The boat
WHEN WE REACHED THE tower the man stopped, put his bag down and the way he
shaded his eyes and looked out over the sea could have been a caricature of me
on La Gomera peering out towards the island, an imitation of everyone who
stares at the horizon and wishes they were some place else.
He kept looking, but there was nothing to see but the unending waves of the
ocean, the great vastness of it all making the island appear transient and exposed,
one giant swelling tide and it would be gone, wiped from the map, perhaps the
tower remaining to remind seafarers of the impermanence of all things, even
those we hold as true and dear.
I looked back the way we had come as if at the past and knew that, even when
I returned, I would not be the same, that my life had already changed, each step
that I took invisibly unpicking and remaking the fabric of my being. When I set
out for the island with nothing, not even my clothes, it was as if I had thrown
myself on fate. It was fate that would now deliver me into the reality of who I
was, not who I pretended to be, that multiple persona who changed for Bobby,
my parents, for old friends, my colleagues at work, for celebrities I met through
my job.
We are all chameleons acting out different roles, trying to find the role that
suits us best. As I stood at the top of the hill in that unknown place, it felt as if
the atoms and cells of my body were at that very moment dividing and
reforming, that another version of myself was rising to the surface and, like a
negative in a tray of chemicals, a more authentic picture of that girl who had set
out in search of adventure was about to appear. I was terrified of the man, of the
power he had over me, but my fear was contained in a heightened sense of self.
Within my fear, I experienced a sense of being at centre stage, no longer an
observer watching life, but the star of my own implausible production.
The air blustering about the tower was briny and pure and tasted as if it had
been charged with an extra shot of oxygen. Just as we had stopped at the tower,
the sun seemed to have stopped in its progress across the sky, the slow steady heat baking my skin and putting a vibrant tint on the colours of everything
around me: the sea and sky, the black rock, the green cactus plants, the intense
red and yellow blooms of wild flowers. It was as if the veil had been lifted from
my eyes and I was seeing everything more clearly. Far out to sea the faint mist
was turning to cloud and I thought there would be a storm when night fell.
The tower was a little taller than me and was probably the remains of an
ancient lighthouse. It was circular and made of blocks of stone cut from the rock.
The island, too, was perfectly circular, the tower like a pert nipple on the low
hill.
The sensuality of the landscape, the fact of being naked in the sun, was
inhibiting my judgment, lessening my fears. I dug my nails once more into my
palms to wake myself up, to remind myself what had happened to me. This
wasn't a holiday romance, a diversion. I was a prisoner, beaten and abused. It
was hard to keep that fact lodged in the front of my mind, even with my bottom
tingling still, even with the taste of the man's sperm in my mouth.
It was so weird having been bent over by a stranger and spanked, so bizarre
having his urine drying on my skin, my conscious mind seemed to be rejecting
that fact and dwelling on the beauty of nature, the warmth of the day, the wild
flowers, the scent of the sea air. I had to keep my wits about me. I didn't want to
antagonise my captor. The worst that he could do to me he had surely already
done. I had to go along with him without complaint, lull him into a sense of
security until I found a way to escape.
I took a deep breath and calmed myself. If there was a bright side, and usually
there is, I hadn't been harmed, not really, and if nothing else I was getting the
overall tan I'd always wanted. The thought went through me and I shuddered
with the shame of my own stupidity. Escape. That was the only answer.
The man still scanned the horizon, for what I wondered, a boat, the past, a
message?
From the tower, I could see at the bottom of the hill the roofs of some
buildings and, as we set off down the rugged path towards them, I wasn't sure if
I should feel more afraid or faintly relieved. Surely, there would be someone
there who could help me? Someone who spoke English. Girls can't just be
tethered, led around without any clothes on, used as a urinal. I had decided to
behave myself for now, but when I was free to report the man, bring him to
justice, get my revenge.
My resolve made putting one unshod foot before the other easier as the path
curved down to the sea. We walked along the dunes above the beach. The
buildings turned out to be two sheds that could have been built from driftwood
and thrown up by the wind. They were roofed in corrugated plastic sheets of heat baking my skin and putting a vibrant tint on the colours of everything
around me: the sea and sky, the black rock, the green cactus plants, the intense
red and yellow blooms of wild flowers. It was as if the veil had been lifted from
my eyes and I was seeing everything more clearly. Far out to sea the faint mist
was turning to cloud and I thought there would be a storm when night fell.
The tower was a little taller than me and was probably the remains of an
ancient lighthouse. It was circular and made of blocks of stone cut from the rock.
The island, too, was perfectly circular, the tower like a pert nipple on the low
hill.
