Bird North and Other Stories Read online

  ‘Arab?’ he said.

  Arab didn’t move.

  ‘Arab!’

  Arab rolled over and opened his eyes. ‘Josh,’ he said. ‘Mate.’

  ‘Where’s Callum?’ said Josh.

  Arab shrugged and rolled back to face the wall. ‘Bro, awesome to see you too,’ he said.

  Josh went back through the doorway. ‘Callum you fuck-head!’ he said, opening one of the doors. There were no curtains. A tall naked man lay on the bed. It wasn’t Callum. Josh shut the door quickly. There’d been a pair of women’s underwear on the bed.

  ‘Who the fuck’s that in the bedroom?’ he said, kicking the side of Arab’s bed.

  ‘What?’ Arab said.

  ‘In the bedroom? Who is it? It’s supposed to be the three of us.’

  ‘That’s Si. We met him last night.’

  ‘But ...’

  Arab sat up. His hair had grown even longer and his abs stood out. ‘He’s got pot,’ Arab said, holding his hands as if weighing something. ‘He stays, we get pot. He doesn’t stay ...’ He sighed. The smell was bad. He lay down. ‘He’s British, man.’

  ‘Well, what about Callum?’ said Josh, going across the room. He waited outside the other door. There was no sound. He knocked and went in. The window above the toilet was broken. A tennis ball was floating in the toilet bowl.

  In the lounge Arab was breathing evenly. ‘Shit,’ Josh said. He drew the grey curtains. The doors to the deck were open. It was warm and still. Below him, on the grass, a pair of board-shorts made a sandy nest for two empty beer bottles. He looked across the water at his parents’ place. Two people – Sarah and his dad – were carrying the double kayak down the lawn. When it came to family activities Sarah charged a participation fee.

  With the curtains open it was lighter inside. There was a bottle of vodka and a pack of cards in one corner. He picked up a condom box. It was empty except for the lubricant and instructions. He put the lubricant in his pocket and went to his bag where he took out a towel. Outside, beyond the grapefruit and his surfboard, a ten-speed was leaning against the bach. It must have been the pom’s. In the seventh form Dan won the school cycling prize. Josh had watched from the back of the auditorium as his brother walked onto the stage. A student yelled something and the other students laughed and cheered. Some of the teachers on the stage smiled. Others thrust their heads forward and narrowed their eyes. Dan shook the rector’s hand and everybody clapped. Josh told the boy beside him he was Dan’s brother.

  ‘Bullshit,’ said the boy.

  Josh took the neck of the bike and gave it a shake. It slid down the wall. He went around the bach, down a sand trail and onto the beach. The swell had died. He was happy. He got scared in deep water. Surfing was about being seen with the board. At the beach with his mates he’d say he had a sore arm or that he was too hung-over. Recently, getting his board off a roof rack, he’d pretended to strain his neck.

  He sat on the sand and took his T-shirt off. There were only a few hairs on his chest. On his stomach they were sparse and light coloured. Josh walked down to the water. The sand was warm and then it was hard and damp and there was a line of bubbles drying at the high-tide line. In front of the island he could see the on/off flash of the kayakers’ red paddles. He went deeper into the water and then forward and under. He kicked just above the bottom. When he looked ahead the ocean was an ominous dark ribbon. He surfaced quickly and stood up facing the beach. Two women were power-walking. Closer to the surf-club, lifesavers were doing things with flags and four-wheeled motorbikes.

  Josh lay down by his T-shirt and raked sand up to his chest. He rested his chin on the sand and closed his eyes. After a while he felt the sun burning his back and neck. He turned over and sat up. Dressed in white, an Asian couple were going slowly down the beach. Occasionally the woman would bend over, pick up a shell, and hand it to the man following behind her.

  At home in Auckland there was a photo of Dan wearing a pin-stripe suit and carrying a plastic machine gun. His hair was in a pony-tail and the girl with him had a black dot at the corner of her smile. Josh had seen her on Christmas Eve. He, Arab and Callum had been drinking at Callum’s brother’s apartment in the city. Arab had arrived with some speed, but when they snorted it nothing happened. ‘It must be coke,’ Arab had said, ‘and that takes longer to work.’ They’d played drinking games and then gone to a fast-food restaurant. Josh had seen her in the queue and told her who he was.

