RAW BLUE

by Kirsty Eagar

  16

  it’s not easy sometimes

  I call him the next morning at nine-thirty. Then I think it could be too early, so I cut the call before he answers. I figure I’ll wait until later, midday or something.

  I’m sitting on the couch, biting my cuticles, tearing bits of skin off with my teeth and spitting them on the floor. My hair’s all mussed up and I reek of beer and cigarettes – salsa club afterburn. I’m thinking I’ll clean myself up, walk down to the newsagency and buy Saturday’s paper, see what Bernard’s got to say, when my mobile rings. I check the screen and recognise his number. My heart starts thudding.

  ‘Hello, Carly speaking.’

  ‘Hello, Carly-speaking. Ryan here. How are you, mate?’

  ‘Good. How are you? I got your message.’

  ‘Yeah, so what’d you reckon?’

  ‘Um, I’d like to borrow it – a board – if that’s okay.’

  ‘Yeah, no worries. What do you wanna do? Pick it up from my place? Or do you want me to drop it off?’

  When I don’t answer, he says, ‘Or, I’ll tell you what – I’m going down now. Meet me there if you want.’

  ‘You mean at the break?’ It’s Saturday. I’ve never seen him there on a weekend.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Okay. That sounds good. I’ll be about fifteen minutes.’

  He’s parked in the back car park. The car spaces near him are taken so I park further up near the dune. Then I just sit there for a second, feeling nervous.

  I’ve got my bikini on under a pair of denim cut-offs and a blue singlet top. I’ve washed my face and dragged a comb through my hair, putting it up in a ponytail, and sprayed on a lot of deodorant. But my eyes are bloodshot and I’m feeling pretty queasy. I should have eaten something – aspirin on an empty stomach is never a good idea. The sun slaps me as soon as I get out of the car.

  He’s standing at the back of his Commodore, rubbing sunscreen on his forearms.

  ‘Watch it,’ he says as I approach.

  I look down and see the patch of broken glass – I’m barefooted. ‘Thanks. Sorry I’m a bit late. I went to the top car park first.’

  ‘Thought you parked down here.’

  ‘I thought you parked up there.’

  He nods, raising his sandy eyebrows, conceding the point. Then I realise I probably shouldn’t have let him know that I know where he parks, what car he drives.

  He studies me, eyes screwed up against the sun. ‘Had a big night, mate?’

  ‘Yeah, sort of.’

  He rubs his hands off on a towel and throws it in the back of his car. Then he’s all business. ‘So, I’ve got a six-two here for you. It’s a round tail, bit wider and thicker than your board. Should be all right, though.’

  He pulls the board out of his car and holds it up so I can see it, resting its tail on his foot. The nose isn’t too far above the top of his head, which means he must be around six-foot. He doesn’t look that tall, maybe because he’s solidly built.

  He runs a hand down one of the rails. ‘Bit more volume than yours. So you might find it’s easier in the small stuff.’

  It’s a nice-looking board. Only a few dings. There’s a Hard Cut decal placed diagonally across the deck under the nose.

  ‘Are you sure this is okay?’ I ask.

  ‘Wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t.’

  ‘Fair enough.’ I smile stupidly. It’s like the first time I talked to him in the surf – he’s got me off balance. One minute he’s calling me mate, the next he’s business-like, and then out of nowhere he’s abrasive.

  ‘So you want it, or …’

  ‘Oh, sorry.’ I step forward and he hands me the board.

  I tuck it under my arm, feel the weight of it. ‘What’s your board like, the one he lent you?’

  He pulls the second board out of the back of his car and holds it up for me to see. ‘Bit bigger. Six-four.’

  ‘What do you normally ride?’

  He glances at me, his lips pressed together in a skewed smile. ‘What? You mean my new board?’

  I colour. ‘Yeah, the one that … Look, I’m really sorry about that. Truly. You don’t know how bad I feel.’

  He scratches his nose. ‘Oh, I dunno about that. You were pretty upset. I was worried I might have hit you in the head or something.’

  ‘Yeah, well …’ I look down at the ground and swallow, trying to clear a tight throat.

  ‘I’m only stirring you, mate. It wasn’t your fault. Just goes to show I can’t turn for shit.’