The sensuality of the landscape, the fact of being naked in the sun, was
inhibiting my judgment, lessening my fears. I dug my nails once more into my
palms to wake myself up, to remind myself what had happened to me. This
wasn't a holiday romance, a diversion. I was a prisoner, beaten and abused. It
was hard to keep that fact lodged in the front of my mind, even with my bottom
tingling still, even with the taste of the man's sperm in my mouth.
It was so weird having been bent over by a stranger and spanked, so bizarre
having his urine drying on my skin, my conscious mind seemed to be rejecting
that fact and dwelling on the beauty of nature, the warmth of the day, the wild
flowers, the scent of the sea air. I had to keep my wits about me. I didn't want to
antagonise my captor. The worst that he could do to me he had surely already
done. I had to go along with him without complaint, lull him into a sense of
security until I found a way to escape.
I took a deep breath and calmed myself. If there was a bright side, and usually
there is, I hadn't been harmed, not really, and if nothing else I was getting the
overall tan I'd always wanted. The thought went through me and I shuddered
with the shame of my own stupidity. Escape. That was the only answer.
The man still scanned the horizon, for what I wondered, a boat, the past, a
message?
From the tower, I could see at the bottom of the hill the roofs of some
buildings and, as we set off down the rugged path towards them, I wasn't sure if
I should feel more afraid or faintly relieved. Surely, there would be someone
there who could help me? Someone who spoke English. Girls can't just be
tethered, led around without any clothes on, used as a urinal. I had decided to
behave myself for now, but when I was free to report the man, bring him to
justice, get my revenge.
My resolve made putting one unshod foot before the other easier as the path
curved down to the sea. We walked along the dunes above the beach. The
buildings turned out to be two sheds that could have been built from driftwood
and thrown up by the wind. They were roofed in corrugated plastic sheets of different colours and I imagined those, too, had been carried to shore on the tide.
Beyond the sheds in a grove of bent pines I could now see several huts built
from black stone with thatched roofs. They seemed to be abandoned and mostly
in ruins. If there had ever been a community on the island it had long since gone.
Beyond the first shed, there was a bay hidden from view below a wall of rock.
The inlet was ringed with volcanic outcroppings coated in cockle shells, which
made a natural harbour and protected the black sand beach where the remains of
three old fishing boats lay like dead animals on their sides. There were two
rubber Zodiacs, heavily patched, looking anything but seaworthy, one half in and
half out of the water, the other pulled up on the sand.
As we drew closer to the bay, I began to think we were completely alone, just
the two of us, and was processing the implications of this when another man
popped up from behind the beached Zodiac. He had been working on the
outboard motor and shook his head in an irritated gesture that revealed that
whatever he had been trying to do, he had not been able to do it. He approached,
wiping oil from his hands with a greasy rag. He said something to my man, and
they didn't exactly shake hands, but touched their fingers lightly together.
The newcomer was dressed in a similar fashion as the beachcomber in a black
tunic and matching black turban. He was younger with a precise pointed beard
and clear lively eyes that studied me with the concentrated gaze of a scientist
looking at a rare specimen through a microscope. He said something and the
other man laughed. The younger man pinched my narrow waist as if to show
there wasn't much meat on me and then took a grip on my breasts, turning to the
other man as if to say they at least were satisfactory.
They carried on talking and I wasn't sure what to do, what to say. Their
language was completely unknown to me; with French, Spanish, Italian, even
German I could have understood something, but their guttural sounds held no
clue to their meaning and I was trying to follow the conversation by studying
their impenetrable features. They moved down the beach to look more closely at
the open outboard and I followed automatically, as if my will had gone. When
they finished discussing the problems with the motor, I plucked up the courage
and took a step closer to the man in the black tunic.
'Can you help me, please,' I said. 'Do you speak English? Habla usted
español? Parlez vous francais?'
He stood back as if in shock and shouted at me, waving his fist as if I had
done some terrible thing. He then spoke to the beachcomber and they both
laughed.
'I haven't done anything,' I said.
The man in black stared at me, sealed my lips with a stiff greasy finger and said a single word I did understand. 'Shush,' he hissed.
He then waved his finger at me as you may wave a finger at a naughty puppy.
That's what I was in their eyes. I was secured by a leather thong, a dog being
trained to behave itself. I stared at the man and he stared back until I lowered my
eyes.
My captor removed the conch shell from his bag and the man in black turned
it through his hands like a connoisseur with a rare gemstone. He examined the
pink glaze on the inner lip of the shell, running the tips of his fingers over the
smooth surface. He looked up and, as our eyes met, I knew instinctively what
was going through his mind. He gave the conch back to the other man and then
did something revolting and inexcusable. He ran the side of his hand like a saw
between my legs, opening the pink lips of my vagina. I tried to back away, but
his hand slid around my waist and he held me still as he wormed his fingers up
inside me. He removed his hand and showed me his palm slicked and shiny with
discharge. I couldn't believe he had done this and I couldn't understand why I
was wet.
