Page 87 of Just Watch Me
“What time is it?” Skylar asked. “Have I overslept? Wait. We’re meant to be flying home today.” She threw back the duvet and got to her feet, soreness and all.
“Not happening,” Jade said. “We’re stuck here. Well, maybe Mum and Dad aren’t, as they have the car, but the authorities are saying to stay put if you possibly can. It’s a mess out there, and the airport’s closed for at least another day while they check. Luckily, the runways were above tsunami level. Who knew? They always seem like you’re landing in a seaplane. Turns out the biggest wave was less than eight meters, too.Seems impossible, doesn’t it? Mad how much damage an eight-meter wave can do. And it’s …” She looked at her watch. “Eight-fifteen.”
Eight-fifteen?Skylar’d woken by six-fifteen just about every day of her life. “How do you know what they’re saying, though?” she realized. “Is the electric back on? The TV?”
“No,” Jade said. “But the mobile network’s working. Hooray for buried cables, eh.”
She looked at Skylar with something like speculation, and Skylar smoothed her hair and said, “What?”
“Your shirt’s on inside out,” Jade said. “And it wasn’t last night. Interesting. So you twoareinvolved. No worries,” she said, when Skylar opened her mouth. “I assumed you were anyway, or why would you come on this holiday?”
“Because our grandparents are dating,” Skylar said. “We explained this.” She longed to put her PJ top to rights, but there was no point now, was there?
“Yeh, right,” Jade said. “I’d bring some tea and toast to the heroine of the hour, but as there’s no electric, there’s no tea and no toast. Fancy a glass of water and a slice of bread with jam while you look at nothing? You said your phone was out of juice. You could charge it in one of the cars, like the rest of us. The only question is, will we run out of gas or battery life first.”
“Forrest,” Skylar realized. She ignored the rest. How was she a heroine for staying with the kids? Was she meant to have deserted them? “We need to get him home. His poor parents. What’s it like out there? Driving, and all?”
“Like I said, they’re asking people not to. Streets are a bit of a mess.”
“And the airport’s definitely closed all day?”
“Until tomorrow, like I also said. Then they’ll see.”
“Bugger. I need to phone my principal to tell her I won’t bethere. Start of the new term,” she explained, when Jade looked confused.
“Oh,” Jade said. “I never pay much attention. How old are you, anyway?” She took a seat on the bed as if she were prepared for a long, cozy chat.
“Pardon?” Skylar blinked at her. She needed to brush her teeth. Also take a shower. She was a bit … sticky. Which was nice, but she also felt like she was wearing a scarlet letter again. Like everybody could tell.
So what if they can? What have you done wrong?Other than violate professional standards, that is. But otherwise? She wasn’t a devotee of the purity culture, and Zane’s whanau was presumably aware that he had a sex life.
Well, there was the pregnancy idea, but never mind that. She had enough to think about just now.
“You don’t look much older than me,” Jade said, “and I’m twenty-eight. But you have older kids, like Zane. So I’m asking.”
“I’m thirty-two. A bit older than you, yeh. Why?”
“Just that it’s like you’re in a different world,” Jade said. “Or a different generation. Probably just more mature, though.”
Because I seem forty,Skylar thought. Not exactly welcome news. But—Forrest. Shehadto try to get Forrest home somehow.
And not think about Zane too much. That was high on the agenda. She was a world-class overanalyzer, but she didn’t have to be one today. She and Zane had shared a terrifying time, they’d had to work hard to get through it, and they’d clung together a bit in the aftermath. Bonding in a traumatic situation, that was. Perfectly natural.
She wouldn’t be odd around Zane, either. Easy-breezy lemon squeezy. She did this all the time. She was a fun-loving, casual woman who did Speed Dating and went dancing andhad unprotected sex and … and whatever else women like that did.
She was so not prepared for this.
Skylar came into the dining room … brightly, Zane would call that. Or maybe “breezily” was a better word.
“Goodness, I’m late,” she said. “Everybody else already awake and eating, I see.Thatdoesn’t happen often. Well, I’m awake now, anyway. My cold shower saw to that. I’d call it ‘invigorating,’ but it was more like me trying not to scream.”
“Because we used up the hot water last night,” Finlay said. “Even though we took very short showers.” He jerked away when Skylar went to kiss him.“Mum.”A hand went up to ward her off. “I’meleven.”
“Sorry,” Skylar said. She kissed Olive, though, and George, and put a hand on Forrest’s head and smoothed his hair. “Doing OK?” she asked him.
“Yes,” he said. “Because George and Georgia and I have been playing, even though there’s no TV. I didn’t know people took two showers a day, though. You don’t get dirtysleeping.”
There went her color, straight up to her cheeks. “Yes,” she said, “well, I …”
