by Paloma Meir
“Spain’s not third world dude. Madrid’s a world-class city. Try living in Peru... She’s a rich girl living a rich girl’s life.”
“I know that, Serge. I was venting. I’m not calling her. I’ll send her a baby gift and be done with it.”
“Cool. What about the asshole husband or boyfriend putting her on a diet? That girl was a bone growing up. I should know. She ran around my house in tank tops and panties for half her life.”
“You know how you don’t want to talk about Carolina and Anthony? I don’t want to talk about her body, okay? We good there? That said, Paolo sounds like a dick. For all of her pretensions, she was an idiot.”
“If that’s what you need to tell yourself, bro.” I paused for a moment considering his state of emotions. “Danny, I don’t want to overstep our boundaries, but I always wondered about you not going with her to Europe. The last time I saw the two of you together in Boston was at your apartment. She had all those brochures on schools for you... All that jumping up and down trying to get you to take a gap year or go to school over there for a year. It didn’t seem like she was asking for too much... Then you didn’t go anywhere anyway.”
“It’s easy to look back on it now and say that. At the time it seemed like I would be putting my life on hold for some romantic whim of hers. I wouldn’t want to live over there, you know? I thought if she went away for a semester, she would get it out of her system, and then... Well you were there for that... Her being with Paolo... I had been with her since she was fifteen. I don’t know... I thought that she would be back within the year. That didn’t happen. That year turned into another year. She wasn’t coming home. I was kind of okay with it until she came back last summer. We good, Serge?”
“You never told me you saw her last summer. What happened? It must have been something for Carolina to make that attack.”
“Nothing that would explain your sister’s takedown. Let’s run. Good warm-up for our wetsuits.”
We ran home in silence.
…
I ran into my parent’s home, late for dinner. My dreadlocked hair still wet hair from my quick shower after a long day of surfing with Danny. “Carolina,” I called out to my sister from the doorway of our childhood home, “Come here I want to show you my car.”
“Your car?” I took her hand as she approached the door and pulled her outside onto our front porch.
“There it is. It’s blue,” I pointed to my Prius, “What was the point of this morning? You can’t do that to him.”
“I’m sorry. I told you I have jetlag.” She did not look at my car or me.
“What’s going on with you and Zelda? Don’t lie to me this time... She left him six years ago. Did you forget that part? Why are you so worked up about it now?”
“Why do you feel the need to protect him?” He’s an adult, and so are you. Why are you always taking care of other people? Grow up both of you. If you care so much about him take him shopping. Take yourself too. You two were more together in high school.” She turned to go back inside the house.
“Deflecting didn’t work when we were kids, and it’s not going to work now. What was the point of purposely going after him like that? You know he still hurts for her. You’re ornery and unpleasant but never cruel.”
“Ornery and unpleasant?” she snorted. "I’m not kidding. I didn’t mean to hurt him... He should have gone to get her. He should go get her.”
“What do you mean he should go get her?”
“Serge, I really do have jetlag.” She rubbed her eyes that were a little red. “Please... I’m sorry. It’s fine. You know I care about Danny. I didn’t mean it.” She took my hand. “Come on. Let’s go inside. This dinner is going to be hard enough without you being mad at me.”
A loud sigh escaped from my mouth. The dinner would be hard for her. I squeezed her hand and forgave her.
…
Back at home, because the day was never going to end, I found Danny pacing back and forth from the kitchen to his room muttering about baby gifts, saying pink, pink, pink over and over again. I worried he would fall back into his stoic ways, but for whatever reason he did not.
I got into my bed that was unlike any other, sunk into what would be a better descriptor, and heard Danny yell out USA with spirit. He sounded almost happy. I wondered for a moment if maybe I had coddled him too much, if Carolina’s tactic of aggression was the way I should have gone with him. Not worth pondering.
I pulled the overstuffed duvet tightly around myself and began my usual late night calls to the women in my life starting with Marianne. Brendan was coming the following week, and we had planned a road trip up the coast to visit Danny’s brother in Marin County. We were going to spend the night at her apartment in Santa Cruz on the way back down the coast. I was having second thoughts because the commitment prone Marianne had a boyfriend which bothered me.
She didn’t answer, so I left a message. I was about to call Lana, a grad student up at Pepperdine to check in on her, when Danny screamed out, “Hell yes, chocolate covered caramel." I laughed as anyone would and decided to let the women of the world solve their own problems for the night and drifted off into a very happy sleep.
Chapter Fourteen
We pulled up in front of Marianne’s apartment late in the day after a weekend spent at Danny’s brother's house up in Marin County. The three of us had gone up to celebrate the organic spiced vodka Brian had been distilling and serving in his restaurant. It had been bought by one of the larger liquor companies making him quite a bit of money.
“We’re going to be cramped. It's small. Let’s head down the coast. I’ll text her, let her know the change of plans.” I took out my phone as Danny put the car in park.
“Dude you’re just pissed that she has a boyfriend," Brendan said from the back seat of Danny’s car.
