Troppo (14 page)

‘The Indonesians are not always that welcoming to outsiders, full stop. Only a few years ago, Indo-Chinese were being raped, persecuted, burned alive. Now, in this instance, just getting rid of one man –'

‘Yeah, but,' Rick interrupts bullishly. ‘The difference is, we're spending money. The Indos are getting our money. Even Shane is doing his bit to boost the economy. The Chinese hoarded it and kept it to themselves. We hand out. Just look at Bali, mate.'

Dennis pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose and continues patiently. ‘You may be right that money from tourism will solve it, down the track. But at the moment, we simply don't have the luxury of time to wait for the locals to appreciate these flow-on effects. From what I gather, from what Meri has heard in the community, it was a couple of radical young men
who threw the rocks at Franz and Adalie's – and I use the word “radical” carefully. But they are known to be affiliated with a militant Islamist group with wider reach. Now whether that's Darul Islam or Jemaah Islamiyah or someone else, we don't know. But, Meri's suggestion,' – Meri steps from the kitchen and rests her weight against the doorframe, tea towel in hand – ‘is that it would be best to approach Abd al Hakim directly and give a sizeable donation to the mosque. He is in more of a position to control and influence young men like this, because he has the ear of the whole community, can mobilise the community against them. At the moment, he has no motivation to do this. But for the right price …'

Rick says under his breath, ‘That towel-headed bastard won't get a cent from me.'

There's the trace of a smile on the cook's wife's lips.

Rick says louder, with muscle, ‘So who was it then that bulldozed my villas? Are you saying it was these radical cunts?'

‘I'm saying we negotiate with Hakim so that we all stay safe.'

No-one answers. Matt leans back. Manages to command the attention of the group with this single movement.

‘I think Dennis is right,' he says. ‘I think that's a good way to go about it. But I've also been working with Bapak Joni on a different strategy. We've been to see a dukun.'

‘A dukun?' pipes up the English bloke for the first time. ‘A fucking dukun? Are you serious, man?'

The Kiwi looks smug. That's obviously what she was referring to at the internet cafe.

Dennis puts his head in his hands.

‘To make Shane sick,' Matt says. ‘Less trouble. Just for a while, just while things settle down.'

The night I met Shane he'd winced and buckled and grabbed his gut. Is he sick? I asked the girl. No, not sick. I remember Matt
and Joni talking that morning, and Matt asking me, after we'd had a surf together, how Shane had seemed. It doesn't surprise me, Matt going to the local black magician. From what I've heard, there's still plenty of black magic in the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu. Matt would have grown up around it.

‘Bullshit.' Rick sneers. ‘It's a load of bullshit.' He turns to me, even though I've been watchfully silent. ‘Your hippy mate here might think there's such a thing –'

Matt springs to his feet. Rick tenses. We all tense.

But Matt ignores him and starts collecting the empty bowls. Meri rushes forward to help but he waves her away. I follow him to the kitchen. He fills Meri's sink. I add a squirt of green detergent then hand him the bowls, one after the other. They make a percussive sound as Matt stacks them, clean, on the other side.

‘When do you go back to work?' I ask without looking at him.

‘Coupla days,' he says.

‘Before you go, will you take me to the dukun?' My voice trembles. As a kid I always had the feeling that the uneasy line between the spiritual and the physical was easier to cross here than at home. This chance, to go and visit a dukun … it is rarely something you can even talk about with local people, let alone experience firsthand.

‘No.'

I take his hand. ‘Please?'

He says nothing and we're saved from silence by the sound of a text message. I pull out my phone, wondering if Josh has replied. Then I realise Matt has the same message tone, and it's not for me. A bright strand of hair is caught in his stubble and it takes all my willpower to resist reaching over and drawing it free. He puts his phone away.

‘Sorry, Pen, I won't be able to give you a lift home. I'm sure
Dennis will take you after everyone's left. I'll see you tomorrow. We should go up to the hot springs. When do you start at Shane's?'

It takes me a beat to answer. What's so important that Matt has to race off without giving me a lift?

‘In a coupla days,' I say.

‘Righto.'

The Kiwi's voice bounces after him into the courtyard: ‘But Matthew …!'

And then he's gone.

I go back to my chair, to the now-struggling conversation. It's obvious the group doesn't get together often. The only thing they really have in common is that they're all outsiders.

Before she leaves, Adalie asks for my number. ‘We're starting to pack soon. I will send a message in case there is anything you might like. We won't be able to take everything.'

I thank her warmly and soon I'm the only one left, waiting in the kitchen while geckos zigzag the walls.

‘That Matt's a scoundrel,' Dennis says after he and Meri have seen off Rick and the Kiwi, ‘leaving you here to walk home. I'll give you a lift after a cup of tea.'

‘Oh, I don't want to be any trouble. I'm more than happy to walk. It's not that far.'

‘Don't be ridiculous!'

He heads into the kitchen and I help Meri carry the extra chairs back out onto the front balcony. Her lips and nails are a loud proud red and she's pencilled on a beauty spot just to the left of her lower lip. Her hair is cropped short and uncovered.

‘Have you been to Australia?'

‘Of course. Nice for holiday but if you stay there for too long: pusing,
'
she taps her head. ‘And, sorry ya, but also a little bit boring!'

‘Boring?!'

We laugh.

Years ago, I met a young Balinese guy who fell in love with an Australian girl, got her pregnant and found himself bailed up in Bunbury with a bub and a babe, lonely as hell and desperate to get back to Bali. He told me that every night he went to the pub for some company, but it was always the same weather-fucked faces, and so the first chance he had he flew home.

‘Bu, is it hard, being married to a bule?'

