Free Behind Closed Doors by Elizabeth Haynes Page B

sat up and turned to look at her sister.
    The breathing was regular, deep, the merest hint of a snore catching at the edges of it.
    ‘Juliette?’ she whispered.
    No response, the breathing the same.
    Right, then.
 
    She stood up slowly, making sure the mattress didn’t creak beneath her, crept across the room to the bathroom, and shut the door carefully behind her. She had put some clothes into a fabric bag on the hook of the bathroom door, a cover story ready-prepared about it being full of laundry if Juliette asked – which she hadn’t. She got dressed in the dark, put her nightshirt into the bag and opened the door with infinite care. From the bed, she could hear Juliette’s breathing, unchanged.
    The most dangerous part of the enterprise: opening the sliding patio door, and closing it behind her. She had no idea if her parents would still be up – they might be sitting on the patio next door, drinking beer or wine or whatever. The door always made a noise as it opened. If she was caught, she would say she wanted to go for a walk, didn’t want to disturb her sister – that it was too hot in the room, and she didn’t want to just open the door because if she’d gone back to bed she might have fallen asleep with the door open and they might have been burgled or robbed or murdered in their beds.
    Nobody was there. The patio was empty. The bedroom next door was in darkness, the door closed, the air-conditioning unit on the roof humming.
    Out here, the noise of the cicadas and the crickets buzzing and drilling was almost deafening. Sandals in hand, she skipped through the shadows to the gate which led to the road and the shops and the market square beyond. When she got out of earshot, she pulled her sandals on and skittered down the road, tugging her skirt a little lower.
    It was so busy! She hadn’t expected that. So many people, so many drunk people – and the bars all noisy with a constant thud-thud of the Euro-pop beat that was everywhere. People staggering around her, seemingly oblivious – and pushing into her, knocking her off balance. Blokes shouting and swearing at each other, beer bottles being dropped, swung around, girls with their arms around each other for support or sitting in the gutter. One girl puking, on her side, on the ground, and then a distant wail of some kind of emergency vehicle heading towards them.
    The darkness was disorientating. It was like a negative image of the town in the daytime, the tourist shops mostly closed and in darkness, the bars and restaurants lit up with neon of every colour, flashing.
    She had gone too far, skirted the market square somehow, because suddenly there was the Pirate Bay, transformed into a nightclub, the terrace outside heaving with people drinking and smoking and shouting to make themselves heard above the crashing beat.
    How was she going to find him with all these people?
    She pushed her way to the bar, conscious of her height and all these people and the fact that she was on her own. How was anyone going to believe she was eighteen? Behind the bar was a big Greek man along with all the other young bar staff who were dashing between customers, serving up beers and mixers and pitchers full of cocktails. He was sitting on a bar stool at the end, smoking a cigarette and with a newspaper spread out over his enormous thighs. This must be Nico’s boss – what was his name? Began with a V… Maybe Nico came on here after the pizza restaurant closed.
    ‘Hey, Vasilis!’ someone called out, and when the man looked up and raised his hand in an acknowledging wave Scarlett made a decision and approached him.
    ‘Excuse me,’ she said, and then louder when the man did not apparently hear her, ‘Excuse me! Vasilis!’
    He looked at her with displeasure and then surprise and then amusement.
    ‘Can you tell me where I can find Nico?’
    ‘Who you want?’
    ‘Nico. He works here.’
    ‘I have no Nico work here.’
    ‘Oh. Well – I don’t know…’
    One of