The Half-Life Of Hannah (Hannah series Book 1) Read online

  “Of course not,” Hannah agrees, even though she has absolutely no idea.

  “What if there are more?” Jill asks.

  “What if there’s a pack of them,” Luke asks. “What if they surround us, like wolves?”

  “Luke,” Aïsha whines.

  “Yes, stop it Luke. You’ll give yourself nightmares,” Hannah says. “They don’t like noise. Wild animals never like noise. So just talk loudly or sing a song or something and you’ll be fine.”

  “Wooh wooh wooh!” Luke shouts, brandishing his stick.

  “You don’t have to wake up the whole neighbourhood,” Cliff admonishes.

  He shrugs and starts to sing his favourite song from The Lion King instead – I just can’t wait to be king.

  “Don’t sing that Luke, that’s lame,” Aïsha says. But as they head into the next patch of darkness even she joins in.

  When, half a mile down the road the street-lamps become more regular and they all start to relax, Hannah moves to Jill’s side. “She can sing!” she murmurs. “Aïsha can sing.”

  “I know,” Jill says. “It’s amazing isn’t it?”

  “It is. She’s got a great voice.”

  “Luke can’t,” Jill says, and Hannah laughs.

  “No! No, he gets that from his mother, unfortunately,” she says.

  TWELVE

  The next morning Hannah is first up – even Luke is having a lie-in.

  She quietly makes herself a cup of coffee and sits nursing it as she watches the shortening shadows of the olive trees.

  She feels a little tired still, and vaguely hung-over too, but contented also. She likes the calm before the day begins, this sensation that everyone she loves is sleeping nearby. It’s so much easier to love them when they’re asleep, after all.

  When she has finished her coffee she wanders around the garden, looping the house and listening to the morning sounds of Provence: the buzz of insects around the lavender, snoring from Tristan’s shutters (a smile), a distant moped buzzing up a hill, water falling from the hosepipe into the now half-filled pool.

  When she reaches the front of the house she sees an extra car parked behind Tristan’s Jeep, a turquoise Twingo. Its two-tone paintwork shimmers in the morning light. So Tristan got more than a lift home, she thinks.

  The house continues to sleep, dark and heavy, so, careful not to disturb anyone (for her own benefit, not theirs) she fixes herself some toast and another cup of coffee, and takes them, along with her novel, back to the patio. She reads for a whole hour, uninterrupted – a rarity.

  “Morning!”

  Hannah jumps and turns to see Jill hanging from the doorway. She’s wearing men’s pyjamas.

  “Is everyone else still in bed?” Jill asks.

  Hannah nods. She doesn’t want to speak yet. Her head is still stuck in her novel, and she likes it there.

  “I think I’ll go back to bed for a bit then,” Jill says, “I just got up for a glass of water.”

  Hannah nods again, winks at her sister and flutters her fingers in a goodbye wave.

  Another hour passes by before Cliff appears in the same doorway. “How long have you been up?” he asks.

  “Since eight,” Hannah says quietly. She stretches and stifles a yawn and realises that the day is hotting up – that she’s sweating.

  “Couldn’t sleep?”

  Hannah shrugs. “Just reading,” she tells him, now reluctantly closing her book.

  Cliff’s booming voice could wake the dead, and, sure enough, within a minute first Luke then Aïsha appear, requiring breakfast. They are closely followed by Jill and Tristan.

  Hannah is the only person who isn’t surprised when the barman appears behind him, his floppy hair now a dishevelled bed-head wonder.

  “You all know Jean-Jacques,” Tristan says by way of introduction. “Now, I’m gonna make pancakes if anyone wants them.”

  “I’ll help,” Luke says, jumping up and following Tristan into the house.

  The easy morning chat that had prevailed up to that point vanishes the second Jean-Jacques takes a seat at the table. Hannah looks at him and forces a smile. She nods at him in a friendly way and he smiles weakly.

  “So,” Hannah says.

  Jean-Jacques clears his throat.

  “So Tristan got you to drive him home last night?” she says.

  Jean-Jacques nods.

  Aïsha gets her iPhone out and puts her earbuds in. Hannah wishes she could do the same.

  “He’s lucky,” Hannah says.

  “Thank-you,” Jean-Jacques says, averting his gaze and blushing deeply.