The man rubbed his fingers together, held them to his nose and stared at me at
the same time. I would have slapped him across the face, but couldn't with my
hands tied behind my back. I understood how controlling this is, that with your
hands bound in this way you can really do nothing but accept what happens to
you just as the wind-bent pines bend to the prevailing wind. I was gritting my
teeth. My knees felt weak. My heart was pounding in my chest. I had thought as
I stood at the foot of the tower that being in the hands of fate was liberating, but
it was confining, too. I was imprisoned by the whims and lusts of others.
The two men now started arguing, shrugging, raising their voices, turning
away and turning back again. This went on for several minutes. The man in
black was punching the palm of his hand. The beachcomber was shaking his
head and making a clucking sound with his tongue.
'Agh. Agh. Agh,' he kept saying.
The man in black finally took out some money, three or four folded notes, and
slapped them down on the side of the Zodiac. My man looked at the money,
shook his head and the other man angrily grabbed the money, stuck it back in his
tunic and went back to work on the outboard motor.
We turned away and were making our way towards the sheds when the man in
black shouted what sounded like a terrible insult. My man stopped, threw up his
palms as if in defeat and we returned once again. The man repairing the motor
wiped his hands on the same filthy cloth, drew out his money and counted out
five 10 euro notes that the beachcomber squirreled away in his blue tunic.
It was only at that moment that I realised that the two men had not been shouting at each other in anger. They were bartering over the price for that
bonded piece of bric-a-brac. I was valued at 50 euros, the price of a meal in a
good Barcelona restaurant.
Had I been sold, I wondered? Or was this a rental? Was I now a hooker and
the man in blue my pimp? Was this how he made his living, searching for conch
shells with pink lips and stray girls washed up on the beach? Was that what I had
become, an object to be sold or hired or exchanged?
Yes, that's exactly what I was. I had stopped being the girl who catches the
bus along the Fulham Road with its cinemas and antique shops and bars and
restaurants. I was no longer the girl who, with the toss of her long blonde hair
and her pouty lips, had entrée to every club in the West End. I was no longer one
half of a happening item. I was merchandise in the market. I was a slave like the
people once stolen from Africa.
The younger man studied his prize. He felt my breasts, did that revolting thing
of running his hand between my legs and, as if I were a horse, he even looked at
my teeth; the only thing that appeared to impress him, good private dentistry and
not one single filling.
'Please, please don't …'
'Shush,' he said.
He took out a worn knife with an ivory handle and a curved blade that
gleamed in the sun. He turned me around and slashed through the leather thong
binding my wrist. He then pushed me down over the rounded hull of the Zodiac.
He said something which I assumed was 'don't move,' and I lay there with my
bottom in the air and my waist resting over the thick rubber sides of the
inflatable boat.
The beachcomber, my owner, had moved around the bay and sat in the shade
of one of the beached fishing boats with a clear view of the action. He crossed
his legs and lit another cigarette.
The younger man used his foot to spread my legs wider and I had never felt
more exposed, more ashamed, with my bottom in the air, still smarting from
being spanked, and my wet pussy pushing through my thighs. The man started
massaging and smacking my bottom; not hard, but what on another occasion I
may have described as playfully. I heard him spit. As his moistened finger
pressed at the delicate ring of my anus, a surge of fierce, uncontrollable anger
rose up through me. I pushed myself up from the Zodiac, turned and slapped him
across the face.
The sound rang out like a gunshot. I heard a bird lift on flapping wings from
the undergrowth and fly like a stray thought across the empty sky.
The man didn't look angry. He was amused. He lifted his hand to slap me back and, as I raised my hands to protect my face, he slapped my breasts, first
one breast, then the other. I am not sure why this was so shocking, but it was. I
hit him again, and he hit me again, two swift blows as if my breasts were
punching bags. Tears streamed from my eyes and a scream rose into my throat.
'You bastard,' I cried.
I rushed at him. I got my hands around his throat and tried to throttle him. But
men are always stronger. He took a firm grip on my wrists, pulled my hands
down, turned me around and shoved me back against the black rubber Zodiac.
The beachcomber was grinning, his brown teeth on show, the cigarette in the
crook of his fingers.
I caught a glimpse of the man in black as he stepped away from the Zodiac
and grabbed a curving strip of bamboo from what looked like the remains of a
beached lobster trap. He snapped the bamboo in half and I heard the two-
tongued cane come down through the air with a screeching sound that made me
shudder. He did it again once more and, the third time, the cane bit like the teeth
of a serpent into the soft flesh of my bottom.
