The Riptide Ultra-Glide (3 page)

“What seems to be the problem?”

“¿Qué?”

“Sounds like gout. Take this and see the nurse out front.”

Patients stacked up again at the checkout window. But not to settle accounts. This was exclusively prepay. And one size fits all. Each person picked up an identical single small square of paper that the doctor had filled out ahead of time and stacked in a tall pile. The only chore left was for the nurses to fill in the names. Back pain, knee pain, migraine, toothache, general blahs, didn't matter: The nurse handed over a script for ninety tablets, eighty-milligram oxycodone, the greenish-blue ones.

“And here's the address of the pharmacy. Make sure you go to that one . . . Next, please! . . .”

Palm Shore Pain Associates, Inc.

The back door opened and the men from the school bus filed in. They had an express-line arrangement; nurses took them directly to the doctor's personal office in groups of fifteen. And they didn't look too good. Missing front teeth and that sallow, ruddy complexion that says
no permanent address
. As the men filed past the reception desk, the driver forked over four hundred dollars a head, which was a hundred more than everyone else waiting behind them.

An hour later, the sixth and last group of fifteen left the office and climbed back on the bus. The driver collected a prescription from each, just as he had done on all of their last eight vacations to Florida. Of course, they would get them back at the pharmacy, but then they'd have to turn over their pill bottle upon rejoining the bus, or it would be a long walk back to Kentucky, and no three hundred bucks for their trouble.

The driver started up the bus and pulled out of the alley behind the pain clinic.

Suddenly: “What the hell?”

A single whoop of a siren. Before anyone knew it, the SWAT team was everywhere, black helmets and Kevlar vests, M16 rifles pointed at the windshield, storming aboard.

Patients waiting on the patio in front scattered across the shopping-center parking lot and were tackled under running sprinklers.

The shrill yelling outside brought nurses running into the waiting room, just in time for more officers to crash through the doors. Someone in the bathroom stopped up the toilet trying to flush prescriptions.

More M16s. “On the ground! Now!”

Every chair emptied in the waiting areas. Officers pulled others from examination rooms. Another member of the tactical unit came in the back door, pushing the doctor ahead of him. “Tried to climb out his window.”

Another pulled a nurse with wet arms out of the bathroom. The crackdown required several bags of those plastic wrist cuffs. Finally, everyone was lying stomach down and heard their Miranda rights in two languages.

“Secure,” said the officer in charge. “Let 'em in.”

Lights! Cameras! . . . The TV gang from all the local affiliates poured through the door.

“Can you hold up the money and those prescription pads again? . . .”

One of the stations went live from the parking lot as officers paraded suspects toward corrections vans.

“In a highly coordinated and dangerous operation, authorities have just raided one of the largest South Florida pill mills illegally dispensing oxycodone, which has contributed to record numbers of overdoses not only in Broward County, but as far away as West Virginia. Officials report they even seized a bus that out-of-state traffickers were using to transport homeless people from Kentucky, and today's arrests should seriously disrupt the Interstate 95 pipeline of so-called Hillbilly Heroin . . .”

Behind the TV correspondent on U.S. 1, dozens of weary street people stared out the windows of an unnoticed school bus that had just left a different medical clinic three blocks away and was headed back north on Interstate 95.

Chapter Two

KEY LARGO

T
hrowing rocks at cars is cool!” said Coleman.

“Another quote for the ages,” said Serge.

And another typical afternoon in paradise in the Florida Keys. Empty, bright, baby-blanket sky. Shimmering emerald water all around the Long Key Viaduct with its century-old arches. Heavy, happy traffic heading both ways, including a clown-fish-orange 1976 Ford Gran Torino SportsRoof, with the Magnum 500 wheels, laser stripe and 429 cubic inches of V-8 madness.

A foot hit the clutch, and a hand slammed the shift into top gear. The Torino swerved across the centerline and passed six cars, swinging back at the last second as a van full of sheet-white people passed in the other direction.

“Hot damn!” Serge reached over from the driver's seat and punched Coleman in the shoulder.

“Ow.”

“I'm so jazzed!” Serge bobbed in his seat. “I love the beach season!”

“What's the beach season?”

“Comes right after
the
season, otherwise known as tourist season or snowbird season, starting after Christmas, when people migrate to Florida to escape the cold. Then they walk along the beach at sunset with sweaters tied around their waists. I respect the lifestyle choice, but I can't hang with it. What's the point of Florida if you don't get in the fucking water?”

“I remember on New Year's Day, you were the only one splashing around out there.”

“That was my annual polar-bear plunge,” said Serge. “But how can it count if you're living in Florida? Except in Jacksonville, where the Parrot Head Club makes it interesting by drinking tequila before sunrise. And I mean way into the bottle, before jumping in the surf at a sunrise that is blocked by a frigid gray sea mist, and they leap back out with half of their wacky foam hats left drifting out to sea, then finish the tequila, sleep twelve hours and dance that night at the local moose lodge. They're very focused.”

