The Beach

When she reached us she was unimpressed by our catch. 'I do not like them,' she said curtly. 'Will you come for a swim?'

I pointed at the chest-deep water, shoulder-deep for Francoise. 'We are swimming, aren't we?'

'No,' said Etienne, finally looking up. 'She means a swim.' He gestured to the open sea. 'Out there.'

We played a game as we swam out. Every thirty feet we would each dive to the bottom and return with a handful of sand.

I found the game strangely unpleasant. A metre underwater the warmth of the tropical sea would stop, and it would turn cold, so abruptly that by treading water one could pinpoint the dividing line. Diving down, the chill would start at the fingertips then swiftly envelop the length of the body.

The further we swam, the blacker and finer the sand became. Soon the water at the bottom became too dark for me to see anything, and I could only blindly kick out with my legs, arms outstretched, until my hands sank into the silt.

I began dreading the cold area. I would hurry to catch my fistful, pushing up hard from the seabed though my lungs were still full of air. In the times I waited at the surface, while Etienne or Francoise swam down, I would keep my legs bunched up beneath me, using my arms to stay afloat.

'How far out do we go?' I said when the sunbathers on the beach behind us had turned into ants.

Etienne smiled. 'You would like to go back now? Are you tired? We can go back.'

Francoise held up her hand clear of the water and unclenched her fingers. A lump of sand rolled out and dropped into the sea, where it sank, leaving a cloudy trail behind.

'You are tired, Richard?' she said, eyebrows arched.

'I'm fine,' I replied. 'Let's swim further.'

Suckered

At five that afternoon the temperature cooled, the sky turned black, and it rained. Unexpectedly, loudly – heavy droplets pouring down, cratering and re-cratering the beach. I sat on the small porch outside my hut and watched a miniature Sea of Tranquillity form in the sand. Across the way Etienne appeared briefly, snatching the swimming shorts he'd left out there to dry. He called something to me but it was lost in a roll of thunder, then he ducked back inside.

I had a tiny lizard on my hand. It was about three inches long, with enormous eyes and translucent skin. The lizard had been sitting on my cigarette packet for ten minutes, and when I'd got bored with watching it, waiting for a tongue to lash out and lasso a fly, I'd reached out and picked it up. Instead of wriggling away as I'd expected, the lizard had casually rearranged itself on my hand. Surprised by its audacity, I let it sit there – even though it meant keeping my hand in an unnatural position, palm facing upwards, which made my arm ache.

My attention was distracted by two guys running up the beach, whooping and shouting as they came. As they reached my hut they turned off the beach and leapt athletically on to the next porch along from mine.

'Man!' whooped one of them, white-blond with a goatee beard.

'That's some fuckin' storm!' replied the other, yellow-blond and clean-shaven. 'Whoop!'

'Americans,' I whispered to the lizard.

They rattled at their door, then ran back into the rain towards the beach restaurant – weaving around, trying to dodge the rain. A couple of minutes later they came speeding back. Again they rattled at their door – then white-blond saw me, apparently for the first time. 'Lost our fuckin' key!' he said, and jabbed a thumb towards the restaurant. 'They lost theirs too! Can't get in!'

'Stuck out here!' said yellow-blond. 'In the rain!'

I nodded. 'Bad luck. Where did you lose it?'

White-blond shrugged. 'Miles down the fuckin' beach, man! Miles and miles!' Then he walked up to the wooden guard-rail that separated our two porches and peered over. 'What you got in your hand there?' he asked.

I held up the lizard.

'Wow! Is it, like, dead?'

'Nope.'

'Excellent! Hey, can I come over? You know, meet the neighbours!'

'Sure.'

'You want to smoke a joint?'

'Sure.'

'Excellent!'

The two of them vaulted over the guard-rail and introduced themselves. White-blond was Sammy, yellow-blond was Zeph.

'Zeph's a strange name, right?' said Zeph as he shook my left hand, not wanting to disturb the lizard. 'Can you guess what it's short for?'

'Zephaniah,' I answered confidently.

'Wrong, dude! It isn't short for anything! I was christened Zeph, and everyone thinks it's short for Zephaniah, but it isn't! Cool, huh?'

'Definitely.'

Sammy started rolling up, pulling the dope and papers out of a waterproof plastic bag in his pocket. 'You're English, huh?' he said, as he flattened out a Rizla with his fingers. 'English people always put tobacco in joints. You see, we never do. Are you addicted to smoking?'

'Afraid so,' I replied.

'I'm not. But if I put tobacco in joints I would be. I smoke all day, like that song. How's that song go, Zeph?'

Zeph started singing a lyric that said, 'Don't bogart that joint, my friend,' but Sammy cut him off.

'No, dude. The other one.'

'What, 'I smoke two joints in the morning'? That one?'

'Yeah.'

Zeph cleared his throat. 'Uh, it goes, «I smoke two joints in the morning, and I smoke two joints at night, and I smoke two joints in the afternoon, and then I feel all right»…And then it goes, «I smoke two joints in times of peace, and two in times of war. I smoke two joints before I smoke two joints, then I smoke two more.» I can't remember the rest.' He shook his head.

'No matter, dude,' said Sammy. 'You get the idea, Ricardo? I smoke a lot.'

'Sounds like it.'

'Uh-huh.'

Sammy had finished rolling the joint while Zeph had been singing. He lit it up and passed it straight to me. 'That's another thing about English dudes,' he wheezed, smoke coming out of his mouth in short bursts. 'You hang on to the joint for an age. Us Americans take a toke or two and pass it on.'

'It's true,' I replied, sucking in.

I was going to apologize for the poor manners of my countrymen but I collapsed into a coughing fit.

'Rickster!' said Zeph, patting me on the back. 'You gotta cough to get off.'

A couple of seconds later a blistering bolt of lightning crackled over the sea. After it was gone, Sammy said in an awestruck voice, 'Most totally excellent, dude!' Zeph quickly followed it up with, 'Like, utterly outrageous, compadre!'

I opened my mouth, then hesitated. 'Excellent, dude,' I muttered thoughtfully.

'Most excellent,' Sammy repeated.

I groaned.

'A problem, Ricardo?'

'You're winding me up.'

Sammy and Zeph looked at each other, then at me.

'Winding you up?'

'Having me on.'

Sammy frowned. 'Speak in English, my man.'

'This… Keanu Reeves thing. It's a joke, right? You don't really talk like that… do you?'

There was a brief silence, then Zeph swore. 'We're rumbled, Sammy.'

'Yeah,' Sammy replied. 'We overplayed our hand.'

They were Harvard students. Sammy was studying law, Zeph was studying Afro-American literature. Their surf act was a reaction to the condescending Europeans they kept meeting in Asia. 'It's a protest against bigotry,' Zeph explained, pulling knots out of his tangled blond locks. 'Europeans think all Americans are stupid, so we act stupid to confirm your prejudices. Then we reveal ourselves as intelligent, and by doing so, subvert the prejudice more effectively than we would with an immediate barrage of intellect – which only causes confusion and, ultimately, resentment.'

'Really?' I said, genuinely impressed. 'That's so elaborate.'

Zeph laughed. 'No, not really. We just do it for fun.'

They had other acts they liked to do. Zeph's favourite was the Surf Dude, but Sammy had another – he called it the Nigger Lover. As its name implies, it was a bit more risque than the Surf Dude.