The Beach

∨ The Beach ∧

53

Dislocation

It was a long walk from where I entered the clearing to where Étienne, Françoise and Gregorio stood talking. I had plenty of time to think about how much the change of work detail would affect my life on the beach. Mainly I thought in rapid slide-show images, different shots of the four of us chatting and having fun: diving off our favourite fishing boulder, taking bets on who would catch the biggest fish, swimming for spears that had missed their mark or found their mark, or re-enacting throws that were comically bad. The image I lingered on the longest was, unsurprisingly, of Françoise. Françoise as an Amazon, frozen, with a spear poised above her head, concentrating fiercely on the shapes beneath the water. Even now it’s a picture I can clearly recall.

It seemed to me, as I got nearer, that they must have heard the news. They paused in their conversation and all turned, watching me with quiet and serious expressions. But it was simply that they’d read the look on my face. That and my posture, and the speed I was walking. If someone walks unhurriedly towards you, head bowed, you have to know that something’s up.

There was a strange moment when I reached them. They remained silent, waiting for me to speak, but I felt like I’d already been isolated from their group. It reminded me of the first morning after my fever, discovering that Étienne and Françoise had made themselves a part of the new world while I had been asleep. When no words came I frowned and put a hand on the back of my neck, then shrugged helplessly.

‘What is it, Richard?’ said Étienne apprehensively. ‘There is something the matter?’

I nodded.

‘What? Tell us.’

‘…I’m off the fishing detail.’

‘Off?’

‘Moving to another detail. Sal…She just told me.’

Françoise gasped. ‘But why? How can she do that?’

‘Something to do with Jed. He needs a work partner. Keaty’s going to replace me.’

Gregorio shook his head. ‘But wait, Richard. You do not want to move, yes?’

‘I like the fishing detail…’

‘Then OK. You will stay. I will find Sal and talk to her now.’ Then he marched off towards the longhouse.

‘Gregorio will stop this,’ said Étienne a few moments later. ‘Do not worry, Richard. You will not have to move.’

‘You will not have to move,’ Françoise echoed. ‘We are a good team, Richard. Of course you will stay with us.’

I nodded, pleased by my friends’ display of solidarity, but at the same time I was entirely unconvinced. I knew that Sal’s decision would be final, and as if to force the point home, the sound of her low voice began to drift across the clearing, telling Gregorio that this could be the only way.

♦

Although I was feeling sorry for myself, unsure of the sudden way in which things had developed, as the day went on I felt more sorry for Keaty. After Gregorio’s failure to change Sal’s mind, the four of us spent the rest of the afternoon sitting in a circle, getting stoned and bitching about the way things had turned out. Keaty, however, sat by the entrance of his tent. He was apparently engrossed in his Gameboy, but he looked miserable. I think he felt responsible for everything, and it must have been depressing to feel that his new workmates were so unhappy with the circumstances of his arrival. Eventually, Keaty’s obvious discomfort became intolerable. Sensing that the onus was on me, I called over to him and suggested he join us. He sheepishly put down his Nintendo and came over, immediately launching into an apology for the situation he felt he’d caused. All of us protested at once, but it did nothing to cheer him up. He also told us that he’d spoken to Sal himself, insisting that he didn’t mind remaining on the garden detail, to no effect. This, at least, provided a topic of discussion that didn’t make Keaty’s discomfort any more acute, because it raised the underlying reason for the job switch.

‘Perhaps,’ Françoise said, ‘there is something happening on the island. Something to do with the drug farmers.’

Keaty muttered his agreement, but Gregorio looked doubtful. ‘So maybe the Thais are putting new fields on this side of the island. It would be a problem, but why would Jed need a partner? If he had ten or fifty partners, he could not stop them. There is no difference.’

‘Is there ever any talking with the Thais?’ Étienne asked.

Gregorio shook his head. ‘Daffy spoke to them when they first came, but he is the only one. He said they knew we were here already, and they were not interested in us if we did not move from the lagoon. Since then, nothing.’

‘Maybe they’ve got pissed off with Jed nicking grass,’ I suggested.

‘Yes, but it is the same thing. If they are angry or not angry, what difference if Jed has a partner?’

‘So what else could it be?’

Gregorio looked down at his hands, then back at me. ‘I do not know, Richard…I really do not know.’

♦

We continued chatting until late evening, but only going round in circles. Without Jed or Sal there was no way our questions could be answered, but Jed was still absent by the time we went to bed, and no one felt like talking to Sal.

It took me over two hours to get to sleep that night, and the thoughts that kept me awake were as unusual as the rest of the day had been. For the first time since arriving on the beach, I started thinking about home. Almost, in fact, wishing I could return. Not to leave the beach permanently – just to contact a few important people and let them know I was still alive and OK. My family particularly, and a few of my friends. I suppose it may have had as much to do with my earlier conversation with Françoise as with the subsequent unsettling events. The thought of parents had hovered in the back of my mind, reluctant to fall under the beach’s amnesiac spell.