The Clear Part 2

"She makes me laugh," I said limply. "But that's been true of all my girlfriends."

"Is she special at all?"

"I don't know."

"Are you missing her?"

The realization that I wasn't made me feel like I had betrayed Caroline, but it felt more important to please Alex. I didn't want her to think she was an interlude.

"At first, when we were apart, I believed that absence made me like her more. It made me aware of what I liked in her. Now that I'm used to being alone, I don't see the point."

"Absence makes you forget," she said. "I think a relations.h.i.+p is about turning up, as much as anything. Being there."

I considered this, and although there was truth in it, it didn't seem right.

"If you love somebody enough, the absence shouldn't matter."

"But what makes you love somebody that much?" Answering her own question, she spoke sadly. "I don't know yet."

"The strange thing is that when you first feel something, you believe you know the person. You don't, but you might have glimpsed who they are."

"Glimpsed?"

"Caught sight of? With you, I believe I like you because I've glimpsed who you are. Not just a version of yourself that you create to please me, but the real you."

She smiled. "How do you know I've not created it?"

"When you smile, I can't believe that's false."

She ignored this and went on. "If you like me, I don't want it to be like them," she waved her fingers at the pearling shop. "I don't want you to like me just because of my body." She looked shy, but said, "It will get older and look worse."

I smiled at this conversation, because it was similar to one we'd had on the beach; several of the words she was using had been unknown to her the night before.

"What makes you think I'm only interested in how you look?"

"The stuff we are is," she paused to find the word, "horrific. If I were to show you who I really am, to cut myself open like that oyster, I would be as disgusting as it was. Just meat."

I understood her doubts, but chose not to concentrate on them. I could look at her and realize that she was a human, with a bowel full of s.h.i.+t, and a belly of vomit; I could picture her red bones and lungs, see her teeth in terms of her skull. I knew that unwashed she would stink in a day, and her smile lines would be wrinkles a few years from now. But it seemed pointless.

"What does it matter?" I said. "Even if you are flawed, I trust there's something within you that I want to know."

We'd been there so long it was lunchtime, so we ate, and then went back to the lodge. We were both anxious about Melanie, but Alex spotted a note from her on the message board.

"She's gone without me. She knew I wasn't coming."

"I'm sorry."

She nodded. "I am sorry for upsetting her. But now I'm here."

We finished the vodka with our dinner, by the pool, and Alex suggested we go back to the beach. Not for the whole night this time, she said, but until it was cool. I went to the toilet, and when I came back she was by the aquarium. Jake and Baldy were standing behind her, silent and motionless. Panny was kneeling next to her, leaning round in an attempt to make eye contact.

"Do you like fish?" he asked.

"Not these ones," she said. "They have no colour."

"You like a bit of colour do you?" His friends smiled as he rubbed his dark chest.

"I just think they're strange," Alex said, the green light from the tank making her look curiously pale.

"Come on," I said, "we'd better go."

"Why are you always running away?" Panny moaned as she stood. His voice sounded like a child's again. "Why don't you like us?"

"Why can't you just leave us alone?" Alex snapped, and I stiffened, my stomach going hot, expecting a reaction from them. "Let's go," she said, apparently unconcerned.

I didn't look back, but listened, wondering why they made no more comments or sounds. I couldn't even hear their feet, so they must have been keeping still.

On the walk to the beach, we talked quietly, which gave us an excuse to be closer to each other. Our shoulders brushed together. It worried me that she looked so unhappy, so I asked her what was wrong.

"They bothered me," she said, looking back up the road.

"Those three?"

"People are always staring."

"You feel invaded?"

"No, not that. They don't want to see inside, they are only interested in my surface. There's more to me than that. But they're wearing my surface away."

I wanted to tell her that I was different, that it was more than attraction, but knew I would sound defensive, so let her continue.

"They think that loud men can make me happy. They don't see who I am. If I showed them. . . ." she looked up, confused, grasping for words. "I could show them."

As we climbed the dunes, the sound of the ocean was close and calm.

"Maybe," I suggested, "people are attracted to you because you're so opaque. Your reservation makes you seem mysterious, a puzzle to be solved.

People feel empty unless they work you out."

"Is that why you stared at me on the coach?"

"That was because of your torch," I said, holding out my hands, mimicking her actions.

She smiled, knowing she'd embarra.s.sed me. Before I could think of a way to explain, she said, "I know. It's different with you. I think you want to know me. If I answer a question, you ask it again until I tell the truth.

If I don't concentrate, you can see right through me."

It was this generosity of hers, to a.s.sume the best about me, that made me wince at the thought of Caroline. I realized that we'd spent the last year obsessing over the technicalities of our relations.h.i.+p, trying to make it function, rather than nurturing the emotion. We'd stopped hoping for the best, because it had pa.s.sed. That's why I'd been missing her. Not because she was necessary, but because she was already gone.

The sand was the coolest it had been since we'd arrived, and as we walked, I put my arm around Alex. When she returned the contact, we stopped at the water's edge and kissed. I hardly dared close my eyes, because the tiredness was so intense. But it felt such a relief to be there, seeing moonlight on her face, feeling the water around my feet, finally holding her. When she looked up, I could see the clear of her cornea, a crescent of white reflecting on it.

If I had done this without the buildup, just been unfaithful to Caroline, it would have made me sick with regret. As it was, she only entered my thoughts for a second. It didn't feel indulgent to be doing this, because it would have been wasteful to avoid it.

I heard voices, and looked up at the dunes. The three men were yauping loudly, jogging towards us. As they came nearer, I saw all were carrying beer, and two had torches. They turned them on and shone them in my face.

