The Day Of The Wave

by Wicks, Becky

  I sigh, pulling the next beanbag over closer and sitting down next to her. 'Yes. She's gone to Bamboo Island with Justin for the night. Said she'd make her own way back home.'

  'With Justin?' She looks at me with even more surprise. 'Did they bond over the mushrooms or something?'

  'It would seem so.' I take off my flip flops. They're wet and extra sandy from the rain. The sky is black outside now and the wind's picking up, too. Izzy sits and reaches a hand to my face. I wince.

  'I can't believe she did that!' she says, looking incredulous.

  'I'm OK,' I tell her as her eyes cause my insides to flip again - what's with that? 'How are you feeling now?'

  She exhales, curling her legs up. 'Better, thank you, but I didn't want you to get in trouble.'

  'It's not your fault. And hey, I'm sorry I hit Justin...'

  'No, no, that was...' she trails off. I notice a slight smile spring to her face that she doesn't quite manage to hide behind her hair. 'I don't like to endorse violence, Benjamin, but he was acting like an idiot.'

  I cringe. 'Punched on a boat by his dive instructor. He's going to write that on TripAdvisor.'

  'Then I'll write on there too, and tell everyone why,' she snaps. 'Mushrooms aren't so magical for everybody.'

  I snort at her words. 'You should be a writer.'

  She rolls her eyes. 'At least they made him a fun-guy for a bit. Get it?'

  'Awful,' I say, but she's laughing now. She's amazing when she laughs.

  'Listen,' she says. 'I just spoke to a friend at the magazine. I'm asking for more holiday time, so I can really commit to the school.'

  Wow. I was not expecting that. 'Seriously? That's so great!'

  'Are you sure?' She's still smiling but there's apprehension in her eyes now as she shifts around on the beanbag to face me. 'You won't get given more scratches?'

  She studies my face for a second; the four straight cuts across my cheek. It really does look more like I was attacked by a cat than a human. 'I can't say that won't happen,' I tell her. 'I don't know what's going on, but it's not your problem.'

  I signal to the barman, order a coconut for myself and one more for Izzy, but when I turn back there's a look on her face I can't read. Did I just say something offensive? Shit. I didn't mean to, but I don't want to her worry about anything she doesn't have to worry about.

  'I don't much like seeing you hurt either, Ben,' she says suddenly. She's looking right into my eyes again. I lose myself as that moment on the boat flashes back into my brain. It was just us back there, scared to tears. I would have done anything, anything. I felt so responsible for her. Is that what Kalaya saw? Is that why she went so totally crazy at me, this time more than any other? Is that how Izzy feels about me, now that we've found each other?

  I look away as the thunder splits the sky outside and the heavens open. People are screaming with laughter now as the light rain turns into something like miniature glass shards falling from the sky and even more people start running off the beach. The other beanbags get taken away, distributed around the floor. The barman is suddenly run off his feet.

  'Bamboo Island might be a little wet for camping tonight,' I think out loud, watching the scene unfold. Izzy pulls a face. She picks up her iPad from the floor under her feet, hands it to me. 'Watch this while I pop to the loo,' she says, standing up. I take it from her.

  'Pop to the loo, my darling,' I say in my plummy British best and she whacks my arm on her way past. Our coconuts arrive but when I take mine, I accidentally make the iPad screen light up. I can't help looking at it. It's a Facebook page for someone called Amy and it's showing a huge tattoo of a fluffy bunny rabbit's face inside some kind of mirror. I've never seen anything like it before. It's kind of hideous. I'm still looking at it, zooming in on parts when Izzy flops back down into the beanbag.

  'Sorry, it came on, I didn't mean to look,' I say, handing the iPad back.

  'That's OK!' She takes it and smiles when she sees the screen. 'That's my friend from the magazine. She's been wanting to get this tattoo for ages and she finally did it! Looks good, don't you think?'

  'It's definitely different,' I say, tactfully. 'She must be quite a character to have something like that. You can tell a lot about someone by their tattoos. Where it it?'

  'Back of her leg,' Izzy says, studying it now. She swipes the screen to the next photo. 'It's true, Amy's pretty quirky. Look at this one.' She hands it back and I can see Amy in another photo. She's laughing and holding a wine glass. Her red hair is cut in a glossy pixie cut and I can see another tattoo of some playing cards on the top of her arm. They have faces, like the ones in the Disney version of Alice in Wonderland.