  ‘He was such a good driver,’ she’d said, ‘and so good looking.’

  Then she told him she was a lawyer and that she was going to London.

  ‘Thanks, about the driving I mean,’ Josh said.

  She gave him a hug. ‘Be strong,’ she said, which was something he’d heard a lot around the time of the funeral.

  He tried to think of what else he’d have liked to hear about Dan, but in his mind the conversation always ended with her wetting her lips and saying, ‘I’ve got a waterbed at my apartment.’

  His hard-on was pressing into his shorts and there was sand over his chest and stomach. It would look like he’d been playing in it. He sprinted down to the water and went in and under. He stood up and got his hair right. Up at the bach someone was moving across the doorway. The sand was hot and as he ran up the trail he had to stop twice to jump onto his towel.

  ‘Arab, you lazy bastard,’ he shouted, going up the back steps.

  The tall man was sitting at the dining table. Arab was on the edge of the bed holding an unlit cigarette. They were laughing.

  ‘You missed a fucking huge one last night,’ said Arab.

  Josh punched him on the arm and took the cigarette. The man at the table stood up. He had short dread-locks and was thin. ‘All right mate? I’m Si.’ He held out his hand.

  Josh slapped rather than shook it. He looked over to Arab. ‘Beer?’ he ripped open the box on the table.

  Arab groaned.

  ‘I’ll have one,’ said Si.

  ‘Bottle opener?’ said Josh, lighting the cigarette.

  ‘You should have bought twist-tops,’ said Arab.

  Josh went into the kitchen. There was newspaper all over the floor. Some of it was wet and there were chips in the sink. ‘Fuck’s sake,’ he said, going back into the lounge and looking on the table. A Lonely Planet had been book-marked with a banana.

  ‘What about a fish slice?’ said Si. He had a ring through one of his nipples. It was thick, rubbery, and surrounded by black hair.

  ‘I wasn’t going to fry it,’ said Josh.

  Si went into the kitchen. Josh looked at Arab and shaped his thumbs and forefingers into circles then hung them from his nipples. He made a mincing movement with his hips. Si had a yellow-handled fish slice when he came back. He took one of the bottles, held it a certain way, and back-handed the fish slice up its neck. The lid looped across the room. He had strong forearms and his hand moved fast. The lids popped like they were champagne corks. Arab raised his arm and shouted, ‘Ole!’ Si put the opened bottles in front of Josh.

  ‘Your sister back from Aussie?’ said Arab.

  Josh took a bottle and pretended to throw it. Arab flinched.

  ‘You got a sister then?’ said Si, filling the pipe.

  ‘He sure does,’ said Arab.

  Josh held his bottle up and waited for the others to follow. ‘To New Year’s,’ he said.

  They all had a turn on the pipe, and then Si went to the shop.

  ‘Yep,’ said Arab burping, ‘you missed a huge one last night.’

  Josh ignored him. He walked onto the deck and called Callum. There was no answer so he left a voicemail: ‘Where the fuck are you?’ There was a chundering sound from the bathroom. The door was open and Arab was over the toilet. Josh called Callum back. The answer service kicked in and he held the phone next to the column of vomit and shouted, ‘Arab says, Happy New Year!’

  Back in the lounge, he picked up a beer and the fish slice. The lid came off, but so did a section of the bottle’s
neck. Arab came in and sat on the bed. Josh showed him the bottle top with the glass still attached, but Arab wasn’t interested. He started wiping his chin and mouth with a pillow. ‘Oh man,’ he said. There was a thundering. It was someone charging up the front stairs. Josh thought of the police and then his mum. The telescope! He was on the deck and starting down the back steps when Si came in with a bag of groceries.

  . . .

  They cooked and ate most of a packet of sausages. Then Arab, who was feeling better after another smoke, trapped a sausage in the fly of his board-shorts and went onto the deck. An old couple were in a car and when they saw Arab they smiled. Arab pretended to ride a horse in slow motion. The woman, who was in the passenger seat, made a flapping gesture at her husband and they drove off. Arab came inside with his arms raised and then pitched the sausage onto a nearby roof. Some seagulls flew down. Si refilled the pipe.