  When I can look at him again my face is flat. I can’t be bothered pretending that it doesn’t matter, because he’s just made me squirm, and that’s what he wanted, so I hope he’s happy.

  ‘I normally ride a six-two.’ His voice has lost its smart-arse edge.

  ‘Well, do you want this one then? That’d suit you better wouldn’t it?’ I flip the board so it’s standing on end and push it towards him. ‘Here, take it back. It’s cool.’

  He frowns. ‘No, you have it, mate.’

  ‘No, mate, you have it. I can wait for my board. I don’t need to borrow one.’

  ‘Hey, hey, settle down.’

  ‘Well, I’ve told you I’m sorry. I feel like an idiot, all right? I feel like I should never surf here again. But I don’t want to surf anywhere else, do I? So I’m stuck. All I can do is offer to pay for your board when he’s fixed it. Except you said he’ll do it for free, but I’ll give you the money it would have cost anyway. How about that? Fifty, a hundred bucks, whatever. And my board – tell him I’ll pay for it.’

  ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa. Carly, you’re taking me the wrong way.’ He’s holding up a hand like a stop sign.

  ‘I’ve got a hangover, okay? So I’m not very … It’s not easy sometimes.’

  ‘Yeah.’ He gives a flat laugh. ‘I know.’

  I feel nauseous. It’s the heat, the hangover and the stuff I’ve just said. No. It’s Ryan. What am I doing here?

  ‘Here, take it.’ I shake the board at him. ‘I don’t want to owe you anything.’

  ‘Mate, you don’t owe me. I hit you, all right? So just calm down, take the board and just …’ He shakes his head, holding his palms up.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I don’t know, just … relax.’

  There’s an uncomfortable silence that goes on for a long time.

  ‘I feel stupid now,’ I say.

  ‘You’ll get over it. You coming for a surf?’

  ‘What? With you?’

  ‘Well, that would be social.’

  I start chewing my cuticles. ‘What’s it like? Have you had a look?’

  ‘Yeah, not bad. Wind’s getting into it a bit. There’s some size, maybe three, four-foot.’

  ‘What direction is the swell coming from?’

  ‘Southeast.’

  ‘What’s the tide doing?’

  Amused, he wipes a hand over his mouth. ‘Close to low, I think.’

  ‘Is that Shane guy out there?’

  ‘Doubt it. He was at home when I left.’

  ‘You live with him?’

  ‘Can’t always pick your friends. You all right, Carly? You’ve gone white.’

  I swallow. My throat’s slippery with saliva, an early warning signal that I’m going to spew. Why’s he being nice? What does he want? I thought I could handle this but I can’t. Last night flashes in my mind, the feel of Marty’s dead weight on top of me. And that other night: hands grabbing, tweaking, cupping. Slime between my legs.

  ‘Carly?’ Ryan’s voice is alarmed.

  The world turns to static and I bend over quickly. ‘I think I’m going to be sick.’

  ‘Here, come over to the tap. Have some water.’

  ‘No …’ I breathe deeply and close my eyes, fighting the urge to vomit.

  When I straighten up again he’s just standing there, not sure what to do. Ryan’s eyes are grey, but for the first time I notice there are chips of gold in them too. He looks concerned.

&n
bsp; I swallow again. ‘I, um … Sorry. I think I should go home.’

  ‘You right with that?’ He means the board – do I want him to carry it to my car?

  I pick it up and tuck it under my arm. ‘No, it’s right.’

  ‘Maybe getting in the water will help.’

  ‘No, I just … I want to go home.’

  ‘Yeah, okay. All right.’

  I realise then that Ryan’s disappointed I’m not going surfing with him. I’m not sure why that might be. I can think of reasons, like he wants the guys in the arrowhead to see he’s in with a chance. But somehow that just doesn’t seem like his style.

  But then, I don’t know him at all, do I?

