The Beach

∨ The Beach ∧

48

Cab!

Night John-Boy,’ said a voice. Bugs’ voice, loud and firm.

’

‘Night Rich,’ came the immediate reply – hard to recognize, but I guessed Moshe.

I grinned at the darkness. I knew Bugs had been pissed off by the way we’d laughed at him, and knew this was his way of regaining – what? Authority or respect. And now his cue had been chucked directly back to me, the person who caused the laughter. That must have grated.

My grin widened and I let the silence hang for a few seconds, then I said, ‘Night Jesse.’

Jesse passed it to Ella, who passed it to an Aussie carpenter, who passed it to one of the Yugoslavian girls, and I tuned the rest of the game out.

♦

There was a question that needed answering, I realized as I lay awake that night and listened to the laser beams hammering on the longhouse roof. Why did Bugs get on my nerves so much? Because he really did. I hadn’t even realized how much until Jed told me to admit it.

I mean, it wasn’t like he’d done anything bad to me or said anything rude. In fact I barely ever talked to him. Not talk talked. Our exchanges were all about work, arranging the carpentry detail to knock up some new spears, passing on a message from Gregorio or Unhygienix, stuff like that.

To answer the question I made a mental list of all the things he’d done to piss me off. There’d been his stupid stoicism when he hurt his leg, the thing with the soup, his almost wacky name. He also had an irritating competitive streak. If you’d watched the sun rise over Borobudur, he’d tell you that you should have seen the sun set, or if you knew of a good place to eat in Singapore, he’d know of one better. Or if you’d caught a shark with your bare hands…

I decided to deny him the chance to talk me through his tiger-shark experience.

But anyway, these weren’t big enough reasons. There had to be something else.

‘Just a hunch then,’ I muttered, and rolled over to go to sleep, but it didn’t satisfy me as an answer.

It would have been useful if Mister Duck had dropped by that night, because I could have asked him to fill me in more about Bugs’ character. Unfortunately he didn’t. He was a bit like taxis in that respect. Taxis and night buses.