The board I’m on is quite nice for surfing, as it happens. I zip down the line a bit, and then – just because I can – I step forward and hang my toes over the nose. Dad taught me to do this, and to hang ten, but instead of that I step right the way to the back of the board, since the wave is steepening in this section, and drive it around a couple of little turns, and then finally carve off the wave. Without falling I paddle back out to where Lily is waiting, watching.
“Oh my God. You didn’t say you were an expert!”
I shrug. “I’m not.” But I don’t say anything else, because right away another set of waves is coming in, from a slightly different angle, and I paddle out to it, this time taking the best one, and I surf it on my back hand, leaning myself into the wave and casually dragging a hand for a few seconds. Again I carve off the wave at the end of the ride and paddle back out.
Soon I’m really having fun. James and Oscar are still struggling away, and there’s not much I can do for them, so instead I concentrate on teaching Lily how to actually catch waves. Stand up paddle boarding is much easier than surfing, and if the conditions are right – like today, with smooth water with small waves – almost anyone can learn to ride proper waves, but there’s a few things you have to get right. Like the way you stand. You start off facing forwards, but when you catch a wave you have to turn sideways, like when you’re riding a skateboard. And you need to start paddling forward at just the right time, and do short, hard strokes with the paddle, so that you’re going at the same speed as the wave when it picks you up. Once Lily gets all that she’s able to catch the waves. The first one she gets she yells out in fear, and I think excitement, and her eyes are shining when she paddles back out (her hair mopped onto her head, and on her knees, a bit less elegantly than me, but she’s getting the hang of it now). And it’s obvious she’s enjoying it, and that, well that makes me really happy too.
An hour later James and Oscar go in, and Lily says she wants to join them. I’m a bit surprised, I guess because I’m used to surfing with Dad, and he’ll sometimes stay out for six hours. But we ride waves in together, and I get nice top-turn off the final section. Then we carry the boards up to where Eric and Jennifer are sitting, and James and Oscar are lying on their backs on the sand. They look puffed out.
“So you’re a dark horse, Billy,” Eric says when we get there. “You didn’t tell us you were a surfing champion.” He looks at me with raised eyebrows.
“What?” Lily turns to look at me.
“We were watching you zipping around out there like some sort of…” Eric waves one hand as he searches for a word “…Hawaiian prince, and I got suspicious.” He holds up his phone. “I Googled you.” He starts reading from the screen. “Lornea Island Champion, several times over, plus winner of the Big Wave Challenge. Look at the size of that trophy!” He turns the phone, and Lily leans in to look. James does too, but from further away. I can’t see the image that clearly, but I know right away which web page he’s on. It’s about a surf competition that was held on Lornea Island, and I didn’t win it, Dad did, but the local paper is so bad at fact checking they got mixed up. They used a photograph of me holding up Dad’s cup, and thought I’d won it.
Lily turns to me, a look of pretend outrage on her face. “I can’t believe you sat in the back of the car the whole time we were driving here, and didn’t mention once you were a bloody professional.”
“I’m not.” I protest. And I think about explaining, but then I decide I’d rather everyone just forgot about it.
Eric laughs, and James and Oscar say they’re going to the store to get changed. I look at Lily to see if she’s doing the same, but instead she’s already reaching behind her for the zip on her suit, and she pulls it down. I’m a bit stunned, until she peels it down and I see she’s wearing a bikini underneath, a white one. Then I remember I should look away.
“Here, do you want to borrow some shorts? I brought a spare pair.” Eric smiles at me, and then tosses me a towel, so I get changed right here on the beach, while Lily peels off the rest of her wetsuit, then stretches out on a towel.
Chapter Eighteen
I don’t know who packed the hamper, but it’s filled with amazing food. There’s cute little sandwiches, some with cucumber and others with this special Italian dried ham, and a cold pasta salad, and then little pastries, and pots of olives and sun-dried tomatoes. I ask about it, and Jennifer shrugs, and says she picked it up from a deli, though she doesn’t say which one. She seems to be into sunbathing, she’s wearing a green bikini, which goes well with her brown skin, which is shiny from the sun cream she’s put on. Actually it was Oscar who put it on, I notice, since he and James are back now. And for a little while,
