It Was Us

by Cruise, Anna

  My temples throbbed, and it wasn't just from listening to her babble. I'd put away twice as many drinks as I'd planned to last night. Like usual.

  If Jay had been there? He always cut me off when I was getting close to the line, especially during competitions. He knew when to stop me and he knew I'd listen.

  But he wasn't around anymore and I didn't listen to anyone.

  “Did I?” I asked. “Because I don't even remember.” I picked up my phone and checked the time. “I gotta roll.”

  “You really don't want my number?” she asked, disbelief in her voice.

  I wasn't going to stand there and explain myself. I could tell her it was me and not her, but that would sound like a line. Didn't matter if it was true or not. I could tell her I didn't know when I would be coming back through again and I didn't want to get her hopes up. But I didn't want to waste my time. Or hers. It all just sounded like bullshit and she wouldn't get it and then she'd start asking questions and then I'd get pissed and it would just get worse.

  I hoisted the bag over my shoulder and opened the door to the room. I glanced at the girl in my bed whose name I couldn't remember and said the same thing I'd said a hundred times before.

  “No,” I told her. “I really don't want your number.”

  TWO

  “Where the hell have you been?” Matty shoved my surfboard into my chest. “Fucking heat starts in ten minutes.”

  I dropped my duffel bag on the sand and pulled out my rashguard. “Chill. I'm here.” I slipped into it, the cool fabric rippling my skin with goosebumps. The sun hung low in the eastern sky, the early morning chill still lingering in the air.

  He lifted the sunglasses he was wearing and parked them on his mop of blond curls. His forehead, tanned and lined with age, creased into a frown. “Right from the bar, based on how you smell.”

  I just nodded, ignoring him. I wasn't surprised to see him. Matty Bartholomew wouldn't miss a competition in Huntington. Especially if I was in it.

  I stole a quick glance at my surroundings. The beach was already packed with people, even at that early hour. Spectators, reporters, a few straggling surfers who hadn't made their way out into the water yet. A couple eyed me curiously, careful not to make eye contact. We were competitors, after all. We were all there seeking the same thing. A championship. There were no friendships here. Not with Jay gone.

  “I waxed it for you,” Matty said, pointing at my board.

  I rubbed my hand down the bumpy surface. “Not a kid anymore, Matty. I got it.” But I had to admit, he'd done a good job. What had I expected? He'd been surfing for more years than I'd been alive.

  He snorted. “Bullshit. You ain't got nothin', kid. And you know it.” When I didn't respond, he raised his voice, making sure I heard him over the waves and the buzz of the crowd as they moved into position around us. “I saw you last night.”

  I picked up the ball of wax tucked inside my bag and kneeled down in the sand. Lightly, I rubbed it across the mid-section of my board, smooth wide circles, small to start, growing wider as I expanded my reach.

  “You think Jay would have been happy?” His tone was gruff. “Seeing you last night? Knowing you're throwing all this away?” He made a sweeping gesture with his hand. The sand. The ocean. The crowd of spectators and reporters, all gathered to watch the opening heat. “This is yours, Kellen. All this. And you're pissing it away.”

  I didn't want to hear it. I sprang back to my feet, firing the ball of wax into the sand. Matty took a step back, probably expecting for me to take a shot at him. Instead, I grabbed my board and jogged out to the water.

  The sand was lined with people as far as I could see in either direction and I heard people call my name as my feet hit the packed sand. Some whistles and clapping, heads turning in my direction. A couple of years ago, I would've eaten up the attention. I would've slowed down, strutted down the sand, let them all get a look at me, maybe pick a pretty face or two that I wanted to find after the heat.

  But now?

  I just wanted to get it over with. I splashed into the breaking waves, threw my board onto the water and jumped on top of it. I paddled out with strong, quick strokes, propelling myself away from Matty and the crowd, away from everything. My board glided across the glass-like surface of the waves and I fought the urge to keep paddling, to say fuck the heat and the competition and just go as far as my board would take me.

