Pandora & The Music Box

Finale

I looked up. It was the young Welshman Archie, with his cherubic son.

They picked up the striped towels that had been draped over the sunbed next to mine. I felt a familiar stab of panic at having to make small-talk. If I had known who those towels belonged to, I probably wouldn't have parked myself beside them. The pool was large with concealed areas, and bridges and islands covered with palm trees. I hadn't noticed Archie and his son when I'd been bobbing around with Asha.

We'd run into each other around the hotel since that first day, in the restaurant or the lavish marble reception area, but while Archie had grinned and looked as if he might attempt conversation, I'd smiled vaguely, ducked my head and continued on route to wherever I'd been going.

'It's a furnace today,' he said now, nodding towards the sky. 'More than usual. I think that's why it's slightly quieter out here. People are hanging around the bars indoors. All the heat's coming from the Sahara. There's a weather warning out.'

'Is there? Oh.' I racked my brains for something sensible to say. 'I suppose it beats flood warnings, like back home.'

'I guess it does. Zach and I were flooded out last winter. Stream near our cottage turned into a river.'

'Really? Nightmare. I'm sorry. We're high up where we live. Get a battering from the wind, and snow can be bad, of course. Drew and Iris – my brother-in-law and my sister – have a four-by-four. Makes it easier to get around.'

And that was it. We were making conversation, as simply as that. It didn't seem to matter for once that I had verbal diarrhoea.

'I'm Pandora, by the way,' I said, oddly unabashed.

'Great name.' Archie smiled, without mockery.

'Most people call me Dor. And this is Asha Mae.' I stroked the baby's damp, silky curls. 'My daughter.'

He hesitated for the first time, the wide smile faltering. 'Oh... I didn't realise... I thought she belonged to that lady you're here with. You're really alike. She's your sister, right?'

'Iris.' I nodded.

I didn't care what anyone thought anymore, how they reacted to me as a teenage mum. I'd made my decision to keep my baby, and Iris had backed me up, although after her miscarriage I'd known it was breaking her heart to see my belly swell day by day. When Asha Mae arrived, after a difficult last few weeks of pregnancy, my fragile state of mind meant I hadn't bonded instantly. Iris had taken over, perhaps a bit too much, but I'd been lost in a dull, blanketing fog, and it was only as I emerged from it that I started to resent her closeness to the tiny creature who'd invaded our lives.

'Asha's dad isn't around,' I felt compelled to add. 'It's complicated... but anyway, he didn't want to know. He went to uni in Edinburgh.'

Archie perched on his sunbed, as the gorgeous Zach took Asha's hand delicately in his and introduced himself before running off to splash around in the shallow, sloped area of the pool beside us.

'I know all about "complicated",' Archie admitted to me, his voice low. 'Zach's mother and I were in the lower sixth when she got pregnant. I persuaded her to keep the baby, we even tried to make a go of it, but...' He shrugged. 'She was more wild-at-heart than maternal. We couldn't hold it together. She's backpacking around Australia at the moment. I get emails, but we're not together. Not like that. We were never right for each other,' he tailed off.

'I'm thinking of resitting my exams,' I said, as naturally as if I were talking to a long-standing confidant. 'Maybe going to college. I enjoy creative writing. Iris says she'll help with Asha, but I'm hoping she and Drew will have a baby of their own soon, too.'

Archie nodded. 'I work on a farm. That's how I've got a cottage.' Unassumingly, he flicked back a lock of his white-blond hair. 'I'm trying to do a photography course, though. Apparently I've got a good 'eye'. My parents want to help out more, financially, but I'm too stubborn to let them. I guess I'm proud. This holiday's been my only concession. My mum said I'd been working too hard. But you know, she was right. It's great to have all this free time with Zach.'

We sat there, blinking at each other, taking it all in.

'Sorry. I don't usually talk this much,' Archie apologised. 'Not to someone I've barely just met.'

'Neither do I. There's no need to be sorry, though. Is there?'

Suddenly, as if I were ten years younger, I wanted to believe in Disney-style fairy tales. The possibility of happy endings. Or even, a happy beginning. I'd never really known one of those, if I was honest. And I was only seventeen, when it came down to it. A happy beginning under the swaying palm trees would suffice. My once upon a time, one summer.

'Have you ever ridden on a camel?' asked Archie. The grin was back. Daring me.

'No.'

'Do you fancy it one day?'

'Maybe,' I said. 'Right now, though, I'd rather have an ice cream. Wouldn't you?'

Archie flashed his wristband. 'I'll get these. Stick with me, kid, I'm nothing if not generous.' The grin expanded. Teasing. Infectious. 'Name your flavour. If you're lucky, I might even throw in a lemonade.'

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