I wailed in agony. I wasn't going to take this. I pushed myself up again, my
fists clenched, but before I could hit him, the man caught me by the shoulders,
held me still and stared into my eyes. He spoke slowly, his voice low and
threatening. It didn't matter that I couldn't understand a word. He turned me
round and pushed me back against the side of the Zodiac, the weight of my body
springing me back up and, as it did so, that terrible cane came down once more,
the two sinewy fingers biting into my flesh, the pain like no pain I could ever
have imagined or will ever be able to fully describe: a pure, unmodified pain, the
pain of loss, perhaps, a pain beyond the physical, a pain that touches your soul
and reshapes the strands of your DNA.
What fight there was in me had gone. I lay slumped on the black rubber hull
of the boat, tears falling from my eyes, snot falling from my nose, my body
trembling involuntarily. I had to take this, I had to take everything and, when the
moment was right, when fate was on my side, I would flee. If it took the whole
of my life, I would escape.
The bamboo cane rose up again, the air split like ripping fabric, and two
lightning stripes of sheer agony carved their cruel message into my flesh. It felt
as if the first four pairs of smarting wounds were kindling and the last two twins
of evil lit a forest fire that burned up my spine and down over my thighs. My
body was coated in sweat and I could smell the pungent whiff of the
beachcomber's piss coming back to life on my clammy skin. Somewhere at the
back of my mind was the fleeting thought that having my bottom spanked and
sucking off the man who had found me on the beach hadn't been so bad after all; that there had been a perverse pleasure in the obscenity of being defiled in this
way.
I was aware that the man behind me was lifting the cane one more time, but
before it came down across my bottom, the beachcomber shouted at him. There
was a moment's pause, the earth stood still, and the man in black tossed the
instrument of torture back on the sand.
A wave of gratitude went through me as my cheeks were prised apart and the
man's cock entered my pussy as a shark glides through the sea. I should have
been dry and tense. I wasn't. I was an ocean. I don't know why. I was drenched
with sweat and fruity discharge. The man's erection slid into the depths of my
vaginal passage, he drew back and pushed in again, the springy side of the
Zodiac making the action effortless, even graceful.
Something had happened to me. Some wires had crossed. The pain from being
beaten with that cane was beyond words, but the pain immediately began to
diminish. It was as if my mind and body had drifted apart. I hated the man. I felt
abused, ashamed, hysterical. And yet, and yet, my body felt a relief, from the
pain, yes, but also from all the pent up fears and anxieties and uncertainties of
life.
This man, this stranger, was fucking me. Fucking me. Fucking me. In and out.
In and out.
Fucking me.
Fucking me.
It wasn't a word I ever used for the act of making love. But we weren't
making love. I was being fucked. And I realised that I had never been fucked
before. This was a first. I had lost my virginity before I left school. There had
been several boys since then, not that many, not compared with most of my
friends. But that was the problem. They were boys. They didn't know what
foreplay was. They didn't know how a girl's body reacts to different stimulus.
And I didn't know either. Not until now.
I had been terrified, beaten, despoiled and now I was being well and truly
fucked. The pressure from his thrusting penis was nursing and nudging my
clitoris and I realised with horror that I was pushing back, I was spreading my
thighs wider and drawing him in deeper. I wanted more. I wanted his hard cock
to tease and tickle all those nerve endings and pleasure points that had never
been reached before.
Fuck me. Fuck me. Fuck me.
I heard the words echo round the little bay and over the sea and couldn't
believe it was my voice coming back to me.
Fuck me. Fuck me. Fuck me.
The man in black gripped my hip bone in one hand and began to slap the side
of my bottom with the other hand like he was clutching a riding crop and driving
a horse to the finishing line, the beat of those slaps keeping pace with the
pumping thrust of his cock and the pounding rhythm of my heart.
Fuck me. Fuck me. Fuck me.
My voice was a whisper now. My mind had gone to mush. My body didn't
belong to me. It belonged to that driving hard length of oiled cock drilling into
the depths of my soul. My eyes were closed. I was biting my bottom lip. This
was the fuck of my life.
He started to come and, at that precise moment, I had my first real climax. My
body shook and went into spasm. My breath came in short, sharp gasps and, to
my eternal shame, I screamed not in pain but in pleasure as that cruel cock
ignited my orgasm.
Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.
I was quivering, wiggling my ass, my vagina muscles holding on to that cock
like it was a hand reaching out in the darkness. He took hold of my hipbones, he
pushed into me as hard as he could, and I had a sense that while thrashing me
with the cane and fucking me from behind had only been for his own bestial
pleasure, he was now allowing me to ride the last fading ripples of my orgasm
before he withdrew.
He fell across my back, satisfied and exhausted. I lay beneath his weight,
shuddering and ashamed. What the hell was happening to me? A man beats my
backside with a stick and then I start coming in a tidal wave, the little
aftershocks still running through my trembling body. His cock was still stiff
inside me and I felt our juices trickle down my thighs. He said something and
there was laughter in his voice as he pushed himself up from me. He slapped me,
not that hard, but enough to awaken the pain in those ten razor welts scored
across my bottom and the contractions from my orgasm let go with another little
rumble like the last seismic shifts from an earthquake.
