by Mark Stone
I grabbed the one closest to me, a large man with the sort of carefully trimmed beard that told me he spent a lot of time looking at himself in the mirror. As I spun him around, throwing a fist directly into his nose, it occurred to me that the mirror would show him something different the next time he looked into it. I punched him again and then threw an elbow into his nose for good measure as he stumbled backward. It would show him a bruised and battered mess. With any luck, and if he still had the brain the good Lord gave him, it would teach him not to come to my beach anymore with trouble on his mind.
As I turned to the second man, a slightly taller man who was a decent bit thicker than the first one, I saw he was already coming for me. Lumbering like a moving sequoia tree, he ventured a fist in my direction. Since he was as slow as maple syrup in cold weather, I didn’t have any problem dodging it. It was a good thing, though. His meaty hand would have knocked the hell out of me. As I watched it sail past, I shuddered thinking about what that massive paw must have done to Brick.
I shook my head. That didn’t matter now. All I could do was stop him from moving forward. Turning quickly, I punched him once, twice, and a third time in the body, hitting his ribcage and then the gut.
The dude was a brick wall, though. The punches barely fazed him. He hardly stepped back at all. In fact, he pressed forward, throwing his shoulder into my chest and lifting me off the ground. As I went through the air, I felt the first drops of rain hit my face.
By the time I slammed into the sand below, the sky opened up and unleashed a wet fury.
Rain pounded down on me, roaring as it beat against the water, the sand, and my skin. It only stopped when the wall of a man stood over me, his back blocking the torrent of rain. The man lifted his foot and brought it down toward my chest. My eyes went wide as I grabbed his foot, stopping it in its tracks.
He was strong, though, still pressing his boot down in an effort to stomp me. Having slowed it, I spun, letting the foot go to hit the sand forcefully. Then, I punched the side of his knee, finally sending him stumbling. Moving my lower body, I swept his other foot, sending his ass to the ground. Then, jumping up, I kicked him in the gut to keep him down.
Turning my attention to the last guy, I saw he was hauling ass. Running down the beach, all I could see was long blond hair and a set of red sneakers moving up and down as the guy ran. He turned, probably to check and see if I was coming after him, and I saw his face. He had pockmarks on his cheeks and a pair of bags under his eyes. He turned back quickly and sped back up, nearly falling as he rushed away.
“You’d better run,” I mumbled, wiping sand from my face and walking to the spot where I knew Brock would be.
Only, Brick wasn’t there. In fact, lying in the spot where I thought my friend and protégé might be was someone I couldn’t consider either.
“Seriously? I hauled ass over here and fought for you?” I said, looking down as Cameron James peered back up at me. His face was cut and bleeding to the point where if he hadn’t been such a dick, I might have actually felt bad for him. He was a dick, though, and as he stood up, nodding at me, he proved it to me.
“Took you long enough,” he said, leering at the guys I had put down. “Not that this should have been an issue. Honestly, when I took the job here, I really thought there would be better security.”
“What?” I said, throwing my hands out. “You’re a lifeguard on the beach, you jackass. You are the security.” I shook my head. “Now where is Brick?”
“I have no idea. All I see is sand,” Cameron said. “Though if you want to hit these goons in the head with something, I suggest a couple of rocks. I saw some earlier near the shoreline. They’ll work every bit as good as bricks.”
I pursed my lips, trying to stop myself from screaming. “We don’t hit people in the head because we’re mad at them here, Cameron,” I said sternly. “Even people who hurt us. We’re better than that.”
“You’re the one asking about bricks. What was I supposed to think?” Cameron asked, narrowing his eyes at me like I was some kind of lunatic.
“Brick is a person, you nitwit,” I said. “He’s the man whose tower you’re currently standing under.”
“Then where is he? He should have come to help,” Cameron asked.
“I’m right here,” Brick said.
Turning, I saw the kid walking up to me. Miller and a few other people were behind him.