  They went to the beach with V bottles filled with beer and sat at the top of a sand dune. There were police in blue shorts and baseball caps and lifeguards in red and yellow dodging toddlers in body-suits and broad hats who ran in and out of the shallows with their arms raised like it was a hold up or a mugging, and everywhere the women wore string bikinis and hotpants and they held bottled water and designer sunglasses and fluoro beach towels and Si and Josh nudged each other and said things about tits and pussy, and Arab rolled cigarettes and told and re-told the story about the old couple and the sausage in the fly of his shorts, and when the sand gently avalanched them to the base of the dune they rampaged down the beach and pelted each other with wet sand and then hit the water like they’d been gunned down and were re-born shouting foul words at the broad blue screen of sky and then dashing back up the beach they flung themselves at the dune where the sand had been fried, no, grilled, where the sand had been in a big fuck-off oven for months, and it made their palms red and shiny and they crawled back to the top and drank hot flat beer and burped and crowed and wrestled and smoked one cigarette after another. Then Sarah came over.

  ‘What are you guys up to?’ she said. She was wearing her favourite white hat – it’s seventies fashion, you so wouldn’t understand – and a red bikini. She had an unlit cigarette.

  ‘We’re talking about love,’ said Si. He smiled at Sarah and held up his lighter.

  Sarah knelt forward to reach the flame.

  ‘We’re talking about going out to the island,’ said Josh.

  ‘You’ve been drinking a lot of V,’ Sarah said, smiling at Si.

  ‘It’s not V,’ said Arab.

  Sarah put her hand over her mouth as if surprised then tilted her head and exhaled. ‘The island?’ she said, looking at Josh. ‘You’d be scared.’

  Arab started laughing then tried to say something, but it came out as a loud hiccough. He pointed at his neck and at Josh. He went onto all fours. He was crying now and the snot coming out his nose was making black cylinders in the sand.

  ‘You’re a disgrace,’ said Josh.

  ‘The island?’ said Si. ‘Who’s got a boat?’

  ‘You don’t need one,’ said Josh. ‘You just have to get the tide right.’

  Si stood and looked. ‘See,’ Josh said, pointing to where the beach curved and made its closest point to the island.

  ‘Why would we go there?’ said Arab.

  Si made a cross with his arms over his chest and then pumped his hips with his hands on his arse. ‘The Macarena, man!’

  The others laughed.

  ‘Can I come?’ said Sarah.

  ‘No,’ said Josh. ‘Boys only.’ Then he blushed. But the others didn’t notice. They were looking at Sarah.

  Arab had left them and gone back to the bach.

  ‘Let’s start some proper drinking,’ he’d said.

  ‘What, are you scared?’ said Josh.

  ‘Nah,’ said Arab. ‘I thought the idea was to get wasted.’

  ‘C’mon man,’ said Si.

  Josh clucked and shot his head back and forward.

  ‘What?’ said Arab. ‘Like you?’ Then in a voice that was high and dramatic he said, ‘Oh, my poor neck. It’s so sore!’

  Sarah was talking to some other girls, and Josh thought he and Si had got by without being seen, but then she ran up and held Si by the elbow. ‘Si,’ she put her hand through her hair, ‘can I get some pot?’

  ‘Jesus!’ said Josh. He shoved her ahead and walked up beside her.

  ‘That’s assault,’ Sarah said.

  ‘Get your own friends,’ Josh said.

  ‘Is that what you call Arab? A friend?’

  ‘What does that mean?’ Josh said.

  Sarah looked back at Si.

  ‘Why are you walking like that?’ Josh said.

  ‘Why are you walking like that?’ she parroted.

  The carpark beside the surf-club was full. Towels dried on car bonnets, and people stood around. Tar was melting. A bogan was doing wheelies on a ten speed. Different music was coming from different cars. A rubbish bin was on fire. Two policemen on bicycles were riding towards it. Si had caught up and was walking on the other side of Sarah. She looped her arm through his and tried to do the same with Josh. ‘Piss off,’ he said.

  They drew level with the family bach.