The beachcomber had come to his feet. He looked impressed, with me or the
man in black, I wasn't sure. I closed my eyes and lowered my head. I had done
something depraved and wicked. Surely beaten girls don't have orgasms when
they are violated by strangers. Was I a freak? Was I a fallen woman fit for
nothing but fucking? What had happened to me since I scrambled ashore on this
degenerate little island?
My stomach was wet with sweat and I slipped down over the black rubber hull
of the boat on to my knees. I remained there, panting for breath, and then stood
defiantly to face the man who had thrashed me.
'Satisfied?' I said. He must have guessed what it meant and shouted something to the other man.
Best fifty euros I'll ever spend?
That's what I imagined he remarked, but of course he could just as well have
said, not worth the money, you old crook!
He looked back at me, grabbed his own crotch, said something open to myriad
interpretations and laughed.
It occurred to me that, had the men been English, or even spoken English,
what they had done to me would have been even more of an indignity, that the
absence of any other mode of communication made using me in this brutish
manner the only logical form of communication when two lone men on a
deserted island come unexpectedly upon a naked girl. Would two Englishmen or
two Americans on an island with an African or Oriental girl have behaved the
same way? I think they probably would.
As I had already construed, my nudity was an open invitation few men would
have turned down, my breasts with prominent nipples, my saucy bottom that had
been slapped by strangers in night clubs on more than one occasion, much to my
annoyance and Bobby's amusement. My own craven, immodest display was
bound to get me into trouble, and I must have known that when I threw my
sunglasses back on my towel and set off like Christopher Columbus into the
unknown.
Why did the men both beat me before sticking their dicks into my body? Was
it to make me more receptive, more submissive to their demands? I knew that
there was an erotic side to spanking and corporal punishment, like with anal sex
and threesomes, and all girls think about those things. But I would never in a
million years have thought it would happen to me. It was weird and worrying
that I had been so wet before the man in black released in me that astonishing
orgasm. And why now did I feel so energised; so contented?
The questions ran without answers in a continuous loop through my thoughts.
My body hummed like a recharged battery. Sperm trickled down the insides of
my legs. The bird that had flown out from the undergrowth returned to its former
position as if to show that the world was once more in balance. The man who
had fucked me made his way towards one of the fishing boats where he pissed
over the flaking paint of the hull. At least he's well-mannered, I thought. The
beachcomber was making his way towards the sheds, each step taking him
further away from me.
I watched the beachcomber. I looked back at the man pissing. This was my
chance.
I turned and ran across the sand into the sea, striking out and swimming in a
fast crawl, legs kicking, my body filled with strange energy. I must have been about a hundred yards from shore when it occurred to me that I had crossed the
island. I wasn't swimming back to La Gomera, but out into the empty ocean.
Next stop the Statue of Liberty. I paused, treading water, and looked back.
The men were standing on the beach, eyes shaded like two figures in a still
life. I could see tendrils of grey smoke drifting from their mouths. If they were
concerned as they smoked their cigarettes, they didn't show it. They must have
known that I would see the futility of this attempt at escape and turn back. If I
had tried to circle the island, they would put to sea in the Zodiac that obviously
had a functioning outboard.
My flight had been useless, but I enjoyed it anyway. I had made a show of
courage and independence. The salt water washed the old beachcomber's piss
from my body and douched the other man's sperm from my vagina. The sting
was fading from the welts across my bottom. I felt clean and revitalised. They
were stronger than me. They could hurt me, abuse me, fuck me. But they hadn't
broken me. My time would come, I thought, as I swam lazily back to shore.
They watched, expressionless, unconcerned. Unless I could steal one of those
boats, there was no escape from the island.
The man in black went back to repairing the outboard on the Zodiac and I
followed the other man towards the shed above the dunes. He paused at the
entrance and, as he scanned the horizon, I couldn't help wondering if, when I
had been swimming out to sea, the two men hadn't been observing me at all, but
were watching the horizon for the same illusive something the man who'd
captured me seemed to have been looking for when we paused earlier at the
tower. That illusive something on the sea could only be a boat and again I felt
confident that help was on the way.
I looked up at the sky. The sun was still immobile. It had seemed as if a
lifetime had passed since I swam away from La Gomera, but it was probably no
more than a few hours, three at the most. It must have been a little after midday
when I first saw that speck of rock out in the sea. Now, I was getting hungry and
would have adored a late lunch, some grilled prawns and fresh bread with olive
oil, a cold glass of white wine, a siesta.