  'Nice!' I say, as even more people flood into the bar along with a huge gust of wind. Looks like rainy season started already. I pull out my phone. There's no message from the police yet so I'm assuming Alan hasn't left the island, and there's nothing from Kalaya, not that I was expecting anything I guess. I can't actually believe she's out on a boat in this. I hope they make it over there without too much drama.

  'When did you get your tattoo?' Izzy asks now, picking up her coconut. Her eyes flick to my shoulder blade, even though I'm wearing a shirt. I stretch my legs out in front of me.

  'When I was twenty-one,' I tell her. 'I had it done here.'

  'The T&C means Toby and Charlie, right?' she says, stretching her legs out next to mine. They're not as white as they were. 'I like the design, in the waves.'

  'I don't really tell too many people what it means, not unless they ask,' I admit. 'Do you have any tattoos?'

  My eyes travel the length of her legs of their own accord. I don't remember seeing any tattoos on her, but I have had to try pretty hard not to let my eyes linger on Izzy's body whenever she's been in a bikini. Justin was right about her abs, and her arms are toned in a way a girl's arms only ever get from yoga and Pilates.

  'I thought about it once,' she says now. 'But I don't really think I'm a tattoo kind of person.'

  'What would you have gotten, if you were?'

  She frowns, twirls the straw round in her coconut. 'I like elephants,' she says after a moment. 'Maybe a baby elephant?'

  'OK, maybe you should never get a tattoo,' I tease and she pretends to bump my head with her new coconut. 'So, you've ridden an elephant, right?' I say, blocking her and laughing. I remember how she was about to go ride one on the day of the wave, how excited she was. Her eyes were shining just like this.

  'No,' she says. 'We don't get too many elephants in the UK.'

  Another huge howl of wind rushes in from outside, makes her jump and spill her coconut. Some of it goes onto the iPad. 'Shit!' she cries, standing up with it, then trying to wipe it down with her dress. 'I do not need this to break!'

  'I'll get something, hold on,' I say, hurrying to the bar. There are so many people in here now, all of them wet. Girls and guys in sarongs are shiny-skinned and sandy all at once, leaving trails across the floor. The music's been turned up to create an instant party. 'Can I get some napkins?' I ask a guy behind the bar. He holds out a box but as I take them, a Scottish voice to my right makes me turn my head.

  'Mate, three mojitos please.' He pulls some baht out of his pocket and my eyes scan his scraggly traveller's beard, his sunburnt skin, but it's his hair that makes my blood run cold and then start boiling.

  I hurry back to Izzy. 'Izzy...'

  'We're never going to find Alan Gillespie in this weather,' she interrupts, gesturing outside as she takes the napkins from me, puts all but three aside and wipes her iPad. I put a hand on her arm to stop her, motion to the bar.

  'Izzy. He looks like the guy you described. That's not him is it? Red hair with a blonde streak!'

  'Oh my God.' She slams the iPad to her chest. 'Get down!' She pulls me back down onto the beanbags so fast we fall into each other on the same one. Her face is so close. She's gripping my arm and we're both giggling now with the adrenaline. 'That's him!' she says. 'Ben... oh crap, don't let him see us!'<
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  'What do we do?' I say as she attempts to hide behind me. I can smell her moisturizer, her shampoo, her.

  'Well, we don't actually know if it was him who stole my stuff, I can't just go up there and accuse him. We need to follow him,' she says. Her eyes aren't leaving him, still standing at the bar. Her sundress is bunched up, showing more of her legs right up against mine. We're squished together, flesh against flesh.

  Alan walks across the bar with the mojitos. We watch from our low positions as he hands two of them to two girls. Then he reaches a hand into the pocket of his combat pants, pulls out his phone. 'Pose, you two!' we hear him say. I'm just about to make a comment to Izzy about his pick-up routine when the beanbag shifts underneath me.

  Izzy's gone.

  She's striding up to him, long hair flowing, sundress crumpled round her cute butt and I can hardly believe my eyes when she stops right in front of him and slaps his face, hard.

  'That's mine!' she says. The two girls gasp and a guy from behind the bar hurries over.

