She goes back to the shore.
She lies on the sand and undoes her bikini top. The gentle hands of her new friend, and Ron’s old friend, the sun massage her forlorn freckled back, and send her into a contented sleep.
She feels someone watching her and opens one eye warily. A huge pink youth is staring at her frankly, with round blue eyes. She sits up, embarrassed, doing up her bikini. She snaps, to cover her embarrassment.
Who are you?
I’m Big Boy. Ron Doorie’s mate. You know Ron, of course?
Yes, of course.
Good bloke, Ron. Got a few stupid ideas, though.
His eyes rove over her in the way his father surveys his vast tracts of land. She hugs her arms around her and snaps again.
Well?
Well—cigarette?
Arrogantly spoke, as though he is sure of himself.
She accepts a cigarette and he smiles his infuriating, triumphant smile.
So you’re Ron’s chick?
Perhaps.
Not bad-looking. Ron picked a winner for once.
Look, what is this? The local horse show?
Just having a friendly chat, that’s all.
She knows she ought to get up and leave. But this presumptuous giant’s power holds her back. She stares silently out over her reef, sensing the blue eyes feeling her, making love to her. The reef is of no use to her, so she turns back to the giant, awed by his size. He has taken off his bright flowery shirt and the muscles beneath his fat skin roll like heavy swell in an oily sea.
Why don’t you piss off, Big Boy?
Because you don’t want me to.
Want a bet?
Before the girl can do anything, Piglet’s meaty hand squeezes her breast. The other arm curves around her waist as he pulls her to him. Big lips smother her cries and his body rolls on top of her as his hands crawl over her thin body like crabs.
Up on the cliff, under a scraggly tree that rears in distorted silhouette against the sky, an invisible black form watches Piglet and the girl impassively. Sammy has been watching the girl all afternoon, where he has sat hidden from mankind. He loves her languid movements and the way she seems to melt into the water, and become part of the ocean he loves and needs.
He thinks he should go down and stop Piglet from fouling his dream. But neither of the two likes him; it would be a waste of time. Piglet would only beat him senseless, then go back to raping the girl.
If it is rape.
He sways to his feet, like a snake emerging from the snake-charmers basket, lured and lulled by the music of the sea. He tears away from his shadows under his tree, and walks away.
Down on the shore, Piglet has peeled off Linda’s bikini top. She bites his hand and rolls away as he rears in hurt surprise. She sprints for the curling ocean and dives into its protectiveness.
On the shore, just out of reach of the waves, Piglet bellows, You can’t fool me, you little slut! You were just begging for it, I could tell.
He dangles the white bikini top in his massive fist and laughs cruelly.
White for the virgin, I don’t think! See you soon, sweetheart.
He drops the bikini scornfully on the ruffled white sand. He gives a defeated laugh, picks up his shirt and walks off without once looking back at her.
She stays in the cold water that tosses her to and fro without any fun until she is sure Piglet has gone. Then she crawls out of the slithering waves and cries on the friendless beach.
For Piglet knows what she has been trying to hide from everyone else, especially simple, happy, clumsy Ron: especially herself. She is just a drab butterfly flitting from one drooping flower to the next, getting a little enjoyment before she flutters away. She thought she has found her happiness in Ron Doorie, but she knows now she will leave him, one day—for another flower. Ebony Sammy, the black tulip, perhaps, or red Big Boy, the pink pig face.
She moves down the beach after the giant.
Out on the green sea, the land looks far away and unreal amongst all the wavering fantasy. Suspended between the rolling water and the windswept sky, it doesn’t seem to exist for the wind-washed, sun-scrubbed pack of black-clad boys on their boards.