  17

  blue people

  Coastalwatch

  Swell size 0.5 metre – Swell direction SE/NE

  There are two swells working today – 1–2ft of S swell leftovers combined with NE wind chop. Onshore dribble is nothing to get excited about …

  Sunday afternoon. The Laser is acting funny, sluggish and unresponsive. It could be because I’ve got the air conditioning on. I don’t like to use it when it’s really hot because it labours the motor too much – I’ll have to ask Hannah if there’s a word for that situation. There’s a loud knocking noise coming out of the motor and it’s become really hard to steer, as though the bitumen has melted its tyres. I swear at it the whole way down to the break, revving the engine unmercifully. When I pull into the back car park it’s full. I have to wait for a carload of guys playing doof-doof music to finish wiping sand off their feet and leave.

  I tried not to come here. I checked Mona Vale, Cook Terrace and Warriewood and they were all slop. Still, I jog up the dune to do a check. I want to make sure Ryan and Shane aren’t there. They’re not and I’m not surprised. End of the weekend: crowd central.

  I notice the guy in the line-up waving, but it takes me a while to realise, judging by his slim build, that it could well be Danny waving at me. I wave back and he seems satisfied because he drops his arm. I’m glad Danny’s out there because I need to tell him he’s got a job if he wants it. Actually, that’s not why. I’m glad Danny’s out there because it means I’ve got a mate in the line-up. I run back over the dune to my car.

  I paddle out trying to get used to a strange board. The deck’s slippery; I should have put more wax on it. There’s no grip pad either. Professional surf wankers always go on about how they don’t use grip, they like to be able to feel the board – both hands on it, I reckon.

  Danny’s paddling towards me and I squint at the black marks on his face, confused. When he draws closer I see it’s scribble from a black felt pen. He stops paddling and lets his board drift for a bit, eyeing me from a distance. Then he sits up, still a good five metres or so away.

  ‘Hey, Danny. Looking good.’

  He doesn’t look at me. ‘Did you find it?’

  ‘Been doodling?’ I figure he’s embarrassed.

  ‘I said did you find the DVD?’

  ‘What DVD?’

  ‘Blue Horizon. The surf porn – remember? I put it in your mailbox.’

  Trying to talk to him from this distance is ridiculous. I paddle towards him. ‘You put it in my mailbox?’

  ‘Yeah. I put it there ages ago.’

  I sit up on my board. He still won’t look at me. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t always check it. Do you know you’ve got a moustache?’

  ‘Yes, I do know I’ve got stuff on my face, thanks for pointing out the obvious.’

  ‘What are you thingy with me for? Is it because I didn’t find the DVD?’

  His eyes slide sideways, but he doesn’t turn his head. ‘No.’

  ‘How do you know where I live anyway?’

  ‘I saw your car parked on Powderworks Road. I go past it all the time. I checked the names on the letters in the mailbox to make sure.’

  ‘How do you know my car?’

  ‘I’ve seen you driving it around. And every time you’re here it’s in the back car park. Sometimes I go that way home.’

  ‘Oh.’

  He looks at me, frowns, and faces the horizon again.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ I ask.

  ‘You.’

  ‘Me? Am I giving off stuff?’

  He screws up his nose. ‘Yeah. You’re really bad today.’

  His whole attitude toward me has turned distrustful.

  ‘But I haven’t changed. I’m not bad.’

  ‘Most people are, with your colour. Like you don’t know what they’ll do sometimes. Do you know Shane?’

  ‘The guy that surfs here? The one with the tatts?’

  ‘Yeah. You and him are the same. You’re blue people. And he’s a bad-arse. He punches people and he told me to piss off and tried to run me over once. Sometimes he just goes insane. When I first saw you I thought you’d be all aggro like him, but you’re not. So I don’t get how it works. I had a blue teacher once, too. I hated that class.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘It’s not your fault. It’s just how you are.’

  He’s steadfastly keeping his gaze straight ahead now. He can’t bear to look at me. I feel like I’m some sort of leper.

  ‘But why’s blue bad? I love blue. The ocean’s blue. The sky’s blue.’

  ‘Blue people are different to that. It’s not that sort of blue. It’s dark, sick or dirty or something. And it’s got this bad electric look to it, this sort of static, you know, like a TV when it’s not tuned in properly. It’s sort of prickly, scratchy. ’

  ‘Oh.’

  He’s silent for a second then relents a little. ‘You’re not like that all the time. Sometimes it’s only a little bit. Like the other day when I was talking to you I didn’t really notice it at all. But today it’s really bad.’