  I saw the other guy in my heat, some dark-haired, tatted-up dude from Spain, but my head was spinning and I couldn't place his name. Gomez? Garcia? I'd cruised through the early round heats and had made it to the quarterfinals, more on luck than anything else. My heart wasn't in the competition and it didn't take a fucking rocking scientist to figure out why. At least not for me, anyway.

  I turned to look at him again. He was already in position at the break line, straddling his board, watching and waiting. He shaded his eyes with his hand and scanned the shore and I was pretty sure his eyes settled on me for a minute. Gonzalez? I should've known his name because I should've known his tendencies, what he'd be looking for out on the water. But I was too hungover and I wasn't sure I cared. Matty would've punched me in the face if he'd known I was heading out so unprepared.

  A wave swelled underneath me and, instead of riding up and over, I duck-dived, letting the cold water shock my system. I popped back up, shook the water from my hair and face, took a deep breath and tried to focus. Not for me. For Jay. I would do this for Jay.

  The name came to me. Santiago Guerrero. That's who was out there waiting for me at the break. I could hear Jay whispering to me, could see him, his eyes intense, his hand gesturing wildly as he reminded me of the goofy footer from Spain sitting on his board, waiting to surf against me. And I remembered. Santiago Guerrero. Technically sound, but didn't have a creative bone in his body. He'd take what the waves gave him and he wouldn't make a single mistake. But if I was on, if I could get my shit together and focus and do what I was capable of doing, I'd outscore him ten times out of ten.

  I reached the break line and he lifted his chin in my direction, acknowledging me. I nodded back at him.

  The horn sounded on the shore, signaling the start of the heat. He immediately looked behind him, shifted slightly to his right and started paddling. The wave picked him up and carried him away.

  Do it. Do this.

  Jay was there, urging me on. It wasn't a reminder of what had happened, of how the whole fucking world had come crashing down on me six months earlier. It was just Jay, telling me to focus, telling me to do what I needed to do. And maybe it was the beer that still lingered in my system, but I wasn't nervous and I wasn't sad. It was just me and the water.

  I paddled over to where Guerrero had been and turned parallel to the shore, watching the water out in the distance. The swells were small. There wasn't going to be much for him to work with. These were waves that were going to require creativity.

  I let one set pass beneath me, then saw one coming that rose up just right, setting up to push me nicely toward the pier. I pointed the board toward the shore, took a deep breath and started paddling.

  The water picked me up and I bounced to my feet. I hunched low, gathering some speed as the water pushed me down the line. I swung my hips and snapped the nose of the board hard off the lip, the white water chasing me from behind. I slid down the face again, then immediately snapped back up. I hit the bottom of the wave again, letting the momentum of the water push me along before angling back up to the top. The board lifted out of the ocean and I floated along the top of the wave for a few moments before dropping down the face again. It began to close out and I snapped back up one more time, shooting up and over the top. The wave passed beneath me as I landed on the water and I hopped off the board, submerging myself in the ocean.

  I popped back up, the roar from the shore telling me all I needed to know.

  Santiago Guerrero didn't have a chance.

  I spent thirty minutes decimating the water, carving up the
blue ocean and white foam. I never glanced at Guerrero again. I didn't think about competing or being hung over or the girl whose name I couldn't remember. I didn't even think about Jay, who should have been cutting up waves right along side of me.

  It was just me and the water.

  When the horn blew to end the heat, my arms and legs were heavy with fatigue and I paddled in slowly, letting the small waves push me toward the shoreline. The massive crowds on the beach pushed toward the water, craning their necks, calling my name again.

  I ignored them, shook the water from my face and trudged up the narrow strip of sand cut between the spectators that was specifically reserved for the competitors.

  Matty was waiting for me. His sunglasses hid his eyes but the grin spreading across his face told me all I needed to know. “Well done.”

  I shrugged and dropped my board to the sand.

  “You didn't surf like a vodka bottle,” he said, his voice gruff. “Imagine what you could do if you ever hit the water sober.”

  “Yeah,” I said, stripping off the rashguard. “Imagine.”

