True Colors

by Judith Arnold

  ***

  Some marinas had a rule stipulating that sailboats had to approach their slips on their motors. Ty Cronin preferred the marinas that didn’t have that rule. To him, maneuvering a boat into a slip on wind power alone was a welcome challenge. Gauging the coastal breezes, riding in on the jib, tweaking the rudder an inch one way or the other until you eased alongside a mooring or into a berth… Sweet. What was the point of sailing if you had to rely on the motor?

  The North Cove Marina at Brogan’s Point didn’t have a motor-only rule, so Ty brought the Freedom into its slip on wind power and technique. He’d had a good run up the coast from Key Biscayne. Some nasty weather off the Carolina coast, but nothing he couldn’t handle. The Freedom was a gorgeous vessel: tiny but well-equipped galley, comfortable upholstered sleeping benches, an inboard shower and state-of-the-art commode in the head, and big sails that swelled and curved and maximized the wind’s power. He hadn’t even bothered with the spinnaker. The boat moved fast enough without it, and this trip wasn’t a race.

  It was a job. Wayne MacArthur had offered him a nice chunk of change to transport the boat from his winter home in the Florida Keys to his summer home in this seaside town north of Boston. Ordinarily, Wayne had explained, he would sail the Freedom up the coast himself, but he had some business issues detaining him in Florida, and he wanted the boat moored in Brogan’s Point before Memorial Day. Ty was cool with that. The list of adventures he’d prefer over spending a week doing a solo ocean run was pretty short. Getting paid for the privilege was a bonus.

  He’d never been to Brogan’s Point before—or, for that matter, any part of New England. So what the hell. He’d sail up, spend a few days, and fly back to Florida. He had nothing going on there that couldn’t wait for a couple of weeks.

  He navigated the Freedom into its assigned slip and glided the boat into position with barely a tap against the old tires cushioning the side of the dock. He leaped off the boat and onto the smooth pine planks of the dock, lashed the boat fore and aft, and stood for a moment, his feet planted on the dock’s solid surface, his legs adjusting to the lack of roll and pitch.

  The May afternoon was mild, warm but nowhere near as humid as the heavy air smothering southern Florida at this time of year. A refreshing breeze lifted off the water, flinging a lock of Ty’s hair across his nose. He’d washed his hair that morning when he’d showered, but after a day that had started off the coast of Rhode Island, carried him through the Cape Cod Canal, and blown him into his destination on brisk, strong gusts, he could use some freshening up.

  Back on the boat, he spent a few minutes lowering the jib and wrapping it. He cleated the ropes, secured the rudder, and shut down the onboard navigating equipment. Then he ducked into the cabin, yanked off his shirt, and wedged his six-foot-two-inch frame into the closet-size bathroom. Tepid water, a bit of soap, more water and a few swipes with a towel invigorated him. He squinted at his reflection in the small slab of mirror above the sink. A raspy stubble of beard had sprouted since he’d shaved yesterday morning, somewhere around New Jersey, but he didn’t feel like shaving again. He felt like getting rich and celebrating.

  He donned a fresh shirt, stashed his duffel and laptop inside a storage bin beneath one of the upholstered benches, and secured the bin with a padlock. No saying who might be hanging around this marina. No point taking chances.

  His wallet and cell phone stuffed into the pockets of his jeans, he emerged from the cabin and sprang back onto the dock. He snapped a couple of photos with his phone. The boat in its berth. The supply shack at the end of the dock, a massive wooden crate overflowing with bright orange life vests beside the open door. The much larger building on shore, situated midway between this dock and the next one, with a phony-looking anchor painted on its side, and above it the words “North Cove Marina” in nautical blue and gold lettering. Ty texted the photos to Wayne, along with a brief message: “Made it safe and sound.” Then he waited.

  In less than a minute, his phone vibrated. “Check’s in the mail,” Wayne had texted back. Ty tapped the phone to open his PayPal account. Twenty thousand dollars had just been added to it.

  He grinned, transferred the money to his bank account with a few clicks, and strode up the deck to dry land. The door to the large building was open, and he stepped inside.

