Chapter 16 Elis
Elis
It’s their first day proper in New Zealand and Elis is on a high – literally.
He stands atop Bob’s Peak, on the shoulder of Ben Lomond, one of the area’s tallest mountains, and a cool wind feathers his face with alpine air, the clarity of which you only get at such an elevation.
The sky is a thick blue, with furry claws of cirrus, and the sun has a burning intensity.
It’s an improvement on yesterday; four seasons in one day, the hotel receptionist chirped when Elis returned from a walk soaked through from a sudden shower.
After that he skulked back to his room to sleep off his jet lag and was out by six o’clock.
They all were. And so, as expected, today got off to a very early start.
The luging wasn’t as exhilarating as he’d hoped.
He thought there might’ve been an opportunity to have a proper race, a chance to leave George in a cloud of dust. But it was kids’ stuff, really.
Every time he got up a head of speed in one of the rattly little karts, he had to brake to a stop because a member of some uncoordinated family had failed to take a bend.
No one could knock the scenery, though. The vista from the viewing platform was epic; from there you could see the whole lake and deep into the wondrous landscape he’d read all about: to the east, the Remarkables, an enormous and nobbled alligator of mountains that dominated the horizon, and to the west, the magnificent Cecil Peak, rising ominously steep out of the water.
This colossally ruptured, gloriously discordant corner of the Earth’s crust was bellowing a reminder, if they needed one, of just how much there was out there to explore.
He stared at it, lost in all the possibilities, until George ushered them into the cafe where English canteen-style food was being kept warm under lights.
They had a high-carb lunch that hit none of Elis’s macros, and now, while they wait in a queue for a cable car to take them back down the mountain, he can feel his body tire as his digestive system works overtime to break down a gutful of refined fats and starch.
They move forward on to the platform and wait as the group ahead of them boards a cable car and the next one trundles into position.
It’s a delicate, glass-sided pod with benches at each end.
They file in, sit down and off they go. Elis’s stomach drops as the ground slips away and they’re suspended, thinly encased and dangling, and the mountainside – a chaotic mix of rocky cliffs and dull grassy terrain – falls further below, almost impossibly steep.
Reubyn has gone silent, staring at his feet, as he did on the way up.
Elis leans forward and puts a hand on Reubyn’s shoulder. ‘Are you all right?’
Reubyn remains silent, head bowed, refusing to look out of the windows. His vertigo came on gradually on the way up, but this time he’s started suffering immediately.
‘You don’t look too well, mate,’ George says.
‘How’s that fish and chips settling in your stomach?
’ There’s no response, and George grins – a sure sign that he’s going to keep prodding.
‘Maybe you should do a food review for your channel,’ he says, and then, when Reubyn doesn’t reply, adds: ‘How would you rate the batter, out of ten? Was it greasy enough for you? It looked a bit oily to me.’
Reubyn still doesn’t respond. His skin gleams an unhealthy shade somewhere between grey and yellow, like a raw chicken breast on the turn; globules of sweat have formed between the sparse hairs on his crown.
‘You should’ve brought your selfie stick for this,’ George continues. ‘Sweaty Brit suffers vertigo-induced heart attack on cable car – that would get some views.’
‘Bugger off.’
Laughter echoes around the cabin.
‘I’m no engineer,’ George says, ‘but that cable doesn’t look very robust to me. And it sure is a long way down.’
They’re about halfway back now, but it is still a long way down – both to the rocks directly below and to the base of the mountain.
After a brief silence, George smirks as if he’s thought of something clever.
‘You know, Reubs,’ he says, ‘New Zealand is one of the most earthquake-prone countries in the world.’ He winks at Miles.
‘We’re right on a fault line here, and they have some real big ones.
I wouldn’t want to be in one of these cable cars when the next big shake happens.
’ He grabs hold of the bench and starts jerking forward and back, generating a slight rocking motion.
‘Do you feel that? I think the earth’s moving down there. ’
Reubyn lifts his head a couple of inches and rolls his eyes to look at George. ‘Stop it!’
Cackles reverberate around the small space.
‘All right, all right,’ Miles says. ‘That’s enough.’
On his word, the cabin falls silent. Miles and George turn their attention to their phones as the cable car approaches the bottom of the mountain. Eventually they’re low enough that Reubyn raises his head and puffs out his cheeks.
Miles looks up, twists the corner of his mouth. ‘Hey, I’ve been meaning to ask, have any of you ever heard the name Alex Burnfield?’
‘I don’t think so,’ Elis says.
