It’s almost ten by the time I enter the flat that night. I’m at the kitchen sink, scrubbing dough from beneath mynails, when the house phone rings, which either means the caller is old or a teacher. Or, I realise as I pick up, it’s an emergency.
‘Luca?’ a voice asks, and it takes me two seconds to place it. I was right about the teacher bit.
‘Safa?’ I say, and immediately regret it. I tend to avoid calling her anything, because ‘Mrs Lorca’ feels weird after knowing her for so long, but her first name implies a closeness we don’t share.
‘Luca, is Simo with you?’
‘No, he isn’t,’ I say, my throat constricted.
‘Do you know where he is?’ She sounds panicked. ‘He isn’t home and he left his phone behind.’
‘I really don’t know, I’m sorry. Did he go running?’
‘In this weather?’ Her voice jumps to uncomfortable heights. A quick look outside tells me that the world has been swallowed by fog. ‘I hope not. Oh god, what if he did?’ I hear quick footsteps and the creaking and banging of several closet doors.
‘His running shoes are here,’ she says, sounding relieved. ‘Are you sure he’s not with you?’
It’s an odd question to ask. I’m pretty sure he hasn’t snuck into the flat to hide beneath my bed, though I’d welcome it if he did.
‘I can go look for him?’ I tend to have a good sense of where he could be.
‘I’m not sure that would be safe,’ she says, and I think I can hear actual fear in her voice.
‘It’s no problem. I could find my way around this town blindfolded.’
‘Would you? But please be careful. And call me!’
‘I will,’ I assure her.
‘Be careful!’ she repeats, before I hang up.
Dad is snoring softly in his bedroom, so I send him a text as I make my way out. For a while, I linger in the doorway, trying to decide where to go. The fog is a wall; I can’t even make out the flower shop, and the light of the street lamps is struggling to reach me. It’s so thick that it soaks up every sound. Usually I’d be able to hear the ocean from here, and any cars on the junction. I take a few steps and it’s like walking into a void.
Everything is closed, so Simo won’t be at Sheila’s or the library. The stage is out of the question, as something tells me that he’d rather not stare at a giant heart with our initials in it, and Clifford Island is cut off by the tide. But sad people are drawn to the sea, and if Simo is anything like me, and I hope he still is, he’ll be on the beach.
When my shoes slide over sand, I know I’ve reached the promenade. Even from here I can’t make out the sound of waves.
I should be worried, but I’m as eerily calm as the fog around me. If something had happened to Simo, I would know. You can’t unravel a connection so deep in a matter of days. It’s impossible to ever get Simo out of my system, because he’s been with me at almost every important step of my life. It’s a calming thought, but I still feel heavy, grieving what I likely destroyed.
A walk along the waist-high wall that separates the beach from the promenade leaves me empty-handed. There’s no point in shouting, so I step on to the sand. I go barefoot,because even though it might be cold, there are few things I hate more than sand in my shoes.
The bank where the ocean laps against the shore leads me down the beach again. My instinct tells me that I’m getting closer. Heat gathers in my chest, like a magnet finding its opposing pole. But when I reach the point where I think he is, there’s only vapour milling shapelessly around me. Maybe I have lost it, the bond I considered unbreakable.
‘You looking for me?’
I jump and almost land on my arse in the water. But when I follow the voice a few steps away from the shore, there he is, sitting cross-legged on the sand. His feet are bare too, and he’s only wearing running shorts. I try not to stare at the exposed skin, reminding myself that this is the worst time to thirst over his thighs.
‘How did you see me when I couldn’t see you?’
I can’t see his eyes, because he stubbornly keeps his gaze on the sand, but his hair is tousled and there’s a shadow of stubble on his cheeks. Neck bent and shoulders hunched, he looks angry and vulnerable at once.
‘I didn’t. But I could hear the sand crunching beneath your feet.’
‘So you knew it was me?’
He looks up at me with an unreadable expression. ‘I knew.’ Despite the hardness in them, I’ve missed his brown eyes and the flecks of gold in them.
I swallow in a useless attempt to get rid of the shame at the back of my throat. ‘I’m not stalking you.’