  I race up to her too, but she's already grabbed the phone out of his hands. 'You stole this on the bus to Phuket!' She holds it up to everyone looking on. 'My phone!' she announces. 'See the cover? Sweet Eats Magazine - it's where I work. Where's the rest of my stuff? Where's my passport?'

  The Scot looks like he can't speak. Several people are laughing and pointing and taking photos with their own phones now. 'I don't know what you're talking about...' he starts but he stops as he sees her glowering face. 'I'm sorry,' he finishes, wisely.

  'Listen, Alan,' I say, stepping in. His eyes widen when he realizes I know his name. 'The police know what you did. Izzy filed a report and they told us you were here. She just wants her passport back. Help us out?'

  Izzy's arms are folded right next to me. I'm trying not to laugh. I can't believe she slapped him - she's the feisty Bizzy I fell for when I was sixteen all over again. 'Give me my stuff back, Alan,' she says, 'and we'll let you off the hook. We'll tell the police not to arrest you.'

  I throw her a look. Wise move. And incredibly charitable.

  Alan throws his hands in the hair, almost throws his cocktail, too. 'Fine, I'm sorry,' he says. 'I really am, I don't know why I did it, she made it too easy!'

  'No excuse,' Izzy says, tutting. 'I thought you were a nice person, Alan. You really let me down.'

  Alan looks genuinely mortified, especially as the two girls he was hitting on hurry away to the other side of the bar, giggling. I almost giggle too. Izzy's going to make a great teacher with comments like that.

  ISLA

  'I can't believe I got everything back,' I say again as we run side-by-side down the maze of alleys back to Rick's Place. 'Did you see how terrified he was that we were going to have him arrested?'

  The rain is pummeling down on our heads now and the streets are slushy puddles of sand and mud but I'm still riding a high from what happened. We marched Alan through the rain to his crappy hostel and made him get my purse with everything still in it from his locker. We did it in front of everyone there. Ben made him swear to pay the money he spent back into my account, too. 'Do you think they really would have arrested him?' I say, jumping over a puddle.

  'I don't know.' Ben's carrying my stuff in his waterproof pack. The thunder's still rolling all around us but we're running late to catch the last boat. 'They're probably more likely to arrest us for punching out half of Phi Phi,' he says. 'We probably shouldn't come back here, ever.'

  I laugh as we finally reach the ugly building and throw ourselves through the door. My dress is drenched and I know my bikini is more than visible through the white fabric. His white shirt is no better but it's clinging tight to all his muscles. I watch them strain as he makes a grab for our stuff behind the desk, doing my best not to lick my lips, just as Rick sashays out. 'There you are!' he says.

  'We'd better run,' Ben starts, but Rick holds a hand up in front of him.

  'No boats. All cancelled.' He points to the tree that's banging against the window outside. 'Crazy storm, yeah!'

  'Man, no boats at all?' Ben says. He puts our bags back down.

  'No boat. Not safe.'

  I fold my arms across myself. I'm not really feeling brave enough to get on a boat with the weather like this anyway, if I'm honest, and I can tell Ben knows that. Part of me is glad they're cancelled, although I'm supposed to be meeting Marcus in the morning at the school. 'I guess we'll have to stay, get the first boat back in the morning,' Ben says. 'Do you still have rooms?'

  Rick flips through his book, picks up a pen and chews on it. He furrows his brow, looks at us apologetically. 'Sorry no room. Ah, wait. I have one room.' He taps the book with a long nail.

  'Just one?' Ben says, leaning his arms on the desk. I watch the rainwater drip from his hair before he runs his hand through it, scrapes the curls back from his face. My heart is thudding now.

  'Sorry, yes,' Rick says. 'But it nice one.'

  I try not to look like I'm even registering what's happening, even as a mild panic breaks over me like a rash. 'We'll have to share, is that OK?' Ben says, shooting a look at me. 'Unless you want to go find somewhere else?'

  Before I can speak, the thunder crashes overhead, as if to emphasize the fact that we probably shouldn't be walking around outside any more than we really have to. 'Not a problem,' I say quickly. 'We'll make do.'

  'Good, good!' Rick beckons us back down the dank hallway, which still smells like someone smoked twenty Marlboro Lights and then vomited in it. Ben carries our bags right into the end room and puts them down on the bed. There's only one bed. My throat dries up when I see it. There's no sofa or anywhere else to sleep.

