One Thousand Stars and You Page 2

  She heard the office door closing across the landing and picked up the TV remote, pausing The West Wing just as her boyfriend appeared in the bedroom doorway. He looked tired, she thought – adorably so, with his caramel fringe askew and a gravy stain on the front of his grey T-shirt.

  ‘Nice bath?’ he asked, stifling a yawn.

  Alice nodded. Her thick, light-brown hair still felt damp. She must plait it before bed, she thought briefly, her hand going to its silky ends. Once upon a time, Richard would have offered to do it for her, but those days felt like half a lifetime ago. Living together had undoubtedly changed the dynamic of their relationship – which Alice had known it inevitably would – but she reasoned that she had gained more than she had lost. Richard might not be as affectionate towards her as he once was, but sharing a home had made their intimacy feel cosier, somehow. Being with him was easy.

  ‘I’ve been thinking,’ he said, coming towards her and sitting down on the edge of the bed. ‘I want to do something special for your birthday, too.’

  ‘Oh?’ Alice sat up straighter and crossed her legs. She was wearing the pyjamas Richard had got her for Christmas, which were fleecy and covered in polar bears. Perfect for the below-freezing temperatures that had arrived hand in icy hand with the first few days of February.

  ‘I know we said that we’d wait until we bought a place, but …’ He paused, watching her closely to gauge her reaction.

  Alice knew exactly what he was going to say, and her heart began to pound against her chest. It was the same feeling that had sent her up those slippery steps at the pool, the fluttering that she associated with losing control. Alice opened her mouth to speak, but found there were no words. Richard’s hand was on her cheek now, his thumb hooking her hair around her ear, his fingers brushing against her neck. Alice shivered.

  ‘I think that when you get back from Sri Lanka,’ he said softly, ‘we should set the date.’

  4

  Alice slipped her Sri Lanka travel guide into the side pocket of her backpack and did up the zip, almost dropping her passport in the process. Her hands had turned clammy with nervous excitement from the moment the captain switched on the seat-belt signs and announced that they would soon be landing, and she now felt as if the dial controlling her senses had been cranked to its highest setting. Her eyes widened as they took in the joyful chaos of Bandaranaike International Airport, her nostrils flaring with delight as a host of new scents assailed her, and her ears rang with a cacophony of sounds.

  ‘Wow,’ breathed Maureen, her usual buoyant sweariness for once subdued by the mayhem unfolding around them. ‘Bit lively in here, isn’t it?’

  Steph rubbed her eyes and yawned blearily, her cheeks pink beneath her blonde curls, which she’d tied up in a high ponytail. While Alice had spent the eleven-hour flight devouring first her book and then several movies, her oldest friend had eaten one meal, then pulled her pink satin eye mask down over her face and promptly fallen asleep. Maureen had followed suit, but not before taking full advantage of the complimentary wine on board.

  ‘My head hurts,’ Maureen groaned, and Alice chuckled in amusement.

  ‘Come on,’ she said, bouncing eagerly on the balls of her feet. ‘Let’s get through passport control and find a taxi.’

  They made their way through the chattering crowds, pointing in wonder at the open-fronted shops in the arrivals lounge, which sold everything from elephant-dung notebooks to washing machines. Alice had never seen white goods for sale in an airport before, but nobody else seemed to be looking twice as they hurried past. Every local face Alice glanced at carried an honest and warm smile; dark-brown eyes crinkling with pleasure as she returned their grins of greeting. When they reached the end of the long walkway, the three girls found themselves face-to-face with an enormous statue of Buddha.

  ‘Selfie!’ cried Maureen, but Alice put a hand on her arm before she could reach for her phone.

  ‘Don’t,’ she warned. ‘You’re not supposed to take pictures with your back to Buddha – it’s disrespectful.’

  Maureen nodded, and Alice felt the grateful gaze of the nearby security guard fall across them.

  ‘You are good,’ Steph remarked, as they waited in the passport control queue. ‘Doing all the research so we didn’t have to.’