Coleman lifted a cheek to sneak one. “The time I'm thinking of, you were yelling at the people on shore.”

“What was I yelling?”

“ ‘Get in the fucking water!' ” Coleman dropped a tab of ecstasy. “But they ran the other way instead. Oh, you were also waving a gun. Then the beach was empty and covered with sweaters.”

“It was probably getting late for them anyway.”

“Then you came charging out of the water,” said Coleman. “At first I thought you were running after them like the other times, but you jumped in the car and turned on the heater.”

“Because the water was way too goddamn freezing to get in.” Serge shivered at the thought. “What was I thinking? That's why I love the beach season! Instead of fleeing the cold, people get in the water to escape the heat. That's my crowd, keeping it Coppertone real. And it all builds to the huge climax on the extended Memorial Day weekend. I can't wait! I love the beach season! That's why I bought a ton of toys at that Home Depot on Vaca Key.”

“Home Depot has beach toys?”

“Better.” Serge reached for a bag in the backseat and pulled it onto his lap. “Hurricane toys! Hurricane season starts the first of June, which means hurricane
preparation
begins the same time as beach season . . .” Serge glanced back and forth from the road to the bag, steering with his knees and pawing inside. “Here's the crank-powered emergency weather radio and compass, the floating diode flashlight that needs no batteries and runs on the Faraday Principle, a laser-guided compass with GPS, the solar survival blanket developed by NASA, a big-honkin' all-purpose tungsten hunting knife with compass
and
flashlight . . .”

“All this stuff will help us survive a storm?” Coleman asked nervously.

“Heck no.” Serge flicked the laser on and off at approaching traffic. Someone in a Mazda skidded down the shoulder into sea grapes. “There ain't going to be any hurricanes this year. I just like to play with this crap during beach season. Did I mention I love it?”

“Where have I seen those other boxes before?” asked Coleman.

“Military MREs, or Meals Ready to Eat, distributed by the National Guard to storm victims. Got them at a surplus sale this morning. The cool part is the heating element: This clear plastic pouch with what looks like a tea bag in the bottom, and you add just a
little
water to start a chemical reaction that generates a ferocious amount of heat. I'm going to have some fun with those.”

“Now I remember,” said Coleman. “You used the heating pouches on that price gouger we captured a few years ago after that hurricane. But you never like to use the same thing twice. You said it shows lack of imagination and disrespect for your contestants.”

“That's right!” Serge opened one of the boxes on his lap. “But true imagination is squeezing a second, totally unrelated use from the same item. This time, an ignition source.”

“Ignition?”

“Read about it on the Internet.” Serge pulled a plastic bag from a meal, containing plastic utensils and condiments. “Here's the key . . .” He pointed at a tiny, one-serving foil packet of Tabasco sauce.

“Why do soldiers have Tabasco sauce?”

“Because war requires spicy food.” Serge stowed the bag. “Anyway, back to the plot: Some cadets from West Point were on survival training, and one of their tasks was to start a fire.”

“How hard can that be?”

“They took away their lighters and matches.”

“Oh.”

“So this one cadet gets the idea to substitute hot sauce instead of water in a heating pouch and—
shazam!
—fire. Who would have thought? . . . But I still haven't figured out how to use it as an instructional aid.”

“Can I have some of the freeze-dried ice cream?”

“Knock yourself out.” Serge tossed a foil packet sideways across the front seat. “But the most excellent purchase of the day is in the trunk, courtesy of the construction wholesaler I hit after Home Depot.”

Coleman sucked foil. “When I was in the bar next door?”

Serge nodded and spread his hands. “Been looking all over for these ever since I first saw them on the Internet when Hurricane Wilma slammed Fort Lauderdale: instant sandbags. Just add water.”

Coleman stopped sucking. “I thought sandbags were supposed to
stop
water.”

“These are special. Each bag weighs only two pounds dry because they're filled with these lightweight, scientifically developed crystals. But soak them in water, and a half hour later each feathery sack has inflated into a thirty-five-pound rock-hard bulwark of flood protection. Perfect for the hurricane survivor with a hectic schedule.” Serge jerked a thumb back over his shoulder toward the trunk. “Picked up thirty of 'em for hours of entertainment and education.”

They came off the bridge into Islamorada.

“Serge.” Coleman aimed his joint out the window. “You're passing the Hurricane Monument. You never pass the monument; I always have to stop and wait for your photos.”

“No time.” Serge hit the gas. “I need to find a shopping center on Key Largo with a Target or Kmart.”

“What for?”

“It's the beach season! I need to buy a ton of surfing music and every beach-movie DVD they've got.” Serge reached under his seat and pulled out a camcorder. “I've totally rededicated my life to complete immersion in the beach culture. We'll get jobs raking sand before dawn behind the resorts, rubbing lotion on aristocrats and selling tropical snow cones behind the boardwalk.”

