The Secret Path by Karen Swan (summer beach reads TXT) 📕

scanned the room with a fresh gaze. A loosely woven rattan lampshade dangled from the centre point of the apex roof; a long-forgotten beer can nestled in the crux of the rafters, where the roof met the walls. The space was small but felt spacious on account of there being no furniture apart from the 1970s cane bed, which had peacock-tail head and footboards and was dressed with faded turquoise cotton sheets that were years old and as soft as hankies. Clothes had to be hung from the hooks nailed along the walls and, if you wanted to sit, you just sat on the bed. Some old wooden Coke boxes had been set on their sides and stacked three high to form a type of console, which was at least useful as somewhere to set down a book, or glass or phone; and on the wall, as a solitary nod towards decoration, there was a brightly painted 1950s kitsch oil of a pneumatic woman in an off-the-shoulder red dress.

Tara had been sleeping in this room since she was nine years old and that painting had been hanging there even then. To her pre-pubescent self, the woman’s glamour and obvious sex appeal had been enthralling. She would stare at her for hours wondering, wishing, hoping that she too would one day look like that: seductive, enigmatic, alluring, dangerous. But standing here now, the only thought in her mind was trying to work out exactly when (and why) she had gone from desperately wanting to look like that woman, to desperately not. And how sad that was, because it illustrated as a fine point that every last vestige and wish of the person – child – she had once been, had vanished. No trace remained.

‘Don’t worry, it’ll grow on you,’ she said, patting his stomach as she passed him into the bathroom. She kicked the door to.

‘Is there even hot running water?’ he called through.

She hesitated as she sat on the loo. ‘. . . There’s running water,’ she conceded. ‘But don’t worry, everything’s hot around you instead.’

She flushed, washed her hands, began brushing her teeth.

Rory walked through a few moments later, stripped down to his boxers. He stopped at the sight of the tiny space. ‘Please tell me there’s a shower?’

‘Of course . . . Outside.’

His shoulders slumped. It was half one in the morning.

‘Relax. Shower in the morning. We just need to sleep.’

Rory began splashing cold water over his face. He looked at his reflection in the light of the exposed bulb. Bags pouched beneath his eyes; the light flattered neither of them. ‘Jesus.’

Tara stripped off as she walked back into the bedroom, collapsing into the bed naked.

Rory pulled the mosquito net closed around them and slid down the sheets beside her. She lay still as he fussed with the pillows, punching them into fluffiness and turning them over. They were finally here, back in the land she loved, on the holiday she had been dreaming of – the one that was going to be filled with lots of sun, sand, sea and sex. But not just yet. Right now, all she wanted was sleep.

‘How’s your headache?’ he asked, his voice already growing thick with incipient unconsciousness as he allowed his limbs to become heavy.

‘Still there.’

‘Need a Nurofen?’

She was quiet for a moment as her thoughts caught up with her again. ‘No, I think I’ll be fine. I can sleep through it.’

But she didn’t close her eyes, too scared of what she might see behind her eyelids. She watched the ceiling fan whirr and spin. He watched her from one open eye.

‘Hols mentioned you had a patient die?’ he asked after a moment.

Her hair rustled on the pillow as she turned to face him. ‘Did she?’

‘Asked if you were all right. I had to tell her I didn’t know anything about it.’

‘No, I . . .’ She gave a tiny shrug as it settled on her again, the memory like a rock on her chest. ‘There wasn’t much time; we had the awards thing straight after.’

‘Right.’

‘Yes.’

‘We could have cancelled.’

‘Hardly. Not when I was a recipient.’

She felt his hand find hers under the sheet and squeeze it. ‘Well, I guess that explains the raid on the Medoc.’

She fell still. ‘Her name was Lucy. She was four.’

She heard his breathing halt . . . then resume again. ‘Shit, that’s hard. What happened?’

She squeezed her eyes shut, not even wanting to say the words. ‘She’d been beaten up by her parents, was admitted just before seven. I did a routine splenectomy. It all went fine. Then in the afternoon, she crashed. I opened her up again . . .’ Here her voice snagged.

He was watching her now, in the dark, sensing calamity.

‘A blade from one of the scalpels from the earlier surgery had . . . slipped out. It embedded in her large intestinal tract.’

He could guess the rest of this story.

‘There were multiple incisions. We couldn’t close them up in time. She bled out on the table. Four sixteen p.m.’

‘Ta . . .’ But there was nothing he could say to make it better.

‘There’s going to be an investigation,’ she said after a pause.

He hesitated. ‘Well, that’s routine, I guess. But nothing for you to worry about.’

‘How can you say that? I should have checked the sharps count. I should have double-checked.’ She blinked back at him in the darkness.

‘Ta, stop right there.’ His voice was suddenly firm. Calming. ‘This is not your fault, you hear me? You did everything you could. But sometimes, even in spite of your best efforts, you’re going to lose a few.’

‘But she was four. She was saveable. I had saved her! And then I—’

‘Ta, if a blade fell from the scalpel, then the equipment was faulty.’ His voice was steady. Logical.

She blinked back at him, feeling a rush of self-hatred. ‘Or the surgeon was in a rush and tired and thinking about what dress she was going to wear that night. I should have double-checked, Ror.’

‘No. I won’t let you talk like that. You have to accept that you cannot save everyone. It’s just not possible and you’ll go mad