Mark Morris: Dead Island

The bus was disgorging its passengers now. As always, they looked bleary-eyed, sweaty and flustered from all the travelling, but many of them were peering around with wonder and satisfaction. Xian Mei was not surprised. There was no denying Banoi was beautiful. It was a place of sunny skies, white sand, sparkling blue seas, palm trees and flowers in abundance. For a tourist resort, the pace of life was laid-back, relaxed, and the atmosphere — even at night — was relatively peaceful. The soundtrack was one of insects, birds and the sighing of the tide, rather than of loud music, drunken shouting and people throwing up.

The first of the holidaymakers were trudging into the hotel now, carrying their suitcases or dragging them on wheels behind them. They were pretty much the same as any other group of holidaymakers, as far as she could see, the majority of their number composed of families and couples. Banoi was a location that appealed to all age groups, which meant that in any sample selection of customers you would find young honeymooning couples, middle-aged couples on a romantic break and elderly couples hoping for a week or two of rest and gentle recreation. Xian Mei had been led to believe that westerners were conniving and deceitful, and so shamelessly decadent that they posed a serious threat to the world’s very stability, but in the three months she had been here she had seen little evidence of that. On the contrary, once you looked beyond their loud, revealing clothes and their open, sometimes abrasive manner, they were not that dissimilar to her own people. Unless Xian Mei was missing something, all they really seemed to want were healthy, happy, fulfilled lives for themselves and their families.

Occasionally people would arrive here alone, and it was this group that Xian Mei observed most keenly. For the most part, though, they too seemed harmless, and in fact she often ended up feeling sorry for them as they took their meals alone, or went for solitary walks along the beach, or spent their days sitting silently by the pool, their heads buried in a book. Sometimes she would strike up a conversation with one of them, find out they were a widow or a widower, or treating themselves to a quiet break after a painful divorce. Or sometimes they were single simply because they chose to be, content with their own company.

As ever with a batch of new arrivals, the first hour was a flurry of activity. Xian Mei and her three colleagues, who were often interchangeable depending on their shift patterns, tried to get through the check-in procedure as quickly and efficiently as possible. They all knew there was nothing more annoying for customers who had spent the whole day travelling, and who were desperate to freshen up and relax, than having to wait in yet another queue. But however efficiently she worked, she knew it was inevitable that one or two people out of a group of fifty or sixty would give her a hard time. In this case, it was a young, muscular, tattooed man with a flushed face and a slight limp. He thumped his elbows on the desk and leaned in towards her with a leer. Xian Mei tried not to recoil at the smell of alcohol on his breath.

‘So where can a guy get a little action around here?’ he said by way of introduction.

Xian Mei gave him a professional smile. ‘That depends what you mean, sir. There is an abundance of restaurants and bars on the island.’

‘That so?’ said the man thoughtfully. ‘And I guess you’d know all the best ones?’

Xian Mei hesitated. ‘I don’t go out too often. I work long hours here, and I’m usually very tired at the end of the day.’

‘Sounds to me like you could use a little R’n’R,’ said the man, leaning in even closer.

‘As I say, I work long hours,’ said Xian Mei. She focused on the monitor in front of her. ‘Do you have a reservation, sir?’

‘I do indeedy,’ said the man. He grinned and leaned back, like a hunter who had failed to bag his target on this occasion but knew it was only a matter of time.

‘Could I take your name, please, sir?’

The man pushed out his bottom lip, feigning offence. ‘You mean you don’t recognize me?’

Xian Mei glanced at him. ‘I’m afraid not, sir.’

Next to her, her colleague, Lan, was dealing with the reservation of a young black man wearing a red bandanna. The black man glanced over at Xian Mei’s customer and shook his head. ‘You givin’ this nice lady a hard time now?’ he drawled in a voice as deep and warm as melted chocolate.

The tattooed man spread his hands. ‘I’m just being friendly is all.’

The black man raised one eyebrow. ‘There’s different types of friendly. I don’t think the nice lady likes your particular flavour.’

Xian Mei smiled, genuinely amused. ‘It’s really not a problem, sir.’

‘You see!’ said the tattooed man triumphantly. ‘Not a problem.’ He turned back to Xian Mei. ‘I think you and me are going to hit it off just fine.’

Xian Mei smiled, but didn’t comment. Instead she said, ‘So if I could take your name, sir?’

The tattooed man sighed theatrically. ‘It’s Carter. Logan Carter. Football star , Logan Carter.’

‘ Ex -football star,’ muttered the black man.

Logan scowled. ‘Just like you’re an ex -rapper, you mean?’

The black man turned and gave Logan a cool, appraising look. ‘We’ll see about that, won’t we?’

‘Yeah,’ Logan said. ‘I guess we will.’

Xian Mei typed Logan’s name into her keyboard and pressed Enter, and immediately his details scrolled up on her monitor, together with a flashing red symbol in the top left-hand corner. Because of her briefing from her manager that morning, she recognized the symbol as the logo for the US National Blood Drive Campaign. Looking up, she said, ‘I see you’re one of our blood drive people, Mr Carter?’

Logan nodded. ‘Sure am. Helped promote the blood donation campaign, what with being a nationally-known face and all. Had my picture taken giving an itty bit of blood and got an all-expenses-paid holiday in return. Sounded like a damn good deal to me.’

Beside him the black man said, ‘Snap.’

Logan turned. ‘Pardon me?’

‘I’m in on that blood drive deal too. Gave some blood at a celebrity event in New Orleans. Next thing, I get a call offering me a two-week gig here in Banoi. Pretty cool, huh?’

Before Logan could respond, a voice behind the black man said, ‘Double snap.’

Both men turned to reveal an elegant and strikingly beautiful dark-skinned woman in a short, sleeveless, green summer dress. The woman waved her plastic room key, on which was stamped the red National Blood Drive Campaign logo.

‘After I gave blood I didn’t even know I’d been entered in a sweepstake till I got a call to say I’d won an all-expenses-paid holiday. Thought it was a scam at first.’

The black man turned to Xian Mei. Nodding at their fellow guests who were still waiting in line to check in, he said, ‘Hey, are all these dudes here because of this blood drive thing?’

Xian Mei tapped a couple of keys on her keyboard. ‘No, just the three of you,’ she said.

‘Hey,’ said Logan, ‘we’re like a club. Well, ain’t that nice?’

The black man looked at Purna and raised an eyebrow. ‘Yeah,’ he said drily. ‘Maybe we should all get ourselves some T-shirts.’

‘WELL, NOW, AIN’T this somethin’!’

Logan stood out on the balcony of his hotel room, looking at the view. He had showered and changed, and was now ready to have himself a little fun. He swirled his scotch and soda round in his glass, liking the way the ice cubes tinkled and chimed. He had popped some Prozac a while ago and was currently feeling mellow, relaxed. His knee had been throbbing some after the flight, but a couple of Tramadol had taken care of that. He thought about the cute Chinese girl on reception and wondered what time she finished work. Despite her resistance earlier, he still had high hopes of reeling in that particular fish. In his experience, it was often the initially shy and reluctant girls who ended up being the wildest between the sheets.