Summer on a Sunny Island

Marcus’s gaze became guarded. ‘I probably shouldn’t even have told my solicitor because it doesn’t actually matter.’

Rosa’s senses prickled. She’d known Marcus for too long not to recognise the signs of him trying to misdirect her attention. Her mind began to work. The only way money still connected them was via the mortgage. Her heart sank. If he was unable to meet a payment then she’d have to do it instead because the formalities of transferring it into his name alone were incomplete. ‘You haven’t run through all your money already?’ She didn’t have her usual salary right now and, thanks to Marcus, she’d come out of their relationship with precious few reserves.

Marcus’s expression froze. ‘Your faith in me is touching, as always. My bank balance is still healthy, thanks.’ There was a touch of smugness in his words.

Rosa was losing patience. ‘So what’s the problem?’

Marcus cleared his throat again. ‘I didn’t want my money to vanish while trying to make a go of Spun Gold full-time so I took a lodger to help pay the mortgage. In the bloody backwards way solicitors do things, they’ve mentioned it to the mortgage provider, who says they need your formal consent before switching the mortgage into my name. I should have got their OK before taking in a lodger, apparently, so I have to cross their T’s and dot their I’s retrospectively.’

Rosa just about followed this. ‘So it doesn’t really affect me? I sign a consent and everything goes through?’

Marcus smiled. ‘Exactly.’ The smile remained pinned to his lips. ‘Something else I should probably tell you because it will be on the paperwork. The lodger is Chellice.’

‘Chellice?’ Rosa broke in. ‘The same Chellice you absolutely swore you weren’t having a thing with?’

‘She’s a lodger,’ he snapped, smile switching off. ‘It makes sense because it’s cheaper than her last place and means she can put more into Spun Gold.’

Rosa heard her voice rising. ‘Either you’re a gullible idiot for believing that’s all there is to it or you think I am. Either way, it doesn’t matter. Email me the details of how I go about signing so we can end this. But I just want to say, MARCUS, YOU’RE A SHITTY BASTARD!’ With shaking fingers she ended the call.

Slowly, she came back to herself, realising she was still at a party. At the shady end of the garden she saw several people swiftly turn their gazes away. Great. Her outburst had been heard.

Zach had obviously caught it too as he uncoiled himself and left the bench to perch on the coping beside her. ‘More sticking up for yourself. Love it.’ But there was so much sympathy in his voice that Rosa’s eyes boiled for a moment. ‘Are you OK?’ he added softly.

‘Yes, it’s just … men.’ She gave a watery smile.

‘Yeah. Shitty bastards,’ he agreed contemplatively.

Shakily, she laughed. ‘Possibly not all of you.’

He patted her arm. ‘How about you keep an eye on Paige for a minute while I go get us more wine?’

‘Plan,’ she agreed, grateful to have a few moments to herself.

The event began to draw to a close at about six, which Rosa didn’t think was bad going for ‘lunch’. As the afternoon had grown hotter and hotter, Dory, Zach, Rosa and Paige waited in the shady function room for Marci. When she finally joined them she looked a bit pink. ‘I’ve been talking to this guy, Jake.’

‘Really? Hadn’t noticed,’ Zach said, deadpan. ‘It’s only been about three hours.’

Marci flushed still pinker. ‘He’s invited me for lunch on Wednesday … if I can get a babysitter.’ Her eyes sparkled hopefully at her brother.

‘I’ll have Paige for lunch,’ Zach agreed easily.

Paige’s ponytail swung as she whipped round to regard her uncle with a winning smile. ‘On the pirate ship?’

Marci’s eyebrows shot up. ‘We use the word “please” when we ask for big favours, Paige, don’t we? Even if you can wind your uncle round your finger? Restaurants cost money.’

‘Sorry,’ said Paige, not sounding particularly so. ‘Please, Uncle Zachary, would you take me to the pirate ship for lunch, please, please?’

Zach smiled down at her with such affection that Rosa’s heart expanded. ‘Wellllll …’ he mused.

Paige all but batted her eyelashes.

‘OK,’ he agreed.

‘Yay!’ She bounced on the spot, clapping her small hands. ‘Can Dory and Rosa come too? Please?’