  Alice shrugged, uncomfortable with the praise. She didn’t want to admit that ever since they had agreed to come to Sri Lanka, she’d been reading whatever material she could get her hands on in order to be fully prepared. She had written out her wish list of places to visit, underlined phrases in the back of the guide book so she could communicate better, and generally immersed herself in all things Sri Lanka, as if she was bathing in the country and its culture. She was very glad she’d done her research on what to expect at the airport, because as soon as they’d all had their passports stamped and were heading towards the exit, the locals descended en masse.

  ‘Ayubowan, ladies. Hello, hello – you want taxi?’

  ‘Tuk-tuk? I make for you a very good price.’

  ‘I take this bag for you.’

  While it was full-on, none of the hopeful taxi drivers were so pushy as to make Alice feel uneasy, and so she smiled but shook her head determinedly as she continued to walk through them, Maureen and Steph not far behind. One wiry-limbed man with a white beard and matted hair pulled at the straps of her backpack, gesturing to her that she should hand it over.

  ‘Néhé istouti,’ she told him politely. ‘No, thank you.’

  ‘Since when did you speak Sri Lankan?’ called out Steph, her knuckles white on the straps of her own bag.

  ‘It’s actually Sinhalese,’ Alice corrected, and Maureen whistled in approval.

  ‘I always said this one was a dark horse,’ she told Steph, narrowly avoiding elbowing another tuk-tuk driver in the face as she swung round. They had reached the doors at last, and Alice took a short, deep breath before stepping outside.

  ‘Woof!’ said Maureen, stopping in her tracks as if the sudden, oppressive heat was a real curtain that had just been pulled across in front of her. Now that they had moved into the area reserved for official taxis, the tuk-tuk drivers that had swarmed around them just a moment ago melted away into the crowds.

  ‘Oh wow, I feel better already,’ Steph said happily, closing her eyes and dropping her shoulders.

  Alice looked at her phone to see if the time had readjusted. It was nine-thirty p.m. here in Colombo – four p.m. back home – and the sky was a hard, dense black above the white awning outside the airport. She had been awake for over thirty-three hours now, but she didn’t feel even remotely tired. On the contrary, Alice felt as if she could take off and run along the cluttered roads of the capital city, just as she did across the water meadows at home, all the way to the hotel they had booked for the night. Tomorrow morning, they would drive up to the Cultural Triangle, where the real adventure would begin.

  ‘Earth to Alice in Wonderland!’

  Steph was calling to her from the open door of a taxi, bemused as always by her friend’s ability to drift effortlessly off into a trance. Alice hurried over and handed her heavy rucksack to the waiting driver. Thanking him as he wedged it into the boot, she clambered into the car and sat down next to Steph.

  Maureen, who had opted for the front seat, leaned around to face them.

  ‘So, are you girls glad that I suggested this trip, or what?’ she asked.

  Alice beamed at her.

  ‘Maur,’ she declared, buckling up just as their driver started the ignition. ‘I’m so happy I could kiss you.’

  Maureen smirked. ‘That reminds me,’ she said, ‘I never told you about my last date.’

  Alice looked up as the car inched forwards and joined the flow of traffic.

  ‘This was with the mechanic, right?’

  Maureen nodded, although it was already clear from her expression that this latest Tinder tale was not going to have a happy ending.

  ‘His nails were bloody filthy,’ she chunt
ered, shuddering at the memory. ‘And when I asked him what his hobbies were, he told me he played the accordion.’

  ‘Random!’ chimed Steph, chuckling and then swearing as she attempted to untangle her sunglasses from her unruly curls. The short amount of time they had spent in the savage humidity had already turned her into a tumbleweed.

  ‘I know!’ Maureen looked aghast at the mere thought. ‘Why couldn’t it have been a saxophone? Saxophone players are sexy as hell.’

  Alice blushed as she met the driver’s eyes in the mirror. For some reason, she felt uncomfortable with where the conversation was going – especially with their driver listening in.

