Tall, Dark & Distant (4 page)

‘I’m wearing the dress. Put my clothes in a bag,’ Georgia called, as she threw her clothes and a pile of cash at the sales girl.

The girl looked startled as Georgia fled from the shop – her feet bare, tags flying from the back of her dress. Ella limped along behind, her sandals flapping around her feet.

‘There,’ Georgia said as the guy with green eyes went into a shop further down the street.

They scampered along Hastings Street, trying to be discreet.They hovered close, but not too close, to the shop where Hot Running Guy had disappeared.

‘He’s pretty hot,’ Ella said. ‘No wonder you’re obsessed.’

‘I’m not obsessed,’ Georgia protested weakly. She didn’t like to hear the word out loud, but she couldn’t argue with the facts. Georgia had exchanged two brief glances and a few words with this guy and now she was stalking him through Noosa’s main thoroughfare. It wasn’t exactly sensible behaviour.

‘You have to say hello,’ Ella said, doing up her sandals and regaining her composure. ‘Go into the shop and talk to him. I’ll go back and get your clothes.’

‘I can’t,’ Georgia whined. She just couldn’t see any possible way to meet those green eyes head-on and speak coherently. She couldn’t trust herself.

‘Well, what are we doing here?’ Ella asked. ‘If you’re not going to say hello, there’s no point staying.’

‘Let’s follow him for a minute, see where he’s going,’ Georgia said. Perhaps if she just watched him for a moment she’d find out what she was dealing with.
It wasn’t really stalking
, she reasoned.

It was … research.

‘Okay,’ Ella agreed. ‘Look, that’s him now.’

He left the shop with a bag in his hand, and then crossed the street. They followed at a distance. He bought a travel magazine, then an ice-cream with two scoops. He walked off without taking his change. Then he sat down on a bench to read his magazine while he was eating the ice-cream. They watched from behind a parked car. When he was finished, he dumped the ice-cream napkin in a bin and disappeared into an arcade.

‘Quick, we’re going to lose him,’ Georgia said.

But Ella was sick of the detective work. She’d drifted over to a sale rack in the doorway of a shop and was holding a pair of skinny jeans in one hand and a bootcut pair in the other. Georgia tossed the jeans back on the rack and dragged Ella across Hastings Street into the arcade. She looked everywhere for Hot Running Guy, but he was nowhere in sight.

‘Come on, he must be through here,’ Georgia called. This time she dragged Ella through the arcade and onto the beach.

The sand was packed with summer tourists. But there was no sign of him.

‘He must have gone back onto Hastings Street,’ Georgia said.

‘We would’ve seen him!’ Ella protested, but she followed. They went back to the street. Then they went back to the beach.

‘We’ve lost him,’ Ella concluded, when it was completely obvious even to Georgia that
this was the case
. ‘You should have talked to him while he was sitting down eating his ice-cream. That was perfect.’

It
would
have been perfect, Georgia agreed. But it was also irrelevant. That moment had passed. ‘He
must
be on the beach,’ she replied desperately.

Georgia trudged back through the arcade, but she knew it was hopeless. He was gone. She wanted to blame Ella. If she’d only been focused on
him,
and not the jeans, things might be different. Deep down, though, Georgia knew it had nothing to do with jeans. This was all about her lack of confidence.

Ella dawdled behind Georgia. She stopped to read a restaurant menu. Georgia could hardly blame her. Lunch was beginning to seem like a much more enticing prospect than attempting to track down a random guy with green eyes, even if he was hot.

Georgia gave up and headed over to Ella, her eyes downcast. A pair of leather deck shoes came into sight, and she slowly raised her head to see who they belonged to. Her eyes took in the athletic legs and the striped shorts. Her heart beat faster. She saw the pale blue shirt, open at the neck, displaying a hint of tanned, muscular chest. By the time she got to his face, and those green, green eyes, Georgia was starting to feel dizzy.

‘Looking for someone?’ the guy said with a slight grin.

