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The stairs were a harder climb, and her eyes refused to read the words on the documents on her desk. She didn’t care. She folded herself forward, tears flowing down her cheeks, and suppressed the urge to bawl her eyes out. At least the children were at boot camp, and she didn’t have to put a face on for them.
Fuck what Jeremy said. She would write a letter to Kendra to say sorry. She wouldn’t need to sign her name for Kendra to know who had written it. She pulled out a piece of paper but couldn’t find the right thing to say. She screwed the paper into a ball and threw it in the bin. She tried again, with the same pathetic outcome. She put the pen down, pushed the documents that she should have been digesting for her morning meeting to one side, and pulled out the bottle of whisky from her cupboard. She poured herself a long drink.
She stared at her phone, and the emptiness swallowed her up. Was Kendra feeling the same way? She sensed that she was by the pain in her chest and the ache that filled her. How could something so beautiful come to such a cruel and sudden end. Where would Kendra go? What would she do? At least she had the money to set herself up with something half decent. She could try and convince herself that Kendra would be okay, but the fact that Sarah had been the cause of Kendra’s sacking gnawed into her like a septic cut.
21.
KENDRA’S DAD EXITED THEflat and loaded her suitcase into the back of the van. “That’s everything,” he said.
They’d cleared out the flat within an hour. She’d spoken to the landlord and persuaded him to bring her contract to a close with no additional penalties, providing she forfeited the deposit. It was generous of him, because she was technically liable for six months’ rent and having just paid over eight hundred quid for her flight to Bangkok and the boat to Khao Sok, she didn’t have the funds to pay for a property she wouldn’t be living in. Maybe she should have taken the bloody bribe after all. But who was she kidding? She couldn’t have taken a penny, no matter how much she might make good use of the money.
She closed the front door and locked it. “That was short and sweet,” she said.
“We’ll drop the keys back en route,” her dad said and climbed into the driver’s seat.
She stared out the windscreen at the sky still hazy from the sun. Her heart had a gaping hole in it where the essence of Sarah had touched her. The ache had kept her awake most of the night and when she had slept, she’d tossed, and turned, and dreamed of skiing with Sarah. She didn’t even like the snow. Then she’d cried until the tears dried.
“Hey, your mum’s making spicy coconut chicken, tonight, your favourite. Blow your socks off, that will.” He stared at her. “It’ll work itself through, sweetheart. These things always do.”
Neither reassuring words nor the tempting dish reached the mark. She leaned back in the seat and planned to go litter picking one last time before she left for Thailand. “Drop me off here,” she said. She grabbed a black bin bag from the back of the van. “I’ll walk back.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
Her dad nodded. The sadness in his eyes added to her own, and she turned away to avoid him seeing her cry. She needed to absorb herself in something useful and right now, this was the only thing she could think of. She looked around after the van turned a corner and wondered if she was being followed and photographed. Her heart raced. She told herself she was being paranoid and turned her attention to the meal-deal sandwich wrapper and drinks can that had been tossed into the hedgerow. “Wankers,” she whispered. Then she screamed the word until her voice broke. She picked up the empty cigarette packet. “I hope these kill you, you fucking wanker. What the hell?” She threw a child’s doll into the bag and wondered if it had been lost or chucked. She hoped it was the former because she felt for the child who missed their toy.
She wandered further along the bank, took her phone from her pocket, and called Malee.
Malee yawned. “Cheow Larn Camp, Malee speaking.”
“It’s me, Kenny.”
“Hey, you’re like a bus. Nothing for months and two calls in as many days.” She started laughing and then stopped. “New number. It’s all gone tits up, hasn’t it?”
“Yep.”
“Shit, Kenny. I’m so sorry.”
Kendra rubbed her eyes. “I tried to get hold of you before, and I had to make a decision because there weren’t many flight options. I have to get out of here for a break, so I booked flights.”
“When are you leaving?” Malee asked.
“Tomorrow.”
“Bloody marvellous.”
“I get into Bangkok about eight a.m. Thursday and should be with you by four p.m. Friday.”
“Got it. How long are you staying?”
Kendra kicked the ground. “I don’t know. I’ll tell you all about it when I see you. It’s complicated.”
“It’s bloody politics. Of course it’s bloody complicated.”
“Hey, thanks.”
“Kenny, I’ve been telling you to come out here for years. If you hadn’t put off your holiday for that damn job, you’d have been here and not gone through the shit that’s clearly now hit the fan.”
