David Szalay - All That Man Is

Then he notices a lifeguard looming over them, his shadow on the water. He is talking to Sandra. He has just finished saying something, and he moves away, and takes his seat again, up a sloping ladder, like a tennis umpire.

‘We’ve been told off,’ Sandra says, hanging languidly in the water, only her sunburnt head, with its mannish jawline and feathery blonde pudding-bowl, above the surface.

Bérnard isn’t sure what’s going on. He still feels light-headed, vaguely unwell. ‘What?’

‘We’ve been told off,’ Sandra says again.

Bérnard, from his crouch in the water, which feels chilly now that he has stopped moving, just stares at her. His body is bony. Individual vertebrae show on his white back. Sandra is still saying something to him. Her voice sounds muffled. ‘…told to stop being so immature…’ he hears it say.

She has started to swim away from him — her head moving away on a very slow, lazy breaststroke.

The surface of the pool, which had been all discomposed by his antics, is smoothing itself out again, is slapping the sides with diminishing vigour.

—

After the horseplay they lie on the side, on sunloungers. Sandra just about fits onto one. Charmian, however, needs to push two together. Bérnard helps her. Then, without saying anything, he takes his place on his own lounger and shuts his eyes. It is late afternoon. The sun has a dull heat. In their dripping dresses, Sandra and Charmian are smoking cigarettes and talking about food. Bérnard isn’t really listening.

Then Sandra’s voice says, ‘Bernard,’ and he opens his eyes.

They are both looking at him.

Charmian, however, quickly looks away.

‘We’re going out for a meal tonight,’ Sandra says. ‘Want to come?’

—

They meet in the lobby of the hotel. Bérnard is talking to the smiling man — who is telling him that his shower will definitely be fixed tomorrow — when the ladies appear. There is an awkwardness. Unlike the previous night, Bérnard has made absolutely no effort at all with his preparations. The ladies, on the other hand, have to some extent dressed up. He sees that immediately. They have make-up on — quite a lot of make-up — and though Sandra is wearing a dress similar to the one she swims in, hanging from flimsy shoulder straps, its green-and-white floral pattern straining to hold the enormities of her figure, Charmian, extraordinarily, is in a pair of jeans and a blouse with delicate lacy details.

‘All set then?’ Sandra says, as Bérnard turns to them.

The smiling man watches tactfully as they leave.

They proceed in silence, initially, through the plain half-made streets near the hotel. The evening is no more than pleasantly warm — the nights are still mild sometimes, this early in the season. Even so, and in spite of the fact that they are walking downhill, Charmian, in particular, is soon shedding sheets of watery sweat.

‘It’s not far,’ Sandra says, panting.

‘What…what sort of place is it?’ Bérnard asks.

‘Typical Greek,’ Sandra tells him.

It turns out to be a long single-storey construction on an arid stretch of road, painted deep red, and covered with signage.

In the huge air-conditioned interior they are shown to a table. Music is playing, the latest international hits, and on screens attached to the walls men are playing golf in America. It is still too early for the place to be very full. The waitress brings big laminated menus, which they study in silence. There are pictures of each item — unappealingly documentary images like police evidence photos.

Things loosen up once the wine starts to take effect — a large jug of it that Sandra orders, which tastes faintly of pine trees.

‘I love this stuff,’ she says.

A stainless-steel plate of stuffed vine leaves also appears, leaking olive oil, and dishes of taramasalata and hummus, and a plate of warm pitta bread.

Bérnard pours himself some more of the weird wine, and then tops the others up as well. He is telling them about his experience in the hostess bar, his first night there, when he was intimidated into emptying his wallet on overpriced drinks for a pair of haughty, painted ladies. Sandra had told him how the taxi driver had tried to overcharge them on the way home from the Hotel Vangelis that afternoon, and he is offering his own tale of unscrupulous piracy. Mopping up the last of the tarama with the last piece of pitta, Sandra says, ‘You don’t need to take that, Bernard.’

‘It’s okay,’ Bérnard says mellowly. ‘Shit happens.’ He drinks some more wine.

‘You shouldn’t take it,’ she says. ‘A hundred euros?’

‘Yes.’

‘I tell you what we’re going to do,’ she says, looking around for the waiter. ‘When we’ve finished here, we’re going to go over there and get your money back.’

Bérnard laughs quietly.

‘I’m not joking,’ Sandra says. ‘We’re going to go over there and get your money back. You can’t let them get away with that, Bernard.’

Bérnard sighs. ‘They won’t give it back,’ he says.

‘Yes,’ Sandra says, ‘they will. When we tell them we’re going to the police they’ll give it back. Remember what happened to us that time in Turkey?’ she asks Charmian, who nods. Charmian has hardly said a word all evening, has only eaten half-heartedly four or five stuffed vine leaves. She seems out of sorts. Turning to Bérnard again, Sandra starts on the Turkish story. ‘This man tried to rip us off changing money in the street. Well, he shouldn’t have picked on us, should he…’

Then the main course arrives.

There is enough food, Bérnard thinks, for eight or ten people.

Platters of grilled lamb, chicken, fish. A huge dish of rice. Portions of fries for everyone and a heap of Greek salad which would on its own have fed a whole family. Also another jug of the wine, even though the first one is still half-full.

With some help from Bérnard the ladies obliterate the spread in under half an hour.

Sandra pours out the last of the wine.

Bérnard is drunk. Quite how drunk, he didn’t understand until he went to the toilet — his shiny face in the mirror stared back at him with eerie impassivity, then suddenly put out its tongue.

The others, however, seem unaffected, except that Sandra looks even redder than usual.

The place has filled up a bit and a band has started playing.

Sandra and the waiter have some sort of dispute over the bill — the manager is summoned — and when that is finally sorted out, she pays and they leave.

Bérnard had tried to offer some money, and on the pavement outside, he tries again. He says, with his wallet once more in his hand, ‘So…?’

‘I think I’m just going to use the lav,’ Sandra says, apparently not having heard him, and leaves him there with Charmian.

He pockets his wallet.

Charmian isn’t looking at him. She is facing the other way, as if she does not want to be associated with him. He wonders whether he has offended her somehow.

He stands there, drunk, looking at her, the slabs of her arms protruding from the frilly sleeves of her blouse, the grotesque inflations of her jeans.

When Sandra rejoins them, he is still just standing there, and Charmian is still staring off down the street.

—

In the end, he is unable to find the hostess bar. They spend about half an hour looking for it, on the fringes of Protaras’s nightlife, in the streets where the neon stops. They drop into a snack bar for pizza slices, sit eating them in a plastic booth. Then a place with live music — some zithering ‘traditional’ band and older couples swaying under a turning glitter ball. Bérnard, badly drunk now, gives Sandra a spin on the dance floor, treading on her feet, feeling the immense swell of her side hot and damp under his hand. He offers to do the same for Charmian but she just shakes her head.