We walked into the bungalow, the darkness a welcome relief after the intense midday sun. Coral Bay exists somewhere in that unhappy in-between where the number of tourists has exceeded the available facilities but has not yet reached the critical mass required for investors to lay down their cash and build new amenities. The shanty town of prefab bungalows and caravan slabs is in direct contrast to the open field, scruffy camping ground and solitary dive shop I remember from a childhood visit. Coral Bay has moved on in exactly the way Rottness hasn’t. This is not a good thing.

The bungalow is simple. As I lug the esky through the front door, I note the layout, an open common room and two rooms each with two beds. Makes it easy, I figure, as I try and work out how to get the fridge going. T & I in one room, Katy and Ad in the other. No worries. I go back outside, walk up the hill to where the car is parked and fossick around the boot for my bag. When I return, T has thrown her stuff on one of the beds and is trying to find her sunblock. Ad sprawls across the other, dead to the world. I catch T’s eye and point at her snoring brother, mouth, “what?!!” She shrugs and turns away. Looks defeated.

I wander back to the common room at sit at the table. Ad’s not a dumb guy, he wouldn’t take that bed unless he had a reason and for the moment, the only reason I can think of is to piss me off. So, I sit and muse for a while with a glass of tap water that tastes like chlorine and think of what to say. After a while T comes back in and sits down. I’m just about to ask her what’s going on when the front door bangs open and afternoon sun floods into the common room. Katy.

Everyone has a type of person that pushes all their buttons in exactly the wrong way. I have a friend who hates salesmen. Cannot fucking stand them. Regardless of how polite or discreet they are, he’ll sit there and glare daggers at them; as if their very existence is an attack on his character. It doesn’t matter if they have no intention of approaching him directly, they just have to be in the vicinity and you can see him hunch over and tense up.

I’m certainly not immune. For me, it’s holier than thou religious types. Boy do they make me steam.

I fully respect and sanction believing in whichever deity you choose. That’s entirely your prerogative. However, when you quietly scold me for declining to visit a Sunday service; When you look down on me for not thanking an invisible entity in the sky for the “miraculous” provision of an empty parking space; When you raise your eyebrows and glare pointedly after an exclaimed, “God, no way! You’re shitting me?!” When every single thing you say to me is loaded and heaped with condescension. Well, then, I’m afraid we have a problem.

Katy and I had a problem.

I’m sure that T was quite conscious that leaving her and I alone together for more than about twenty minutes would result in a very special kind of fiery meltdown.

“This isn’t too bad. Where are the beds?” She has a habit of doing this, throwing herself into conversations without the peremptory introductions. Never a “Hi” or a “Hello” but straight to the point. Usually it’s cool, sometimes it grates. Like this time. She asks T if she’s sharing a room with her and T says no, she’ll share with me. “I want Adrian with you guys.” And there it is. I sit there in disbelief. She doesn’t even pause, just walks into her room and closes the door. Doesn’t look at me. The door clicks shut and T and I sit there, neither saying a word.

I have momentarily lost the ability to speak. T is twenty five for fuck’s sake, and she’s just been addressed like she was eight. We’ve just been addressed like we were eight. I am fuming.

I stand up and walk outside.

Posted in Mwah on Thursday December 22, 2005.

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