Inside the shed the smell of fish lingered on the dry air but it was clearly long
ago when that shed had last been used by fishermen to sort their catch. Along
one wall, supported by posts, was a wide shelf at table height. Below the shelf,
flat wooden crates were stacked up, the sides stamped with the curlicue lettering
of an alphabet I had never seen before; Arabic, perhaps, although it could have
been from the language of the people who must once have lived in the black
stone huts beyond the bay.
All along the shelf, like a display in a museum, were hundreds of objects that had washed ashore, wooden chests, some ancient with engraved brass stays and
locks; porcelain cups, aluminium candlesticks, oil lamps; a painting I was sure
was the work of Picasso; plastic and alabaster figures, toy soldiers; a spear, a
bow, a quiver of arrows. There was a big copper kettle ornamented in brass –
Russian, I thought; some small barrels marked Jerez and bottles like strange
works of art in various shapes and shades, the glass glistening in the light
angling through the plastic sheeting. Above the display on a narrow shelf where
knives and gutting tools would no doubt have once been kept, was a line of china
dolls and rubber dolls, mostly naked, their blue and green and brown unblinking
eyes following me as I moved along the exhibit.
At the far end of the shelf was an arrangement of sea shells, judiciously
chosen and displayed, each with its own colouring and contours, unique like
fingerprints. The beachcomber unpacked the conch from his bag and the way he
set it down and moved it fractionally for best effect showed a sensitivity that was
all the more surprising seeing how after sucking his cock he had pissed on me.
He turned back from the display with a look of pride and for some reason I
smiled. He said something, his expression like a painter at a gallery opening, and
seemed to appreciate my nod of approval.
'You're a genius,' I said, and he revealed his row of brown broken teeth as he
grinned.
From the shelf above the display, he found a length of leather thong and
removed the pendant from his tunic. As he fastened the pendant around his neck,
I noticed that it was a gold coin with the raised head of what looked like a
conquistador. He saw that I was studying the medallion and repeated that gesture
with his thumb and fingers to show that it was worth a lot more than 50 euros.
On the other side of the shed, some stone blocks taken, I suspected, from the
abandoned huts, had been set up to create a hearth. On the wall, among a heap of
blackened pots and wooden spoons, was a calendar from the year 2000 showing,
of all things, a photograph of the Twin Towers in New York, and I remembered
being 13 and starting at senior school, the new millennium arriving with its
uncertainty and symbolism. The picture of the towers seemed prophetic in that
shed somewhere off the coast of Africa and I wondered if in being there –
hanging from a rusty nail – there was some significance other than expressing
for the beachcomber an enduring idea of home.
As he broke kindling to light a fire, he noticed there was insufficient wood
and, fluttering his hand, sent me out to collect more. As I made my way towards
the exit, he called and pointed at the sacking bag. His body language as he spoke
reminded me of my mother and seemed to say think before you act, or look
before you leap, as she was always telling me. After being inside the shed, the light outside was brilliant and I missed my
sunglasses; I missed my sunglasses more than I missed my clothes. The bay was
littered with wood and, as I filled the bag, I was overwhelmed once more by
conflicting emotions. I should have been neurotic and trembling with fear, but
my fear appeared to have gone. I wasn't exactly happy, that would be an
exaggeration, but neither was I downcast being there on the beach stretching my
limbs, breathing the clean air, the tide receding behind a ring of seaweed
humming with tiny flies. That other girl, the one in the denim skirt and red heels,
was a million miles away and from out of those cute little costumes of the
chrysalis a butterfly had emerged in a suit of new colours; a wild creature being
slowly tamed, a naked girl with perspiration glistening on her skin and an
inexplicable feeling of contentment in her belly.
After being bent over the hull of the boat and fucked to a braying climax, it
didn't exactly feel natural walking about naked, but it didn't seem to matter
much either. When I had first set off swimming to the island without wearing a
costume, I had felt daring. Then I began to feel ashamed. Now, my shame was
vague as I noted that the man in black working on the Evinrude motor didn't
even bother to look at me as I was bending over next to him to gather another
piece of wood. After being fucked and beaten, nothing worse could happen. I
wasn't safe. But I didn't feel as if I were in danger either. I was just being; living
in the present without a past and the future uncertain, as the future always is.
The bag was full and my man in blue looked pleased as I unloaded it next to
the fire. He added the wood to the flames, placed a huge metal pot on the
improvised grill and poured in water from a large plastic bottle that was new, not
washed ashore, and my confidence that a boat would soon be arriving put a
spring in my step when the man waved me back out to collect more wood.
On the far side of the fishing boat furthest from the shed, the hull was torn
open and I pulled off some long dry planks, making the hole bigger. I crawled
inside with some daft idea that I might find something to help in my escape, but
there was nothing there and the big crab that scurried by almost scared me to
death. I pushed my way out, took a peep at the man in black, he was still
absorbed by the faulty motor, and squatted down to pee, the first chance I'd had
to do so in private. I gave myself a little shake, there was no paper, and it was an
odd pleasure relieving myself in the open air. The smell of my pee was rich and
spicy, and I could understand why boys on country walks were always pulling
out their dicks and spraying trees.