“No that’s not it,” I texted her though it probably would have been easier to get out of the car and tell her. “Okay it’s that.”
“She doesn’t live with him. You could get back into her bed for the night. You own her man.”
“I don’t know about that...” I put the phone back in my backpack and ignored Brendan’s thoughts on human ownership. “Let’s head down the coast, and camp out on the beach before we head home. We could probably make it down to Big Sur before dark. We could eat dinner at Nepenthe.”
“We don’t have any gear,” Danny said as he started his car up again.
“Serge, Serge, Serge claim her if you want her... I don’t want to sleep on the beach.”
“Camp on the beach... fucking good.” Danny made a tight U-turn down to PCH, “I’ve got a blanket in the trunk.”
“Danny, what is up with the two of you? It’s like you wifed each other. You’re going to let him get away with that? One blanket for the three of us?”
“It’s nothing, Brendan. Jimena was staying at our house last week… The start-up chick last night. Serge is doing fine, Lothario-style fine. He’s got them on our doorstep bringing over fresh baked tofu cakes, or whatever cardboard food he eats.”
No matter what I said to Danny, he would not believe that most of the women in my life were just friends.
“Start-up girl,” Brendan nodded his head up and down with approval and held his hand up for a high-five. I slapped it hard, “Okay, but find a sporting good store. We need sleeping bags. I’m not sharing a blanket with the two of you.”
The start-up girl name was Jane. Sweet, sweet Jane... Maybe Danny was right. We both went hard with the women. It was the emotion that was lacking, not the sex.
We camped out a few miles down the coast from Big Sur. Camped out wouldn’t have been the right phrase. Brendan had wanted the full experience when we stopped at the sporting good store. My frugal ways put a stop to that.
One night on the beach would only require a sleeping bag, I told the two of them. Their arms were full of lanterns, dehydrated food packs and GPS equipment. We had already picked up food from the market, I reminded
them, and GPS wouldn’t be required for the short walk from the car to the beach.
Brendan hauled the case of vodka Danny’s brother had given us down to our campsite saying the hard wooden top would be a good place to store our wallets and keys. Liar, our Russian friend planned to live up to the stereotype and drag Danny and me along for the ride.
We sat not more than twenty feet from the shore, shivering a little because the sun warmed sand turned unexpectedly cold as the sun went down. We guzzled Vodka as if we were in Siberia.
I had never been drunk before and hadn’t taken my first sip of alcohol until my twenty-first birthday. It had been one beer. The most I had ever drunk before that night with Brendan and Danny were two beers. I had no idea what I was in for, and I don’t think Danny did either. He was never much of a drinker.
“Freezing out here, Serge. If you weren’t such a pussy, we could be back at Marianne’s, listening to you fuck her in the bedroom. The two of you and your high school girlfriends,” Brendan laughed and pulled the sleeping bag over him like a blanket.
“You’re very crass, Brendan,” I fell backwards onto the sand, the vodka warming me up “It’s about sixty-eight degrees out. Who’s 'the pussy' now, Brendan? Huh? Here take my jacket.” I reached out beside me to pick it up and throw it to him, but my hand couldn’t connect.
“Let me help,” Danny leaned over to pick it up, but fell face first into the sand. “It’s in my mouth.” He laughed like a crazy person, rubbing it more into his face as he tried to wipe it off.
“Zelda hated the beach... I shouldn’t have told her we were going to live in Malibu.” Suddenly sad, he lifted the bottle up and guzzled it down as if it were a sports drink. I didn’t know what to say to that even in my free and easy inebriated state. I took the bottle from his hands and followed the motion, drowning and splashing myself with the harsh spiced vodka.
“Danny,” Brendan shivered and gulped from his personal bottle, he had been cradling like a baby since we set up camp. “We took care of this already. No more moaning about Zelda. I listened to this for a year.”
“What are you? The iron man? You don’t ever think about Cara? Indivisible for the whole four years with her.” I punched Danny lightly in the arm, actually I missed. “You say what you need to say, Danny.”
“Cara? Nah. I think about Celena more than her.” He took another slug of the bottle.
“Why would you think about Celena? I don’t even like to think about her.”
“She blew him at a party.” Danny said lost in his ennui over the fairest maiden Zelda. “You never told him?”
“Serge, fuck, I’m sorry. She was corrupt, fucking evil. I was drunk like this.” He punched himself in the side of the head. “She did it to hurt you. I couldn’t walk or see straight. She took me outside... I wanted to tell you. I told Cara and she wouldn’t let me. Half a lifetime ago.”
“You mean I didn’t have to have to stay with her? I could have hated her like any sane person would have hated her?” I stood up with a plan to drown myself in the ocean, but tripped over my feet, sat back down and drained the bottle. I buried my head in my hands and practically cried. “My Mom... Zelda... wasted time.”
“Serge, buddy...” Danny rubbed his hand up and down my back.
