Nicola Barker - Wide Open

She went and sat outside, at the top of the stairs. With the hide’s dark jaw to the back of her she felt like a mollusc, a beach creature, with its shell tucked neatly behind it. A refuge.

She held the camera up to her eye and found herself staring into the gut of yet another crustacean. She had a particular way of seeing things. She did not notice the view, the exterior, instead she saw the black box, the glass, the interior. And inside this clean little belly she suddenly saw all of life. But everything much smaller and neater.

Jim saw her — way off at first — from the far end of the beach. But even at that distance he could see her savage mouth working, tearing, jabbering, as she strode out, swinging her long arms, kicking up sand with her skinny legs. She repelled him. She was unpredictable, stunted, somehow, and raging. He wanted her to leave them alone. Ronny especially. She would drain him dry if she could. He hated this idea. Lily suckling and guzzling.

He watched her. She was expostulating with her hands. She was with a friend. The friend was disrobing.

♦

“But you don’t have a towel,” Lily was saying.

“It’s windy. I’ll dry off soon enough.”

“What if someone comes along?”

“Should that be a problem?”

Connie wore pale linen trousers and a turquoise shirt. She pulled off her trousers. Her knees were both bruised, but she didn’t care.

“Will you come in with me?”

“Fuck off!”

“Goon!”

Lily pointed. “I know those two over there. I’m not stripping in front of them.”

“Fine.”

Connie unbuttoned her shirt. Underneath she wore no bra and a g-string. “You could swim in your underwear,” she wheedled. Lily scowled at Connie’s non-existent bikini line without replying.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” she said, “and if you don’t mind I’ve actually got some other things to do.”

She stalked off, stiff-backed and bristling. Connie smiled after her.

♦

Jim nodded slightly at Lily’s greeting but he didn’t speak. Lily pointed. “Would you believe that?”

“What?”

He stared over at Connie without much attention. She was paler than the shells. Very pale. But distant.

“She’s a relative. If my dad saw her he’d shit himself.”

“Your dad?”

“He’s anti-nudity.”

Jim remained silent.

“What are you doing?” she asked eventually.

“Nothing.” He scratched his neck. “Perhaps you should go and move her clothes.”

“Pardon?”

“The tide’s coming in.”

Jim indicated. Connie’s trousers and shirt were too close to the water. Lily smiled, “Fuck her,” and bounded off down the beach towards Ronny.

Ronny had surrounded himself with shells. He’d created a circular tableau, and he was at the centre of it. It was several feet in diameter. Lily paused on the edge of it. She stared at him for a while. “What did you do to yourself?”

He looked up, “Uh…?”

“Your hair.”

“Oh. I caught fire.”

“When?”

“Since I last saw you.”

“What were you doing?”

“Burning.”

“Burning?” Lily was mystified. “And what are you doing now?”

He grinned. “Isolating myself.”

“What?”

“With shells.”

“Isolating yourself?”

Ronny put his finger up to his lips. Lily squinted.

He returned to his work. Lily threw herself down on to the sand and chewed her nails while studying Ronny intently. She had no notion whatsoever of a companionable silence. Not even an inkling.

♦

The sea was cold. It reached just above Connie’s knees. She debated whether she would swim. The undertow was quite powerful. An unexpectedly large wave hit her. She gasped. Some seaweed caught around her ankle. As she bent over to remove it, she turned and glanced back across the beach. In the distance she saw Lily sitting next to a person in a hat. Someone else stood just beyond them. A man. His hand was raised. But before she could focus in on him properly, another wave hit her. She fell back into it with a small yelp and started swimming.

♦

“Come away from there.”

Luke’s voice reached her from the bedroom. Sara wore nothing but a towel and a camera. She tested that the prefab’s door was locked and pulled the curtains to.

“I’m certain I heard her voice.”

She returned to the bedroom.

Luke lay on his bed like a tanned sea lion. A beach-master. The bed was old and squeaky. It dipped under his weight. He could feel its springs teasing his spine through the mattress. He still wore his little, plastic hospital wristband. Like a baby, Sara thought fondly, taking hold of his hand. She read it out loud.

“Luke Hamsun.”

“That’s me.” He beamed. Glad to be alive.

“Hamsun. Like handsome but back to front.”

“Norwegian.”

“Truly?”

He nodded.

Sara sat on the edge of the bed. “So they think you’ve passed it?”

Luke looked pained. “The stone? Yes. They said it must’ve been quite a small one. They usually disintegrate of their own accord.”

She held his hand and inspected his fingernails. Luke shifted.

“Don’t be embarrassed,” she smiled, “I’m a farmer. I’m perfectly accustomed to this kind of thing.”

“Gallstones?”

“My father suffered from them. This was way before they had lasers and all the technology they have now. He had his cut out and was given them after in a jar. One was as big as my fist. But I was only a child then, obviously.”

“A fist?”

Luke blanched.

“Yours was probably only the size of a seed.”

“A seed.”

He liked this idea. Seeds were invariably clean and perfectly inoffensive.

But Sara was not thinking of seeds. Her mind had turned back a reel. Back to what she’d said before, about being a farmer. Previously she’d always thought of herself as a farmer’s wife. Previously? Previous to what? To fucking? Her insides curled.

Luke unlooped the camera from around Sara’s neck and placed it against his eye. She was a real honey. She smiled but quickly turned her face away. Her fingers grasped the top of her towel and gave it a modest yank upwards.

Luke’s own fingers moved automatically. As Sara turned, the camera clicked. A shot, taken. But he’d neglected to switch on the flash. He swore and stared at the camera, utterly bemused.

♦

Jim walked slowly along the beach. He hadn’t begun walking until he’d seen a wave touch the first of Connie’s garments. He hadn’t moved until her beige trousers had been lifted on to the swell, spat out, lifted again.

She was in quite deep now, a doughty swimmer. Over the final few yards he broke into a trot. The trousers were lost from view. Something else — turquoise — floated in the shallower waves, and something paler, a scrap, her knickers, floated alongside.

He pulled off his shoes, tossed Connie’s sandals higher up the beach as a precaution and then waded into the water to retrieve the blue item. Shirt. His jeans got wet. He went in a few steps deeper for the scrap, then looked around for the trousers. No sign of them. He waded, hopelessly, and became so engrossed in his close inspection of the ocean bed that he didn’t hear her come up behind him.

“Jesus,” she muttered, “how stupid!”

Jim was soaked to his thighs. He didn’t turn at first, but stared at her reflection in the water where it glistened whitely like a slither of coral. She was almost purple and exotically orange-speckled with the cold. Her arms were crossed over her chest, but she seemed uninhibited. He could tell that she came from another planet. A world where bodies weren’t shameful things. Somewhere nice and kind and open. How would that be?