The Survivors(22)

‘No,’ Ash said quickly, shaking his head. ‘I’m not saying that. I mean, I think Liam’s a bit of an arsehole, that’s not news. But let’s be real. We were all around when the storm hit, we all know the bloody background playing out here. So yeah, Sean’s probably entitled to ask for a favour and yeah, maybe he deserves to get it.’

They rounded the corner and, up ahead, Kieran could see the first glimpse of Fisherman’s Cottage. Two police cars were parked on the road outside.

‘But whatever happened back then is done,’ Ash said. ‘That’s not going to change. So don’t let it tangle you up in something you’re not happy with now.’ A tiny pause. ‘Either of you, eh?’

Kieran couldn’t help it. He shot a sideways glance at Olivia. She didn’t react, but then she always had been better at controlling herself than he had.

It had been a very long morning. He could think of fifty good reasons off the top of his head for the tension across Olivia’s shoulders and neck. He didn’t know her well enough now to be able to tell what she was thinking. But that hadn’t always been the case. And Kieran suddenly found himself wondering, for the first time in years, how much his good friend Ash actually knew about that day of the storm.

It had been a big summer. With their final year exams done and dusted, Kieran and Sean had launched themselves headfirst into the booze-soaked celebrations. Good weather had brought a lot of tourists through that year, including plenty of bored teenage girls who could think of a few places they’d rather be than on holiday in Tasmania with their parents. Kieran considered it his personal civic duty to show these girls a good time, and whenever the beach or caravan park or someone’s rented house came alive with music playing and beer flowing, Kieran was generally there, watching the sun both set and rise through bleary eyes.

Ash had been right there beside him, of course, despite having already called it quits at school. When the students at Evelyn Bay’s secondary school finished Year 10, the state’s education system meant anyone who wanted to complete high school had to dig out their bus pass and spend their final two years travelling to and from the nearest college.

Ash, who had coasted effortlessly in the top third of class for his first ten academic years, had gone to visit his dad and returned with the view that trailing ninety minutes each way on a school bus was for bloody idiots with nothing better to do. He couldn’t be talked around and, with that, Ash’s formal education had come to an end.

It was great, though, Ash had used to say – a lot – over those next two years. He’d showed up on the first morning to wave Kieran and Sean off on the bus with a grin. Then he’d turned around and got a job at the plant nursery, worked out pretty quickly that he was pretty good at it, and started finding his own gardening work. He had money coming in. Not loads, but more than Kieran and Sean. The best bit, though, Ash reckoned, was the freedom. Being able to spend his days however he chose. Maybe so, Kieran had thought, but it still seemed that most days what Ash chose to do was hang around the bus stop in the evenings, waiting for his friends to come home from school.

For Kieran, the summer of the storm had felt almost like a reunion, with the classroom finally behind them. They’d all been working. Ash had cooked up some idea to launch his own landscaping business and was flat out turning his grandmother’s garden into a showpiece. Kieran and Sean had worked for their older brothers, same as every year. Finn and Toby didn’t muck around when it came to the diving business and it was hard work – ‘Minimum wage for maximum shit,’ Kieran had used to complain to Verity, but he hadn’t really meant it.

Olivia had been there too. Down at the beach in her bathers. Getting a beer from the fridge at a Friday night house party, looking as relieved as anyone to have put the tedious bus rides to college behind her. She’d been around a lot, but not with them. Because while Kieran and Ash had a strong preference for the holiday-happy girls who stayed at sea view cabins or the caravan park before disappearing back to the mainland two weeks later, Olivia and her friends had a strong preference for guys who were nothing like Kieran and Ash.

She had time for Sean, though.

Kieran would sometimes glance up from whatever sagging couch he’d landed on, trying to remember the name of the girl he was talking to, and across the party he’d see Olivia and Sean leaning against the kitchen counter, chatting quietly about something Kieran could only guess at. Kieran would look over at Ash, who would also be watching and shaking his head with the same baffled look.

‘I don’t get it,’ Ash had said, more than once. ‘Is she just really into his whole shy virgin thing, or what?’

Kieran had grinned into his drink. ‘I dunno, mate.’

‘I mean, look at him. And then look at her.’

‘Yeah. I’m looking.’

‘Then explain to me what’s going on.’

Kieran laughed. ‘I can’t.’

That wasn’t true, though. When Kieran thought about it, which he found himself doing surprisingly often, the answer was pretty obvious. Olivia and Sean were friends. They had taken a couple of the same classes during the final school year, and had been paired together on a joint project. This had once involved Sean spending a whole afternoon working from Olivia’s bedroom – about which he was infuriatingly light on detail, despite an extended grilling from Ash.