Georgia stood facing the object of her obsession, aware of what had just taken place. While she and Ella had scurried up and down Hastings Street like a pair of novice spies, he had known exactly what they were up to. While they watched him, he was watching them. Georgia felt absurd. She struggled to think of some way to explain her stalking. Ella would’ve had an instantly believable story at her disposal. But Georgia had no idea.

‘I’m Nik Ledbury,’ the guy said, breaking the awkward silence.

‘We met on the track a few days ago? You might not remember me.’ With his well-chosen words, the guy with green eyes had turned the situation on its head. For this drop-dead gorgeous guy to pretend that
she
might not remember
him
was modesty in the extreme. Georgia was falling in love. And all she knew about him was his name.

‘Hi. Yeah, I remember. I’m Georgia.’

A flicker of something odd flashed across his face as she said
Georgia
.

Georgia hesitated. She wondered if instead of saying her name, she’d just told him she was Osama bin Laden. It wasn’t out of the question. She felt like anything was possible in her current situation. Only she could make such a mess of saying her own name. Things were starting to fall apart already and they had only just begun. Then Ella wandered over and Georgia offered a silent prayer of thanks, knowing she was saved.

‘This is my friend, Ella,’ Georgia said.

‘Great to meet you,’ Ella said to Nik, perfectly normally, as though they hadn’t been stalking him for forty-five minutes. ‘Are you here on holidays?’

Nik nodded. ‘Yes. Just arrived.’

Ella glanced sideways at Georgia, and Georgia knew she was willing her to continue the conversation. Ella had done her bit to get things moving. Now it was Georgia’s turn.

She took a breath. ‘Are you from England?’ she asked, hoping that she had correctly interpreted his polished accent. His tan looked anything but English, but his vowels were unmistakable.

‘Sort of,’ Nik replied. ‘But I’m not rushing back there.’

Ella shot Georgia a look of encouragement that was so blatant she could have danced down the street naked and Georgia would’ve been less embarrassed. But then Ella made up for it, moving things on in a way that would’ve taken Georgia ten years.

‘We’re having a barbeque this afternoon,’ Ella said, ‘if you want to come.’

Nik bit his lip. He looked at Ella and then at Georgia. There was a three second silence as Nik weighed up the invitation; it felt like three hours to Georgia. ‘I’m … pretty busy this afternoon.’

Georgia looked at Nik’s magazine, the shopping bag. He didn’t look like a busy guy, but even she could spot a polite rejection when she saw one. She lowered her eyes, trying to cover up her disappointment.

‘I’m pretty busy, but I’m sure I can come by,’ finished Nik. ‘Why not?’

Georgia’s eyes flicked up with the unexpected response. She controlled an urge to jump up and down, but she couldn’t stop a smile spreading across her face. She waited patiently as Ella went into great detail about how to get to her house, which roads to take and which ones to avoid. Georgia tried to keep her eyes on Ella, but they kept drifting back to Nik. His eyes transfixed her.

She felt herself drifting out of Hastings Street, floating in a clear lagoon, with no-one around except for her and Nik …

‘See you later,’ Nik said, waking Georgia from her daydream.‘Nice dress, by the way. It really suits you.’ He smiled playfully.

Georgia looked down at her attire. She was dressed for a nightclub, not the beach.

‘Oh, thanks,’ Georgia mumbled. ‘I had something on this morning … you know … I don’t always get, you know, dressed … to go to the beach. Well, I always get
dressed
. But you know …’

‘See you, Nik,’ Ella interrupted, before the story got any worse.

Nik smiled at Ella, and then turned his eyes to Georgia. Was there another flash of weirdness, before he turned his eyes to Hastings Street? Georgia couldn’t say for sure, but there was something. What was it that was making him so nervous? It surely wasn’t her – guys like Nik didn’t get nervous around girls like her. She hoped she hadn’t messed everything up with her awkwardness.

There was no point speculating about it, anyway. Right now she had a bag of clothes to collect. She also had some intensive speech therapy to undertake before the barbeque this afternoon.

Georgia’s heart nearly jumped out of her chest when the buzzer rang at Ella’s place. No-one used the buzzer normally. Every-one just arrived and walked straight through the house to the back terrace or the pool. The sound of the buzzer signalled the arrival of a new visitor to the Simms’ house.