There is a strange, unspoken hierarchy out on the water; almost a type of pecking order, really, that doesn’t exist on the land. Probably because a surfer can float all day on the idly moving back of the water and perhaps get only five or six good rides, so it is a hierarchy based on good manners and skill of performance. That is why the surfers are glad Big Boy doesn’t come out, because he has yet to learn this highly complex code. If a person waits on the outside break all day for a ride then, just as he gets it, someone slides in on the inside, causing him to pull out or wipe out, it can cause bad situations and is even dangerous in white water near reefs in high waves. So courtesy is extended to everyone; if one surfer sees another in the prime position for the wave, he pulls out and lets him go. There’ll be another wave soon—waves are as countless as the stars in the universe. Of course, the more experienced surfers are usually those who get the best places, but in keeping with good manners no top surfer ever hogs all the waves; sometimes he will pull out of a good one to let a less experienced rider have his chance. Of course there are times when a surfer feels he is as good as the surfer in the prime position and will drop in. Then things can get a little tense and nasty. But in all the seven years Ron has been surfing he has not seen one occasion turn into fisticuffs; mostly, after a few sharp words, the two antagonists drift further apart. Back on the shore, the quarrel is almost always forgotten. Anger, for them, is as loose as the sliding clouds changing and moving all the time, just as they did before man was even thought of. It is a time for idle talk out here as well, a time to get to know your companions even better as you squat or kneel, sit or lie on your gently rocking hoards and survey the blue horizon for the wave of the day.
Ron hugs his slender, polished, green board between his wiry legs and his green eyes hypnotise the huge green wave bearing down on him. All green—all supreme and harmonious.
He catches the great green wave and flies through the rushing water, suspended between the watery foam-flecked pit below the wave and the blank blue sky above: right on the crest of his wave. He is really moving now. Several others compete with him, then two catapult off and there is only one—Sammy Saydlaw. They cut spinning patterns into the gleaming green side of the wave, with their boards performing perfect movements. Then the crest seems to bow before its god and the wave forms a tube. Ron shoots into the tunnel with Sammy tailing him. Glorious blue greenness with its own special muted light and roaring all around, as though he is in the very belly of the wave; water all around him and everything moving fast, without his knowing where they are all going. He crouches on his bucketing board and skims out of the tunnel, up over the curving back of the wave and down into the valley. He subsides back onto his board and watches the wave crash onto the rocky shore.
So huge, so magnificent, created and moulded by the cunning, clever hands of the sea; an idea from the sea—and he has mastered it, controlled it and made it die. The biggest and best wave of the day and only he has ridden it all the way to victory: no, only he and Sammy.
Ron turns and grins at silent Sammy, coming up behind him. He shouts in ecstasy.
Man! Man, did you see that tube? Wow, what a spacy wave, and I took it all the way. And did you see that tube? That blissed me out, man.
Yeah, I saw it. It was good.
Sammy smiles faintly and his green eyes flicker away over the shimmering water. He can read and understand waves, but girls and love he can’t. In that way he is very much like Ron, his best and only friend. He has to tell Ron what he saw, although it will hurt them both. He has too often smashed on unkind rocks to know otherwise.
Ron pushes his russet hair from his green, shining eyes and off his brown, radiant face. He glances out to the horizon in search of another wave. But there are none worth capturing after the demise of the one he just rod
e.
He turns to Sammy, who has drifted up beside him, and smiles into the dark, worried face.
Hey Sam, you going to that show tomorrow night?
Beverley’s?
Yeah. Jesus, man, every time I go there, there’s a fight or rape or attempted suicide—and always pigs busting us. Man, something always happens at Beverley’s.
Sounds like fun. I might come.
It wouldn’t be the same without you, man. Everyone’ll be there. All the guys, chicks. Even Piglet, I suppose.
Piglet? I got something to tell you about Piglet, Ron.
And he tells him. Out there on the empty sea, with their disjointed reflections squirming beside them, captured by the sun and water, with the blue sky above that reflects all that the youths want to see and be, and the thin ragged strip of land in the middle beckoning like a crooked dry finger. Asking Ron to come off his rolling green dream: asking Sam to come back and be a black man, as he should be. Beckoning and sighing for the sheep to come home.
That night, around the cold trembling fire, Ron stares sadly into Linda’s masked face. He plays with two burning twigs, then glances shyly at the skinny girl on the other side of the fire.