‘I was about to suggest the very same.’ Zach gave his sister a wink before she could butt in with more parental objections.

‘The pirate ship is pretty cool,’ Dory said, ‘so thank you. I’d love to join you.’

Rosa felt a stirring of misgiving. A ship? ‘Can I wait and see if the sea’s still calm? I get seasick.’

Paige giggled. ‘It’s a pirate ship on the ground.’

‘Firmly on the shore,’ Zach confirmed.

‘Oh! In that case, thank you. I’ve never eaten on a pirate ship.’ Rosa smiled at Paige’s beaming delight.

As the group finally made their way downstairs Zach fell back to where Rosa brought up the rear of the party. ‘About lunch,’ he growled theatrically out of the corner of his mouth. ‘I’m not dating at the moment.’

She stifled a giggle. ‘I’ll tell my mum we’re just good friends.’ Then, before he could make a joke of that too added, ‘I could do with a friend out here.’

The merriment in his eyes faded away. ‘I’m your man,’ he said, which left Rosa with a surprising case of the warm and fuzzies. She kept seeing Zach being kind to people and it was heart-warming to find herself included.

Chapter Five

On Monday morning, Rosa was happy to return to her role as kitchen porter. Dory was working on several versions of bigilla, the dip made of beans and garlic popular in Malta, but she was content for Rosa to join the sea clean later. Rosa texted Zach to tell him.

He arrived at their door at three p.m., jingling his car keys. ‘Do you have ID to show Joseph? I don’t want to put him in an awkward spot if he doesn’t identify you and you turn out to be a criminal.’

‘I’m not!’ she returned shortly, then realised that, unless Dory had been spilling beans, he wouldn’t know the ups and down – mainly downs – of why she and Marcus had split up and she flashed a smile to offset her terseness. ‘Give me a second to grab my UK driving licence.’

After they’d driven along the seafront road, Zach had shoehorned his car into a spot in a side road in Sliema. The public beach on Tigné seafront had a breathtaking view across Marsamxett Harbour to where Valletta shimmered in the heat haze. Rosa managed to get down onto the rocks without dropping fins, mask, snorkel or towel and was introduced to Joseph, who, in the mixed-culture way of Malta, had an English mother. ‘Joseph’s dad was a cousin of Nanna’s,’ Zach explained. ‘We say we’re cousins because the exact relationship takes too much working out.’

‘Pleased to meet you.’ Joseph was a stocky man with a waistline that suggested he didn’t totally adhere to the healthy part of the Mediterranean diet. He introduced his wife, Maria, who when she’d kissed Zach on each cheek, shook hands with Rosa and eyed Rosa’s snorkel gear with a smile. ‘I think you wish to be in the water rather than on the shore to give out snacks and drinks?’ She indicated two coolers of drinks and a cardboard box containing crisps and fruit.

Rosa felt sympathetic, remembering the times she’d drawn an uninteresting task at Blackthorn’s events. ‘I could do some of each,’ she offered.

Maria laughed and patted Rosa’s arm. ‘You swim. It’s good to clean the water. I have Luccio to help me.’

Rosa hadn’t noticed Luccio nearby but now he sent a grin her way. ‘Let her give out drinks, Maria. Then I can cool off in the sea this hot afternoon,’ he teased and kissed Rosa on both cheeks.

‘Great to see you again.’ Rosa had forgotten Zach had mentioned that Luccio worked at Nicholas Centre. He looked much younger than when she’d seen him last time, happier and cleaner cut, although his outfit of T-shirt, flip-flops and skinny shorts that showed the tattoos on his legs was much the same. It was ‘the look’ for young men on the island. Older men tended to wear roomier shorts and – usually – no tattoos.

Teenagers began to arrive as Rosa chatted to Luccio about how he liked working as a youth support worker. They approached Joseph to sign in to the sea clean project, collecting bottles of water or soft drinks from Maria, pulling off shorts and T-shirts to reveal swimming gear beneath.

Rosa was introduced to the other adults present: Peter, Axel and Malin. Peter was Maltese and Malin was a pretty Swedish blonde woman who was in Malta for the scuba diving which, she explained, she funded by working at Nicholas Centre and casual work in bars. Axel, a German in his early forties, had lived in Malta for years and was the assistant manager at Nicholas Centre.