  “I meant... I just meant that the road was very dark,” Hannah explains, flushing with heat herself. She catches Jill’s eye and gives her an exaggerated stare and a vague shrug – a plea for help.

  “There were wild beasts,” Jill says. “On the road. We were scared.”

  Jean-Jacques frowns. “Beast?” he says.

  “Yes, animals,” Jill says, miming a four legged creature on the table-top with one hand.

  “Ah. Un daim ? Un sanglier ?” Jean-Jacques asks.

  Everyone stares at him blankly. They have no idea what he is saying.

  “It’s a nice bar,” Cliff says. “It must be nice working there.”

  Jean-Jacques shrugs. “C’est tranquille,” he says. “It’s just a job for summer.”

  “Of course,” Cliff says. “So what do you do the rest of the time?”

  “Station de ski,” Jean-Jacques says, then, “Ski station. I am teaching the snowboard.”

  “Snowboard? Cool,” Aïsha says, almost immediately looking surprised at her own utterance.

  Luke, thankfully, appears with the first plate of pancakes. Everyone is grateful for the distraction.

  “That was quick,” Hannah says.

  “Tris’ made the gloopy stuff yesterday,” Luke says. “More coming!”

  Once everyone is served, Tristan returns with his own plate and sits. “So what have you people been talking about?” he asks.

  “Oh this and that,” Hannah tells him. “Jean-Paul here is a snowboard instructor.”

  “Jean-Jacques,” Jean-Jacques corrects her.

  “Sorry, of course,” Hannah says. “Sorry.”

  “Is there much call for that? Here, I mean?” Tristan asks, looking around the garden as if in search of snow.

  “The ski stations is two hour away,” Jean-Jacques says. “Is OK.”

  “I see,” Hannah says. “How amazing.”

  A silence falls over the table again. Cutlery clinks against plates. People chew on pancake.

  “So where do you go out around here?” Jill asks.

  “Pardon?”

  “I mean, it must be a bit boring being gay in a tiny place like this,” Jill says. She sees that Tristan is bristling, but whatever the problem is, it’s too late now. “So I just wondered where you go when you want to have some fun.”

  Jean-Jaques furrows his brow, then swallows and turns his attention to his plate. His hair falls forward almost completely hiding his face.

  “Jean-Jacques here isn’t gay,” Tristan says, his tone a strange mixture of crisp over-emphasis and amusement.

  “Oh, sorry,” Jill says. “Sorry, I... I just assumed.”

  “Yeas,” Tristan says, sounding quite camp now. “Yeas, so did I. But no! So you see. Life still has fresh surprises to throw at us.”

  Jean-Jacques pushes his plate – which still contains half a pancake – away from him and stands. “So, I ‘ave to go,” he says. “Sorry. But many things today. Thank you for your hospitalité.”

  As he leaves, awkwardly, he knocks his chair over, stoops to pick it up, and then, combing his hair with his fingers, vanishes from view.

  “What on earth was all that about?” Jill asks once they hear the car driving away.

  “Don’t ask,” Tristan says. “Really. Don’t ask.”

  “No,” Jill whines. “Tell me.”

  Hannah shoots Tristan a warning glance,
then seeing that it’s a lost cause, turns to Luke.

  “Why don’t you go off and play for a bit?” she suggests. “You too, Aïsha.”

  Aïsha pulls a face. Luke mimics her expression and says, “Play? What at?”

  “The pool is full enough to swim in I think,” Hannah says.

  “Really? Is it?” Luke is already standing, already trying to remember where the diving mask is. He had forgotten there was a pool.

  “It’s over half-full,” Hannah tells him. “But don’t dive in yet. You don’t want to hit your head on the bottom.”

  “Help me blow up the air beds?” Luke asks Aïsha, and she forks a final mouthful of pancake, stands and feigning reluctance follows him.

  “So?” Jill prompts, once they have gone.

  Tristan pulls a face. “Oh God,” he says. “Well...”

  Cliff stands. “I’ll clear the breakfast things,” he says, gathering some cups together.

  “I can do it in a bit,” Hannah offers.

  “It’s fine,” Cliff tells her. “You three have a natter.” He always feels a little uncomfortable with these intimate conversations. He never quite seems to be able to strike the correct balance between showing polite interest and sounding as if he’s showing too much interest in something that he believes should ultimately remain private.