Piglet was here today.
Was he?
Yeah. I saw his car on the top of the hill, when I was surfing. You couldn’t miss it with all the boards on it. More boards than a chicken’s got feathers.
A weak laugh that is lost in the smoke. No joy in it at all.
Did you see him today, after I left you on the reef?
No.
Oh, I thought you might have. He must have gone down that way because he wasn’t on the beach or in the water.
No. There was no one there.
Right.
He stares at her alabaster face shielded by the flames and knows now that Sammy was right; she will spread her legs for any animal, and when she gets sick of him, she will leave.
Linda pretends to eat her food and wonders why she does not tell him what really happened.
So they both sit there on the freezing white sand with the jagged fire between them, separating them.
Oh, yeah, that’s right. Beverley’s holding a party tomorrow night. Have a change of scenery, eh?
OK, Ron, a party sounds like a good time.
Ron grins suddenly; determined to hold on to his girl.
Yeah. A good time will be had by all.
They arrive at the house at about eight o’clock. There is a buzz of mosquitoes from the verandah and a noise from a stereo and people down the hall. All around outside, cars huddle into the shadows of the trees and the night, as though ashamed of their shabbiness. Only Big Boy’s new Rover stands brazenly under the one humble light in the street.
Beverley lives on the outskirts of a small coastal town, hidden away in her own Garden of Eden. Everyone knows about Beverley. At the moment, she is growing a crop of marijuana, a couple of kilometres away, in the bush. Next time she may be selling heroin or her own body—it’s all the same to her. Either way the police always catch her. She is that kind of girl with that kind of luck.
Ron and Linda and silent Sam stand by the fly wire door until Beverley comes to greet them. She is short and sloppy, with waist-length red hair and huge, placid brown eyes like a cow’s. In her small hand she holds a joint which she hands to Sam while she squeals and hugs Ron.
Ron, baby, where’ve you been? Sambo, too. Wow, what a buzz! Hey, come on in, anyway. Keep that joint, Sam sweetheart— there’s plenty more. Hi, you must be Ron’s chick, huh? All the guys are sold on you, I can tell you.
Down the skinny dirty passage, past a couple making drugged love on the floor. Into a maelstrom of music and voices from the two dozen or so youths sprawled around on the stained carpet.
Christ, is that Doorie? I thought he was in jail.
Got a lovely sheila there, mate.
G’day, Sammy, sweetheart. Come and sit here with me.
Give us a try on that joint, man.
Hey, Ron, how’s the surf down south, babe?
What was the cray boat like, man?
Fuck, man, I haven’t seen you in yonks.
Ron falls down on an empty beanbag and drags Linda after him. He holds her close to him protectively and smiles around the room. Sure enough, there is huge Piglet, holding up a wall and swilling beer from a bottle almost lost in his massive fist. He eyes Linda over with his small round eyes and grins confidently. Ron scowls and glances at Linda, but she is listening to Gren tell one of his stoned jokes. He forgets about Piglet and settles down to have a good time, drinking and joking and smoking Gren’s joints and keeping a gentle hand on his woman’s thigh, to remind himself, that he still has her.
About two o’clock in the morning, when everyone is stoned or strange and several people have staggered out to be sick in the tangled weeds and perhaps go to sleep there; when couples are naked and rolling on the dusty splintered floor, getting what love they can before the sun rises and it’s tomorrow again, it is then that drunk Piglet staggers over to sleepy Ron. In the corner Sammy stiffens beside his murmuring girl for the night, alert and ready, as he has been since the party began.
G’day Ron, my old mate, and how’s things with you?
Good.
That’s marvellous, boy. Marvellous. And I hear you were actually working?
On a cray boat. You ought to try it some time, Big Boy.
On a cray boat? Do you call that working, Ron? Come on, you didn’t do any work.
I did.
Ron sits up warily, coming out of his marijuana dreams. He has been proud of the work he did on the cray boat. Now, flushed and drunk, Piglet is tearing his pride apart with brutal words.
