Riptide (14 page)

twenty

Daaaamn:
like a really emphasized wow;
can be use to express almost any
emotion including admiration

Transcribing affidavits is like working on those little puzzles in the kids magazines I got growing up. There were all these little blanks with symbols underneath, and you’d look up the symbol to figure out which letter went in the blank. Only affidavits are way crazy, and there aren’t any blanks. It’s frying my brain. All of these have to be translated from shorthand into English. Whoever created shorthand was nuts. I think it’d be way easier to just write things out.

I take a break to wipe my hands across my face and blink my eyes a few times. I run my hands through my hair and stare off at the ceiling.

“That bad, huh?” Brianna’s soft voice pulls me back to reality.

I grin, sheepishly. “On a scale of one to ten with ten being equal to being scraped over Grimace Rock? I’d give it a nine.” Then I bat my eyelashes at her. “I need a few minutes to space out. Don’t turn me in. Pretty pleeeeease?”

She throws her head back and laughs. Full-on belly laugh. Then she pushes at my shoulder. “That’s what works for little girls.”

“Sexist.”

“Never. In fact, would you like to go on a date tonight?” Brianna’s face remains calm, as if girls ask guys out all the time.

Daaaamn. That’s hot. I’m in. “Why yes I would, fair queen. Where?”

She pouts her lips. “A queen should not do all the work.”

I smile and bow.

As Brianna and I walk underneath the neon-lit awning and open the doors, a blast of stale popcorn and pizza hits us. The sounds of bowling balls thudding against wood lanes ricochet off the concrete walls.

I head straight to the counter where a Blue Hair waits to ring us up. She’s gotta be in her seventies. According to her nametag, she’s Gladys.

I say, “Hi ma’am. We’d like to rent a lane for the next couple of hours. We’ll need the works—shoes, balls, gutter blockers.” I shift my eyes back and forth before giving a loud stage-whisper. “She’s a total newb.”

“Well, I’ll be darned.” She winks at Brianna and doesn’t even acknowledge me. “You let old Gladys fix you up. The first experience is always important.”

Brianna laughs and thumps my elbow. “We don’t need gutter blockers.”

I give her a wide-eyed innocent look. “Are you sure?”

She puts her hands on those killer hips.

“She doesn’t need the blockers,” I say. “I guess we’ll only need the shoes and balls.”

Gladys laughs a raspy smoker’s laugh and rings me up. “Okay, sugar. You’re lane thirty. You let old Gladys know if you need anything else. You can pick out your shoes over there, and the balls are across from the lanes.”

We grab retro shoes that reek of disinfectant. Then we head to our lane. We’ve got the last one, by the wall. It’s been painted graffiti style with a mural of old famous
people like Marilyn Monroe, Elvis, and Buddy Holly.

I turn around and fling my arm toward a rack of balls a few feet away. “Why don’t you step into my office?”

“I’d love to,” Brianna says.

Feeling like a king, I walk over and check out the goods. I grab a lime-green fifteen-pounder. Brianna hovers over a couple of balls before choosing an orange eight-pounder. I wiggle my eyebrows up and down. “You ready to get schooled?”

She swishes her hips as we walk back to our lane. “Don’t get too cocky, Mr. Watson. I might surprise you.”

“Let me have it. No holding back.”

She laughs. “Oh, don’t you worry about that.”

I set up the computer system, keying in the monikers
Linda
and
El Toro
, which mean “pretty” and “the bull.”

Brianna says, “What’s that?”

I grin, forgetting she’s doesn’t speak Spanish. “What? I’m half Mexican. This is my cultural twist on Beauty and the Beast.
Linda
means pretty.”

She smiles. “All right,
Toro
. Show me what you got.”

I say, “Who says I’m
Toro
? Kidding.”

I snag my ball and swagger toward the lane.
Thunk
. It hits the wood with a loud thud and rolls straight down the middle. Two thirds of the way down, it starts curving toward the gutter.

“It’s all part of the plan,” I say. “Watch and learn.”

Then the ball curves back at the last second and knocks two pins down.

“All part of the plan, eh?” Brianna bumps me with her hips.

I’m having trouble focusing.

I wait at the ball return, finally able to come up with something witty. “Humble beginnings make victory taste that much sweeter.” I grab the ball as it pops out of the chute and approach the lane holding the ball in both hands. I stand at the edge, widen my stance, and bend down, swinging the ball back between my legs and tossing it gently down the center. It wobbles down the middle and ends up knocking down all but one remaining pin. I turn to Brianna, waiting for a response. She winks and gives a small nod of appreciation. I pull my arms back, fist tightened, in a
yeah baby
motion and take a seat. “You’re up, Buttercup.”