‘I’ll get it, Mum,’ Ella shouted, sauntering to the door. She turned to Georgia. ‘You wait there and look good.’

Georgia stood in the kitchen, trying to look casual but not sloppy. She had spent the afternoon at the Simms’ holiday house under Ella and Mei’s tutelage. Her friends had advised her on how to wear her hair, how to put on a subtle amount of make-up and, importantly, how to hold a conversation without looking like she was meeting a guy for the first time in her life.

All the while, Georgia’s sister sniped from the sidelines. Alice was of the opinion that no amount of make-up or hairstyling would change the fact that Georgia was a nerd. Georgia’s luck with guys had been, and always would be, zero.

‘You’re wasting your time – he probably won’t even turn up,’ Alice announced as Mei straightened Georgia’s hair.

Georgia had done her best to ignore her sister, but she couldn’t quite dismiss the idea that Alice might be right about Nik – until she actually heard him at the front door.

‘Nice to see you, Nik,’ Ella gushed from the hallway. ‘No problems finding the place, then?’

Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out,
Georgia told herself.
Casual, not sloppy. Maintain eye contact, don’t stare. Get him talking, don’t babble.
She repeated the instructions like a mantra as Nik and Ella walked towards the kitchen. Georgia was just about to put her training to the test, when Ella’s mum floated past her to greet the new guest.

‘You must be Nik,’ Ella’s mum said. ‘Ella tells me you’ve just arrived in Australia? You look rather tanned to be fresh off a plane from the English winter. Anyway, welcome to Noosa.’

‘Thank you,’ Nik replied. ‘This is for you.’ He held out a bottle of champagne. It was clear from the startled smile on Ella’s mother’s face that it was an expensive one.

‘Dom Pérignon. Oh, how lovely.’

Nik turned to Georgia. He gently placed his hand on her left shoulder, leant towards her and kissed her on each cheek – European-style. She almost fainted on the spot. The butterflies that she had managed to keep under control all afternoon went into overdrive. Her face went red and her throat went dry.

‘Hey, Nik,’ Georgia managed to say. She was worried her mouth was gaping.

‘Georgia, why don’t you introduce Nik to everyone?’ Ella intervened. ‘I’ll sort out some drinks.’

Georgia did as she was told – glad to have something to do, instead of standing around like a lovesick puppy. But she had hardly taken a step when Alice stalked over. Mei was supposed to be keeping Alice as far away from Nik as possible, for as long as possible. Georgia could tell by the evil smile on her sister’s face that this wasn’t going to end well.

‘You must be Georgia’s new boyfriend,’ Alice purred, without waiting for an introduction. ‘Georgia’s never had a boyfriend before. You’re the first. Isn’t that nice for you?’

Georgia looked into the sky, hoping for a spaceship to land and a three-headed alien to abduct her. A lifetime of servitude to the King of Planet Zorg would’ve been better than this.

‘Hello. You are …?’ Nik replied, ignoring the comments.

‘Alice,’ she replied with a simpering smile. ‘I’m Georgia’s sister.’

Yes, this is my sister, Princess Malice. She had three boyfriends this year. The first lasted seven weeks, the second, six days, and the third just four hours, because she really is that unpleasant.

That was what Georgia wanted to say, but she didn’t. It wasn’t wise to engage Alice on the topic of boyfriends. Anyway, Alice was right about the tally so far. Unless Georgia counted Zane Wardour, who gave her a coloured pen in grade three, she was really struggling to come up with any names at all. Even Georgia’s date for the school formal had been the borrowed son of her mother’s friend.

But that didn’t mean Alice had to announce it to the world, or more importantly to the most perfect potential-boyfriend Georgia had ever met. She took the moral high ground and ignored her sister. She also indulged in a momentary fantasy involving writing Alice’s name on her lizard-poo-stained knickers and hanging them on the front gate for all to see.

‘How about a swim?’ Georgia said to Nik, turning her back on her sister.