makes me feel kind of like … I matter to him.

I step into my bedroom—and surprise shoots through me at the sight of Matt sitting on one of the beds. He’s leaning back against the pillows, his arms crossed over his chest. “I see you’re getting to know my extended family quite well,” he says. “Or one of them, at least.”

I put my things down on top of my suitcase, then turn and face him. “You’re talking about Aiden.”

“Yes. The guy who managed to distract you so much that you got lost while coming down a perfectly visible mountain trail. The guy you were so desperate to talk to when you got out of the shower that you didn’t even stop by your room first to put your things down.”

I look down at my hands. “Elize told me what happened to his father. It sounded so … horrific. I couldn’t stop thinking about it in the shower, so I went to talk to him afterwards. I just wanted to say that I was sorry about it. Because, you know, I didn’t know before. And now I do.”

Matt purses his lips, then says, “And the mountain? What happened out there?”

“Nothing
happened
. I showed him the forest and the waterfall and the view, and we were talking while we were coming down, and we somehow ended up on one of those smaller side paths that criss-cross all over the place. Then it started raining, and the rain was really heavy, so we sat under a tree till the storm passed.”

“You sat under a tree during a storm?”

“Yes, we—Oh.” I guess I really was distracted. “Look, it wasn’t an isolated tree, and the lightning wasn’t, like, right there.”

Matt sighs as he climbs off the bed and comes towards me. “Sarah. You need to stop daydreaming so much and pay attention to what’s going on around you.” He rubs his hands up and down my arms. “And I’m sorry about earlier. I was just so worried about you, and when I realised you were safe, I kind of overreacted.” He leans forward and kisses my cheek, then takes my hand and leads me out of the room. As we head towards the stairs, I hear a creak in the floorboards beneath the passage carpet somewhere behind us, but when I look over my shoulder, I don’t see anyone there.

From:
Alivia Howard

Sent:
Sat 21 Dec, 11:25 am

To:
Sarah Henley

Adam Anderson

Subject:
The robots won’t find us here

Squeeeeeeee! I’m gonna be home tomorrow night! I’ve missed you guys so much (and Logan too, but he’s a gigantic butthead for ignoring all of us since we left school, so I’ve finally given up on trying to make contact with him). ANYWAY, you are hereby officially invited to my house on Tuesday. 10 am ish. Please respond with one of the following:

1) Yes

2) Yes!!

3) Oh, HELL YEAH, I’ll be there.

As you can see, ‘no’ is not an option. I’ll text you the code on Monday morning. See you on the other side!

xx Livi

P.S. Be ready for an overload of junk food. My hosts have insisted on feeding me rabbit food for the entire year.

_____________________________

From:
Sarah Henley

Sent:
Sun 22 Dec, 7:08 am

To:
Alivia Howard

Adam Anderson

Subject:
Re: The robots won’t find us here

My response: 1, 2 and 3! Can’t wait to see you both!

P.S. I’ll bring the zoo biscuits.

_____________________________

From:
Adam Anderson

Sent:
Sun 22 Dec, 7:43 am

To:
Alivia Howard

Sarah Henley

Subject:
The robots will always find you

4) I’d rather have every hair on my body plucked out individually.

5) Kidding :) Obviously 1, 2 and 3.

P.S. I brought home a backpack stuffed full of American choc / candy / biscuits / other life-threatening junk food. You’re welcome, Livi.