Page 25 of The Custard Tart Cafe by the Sea
“I’m sure she’s in good hands with Leona,” I reassure an anxious-looking Kelly.
“You’re right. She does seem like a savvy lass. I just hope we don’t end up living separate holidays, that’s all. This was meant to be a group trip and already we’re fragmenting over plans.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t worry about that. Something tells me Radhika will be back with us before we know it.”
I pull my sunglasses down to scrutinise the flurry of dishy-from-a-distance male delivery drivers toing and froing from the back of the confectioners to fill their individual vans with boxes of sweet treats. So that’s what Leona was alluding to! Radhika must have missed them by seconds.
“Fancy a dip?” I ask Kelly.
“We’ll sink. We’ve barely digested breakfast!” Kelly is horrified at the idea.
“We’ve got the pool to ourselves now. Who knows when the early birds we briefly encountered at breakfast will be back from their excursion. We should make the most of feeling like we’re in our own private villa while we get the chance. Besides, if we drown, help’s not far away.” I tilt my head toward the confectioners with a knowing smile and Kelly’s eyebrows ascend to the heavens.
“Radhika’s a numpty,” she affirms. “And that’s coming from a happily married woman whose eyes don’t wander.”
Several hours later we are gathered around the wooden table on our joint balcony, listening to the soothing chorus of cicadas. We’re also swatting at mosquitoes that are refusing to wither in the face of Kelly’s homemade lemon insect repellent. I had to come up with every excuse in the book to avoid hiking through carob and cork tree countryside earlier this afternoon, thanks to Kelly’s insistence that my morning swim was not enough exercise to cancel out my gargantuan brekkie. Then mercifully Radhika returned to the fold and Kelly was finally outnumbered.
“All right. You’re off the hook for today and today only,” concedes Kelly. “Group meeting first thing tomorrow though. We need to cater for everyone’s tastes on this holiday. It’s only fair. Radhika, you’ve already gone off and done your own thing,” Radhika opens her mouth to discuss all the juicy titbits of her day, but Kelly is on a roll. “You can tell us all about it later. And not only that, Radhika, but we’ve already agreed to a night out with you on the Strip, which is a grand gesture on my part since my clubbing days are far behind me.” Radhika rolls her eyes at the drama and neediness in Kelly’s voice. “Willow: we’ve agreed to a day in Tavira so you can visit this custard tart place and tick that box.”
“Oh, don’t make it sound like a chore!” I protest. “There’s plenty of culture in Tavira too. It says so in your guidebook. You could head up to the medieval castle, go to one of the wide sandy beaches, take a boat trip, pop into the non-touristy shops and sample the delicious local products, take yourself off to the marshland for a spot of birdwatching—”
“Yawn!” Radhika pulls a real one after she says it, starting all of us off.
“Aw, I love that we’re so very different,” I say. “Yet when it comes to yawning, we have such empathy and can all subconsciously agree that it just has to be done en masse.”
“Yeah, all right. Can we get off the bloody subject now, please? I can’t stop doing the damn Y word,” Radhika replies. “Which is hardly surprising when we are marooned in boredom-ville in the middle of nowhere.”
“Is that so?” I challenge, disappearing inside to unplug my mobile phone from its charger, click on the photo gallery, and push it across to Radhika so she can see this morning’s excitement in close-up. Yeah, I know it was majorly uncouth of me to get snap-happy with those guys– and without their permission, too– but I couldn’t help it if they just happened to be in the background when I was taking my touristy holiday pics, could I?
“Right,” says Kelly. “My one requestis that we all go on a hike together. I don’t think that’s too much to ask. The terrain isn’t as hilly as you might think, and we’d be setting off before the extreme heat of the day. It will be an excellent way for all of us to blow away the cobwebs and move our arses.”
“Oh, I could be persuaded,” Radhika replies to Kelly’s statement without knowing it.
“Great. That’s settled, then. In principle we have three events booked to cater to our three diverse tastes: my hike tomorrow morning… in fact, I’ve already taken the liberty of booking it up at reception; they’ll provide us each with walking boots, sunhats, a delicious Portuguese packed lunch and bottles of water.”
“You what?” Radhika has only just twigged what she’s signed herself up for and does not look impressed.
“Keep up, hun. You just OK’d it, remember?” I giggle, although I’m Camp Radhika on this one myself, and really don’t want to expend that much energy.
“Willow’s Tavira trip Wednesday, and Radhika’s night out Thursday,” Kelly summarises.
“Friday will have way better hot male footfall in the bars and discos, Kelly.” Radhika sulks.
I know it sounds ridiculously presumptuous, but soon that consideration will be but a distant memory. I can already tell that Radhika will be enamoured with at least one of this morning’s hunky trio by the end of the week. Assuming they return to the quinta for rustic cake reinforcements, anyway.
“Erherm. You heard what Leona said on the first morning: don’t make snap judgements as to where and when the talent might appear,” I chip in. “Look at the opportunity that passed you by today, for example.”
“Whatever. Do I even have a choice?” Radhika bristles.
“Hooray! I’m glad we’ve got that sorted,” says Kelly, too entrenched in her own agenda to have a clue what Radhika and I are talking about. “Although evidently we’ll have our work cut out reaching group compromises in between our days out. Now we don’t need to have tomorrow’s meeting after all and we can sit back, relax and play a round of gin rummy… minus the gin and with a good old pot of the pu-erh tea I packed for such an occasion.”
“Yay. Riveting,” says Radhika as she gathers up the cards in the middle of the table to cut them and we settle down to the wholesome excitement of Monday night in a remote Portuguese farm house.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Radhika is ina sour mood at breakfast and she can’t even put it down to a hangover after last night’s tame game of cards and the rather astringent hot drink that accompanied it. Not even Leona’s hilarious anecdotes, about Radhika’s flier distribution technique and chat-up lines over the most sumptuous coffee cake I am sure any of us have ever tasted, can force a smile onto my friend’s face. I can’t help but wonder if there is more to these mood swings than meets the eye; if they aren’t simply a ‘quirk’ of her personality but down to something else altogether. They’ve certainly increased in frequency over the past year. Then I forget about my concern, as she immediately brightens up when she catches a glimpse of the delivery guys as we head back to our rooms to get ready for the delights of the hike. Maybe their presence at the quinta really could be a daily occurrence…
“Can you think of a plausible reason for me to accost them?” She knocks on Kelly’s and my door, out of breath in her rush to coat herself in a bottle of Impulse body spray that made the flight to Portugal. “Ah, well, forget it.” She takes in our clueless faces. “I’m sure I’ll pull something out of the bag,” she shouts behind her as she scurries off.