Brianna grabs her ball like she knows exactly what she’s doing. She walks like a queen toward the lane, stops at the edge, flings her arm back and releases the ball too early. It makes a loud thud and rolls toward me. I stop it with my feet. Then I howl with laughter.

Brianna shrugs her shoulders. “Humble beginnings, right?”

“I’m thinking that’s along the lines of inglorious or meager or infamous.”

“Thanks.”

“Anytime.”

She gets the ball and heads back toward the lane. I walk up beside her and say, “Okay, it’s time for a mini-lesson.”

She puts a hand on her hip and waits.

I say, “Watch me act it out in slow motion.” She watches my exaggerated walk and fake release, looking antsy to do it herself. “Notice, I didn’t stop and then toss. It’s all one fluid movement. You want to keep your thumb pointing straight. If your thumb points to the right, then the ball is likely to roll in that direction. Keep your elbow straight and slightly bend your left knee, which should be in front by the time you glide to the edge.”

“Got it.”

I say, “Let me walk you through it.”

Then I stand so close I can smell her perfume. I reach for her right arm and guide her through the motion, my hand on the back of hers. As I swing her arm to the edge, I say, “Release now.” Then I let go of her hand and step away fast, blood whooshing through my body. “You’ll get it this time.”

She says quietly, “Yep. Definitely. Thanks for the tip.”

Then she knocks down eight pins. We high-five. “You rock!” I say.

By the final round, she’s kicking my butt and loving every minute of it. We return our funky shoes to Gladys. She hands me a
buy
one hour, get the second hour free
card. “Come again, honey. And bring your girlfriend.”

And even though I’m not sure about the label, neither one of us corrects her.

twenty-one

Everything has to be rethought.
—Elias Canetti

The last prewashed dish clinks as Mom arranges it in the dishwasher. I grin, thinking about Mom’s need to clean dishes by hand first.

The dishwasher isn’t for scrubbing the dishes; it acts as a sterilizing agent.
— Mom

The dryer buzzes. “Grace, let’s fold clothes and catch up on how things are going,” she says.

The words by themselves sound inviting, but her tone is all business. Ugh. I head for the laundry room and transfer warm, lavender-scented laundry into a basket. I toss nearby hangers on top and trudge to the living room couch, which is our home base for folding and hanging clothes.

I grab a shirt and begin to fold it as meticulously as the clerks at Saks do.

Mom grabs a hanger and slips it underneath a shirt, from the bottom so as not to stretch the neck. “It seems like you’ve found a new surf partner for the days when Ford can’t take you, but you and Ford have still been surfing together quite a bit.”

I smooth out a wrinkle, ignoring the fact that she’s fishing for information. “Yes ma’am.”

She crinkles her forehead for a microsecond before smoo-thing it out with her fingers. “What about your college applications? Those essays won’t write themselves.”

I reach for a pair of panties and begin tri-folding them. “Umm. I figured I’d wait until school starts to do the final drafts, you know, run them past my English teacher? I’ve been focusing on filling out the basics on several.”

“So you haven’t finished any essays.”

I open my mouth and hesitate. The answer: a flat-out lie. “Not final drafts, anyway. I’ve been playing around with the rough drafts and outlines.”

She nods her approval.

I grab a shirt and focus on perfect creases. There isn’t a right answer to the inquisition and, at this point, I can only make it worse.

“Grace?”

I look up at my mom, mid-crease.

She raises her eyebrows. “I’m counting on the fact you have enough sense not to get involved with Ford. He seems like a really nice guy, but with these surfer types—you really need to watch it. They tend to be low on ambition. Wait for the Ivy League guys—you know they’re good enough.”

Wow. And um, hello? Surfers aren’t all low on ambition, especially Ford. They just have
different
goals. Surf Pipeline. Travel the world. Go pro. Surf for life. Besides, we’re in high school, give it up. Hardly anybody knows for reals what they want to do for the rest of their life.

“No problem,” I tell her. “We’re just friends. We’re not dating. In fact, he takes other girls surfing.”

Nothing about those statements feels right to me. I’ve been trying to ignore the incident with that Brittany girl, or whatever he name was, but I can’t. My temples throb whenever I think about the possibility of another girl in Ford’s life.

“That makes things easier.” Mom pats my arm and gives it a small squeeze. “I hope you realize how much I love you. Don’t lose sight of your priorities, everything you’ve worked for … you don’t want to throw away the past three years of hard work to fail now. And the point of all your hard work is to get into the best college.”

The best college? For who? Keeping sight of her priorities means losing sight of mine. Dreams keep slipping through my fingers like sand.

“Can you help me with the furniture?”

“Ah, man. Are you on a feng shui kick again?”