  ‘O-kay.’ Feeling winded, I decide to change the subject. ‘Uh, Emilio – that’s my boss – said you can have a job. You start on Friday. Same shift as me, four-thirty to twelve. That’s if you still want it.’

  ‘Can you give me a lift?’

  ‘If you like.’ I’m actually wondering how he’ll go stuck in a car with me and my evil energy.

  ‘You should be okay by then,’ he tells me, matter-of-factly. ‘You better get that DVD, too. What if it rains?’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘How come you don’t check your mailbox anyway? What’s wrong with you?’

  ‘Well, I’m not expecting mail, I guess.’ Hannah cleans out my mailbox now and then, bringing down a bunch of junk-mail catalogues and the occasional bill.

  He seems to have relaxed a bit, if only because his mind’s on my sloppy mail habits.

  ‘How’d you get that stuff all over your face?’ I ask.

  ‘I slept over at my friend’s place last night.’

  ‘And he did that? I guess you’re lucky he didn’t shave your eyebrows.’ Both of Danny’s eyebrows are intact, but he does have arrows, stars and smiley faces all over his cheeks, and a penis on his forehead.

  ‘No, his sister did it this morning when I was asleep. I sorta knew she was doing something, but I wanted to finish my dream. It’s waterproof pen.’

  ‘Do you know what she’s written coming out of your mouth?’

  ‘ “I’m gay”.’ He doesn’t seem overly bothered. ‘I think she likes me.’

  I laugh. ‘Have people been staring at you?’

  He frowns. ‘I don’t know. I guess so. I forgot it was there. Can you really notice it?’

  ‘Well yeah, but … I think it’s great.’ To me, Danny rocking up to surf with graffiti all over his face is magic. I want to tell him that I think he’s precious, that the fact he talks to me is a gift. But of course you can’t say things like that to people.

  ‘Can you talk to my mum?’

  ‘About the job? Emilio can call her if you want.’

  ‘No, I want you to do it. I told her that you’ll give me a lift. It won’t take long, just ring her. I wrote my phone number on the DVD, but you wouldn’t know that because you haven’t p
icked it up.’

  Okay, so the DVD is a major issue. ‘When’s a good time to call?’

  ‘Just ring tonight. I’m gonna go now. I don’t want to talk to you any more, you’re too blue. They talk about Shane in the surf forums on the net. You should check it out. See ya Friday.’

  He paddles across for a wave. When he’s on his feet, I watch him head left. He’s turning really well considering there’s not much push to the wave at all, sending spray flying off the back like a series of retorts. He rides it all the way in.

  I focus on catching waves, trying to ignore the paranoia Danny’s started. I feel like I’m the one with the Picasso face, not Danny. I feel like everybody will see there’s something wrong with me. I’m up early on the next right and I start trimming across the top. Time slows when you’re on a wave, everything becomes that moment. This board is harder to turn than mine. Without a grip pad I can’t gauge where my back foot is. I shuffle back and the board responds better. Then I take aim for the lip. It pushes the front of my board, completing the turn for me. The wave ledges and I lean back, dropping down, then race along the reform.

  It’s only a timeout. As soon as it ends I’m feeling bad again. Danny’s seen inside me and I’m rotten.

  18

  the brazilians

  Coastalwatch

  Swell size 1.5–2 metres – Swell direction E

  It’s on people …

  Thursday. A power swell has arrived and the break is absolutely jammed. The mid-morning slackers have been joined by a whole heap of workers throwing sickies and kids wagging school. I’m relieved. So many people means it’ll be easy for me to hide if I see Ryan out there. Up until now I’ve avoided him all week by going early or surfing late.

  I’m standing down at the Alley in board shorts and a rash vest, all jittered up with adrenaline, watching waves with massive faces pushing through like lines of charging soldiers. There are so many people out there, swarming the water’s surface like insects. I’m torn between stretching properly and giving myself a chance to watch how it breaks, and just getting in there and finding out. Waves are peaking in three places: off the point, the middle of the line-up and over towards the lifesavers’ building. When it gets good like this some incredible surfers come out of the woodwork. I watch this one guy do so many cutbacks he looks like a skier traversing across a mountain face.