Reubyn shakes his head with the listless energy of someone who’s dismissed the question without giving it any thought.
George stares through the glass, running his knuckles over his jawline. ‘Burnfield? I don’t think so, either. Why do you ask?’
‘Oh, it’s one of my trolls. No big deal.’
Miles goes back to his phone. After a minute of thumbing the screen, he cocks his head. ‘Pol’s gone to the pub.’ He turns his screen so they can see. On it is a picture from Polly’s Instagram; she’s leaning back in the half-shade of a parasol, a wine glass resting in her hand.
‘Marvellous,’ George says, rubbing his hands together. ‘Where is she? Let’s join her.’
Miles taps at his phone. ‘I’ll find out.’
Elis clears his throat. ‘Oh, come on, it’s too early for the pub, isn’t it, fellas? There’s other stuff we can do.’
‘Like what?’ George asks, seriously.
‘Well, there’s this steamboat that takes you out on the lake for—’
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake!’ George shakes his head. ‘Can you stop trying to be Captain Cook for five minutes and just chill out a bit?’
Miles laughs, and Elis clenches his jaw. He feels a sting of real irritation – not so much towards George but at Miles. George’s moronic comments are to be expected, but Miles should have his back.
‘It’s two o’clock in the afternoon,’ Elis protests, a vein burning in his forehead. ‘The day is young.’
‘Yeah, and we’ve all scaled a mountain this morning,’ George says. ‘I think that means we’ve earned ourselves a nice drink.’
Miles shrugs. ‘He’s got a point.’
Elis mutters under his breath. But there’s no time for any acrimony to fester in the cabin – they’ve arrived.
They file out, and George slings an arm around Miles, glancing over his shoulder at Elis as he guides Miles out on to the street and towards the town.
Elis hangs back with Reubyn, who staggers out, visibly disorientated.
Elis grinds his teeth. What has he signed up for here?
A two-week piss-up? They’re in New Zealand, for God’s sake, and all these guys can think of to do is go to the pub.
It’s such a waste. They make it out on to the street, and Reubyn slumps his backside on a low wall and hangs his head.
The colour is returning to his cheeks, but he still looks pathetic, drawing the long deliberate breaths of the infirm.
Elis places a light hand on his shoulder. ‘How are you feeling, man?’
‘I’m fine. Just give me a minute.’
‘I’m sorry – I didn’t know about your thing with heights; you were fine on the plane, weren’t you? Anyway, I didn’t realise it would be that steep.’
‘It’s fine. I’m just glad to be off the bloody thing.’
Reubyn takes a bottle of sunscreen out of his bag and wearily smears factor 50 on to his forearms and head. It’s already his second application of the day. When he’s done, Elis offers his hand and hauls Reubyn to his feet.
‘George can be a bit of a prick, can’t he?’ Elis says.
Reubyn raises an eyebrow. ‘Oh, I know he can be a bit much, at times. But he’s all right, really.’
‘I get the feeling he’d rather I wasn’t here.’
Reubyn shakes his head. ‘That’s not true. He can be a bit full-on, but he doesn’t mean anything by it. You get used to him.’ Reubyn registers the doubt lines on Elis’s forehead and adds: ‘Honestly, he’s just having a laugh.’
‘I’ll take your word for it.’
Reubyn appears suddenly brighter, but Elis still sets a slow pace; it’s only a ten-minute walk to where the town’s bars are clustered on the lakefront, and he’s in no hurry to get there.
As he strolls, Elis’s eye tracks along the ragged outline of the mountainous horizon.
On a day like this, there must be plenty of climbers on those peaks, all in ascension towards life’s most momentous moments; up there – where freedom is a real, touchable thing – ambitions are being met, bucket lists ticked, summits reached in eruptions of endorphins.
His sight rests upon the highest visible point, a knuckle of rock raised triumphantly against the blue sky, and he imagines what it’d be like to be there standing on it, staring back down.
‘Hey,’ Reubyn says, wiping the image from Elis’s mind, ‘you know I told you I had a surprise for us?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Well, it’s all confirmed. I think Miles is going to really love it. Do you want to see?’
‘Of course.’
Reubyn fiddles with his phone, then turns it to the side and pincers his thumb and index finger to zoom in on an image. ‘Check it out.’
Elis’s head recoils with surprise. ‘Bloody hell.’
‘I know, right?’
He takes the phone from Reubyn to examine the picture more closely, and a tingle of excitement fizzes through him. ‘Is that . . . is that for us?’