AMITY

Bobby made a pilgrimage to the island of the great White Shark, otherwise known as Amity where after the July of '75 all hell had broken loose.

Quite often he'd visit places he'd read about in the papers, locations where terrible things had taken place - murders, freak accidents, shark attacks. He liked to commune with tragedy as if it helped him resolve his own issue with death that he'd had ever since early childhood. Of course, this strange hobby was his own secret that nobody else would ever know about, it would be too embarassing and awkward to explain to the average person. If he thought about diagnosing his peculiar pathology then he supposed he would be called a 'tragedy tourist'. In the past few years he had been to Dealey Plaza, The Ambassador Hotel, Cielo Drive and a strange Motel outside of Fairvale, California where famously a transvestite killer had run amok. In all those places he'd found a great deal of stimulation just imbibing the atmosphere where terrible, violent acts had occured.

It was all blood in the water to Bobby.

Whenever the travelling stranger arrived in a new location he always like to spend a day or two just absorbing the feel of the place, talking with the locals, enjoying the food and culture so that he could then revel in his more targeted points of interest.

In some ways he was like a detective, in others like a criminal. Bobby might have even said like a shark as he was currently in the town which had been defined by one.

Looking through his amateurish looking dossier of cut out newspaper clippings in the 'Seashell' diner, he read through the various reports of the shark's victims deaths that he'd saved like they were baseball cards. Chrissie Watkins was the first that brought the story to light, followed by Alex Kintner, Ben Gardner and the notorious Quint, a shark hunter and owner of the Orca where Chief Brody famously exploded the shark by shooting a pressurised scuba tank inside its mouth with a harpoon gun. Bobby loved the whole timeline of events and could almost imagine the scattered, scaly dermal denticles floating in a million pieces in the sea. Perhaps he'd find some washed up whilst beachcombing. Or perhaps if he was lucky, a shark's tooth.

"You police, mister?" a young kid said as he stared at all the spread out documents on Bobby's table next to his coke float and half finished plate of pancakes.

"Nope. I'm a historian."

"A histor what?"

"I study events after they happen."

Then noticing a couple of graphic looking photos of shark injuries, the kid recoiled in horror although Bobby, never the best at being able to read emotional responses in others so well, thought the young boy might be interested and picked them off the table and offered them to him.

"You want to take a closer look?"

The kid shook his head vigorously and started to slowly walk away from the strange man.

"Wait. What's the matter, kid?"

Running out of the diner, Bobby shrugged, unable to compute what had just happened, perplexed by the strange encounter. Then, draining his coke through his straw he made such a performance of it, almost like fingers being scraped down a chalk board that the entire diner went eerily quiet.

Oblivious of the people staring at him, Bobby eventually got up from his table and left the diner to head back into the town.

Keeping his ear to the ground as he wandered round Amity for the rest of the afternoon, Bobby acted like he was in his very own private episode of Columbo, asking questions of the townsfolk to see if he might chance upon some direct connection to the victims. The closer he got to the action he'd read about in his dossier the more excited he became. In many ways it was like a sexual thrill for him. A virgin, Bobby had never found it easy to make friends, let alone partners with women but somehow in pursuit of crime scenes post the event, he had found something that had provided him with a real sense of belonging, he might have even said intimacy.

And later that night, when he made his own camp on the beach he imagined the scene of Chrissie Watkins skinny dipping in the mirror-like midnight blue ocean, content with a sense of freedom in nature, oblivious to the horror that lurked beneath her feet. Suddenly a great desire to commune with her spirit took over him and he pulled off his shoes and socks and headed toward the water that called to him like a siren song.

Swimming far out until there was no possibility the sea bed could save him from drowning, he floated on his back, staring at the giant moon illuminating the sea surrounding him.

It was so eerily still, Bobby was convinced he could hear Chrissie's screams echoing in the silent serenity of the night which was eventually broken only by the sound of a distant trawler cutting through the waves.

Bobbing on the surface like a buoy, the young stranger felt at perfect peace with the world, contemplating death whilst feeling more alive than ever. It was this perfect dichotomy that made the pilgrimages to these scenes of horror worthwhile.

Turning back onto his front and treading water for a moment, he looked toward the twinkling lights of Amity's beach front houses just beyond the shoreline and decided to slowly make his way back.

It was at that exact same moment he felt something tug at his right foot.