‘In what way? Privately, or with visas and government and things like that?'

‘Well, privately I guess. Like with the cultural differences.'

She gives my question some consideration before answering. ‘It was hard at first. You wouldn't think it now, but when Dennis first came here he was always angry about everything. “Why do you throw your rubbish out the bus window,” he asked me, and, “How come I'm still paying twice as much for everything when I live here?” and, “Why did your neighbours have to go and sell their rice paddies, they've wrecked our view!”' She slaps the knees of her jeans, excited now. ‘I told him, if you want to stay here with me, you must learn this culture, understand this culture. But don't complain. Stop complaining and getting angry over stupid things. It's just the way it is here, you just have to accept it. Begitulah saja.'

She smiles fondly.

From inside comes the siren of the kettle.

‘So does he still get overcharged, like at the market and when he has to bargain at the shops?'

‘Iya! All the time! He's a bule, kan?' Ibu chuckles softly. ‘You know what he say to me? He say: “Meri, I already live here long time, why they keep calling me bule? My name is Dennis and I'm from Australia!”' Ibu wheezes with laughter. ‘Ha, ha, but he still bule! I tell him, “You still bule”'

Her laughter is infectious.

She dabs her tears with a tissue and continues. ‘Ya, it's better if I do the shopping. When we go on holiday to Bali, I say, “Dennis, you stay here in the hotel while I go shopping.” As soon as they see him – wah! At once everything is more expensive. Hang on a moment Penny, I get the tea.'

She disappears inside.

I'm knackered. Don't think I'll make it through a cuppa. Maybe it's better to head back now. Dennis is already asleep, slumped soft in one of the chairs in the lounge. I join Meri in the kitchen. ‘He had a big day today,' she says.

‘Of course, I'm sorry for keeping you up so late.'

‘Not at all, it was nice to finally talk to you. Can I drop you home?'

From the way Ibu asks the question she's hoping I'll decline. It's been a long day, and putting up with a bunch of whingeing bules has probably been exhausting.

‘No, no, really it's fine. It truly isn't far.'

There's a thump in the roof. The triumphant sound of claws.

‘If I get tired, I'll jump on an ojek.'

‘Maybe it's too late for ojek.'

I wave away her concern.

The air is emptier than during the day. I fill my lungs, enjoying the brisk burn of it. On either side of the road there's the wet suck and burble of evening rice paddies. It takes me nearly an hour to walk back into Batu Batur and across town to Ibu Ayu's. I didn't realise how far out of town Dennis' village actually is. I don't feel unsafe, but consciously avoid thinking about dukuns and black magic. It's one thing to be excited about a potential trip to a dukun in the well-lit company of friends, another to entertain such a thought on a dark walk home.

Ibu Ayu's is tucked in right at the end of a lane that twists like
a shoestring. During the day it's filled with big-eyed schoolkids crunching lollies and men wheeling kaki lima of sugary crushed ice. But now, the warungs and shops, all boarded shut, look completely different. A light bulb barely burns the edges of the dark. A rat weaves through the gutter grates by my left ankle. I keep an even pace.

And then hear footsteps behind me.

There's a chattering sound and the tiny cymbal clash of something metallic. I focus on the kink in the lane ahead. After that, I'll be able to see the sign to Ibu Ayu's, can start hollering.

Whoever is behind me keeps pace. Not closing in, not falling back. Every now and then there's that strange chatter, like mice, or wind-up children. I round the kink and speed up. There's the sign now, hand-painted, with the blue curl of a wave. Behind me, the steady slap of rubber on cement. It's him, I think. It's the guy who was watching me in the shower. I hope and hope and hope that the gate is open.

It is. I slip through, shut and bolt it.

Then I run across the grass to my bungalow, climb the steps two at a time, and try to get a glimpse of the lane from the balcony. The wall is just a little too high. So I climb up onto the balcony railing and steady myself by curling my fingers around the roof.

There's a man standing just back from the gate. The fire-flower of his cigarette end blooms and fades. It's too dark to see his face. Wound around his hand is a chain. My eyes follow its straining links to a collar. A monkey's collar. The monkey looks around, alert, ears pricked. Then it slides a mask over its face and jumps onto the man's shoulder.

The man stays like that, perfectly still, face upturned.

I'm in tight jeans, gripping Matt between my thighs. We lock hard around a mountain corner and my breath catches. The vegetation becomes thicker as we climb: vines drop like wet lassoes, poisonous flowers exhale. There are no people, no wooden stands of durian or banana by the roadside.

At last we come to a clearing where Matt parks the bike. It's cool. Above us, birds wail long and lustily. Matt takes my hand and we walk up a dirt track. Ten minutes later, the jungle falls back around a string of steaming volcanic pools. Water trims off into water.

Matt's stripping, and my gaze whips back to his body, a bit skinny from too much surfing and rice, but not bad.

‘Jesus, Pen!'

I cover my face and laugh – a moment later he's dragging my jeans over my thighs, grabbing my chin between his fingers, owning my mouth. Monkeys backfire through the trees. We fall into one of the pools. Once or twice I glance at the surrounding jungle. Matt murmurs, ‘Don't worry. The locals don't come here, they're scared of the spirits.'

And so I stop looking and let those freckled lips take mine.

Later, I dip under, hold my breath until my lungs swell blue. Burst back. Completely physical. Completely whole.

‘What kind of spirits do the locals think live here?'

‘The spirits of children.'

‘Oh.'

‘But not all the locals. Things are changing.'

‘What, with religion?'

‘Sure. And the influence of the West. Technology. Look at the crew using mobile phones. No-one had one five years ago. Telly too. There's only one or two families in my village with a satellite dish but everyone's saving up.'