Second Star (18 page)

“They could be there,” he says. He sounds so sure, so certain. I open my eyes; his face is just inches from mine. His blue eyes are clearer than water. His breath is cool on my skin. He begins to drop his hand from my face, but I cover it with my own hand, pressing his touch even closer. His fingers are warm and solid, as strong as the rest of him.

Before he can back away, I lean forward and kiss him. Softly at first, like it’s my first kiss and I don’t quite understand the mechanics of it. For a split second, he doesn’t kiss me back, and I think maybe he’s not going to. Just the thought makes my stomach hurt, makes me want him more, makes me want to lean in closer, press my lips to his that much harder. And just when I think I can’t take it anymore, he kisses me back.

He lifts his wounded hand from my lap so that his palms are on either side of my face, cupping my cheeks. The Band-Aids are rough against my skin; I can smell his blood and his sweat, the stale beer that must have soaked into his clothes in the bar’s parking lot. I weave my fingers through his dark hair, gently brushing out tiny pieces of gravel from the ground.

The kiss seems to last forever and yet seems to end too soon. Jas is the one who finally pulls away.

“We should get going,” he says, jumping down to the ground. He has a look on his face, in the fog and the rain and the cloudy light shining down from the streetlamps above us, that I’ve seen before. A look I now understand is reserved just for me.

“Hey,” I say, emboldened, “that day, on the beach at Kensington. You didn’t really come to Pete’s side of the beach for the waves, did you? You were there because of me, weren’t you?”

Jas smiles. “What do you think?” he says. He lifts me down from the truck and takes my hand in his, leading me back to the passenger side, opening the door for me. When he gets in on the other side, I slide across the seat to lean against him and rest my head on his shoulder. As he pulls back onto the freeway, he puts his arm around me, and I fall asleep listening to the patter of the rain on the roof of the truck.

I wake up a couple hours later in another motel parking lot, almost identical to the one we left behind this morning. The only difference is that parking lot is filled and the sign flashing
VACANCY
has the word
NO
in front of it.

The rain has increased from a drizzle to a pour, and Jas runs from the motel lobby to the car.

“Come on out,” he says, opening my door. He takes off his sweatshirt and holds it over my head to keep me dry, the other arm around me, holding me close. He’s so warm that I wonder what it would be like to crawl up inside him.

“It says no vacancy,” I say, pointing to the sign above us.

Jas shakes his head. “Honey, I made these reservations days ago. The very second I heard about that swell.”

I stand on my tiptoes and kiss him again, quickly this time.

When I pull away, he says, “I got us separate beds again.”

“You didn’t have to do that,” I reply, winding my arms around his waist as we walk toward our room. I mean it. I want to stay this close to him for as long as I possibly can.

28

Jas’s long body curls around me when we finally fall asleep. I concentrate on the weight of his upper arm resting on my rib cage, the heat of his knees pressing into my calves. I press my back against his front, feeling the muscles of his chest flex as he tightens his hold on me.

Soon, Jas’s breathing grows slower and his muscles relax. He’s asleep, and I’m wide awake. Even though I hate to put any space between us, I roll away. He needs his rest for tomorrow; I don’t want to keep him awake just because I am.

And I’m not sure I want to talk to him about my reasons for being restless. How did I get here, lying in bed with a guy whose last name I don’t even know? I don’t even know the name of the town this motel is in. He’s a drug dealer, he can be violent, he can be cruel. He’s the reason Pete kicked my brothers out in January, the reason I’m still no closer to finding them than I was the day I graduated high school.

And yet, listening to the waves crashing through the open window, I know that I
am
closer. I sit up and slide off the bed. We chose the bed closest to the window; Jas threw my duffel bag on the second bed, but otherwise, it’s completely undisturbed.

I’ve never done anything like this. My god, until last night, I’d never even been in a motel like this. There’s only one lamp in the room, on a nightstand in between the two beds, and when Jas tried to turn it on earlier, the bulb flickered weakly. I don’t even want to think about the last time they cleaned the bathroom; there’s a ring of sand around the drain. And every surface in the room is covered in dust, as though no one has stayed here for months. Which, I guess, they haven’t. This place probably only fills up when the nearby waves break, and according to Jas, that hasn’t happened since January.

