After yoga, we had a quick drink in the bar of the hotel where the gym is located. The hotel was hosting a graduation ball: sylphs in tissue-thin gowns giggled in corners while zitty lads, tugging at neckties, arrived with their mothers. I think of the years they have yet to live, all the sorrows, challenges, and joys not yet known; time, working its sublime magic on flesh and heart and mind, transforming them into something stranger and more marvelous. Afterwards we walked along the beach, waiting for Teddy to take his elephant dump. V said, Isn't that romantic? Two youths had snuck out of the party, snogging on a spit of water-lapped stone; as low white clouds swept across the mountains on the far shore, they looked, in their pale, glittering finery, like magical creatures risen from the sea. Today, I spotted a used condom while my friends changed into swimsuits. Everyone snorted. Then they ran into the sea, squealing and shouting, like selkies returning home.




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