by Lisa Freeman
When we got to the van, Jerry opened the door and said, “Ladies first.” I figured I had made it clear that I could handle opening my own doors, but I kept my mouth zipped as I climbed in the back to change. For the first time in hours, I was alone.
When I came out changed, fresh and nice, the sun was up, the air was warm. The VPMs didn’t see my wet suit top or my board hanging in the racks. But they did see me tying up my shirt and zipping up my shorts. I tilted my head down and let my hair fall over my face as I muttered, “Oh great.”
Jerry was oblivious—again. He was on his usual happy high from surfing, but I could sense the impression all this was creating. Jerry at Nani’s? Nani getting dressed in the back of the van? Nigel gone? It was a disaster, and from the look on Lord Ricky’s ugly mug, one that was only going to get worse.
He went all singsong-y and he said, “Jerry and Nani, sitting in a tree. K-I-S-S-I-N-G. B-U-S-T-E-D.”
“You stink like the Oscars,” I told him.
Lord Ricky went ballistic, kind of like he did last summer when I touched Mary Jo’s brother’s dog tags, not knowing why he wore them. “How do you know about the Oscars?”
Jerry came to my rescue. “I told her, man.”
“That’s not chick stuff, Richmond.” Lord Ricky hocked a big loogie and swung his board a little too close to me as he charged toward the water.
Jerry gave me the stink eye.
“I know, I know,” I said. “I’m sorry.”
He took my arm and pulled me aside, again sparking unwelcome attention from the VPMs.
“Nani, what happens in the water can never, ever be talked about when you’re on land.”
I nodded. I totally got it. It was just like the unspoken rules the SOS had on the beach. Except this was a rule guys lived by.
Jerry continued, “And I want you to keep your board in the van. It’s safer.”
“But what if I want to surf when you’re not around?”
“If they found out, it could end really bad for you—and me,” Jerry said.
It had never occurred to me that I was putting Jerry at risk by surfing with him, but if he were to lose the trust of the guys he surfed with, they wouldn’t watch his back anymore, and that would make it very dangerous for him, too. So I agreed, as long as he promised to meet me again tonight.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
The Bet
For the rest of the week, I barely heard the lineup and recruits talking. The only thing that made me feel good was the ocean, so I concentrated on it. I was clear-eyed and in flow with the universe when I was in the water. Once, everything was the ocean. Most people don’t know this, but all of us come from the sea. I had to be in Nāmaka’s world.
The lineup sunbathed like topless girls on a yacht. We had that much attitude. They checked their ring tans and admired that they were getting darker. I was doing just the opposite, wearing sunscreen and making sure I didn’t get too dark. Regardless, we were looking good. Our towels lined up evenly, starting with Ms. ERA, then Julie, Jenni, Lisa, me, Baby, and Mary Jo.
The Topangas were trying to get Glenn’s attention. They still didn’t know about the No Girl rule in Tubed. It amused us to watch them try, again and again, to get Glenn to take their picture.
The whole lineup was smoking—except me and Baby. Every five minutes somebody lit up. But I hadn’t stolen, bummed, or snuck a single cigarette. I wasn’t worrying about finding some guy to buy me a pack of Larks in the morning. And falling asleep next to my abalone ashtray was much nicer when it wasn’t full to the brim with old butts. The stink that had once made Nigel call me his little smokestack was leaving me for good—along with the constant craving for more.
The VPMs had the break to themselves for the entire week. The wind picked up in the late afternoon, and it looked radical out there. I felt a camaraderie with the guys, now that I’d be out there. I studied how they dug in super strong, took off deep and steep, and never rag-dolled. I knew I couldn’t sit among them in the takeoff zone, but I was gaining a lot more understanding of what they were doing out there. That’s all I really wanted to think about—surfing.
The lineup didn’t talk about the rumors they heard about me and Jerry, but I knew they were saying stuff behind my back. Lord Ricky told everyone at Roy’s—I mean Patrick’s—about me coming out of the back of the van. The VPMs told Lisa and Jenni, and the way it spread from there was pretty easy to figure out. Everyone was getting way too interested in my private business. That’s why it kind of annoyed me when Jenni asked, “Are you really going to drive Nigel’s van, now that he’s gone for good?”