Mom power-walks to the other side of the couch, a woman on a mission. Her butt sticks out as she shoves the couch in a new direction, except the couch doesn’t budge. She looks pretty funny; I can’t help but laugh before lining up next to her and giving a strong push. The behemoth inches forward.

“Thanks, honey.” Mom turns and gives me a quick smile.

“No prob.” I tuck a strand of hair behind my ear and push again. “What’s with rearranging the furniture?”

“Nothing much. Your dad felt things were a bit staid, so I’m trying to up the energy in here.” We have a good rhythm going on the couch and we’re making progress.

“Are you serious?” I stop and twist around, popping my back.

Mom cringes at the snapping and crackling. “Grace, that gives me the heebie-jeebies.”

I laugh. “Why don’t you get Dad to move all this crap?”

“Right now isn’t good timing. He’s stuck on a pretty big case.” She sighs. “It looks like this will be a tough win.”

Translation: Stay out of his way.

I roll my eyes. Like that’s anything new. Whatev. “Let’s give this a final go.”

Mom counts: “One, two, three,
push
.”

The couch jolts forward and so do we. Mom ends up splayed across the end of it, rear end sticking up. All I hear is muffled laughter, since her face is buried in accent pillows. This is the mom I grew up with, the one who used to laugh more often. It seems like she laughs less every year. I miss that. I miss her. I miss the relationship we used to have—when I looked up to her as my hero. It seems like the older I get, the more my parents argue, and the more they argue, the harder she works and the less she smiles.

She comes up for air. “That should do it for now. We can move the recliner later. Think he’ll like it?”

“What’s with you and trying to make everything so
nice
for him? He treats us like crap one minute and queens the next.” I’m sick of pretending. What’s up with that?

Her happy face leaves the building. “Well, Grace,” she snaps, “what do you want me to do? Huh? Leave him?”

“I don’t know. Why not? You don’t seem happy.” I know I’m not.

“Then what? Marry someone else who treats me like crap? Learn how to put up with their crap? I think not.”

Adrenaline pumps through me. The gloves are off. “How about marry someone who
doesn’t
treat you like crap? Good guys do exist.” I falter on the last line, wondering how many Fords are out there.

Mom’s lips curl into a scowl. “Yeah, right. What do you know about life? Nothing.”

“I know it
sucks
to be treated like I’m nothing.” I want to explode, but my words come out in a carefully controlled tone. The edginess lies below the surface.

“Well, if I leave your father … what then? And what are you going to do? Be there for me? Oh wait, you’re going off to college next year. I’ll be all alone.”

I don’t know what to say to that. The shit of it is—she’s right.

Not long after my argument with Mom, my cell rings. It’s Damien.

He says, “Hey, baby. Wanna ride?”

I laugh. “Really? Is that the best you can do?”

“Made you laugh. Wanna catch a late-afternoon surf session? Turmo?”

I glance at the clock. “You know it.”

“I’ll swing by to pick you up in fifteen.”

I start running around the room, yanking my shorts off while looking for my swimsuit. “I’ll be ready in ten.”

I barely make it to my front porch before Damien rolls up in my driveway, music blasting from his Jeep. I carry my Roxy duffel and board over to his vehicle. He slides my board on top of his and adjusts the strap so they don’t rub against each other. I sit on the passenger side, enjoying how different his Jeep is from Esmerelda. It’s immaculate. No stray pieces of trash in the floorboard. No marks on the dashboard. No rust on the paint job. It even has the new-car smell. I don’t understand why Ford has such a problem with Damien. He has him all wrong.

Damien gets in and starts the car. No funny noises.

I say, “Once upon a time, I wouldn’t have pictured you to be so orderly.”

He turns down the radio. “That’s when you didn’t know me. I’m a man of surprise and mystery.”

I lay on a sultry voice. “Ooh. Sexy.”

He laughs. “You’re a trip. Want to go out sometime?”

Whoa. He’s straight to the point. “Um, you know I’m training for the comp. Trying to stay focused right now.”

He says, “Oh, cool. I didn’t realize you were so serious about this stuff. You need any help?”

“Yeah, totally. You’ve already been great helping me with my airs.” But I feel guilty not mentioning Ford. So I add, “Ford’s been helping me out too. Kind of my coach. But he’s at his internship more often than not.” Frustrated, I lean against the seat, feeling like more of an afterthought than a focus.

Damien says, “Dang. Ford gets around. He must be starting a surf school.”

I stare out the window. What the heck
was
Ford doing with that … Brittany? My heart beats erratically and I feel sick. And there’s nothing I can do to stop it.

Damien says, “You’re quiet all of a sudden. What’s up?”

“Nothing. I’m tired.”

We get on the interstate. Damien turns the music louder. The windows are rolled down and between the wind and the music, there’s no room for conversation. We’re quiet the rest of the way to Turmo.