Bay of Fires Read Online Free

burnt bridge where wildflowers were in season, tiny pink and lemon petals among parched banksia and wattle. Any of those would have made a nice walk for a tourist.
    Through the binoculars Sarah watched as two people in white jumpsuits lifted the body into a bag, and then onto a stretcher, and carried it to a white van parked behind the grassy dune.
    “It’s quite disgusting that you touched that dead woman,” Erica said with a grin. “Mum’s worried they’ll make you a suspect.”
    “Mum’s got no idea.”
    “Yeah.” Erica took the binoculars. “Oh. She’s gone.”
    There was disappointment in her voice as she turned and announced the news to the people gathered on the veranda.
       
    A solitary bodysurfer hurtled down the face of a seven-foot wave in the post-storm swell beneath the shack. The wave crashed, and he disappeared into the beating foam. Sarah counted silently. It was a good thirty seconds before he emerged from the white water. It would be like being inside a washing machine in there. He stood up, twisted around, and dived under an incoming wave, just before it exploded with a force Sarah could hear from the veranda. His forceful strokes were those of someone who had done years of swimming training in the pool.
    She had not seen him since Christmas night at the wharf. She had woken the next morning on cold sand, daylight penetrating her closed lids. She could smell something acrid and hear flies buzzing. Her hair stuck to her face, pasted across one eye, and she desperately needed a drink of water. She sat up, squinting in the overcast morning glare. She was in a sand dune. Her fly was undone and one of her sneakers was not on her foot. She could not remember passing out.
    She was alone, her skin clammy and her guts sick. Her head reeled when she stood up. She peeled the damp clump of hair off her face and pushed it back. The ocean and rocks fluctuated and she felt seasick. It looked like the sand dunes beyond the wharf, although her hungover mind was not sure. She couldn’t remember walking up there. The last memory she had was of being in the car, listening to the clinking of moored boats and rain on the roof. Sam, her seventeen-year-old one-night stand, had left, of that she was fairly certain. She could not remember leaving her car.
    Flies buzzed around something at her feet. Creamy vomit, a chunky pile of regurgitated Christmas lunch, sat centimeters from where her head had been. She fingered her clumped hair; the smell was foul. She retched, stomach muscles convulsing in a bid to dredge her guts. Yellow bile came out, acidic and rancid.
      
    Erica’s voice brought her back to the present, the hot veranda and the swirling swell below.
    “Sam Shelley.” Erica leaned on the railing beside her. “He is H.O.T. Hot.”
    “You’re learning to spell. Don’t tell me Qantas are educating their trolley dollies these days? It’s really great.”
    “We’re not just there for our looks.” Erica laughed; meanness was wasted on her. “Go and get the binoculars so we can have a closer look.”
    “No.” Sarah felt saliva spray from her mouth. “Someone is dead, Erica. Get a hold of yourself.”
    In the surf, Sam was being pummeled in knee-deep water. He braced his hands on his knees and bent forward, probably hacking salt water out of his nose.
    Sarah went inside and lay on the couch. Erica and her mother treated her like she was ill, offering her toast and watching her closely for signs of something. Signs of what, she didn’t know. Did they expect her to break down in floods of tears, shaking with shock at what she had touched? That wasn’t going to happen. At least they weren’t asking any more personal questions. She closed her eyes as Erica placed a cup of tea beside her. The attention was pleasing.
    The scent told Sarah the tea was Earl Grey, her favorite. Without tasting it, she knew it would contain one sugar, and have been topped up with cold water so it was barely hot, just how she