  Rick leaves us to it. I stand in the middle of the cold, tile floor, arms still around myself like an idiot. Ben's looking at me. 'Is this going to be a problem?' he says now in concern.

  I shake my head, swing my arms. 'No, God, Ben, why would it be a problem?' I say nonchalantly. 'Just don't tell Kalaya.'

  'I wouldn't dare. You should probably get out of that dress.'

  'I only just got here, Romeo,' I say. It comes out automatically because I'm nervous but I see his eyebrows rise in amusement. I curse my stupid mouth, unzip my bag, pull my clothes and Body Shop bath salts out. Then I head to the bathroom and change. When I come out, Ben's studying his scratched face in the mirror above the desk. He's taken his wet shirt off. My eyes trace the lines of his back up to his tattoo. Dear God, why does he have to be so gorgeous?

  'I'm going to have to break it off with her,' he announces, running a finger over one of the marks and wincing.

  'Domestic violence towards men is a big deal,' I say, only half jokingly, getting out my hairbrush and running it through my hair. 'Have you read Gone Girl?'

  'Very funny. Is that where you got all your tips? That was a pretty kick-ass move you pulled back there,' he says, turning to me. His shorts are so low I can see the cut of his abs and I want to touch him again. I smile at him instead, flex my arm muscles the same way he did when he first went to find Alan.

  'I was just following your lead. Really, though,' I say, 'I didn't mean to cause any trouble between you two, I'm sorry.'

  Ben sighs. 'I was going to do it anyway,' he says.

  My heart short circuits on the spot. He scans my face, puts a hand to his chin across his stubble. He looks like he's going to say something else, but he stops himself and walks over to the window, leaving a trail of invisible eggshells between us.

  'How long was your longest relationship?' I ask him after a second, moving to the mirror myself with the hairbrush. I can't help it, I want to know. 'You must have exes all over the world, travelling as much as you do.'

  'Three months is my longest. I don't have exes,' he says, still looking out the window at the rain.

  OK. I wasn't expecting that. 'What do you mean?'

  'I mean I manage to form friendships, usually, not relationships. So there are no exes.'

  My heart's an actual drum now. 'Sexual friendships?' I s
ay. 'So, basically you don't like to commit much?'

  'I'm an asshole, you can say it out loud if you want,' he says, turning around. The look on his face shocks me to the core; I've never seen it before. I almost drop my brush.

  'I'm so sorry,' I say quickly. 'It's none of my business, Ben. You're not an asshole... really...'

  I'm still speaking as he strides towards me and catches my elbow. He leads me to the bed, sits us down, rubs his hands over his eyes next to me. He looks tortured.

  'Izzy,' he says. 'You didn't deserve that.'

  'It's OK.'

  'No it's not, I owe you more.' He takes the brush from me now, puts it down behind us on the blanket, looks at me. 'I owe you so much more than that,' he says. He takes my empty hand in his and holds it against his thigh. The sparks travel up my arms, along my scars like they're wires to my internal organs. He doesn't have exes?

  'Honestly... I can be an asshole. I guess there's just this fucking empty hole in me that I know nothing can fill and that sucks. It winds up on my face and in my actions and I can't give people what they need from me in the long run, so it's always been easier to break things off and move on, you know?'

  He's still holding my hand. It's big and strong and I know it's probably taking a lot to admit what he sees as a weakness in himself. 'You're right,' he says, 'I'm not really great with commitment. I'd only end up hurting people more if I tried.' He closes his eyes now. 'I've never actually said that out loud before.'

  I let out a breath through my nostrils. I'm still trying to seem indifferent, friend-to-friend, but my heart is a flapping swan inside me, the more this new information sinks in. I'm aware of his semi-nakedness in every sense of the word. He's showing me his vulnerability. I owe him the same.

  'Colin told me I was only half there,' I tell him now, swallowing, looking down at our hands entwined. 'He was right.'

  I can feel Ben's eyes on me. 'The guy you've been with for four years?'

  I nod. 'We met on my birthday, he was working in the bar. He was blowing up balloons for my party and he accidentally popped one against my boob. He was so mortified about it, he offered to take me for dinner.'