  “Is he really not gay?” Jill asks.

  Tristan laughs. “He drives a Twingo,” he says. “What do you think?”

  Aïsha, who has for some reason returned, asks, “Is a Twingo really gay or something?”

  Tristan laughs. “Let me see: a little car with rounded edges in two-tone turquoise-slash-purple no doubt selected personally by Victoria Beckham.”

  Aïsha shrugs. She looks confused. “OK... What about a Jeep then?” she asks.

  “A Jeep’s far, far worse,” Tristan replies. “Especially if it’s red.”

  “I thought you were helping Luke,” Hannah reminds her.

  “We can’t find the pump,” Aïsha says. “And I’m not blowing them up. It makes me dizzy.”

  “It’s in the car,” Cliff, who is still lingering, says. “Come. I’ll get it for you. It’s still in the boot.”

  “So yes, of course he’s gay,” Tristan says as they head-off. “But he can’t admit it yet. Not even in bed. Classic Catholic angst.”

  “He is quite young I suppose,” Hannah says.

  “Yes, how old is he anyway?” Jill asks.

  “Twenty three I think,” Tristan answers.

  “Yum,” Jill says. “Lucky you.”

  Hannah frowns at her sister. “Really?” she asks.

  “Uh-uh! They’re up all the time at that age. You only have to say the word sex and they’re ready for action.”

  “I’m afraid I can’t even imagine it,” Hannah says after a couple of seconds of trying to do just that. “As far as I’m concerned, if they’re young enough to be your offspring then they’re too young. That’s my theory anyway. No offence Tristan, it’s just me, I guess.”

  “No offence taken, you’re probably right as it happens,” he says. “Youth is much overrated.”

  “Really?” Jill sounds disappointed.

  “Totally frigid. Didn’t move a muscle.”

  “Not even... you know... that muscle?”

  Tristan laughs. “That,” he says, “Isn’t a muscle. But yes, that worked. It’s just that nothing else did. He got a hard on, but spent the whole time on his back like this.” Tristan links his hands behind his head to demonstrate. “Handy if you need an ironing board, but he really doesn’t win any prizes as the world’s greatest lover.”

  “Gosh,” Hannah says, thinking about how much she moves when she makes love with Cliff. She doesn’t fold her hands behind her head, but all the same... She would have to admit that she puts less effort into it these days than she once did. Perhaps she needs to watch that.

  “He told me he was straight too,” Tristan continues. “Once he had come he asked if I wanted him to leave, and I said, no, he could stay. And he said, ‘OK, but I’m not gay. Just so you know.’ Can you believe that?”

  “Lord,” Jill says. “What did you say?”

  “I just said, ‘Non, chéri, bien sûr.’” “Meaning?”

  “Meaning, ‘No dear. Of course you aren’t.’”

  “The pool guy’s back,” Cliff says, returning from the car and sliding back into his seat. Then visibly remembering that he had been in the process of clearing the table, he stands to continue where he left off.

  Jill sits up straight, suddenly alert. “He’s here? What, round there?” she asks, gesturing towards the other side of the house.

  “Yes. He’s putting chemicals in the pool. It looks quite complicated.”

  Hannah has to strain to look up at Cliff, now standing behind her with a pile of plates. “Chemicals?” she asks. ‘Chemicals’ sounds worrying.

  “Chlorine and stuff, I guess,” Cliff says. “To keep the water safe.”

  “Of course.”

  Jill stands and flicks back her hair.

  Hannah laughs. “Where are you going?” she asks. “You don’t even speak French.”

  “I do,” Tristan says, smiling and starting to stand as well.

  “I’m going for a swim,” Jill says. “I’m allowed, aren’t I? I just hope I can find my bikini, otherwise I may have to skinny-dip.”

  Tristan follows Jill inside the house and Cliff catches Hannah’s eye – a moment of complicity.

  They can hear Tristan and Jill arguing light-heartedly inside the house and then, less than a minute later, they burst from the interior in their swimming costumes, laughing and jostling for position like teenagers.

  “Stay back!” Jill is saying as she whacks at Tristan. “Stay back I tell you! You’ve had yours.” They sprint across the lawn and then vanish from view.