"Jesus Christ," Baldy said, "look at lover boy." His face screwed up as though furious with us. Panny looked like somebody at a party who's been turned down; miserable, and over-acting happiness. Jake followed on behind, his face lost behind his dark beard.

"I'm not happy about this," I said to Alex, then turned to meet them, trying to sound pleased. "All right lads."

Baldy pushed me back, hard enough to make me fall, but I managed to right myself, just before I hit the water. He came at me again, and this time I tripped against the waves. My face went under, and I think I was held there, because although I struggled, I couldn't get my head out. My need to breathe was so strong, it felt as though I was about to suck in water.

Somebody dragged me up, pulling my arms back.

"Let him go," Alex demanded.

"Please, just let us leave," I gasped.

"No, I don't think you're going anywhere," Baldy said, grabbing my hair.

He pulled me towards him, then embraced me, with his arms around mine, and dragged me onto the sh.o.r.e. There was still just a chance it was a joke, so sounding as bright as I could I said, "All right, you win." I felt his forehead thump into the back of my skull.

Alex stepped back, and went out of sight.

I looked at the line of white breakers, to see if her shadow pa.s.sed in front of them, but there was nothing. I felt like collapsing, because Baldy's arms were so tight around me. My lungs were weak, hardly able to move my ribs.

"Jake, bring her back," he said, nodding in her direction, freeing his arm momentarily to make the sign language. In response, Jake padded off into the darkness.

"If you hurt her," I said, unable to think of a decent threat, given the way he was holding me.

"We're not going to hurt her. n.o.body ever got hurt by being touched."

Panny had a look which I mistook for boredom; when he spoke, I realized it was contempt. "It's you we're going to hurt," he said, unfurling his roll-up knife holder. The pearling implements were all there, and he pulled free the smallest one, which looked like a long scalpel.

"Come on Jake," Baldy said to himself, then into my ear he said, "That little f.u.c.ker can see in the dark."

"Please, I need to breathe."

There was a flash in the distance, which could have been lightning, except it seemed to come from the sand. We heard Jake before he was in sight, a sort of gasping and moaning. His mouth was wide, turned down and white with spit. It was as though he was screaming silently, his inability to create a sound making him more desperate.

Baldy let go, attempting to throw me down, and ran towards Jake, who was now on his knees. As Panny moved forward I used my momentum to trip him.

I had him on his back, my knees on his shoulders; he was winded, and so shocked, the knife was limp in his hands. I was able to pull it free, and held it in front of his face.

Jake was curled up on the sand, but Baldy had abandoned him and was striding at me.

"If you come near me, I'll cut him."

Panny seemed to believe me, because he lay still, almost patient. Baldy, however, ran up and kicked me in the side, and I felt instantly suffocated. His foot hit my jaw, and as I went over, it felt like I was falling from a high place.

I can't have been unconscious long, but when I came round I could feel pressure on my chest, arms and legs, holding me down on the beach.

Something like thread was pa.s.sing over my gums, wet and sharp. As my vision cleared I could see two faces above me. Between them, they had me pinned down, and their fingers pulled my lips back, as they pa.s.sed the blade over my gums, opening them. The scalpel snagged against the top of my front teeth, and pressed into them.

I could hear crying to the side of me. It sounded like Jake, trying to form words, but on the in-breath, so they were hoa.r.s.e and wet. Then I heard Alex speak in German, calm, but distant. Baldy slumped further onto me, pinning me down, and I saw Panny stand, pointing his torch down the beach. I turned my head to see him illuminate Jake, who was now still, but panting. Then he raised the beam into a s.p.a.ce over the sand.

There was no apparent outline to Alex, but as the light pa.s.sed through her body, it illuminated her insides. Her bones were visible only as gla.s.s, and between them, in a yellow swill like b.l.o.o.d.y water, were her organs. As she stepped forward, they heaved in unison. The beam of the torch pa.s.sed her beating heart, and when it shone on her face I could see the thick swell of tongue pressing behind her teeth.

I couldn't move my head. Seeing her like that had taken all my strength.

Panny didn't move either, because when she reached him I heard something impact on his throat. He coughed as he went down, and landed with his head facing mine, eyes closed. The torch was s.h.i.+ning over Baldy, who looked greasy with sweat. His arms were by his side, and he looked upset, tired, but completely unable to move. Alex took the scalpel and ran it down his thigh, the skin peeling open to reveal flesh like the inside of a plum. He began to struggle, the wound dusting with sand.

When he was off me, I felt my strength return, stood and backed away. Alex moved out of the torch beam, and in the moonlight I could see her face.

The noise behind herof the three of them, pained and franticdidn't concern her. She was watching me, for a reaction.

I held my hand out towards her, and said, "We'd better go."

On the coach the next day, we didn't talk much. It wasn't that we'd run out of things to say, but the magnitude of what we were doing had begun to sink in. I still hadn't spoken to Caroline, but left a message telling her I was going back to Perth, with somebody I'd met. I didn't have the heart to wish her Merry Christmas.

Alex had the window seat, even though her eyes were closed. It was the first time I'd seen her asleep. The sun was setting, and most people pulled down blinds to shade it out. I left ours open, to watch the orange glow on her skin. The ends of her hair had bleached over the past few days, so they let through light.

I remembered what had happened, and my heart sped in response. It was the men's reaction that frightened me, rather than what I'd seen in Alex. I wasn't even sure whether she'd had a choice, or had just been worn down by them. It didn't seem to matter, because I was more disturbed by the anger in them, than the stuff she contained. As I watched her eyelids tremble in sleep, it wasn't her contents I was thinking about, but the content of her dreams.