Then Myra and I sat at the Berkowitzes’ kitchen table and scarfed down our Zabar’s treats. Judith breezed down the stairs and into the kitchen.
“Oy vey. Is it hot enough already or what?” Judith was a nearsighted, heavier, clumsier version of her daughter, and Myra secretly joked that Judith was “the perpetual zaftig elephant in the room.” Since I’d known Myra’s mom, she had broken at least ten prized objects collected from their worldwide travels. A stray elbow and kaboom!—down went the jade sculpture from Japan. A tripped stumble and crrrack!—the Peruvian deity with the embarrassingly long and pointy boobs lay shattered on the floor.
“Myra-doll, Daniel and I need to fly over to Paris for a meeting next week. You’ll be okay here without us?” Judith took a big bite out of an ‘everything bagel,’ sprinkling poppy, sesame, and caraway seeds all over the floor. One of the few things our mothers had in common was that they both insisted we call them by their first names. When I was younger, I had thought it made Sara and Judith really cool; now that I was older, it seemed just another indicator of narcissistic self-absorption.
“Sure. I’ll be fine,” Myra shrugged.
Judith ruffled Myra’s hair with her free hand, like she was shaking out dust from a feather duster. “That’s my doll. She’s the best daughter on the planet. Right, Ahnala?”
Judith had given me the nickname of Ahnala when first we met; Myra thought it was thoroughly obnoxious and presumptuous—totally faux-Yiddish—but I kind of liked it. I thought it made me sound exotic, ethnic, and a bit above the fray.
“Definitely. The best,” I nodded.
“How long will you be gone?” Myra asked.
“Probably only a few days, but it could be longer. Maybe Ahnala will come stay with you if you get lonely?” Judith flashed us a big-ass grin, meant to inspire excitement and childlike enthusiasm—which was sort of lame really, given that we were nearly seventeen years old.
“Whatever, Judith,” Myra snapped. “I’ll be fine.” Even my mature best friend slipped into sullen grumpy teen mode every now and then; Judith, however, barely noticed.
“Great! I’ve gotta get back upstairs before Daniel completely messes up our article. Love you, girls.” Judith planted big, squishy kisses on both our foreheads, careened out the door, and raced back up the stairs with the rest of her bagel.
Myra, wiping her forehead, picked off a stray sesame seed or two. “Yuck. She is such a piece of work.”
“Oh come on, Myra-doll,” I drawled in my best New Yawkish Judith imitation. “You know I love you, you beautiful bubbala baby.”
Myra laughed.
“Seriously, you know I’m here, whenever you want me,” I reminded her. “Don’t get all independent and self-sufficient on me, deal?”
“Deal. Now shut up and let’s finish our bagels.”
After scarfing down the last cream cheesy bite, I rode to the Shell Shop, arriving just after noon. I stashed my bike in the narrow side alley that separated our store from the bakery next door. Kendall’s was the kind of town where you didn’t need to lock your bike, particularly if it was out of public view. In addition to perfect parking, the alley also provided perfect smells—intoxicating fumes of burnt sugar, caramel, chocolate, and butter wafted out of the bakery exhaust fan, and every day before work I took at least three deep sniffs. That afternoon I took an extra three deep breaths, prepping myself with extra sweetness before a potentially sour exchange with my mother.
Here goes nothing. I pushed the Shell Shop door open, to the clangy jingle of the “Shell Bell,”—a contraption made by my handy grandfather from clam, abalone, and mussel shells that hung above the entry.
The air in the shop felt cool compared to the humid August heat outside. Sara had cranked the air con up—a ploy to keep sweaty tourists captive in cooling comfort, long enough to sweet-talk them into unnecessary purchases. Sara was rearranging toe rings behind the jewelry case and snapping her gum in time to the country music playing on the radio; she claimed country was good for business, but I think she secretly liked it better than the hip-hop she blasted from the Jeep stereo.
“I told you to be here at noon,” Sara said.
“Sorry,” I mumbled.
“How are you feeling?”
“Better,” I said. “Sort of.”
“Did you stay in bed all morning?”