“I called you, but you didn’t answer,” Brick said. “I didn’t know what else to do. I went to Miller again. That’s when we heard about what was going on.” Brick looked at the two people sprawled out on the beach underfoot. As he looked, people started taking their phones out, snapping pictures of the scene.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Cameron asked, grabbing my hand and lifting it up alongside his own. “We kicked their asses.”
“We?” I asked, looking over at him quizzically.
He whispered a response, barely moving his lips as he spoke. “It’s cool, bud. Just go with it.”
I shook my head, looking back at the people as they started to applaud us.
“We did!” Cameron shouted, talking to the crowd again. “We’re basically heroes.”
17
With my bag slung over my shoulder and sunglasses over my eyes, I held my hand up to my face, walking through the throngs of people on the beach today. Normally, this wouldn’t have bothered me. In fact, I was a little later than usual coming in this morning, and if the beach hadn’t been crowded, I would have seen it as strange.
It wasn’t the number of people who were on the sand today that made me feel out of place in the only area that had ever really been home to me. No, the thing that was tripping me out was the fact that they were all staring at me, all taking my picture, all screaming my name.
While I was used to a few lingering looks here and there—there were people who would say I was a good looking guy, and there were more than a few women out there who had a thing for lifeguards—this was something completely different. These people didn’t think I was cute. Or at least, they weren’t looking at me because they thought I was cute. They were all going crazy over me for the same reason they had been going crazy over me for the last few days, and it was all Cameron James’s fault.
“Can I have a picture?!” one person shouted from the crowd. “Just one picture!”
“Sign my yearbook!” another person yelled as I kept walking, refusing to break stride as I made my way to the main tower to clock in and start my day. I had made the mistake of interacting with these people the first day this happened. I thought it would be rude not to at least acknowledge them. Six hours of batting through a never-ending sea of people later, and I had a whole new definition of what was rude. So I decided to just keep going, no matter who I saw and no matter what I heard.
“Danny Chase, I want to have your baby!” a third voice shouted, and though I had promised not to react, that one almost brought me to a stop.
“Lord in heaven” I muttered, finally stepping into the main tower and walking toward my locker.
Sighing, I ran a hand through my hair and rested my head against the locker’s cool metal. I could swim until other men’s arms threatened to fall off and never so much as blink an eye about it, but dealing with celebrity was a completely different type of exhausting. As it turned out, I didn’t like it too much.
“Well, if it isn’t the belle of the ball,” Riley said, settling beside me and pulling his locker open. I could tell from the sheen of droplets across his skin that he’d just gotten out of the water. I knew that look all too well—not dripping wet but not completely dry either. He had just made a save. Or at least, hopefully, he’d made it.
“Don’t call me that,” I said flatly, pushing myself off my locker and opening it. “Busy morning?”
“Aren’t they all?” Riley murmured. “A dude was trying to teach his son to swim. The kid is all of seven years old and there’s no flotation device in sight. I swear, I think people are the s
tupidest beings on the planet.” He scoffed. “If you want to teach your kid to swim, I get that. I respect it, but wear the damned gear, for God’s sake. Otherwise, teach him in a pool at the Y or something.”
“I get it,” I said. I was far too familiar with that kind of frustration. “Tell me it at least had a happy ending.”
“Happy enough,” Riley said. “I got the kid out just fine. The dad got stung in the ass by a jellyfish. He’s okay, but he’s not gonna be able to sit down for a few days.” My friend looked at me, smiling. “On second thought, I think the ending is happier than I originally figured.”
“All’s well that ends well,” I said, grabbing my water bottle from the locker as well as my sunscreen.
“Except it’s not over,” Riley said. “Carlton called out this morning, something about his mom having pneumonia. So that means Jenkins and I have to split four towers.” He shrugged. “It’s gonna be a hell of a day.”
“I’ve got faith in you,” I said, closing the locker door. “You know what you’re doing—wait, why four?”
