and put his hands behind his head. ‘I don’t know what to make of it, Mum. Look, I can lend—’
‘No!’ she almost shouted. She was not going to let Ed lend her money. ‘I’m phoning Rachel.’ She wandered outside to the humid gardens, the cicadas busy with their own night orchestra, the sweet smell of jasmine in the air.
She dialled Rachel’s number and when she answered it was all she could do not to cry.
‘What’s up, love?’
Maddie told her everything: the money, the savings account that had been emptied, what Tim had said.
‘Bastard. Sorry, love, but to think he just bought a car – what did he say? Zero to sixty in three blimmin’ seconds? Honestly.’
‘I know, Rachel, I—’
‘There’s something else, Maddie. I’m glad you called. Your house.’
‘What?’
‘Well, um. There have been some blokes around. Tim was at the front door today, then when I looked at the car driving away, it was Evans Estate Agents. And yesterday, well…’
There was a slight time delay, but Maddie could almost picture Rachel biting her lip.
‘What?’
‘I think it was debt collectors.’
She felt sick. Why were they at her house?
‘I really don’t want to go back there, Rachel.’
‘You will stay with us. In our spare room. And Maddie?’
‘Yes?’
‘Listen, text me your flight details. Try to get some sleep.’
Maddie clutched the phone and let out a breath. ‘Thank you, Rachel.’
Maddie pressed the ‘call end’ button and wandered back into the room, grateful for the breeze of the fan. Ed was sitting on the bed, his long legs stretched out in front of him.
‘Mum?’ He put a hand on her arm.
‘Hmm?’ She came and sat down next to him.
She looked at his big hand covering her forearm. She used to hold that hand to cross the road.
‘I just wanted to say thanks, you know, for coming here. I was pretty scared. I might not have shown it—’
‘I know, I know,’ she said reaching up and touching him on the cheek. ‘Now let’s get some sleep. It’s been quite a day.’
Maddie lay in the dark that night and her brain whooshed as the fan spun above her head. She could hear Ed snoring lightly. He had his whole life ahead of him. She didn’t want to shatter what was left of his respect for his dad. She needed to get back home.
She had never been particularly superstitious, but an uneasy feeling settled on her, as she clutched her hummingbird scarf in the dark, and pulled it over her shoulders to stop the mozzies from biting. Just then, her phone buzzed with a notification. Finally, Tim with some comprehensible explanation. She thumped her pillow as she sat up.
She leant over and grabbed her phone, the eerie blue light casting a glow over the sheet. Suddenly, the events of the whole day were eclipsed by a single icon. There, in front of her was an acceptance of a friend request.
From Greg.
She sensed that the world as she knew it would never be the same again.
21
The picture was a bit grainy, but she could make out Olive, her glasses perched on her head. Maddie and Ed were in an internet café on the main drag in central Kuta. She’d had an awful night’s sleep in the end, worrying about money, worrying about her life, swatting away a persistent mozzie all night. She and Ed had been trying to change her flights after Maddie had got a phone call from Clare. Clare had felt that Maddie should speak to Olive on Skype again, which was why they were at the café, but she’d also said that Olive had taken a turn for the worse. You’d be a good tonic for her, Maddie. Claire had also suggested Olive would like to speak to Ed.
‘Is it because I haven’t been around, Clare? Is she lonely?’
There had been a silence on the other end of the phone, before Clare said, ‘Mrs Brown, Olive isn’t lonely here. She’s made it her mission to be friendly to absolutely everyone. In fact, I wish more residents were like her, but she is asking more and more, almost every day, for Stan. It breaks my heart because every time we remind her that he’s passed away, for her, it’s as if it’s the first time she’s hearing it, and the sadness in her eyes… It’s such a cruel illness.’
Clare explained that they’d get Olive in a wheelchair and get her to the computer to do a Skype call.
To compound things, Maddie had also got a curt text from