Her point was: girls don’t drive that kind of car. They were supposed to be in convertibles, or VWs. That was another stupid rule I was going to break.
I was tired of taking Jenni and Lisa’s sass. “You make it sound like Nigel’s dead,” I told her.
“He may as well be,” Shawn said, appearing out of nowhere with his board.
I looked at his sad face and guessed that Nigel really did denounce all his earthly ties—including his family. That must have made Shawn feel pretty alone. I knew what that was like. Shawn’s eyes were the same blue as Nigel’s, but his had become hardened by the constant awareness that half of him was absent.
“Hey,” was all that needed to be said.
“Hi, Nani.”
Baby, Julie, and even Ms. ERA looked like they were going to swallow their tongues. They had never seen a McBride in the flesh. His beauty had somehow grown over the summer. There was a little hair on his chest, and his shoulders were broader. Even his voice was deeper. I wondered if Nigel’s body was doing the same thing as he baked bread for the poor.
Jerry stood by Shawn’s side, wearing drawstring trunks, untied, hanging low, which revealed a treasure trail bleached from sun and salt. He balanced on one leg, held his surfboard with one arm, and stretched his quads with the other.
Everyone looked away uncomfortably as he tried to get my attention by making funny faces. Lisa broke the awkward silence by shyly asking Shawn, “When does Claire get back?”
“Few days. She’s spending some extra time in Paris.” Shawn didn’t sound too excited. He also had a hickey on his neck—so, obviously, he wasn’t as lonely as one might think.
I refused to look Jerry in the eye with so many people watching us. But it was like this: if someone tells you not to think about sugar, all you think about is sugar. And Jerry was sugar to me. One big piece of candy I wanted to bite into but couldn’t. I didn’t want to be like Rox, a Funny Kine who does it with boys, so I was putting myself on a Jerry Richmond diet.
When I tuned back in to the lineup, Julie was saying that her parents had just signed divorce papers. Her mother was calling herself a divorcée now. She said, “My dad found somebody else. That’s how come we ended up in LA.”
Baby turned to me. “Do you mind if I ask what happened to your dad?” she asked with concern. Everybody moved in a little closer.
I guessed it was time to start telling the truth. Letting the lineup in. At least about some things. I slowly rolled up until I sat tall.
“He had a heart attack. He pretty much died in front of me.”
I was surprised when Julie came and sat on my towel and slipped her hand into mine. Not like, Let’s get together. But like she cared. The tough ones are always the sweetest.
We all sat in silence, listening to State: radios playing, waves, and seagulls.
“Do you get homesick, like I do?” Julie asked. “I miss the Ventura Pier, the penny arcade, and the kiddie merry-go-round. All the little stores with wind chimes, stained glass, and tiny, freaky animals made out of driftwood and shells.”
“You know what I miss?” I said. “Flowers. Oahu has its own sweet scent.” I told them about the smell of white pikake and jasmine. “We used to make leis out of plumerias,” I said, but I didn’t tell them that plumerias are also the flowers planted in graveyards. “I love the plants that come in clusters of trumpet shapes and cling
to walls and twist into vines. Sort of like morning glories on the mainland. Then there’s anthuriums that look like hearts with yellow beaks.”
Baby laughed. She thought that was so funny.
“They’re red,” I continued. “Shiny and waxy. There’s also this flower called heliconia. It’s pink, and it’s nicknamed the Lobster Claw. And then, of course, there are birds-of-paradise.” Julie said, “We have birds-of-paradise at my house. You can come visit them anytime.”
That kind of nice cracked me open. Julie, Baby, and Ms. ERA were just the combination I needed. They balanced and sheltered me from the wild card, Mary Jo, and they neutralized Lisa and Jenni.