“What?” Riley asked, his head stuck in his own locker.
“You said you and Jenkins had to split four towers,” I reminded him. “I know Carlton called out, but that only makes three. Where’d the fourth one come from?”
Riley pulled his head out and looked at me with slightly widened eyes. “You don’t know?”
“If I knew, I wouldn’t be asking you,” I said. “What’s with the look?”
“You seriously don’t know?” Riley asked.
“I’m not answering that question again,” I said. “Where did the fourth tower come from?”
“I mean, your name has been pulled off the schedule for the next two weeks,” Riley said. “I thought you knew that. The fourth tower is yours.”
Instinctively, I took a step back. “That’s not right,” I said, jogging over to the schedule marked on the big whiteboard at the far end of the room. Running my finger down the checkerboarded thing, I found my tower. There it was, same as it had been for years. Tower 15. Only, my name wasn’t beside it. In fact, my name wasn’t in any of the boxes notating who would be manning Tower 15 for the next few weeks. My name had been erased. In the boxes that stood for the next few days, Riley’s and Jenkins’s names had been scribbled. In the rest of the boxes, three forbidding letters sat: TBD.
“TBD?” I said, letting my finger sit at the curve of that last terrible letter.
“It means ‘to be determined’,” Riley said in a tone that was likely meant to keep me from freaking out.
It did not work.
“I know what the damn letters stand for, Riley! What I don’t know is why they’re there!” I whipped my body back in my friend’s direction. “What the hell needs to be determined? There’s nothing to be determined! That’s my tower! Tower 15 is my tower, dammit! I’m here! I’m ready to work!”
“Chase!” Miller’s voice boomed throughout the main tower. Looking in its direction, I saw my boss. The scowl on his face looked like it had been painted there as he motioned for me to come to him. “You want to keep that voice down and get your ass over here?”
“I want to know why my tower is being taken away from me?” I asked, decidedly not keeping my voice down as I marched over to him. “Did I do something wrong? Did I screw up on the job? Because I’ve been doing this for years, and I never screw up on the job. Shorewatch is way too important to me for that.”
“You didn’t screw up on the job,” Miller said, his voice gruff. “That’s not what this is about.” He pushed the door to his office open, and I saw that it was full. Cameron, Abby, Gina, and the mayor himself all sat there staring at me.”
“What’s going on?” I asked, my body suddenly tensing up.
“Come inside,” Miller said, stepping through his doorway. “Things have changed, and there’s a lot we need to talk about.”
18
“What exactly is going on here?” I asked, stepping through the doorway and looking over this group uneasily. Though I felt for Gina and I got the feeling that Abby was the sort of cop who really stuck to her guns, I couldn’t say that I trusted or even really liked any of them. Throw in the fact that Cameron and the mayor were there, and this instantly turned into a room I didn’t want to be in. Of course, if being here helped me figure out what craziness had just pulled me off the beach schedule, then it looked like I had no choice but to plant myself here and endure it.
“You’re a celebrity, that’s what,” the mayor said, his voice droll and unaffected.
“Well, he’s hanging onto a celebrity,” Cameron corrected, his arms folded over his chest as he half sat, half lay across one of the chairs. “Let’s not give him too much credit.”
“Are you talking about the people on the beach?” I asked, thrusting a thumb into the air and motioning behind me as though the beach could be seen through the walls. “They’re just all riled up because of the internet or whatever.”
“The internet is a big deal, Danny,” Gina said. “It’s where all the news comes from.”
“Not all the news,” the mayor said, looking over at his daughter with sharp eyes. “God, I hope not all the news.”
“The point is that you’re in a different position than you were a few days ago, Danny,” Miller said, rounding his desk and sitting behind it. As he sat, I saw a flash of the lifeguard he always told me he used to be. It was like that. Though he was sluggish and out of shape, every once in a while, there was something really fluid about the way Miller moved. It was just enough to make me believe that all the stories he told of his glory days might have actually had some truth to them.