“Nah, I got up around ten and then hung out at Myra’s.” A half-truth. My life would be ruined if my mother ever found out about Secretspot; she would make it a scene—Sara’s scene—bring everyone there, and my private paradise would be ruined. The one thing I had to myself would be taken away. But this particular morning I wasn’t thinking about Secretspot—I was ready for war. The battle? The YouTube fiasco. “How could you?”
“How could I what?”
“How could you put that thing up on the internet for everyone to see without even asking me?”
“What ‘thing’?”
“The YouTube clip of me surfing.”
“Anna, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
I usually knew when Sara was lying—she tended to shake her head slightly and focus in the general vicinity of my lower forehead, creating the illusion that she was looking me straight in the eye. But now, her eyes were dead set on mine and her head was as steady as a stop sign. Was it possible she was telling the truth?
“That’s why that Stella scout was at Early’s this morning,” I said. “I just know it.”
“Let me get this straight—there’s a video of you surfing on YouTube?”
“Duh. That’s what I just said.”
“And, a top scout from Stella has come calling?”
“Yes.”
“And this is why you bolted from the water this morning?”
“Partly. I don’t want to be scrutinized by some strange scout person. Or five million strangers, for that matter. So you have to take the clip off, now.”
Sara smiled, smugly pleased with herself; she looked like the cat who ate the canary. “No can do. I didn’t post any videos of you on YouTube or anywhere else. But I have to say, I’m glad someone else did.”
“I can’t believe this!” I exclaimed, pacing—a difficult feat in the crowded shop where we had sarongs and sporty sundresses hanging on circular displays, and baskets filled with sand toys at my feet. “Just so you know, I’m never surfing at Early’s ever again, I swear!”
“Come on, Anna. Calm down. No one will give you a contract if you act like a total brat.”
“What if I don’t want some big professional surfing career? There are other things in life, you know.”
Sara groaned in mock dismay. “What? Doodling on a sketch pad in your room, hunched over like some obsessive crazy person?”
“I’m not crazy,” I snapped. Or maybe I was. I had so many sketchpads that I had had to store most of them in boxes in the basement. When she was in a snitty mood, Sara threatened to throw them all away. It hadn’t happened—yet; but just in case, I tore my favorites out and kept them in a separate box hidden under my bed.
“Okay. Maybe not crazy,” Sara said. “But come on, Anna. You’re almost seventeen! You’re supposed to be out there having the time of your life, not living like a hermit.”
“Gee. It’s nice to have a mother who is so supportive.”
“I am supportive. You’re a fierce surfer; you rule the waves. When you’re out there, you’re out there big—above and beyond anyone else; everyone knows it; everyone sees it.”
Out there. I cringed. “Everyone sees it. Exactly. Remember the Montauk Junior Surf Tournament? My spectacular performance?”
“Anna, that was years ago.”
“Sara, get it through your head. I. Still. Don’t. Like. Competing.”
It was as if she hadn’t heard a thing—“Surfing is a given for you,” my mother exclaimed, her eyes
bright with enthusiasm. “You could travel the world, make big bucks, surf places I’ve never seen!”
And there it was. Talk about living through your kid. “Geez. You can’t even pretend this is about me. It is so clearly
about you.”
Sara shook her head in exasperation. “Well, you probably screwed it up already anyway,” she said.
“What do you mean?”
“The scout probably gave up on you, and is signing some eager, enthusiastic surfer down in Florida.”
“Whatever,” I sighed. Do I even care? I asked myself. Was I disappointed? Relieved? I couldn’t tell. All I knew was the knot in my stomach had eased just a little.
“Well, all this aside, I’m sorry you didn’t feel well. You missed an awesome surf session,” Sara said, forcing a smile. “Chest-high and clean rights. I was barreled at least five times.”
“Oh well, there will be other days.” I turned toward the storeroom, feeling my mother’s eyes on my back.
“Kelly was out. So was Mindy,” Sara called after me.
