Slim and pale with wide blue eyes, ass-length ponytail pulled through the back of her baseball cap, she sits in the shadow thrown by a woman wearing a straw hat on the verge of collapsing under a weight of plastic fruit. Her shockingly blue eyes meet mine, then skate across the show pool’s surface. She’s being coy about it, but I’ve seen The Look a thousand times. I’m straddling the concrete wall dividing the wait pool from the show pool. Sunlight arcs over the amphitheater’s zigzagged metal roof, yellow spears quivering the afternoon air. Stands packed with sunburnt tourists in their vacation finery: tank tops and flip-flops and sansabelt slacks, wifebeaters and board shorts. I spot a sallow-chested shirtless man: the unshakable maxim seems to be those with the most revolting physiques are inevitably those most keen to bare them. Blue inflatable dolphins, red seals, black-and-white killer whales bob amidst the crowd. Tinny upbeat music lilts from recessed speakers. Seagulls wheel and spiral against the unbroken blue sky.