“That's not my fault. All I did was my job,” I countered.
“This isn’t the sort of situation where fault needs to be assigned,” Miller said.
“Though if it were, I’m not entirely sure this isn’t your fault,” the mayor said. “At least, partially.”
“I stopped a drug deal,” I said sternly.
“You didn’t stop anything except a washed-up Olympian getting his ass beat,” the mayor scoffed.
“Hey!” Cameron shouted, turning to the man.
“Did I say something that was less than accurate?” the mayor asked, his eyebrows arching. “Am I supposed to believe that you did anything other than lie on the ground, covering your pathetic face, and then take credit when the tide turned?”
This was a surprise. All of my interactions with Cameron and the mayor led me to believe that their relationship was cordial. In fact, I assumed the mayor was a fan of Cameron. I figured that was why he was here. Obviously, he wasn’t that big a fan.
“You’re supposed to understand that my being here is a favor to you and to this whole damn town,” Cameron said, his hands balling into fists that sat folded on his chest.
“Spare me the song and dance. We both know why you’re actually here, and it isn’t to do me or this town any favors,” the mayor argued. “Though I’ll remind you that if not for this town and the gracious offer of its mayor, you’d find yourself in much direr straits than anyone with your record should have to ever consider.” He pointed at Cameron. “You’re here to play your part.”
“He didn’t do anything!” I shouted. “You’re right. All this waste of space did was make a big deal of himself when the cameras started flashing.”
“It’s called marketing,” he said.
“It’s called lying,” I answered.
“I know what he did,” the mayor said. “I know exactly what Mr. James is and is not capable of. That being said, he’s right about the marketing.”
“Marketing?” I said. “I’m not selling anything, Mr. Mayor. I’m here to do my job, and that’s it.”
“You’re always selling something,” the mayor argued. “And don’t look at me with those indignant, holier than thou eyes. Everyone who walks this planet is selling something. You’re not the one person above it.”
“My job is saving lives!”
“This be
ach is property of the city, Mr. Chase. That means your job is whatever I damn well say it is,” the mayor hissed.
“Yeah, that’s not gonna work for me,” I said, stepping toward the man. “And if you intend to talk to me again, you’ll need to call me Lieutenant Lifeguard Chase.”
“Hey!” Abby said, standing and walking between us, blocking my view of the mayor. “Let’s everybody keep everything in their pants, okay?” She looked at the mayor. “You say Cameron needs you, needs this place, and you’re right. You also need him, Jack. How about you go about this a different way?”
That little aside taught me two things—that Abby had a cool head on her shoulders when she needed it and that she had more of a familiar relationship with the mayor than I originally thought. Otherwise, why would she call him by his first name, and why would he allow it?
“The idea that a mayor would edit himself for the sake of a lifeguard is laughable to me, but I guess we’re in laughable times,” he muttered, looking down at his chest and then back up at me. “To my dismay, situations have been unfolding, and you seem to be in the dead center of them.”
“That’s not my fault,” I answered quickly, my jaw tight at the idea that he basically just called me laughable. “Like I’ve been saying this entire time, I’m just doing my job.”
“Are you, though?” Mayor Russell asked. “The first save, sure. You’re on the beach, and you do that whole ‘slow motion run into the water with that red thing in your hand’ routine. I get it.”
“It’s called a torp,” Miller and I both said in unison.
“But the second time,” Mayor Russell continued, ignoring the bit of information we’d just dropped, “you had no business with my daughter after the party that night. You knew how I felt about that. You had no business protecting her.”
“Probably not, but the people whose business it actually is to protect her don’t seem to be able to keep up with her,” I said.
“She’s a fast one,” Mayor Russell said. “I’d dare say she’d be too fast for you too if you didn’t seem to have this uncanny ability to slow her down.”