That evening, when the other guests returned from work, they put a bit more effort into getting to know some of them. The girls next door were from Japan. Their names were Angie and Chinatsu. Cammy said her name should be Japanatsu, if she was from Japan, but Erin said that was racist, even if Chinatsu found it funny. Molly wasn’t sure how she felt about it. The joke seemed to be playing around with language more than anything to do with ethnicity, she felt, but had learned not to join in with every possible argument Erin invited her to. In any case, the country was called Nippon.

  “Do you work on the banana farms?” Cammy asked them and they giggled in reply, nodding.

  “Hard work?”

  “Very hard work,” said Angie. Chinatsu nodded in agreement.

  “How long have you been here?”

  Angie and Chinatsu conferred before they both said, “Four month.”

  “Nup. No way,” said Erin. “There is not a hope in hell that I am spending four months in this dump.”

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  “How long do you plan on staying?” asked Molly.

  They shrugged. “Maybe seven,” offered Angie.

  “Seven. Wow,” said Cammy, sitting back in his plastic chair. “Fair play.”

  *

  The following day they stayed in bed when the buses came to pick up the workers. Without saying it aloud, all three of them knew the likelihood of them attempting to get work here was dwindling. Instead, they waited for the rain to stop, which it eventually did around mid-afternoon, and had a look around town. The local school had an outdoor swimming pool and they paid far too much money each to do lengths in silence. Cammy spent most of the time with his elbows up on the side, Erin lay on her towel in a bikini, and Molly swam an impressive amount of metres.

  That evening they took their pot of spaghetti and pesto up onto the balcony to eat it when one of the other guests from a few rooms over introduced himself. He wore a singlet and denim shorts that hung below his knees, flip-flops and a baseball cap, backwards, above a pierced eyebrow.

  “How you guys going?” he said. Australian accent, which was unusual in this kind of place, in Cammy’s experience. “You get lucky today?”

  “Lucky?” said Molly.

  “With work? Somebody pick you guys up?”

  “Didn’t bother today,” said Cammy. “Tomorrow, maybe.”

  “Nah, mate. Day off tomorrow. Few of us,” he pointed with his beer over his shoulder, “are going for a swim down the creek if you’d like to join us. You too,” he said to Angie and Chinatsu, who had just come out their room.

  “Sounds good,” said Cammy, hopefully. Molly and Erin agreed. Friends would be good. They’d feel less alone. Like their adventure had something to be gained from it beyond the sheer misery of plucking bananas for buttons in the rain.

  “Before the weather picks up.”

  “Seems to rain here a lot,” said Cammy.

  “Mate, you’ve seen nothing yet. Big storm coming. There’s talk of a cyclone. I’m Dale by the way.”

  “Dale. Nice to meet you. I’m Cammy. This is Molly, Erin.”

  They shook hands.

  “A big bastard, they’re saying. Could be nothing left of this place, if it hits land.” He finished his beer in one pull, winked, burped, and said to come meet his mates.