Joseph gave a ‘housekeeping’ talk to the teens while cool drinks were consumed. ‘You will each be assigned to a group. Zach will lead one group with his friend Rosa; Peter and Malin will lead the other.’ Each of the teens was given a rubber sash and belt combination, blue for Zach’s group and red for Peter’s. The sash part could be seen from above the water and the belt from below. ‘I will be on shore to check Zach’s group is safe and Axel will provide surface cover for Peter’s.’

Zach and Peter took over, assembling their respective groups of eight. They’d work in pairs, one diving for debris and the other loading it into floating baskets. Zach made sure he had the attention of everyone in his group. ‘This is our area and you’ll see it includes the cave. You’ll stay away from that,’ he declared in a no-nonsense tone. He pointed at the crevice – which was like a gaping, triangular mouth in the rocks – in case anyone had any doubt what he was talking about. The cave narrowed sharply, tumbling every wave that entered and boiling it white before spitting it back out to sea. ‘We all know it’s fun to let the waves take us in but I can’t save you all at once.’

The teens laughed, nudging one another.

‘And,’ Zach emphasised, ‘if anyone does go into the cave, even if they pretend the sea took them, I’ll set Rosa on them and she’s very fierce.’

Familiar with this kind of ‘instructing under the guise of joking’, Rosa bared her teeth and pulled her eyebrows into a grotesque frown. The teens laughed again.

‘Seriously, if you get too near the cave I’m afraid you’ll have to get out of the water,’ Zach finished with more gravity.

Rosa, fully aware that if you took young people to a public place you actually had very little leverage over them other than to bar offenders from activities or premises, nodded emphatically, which encouraged the teens to nod back.

Before long they were all in the water, pumping their feet energetically while they made adjustments to masks and snorkels and gathered baskets from those on the shore. Zach and Rosa supervised four kids each, putting their faces in the water to spot bottles or cans.

Zach tried not to get distracted by the sight of Rosa’s body underwater. A swimming costume, even one-piece and plain purple, left little to the imagination and one glance told him she had an hourglass figure. In the green-blue marine world he observed several of the lads in his team risk quick glances at her too. Boys would be boys but he wasn’t going to have her made uncomfortable. He tapped the arm of the nearest lad and pointed at a yellow Cisk can between two rocks. It was more than six feet down so the effort of retrieval would give him something else to focus on.

He did have to keep glancing at Rosa because she was on his team and so he needed to know how strongly she swam and whether to bring Luccio in to relieve her. She seemed at home in the water, even if, as she informed him, she’d only recently snorkelled for the first time.

They took a break after an hour. Most of the Maltese kids swam as naturally as walking but there was no harm in taking a breather, drinking a bottle of water and eating an orange. He sat down next to Rosa on a towel because the rock was hot.

‘Is your name really Zachary?’ she demanded, peeling her orange with her thumbnail.

He blinked. ‘Yes. Why, what did you think?’

‘I don’t know. I heard Paige call you Zachary yesterday. I suppose I hadn’t thought Zach was short for anything, maybe because people often think Rosa is short for Rosalind or Rosamund and in my case it’s not.’

He shrugged. ‘Some Zachs are Zachariah or just Zach. Our parents are Steve and Amanda and as they grew up always knowing about five others with the same name they called each of us something less usual. Marci is Marceline and our little sister is Electra.’

She’d put on sunglasses but her face was turned towards his. ‘Electra’s a great name. Is she coming over this summer?’

‘She’s in Thailand, teaching English.’ He felt the hollowness that often accompanied thoughts of Electra and found himself explaining, ‘Truth is, it’s not just me who’s not getting on with Dad – she doesn’t either. He’s had a rough few years, trapped in a cycle of being made redundant, taking a less prestigious job then being made redundant again and so on. Mum’s rheumatoid arthritis prevents her from working so the financial burden falls on him and his age of retirement has moved further away.’

Silently, Rosa’s hand settled gently on his on the towel between them. Surprise tingled through him but he wasn’t about to object to the friendly gesture.

Zach went on. ‘Because he can’t control the big things, Dad’s trying to control the small ones or those that are, frankly, not his business. Electra went home two years ago and Dad told her he expected her to get a proper bloody job and stop gallivanting.’

