Page 36 of Strictly Friends
‘It really didn’t go well!’ Ruby snorted with laughter. ‘Between the booze and my braces, the whole thing was a mess. It wassucha bad kiss, wasn’t it, Griff?’
‘It was indeed a bad kiss,’ he acknowledged solemnly.
‘And that’s when we knew that we’d make great mates, but we could never be lovers!’
‘You must be pretty close, though, if he’s crossing oceans for you – so what’s the deal?’ Mac persisted. ‘Is he, what, like a brother to you?’
‘Well...’ Ruby hesitated, finding it a struggle, as always, to define her relationship with her oldest friend. Although ‘best friend’ was the term she used most often, that didn’t really cover it. Griffin had been an integral part of her life for as long as she cared to remember; they had laughed together and cried together, shared key moments in their lives and knew secrets about each other they would carry to their graves. Trying to label their relationship into something other people would understand or feel comfortable with had always been difficult, but from the way Mac was looking at her, Ruby intuitively knew what he was really asking.
Griffin yawned and rose to his feet, brushing the sand off his shorts. ‘The brother you’ve never had is going to leave you to it. Good to meet you, Mac, and I’m sure I’ll see you again soon. Rubes, I’m going to find Jake and get him to show me around before I end up falling asleep. Looks like there’s a whole magic island waiting for me to explore.’
Slinging his guitar over his shoulder, Griffin slipped on his sunglasses and resettled his baseball cap, tipping Mac a nod of farewell before striding out of the clearing.
25
‘Mum!You’ll never guess what happened today!’
Jake glanced over at Griffin, who was seated next to him at the dining table, clearly itching for the go-ahead to spill the beans. Earlier that afternoon, busy exchanging emails with Nick and researching information for the Paradise Inn website, Ruby had paid little attention when Griffin and Jake had headed out to ‘explore’. But since returning shortly before dinner, Jake had been unusually fidgety, and once Narita had taken their food orders, he could no longer restrain himself.
‘Go ahead, buddy, tell her. She’s going to love this,’ said Griffin.
‘Am I?’ Ruby laughed. ‘What have you two been up to?’
‘I made a new friend. His name’s Drew, and he’s ten.’
‘Oh, okay.’ Expecting a rather more dramatic announcement, Ruby was slightly taken aback. ‘What’s he like, then?’
‘He doesn’t speak,’ Jake pronounced, reaching for one of the freshly baked bread rolls Narita had placed on their table. ‘He’s an orphan and he’s always running away.’
Confused, Ruby turned to Griffin for clarification.
‘I think I’d better tell her, buddy, what do you say?’ Griffin’s broad smile was a world away from his earlier grumpiness, and when Jake nodded, Griffin picked up the story.
‘Jake and I went exploring further inland from the clearing where Mac does his painting. So, we’d stopped for a bit of a rest and I’m playing Jake a couple of tracks on my guitar when this kid suddenly appears out of nowhere. He doesn’t look lost or anything, but he just comes to sit on the grass next to Jake without saying a word.’
‘That’s cos he can’t speak,’ Jake interjected.
Griffin hesitated. ‘Well, hecan, Jake, he just chooses not to. Anyway, we kept asking him questions, trying to find out his name and where he lived, but all he did was shrug and shake his head.’
Ruby’s eyes widened. ‘So, what did you do?’
‘Nothing – for a while. As I said, he didn’t look like he was lost or in any distress. The opposite, if anything. He was smiling and seemed happy enough, so I assumed he lived nearby and just carried on playing the guitar.’
‘Uncle Griffin gave him his hat so he didn’t catch sunstroke,’ Jake threw in helpfully.
‘Hey, I thoughtIwas telling the story,’ Griffin laughed. ‘Anyway, after a bit, I suggested we take him home before his family got worried. So then the kid stands up, grabs my hand, and pulls me along with him. To cut a long story short, we ended up at this mansion, which, as it turns out, is—’
‘Ocean House,’ Ruby interrupted, her mind racing to join the dots.
Griffin looked at her in surprise. ‘Do you know about the orphanage?’
‘Mac mentioned it the other day. But go on, what happened next?’
‘Well, the man who answered the door told us that the kid – Drew – has been with them for a couple of weeks and he’s already run off three times. They had just realised he was missing again and were about to start a search when we showed up.’
Ruby’s face clouded over. ‘The poor child! Did they tell you why he was placed in the orphanage?’
‘His house caught on fire and his grandpa died,’ Jake pronounced. ‘But Drew escaped, so he wasn’t hurt.’