  He jerked his thumb back over his shoulder. “They want a word with you over in the main tent.”

  I squinted into the sunshine. “What for?”

  He shrugged. “Got me,” he said. “They just sent a runner over to me and told me to pass the word to you.”

  I bit back a sigh. I knew it wouldn't be good. Tour officials weren't calling me in to congratulate me on making the semifinals. You got called to the tent, it was almost always bad.

  I just wondered what they knew I had done.

  THREE

  Heath Williams was waiting for me.

  I'd pushed past the throngs of spectators, several thrusting pen and paper at me, asking for an autograph. I ignored them, focusing instead on crossing the sand as quickly as possible. I was anxious to get done whatever I needed to do. Not because I wanted to get back in the water or mingle with fans and the press, but because I didn't want any shit hanging over me. Not then, when the adrenaline from the heat was gone and the uneasiness settled back in, the uneasiness and restlessness I'd lived with for months.

  The tent was positioned twenty or so yards up the beach. Reporters and film crew milled out front, along with more hotties in skimpy bikinis than I could count. They smiled at me, shouted my name. I ignored them, too, keeping my eyes down. A security guard was stationed at the entrance, checking passes. He nodded at me and stepped aside to let me in.

  Heath smiled at me from inside the tent, an over-bright smile that instantly had me wary. As my manager, it was his job to represent me, to look out for my best interests. Sometimes, though, he seemed to forget who he was working for.

  He slapped me on my back, hugging me to his side. The smell of his aftershave clogged my nostrils and I nudged him away a little.

  “Great job out there, man,” he gushed. His sandy hair was styled and gelled and I got a whiff of that, too. “You really sliced up those waves.”

  I just stared at him. He was my manager/agent but it didn't mean he understood shit about surfing. The other guys out there? They'd hired friends, old washed-up surfers to help manage their careers. Me? I'd gone for a real agent. What Heath didn't know about surfing he made up for in scoring endorsements. Big ones. He knew how to spin me, knew how to wring the most money out of the companies salivating for a piece of me. He'd had his minions do the grunt work—scouring magazines for my picture to send in to my sponsors, shit like that—when I was just drifting along as a mid-level surfer. He'd spent his time figuring out tours and finding ways to milk more money for himself. And me. Because that's what I'd hired him to do. Make me money. Period.

  And it had paid off. When I hit it big, he hit it big with me.

  “What's going on?” I asked, glancing around. I didn't see anything out of the ordinary, just people going about their jobs, making sure the competition went off as smoothly as it could. This was where the real action was, where people worked to make the event seem smooth and seamless when it was anything but.

  He motioned to a corner of the tent. A couple of suits stood near one of the tables, papers and brochures spread out in front of them. I eyed them. No one I knew.

  “Well, I wanted to talk to you about a new sponsorship,” he said, lowering his voice. He tried to step closer but I moved away.

  I was pissed. “That's why you called me in here?”

  The semis were later that afternoon and the last thing I wanted to deal with was sponsorships. Hell, if I was being honest with myself, the last thing I wanted to do was compete, but at least that had me in the water.

  “Well, yeah—“

  “I'm not interested.” I had enough endorsements to keep me comfortable. Surfboard company, wet suit company, surf wax company. Sunglasses, sunscreen. All of my bases were covered.

  “Wait, Kellen.” He tugged nervously on the collar of his navy blue polo. “I think you'll want to hear this one.”

  I shook my head and droplets of water sprayed his face. To his credit, he didn't wince. “Not. Interested.” I turned to go.

  “Not interested in half a million dollars a year for the next three years?”

  When I didn't move, he chuckled. “Yeah, that's what I thought. Money talks, man. Even when you're Kellen Handler.”

  I brushed my hair off my forehead and sighed, hating that he was right. Slowly, I turned back around to face him. I folded my arms across my chest and stared at him. “Two minutes.”

  He nodded, a satisfied grin on his face. “OK. This isn't a surfing company, alright? Something new. Something different. This company wants to spice up their image a little. Appeal to the younger crowd. They have their sights set on you, dude. Putty. They're literally putty in our hands.”