The sky above was clear blue like a sheet of silk. I wriggled my toes in the
black sand. I was anxious to return to my old life, even though I knew my old
life would never be the same again. I wanted to get away, I was dying to away, but as I sat at that moment on the sand watching a seagull skimming the
surface of the waves, I experienced a complete calm, an inner stillness in
absolute contrast to how I should have been feeling. Had a man violated me on
La Gomera, I would have been crazed with rage and anger; I would have felt
degraded, used, ruined. But here in this unknown place, all rules and certainties
had changed, evolved or regressed. Without money, a passport, my mobile,
without a stitch of clothing, what mattered wasn't what these two men thought of
me, what I imagined other people may have thought, or what I thought of
myself. Like natives who run naked in the jungle, like nomads in primitive
times, nothing mattered except survival. I had never faced a real challenge and
my determination to survive now made me feel totally alive and living in the
present tense.
I felt my breasts. They were firm, my nipples a deep dark red and jutting out
like two hard knuckles. Little spasms were still erupting in my vagina, a pulsing
sensation like the sparkles left from fireworks. As I thought about the man
gliding into my wet pussy my heart beat faster and the breath caught in my
throat. It was specious and shameful. I had been beaten into submission only to
discover that there was promiscuous pleasure to be found in being taken against
your will.
It was hard to reconcile the gravity of my situation with my body's serene
response. I was a little English girl with two wild men. They could kill me,
weigh me down with stones, feed me to the fish. Whatever they wanted to do to
me, I couldn't stop them. But I knew deep down that all they wanted to do is
what men always want to do, and that is treat a woman like an object and fuck
her until she screams in ecstasy, her moment of rapture a mark of their virility
and power. I was certain every man in every night club in the West End would
want to do the same as those two men, and I had made it easy by appearing on
the island naked without a word to explain myself in their language.
My bottom felt warm, not tender, but glowing, a tacit reminder of being
flogged. I rolled back and sprang to my feet in one flowing motion. I twisted
round, brushed away the sand, and the six red stripes that marked my flesh
appeared like a stigmata, like the brand owners apply to animals and slaves to
show who they belong to.
It was time to go back to work. I filled the bag, collected the strip of cane that
had been used on my bottom and carried the load back to the shed with some
strips of planking balanced on one shoulder. The man in blue gave me a nod of
approval, stoked up the fire, and I watched as he pulled vegetables from sacks
and diced them in swift, practised movements. There were green peppers, heads
of garlic, onions, tomatoes, corn on the cob and some long misshapen roots. He tossed the corn husks into the fire but nothing else was wasted, peel and seeds,
everything went into a big iron skillet with some oil and a pinch of red pepper
from a jar. The smell soon rising into the air reminded me that I was starving.
He gave me a wooden spoon and I stirred the rice boiling in the big pot. There
was sufficient food to feed a small army and I wanted to ask why we were was
cooking so much, why he had pissed on me, why he had stopped the other man
beating me after three blows from that cane I now fed with pointless triumph
into the fire. I had a desire to talk, but had no language in which to do so, and
anyway my companion was content humming to himself as he turned the
vegetables in the skillet. I hummed, too, finding his tune, and he jiggled his
shoulders rhythmically as he glanced at me, his expression that of a parent happy
to be working with his child. We hummed together as if without a care in the
world, smoke filling the fish shed, and I couldn't recall ever having gone so long
without talking.
At work, we didn't read the books we promoted. We read the synopses, we
leafed through the author profiles, and we chatted over cappuccinos with
cinnamon buns and almond croissants. P.R. is all talk, talk, talk; my life was a
whirlpool of tittle-tattle and chatter. Everyone was hungry for each grubby little
crumb of gossip and rumour, drawing it corrosively into our souls from the
mouths of friends, the radio, magazines, the newspaper where Bobby worked.
We were talking without listening to each other or to that voice inside that must
have conveyed me to the Canary Islands, stripped my costume from my limbs
and urged me to swim across the ocean from the known to the unknown; from
security to danger. I was standing there barefoot and naked beside that man in
the scruffy blue tunic because a secret version of myself must have wanted it to
be that way.
He tasted the rice, his expression saying it was nearly done. It was then that
we heard the roar of an engine and it seemed as if the relief felt by the man
cooking was contagious and I felt it too; everything was progressing as it should,
the food would soon be on the table, the machine was working; within the
confines of my present existence, harmony had been restored.