A feather flew past me. The breeze picked it up and made it float slowly enough for me to catch it. This was a sign, I knew it—an omen meant to remind me that there was something gentle inside me. Calmer seas. Call it hope. There was a place I had forgotten to tap into. That’s when I realized: I had been so caught up in Nigel, Rox, Jerry, and my mom’s drinking, that I hadn’t been to my dream chamber in days. The place inside me where I felt things had disappeared. But thinking about flowers and making new friends unlocked that place in my mind.
Out of nowhere, Melanie Clearwater stood over me, blocking the sun. She dropped her hand into my face and opened it, gesturing.
“Can I have it back?” she asked, pointing to the feather I was tickling my leg with. “Nicole gave it to me.”
“How do we know it’s yours?” Lisa demanded.
Melanie put her hands on her back and arched it forward. “Who else’s would it be?” she asked.
“A bird’s?” Baby asked innocently.
That sent a titillating ripple through the lineup, who were blocking their eyes from the reflection off Melanie’s sparkly, gold, see-through shirt.
“Taking this sun virgin thing a bit far, aren’t you?” Lisa said, annoyed.
Melanie was waiting. Staring at me. She was serious, and I worried that the long-overdue turf war between the SOS and Topangas was about to happen. Luckily, since the beach was crowded and Glenn was snapping away at waves for Tubed, it would have to be a low-key battle. No raised voices or fists.
In her most Zen, cool-girl voice, barely moving her lips, Melanie said, “I’d just like my feather, please.” She was so pissed she was twitching.
I was about to hand it to her, but Mary Jo stood up and snatched it away from me. “You’re too nice, Nani.” Mary Jo was at her best during a conflict. She needed trouble every day, like the regular world needs vitamins. Chaos was the only way she kept herself taped together.
Suddenly I got Mary Jo. The riddle was solved. She was a person like me, whose world had been torn apart—doors knocked down, windows blown to smithereens. Like mine, her life was about trying to avoid getting cut on shards of glass. The more we tried to get the broken stuff out, the worse it got. Mary Jo and I knew what it was like to have wounds no Band-Aid could keep from splitting open. Joyce called it grief.
I got it. Mary Jo had to use. She was stuck in a world without her brother. She had the same pain as I did. It lived in her every day. Every day she woke up with only one goal: to forget Ray and the fact that he had been blown to bits in a stupid war. Forget that, like my dad, Ray was gone without a goodbye.
“Hold this.” Mary Jo handed the feather to Lisa and dragged Melanie back to her towel—which, by the way, was almost touching the SOS’s. They talked quietly.
Mary Jo was acting as our liaison. That made me nervous. But as I watched her, I felt my prison doors open. In my mind’s eye, I saw myself walking away from the ball and chain I let other people attach to me.
Mary Jo gathered the Topangas in a circle. They peeked at us over their shoulders with plastic grins. As she talked, they nodded.
Melanie Clearwater looked happy again. Her voice had a sinister twang to it as she said, “Deal,” and drank from Mary Jo’s thermos, passing it around. Downwind, the brew smelled like rum.
Then the most amazing thing happened. The Topangas moved their towels ten feet back, to their usual spot.
“How did you do that?” Lisa asked as Mary Jo strolled back to the lineup.
Mary Jo sat down, pulled out a cigarette, and lit up. “Well … I made a bet with them. If they lose, they permanently—as in FOREVER—stay put.”
“And if WE lose? Jenni asked.
“They get our spot,” Mary Jo said.
“Shut up.”
“What?”
Lisa and Jenni were talking at the same time.
“Don’t worry, we’re going to win.” Mary Jo was tipsy again—to say the least.
“What’s the bet?” I asked.
“Wendy Davenport joins the SOS.” The whole lineup looked relieved. Mary Jo continued, “By August fourteenth. Baby’s birthday.”
I blinked. That was in exactly one week.
“So when do you think we’ll meet Wendy Davenport?” Mary Jo continued. Everyone looked at me.
I wasn’t going to tell any of them I had lost Windy’s phone number and had no idea how to reach her. So I lied. “Soon.”
“Better be sooner than soon.” Lisa grimaced.