  “Do they make you feel terribly old?” Cliff asks.

  Hannah nods and snorts. “A bit,” she says. “You’d certainly never guess that she’s only two years younger, would you?” She pushes her chair back. “But I think I need to see this. Are you coming?”

  “No,” Cliff says. “No, I’ll clear this stuff away.”

  By the time Hannah has found her shoes and rounded the house, Jill is lounging along one edge of the filling pool and Tristan is using the foot-pump to inflate Luke’s air-bed, rather absurdly pulling in his perfectly toned stomach.

  “God, you’re pale Jill,” Hannah says. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so white.”

  “I know,” Jill says. “I stopped going to the tanning place. Pale-and-wan is the new brown-and-sexy or something.”

  “Well, be careful you don’t burn.”

  The pool guy, in the same dungarees as yesterday, is holding a test tube of pink liquid up against a colour chart and saying something in French.

  “He says it’s fine to swim in, but he’ll have to come back tomorrow to add more acid or something,” Tristan translates.

  “Très bien,” Jill says smoothly. She sits up and stretches so that her toe just touches the surface of the water. “It’s freezing,” she says. “I mean, like, arctic freezing. Can you ask him how long it takes to warm up?”

  Tristan translates Jill’s question to French and the man replies, pointing at a duct in the pool wall as he does so.

  “He says he can’t switch the heater thingy on until the water reaches that tube,” Tristan says. “But after that it will be ready in forty-eight hours.”

  “So it’s heated then. That’s good,” Hannah says.

  “Apparently so.”

  “Do you speak any English?” Jill asks the man, squashing herself back against the pool edge in order to enter his line of vision.

  “Ma copine veut savoir si vous parlez anglais,” Tristan translates when he shrugs.

  “Alors, pas de tout !” the man replies.

  “Sorry dear,” Tristan says smugly. “He says not one word. Sucks to be you, huh?”

  Jill licks her lips. “We�
�ll see,” she says.

  “Stop Tris, you’ll pop it,” Luke says, tapping Tristan’s leg with one hand to grab his attention.

  Tristan glances down to see that the air-bed is more than amply inflated. He crouches down to disconnect the pump and plug the filler valve. “There you go. Now yours Aï’ – bring it over.”

  The pool guy starts to collect his various tubes and boxes of kit together placing them in a bucket, and then straightens and takes the handle of this in one hand and the huge container of chlorine in the other.

  Hannah watches Jill surveilling his departure. She looks, Hannah thinks, like a lioness about to pounce.

  “Au revoir,” he says vaguely, to all of them. “À demain.”

  As he turns away, Jill sits upright, hesitant. And then, a decision taken, she jumps to her feet and runs across the grass to catch up with him. Joining him halfway across the lawn, she puts one hand next to his on the handle of the bucket and says, “Let me help you with that.”

  The guy pauses looking alarmed, as if perhaps he suspects that she’s trying to steal his bucket. But then he smiles, looks bashful, lowers his head, and continues to walk, linked now, to Jill, via the bucket.

  As they vanish from view behind the house, he starts to talk to her in French.

  Hannah stares wide-eyed at the mid-distance where they no-longer stand, then refocuses on Tristan and shakes her head.

  “Unbelievable,” Tristan, who has momentarily ceased foot-pumping says. He grins broadly. “Absolutely un-be-lie-va-ble.”

  Hannah nods. “My little sister, eh?” she says. “Never ceases to amaze, that one.”

  She turns to glance at Aïsha to see how she’s reacting to this, but she has her headphones on and is tapping her hand in time with the music. She seems totally oblivious.

  Hannah turns to leave. “Call me when the pool’s warm,” she says.

  Cliff takes Stieg Larsson to the hammock with him but immediately falls asleep, the novel spread across his chest.

  Hannah offers to help Tristan prepare lunch, and Tristan, ever the chef, tasks Hannah with salad washing duties whilst he fries potatoes and beats eggs for a Spanish tortilla.

  From behind the house, Hannah can hear the shrieks of Luke and Aïsha splashing around in the pool. A sound of summer – a sound of childhood momentarily restored. She smiles to herself, is pleased with herself, even, for having insisted on this destination. “Don’t you ever get fed up with cooking?” she asks Tristan after a moment’s silence.