Kelly Garrison and Mindy Shultz—two of the biggest bitches born this century. Because they surfed—lamely, I might add— Sara assumed that the three of us should be best buds. As far as I was concerned, Kelly and Mindy were worse than the rudest of dudes; they hogged waves, made fun of beginners, and both surfed with territorial aggressiveness I couldn’t abide. Nobody owns the ocean—least of all, a couple of sub-par surf snobs with sticks up their you-know-whats.
“Big whoop,” I mumbled.
“What’s wrong with them?” Sara persisted. “They seem like nice girls.”
“Kelly is as much of a snake as any of the guys in the water, and Mindy is a stuck-up, entitled priss.”
“You’re impossible,” Sara sighed. “I just don’t get it. When you’re not home drawing in your notebooks, you’re always with Myra.”
“So?”
“So, Myra’s okay in a geeky kind of way. But she’s not exactly—”
“Exactly what?” My blood began to boil.
“Enough—okay? Myra is not exactly enough.”
“You mean she’s not cool enough. Or pretty enough. Or popular enough?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“But you meant it.”
“No, I didn’t. Anna. News flash: Myra is not enough. You need more friends.”
“Not friends like Kelly and Mindy.”
“Why do I even bother?” Sara groaned. “While you’re back there unload the box of Shellys and tag them, please. And it looks like we’re running low on Kendall’s Watch tee shirts. You need to check the inventory.” Sara busied herself dusting the display of picture postcards—old granny heads superimposed on Baywatch bodies with captions like Everyone feels like a babe in KENDALL’S WATCH or It must be something in the KENDALL’S WATCH water supply. Sara thought the postcards were hysterical, and people did buy them in batches. I thought they were the tackiest things I had ever seen in my life, and wouldn’t send one to my worst enemy.
Conversation over, I headed to the storeroom and started tagging Shellys—hand-made shell families concocted by Edna McNully, an old friend of my grandmother’s and a local nut case. The Shellys were, without a doubt, the coolest things in the shop. Each figure in a Shelly family—mother, father, big kid, baby, and dog, cat, or an occasional bird—was crafted from tiny scallop, snail, and mussel shells, held together with wire; their faces were painted like clowns and they had bright yellow yarn for hair. Edna twisted their little shell bodies in uncomfortable looking poses, and glued them inside wood boxes she called “Shelly Cottages.” Edna used dollhouse accessories—some of which I suspect she stole from her granddaughter—to furnish the cottages.
When not making Shellys, Edna walked through town talking to herself and picking up loose trash that she stuck in the deep pockets of her rain slicker. If not for her son John, the mayor of Kendall’s Watch, Edna would probably have been carted away a long time ago—that, and the fact that everyone loved the Shellys. After the Kendall’s Watch tee shirt, with its psychedelic wave logo designed personally by Sara, the Shellys were our biggest sell.
After Shelly tagging, I checked our Kendall’s Watch tee shirt stash. We were definitely low on inventory. Sara needed to call the distributor and order a big shipment ASAP. I left the storeroom to tell her, and found her busy, way busy, with a customer.
Sara leaned over the display case of ankle bracelets and earrings, pouring her body toward the man standing on the other side of the counter. She twisted a lock of hair with one hand and absentmindedly tapped the display glass with the fingernails of the other. Her target was tall and thick—like a former football player whose glory days were over. His hair was long, dark and shaggy; his suede jacket uber-hipster, and totally unnecessary in the eighty degree weather. He wore Ray-Bans and flipped an iPhone around in his right hand while grinning like a fool at the local goods—namely, my mother.
“Oh!” my mother chirped when she finally saw me. “There you are. Anna, meet Rusty Meyers. Rusty comes all the way from San Luis Obispo. He’s staying at the home of an old college buddy off Shadmoor.”
Rusty Meyers flipped up his glasses, and held out a blocky hand. “Awesome to meet you, Anna.” His eyes were blue and piercing, and the way he looked at me would have been blush-inducing sexy on a guy half his age, but from a forty-
something-ish dude it was just disturbing.
Then, I panicked—what if this Rusty was the Stella scout? Instantly I looked down and away, focusing on the price tag of a striped beach towel marked down from fifteen dollars to ten. There was nowhere to hide and I could feel Sara watching me like a hawk; I swallowed the lump in my throat, and reluctantly reached out to shake Rusty’s hand. His palm was sweaty. I put my hand behind my back afterwards and wiped it on my shirt.