  The front room was ugly in a familiar way. The pale green walls were decorated with a few nautical-themed prints, framed maps, oversized ropes and doughnut-shaped lifesavers. More boxes of bright orange life vests stood on the floor. A counter extended the length of the room, manned by a skinny kid who looked barely out of high school. He wore a polo shirt with the cute-cartoon anchor insignia stitched above the pocket, and salmon-red slacks.

  “Hi,” Ty greeted him. “I just sailed Wayne MacArthur’s boat in.”

  The kid opened a loose-leaf notebook. The fancier the yacht club, Ty had noticed over the years, the more old-fashioned. He’d worked at some marinas that operated out of shacks no bigger than an outhouse but managed their slips and monitored conditions with up-to-date computer software. An upscale place like this, where the staff wore shirts with anchors above the pockets, used notebooks.

  “What slip did you park in?”

  Ty recited the number of the slip Wayne had instructed him to use. The kid flipped through the pages of his notebook, found what he was looking for, then glanced out a window behind the counter and eyeballed the boat. “Nice ship,” he said.

  “She sailed beautifully.”

  “Is Mr. MacArthur still on board?”

  “No. I brought her up myself. He’s flying up.”

  “Okay.” The kid turned the notebook around so it faced Ty, handed him a pen, and asked him to sign his name.

  Ty considered asking where the nearest bar was, but then realized the kid was probably too young to drink. Not that that would have stopped Ty when he’d been that age. He’d been filching the occasional beer by the time he was fifteen, not to get drunk but to piss off his grandparents. Still, this was a ritzy yacht club in a ritzy town. He smiled, gave the kid a nod and headed back outside.

  Strolling through the parking lot, he tapped his phone, searching for bars in the area. Without wheels, he needed to find a bar close by.

  The Faulk Street Tavern. It sounded quaint and New England-y. He called up a map of Brogan’s Point and located the place, less than half a mile away. Since he’d have to return to the boat after he’d drunk himself a toast or two, he didn’t want to travel too far for his refreshment.

  Brogan’s Point didn’t have much of a downtown. It boasted a nice-looking beach, though, stretching along the ocean below a stone and concrete sea wall. A few shops lined the street bordering the sea wall, and more shops filled the streets intersecting it, two- and three-story buildings constructed of clapboard, brick, and stone. Eateries, hardware stores, ice-cream parlors. A real estate office. A women’s clothing boutique. A Starbucks, of course. Turning from the stores, he gazed along the ocean’s edge. Not far south of where he stood, several commercial docks lined with trawlers stretched eastward into the ocean. Ty could just make out the silhouettes of some warehouses near the trawlers. Fish markets, he figured.

  If a Hollywood director wanted to film a movie in a stereotypical New England seaside town, he could do worse than Brogan’s Point. It had everything Ty expected such a place to have, short of a guy in a yellow rain slicker, dropping his R’s and eating a bowl of chowder. Or chow-dah, he supposed.

  He strolled up the street, enjoying the solidity of the asphalt beneath the soles of his sneakers, enjoying the blunt breezes that rose up off the ocean to slap against the side of his head. Yeah, he could see spending a few days here before buying a plane ticket back to Florida. He could sleep on the boat, use up his food supply, and spend some time on the beach, even if the water here wouldn’t be warm like what he was used to down in Florida or what he’d grown up with in California. Ocean was ocean. Sand was sand. Ty’s parents used to joke that he wa
s actually the son of a mermaid, given his affinity for the sea.

  Up ahead he spotted the corner where Faulk Street intersected with Atlantic Avenue. He turned onto the side street and entered the bar.

  To his great relief, it wasn’t quaint. It appeared to be a working-class establishment, a little dim, a little scruffy, not too crowded but already redolent with the stinging scent of hard booze, beer, and oily, salty edibles. He stood just inside the doorway, surveying the place and considering where he ought to plant himself. The tables all looked too big for one person. A few of the bar stools were occupied, but more were empty. That seemed like the better bet.