When my brothers were here. Maybe they stayed in this very motel. It would have been too cold to camp out on the beach. Maybe they convinced some friends to let them crash on the floor of their room, or maybe they used up the last of their allowance money to pay for a room of their own. No; they would have long since spent whatever money they’d taken when they left home.

I glance back at Jas; he’s rolled onto his back now and is snoring softly. The sound is comforting, a reminder that I’m not alone. With his drug money, he could afford to stay anywhere. He could have booked us into the nearest five-star hotel. The fact that he chose this place makes me like him even more. This is where the surfers stay. There’s nowhere we could have stayed that would have been closer to the water.

I grab his sweatshirt and slip it on, breathing in the smell of him: Tide and sweat, beer and salt, and something else, something uniquely Jas. I slip out the door, careful to close it as quietly as possible behind me. I don’t want him to follow me.

The rain has stopped, but the air is clouded with mist. I can barely see three feet in front of me. I walk barefoot across the motel parking lot and onto the beach, feeling the sand between my toes. It’s cold beneath my feet, no trace of the day’s heat left behind.

The roar of the ocean grows louder and louder, not just because I’m getting closer to the water but because the waves are picking up. Witch Tree might not be breaking until tomorrow morning, but the ocean is getting ready for it now, like a dancer warming up before her big show. The moon is full above me, pulling the tides every which way.

I walk until the sand goes from moist to wet beneath my feet, until I can feel the waves lapping my toes. I hear something to my left—a shout, a laugh, a cry, I’m not sure. In the distance, where there was only darkness before, I see a hint of light, someone sparking a fire. I watch as it grows from a single flame to a roaring bonfire, glowing and brilliant through the fog.

I smile, remembering the bonfire on the beach the night that I graduated, the first time I saw Pete. I’d never seen anyone move on the water the way he did; he looked like it was what he was made to do. Was it luck that made Pete leave Kensington that night, head down to Newport, to the beach where my classmates and I were celebrating?

Even though I’m yards away from the bonfire on the beach now, I feel warmer just knowing that it’s there. I was falling hard for Pete, and now I’m falling fast for Jas. How is that possible? To feel such intense emotions for two different people, one right after the other? Maybe Fiona and my parents were right, after all. Maybe I am crazy. At least a little bit. I’d have to be a little bit crazy to do what I’ve done over the past few months, wouldn’t I?

And I’d have to be at least a little bit crazy to have enjoyed it as much as I have. Even despite the fear and the heartache, despite Pete’s lies and Jas’s dust, I’ve never felt so alive.

Another sound floats down the beach from the bonfire. A shout this time. Someone calling someone else’s name. Must be a group of surfers, getting ready for tomorrow. Maybe they’re celebrating the waves to come. I squint in the fog, trying to make out shapes of people sitting around the fire; from here, all I can see are shadows.

But then one of the shadows turns; I see a profile, one that I recognize. I break into a run, but the fire is farther away than I realized. I’m panting by the time another silhouette comes into view.

Between heaving breaths, I shout, “John! Michael!” I expect them to turn when they hear my voice.

“John! Michael!” I scream hoarsely. I cough; I’m getting a stitch in my right side. I wish I were stronger, faster, fitter. Jas or Pete would be there by now. They’d have sprinted down the beach in two seconds flat.

“Please!” I shout, and as I do, the figures scatter. The wind whips off the ocean, and the fire climbs to a terrifying height; for a second, it looks like it’s about to explode, and I freeze in midstep. Just as suddenly, the flames begin to dwindle until it looks like they’re going to fade away entirely.

“No!” I shout, willing myself to run faster, breathe harder, anything to get there before my brothers have the chance to disappear again. “Please!” I say once more, but by the time I’m close enough to smell the smoke from what’s now a dying fire, everyone has gone. The wind blows my hair into my face, blinding me. I tear it away, wishing I could rip it off. I turn in circles, calling my brothers’ names, but the wind carries my voice away before the words get very far.