“Anna,” Sara snapped. “Cat got your tongue?” As if a person, shy or otherwise, would ever let a cat anywhere near their tongue! I vowed that if I ever encountered a silent kid, or grown-up for that matter, I would never, ever utter those words.
“That’s okay, Sara.” Rusty turned his killer gaze back toward my mother, who returned it in full force. Sara looked like she wanted to eat him alive. The charge between them was as powerful as a nuclear reactor, and it made me really uncomfortable. I had thought buzz-cut-Steve was Sara’s summer target; obviously he now had competition. Or maybe Steve had already been totally eclipsed? Who could keep up with these things?
Sara leaned closer to Rusty, squeezing her arms together, plumping her already un-ignorable cleavage.
I cleared my throat. “So, pardon me.” Pardon me? I sounded like a grandmother. Get your foot out of your mouth, Dugan! You’re desperate to know, so force out the frigging words. “You’re…um…not from Stella?”
Rusty broke his ga-ga gaze lock with Sara and looked at me quizzically. “Stella? Who’s Stella?”
“Anna, you silly girl,” Sara giggled as if someone were tickling her with a feather. “Rusty doesn’t surf. We met last night at The Castaway.” The Castaway was a high-class bar and grill down in Easton, the upper crusty enclave between Kendall’s Watch and Montauk. The Castaway was one of the many haunts that my mother liked to frequent, searching for wealthy, attractive guys. “Rusty’s a venture capitalist. He invests in green product development.”
“Oh, sorry,” I said. Rusty seemed as environmentally correct as the beer cans tumbling like tumbleweeds down Main Street after a busy summer weekend—but what did I know about rich men?
Rusty shrugged. “No worries.”
“Anna’s being scouted for a spot on the Stella Junior Women’s Pro Tour, Rusty. Only the best young female surfers in the world are considered. Isn’t that awesome?”
“Awesome is an understatement,” Rusty grinned at me. His perfectly white teeth probably cost more than most mid-sized cars. “You must be total
ly psyched.”
Shrugging, I could feel the muscles in my jaw begin to tighten. My mother sashayed from behind the counter and draped an arm around my shoulder, pulling me close. She smelled of coconut body wash and tobacco. Sara smoked three cigarettes a day, one after every meal; she had great self-control or a controlled addiction, depending on your perspective.
“She is totally psyched, aren’t you, Anna?” Sara flashed me a smile, which I interpreted to mean: Get your shit together and make nice to my latest crush or I’ll make your life a misery.
I caved. “Totally psyched,” I muttered with as much energy as a dead bug.
Rusty barely noticed. “So, Sara. Dinner tonight?”
Sara shook her head. “No can do. Thursday nights are always reserved for dinner at my parents. Anna and me, and the old folks. It’s written in stone. But maybe after?”
Rusty grinned. “Meet me at the Castaway at ten?”
Nuzzling up close to Rusty, Sara purred, “You got it, babe.”
Yuck, I thought. Does anyone notice that there is a sixteen-year-old virgin standing in this room? If a fling with Rusty had officially started, I could count on endless evenings home alone—just me and my microwave ramen. Sara would scramble back at three or four in the morning, if she returned at all. At least she never brought guys home—a minor sign of virtue in her man-crazy life.
The clackety-clack of clam and mussel shells at the shop door announced a customer. Hallelujah, I thought. Saved by the Shell Bell.
“Can I help you?” I hurried toward the sunburned couple who had entered, fighting my usual flight response, relieved to focus elsewhere, anywhere other than at my mother and her new conquest. “Are you looking for anything in particular? Something made out of shells, maybe?”
Rusty left soon after, but not before whispering something to my mother which set her off in a torrent of sultry sighs. I did my best not to pay attention, talking a lot—at least for me—to the customers about the fabulousity of a deluxe Shelly chalet. As the Shell Bell clattered at Rusty’s exit, I mumbled, “Good riddance to bad rubbish.”
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