  ‘You’re missing all the scenery,’ she said, wincing as an overcrowded bus almost veered straight into them. Colombo was a riot of colour, noise and activity, with car and tuk-tuk horns blaring, bicycles weaving precariously between the traffic, and a huge number of stray dogs wandering along the side of the road. Everyone they passed on the lit-up city streets was dressed in shades of vibrant red, sunshine yellows or deep, bright greens. There was clutter and chaos and rubbish and shouting and music, but as Alice pressed her nose to the glass and took it all in, she could sense a harmony to the madness, too.

  Maureen was now bemoaning her accordion-playing mechanic’s persistent follow-up texts, which made Alice laugh. When it came to their love lives, her two friends were looking for very different things. Maureen wanted to go out and get herself a man with his own house, car, business and, ideally, children, because, as she bluntly put it, ‘Pregnancy destroys your body.’ Steph, on the other hand, was resolutely hoping to be found by ‘The One’, a mythical creature with apparently no bad habits, a keen willingness to have at least six kids and, as she sweetly put it, ‘A schlong to be seriously proud of.’ Alice, of course, had found her life partner when she was just eighteen, so she’d never really had time to wonder about anyone else. Richard had been with her through everything – he had stayed the course all through university, forgiven her when she needed forgiving, and even, on occasion, stuck up for her when her mother became too much. A life with no Richard in it was impossible to imagine.

  ‘I wish we were travelling all over Sri Lanka in this,’ sighed Maureen, who was settling into the taxi’s leather upholstery like a blissed-out cat.

  ‘What, and miss out on all those five- and six-hour train journeys?’ joked Alice.

  ‘Don’t remind me.’ Maureen screwed up her pale-green eyes. ‘I can barely handle the ten-minute Tube journey from Stratford to my office, so don’t be surprised if I just start crying about an hour in.’

  Steph tutted. ‘Don’t be daft – it will be amazing. And how would we ever meet men if we were trapped in a car with each other all the time?’

  ‘There’s more to life than men,’ Alice jokingly reminded the two girls.

  ‘That’s easy for you to say,’ Maureen replied, humour dancing across her features. ‘You’ve got lovely Richard waiting for you at home. I haven’t met anyone worth a second date for months.’

  ‘Nor me,’ said Steph. ‘The man of my dreams could be in Sri Lanka right now, just waiting for me to find him.’

  Alice, who did not view the dating game as a treasure hunt in which men were the prize, kept her mouth very carefully shut and let Maureen and Steph carry on their conversation without her input. To her friends, she knew it must seem that she had it all worked out. She was living with a man who was kind to her, loved her and, as yet unbeknownst to them, wanted to marry her – but what they couldn’t see was the nagging feeling, deep down, that something was not quite right with her and with the life she had chosen. Ever since Richard had mentioned setting the date, Alice had felt as if each of her limbs had been tied to bunches of helium balloons. She could not find traction on the ground, no matter how hard she tried.

  Breaking air-conditioned-car protocol, she wound down the taxi window so she could breathe in the fragrant air, and was assaulted with the sweet, rich scent of burning wood.

  What she was feeling must simply be a case of cold feet. Getting married was the logical next step for her and Richard, and it was one she wanted, no matter how jittery it made her.

  5

  ‘Alice. Alice, wake up.’

  Alice sat bolt upright as if shocked with a Taser to find that Steph was poking her on the leg.

  ‘Wh …’ she began, blinking the sleep out of her eyes. It was pitch-black outside the car.

  ‘When did the sun go down?’ she asked blearily, stretching her arms out in front of her and grimacing with satisfaction when she heard her stiff joints click. After the long flight, yesterday’s taxi from the airport to the hotel and today’s mammoth drive cross-country from Colombo all the way up to Habarana, Alice figured she had done more than enough sitting down.

  ‘Oh, about an hour ago. Vidu says we’re nearly there – isn’t that right, Vidu?’

  Their driver grunted in agreement.

  ‘You drooled on my shoulder,’ Steph added, pointing to a wet patch on her green vest top. ‘But you looked so peaceful, I didn’t want to move you.’

  ‘Sorry,’ Alice said, wiping ineffectually at the damp area with her fingers. ‘I can’t believe I fell asleep.’

  ‘It was a nice sunset,’ Steph admitted. ‘But there’ll be plenty more, so don’t worry.’