  He strode across the room, the center of which was clear of furniture. A dance floor? If it were his choice, he would have filled that space with a pool table. But he wasn’t really up for a game right now. He’d done a week of hard sailing. He needed to decompress.

  The woman behind the bar stood nearly as tall as Ty, with square shoulders, short hair fading from ginger to gray, and a pleasantly weathered face. She had the sort of no-bullshit look of a sports coach, or maybe a shrink. He supposed either of those character types would make good bartenders. “What can I get you?” she asked.

  “A shot of bourbon and a glass of whatever you’ve got on tap,” Ty said.

  She named a few beers. No connoisseur, he asked for the first one she’d listed, then settled onto a stool and gazed around the room. A group of frat boys sat at one table, cheerfully arguing about the relative merits of Porsches and Ferraris. Three portly older men in faded Red Sox caps nursed their drinks at a table near the door. Two attractive women sat facing each other in a booth to his left, one with long, curly red hair and the other with black hair that ended in a ruler-straight line at her shoulders. They each had a glass of wine, and they bowed their heads together across the table that separated them, engaged in intense conversation. A couple of stools down from Ty, a guy three sheets to the wind slumped over an untouched mug of coffee.

  Against the wall opposite the bar stood a jukebox. It looked like something you might find in a catalog, or in one of those stores that specialized in selling new stuff designed to look old. A dome-shaped arch, buttons, fabric-covered speakers flanking a colorful façade of what appeared to be stained glass peacocks, of all things.

  He heard the thump of glasses on the bar behind and swiveled around on his stool to discover that the bartender had served his drinks. He tossed back the bourbon in one gulp, savoring its burn down his throat, then followed it with a sip of cold beer.

  He had money. He had time. He had liquid refreshment. Life was good.

  The din of voices rose slightly as more people trickled into the bar. Ty glanced at his watch: five fifteen. Rotating back around to view the room, he nursed his beer and watched the bar’s clientele drift in, most of them just off work from the look of it. Some wore the uniforms of their jobs: garage coveralls, medical scrubs, tailored outfits that included button-down shirts adorned with loosened neckties or colorful scarves, depending on gender.

  An energetic woman in tight black pants, her hair pulled into a pony tail, bounced over to the bar. “Sorry I’m late, Gus,” she shouted to the bartender as she laced an apron around her waist. “The traffic on Route 1 was a bitch.”

  “Surprise, surprise,” the bartender muttered sarcastically. Ty wondered whether Route 1 here in Massachusetts was the same road as Route 1 in Florida. He was pretty sure it was. Like I-95, Route 1 spanned the length of the country from Maine’s Canadian border to Key West. Pretty cool to think you could drive from the nation’s northern border to its southern tip on one single road. Maybe someday he’d hop on his bike and ride the distance, just for the adventure.

  The waitress grabbed a tray, shot him a quick smile and headed back into the room, circulating from table to table, checking on the patrons. Ty watched her for a while, then shifted his attention to the two young women conferring in the booth. The one with the black hair was dabbing her eyes with a cocktail napkin. The redhead leaned toward her, giving the dark-haired one’s free hand a squeeze. Dykes? Ty wondered. He’d hate to think that two good-looking women like them were unavailable to the male half of the population, but a hot little fantasy flared in his mind at the thought of them going at it. An even hotter fantasy placed him between the two of them, the meat in the center of the sandwich. He laughed at his crassness, told his balls to stop thinking for him, and took another sip of beer.

  “Share the joke?” The woman who’d addressed him had stepped up to the bar, blocking his view of the drunk guy with the coffee. She was probably within shouting distance of forty, nice looking and dressed for cruising in a short skirt and a low-cut blouse which displayed cleavage deep enough to swallow small items.

  “Just thinking about what an ass I am,” he said pleasantly.

  “I don’t believe that,” the woman said. Catching the bartender’s eye, she said, “Can I have a Cosmo, Gus?” Then she turned back to Ty. “You’re not from around here, are you.”

  “Is this one of those places where everybody knows everybody?”

  “Kind of. I guess you and I should get to know each other, so you don’t feel left out.”