Why, Ron. I think you were back in jail again. Isn’t that the truth?
Oh, shut up, Big Boy.
Piglet leans close and breathes stale beer all over thin Ron. He leers.
Shut up? Oh, I understand. You don’t want certain quarters to know of your previous sinister dealings. Well, sssshhhh, Big Boy.
Piglet chuckles deeply and stares at Linda with wicked red-veined blue eyes, while he places a huge finger over blubbery lips.
And how are you today, sweetness?
That’s Linda.
I know that’s Linda. That was her name yesterday, wasn’t it sweetheart?
Piglet bares his teeth at Ron.
How’s your pal Sambo going?
Good.
Piglet turns to the quiet Linda, who tries to disappear into the beanbag.
You know what, Linda, I forgot to tell you one thing yesterday. On the beach, remember? Sammy and Ronnie baby here are very close. Very close, isn’t it, Ron? They share everything—everything.
He stares at Linda with innocent yet cold eyes, a shark circling around his prey in a dark sea. Then he turns back to bristling Ron.
Isn’t that right, Ron?
Go away, Big Boy, and play with your bottle.
Play with my bottle, uh? What do you play with?
Ah, piss off.
Tell me one thing, Ron. Has Sam had your baby yet?
Ron’s eyes go cold and flash over to Linda who sits, astounded, beside him.
That’s not funny. That’s dirty.
Come on, Ron. With all the screws you two have, I felt sure that you’d be a proud father by now. Or am I wrong? Is Sambo the lucky father?
Fuck off—Piglet.
What?
You’re a real Piglet, man.
The name’s Big Boy.
The name’s Piglet. You big, slobbering, pink Piglet!
Ron shouts now and someone giggles. Piglet has got what he wants at last, a chance to fight lucky Ron who has a pretty girl. The giant grabs Ron by his shirt and drags him to his feet. There are screams and shouts as people scatter. Joey, the Italian, cries, Look out, Ron, he’s drunk as a brewery horse. He’ll murder you!
Then a heavy fist smashes open Ron’s eye and he gags. He tries to get out of the grip but he is no match for the giant. He is
punched in the stomach then thrown across the room and kicked in the head, so he is knocked out.
In the corner, Sammy slides away outside and waits under the shadows of a jacaranda tree. His business is not for the drugged eyes of the idle clan inside, but for the trees and the moon and the yellow rainstorm clouds and all the ghosts of his people.
When Piglet swaggers out of the door, Sammy falls in beside him.
G’day, Big Boy.
What do you want?
Why don’t you leave Ron and Linda alone?
The giant stops and sneers down at the Aboriginal.
You can’t have it both ways, Sambo honey. Which one shall I leave you ? Would you know what to do with a piece of crumpet?
Big Boy, you are about as dirty as white can get.
Piglet brushes Sammy aside contemptuously.
Bugger off, you useless black poofter. I’ve got better things to do tonight than talk to a smelly nigger who shoves it up white assholes.
Sammy’s eyes turn an evil bright green. In one movement he scoops up a piece of wood and slams it down on Piglet’s turned back.
Then they are fighting beside Piglet’s car. Only the impassive trees see the violence spilling bloodily on the ground, with grunts and harsh gasps puncturing the serene night.
Just down the road, the police car starts up slowly.
I knew there’d be trouble, sooner or later, tonight.
There always is when Beverley holds an orgy, sarge.
Jeeze, look at that boong go, will you?
They pull up and saunter out, powerful; two blue shadows crawling from their hole, then crawling back again to whatever they came from.
Rightio, you two, break it up. The fun’s over.
The old sergeant turns to a sullen Sammy and stares at him with bleak grey eyes.
What did you attack this bloke for? Don’t think you can lie, because we saw it all from just down the road. You come out of the trees and whacked him over the bonce with a nulla-nulla. Eh?
Sammy says nothing.
Right, sport, if that’s the way you want it. Get in the car.
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