  ‘Dad’s getting security guards,’ said Sarah. ‘He’s worried about his trees.’ She skipped up the lawn and then stopped and blew a kiss. ‘Ciao boys,’ she said.

  The beach narrowed and there were fewer people. Two children with plastic tools were excavating down by the water. Closer to the dunes a man, whose body was a mound of sand, said, ‘Nice day for it!’

  They walked on.

  ‘I heard there was a riot last year,’ said Si.

  Josh didn’t say anything. He was pissed off. He’d only suggested going to the island to get away from Sarah, but with Si so keen he couldn’t back out. Arab was right. They were supposed to be getting wasted.

  The sand-bar was almost three hundred metres long and stretched most of the way to the island. Close to halfway there was a submerged area.

  ‘Let’s do this,’ said Si. The chalky sand squeaked under their feet. A large eyeless fish-head dried in the sun. The sounds of the shore faded. Fishing boats and launches motored up and down a channel on the other side of the island. Long shadowed chutes scarred the island’s cliffs. They reached the section of water. It was moving faster than Josh remembered.

  ‘You’re sure you’ve got the tides right?’ said Si.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Josh. ‘I’ve done this plenty of times.’

  Si went in. The water got to his knees then his thighs. Josh watched. If it goes any higher, he thought. But the water was back to Si’s knees and, as it got shallower, Si kicked his feet out and ran. Josh started across. There was a nagging weight to the water and he had to walk with his feet close to the bottom. Si had made a long slow turn and zigzagged back; splashing through the water on each side of the bar. His dreadlocks clacked as he hurdled a piece of driftwood and he made another turn in front of Josh who was coming out of the water. They started sprinting. Si was much faster, but Josh felt good. They had beer and pot at the bach. His parents didn’t know where he was. They had five full days of it. He held out his hands and made a motorcycle noise. Si looked back and laughed. Sand spat up behind them and they tore towards the island.

  There was a seaweedy birdshit smell. Josh sat on a large rock. Si hopped from one rock to another and then started ripping at some mussels. A jetski pulled a 180, making a white spume in front of their bach. The beach was a snake of colour. ‘What do you reckon Stuart’s doing?’ said Si.

  ‘You mean Arab? Maybe he’s trying on your underwear.’

  Si smiled. ‘Let’s eat this,’ he held up a mussel. He smashed it against the rock and looked inside. He made a face and dropped it then climbed onto a larger rock. ‘Could you swim from here?’ he said.

  ‘Come on,’ said Josh, ‘the underwear, whose are they?’

  ‘Hey,’ said Si. He was looking down the bar. ‘It�
�s your sister.’

  ‘Bollocks,’ said Josh, but he climbed onto the rock and looked. It was Sarah. She was entering the section of water. ‘Shit,’ he said.

  She had her arms over her head though the water was only to her knees. She staggered slightly and brought her arms down so they were like wings. Josh thought he could hear her laughing. The water was over her waist now. She staggered again and this time fell. She disappeared. Her foot periscoped and then was gone. The hat was floating out to sea. Josh jumped off the rock and shouted. He started running. Si went past him. Josh tried to go faster. The jetskier had seen them and was idling nearby. His short hair was stuck back from his forehead. Si got to the water and dived forward. Josh jumped the driftwood. He couldn’t see her. He ran into the water. The sand was softer and he lost his feet. He was late getting his arms down and the water slapped his face. He came up and looked around. Si was calling out her name and spinning around. Josh went under again and clutched at the bottom. The sand went through his fingers. When he came up again he saw her. She was wiping water off her face and backing onto the beach side of the bar. Si was in the middle of the current watching her. The jetskier revved the machine hard. It leapt forward and into a turn. Sarah raised her hands to the water it laid out and laughed. Then she felt on top of her head and looked around on the sand. Her hat was floating out to sea. She ran out of the water and down the bar. ‘Josh,’ she shouted, turning and pointing. ‘My hat!’

  When she walked back her face was sad-looking, but she was doing the thing with her hips and her skin was dark and glistening. Josh got out of the water and stood on the sand opposite his sister. He looked for something to throw.

  ‘I’m piggy in the middle,’ Si said. He was still in the water, but closer to the beach side of the bar.