  She deserved an A for effort, but Ty wasn’t interested. He smiled politely, drank a little more beer, and said, “I’m just passing through. Running an errand.”

  “If only all errands ended with a drink,” she said, accepting the cocktail glass the bartender handed her.

  He rotated in his seat to gaze out at the room again. Business was definitely picking up, more and more tables filling. Another waitress pranced into the pub, her apron already tied around her waist. Two of the frat boys wandered over to the jukebox.

  “Brace yourself,” the Cosmo drinker said.

  “Why?”

  “That jukebox is crazy.”

  How could a jukebox be crazy? He braced himself, anyway, then let out a long breath when the jukebox began pumping music into the room. An old Beach Boys tune—“Fun, Fun, Fun.” Ty recognized it because his grandfather on his dad’s side was a huge Beach Boys fan. The old man owned the band’s albums, cassettes, even sheet music of their songs. He was a crappy guitar player, but he fantasized about becoming the next Brian Wilson. “If you live in California, this is your music,” he’d lecture Ty, who would nod solemnly. As a kid, he’d worshipped his father’s father.

  Throughout the room, people laughed. Some sang along, their voices screeching as they reached for the falsetto notes. A small cluster of revelers moved to the center of the room and started dancing, although it looked more like they were just jumping up and down. Pretty rowdy for a weeknight.

  The song ended. “Like I said,” the Cosmo drinker repeated, “that jukebox is crazy.”

  “What’s crazy about it?”

  “It only plays old songs. Really old songs.”

  “I guess that makes sense. It looks like an antique.”

  The woman shrugged. “I don’t know why Gus keeps the thing there. I mean, if you’re going to have music, it should be music people listen to.”

  Ty could have argued that people still listened to the Beach Boys. But he didn’t want to get into an argument with his chatty new friend.

  Another song came on, another oldie. Ty didn’t recognize this one, but he thought his musically untalented grandfather could have mastered it. It had had only a few smashing cords, and the singer sounded as if he’d gargled with battery acid before laying down the track. The simple lyrics emerged in a harsh growl: “Wild thing…you make my heart sing…” The singer went on to growl that some woman made everything groovy.

  Groovy? Ty started to laugh—and then he stopped. The woman in the booth, the one with the black hair and the teary eyes and the solicitous friend, was staring at him. Staring hard.

  And damn, if he couldn’t keep from staring right back at her.

  ###

  Wild Thing – now available!

  And don’t forget the other books in the Magic Jukebox series
:

   

  Changes

   

  Antiques dealer Diana Simms is engaged to her longtime boyfriend when she finds herself inside the Faulk Street Tavern. The song “Changes” emerges from the jukebox and casts its spell on her. It also captivates Nick Fiore, a local boy who’s arrived at adulthood the hard way, after a tour through the juvenile justice system. Now he’s dedicated his life to helping other troubled kids. He has no business even looking at a beautiful, well-bred woman wearing a diamond engagement ring. But once they’re bewitched by the jukebox, he and Diana must change their lives, their goals, their dreams and their hearts.

  Heat Wave

  Caleb Solomon’s office air conditioner is on the fritz. Although not his choice, he winds up meeting with a difficult but profitable client in the pleasant chill of the air-conditioned Faulk Street Tavern. It’s there that high school teacher Meredith Benoit finds him. Due to a silly prank, her job and her reputation are in jeopardy. She needs a lawyer, fast. But the Magic Jukebox starts playing “Heat Wave,” and a hot wave of passion crashes over Caleb and Meredith, catching them in its undertow and carrying them off.

  Moondance

  Cory Malone and Talia Roszik married as teenagers after Talia became pregnant. Their marriage didn’t last, but their love for their daughter did. Fifteen years after their divorce, Wendy Malone is graduating from high school, and Cory has traveled to Brogan’s Point for the occasion. But Cory’s and Talia’s plans—and their emotions—are thrown into turmoil when they hear the Magic Jukebox play “Moondance.” Can a single song make them forget all the hurt and rediscover the love that once brought them together?