‘Just concentrate on your book, will you?’ She turned to face the tree-line, but over the years she had reached a level of familiarity with Dexter where it had become possible to hear an idea enter his mind, like a stone thrown into mud, and sure enough:
‘So what do you think?’
‘What?’
‘Should we?’
‘What?’
‘Take all our clothes off?’
‘No, we should nottake all our clothes off!’
‘Everyone else has!’
‘That’s no reason! And what about Rule Four?’
‘Not a rule, a guideline.’
‘No, a rule.’
‘So? We can bend it.’
‘If you bend it, it’s not a rule.’
Sulkily he flopped back down on the sand. ‘Just seems a bit rude, that’s all.’
‘Fine, you go ahead, I’ll try to tear my eyes away.’
‘No point if it’s just me,’ he mumbled petulantly.
She lay her back down once again. ‘Dexter, why on earth are you so desperate for me to take my clothes off?’
‘I just thought we might be more relaxed, with our clothes off.’
‘Unbelievable, just unbelievable—’
‘You don’t think you’d be more relaxed?’
‘NO!’
‘Why not?’
‘It doesn’t matter why not! Besides, I don’t think your girlfriend would be very pleased.’
‘Ingrid wouldn’t care. She’s very open-minded, Ingrid. She’d have had her top off at WH Smiths in the airport—’
‘Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you, Dex—’
‘You don’t disappoint me—’
‘But there’s a difference—’
‘What difference?’
‘Well Ingrid used to be a model for one thing—’
‘So? You could be a model.’
Emma laughed sharply. ‘Oh, Dexter, do you really think so?’
‘For catalogues or something. You’ve got a lovely figure.’
‘“A lovely figure”, God help me—’
‘All I’m saying is completely objectively, you’re a very attractive woman—’
‘—who is keeping her clothes on! If you’re so desperate to tan your bits, fine, go ahead. Now can we change the subject?’
He turned and lay down on his front alongside her, head resting on his arms, their elbows touching, and once again she could hear the sound of his thoughts. He nudged her with his elbow.
‘Course it’s nothing we’ve not seen before.’
Slowly she lay her book down, lifted her sunglasses onto her forehead, her face resting sideways on her forearms, the mirror of him.
‘Beg pardon?’
‘I’m just saying that neither of has got anything that the other hasn’t seen before. Nudity-wise.’ She stared. ‘That night, remember? After the graduation party? Our one night of love?’
‘Dexter?’
‘I’m just saying it’s not as if we’ve got any surprises, genitally-speaking.’
‘I think I’m going to be sick—’
‘You know what I mean—’
‘It was a long time ago—’
‘Not that long. If I close my eyes, I can picture it—’
‘Don’t do that—’
‘Yep, there you are—’
‘It was dark—’
‘Not that dark—’
‘I was drunk—’
‘That’s what they always say—’
‘ They?Who’s they?’
‘And you weren’t that drunk—’
‘Drunk enough to lower my standards. Besides, as I recall nothing happened.’
‘Well I wouldn’t call it nothing, not from where I was laying. “Lying”? “Laying” or “lying”?’
‘Lying. I was young, I didn’t know any better. In fact I’ve blanked it out, like a car crash.’
‘Well I haven’t. If I close my eyes I can picture you right now, silhouetted against the morning light, your discarded dungarees splayed provocatively on the Habitat dhurri—’
She tapped him sharply on the nose with her book.
‘Ow!’
‘Look I’m not taking my clothes off, alright? And I wasn’t wearing dungarees, I’ve never worn dungarees in my life.’ She retrieved her book, then started to laugh quietly to herself.
‘What’s funny?’ he asked.
‘“Habitat dhurri”.’ She laughed and looked at him fondly. ‘You make me laugh sometimes.’
‘Do I?’
‘Every now and then. You should be on television.’
Gratified, he smiled and closed his eyes. He had in fact retained a vivid mental picture of Emma from that night, lying on the single bed, naked except for the skirt around her waist, her arms thrown up above her head as they kissed. He thought about this, and eventually fell asleep.
In the late afternoon they returned to the room, tired and sticky and tingling from the sun, and there it was again: the bed. They stepped around it and walked out onto the balcony that overlooked the sea, hazy now as the sky shaded from blue into the pink of the evening.
‘So. Who wants first shower?’
‘You go ahead. I’m going to sit out here and read.’
She lay on the faded sun-lounger in the evening shade, listening to the sound of the running water and trying to concentrate on the tiny typeface of her Russian novel, which seemed to be getting smaller with each page. She stood suddenly and crossed to the small fridge that they’d filled with water and beer, took a can and noticed that the bathroom door had swung open.
There was no shower curtain, and she could see Dexter standing side on beneath the cold water, eyes closed against the spray, head back, arms raised. She noticed his shoulder blades, the long brown back, the two hollows at the base of his spine above the small white bottom. But oh God, he was turning now, and the can of beer slipped through her hand and exploded, fizzing and foaming, propelling itself noisily around the floor. She threw a towel over it as if capturing some wild rodent, then looked up to see Dexter, her platonic friend, naked except for his clothes held loosely in front of him. ‘Slipped out of my hand!’ she said, stamping the beer foam into the towel and thinking eight more days and nights of this and I will self-combust.
Then it was her turn to shower. She closed the door, washed the beer from her hands then contorted herself as she struggled to undress in the tiny, humid bathroom that still smelt of his aftershave.
Rule Four required that Dexter go and stand on the balcony while she dried herself and got dressed but after some experimentation he found that if he kept his sunglasses on and turned his head just so, he could see her reflection in the glass door as she struggled to rub lotion onto the low parabola of her newly tanned back. He watched the wriggle of her hips as she pulled on her underwear, the concave curve of her back and arch of shoulder blades as she fastened her bra, the raised arms and the blue summer dress coming down like a curtain.
She joined him on the balcony.
‘Maybe we should just stay here,’ he said. ‘Instead of island-hopping, hang out here for a week, then back to Rhodes then home.’
She smiled. ‘Okay. Maybe.’
‘Don’t think you’d get bored?’
‘I don’t think so.’
‘Happy then?’
‘Well my face feels like a grilled tomato, but apart from that—’
‘Let me see.’
Closing her eyes she turned towards him and lifted her chin, her hair still wet and combed back off her face, which was shiny and scrubbed clean. It was Emma, but all new. She glowed, and he thought of the words sun-kissed, then thought kiss her, take hold of her face and kiss her.
She opened her eyes suddenly. ‘What now?’ she said.
‘Whatever you want.’
‘Game of Scrabble?’
‘I have my limits.’
‘Okay, how about dinner. Apparently they have this thing called Greek Salad.’
The restaurants in the small town were remarkable for being all identical. The air hung smoky with burning lamb, and they sat in a quiet place at the end of the harbour where the crescent of the beach began and drank wine that tasted of pine.
‘Christmas trees,’ said Dexter.
‘Disinfectant,’ said Emma.
Music played from speakers concealed in the plastic vines, Madonna’s ‘Get into the Groove’ performed on the zither. They ate stale bread rolls, burnt lamb, salad soused in acetic acid, all of which tasted just fine. After a while even the wine became delicious, like some interesting mouthwash, and soon Emma felt ready to break Rule Two. No flirting.
