Wicked Game

  April/ May 2003 We travel south to Coral Bay, to turquoise seas and pristine beaches.    The air conditioning in the hostels is drying out my throat. I am constantly hoarse. I drink cartons of orange juice daily. A Canadian man we share a dorm with tells us he likes the AC, it reminds him of home where they sleep in cold air with piles of blankets. We are walking out of the hostel. I'm wearing loose light trousers. Steve is behind me on the busy pavement. A man glances in my direction. Steve pulls the back of my trousers. I turn to see him looking down into them, at my behind in a thong. His smile is smug and proprietary.     'Stop it,' I say.    'But it's pretty.' We walk along a few paces more before he lets go. We tell each other jokes one night.    'If anyone asks you if you like clubbing,' I say, 'say, "yeah, I hate baby seals "'    Steve laughs, almost choking on his drink. He uses my phone to text my joke to his friend...

  April 2003 We are in Exmouth, here for the Ningaloo Reef. We snorkel, taking it in turns. I glide over the coral, watching anemones wave in the water.     That world looks so much better than the one I live in. I would like to be a mermaid and dive to the sea bed and stay there forever.    Perhaps I am a mermaid and I traded my voice for legs. I look up at Steve lying on the beach in the distance. Whoever my prince is, it's not him. Kissing him has done nothing.    Beneath me something moves. A long grey fish with a finned body. A reef shark. I watch, mesmerised for a moment before I am struck by fear.    A shark.    They say reef sharks are harmless, they never attack humans. What if it doesn't recognise me as human? I swim back quickly to the shore.    Steve adjusts the mask so he can use it, pulling the straps out to accommodate his much bigger head.     'I must have a bigger head for my big brain,...

April 2003 With Steve time and space are obscured as if by octopus ink.    We move from town to town, hostel to hostel, heat blazing our minds, burning me up inside.    He pulls at my favourite top, a psychedelic striped vest with a black silhouette of a fairy on it that I bought in Byron Bay.    'You're like a flashing neon light in this,' he says.    I twist away from him, so the fabric slips from his fingers.    'People are staring at you,' he says.    'Maybe I want people to stare.'    A bus driver loading our backpacks asks if we're travelling together.    'Yes,' I say.     Maybe he doesn't hear me. He looks to Steve.    'Yes, we're together,' says Steve.    The bus driver blows out a long, audible breath.    'Why did the bus driver seem surprised that we're together?' I say to Steve later.    He squeezes my bum. 'Because I look like I should be sta...

 April 2003 The bus is going down the west coast.     Steve tests me on currency codes.    'JPY,' he says.    'Japanese yen.'    'MXD.'    'Mexican dollar'    'I forgot,' he says. 'you worked in a bank.' He looks out of the window. It seems the game bores him if I know all the answers.    We arrive in Port Hedland, another tiny town.     My period starts. I am torn between feeling relieved I'm not pregnant and disappointed that my body is proving me right in its unlikelihood of getting pregnant.      I don't want a baby with Steve I remind myself. I don't want to be pregnant now.     The only other people staying in the hostel are a mother and daughter from Berkshire. The daughter is about my age, the mother maybe in her fifties.    'Do you smoke?' the daughter says to Steve when we are all sitting outside in the evening.    'Yes, I smoke,' he says....

  April 2003 We are on the bus to Broome.    'I know we've only known each other for about a month,' says Steve, 'but it feels like longer.'    'Am I that boring?'    'Don't be silly.' He squeezes my hand. 'Normally when you start going out with someone you only see them once or twice a week on dates, but we're together practically all the time.'    'Yeah, I suppose.'     Are things moving too fast, I wonder. Broome for us is all about the beach. We swim in the turquoise sea and lie on the warm sand. He falls asleep. I write our names in shells.     Early one morning we walk to Cable Beach and in a spot where no one is around swim out to sea. He pulls me close and kisses me, moving my legs so they're wrapped around him. He pushes the front of my bikini bottoms to the side.    'We can't,' I say.    'There's no one here.'    'But what if-'    'No one will know.'    ...

  April 2003 We travel on the greyhound bus through the hot, stark north.    We act like last night didn't happen. My face feels misshapen from crying and there is an emptiness running through me.     I shouldn't have believed Steve when he said 'April Fool.' I stare out at the endless landscape. I didn't believe him. I just wanted to. Now maybe I don't but it's too late to change my mind.        The film 8 Mile plays on a TV screen at the front of the bus. Steve slips his hand up my top and whispers about my green and yellow purple hills.    'Green and yellow and purple?' I say.    He runs his fingers over the flower and leaf pattern on my top. 'Green and yellow,' he says.    'Purple?'    He pulls my top forward so he's looking down it. 'In there,' he says.    'They're not purple.'    'I could make them purple.'    I think that sounds painful.    We play han...