We rushed outside. The man in black looked pleased, but he didn't punch the
air as do game-show contestants when they answer some inane question or
tennis players when they score a point. It was just as well, as the engine
immediately spluttered and died. The man called, my companion tapped my
bottom with the flat of his hand, and I ran down the beach to see what was
wanted. The mechanic turned the key again, the engine fired and, conversing in
sign language, while I nursed the throttle, easing the rubber grip back and forth,
he ducked under the engine cowling with a screwdriver and made adjustments until the motor was running smoothly. He stood straight, waiting for a few
moments, looking intently at the engine, then closed the clasp on the cowling.
He said something, his voice sharp, then made scissors with two fingers and
pointed at his eyes so that I watched as he turned off the engine, unhooked the
orange cable holding the key and slung the cable around his neck.
Perhaps he had bought me for 50 euros and as my new owner was making
sure I understood that there was no escape.
I followed him back up the beach. In the shed there were two plastic jerry cans
filled with gasoline. He shoved a pole through the two handles and we carried
them together, one at each end. I was at the front and could feel his eyes on my
back, on the red welts he'd placed on my bottom with the cane since turned to
ash in the flames. We put one of the plastic containers in the boat he had just
repaired. When we placed the can in the other boat further down the beach, he
went through the same ritual, pointing at his eyes, removing the key and hanging
it on the cord around his neck.
'Yes, dear, I got the point the first time,' I said, and he stared at me until I
looked away.
The tide had receded far out beyond the bay and a strip of black sand stretched
around us like a velvet band of the sort I wore during my preppy period before
university. We ambled down to the water's edge where crabs were emerging
from the hard sand. We stared out to sea. He grinned and pointed.
I could just make out the shape of a boat heading towards us from a point at
the centre of the horizon. The man shaded his eyes and glanced up at the sun as
if to judge how long it was going to be before the boat arrived. He wasn't
wearing a watch and I imagined his life was driven by the motions of the sun and
moon, the stars and tides, by the forces of nature, that the way he had beaten and
penetrated me was a demonstration of passion more than violence. He said
something, then rubbed his stomach, asking it seemed if I were hungry, and I
nodded eagerly. Like the older man, in his eyes I saw the expression one might
have for a child, a look incompatible with the fact that I was a grown woman and
happened to be stark naked.
We made our way back to the shed. The older man had laid out three plates.
He served a small portion of rice with the vegetables on two metal dishes, then
heaped a generous portion on a porcelain plate with a Chinese scene in dark
blue. He gave me the pretty plate. He said something to the other man and, when
they both chuckled with laughter, I tried to read their banter in their body
language. Now that each in his own way had left his seed on me, they displayed
no interest in me sexually and treated me merely as a curiosity as Europeans
during the age of discovery must have shown the indigenous peoples brought back from the jungles of Africa or the crumbling cities of South America to be
exhibited in music halls and travelling shows.
We went outside, out of the smoke, and sat cross-legged on the sand watching
the boat growing larger as it approached. There were no forks or spoons and,
copying the men, I made little balls with the rice and vegetables and popped the
food in my mouth. Not only my body, my taste buds seemed to have burst into
life and nothing I had ever eaten before had tasted quite so marvellous. I ate
quickly, hot oil dribbled from my fingers on to my breasts and the momentary
sting on my bare flesh was a reminder of what it is to be fully alive.
When I had finished, the man in blue indicated the shed with his thumb,
pointing behind him, and I went hurrying inside like Oliver Twist hungry for
more.
When I returned, the two men were still eating their modest rations. They
appeared to chew each grain of rice, savouring the food, and I realised I had a lot
to learn, that in my cappuccino life I always left two thirds of the almond
croissant, the pizza crusts, the glass of white wine I didn't want even when I
ordered it. My friends and I and everyone talked about the melting ice caps and
vanishing forests without doing anything more than talk. We consumed and
chattered and contacted the BBC and the cable channels to promise that this
author and that author was a witty raconteur, hilarious but at the same time deep
and interesting, really great television. Even in the book business you are selling
dreams.
My belly was swollen by the time I had finished and I stretched out on the
sand staring up at the sky. When the men lit up, I fancied a cigarette and lay
there breathing in their smoke. I ran my palms over my tummy and felt like a
turkey that was being fattened for Christmas.
Why, when the men ate so little, had I been given a heaped plate of food and
then, like a fat girl at boarding school, gone scurrying off for seconds? Why had
I been given the one china plate? They were mocking me, having fun, I decided.
As the white European, would I not normally expect special treatment? Didn't
we as a people always take the best and leave the scraps for the natives?
Now I was the native. With the stripping away of my clothes, I had been
stripped of identity, a past, of preconceptions. I was stuffing my belly because I
didn't know where the next meal was coming from. I possessed nothing. I wore
nothing. I was nothing. I was grateful for the plate of food, for the feel of the
warm sun on my skin, for any small kindness.