“I didn’t know you were going to get back together with her. You didn’t even tell us for months that you were seeing her again. If I had known, I would have told you. It wouldn’t have mattered what Cara said. I would have told you. You and Danny are my best friends. She knew that. She wanted to break you, fucking hurt you. She was crazy. She drew me in. I don’t even know what went on with her and Cara. I kept going to Celena’s house to talk her down and things happened. She locked me in dude, then the switch would flip, and then it was you. She’s apologizing to me. Insane. I was sixteen, Serge. You can’t hate me for this. I paid for it already.”
“My best friend fucking my girlfriend? Broken up or not, I can fucking hate you.” I shakily stood and swung my arm in his direction. “I can hate you forever.” I closed one eye because there was two of him, but still missed.
“I never fucked her ever. That would have been too easy for her. It was all mind games. Everything she did was for you. It was crazy. She was crazy. I was trying to help her, protect you. Why do you think she finally started taking the medication? I set her straight Serge. You were doing your Prism project, weren’t paying attention.” He turned his head, retched into the sand, covered his mess like a cat, and took another slug of the vodka. Even at his worst, he was still hardcore. “Stalking you, your sister, even Zelda. Dude, she would hide in bushes. Tell him, Danny.”
“All I knew about was the party, and that she was following around Zelda and Carolina.” He fell back into the sand, his face partially mashed to the ground making it hard to hear his words. “And I set her straight. She didn’t follow them around anymore.” He picked up a pile of sand and poured it over his head. “We took care of you dude... that project, you were buried in it. It worked out. You’ve always said you wouldn’t have been able to go to MIT without that money. We took care of you...”
“You’re repeating yourself... You don’t get it. I didn’t have to be with her. Every day, I went to her house.” I swung my body around and kicked a pile of sand at him. I missed him because the swirl of movement continued well after my body stopped, “Since when is it all right to fuck each other’s girlfriends?”
“I didn’t fuck her.” Muttered my betrayer.
“Shut the fuck up.” I lunged his way without success and turned to Danny “Is it okay I wanted to set a timer and roll around nude with your girlfriend? Feel her body pressed up against mine, rub myself on her, really go at her, for no more than fifteen minutes? I would have asked her too, and she would have said yes,” I suddenly knew that to be true. I hated myself for not having the balls to act on it. “If you weren’t fucking climbing out of her window the next day... Her hair in my hands, those long legs wrapped around mine...”
“You’re going to regret saying that in the morning.” Brendan laughed and fell over onto his side, “Rookie drinking mistake.”
“It was in my head, not my actions, you dumb fuck weasel backstabber.” I turned away from him and fell onto my knees before a possibly unconscious Danny. “She wasn’t supposed to turn into a modern day Salome. She was an awkward child, malnourished looking. She was my friend. She wasn’t supposed to grow up to be a goddess. I’m sorry. I never thought about her that way after the day we went for a run in Malibu, ever. Her pearlescent skin, that body, her face... I was sixteen Danny. I noticed her and hated myself for it...”
“You get to be sixteen with your mistakes and I don’t? Fuck off, Serge.” Brendan threw his bottle down and jumped towards me. He probably would have landed right on top of me if Danny hadn’t woken up in a mania.
“It’s your fault. Nothing to do with Malibu. I could have talked her down from that. I talked her down from a lot of things.” He jumped up with a military style push-up, shocking me. “She would be here now if you had set the timer.”
“I never felt that way about her ever... I didn’t. She was like a sister. I would never have used her that way.” I nodded my head to be sure. “I was a kid,” I turned towards Brendan who stood next to Danny, “but not a psychopath kid like Brendan.” I sneered his way. “She didn’t leave for a, “life experience”. It was over. Almost six years you two were together. People don’t mate for life at fifteen. She grew up. That’s all there ever was to it.”
“Wrong dude. I’m going to get her. She’s fucking coming home. Dead time since she left. I should have done it that day in the juice bar like you said... Airport run. We’re going now.” He wobbled towards the wooden case of Vodka.
“Brendan grab the keys, throw them.” I yelled out unable to coordinate my feet in the right direction. Brendan ran ahead of the cross-footed Danny, picked up the keys, and held them over his head.
“Other way,” I yelled out as I stumbled in their g
eneral direction “Not into the ocean, but throw them hard.” He wasn’t in the prime condition Danny and I were in, but still he had the grace of the natural athlete he had once been. I smiled as the moon lit up the keys flying across the night sky.
“You think I can’t find them?” He ran after the keys as Brendan and I fell to the ground.
“No I don’t...” I yelled out. I was getting cold and the sleeping bag was out of reach. I pulled the car blanket we had used as a picnic blanket around my knees, “Did you see where they landed?” I whispered to the one who used to be my friend, “Or are we going to have to call Triple A in the morning?”
“Over by the rocks. He’ll never find them tonight. We’ll probably find them in the morning." He pulled part of the blanket across him. “Is he going to do this all night?”
“Danny, are you going to do this all night?”
“Yes. I need to get to Madrid.”
“All you’re going to get if you find them is a DUI. Even if you made it to the airport, your passport is at home. They won’t let you on the plane.”