Chapters (39)
- Cover
- Title
- Author’s Note
- Glossary
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Acknowledgments
While she knew that it was probably the upshot of boredom, Faye decided she was hungry and looked at the boxes of supplies lined up against the wall. She’d packed ample food to satisfy herself and Derek. Even with the fresh items for the rest of the hike labelled and stored in the refrigerator in the rangers’ office for delivery to the relevant cabins each day, there were plenty of options on hand. It would soon be dark and it was clear that the rangers wouldn’t fetch them today. She and Clare weren’t going anywhere. Cooking would help pass the time.
Faye lifted the lids of the utility container and cooler box she’d packed. Eggs, pasta, olive oil, mayonnaise, tuna, beans, peanut butter, onions, garlic, pesto, bacon, potatoes, feta, cheddar, cream cheese, butter, cream, milk salt, pepper, tea, coffee, wine and a small bottle of dried mixed herbs. What should she make? What would Michelle do? What gourmet camping dish would her friend whip up over the fire single-handedly? Faye felt a flash of annoyance. Why did she always compare herself to Michelle when she knew she’d always judge herself to be inferior? Wasn’t there anything that she was proud of? Was there nothing that she had achieved that Michelle hadn’t? It wasn’t as if she was useless at everything she did.
Faye had found a job as a junior accountant at GNS Medical Supplies less than a week after her final university exam. Her parents had explained years earlier that they would pay for the three years it should take her to get her bachelor’s degree in accounting. After that, she’d be on her own, even if she failed and was required to re-sit her exams. (She didn’t.) There was no money to fund further studies or to support a break between studying and working. That Derek, Diane, Bruce and Helen would spend several weeks in Diane’s parents’ holiday home on the West Coast during the summer holidays while Faye learned the ropes at GNS Medical Supplies neither surprised nor troubled her. She might’ve momentarily wished she could be with them, and certainly she missed Derek, but Faye was pragmatic. She hadn’t been born to money like her friends.