Finding Jack by Sofia Due

Author:Sofia Due
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The Book Guild Ltd
Published: 2023-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

34

Gennie shut Sergio in the kitchen and Roxy in the hall, each with a bowl of water and some treats, and strict orders to behave. They immediately took up positions either side of the kitchen door and resumed their habitual growling match, Roxy jumping and scratching at the floor.

‘Be reasonable, guys,’ Gennie said. ‘I need a moment, maybe two.’

Maybe ten. Her bed was full of sand, and her attempts to brush it up only spread it further. She untucked the sheet and bundled it up, lifted the sash window and shook the sheet outside, only remembering as she pulled the sheet back in to check there’d been no-one underneath the window. It was just as well her room faced the side of the farm and not the yard, where there were passers-by, not to mention witnesses. Her hair was also full of sand and stiff with salt, and her scalp had started to itch. She climbed into the bath and turned on the overhead shower. Jack wouldn’t be back; and actually, that was fine. There were worse ways to while away an afternoon waiting for the apocalypse.

Gennie lifted her face to the rush of hot water and willed it to cleanse her of emotion along with the seawater. Her day had been filled with physical sensations and her body felt pleasantly used, stretched and purposeful, released temporarily from the tangle of confusion which nested at her core.

There were sounds outside the bathroom door. She shut off the water to listen.

‘Gennie?’ His voice was quiet, not much more than a whisper.

‘In here,’ she said. ‘I’m nearly done. You can come in.’ She turned the taps back on. She wouldn’t think too deeply about what she was doing. Going with the flow, wasn’t that it?

Jack came into the tiny bathroom, half filling the space between the basin at one end and toilet at the other, staring directly at her through the shower screen.

‘Get in if you like.’

‘Is there room?’ he asked.

‘Room to wash,’ she answered. She averted her eyes as he peeled off his clothes again and climbed in with her.

‘Here,’ she said, pressing a bottle of shower gel to his chest as he pulled her wet body towards him. She squeezed shampoo into her hand and started to wash his hair while, his hand on her hip, he turned her this way and that.

‘Where’s your tattoo?’ he asked. ‘Max said you had a tattoo.’

‘And you believed him? I haven’t got a tattoo.’ She was struggling to keep her balance in the cramped space. ‘Is that why you came back then? To check out my tattoo.’

‘No. Well, maybe,’ he said, shaking his head obligingly as she lifted down the shower head to rinse his hair.

‘Show me yours, then,’ she said, and he obediently swivelled to show her the design on his right shoulder blade, which until now she’d seen only as a blur from the safe distance of the life class but which she deciphered as a homage to his regiment and Andy.

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