Page 38 of Ride the Wave

‘So you’ve been lying to me.’

‘I never said that I was ending the interview formally. I said it wasn’t working me asking you questions like that, and that we had to do things differently.’ I give him a stern look. ‘Do you want me to delete it? I will if you like, but do you honestly regret anything you’ve told me this evening?’

He opens his mouth to protest. Then, he closes it.

‘You see?’ I say smugly, sliding the phone into my bag. ‘I really enjoyed our conversation and I think you did too. That was all this needs to be, Leo. I had to get you to relax into it, and you did.’

He doesn’t say anything.

‘There were some really lovely quotes in there. It was exactly what I was after; all those moving things you were saying about the first time you got up on a board, it’s really—’

‘I won’t talk about what happened in Australia,’ he says in a low, serious voice, completely different to the way he was talking to me before.

The walls are back up. He’s a different person.

‘Leo, that’s not what I—’

‘You won’t trick that out of me,’ he growls, his expression hardened. ‘You can try to play me about other stuff – my hopes and dreams when I was a kid, my life here now – but don’t pretend as though you would go ahead and delete the recording if I’d just spilled my sad little story to you about why my career finished. Don’t pretend to be the good guy.’

I stare at him, stunned. ‘Leo—’

‘This interview is over,’ he says abruptly, getting to his feet. ‘You got what you came for.’

‘Can we—’

‘Will you be okay getting home?’ he cuts in.

If it wasn’t for the hate radiating off him right now, I’d have appreciated how nice it is for him to ask.

I sigh, defeated. ‘Yeah. It’s about two minutes from here.’

With a sharp nod, he bends down to pick up his shoes and walks away off the beach. I turn to watch him go as he strides forwards furiously.

I glumly get to my feet, attempting to wipe some of the sand off my leggings.

Tonight was, technically, a huge success.

But it doesn’t feel that way.

11

As I make my way to the bar for Marina’s girlfriend’s birthday party on Saturday, I feel nervous. I haven’t spoken to Leo since Thursday night at the beach – or rather, he hasn’t spoken to me. My messages have gone unanswered and I had to resist the urge to rock up at the surf shop. I appreciate that it maybe didn’t look so good, me giving the impression that the interview was over when it wasn’t. When I think about it, maybe it was a little underhanded. I realise that I may have played into his belief that all journalists are tricksters out for a good headline, no matter the ethical cost. I wanted to give him some time to calm down and I thought that Marina’s party is the perfect place to approach him in a relaxed, non-professional setting. We need this to re-group.

I could also do with a day off.

Mum called when I was getting ready for the party.

‘I spoke to an estate agent yesterday,’ she informed me. ‘About the house.’

I’d paused midway through applying my lip liner. ‘Ourhouse?’

She cleared her throat. ‘Yes, the family house. Which isn’t really a family house anymore. Your father and I have both agreed that we should sell it.’

I don’t know why this news hits me so hard, but it does. I should have been expecting this. Did I really think Mum would go on living there forever? Surrounded by all those memories? It is a big house for one person. It makes sense to sell it. Of course it does.

But I felt winded. I even had to sit down on the edge of the bed.

‘Iris, are you still there?’ Mum asked nervously.

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