Chapter Seventy-One
Seventy-One
Attack
We’re walking past an old, stunted hedgerow, when I notice that someone has rammed a stick into a wasp nest.
‘That’s so cruel,’ I say. ‘Why would somebody do that?’
‘It was probably just a child,’ he says. ‘Kids don’t know any better.’
‘I’m going to take it out.’
‘Don’t do that,’ he says, gruffly, putting his arm out to stop me. ‘Not a good idea.’
‘Why? I’m not just going to leave it like that.’
‘Think about it. The wasps might think you put the stick there, Lindy.’
‘Why would they think that? It’s probably been there for hours. The wasps will just be grateful that a massive log is out of their bedroom. I’m getting rid of it.’
He breathes through gritted teeth and walks in front of me. Very slowly and carefully, he removes the stick from the wasp nest and throws it in the hedgerow. There’s a brief moment where we both smile at each other, knowing we’ve done our good deed for the day, and then the wasps start coming.
They ignore me entirely, but they really have it in for Caleb. He’s stung on the arm, on the cheek and on the back of the head. All while running at full speed away from the nest. We’re neck and neck in the first straight, but he takes the lead on a bend in the path and ends up ten paces ahead. By rights, the wasps should be coming for me, but they are still absolutely focussed on Caleb.
Eventually, having been stung at least twenty times, Caleb runs to the beach and dives into the sea.
This is awkward.
The saltwater seems to be soothing the stings, but every now and then he lets out an unmistakeable yell of pain.
He hasn’t blamed me for this unfortunate event, well, not in words, but every now and again he directs a disapproving look at me.
‘Sorry,’ I call to him, over the swash of the waves. ‘I didn’t expect that to happen.’
‘I did,’ he says. ‘That is pretty much exactly what I expected to happen.’
‘Well, why did you pull out the stick, then?’
‘Because if I didn’t, then you would have.’
‘That’s very chivalrous but there was no need. I was willing to take my chances.’
Hot after all that panic and running, I think about splashing my face and wrists with seawater. I haven’t run that fast since a very intense personal trainer started at my gym.
‘What’s the water like?’ I ask.
‘Why don’t you come in and see for yourself,’ he says, floating on his back and rising and falling with the swell of the waves.
I roll up my jeans, just past my ankle. ‘I’ll have a paddle.’
He dives into a small breaking wave and comes up with his hair plastered to his face. He flicks it back in one slick, well-practiced move, like a hero from a romcom movie.
‘Do you want me to look at your stings?’ I shout. ‘Make sure all the stingers are out?’
It’s crazy, but I think I want there to be a stinger in his skin, just so that I have a reason to touch him.
He takes his shirt off, revealing red welts over his neck and arms. But on his back, there’s something else. Old injuries, as if from some a terrible attack, and neat surgical scars, raised and inflamed from the wasp venom.
‘Wasps don’t leave stingers,’ he says. ‘Only bees do that.’
‘I’m really sorry,’ I say.
I know he realises what I’ve seen, and why I’m sorry for him.
‘Don’t be. I made my own choices,’ he says. ‘It’s on me.’