Soul Beach

us?
    I laugh at myself. Yeah. Show him three emails that prove my sister’s immortal. That’s really going to help. They’ll have me in the loony bin before I can say ‘afterlife’.
    I could call Cara, but she’d demand to come over even though it’s past midnight, and I bet she still wouldn’t believe me. Plus, there’s no way I am letting her know my middle name is Florence. Not after keeping it secret for eleven years.
    Or Robbie? He’d come back here now and hold me the way I need to be held, but he’d probably be texting geeky Lewis behind my back, getting him to block the site, which is the last thing in the whole world I want right now. This might be madness, but it’s all I’ve got.
    So that’s it, then. I’m on my own.
    I scroll down the Soul Beach email, and my cursor hovers over the activation link. My hand trembles and the screen seems to pulse with my heartbeat.
    ‘Hold on, Meggie. I’m coming,’ I whisper.
    In the distance, I can hear the waves.

10
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    The idea that heaven might be run by West Coast software nerds makes me smile, despite the fear I’m feeling as I stare at the screen. The fear that this might be for real. Or, worse, the fear that it might not be.
    I click Yes, even though I know that’ll give whoever or whatever this is complete control of my laptop, as well as my emotions. And then I hold my breath.
    The beach appears gradually, as though I’m walking through early morning mist that clears with every step I take.
    Before I can even see the place, I feel it, like an electrical charge through my body. For a moment, it’s frighteningly physical, almost paralysing, but then I am warm, fizzy, like my blood has been replaced by champagne.
    I blink, and the mist clears, to reveal that beach. The one from my desktop. The colours are even more dazzling: every grain of sand is a slightly different shade of gold, so realistic that they seem to shift under my feet as I walk. And the turquoise brilliance of the sea, with white foam cresting on the waves, cools my eyes. The breakers whoosh against the shoreline, and they sound nothing like the artificial waves on Mum’s relaxation tapes. These are too real to be relaxing: forceful and stroppy, as if aware of their own power.
    And now I realise. Those are the sounds I’ve been mistaking for anger, for blood rushing through my head. Why didn’t I recognise them sooner?
    I walk along the beach courtesy of my mouse, though the movement is so fluid that I am hardly aware of it. I scour the horizon for people, but nothing interrupts the holiday-brochure perfection, except clusters of bamboo huts on stilts, and what looks like a deserted beach bar with a palm-leaf roof, a long way in the distance. The bay is enclosed by sharp, green-scrub coloured rocks that rise sharply upwards, protecting the landscape from anything that might spoil it.
    I have never been anywhere this breath-taking. I could so easily lie down right here, feel the warm sand mould to the shape of my body, and the healing heat of the sun on my face . . .
    Then I remember I’m looking for Meggie.
    Anger replaces that rush of pleasure and contentment. That’s the first time since May that I’ve forgotten about her death. I don’t think I’ve even forgotten in my sleep.
    So how could I forget now?
    I rage against myself, furious that I’m so shallow, and then furious with this place for making me forget.
    ‘What is this? I don’t want to be on a sodding desert island. I just want to see Meggie,’ I burst out.
    I look around me. Bloody hell. I am in my bedroom, shouting at my computer. I’ve totally lost it now, haven’t I? Or maybe I lost it the minute I believed my sister still existed.
    Disappointment comes in waves, harder and faster than the ones on the screen. I’m crushed. I wanted to believe in this, because I can’t believe in anything else. But it’s nothing but a tropical con trick.
    I try to click out of the site, but wherever I move my mouse, I can’t find the little x in the right hand corner, and I can’t even find the File menu to exit that way. The more agitated I get, the less effect I have on the images in front of me. The water still laps at the shoreline, the sun still bounces off the water, the sand still feels warm between my