‘So she went straight off again?’ Rosa guessed.

He nodded. ‘He’s turned very “my way or the highway” and one by one his family members are choosing the highway. Marci only came out here for a month or so but she’s begun finding out about residency and schools.’

‘Really?’ He heard the surprise in her voice. Marci probably didn’t seem that adventurous to her.

Zach grimaced. ‘I don’t know if she’ll follow through but I wouldn’t be completely shocked. When she got pregnant with Paige it wasn’t planned. Dad went all Victorian and tried to make her move in with him and Mum because no doubt she’d expect help with “the child” and he “couldn’t do everything for everyone”. He managed to alienate both Marci and Mum in one go and when Paige arrived, though he loved her to bits, he’d already built a wall between them because Marci was adamant she’d never look to our parents for child care.’ Nearby teenagers chattered loudly, sometimes in Maltese and sometimes in English. One even spoke Italian with Luccio, who, apparently, spoke it along with Sicilian and English. Peter, Axel, Malin, Joseph and Maria all joined in in one language or another.

Zach carried on. ‘My latest bout of trouble was the catalyst for Dad really losing it. He and I squared up to each other at one point before Nanna stepped in.’ He sipped from his bottle of water. ‘She’s the one Dad really talks to and she probably makes more allowances for him than the rest of us.’

‘She’s his mum.’ Rosa moved closer.

He nodded and swallowed painfully. ‘Grandad Harry has slithered into dementia and Nanna needs help with him but she offered me the work at the apartments and said she wanted me to take it. I said she’d have less help with Grandad if I did that but she wouldn’t take that into consideration. She said Dad and I needed time apart. I checked with Mum whether she minded and she said no. Mum’s always the understanding, gentle one. Dad overheard and said he could look after his own wife. As she’s the one he’s capable of showing love to, I took her at her word and left.’

‘I’m sorry things have been so tough.’ Rosa removed her hand from his as if realising it was there and began to part the flesh of her orange. ‘I scarcely know my dad because he found fatherhood didn’t suit him. He’s a distant stranger who visited, rarely, and gave Mum money toward my keep, also rarely. Still, you have my sympathy.’

He struggled to find a reply, shocked by her casual statement. ‘And you have mine.’

‘You can’t miss what you never had.’ She licked orange juice from her hand and he watched the quick movement of her tongue.

Then Luccio arrived to gather empty bottles and orange peel and they moved on into the second part of the sea clean.

Joseph declared the sea clean over at the end of the second hour. The last of the drinks, fruit and crisps were handed out and some of the teens moved further up the beach to throw themselves and each other off the rocks with a lot of good-natured shrieking. Others packed up and drifted off. The adults gathered the equipment belonging to Nicholas Centre and stowed it in the boot of a people carrier.

‘Rosa works in a youth centre in the UK,’ he said to Joseph.

Rosa nodded. ‘My title is Development Officer. I don’t have the right qualifications to be a youth worker but I’m good at organising events and getting publicity and funding for them.’

‘Funding?’ Joseph pounced on the word. ‘Tell me how you do it in the UK because in Malta we’re always looking.’

‘In the UK too,’ Rosa admitted. ‘One of my favourite tricks is to work with firms who like to organise team-building exercises. For example, we got them to design and build gym bars at our centre, Blackthorn’s. A local joiner donated his time to oversee the project but the company paid for the materials and its employees did the work. I, obviously, have a whole pitch about team building in terms of better communication and group strategising. Then I do all the attendant PR, which makes their budget work twice as hard.’

Zach looked at her with new respect. ‘They go for that?’

Rosa grinned. ‘Often enough for me to keep doing it.’ She asked Joseph about Nicholas Centre and Zach zoned out, familiar as he was with the story of how Joseph’s great-uncle Nicholas had always helped kids with less-than-ideal backgrounds so Joseph had begun the centre in his name. He found himself watching the way Rosa’s hair jiggled around her face as the breeze dried it. Gold streaks shimmered in her drying locks and gold flecks glittered in her eyes. It was as if she had some special relationship with the sun: it loved her best. She took his breath away.

