grey cloud building up on the horizon, but the rest of the sky was sapphire-blue. There was so much more to life than Little Rowland, wasn’t there?
‘Maddie!’ Johnny was slowing down and turning in to a gravelly lay-by. ‘Look! Over there, a baby monkey!’
A tiny monkey – grey and white, adorably cute and fluffy – was clinging on to a tree. Just then, the mother appeared from behind the trunk and the baby clambered onto its back.
‘Need to watch them, though,’ Johnny said as he started the engine again. ‘They can pick your pockets – especially the ones in Ubud. Be careful.’
Pick your pockets? She couldn’t really believe something as cute and tiny as that was capable of stealing.
‘Not far to the temple.’ Johnny revved up the engine and sped off again.
*
The temple wasn’t what she expected. For a start, it was enormous. She’d imagined some small shrine on the top of a hill, a few monks wandering serenely by. Johnny had gone to the booth and bought two tickets. He was now holding out a soft yellow-and-green batik sarong for her and he’d knotted a blue checked sarong around himself and slipped on a long-sleeved shirt over his T-shirt.
‘Put this on – you can’t come in without covering up.’ They wandered through the main doors onto the central courtyard – a large open space with worn stone under their feet. She looked beyond the walls of the temple at the canopy of jungle outside. The temple was an oasis amid the sweltering heat, offering shade and tranquillity, the fragrant smell of incense sticks lingering.
As they passed by an open-air pavilion, she stopped. She was struck with the ornate wooden pillars, engraved so intricately. The filigree work on the overhanging eaves must have been painstaking work. ‘So this is Tirta Empul,’ Johnny explained, as he led the way. ‘It’s pretty much one of the biggest water temples in Indonesia – dedicated to Vishnu, a Hindu God.’
‘You’ve been here before?’
‘Only with people who’d get it.’ He glanced at her. ‘Means “holy water spring” in Balinese. Shall we take a dip? This way.’ He led her to a small door at the end of the courtyard and stood next to it. ‘Jaba Tengah.’ He nodded to the water. There were several people all bathing in the murky pool, waterspouts gushing from the wall. They were submerged in the water, holding it up to their faces, as if in a shower, wetting their hair. Tourists as well as locals were bathing in the cool water.
‘What’s the point of these?’ she whispered. It seemed wise to whisper; they were, after all, in a holy space.
Johnny shrugged. ‘For me, I’m bloody hot – it will be good to take a dip.’ He laughed, the crinkles at either side of his eyes bunching up. ‘But the locals believe it’s got magical powers.’
Most of the women were wearing T-shirts in the water, so Maddie quickly changed into her swimsuit in a small cabin, but kept her T-shirt on too. It was cool next in the water, a relief from the overhead sun on the ride up to the temple. Once they were waist-high in water, there seemed to be some sort of ritual going on, with people moving from one stone waterspout to another.
She and Johnny stood on the stone floor beneath and watched the proceedings, not wanting to interfere. There were stone carvings of elephants, and pale green moss had settled between the slabs of stone on the walls. A musty, damp smell in the inner womb of the courtyard mingled with the sweet smell of burning incense whilst the pale green leaves of the banana trees swayed in the breeze. Patches of water shimmered as shafts of sunlight cut through the shadows. There was a thatched umbrella giving shelter to a small temple on the side, an incense stick with smoke rising slowly from it, burning amongst an offering of fruit. It was all so… Maddie searched for the word – erotic! No… exotic.
She felt a jolt of electricity as Johnny touched her arm, awakening something in her. When was the last time she’d felt that? The reunion. Oh, Greg.
‘Like it?’ Johnny was standing next to her, nudging her in the ribs, bringing her back to the silent waters. It was hard not to notice his tall frame, the water dripping off his toned chest, his tanned broad shoulders, and how his muscles rippled when he held his arms above his head to sweep the