On a muscular leg.
Samo stepped outside and leant on the rail. A quick look from under the eyelids. Hm, the guy was posing. He confirmed it by putting his hand under his head to show off his biceps.
The sleeping man then twitched as if in a nightmare and flexed his body. His muscles bulged.
Samo spat into the sea.
Raf waited for Samo to return and then went to the toilet. He muttered something about the drink which always made him go and made the effort to slowly move behind the corner.
The girl had to be there somewhere. On the top deck again?
He climbed the stairs but could not find her and came down again.
He saw her at the back, leaning against the rail. She was staring at the wake stretching behind the boat, widening into a slightly wrinkled surface of perfect blue.
Raf stopped a few metres behind her, not knowing what to do. Behind his back he could hear the roaring engines making an almighty noise, which seemed to spray out of some sort of an air vent between him and the cabin.
“Hi,” he said finally and thought she had not heard him. But before he could repeat the word she nodded without turning around.
Raf stood there, embarrassed. He looked back quickly to make sure none of his comrades were in sight.
“Are you staying on the island for long?”
She nodded again. He started feeling like a fool.
“The whole week?”
The anger which took hold of him only lasted a moment, but was therefore all the stronger.
“Well, if you decide to look at me, you know where to find me!” he hissed, turned round and walked off.
He noticed a nod with the corner of his eye.
The cassette player switched itself off with a click. Ana untangled the earphones from her hair and put them back into her bag. She turned and had a good look around. The parents on the stern were still trying to catch their children, but there was nobody near her. She just managed to catch a glimpse of one of those boys who had earlier sat on the bow before he disappeared round the corner. She could not be sure but she thought it was probably the bony one who looked different from the others. A pity that he had not walked past her.
During the last piece of music, the one with the faster rhythm, she thought she could sense somebody watching her. A passing feeling, which proved to be wrong.
Another half hour till landing. She tried to imagine her uncle from the photos her mother had shown her. They were all pretty old so her uncle must be well over sixty. Two months with an old man! She was bound to have to listen to him talking about the past day after day.
Max was the next to go to the toilet. He took a long time and suddenly the cynical voice inside Raf’s had recognised the truth. Max was lying. Raf got up and did not care what his friends thought. Without looking at them, he went off. He slowly approached the corridor leading towards the toilet. No sound, apart from the roar of the engines, to which he had grown completely accustomed, and the music which reached him in intervals.
He stepped forward and peeped through the stairs leading to the upper deck.
Max and the girl were talking.
What else could he have expected from him? From that bastard. He just had to chat up every woman who crossed his path. From whichever direction she came. However old she was or how she looked, he did not care. This was someone who would work his way round the whole crowd, not choose just one or two women. Someone who could not even order a drink in a bar or buy cigarettes at a newsagents without trying to interfere with the waitress or the shop assistant. Someone who lied to every woman’s face and told her how beautiful and clever she was — in short she was the most unique fusion of the two qualities in one body. How could women enjoy listening to such blatant lies?
He gripped the rail, wanting to break it. What did he do that was wrong? And what was Max doing that was right? He had never believed his stories about all the adventures and successes, but now… What were those magic words which you have to use to start a conversation? How could you just come, say something and immediately start chatting? Why did he always fail?
He put his forehead on the cool metal and felt like crying. He could not look at them any longer.
He crossed the corridor and walked back on the other side.
“Hi,” said Max.
“Hi,” she answered.
“Are you staying on the island for long?” asked Max.
She nodded.
“The whole week?”
“More, two months.”
“Two months? What will you do for that long, alone?
“I’m visiting my relatives.”
“Well, if you get bored, come to the other side of the island, to the old villa, it’s the only one there. Ask your relatives, they’ll tell you where.”
Alfonz nearly suffocated in the toilet. He did not really need to go but as all the others had been he had to. He found it strange that he did not meet Max and thought he must have gone back on the other side of the boat. He remembered the toilet in their own restaurant at home and felt almost homesick. He had had to scrub it out so many times that he could only hate it in a fed up sort of way. And therefore it seemed strange that here on a holiday in the middle of the sea, he did not recall his family but the toilet instead.
Back in the corridor, he slowly let his breath out and glanced into the restaurant. He was thirsty so he went in. He was just about to say hello, when he stopped himself — there was no one there. He leant on the bar and looked at the row of bottles on the ply-wood shelf under the mirror, covered with fly shit and other dirt and oddly stained at the edges as if it had been attacked by some strange fungi or mould. He nearly changed his mind and left before stopping himself. He had been shy all his life and this was his holiday away from the familiar. If he started shyly that was how he would carry on. He had come here for something different.
He cleared his throat.
He had to do it a few times before the waiter came in a crumpled black waistcoat and white shirt with rolled up sleeves, his arms so hairy that it looked as if he was wearing a tight fitting jumper.
The man did not say anything, just leant on the bar and looked through Alfonz with sleepy eyes.
“An orangeade, please.” said Alfonz.
The waiter carried out his routine without looking at his customer: he reached under the bar, opened the bottle, put it firmly onto the lino on top of the bar and added a glass, covered with white spots.
Alfonz paid and took the bottle.
“Sorry, but this is warm, could I have a cold one?” he said.
The waiter looked him in the eyes for the first time.
“If there’s something you don’t like, go to another bar!”
Alfonz was just about to turn round and ask where it was when he realised he had probably just been the victim of the waiter’s sense of humour. There was nowhere else on the boat and for kilometres around it. They were where they were and they would just have to survive for a week.
He left his drink untouched and walked out. A strange thought came into his head, as if it was not his but as if somebody had whispered it to him. What if he went in the opposite direction and looked for that girl who had walked past earlier? No, he would not have the courage to talk to her, he just wanted to look at her again. He did not take the idea seriously, it seemed so strange and impossible.
He returned to the bow. Max still was not there. Where was he?
The siren went and Max returned. Raf refused to turn away from the outline of the island.