How would I find her? I didn’t know if Windy was playing me, or just playing hard to get. When it came to Windy Davenport, I had more questions than answers.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
T. Rox
Over the next three days, I went through the yellow pages twice, calling every Davenport from Santa Monica to Malibu. Nothing. I tried spelling Davenport with an “i,” too—just in case. I was desperate; I even called Davenport Pets in Culver City. But still no Windy.
At State, I acted like nothing was wrong. I sunbathed and I listened to the lineup preparing for Baby’s birthday, which was coming up fast.
On top of all this, I didn’t have money for the T. Rex concert later that night, so I had to make up one of my BS excuses. I could have used the twenty dollars Joyce gave me, but I needed to stock up on food for the rainy day I knew was coming. To cheer myself up, I headed to the fancy market in the Palisades. Jean was on a binge, and taking care of me wasn’t exactly a priority.
Hughes Market was deserted. As I walked in, I saw on the front page of the Times that the Senate had subpoenaed Nixon’s private tapes. He was so busted now. I was sick of Watergate this and Watergate that.
My stomach growled. I grabbed a rotisserie chicken. It smelled incredible. It was going to be my reward for being so mature and taking care of myself.
I wanted everything in that market. It all looked so amazing. But I got good stuff—you know, peaches without bruises, cheese without mold, and a dozen eggs.
I headed straight for the exotic canned foods: SpaghettiOs, artichoke hearts, olives, and, last but not least, shiitake mushrooms. Then soap and toothpaste. And finally, I went looking for my favorite cereals.
In front of my shopping cart full of treats was a pyramid of Cheerios boxes carefully stacked, corner-to-corner. Next to it was a tower of Frosted Flakes. And there, between them both … was Rox.
A surge of fear jolted through me. Rox looked different but the same. What were the odds that she would be standing in the middle of this section, inspecting her nails for chips?
Like any startled predator, she went right on the attack. “What are you doing here?” Her tone was sinister, and her eyes narrowed. Her stare made my short hairs stand on end. “Tell me about you and Jerry.”
She was seething, and much too close for comfort. What was I going to tell her? That I kissed him? That we surfed together? That I loved Jerry’s style and how he could come out of the barrel clean and untouched? That he knew how to read waves like a mystic and that sitting deep in the takeoff zone with him was as good as any trip to Fiji with her?
I fiddled with the tips of my hair.
She pointed her finger at me and said, “I trusted you.”
Rox bore a striking resemblance to a dinosaur with her claws stretched out, mouth wide open, and her hair whipping around like a giant tail.
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“Why are we acting like this?” I asked.
“There is no more ‘we.’” Rox tore open a box of Frosted Flakes and poured the contents on my head. I was going to stop this before it turned into an atomic bomb dropping on both of us. I pushed the box out of her hands.
A manager lady came rushing over. “Are you girls all right?”
I covered my face. The cereal stuck in my hair. I don’t know why I even left my house. Rox shape-shifted into a sticky sweet girl—like the kind of candy that makes you gag, it’s so full of sugar. “My friend just got really hungry,” she said.
“Well you’re going to have to pay for that,” the manager scolded.
I handed the box to Rox and said, “Oh, yeah, she will.” As I ran toward the door, I saw tons of ice cream in Rox’s cart. Not one quart but five.
“Breaking your fast?” I asked, hurrying away, leaving my rewards and any hope of a friendship behind.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
The Red Queen
In the parking lot, I put my hands on my knees and dropped my head further down. I felt sick to my stomach. What a god-awful mess.
Now I saw Rox as the Red Queen. Just like the Red Queen with Alice, she outranked me and would forever be someone to avoid. Because no matter what I did, she always had the advantage.
What happened in the market was like a game of chess—the only good thing I ever got from slimy Uncle Mike. How to play it, that is. He would always say, “You’re only as good as who you remove. Get rid of your opponent fast as you can, and never get captured.” Well, Rox was my opponent now. Our pact was so over.
If I wanted to be a Queen, a ruler, someday, I had better start acting like one. Like I said, soldiers used to say, “Get tough, cream puff,” or “Suck it up.” Not like Don Ho’s audiences suck up drinks, but like a warrior. Despite everything we had done and said and promised, Rox and I had nothing in common anymore.