I’m sweating beneath Jas’s sweatshirt, but I’ve never been so cold. Even the tears streaming down my cheeks feel like ice. I am so sick and tired of chasing phantoms. I just want to find my brothers and hold on to them, feel their flesh beneath my grip, tactile and undeniable.

Slowly, regaining my breath, I walk back the way I came. The dim lights from the motel lobby are barely visible from here, but they’re enough to guide my way back. I look up at the sky as I walk, waiting for a break in the clouds.

I make a wish on the second star I see.

29

At four a.m., Jas shakes me gently awake. My clothes are still damp from my midnight run through the fog, but if Jas notices, he doesn’t say anything.

“It’s time to go,” he says, kissing my shoulder. “The witch is calling our name.”

A burst of adrenaline makes me bounce from the bed. The wave is breaking.

On the way to the harbor, the fog is so thick that Jas drives at a snail’s pace, careful around the curves in the road. I can’t see six feet in front of us—are people really going to surf in this soup? Jas explains that we’re heading to the harbor to rent a boat for the day.

“Why do we need a boat?”

“Witch Tree doesn’t break onshore; you have to take a boat to get there.”

“How can a wave break in the middle of the ocean?”

“Waves break over changes in the ocean floor. Reefs, that kind of thing. There’s a wave down near San Diego called Cortes that breaks over a sunken island.

“I’ll need to find a partner to tow me in,” he continues. Jas explained that the only way to surf a wave like Witch Tree is to tow into it on a Jet Ski like the one in the back of the truck. “But I’m pretty sure that finding a partner won’t be a problem once we get to the harbor and offer someone a free ride out.”

I nod, wondering how much it costs to rent a boat and a captain for the day, wondering how much a Jet Ski costs.

“That’s an ugly-looking mess you’ve got on your face,” I say. His bruise has morphed from purple to yellow overnight.

Jas laughs, wincing. “If I get my face rearranged like this too many times, you won’t want me anymore, huh?”

“You were too handsome before,” I answer. “Now you look a little bit more like the rest of us.”

Jas laughs again, resting his right hand on my knee. His palm is still covered in Band-Aids. The cut will sting when the salt water seeps in below the bandages, but I know he doesn’t care. Like he said, it takes more than a few bumps and bruises to keep him out of the water.

I almost tell him what I saw on the beach last night; I want to talk about the bonfire and seeing John and Michael. I should be more excited: I saw them, they’re here, Jas was right. Surely they will be at the harbor today, hoping for a ride out to Witch Tree. But I keep my mouth shut. I’m not really sure I saw anything at all last night. Maybe it was someone else. Maybe it was just a waking dream. I press the heels of my hands into my eyes, like maybe if I just rub them hard enough, I’ll be able to distinguish dream from reality, know phantom from human.

“Okay?” Jas says, glancing over at me as he pulls the truck into a crowded sandy parking lot near the docks. Even tethered to land, the boats are rocking and rolling, noisily bumping into the pier. I’ve never seen an ocean so choppy; it looks like a ski slope covered in moguls.

“Fine,” I answer, unclicking my seat belt. But my hands are shaking.

Before he opens the door, Jas leans over, pressing his bruised cheek against my smooth one, steadying me.

It’s cold on the pier; the sun is hours from rising, and judging from the cloud-cover I’m not sure it’s going to make an appearance at all today. The wind whips my hair into my face, and I struggle to pull it back into a ponytail. Despite the hour, the place is packed; half the crowd already have their wetsuits on, their surfboards propped up beside them. A camera crew is struggling with their equipment, hoping for a shot of the best ride of the day. The air feels charged with the power of the summer storm, the swell that simply should not be coming this time of year. Jas told me that the storms usually show up a few days behind the big waves, but I don’t think this storm cares about how it’s usually done. I wonder how far all these surfers traveled. Like Jas said, surfing these waves in August is a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Not that it feels like the beginning of August. It’s freezing.

As Jas heads for the boats, I weave my way through the crowd, looking for John and Michael. I concentrate on listening for the sounds of their voices above the howling wind, the waves, the chatter of the people who’ve gathered. No one seems to mind my bumping into them—they’re all focused on the water—but still, I wish I were tiny like Belle. She’d be able to squeeze between these people easily, like a mouse disappearing into its hole.