  I waited.

  “Okay, okay,” he said, his voice coming out in a rush. “Here's the deal. And you're gonna love it. I know you are. Just Juice.”

  I froze. “What?”

  “Just Juice. The natural juice company? They want you, Kellen.”

  The words buzzed in my ear. Just Juice. The images rushed in and I couldn't stop them. The long drive up the coast. Jay next to me in the pickup. Anxiety over the massive waves waiting for us at Maverick's. Stopping at a gas station for food and drinks. Making fun of him for getting what he always got. The same damn drink every time. Orange mango. Just Juice. Giving him shit over it as we parked the truck. Him throwing the empty plastic bottle at me as we suited up.

  And then...

  “No.” My voice sounded hollow, tinny, to my own ears. I shook my head. “No.”

  Heath gaped at me. “What are you talking about? Just Juice—they're...they're great! Solid company, man. Their first quarter earnings blew last year's out of the water. They have a shit ton of money to spend. They want print ads. Maybe a commercial. It'll take a day. Maybe two. And it's half a million fucking dollars a year.”

  They could've offered me five million dollars and I still would have said no.

  I shook my head again. “No. No deal.”

  His astonishment morphed into anger. He reached for my arm and his fingers dug into my skin. “What the hell is wrong with you? Their reps are here,” he hissed. He nodded his head to the suits parked in the corner. They were watching our exchange with unabashed interest. “This is a fucking no-brainer, Kellen. And I told them it was a done deal.”

  I looked down at his hand on my arm, then at him. His eyes widened a little at the expression on my face. His fingers relaxed and his hand fell away from my arm. I stared at him for a moment longer, a silent warning to not put his hands on me ever again.

  “I don't care what you told them,” I said slowly, making sure he heard and understood. “That's your problem. But you can let them know there is no deal.”

  FOUR

  People closed in around me as soon as I stepped back on to the beach. A sea of faces, a crush of bodies. But all I could see was Jay. Not the Jay I knew, the Jay who was whispering words of encouragement to
me out on the water just an hour earlier. No. This Jay was different. The Jay I last saw, the Jay that haunted my memory every fucking chance it got.

  A lifeless, motionless Jay, limp as a rag doll, as I dragged him to shore.

  Fucking juice.

  Steve Winslow, a reporter for Surfer, approached me. Decent guy, someone I'd talked to at length plenty of times. “Kellen, do you have a few minutes?”

  I brushed past him.

  An all too familiar blond hottie wearing her camera face, microphone in hand, approached me. “You looked great out there, Kellen. Congrats on the semifinals. Tell us how you're going to prepare.”

  I just stared at her. I couldn't think. I couldn't speak. I couldn't breathe. I kept walking, my legs wobbly.

  “Kellen,” the reporter called, her voice sharp. To someone else, she said, “Cut the damn camera.” To me, louder, “Kellen Handler. We have an interview. We're scheduled to go live in five minutes.”

  I didn't stop.

  Winslow jogged up to me, a hesitant smile on his face. “Dude. Lindsay is talking to you.”

  I knew who she was. Reporter for ESPN. I'd almost slept with her two years earlier. But I hadn't. Because Jay had been there to intervene before I could cross that line.

  And he wasn't here anymore.

  Because of me.

  “I don't wanna talk.” My voice was a whisper.

  His smile disappeared and I couldn't tell what replaced it. A frown? A worried look? “You're the man, dude. You're the reason everyone is here. She needs to talk to you. Hell, I need to talk to you. But I'll give you a pass for the moment if you need it.” He glanced back at her. “She won't, though, and you know she'll go complain. You don't wanna deal with that crap right now, do you?”

  I didn't care. I couldn't plaster a smile on my face and talk nonsense shit about the tour, about how the water was, about what my strategy would be for the next round of competition. I couldn't talk about my competitors, about what I expected or wanted from the tour. But, more than anything, I couldn't talk about Jay Torres.