“What boardwalk?”

“We'll build one. That's how dedicated I am.” Serge turned the camcorder toward Coleman. “And through it all, we'll record every last second for my new smash-hit reality show. We'll be famous! . . . Let's rehearse.”

Serge began filming his pal as they drove.

“Okay,” said Coleman. “What am I supposed to—”

“Shut the fuck up!” said Serge. “You do this every time! You ruin every single vacation with your bullshit!”

“But I didn't do anything.”

“Oh, right!” Serge turned the camera around to film his own face. “Act all innocent, like I don't know what you've been up to behind my back! Pitting one side against the other so one day you can rule the whole beach. You're a scheming little bastard, and I'm here to stop you! Your glory days in the sand are over!”

“Serge, you've never talked this way to me before.” Coleman was on the verge of tears. “I thought we were best buddies.”

Serge put the camcorder on pause. “We are. But we have to pretend there's all kind of brooding tension on the beach about to boil over any second.”

“Why?”

“Because it's a reality show. You have to fake a lot of stuff.”

Serge resumed filming out the driver's window at a giant roadside mermaid, a giant lobster, a giant conch shell.

Coleman settled his nerves with a flask of Early Times. “You mean reality shows aren't real?”

“Of course not,” said Serge. “Reality's boring. Especially the realities they pick for these shows. People repairing stuff or the daily life in a tattoo parlor. You know what daily life in a tattoo parlor is? Sitting around and smoking with no customers. Then, after five hours, bells jingle at the front door and someone finally comes in. ‘Yeah, give me something on my face with a flaming skull, an inverted pentagram and lots of swastikas. I want to impress my boss.' ”

Coleman emptied the pint. “That
is
boring.”

“But easily fixed, and always with a feud. Reality shows are required to have them,” said Serge. “Take the most painfully mundane situation, add some nasty spats, and everything is forgiven. In the middle of a five-hour dry spell with no customers, the hotshot new tattoo artist walks over to the minifridge. ‘Okay, who the fuck took my pudding cups?' ”

“Now I'm into it,” said Coleman.

“Me, too,” said Serge. “Feuds have a way of cheering up the viewing public. Or humiliation.”

“Humiliation?”

“The new tattoo guy can go next door in the strip mall to the health spa where they're filming the reality-show contest on people trying to lose a hundred pounds. ‘Oh, so you like pudding, eh? Then take this!'—mashing tapioca up the nose of a fat chick.”

“Who could not watch that?” asked Coleman.

“We are a proud people.”

“The sign said ‘Key Largo.' ” Coleman pointed with a cocaine tooter. “And there's a shopping center up ahead.”

Serge cast a glare sideways. “You still into that stupid crap?”

Coleman flicked open the access hole on the small plastic tube for a quick snort. “Just on Tuesdays.”

“It's Wednesday.”

“Then I'm late.” Another snort.

Serge rolled his eyes. The shopping center came into view, and a turn signal blinked.

Coleman hung his head out the window. “I don't see a Target or Kmart.”

“But there's another big place near Winn-Dixie that's sure to have everything we need.”

They parked, and Serge fleetly went inside to canvass the media section, filling his arms with a harvest of Beach Boys and Annette Funicello.

“There's a
Gidget
movie,” said Coleman.
“Gidget, Gidget, Gidget
 . . .” Uncontrolled giggling. “That's messed up.
Gidget, Gidget, Gidget
. . .”

“Coleman, you're acting really weird.” Serge grabbed a
Baywatch
boxed set. “What the hell's wrong with you?”

“Nothing.” He turned and bent over. Snort.

“Jesus!” Serge's eyes shot around for any onlookers. “We're in a big store. You can't be doing coke!”

Another giggle. “Coke, blow, flake, fluff, snow, marching dust, weasel powder, white death, white lady, wings, yeho, nose-candy, donut glaze, gutter glitter, Charlie, Chippy, Belushi, Foo-foo, Merck, mojo, movie star, Mayan mist, Bolivian blizzard, Inca telegram, California cornflakes, lay lines, cut rails, hitch the reindeer, chase the dragon . . .”

Serge slapped himself on the forehead.

Then a lightbulb went on. Serge reached in his shoulder pouch for the camcorder. “From the top!”

“Coke, blow, flake . . .”

A few minutes later, Serge finished checking out at the registers and paid with fresh twenties.

“ . . . Roxanne, pimp, sugar, thing, cotton, girlfriend, Big C . . .”

Serge gathered up his bag. “Come on, Coleman, follow me.”

“Where are we going?”

Serge led him over to the back of a long line stacked up at the customer-service desk.

“I don't understand,” said Coleman. “You just bought those and now you're going to return them?”

“No,” said Serge. “I just need some customer service. Except for some reason, I always have trouble at customer service. Even though it says ‘Customer Service' on the sign, it usually feels like I'm getting the opposite. I'll give it one more try, because I'm into hope . . .”