He tuned back into the conversation when he heard Joseph say, ‘Will you visit us? We’re always pleased to have guests at Nicholas Centre.’ His eyes crinkled. ‘And we can talk more about fundraising when I have a pad and pen to take notes.’

Rosa’s eyes lit up. ‘That would be great! Maybe I could bring Mum? She’s been to Blackthorn’s to put on cookery demonstrations, like how easily kids can make a healthy stir-fry rather than buying takeaway. She could do the same for you. Our kids loved it because she’s been on TV but I’m sure she’d bring a book with her so they can see her face on the cover.’

‘That sounds fantastic,’ Zach and Joseph said together. Joseph and Rosa exchanged phone numbers so they could make plans after Rosa had spoken to Dory.

Eventually, Joseph and Maria drove off. Zach stretched. ‘Right, this is when I have to get all that crap out of the cave.’

‘But you said it was dangerous,’ Rosa objected, frowning.

‘Dangerous for the kids,’ he amended. ‘But I can bear a scratch or two if I get washed against the side. I’ve done it before. The cave’s a natural collection point for whatever blows into the water.’ He ferreted in his backpack and pulled out a thin, lightweight netting bag.

‘Nice to know you’re in favour of saving the ocean. I’ll hang back and take the debris from you.’ Rosa settled the bag crosswise on her body and reached for her snorkelling gear.

Once again they made the transition from the hot rocks to the cold salty ocean then finned up to the cave, avoiding an area where young men hurled themselves into the sea from the rocks with howls of glee. Zach checked Rosa appeared to be dealing with the choppy foam of the inlet then got her to tread water while he swam into the shallow cave, judging the waves, sculling backwards when they tried to fling him against the rocky sides, grabbing floating bottles and tossing them to Rosa. Soon the bag floated in front of her, buoyed by the mass of plastic bottles.

When it was full and cumbersome he swam back to her. ‘Let’s get rid of that lot on shore.’

At the ladder, he paused to ease off his fins and toss them onto the rocks before climbing out, a technique he’d learned from scuba-crazy Malin. Once on dry land he took the bag from Rosa. She copied his action in removing her fins before exiting.

Taking a bin bag from his backpack he emptied the bottles into it and they headed back over the rocks to the sea. He fell in behind Rosa, from which position he couldn’t help noticing her rear view. Quickly, he wrenched his gaze away. Maybe that was where the convention of men allowing women to go first had arisen from – not good manners but the instinct to check women out unobserved. However, after witnessing the pithy way she dealt with the Paceville guy who’d crossed her boundaries and Jim at the reunion who’d offended her sense of respect, he didn’t intend to get caught ‘noticing’. It was possible to enjoy her directness when it was focused on others, without particularly wanting to draw fire himself.

When the bag was once again full he towed it back to the ladder. ‘We’ve cleared it for now.’ He let her go first again but made an effort not to watch her female charms this time. There would be no cold water to hide any reaction once he was out of the water.

After resting on the sun-heated rocks to dry, Zach offered to buy Rosa a beer and an ice cream and they pulled their clothes on top of their swim things, stowed in Zach’s car their snorkelling gear and the sacks of flotsam to be recycled, then headed down the road towards the row of outdoor cafés, one of which was where they’d eaten on their accidental date, and found a table not too close to the road.

It was only when he tried to pay for two pints of Cisk and two ice creams that Zach’s stomach dropped to the floor. Something was missing. ‘The cash has gone from my wallet!’ Automatically, he patted his pockets, although he knew the notes couldn’t have leapt out of his wallet and into another place.

Rosa’s hand flew to her mouth. ‘Oh, no! You left your wallet on the beach while you swam?’

‘Yeah. It sounds stupid when you say it like that but Malta’s usually safe,’ he explained, feeling both angry and foolish. ‘It was only after the others had gone that there was no one on shore with it. I’ll have to buy one of those waterproof belts for when I’m in the water.’

She unzipped her backpack. ‘I have thirty euros in a hidden pocket, so I can get the bill.’

‘It’s OK,’ he muttered. ‘My credit cards are still there.’

What he didn’t tell her because he didn’t want to even think it let alone say it out loud was that this was the third time he’d lost money recently. Joseph had lost some too.

And each time Luccio had been around.

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