Blue on blue

Saturday. Break of dawn. Australia.Parking is chaotic as usual. Carla and Jordan unpack their boards and sprint towards Granite Bay. The sinuous path is busy with bright joggers, three wheeler prams and febrile surfers. Beyond, the ocean is glittering and the horizon hugs the water like a jealous lover.Carla feels that embrace each time they come here. She remembers when she first saw Jordan a few years ago. It was a glimpse that changed her life. Jordan's freckled salty skin and the eucalyptus scent are inscribed in a special section of her memory. Now they work and share a flat in Brisbane, but often come up the coast to visit Jordan's parents and go for a dip in the ocean.The surf has been great lately and the weather forecast is excellent. The tide has receded so far away that an unfamiliar sight is revealed at Tea Tree Bay. The continental shelf has never been so exposed. A cluster of people scrutinise what Carla and Jordan will later call The Great Wash Out. Jordan gets her phone out and calls home. 'Norman! You better come and check this one out. We're at Hell's Gate. Hurry up. Bring Mum too'.Norman is pleased to interrupt his weekly gardening session. His father bought this lush bit of land bordering the National Park in the 1950s. If leftunchecked in this climate, the luxuriant vegetation takes over like toads in a cane field. He walks to the house, into the kitchen and gets to the boatswain whistle that hangs from a beam. Two short blows is the signal for Jenny to come up from the bottom garden where a wooden shed rests, a bit like a derelict trawler sitting in a muddy cove. Grass refuses to grow around it. Inside, there is a neat studio full of tools and the walls are covered with sketches and plans. Jenny is a yacht's interior designer. Norman is her personal gofer, specialised in the art of finding things. He is a qualified hoarder. Born to serve is his motto. So he just gets on with it. He is a poet. He is a larrikin, witty and irreverent. He belongs to another era, when outlaws were bushrangers and sailors were salty dogs. Jenny is the industrious one. You can see it in her demeanour. She walks and talks straight to the point. Nowadays she treads water at her leisure. After all, they are seafarers emeritus, members of the Turtle Society, humble mariners, lovers of space, and tough nuts in civil life.They decide to walk the three-kilometre track from their house to Hell's Gate. At this time of day, it only takes half an hour to get to the headland.On the edge of the bluff, a group of codgers ponder in silence at the unusual panorama. Excited teenagers are ready to get the 'guns' out. Down below, the surf is forming on a new platform. Nobody has ever seen such a spectacular barrel at that spot. A few daredevils are paddling out through the white water with great difficulty. The tide is strong. Furious troughs are rippling towards the shore.Jordan greets her parents with frantic gestures and comments. Carla gives her some water to disrupt her verbal over-flow. Then she deciphers Jordan's babbling to Norman and Jenny who are baffled. In their washedout blue eyes, there is a hint of fear that reflects the progress of their thoughts.'Tsunami. Somebody said tsunami'? murmurs a spectator.'We'd better get home, darlings,' says Norman. 'I don't like the look of this. Let's find out what the experts have to say about this tide'.'But we want to have a coffee in Hastings Street.''Forget about coffee in low land, Jordan. You are such a voyeur. And look at Carla. She's pale. Come on. We've got phone calls to make. We're comin' back with you in the car. Don't forget your boards'.Norman holds Jenny by the shoulder and steers her towards the coastal track. The onlookers' slow progression clogs the footpath. It compels the foursome to force their way through, like salmon swimming upstream to spawn. Large slabs of sand dunes are exposed in Laguna Bay and the beach looks like the Bay of Fundy at low tide. …