  ‘Mmm-hmm,’ murmured Alice, still shaking her head to unstick the cobwebs of exhaustion. It was impossible to see anything through the window save for the moon, which was three-quarters full and bright enough to cause Alice’s eyes to water as she gazed at it.

  In the front seat, Vidu muttered something in Sinhalese and turned off the road abruptly, narrowly missing a rusty painted sign half hidden behind dense foliage and applying the brakes as the car began bouncing over the potholes.

  ‘Steady on, Vidu!’ laughed Maureen from beside him, making a show of clutching on to the front dashboard as if she was on a roller coaster. ‘I’m too single to die!’

  ‘Jumping road!’ announced Vidu, grinning as he gripped the steering wheel, and soon Alice saw lights appearing up ahead. As they drew closer, a line of single-storey cabins came into view, each with a numbered door. A wooden veranda ran all the way along the outside, and there were small tables and chairs beside every entrance.

  Vidu was unloading their bags when a tall and exceedingly thin man with a large nose appeared soundlessly from amongst the trees, and prowled over to greet them.

  ‘Sadarayen piligannawa,’ he whispered. ‘Welcome.’

  Alice put her palms together in greeting, and was gratified when he followed suit. The man was quite unlike any other Sri Lankan that she’d seen so far, and seemed to almost be shrinking in on himself as he stood beside them. His hair was completely grey, and he was dressed – uncharacteristically for a local – head-to-toe in black. He reminded Alice overwhelmingly of Lurch from The Addams Family, and she had to subdue a desire to giggle.

  While Maureen sorted out a generous tip for Vidu, the tall man beckoned Alice and Steph forwards with a slender finger and showed them into their room for the next two nights. It was basic, with one double bed and a small single, which Alice bagged straight away. She was a restless sleeper, her fizzing anxiety causing her to kick off covers and fidget most nights, so she always avoided sharing except with Richard. He, at least, had grown accustomed to it. There was also a hard-looking sofa in the room, one table and a rudimentary bathroom. Alice loved it. The modern hotel where they had spent the night back in Colombo had been nice, but it hadn’t felt particularly authentic. This place, which the three of them had discovered in the depths of Booking.com, was exactly what she’d been hoping to find, and now that they were here, Alice discovered she couldn’t stop smiling.

  ‘Dinner?’ rasped Lurch, hovering in the open doorway like a spectre.

  ‘Yes, please,’ Steph said, clapping her hands together at the thought of food. Breakfast from the hotel buffet felt like a very long time ago, and all they’d eaten for lunch were packets of cr
isps that they’d picked up from roadside stalls.

  ‘At nine o’clock,’ he told them in his strange, scratchy voice, before shifting away.

  Alice walked across the room to where Steph was staring in horror at her humidity-fried hair in the mirror.

  ‘Pinch me,’ Alice instructed.

  Steph didn’t move. ‘What? Why?’

  ‘Because I’m pretty sure I’m still asleep and have just dreamt that man.’

  Steph laughed, her expression transforming in the smudged glass.

  ‘Did I hear the word “man”?’ demanded Maureen, who had just walked through the door and was buckling slightly under the weight of her backpack.

  Alice started to explain, but Maureen shushed her with a flapping hand. ‘There’s no time,’ she told them, tossing her bag on the double bed and unzipping one pocket after another.

  ‘Shit, where the bloody hell did I put it?’

  ‘Put what?’ Alice asked, bending down to untie the laces of her trainers.

  ‘My make-up bag,’ Maureen replied, as if that much was obvious. Alice thought about the lone mascara nestled in the bottom of her washbag. She rarely bothered with make-up these days. It reminded her of the time when her scar had ruled her life, and she had been too insecure to leave the house without plastering on several inches of Maybelline’s finest. And anyway, she thought, dabbing at the moisture on her upper lip with the bottom of her T-shirt, it was far too hot for foundation in Sri Lanka.

  ‘I look like Monica in that episode of Friends when they all went to Barbados,’ wailed Steph, who was still at the mirror, and now pulling at her frazzled locks in despair.