The Shore (7 page)

“Get real,” Sabrina said, displaying her hands. “You’re looking at a fifty-dollar manicure. These hands don’t scrub toilets.”

“Look, we all have to pitch in,” Polly said.

“I’m sorry, but who put you in charge?” Sabrina asked haughtily. It was clear to Owen that she’d had enough. Again, he found himself feeling a grudging admiration. Sabrina certainly had no trouble voicing her opinions. He watched as she hopped down from the perch she had made for herself on the kitchen counter and went back upstairs.

“I’m just trying to help,” Polly said in a small voice.

“Yeah, well, no thanks,” Curt said. “I’m outta here too. Come on, Avery.”

Avery started toward the door after Curt, then hesitated and patted Polly’s arm. “I appreciate the effort. It’ll be okay. Everyone’s just tired from the party. Maybe we can try again when everyone’s gotten a chance to know one another better.”

Polly looked disappointed, and Owen was surprised to find himself feeling bad for her. After all, she was trying, and maybe in a way she was right. He might love to party, but he also
liked a refrigerator with food in it and a bathroom you could use without worrying about catching some infectious disease. The others started to drift away, and Polly looked crushed, her shoulders slumped and her eyes cast down at the floor. Owen had an idea and instantly hated it, but at least it might make her feel better.

“Hey, you know what might bring everyone together?” he said after the others had left and he and Polly were alone in the kitchen. “Maybe we should have a clambake or something.”

Polly instantly perked up. “That would be great! Just fantastic! Oh, Owen, I knew you were a good guy.”

Owen groaned to himself. Now he almost wished he hadn’t made the suggestion. Good guy? There goes my image, he thought. A second ago I was top stud, now I’m Mr. Sensitive Fix Your Problems!

“One thing?” he quickly added. “Let’s pretend it was your idea, not mine.”

“Why?” Polly asked.

“Just do it, okay?” Owen said. “It’s no biggie.”

Before Polly could press further, Lucas returned to the kitchen in shorts and a T-shirt, having ditched the wet suit.

“Clambake tonight at six thirty?” Polly asked.

“Great, I’ll be here,” Lucas said. “But right now, I’ve got to book.”

Owen needed to leave too, to get to work. Today was his first day on the parasailing boat and he had to get checked out
on the equipment. He and Lucas left the house at the same time. Personally, Owen didn’t get the dreadlock thing on blond white guys. But Lucas gave off an aura of confident self-assurance that Owen inwardly wished he possessed.

They went through the front door together, into the morning sunlight. “Need a ride?” Owen asked.

“No, thanks,” Lucas said. “I can walk.”

“What? I’ve got cooties?” Owen joked.

Lucas grinned. “Okay.”

The sun was already hot and heating the air. Owen squinted in the brightness and felt a stab of pain in his skull—a sign of the hangover he’d been trying to avoid all morning. He put his hand up to shield his eyes.

“You all right?” Lucas asked.

“The sun, it hurts us,” Owen said in his best Golem impression.

Lucas chuckled. Owen smiled back. The smell of the surf was in the air. There were other scents as well, most of them sweet and sugary and sure to be coming from the boardwalk.

Owen could hear laughter and playful screaming from the direction of the beach. He pictured some girl squealing as a guy splashed her with water. His thoughts slipped back to Sabrina. Why did she have to be so bitchy that morning? It didn’t make sense. Usually he was the one who woke up disgusted, not the girl. There was something about her that was different, though. He had woken up half a dozen times before she did and just
lain there and stared at her. Her beautiful blond hair fanning out around her face on the pillow. He’d wanted to reach out and—

“Uh, Owen, your car?” Lucas asked, interrupting his thoughts.

Owen shook himself out of the daydream and pointed down the street to a red Mustang convertible. A minute later they were in the car and Owen relaxed into the familiar black leather seats. “So, where do you work?” he asked Lucas as he put the car in gear.

“Surf shop,” Lucas said.

“Down on Main Street?” Owen started to steer in that direction.

“Yeah, but I’m not going there now. If you could drop me downtown I’d appreciate it.”

“Sure, anyplace in particular?” Owen asked.

“Nah, anywhere’ll be fine,” Lucas said. “So what are you doing this summer?” It was a subtle change of subject, but Owen wasn’t going to push it. If Lucas didn’t feel like telling him why he wanted to go downtown, that was his business.

“The parasailing boat,” Owen said.

“Never tried it,” Lucas said. “Is it fun?”

“The chicks are,” Owen said. “It’s a great way to meet them. You meet a lot of chicks at the surf shop?”

“A few,” Lucas replied noncommittally. “You can drop me here.”

Owen pulled the car over to the curb. They were on a block with a bunch of storefronts—a deli, a check-cashing place, a nail salon—not exactly high rent. Why here? he wondered.

“Thanks for the ride,” Lucas said, and got out.

Three

Later that afternoon as he left his and Avery’s room on the second floor, Curt heard a guitar being strummed and a girl singing softly. For a moment he thought it was a radio, but then he realized it was coming from one of the rooms down the hall. He paused for a moment. It wasn’t coming from Sabrina’s room. Polly’s room was downstairs. That left April.

He could relate to April’s preference for black clothes, but didn’t go for the excessive eye makeup. He just didn’t get why she’d want to look like some character from a Tim Burton movie. He stepped closer to her door, trying to make out the words she was singing. She had a surprisingly good voice, kind of low and throaty. Her playing wasn’t half bad, either, even if it was sort of minimalistic. But it was some moody folk ballad. He hated that kind of crap, so he surprised himself when, after another minute, he knocked on her door.

The singing ceased abruptly, and there was a moment’s silence before April asked, “Who is it?”

“Curt.”

“What do you want?” she asked.

Good question. He wasn’t exactly sure himself, so he made up the first thing that came to his mind. “I want to apologize for being a dick about the smoking thing.”

Another moment of silence passed. Then he heard bedsprings, as if she was getting up. Next the door opened a crack, and one of her heavily mascaraed eyes peeked out.

“Seriously?” she asked.

“Yeah, it was uncool. You’ve got a right to breathe.”

He thought he almost detected a smile, but wasn’t quite sure. “Thank you, apology accepted,” she said, and started to close the door.

“Wait,” he said.

She stopped and frowned.

“Can I come in?” he asked.

“Why?”

“I don’t know. Talk. One musician to another. I heard you playing. You sounded . . . good.” It wasn’t entirely a lie. He might not have liked the style, but her playing and voice weren’t bad.

She stared at him for a minute before stepping back and opening the door. He walked in and was instantly struck by how small and dark her room was. The bed was wedged against one wall, and clothes were hung on a pole that ran the length of the room. It took him a minute to realize that there were no
windows. It wasn’t even a room, just a big closet. An old Yamaha acoustic was propped in the corner. Piece of junk.

“Cozy,” he said.

She bristled suspiciously. “I thought you wanted to talk about music?”

“Sorry,” he muttered.

April shrugged and sat on her bed, picking up one of her pillows and clutching it to her stomach. The neck of her T-shirt opened out, and Curt caught a glimpse of her milky-white cleavage.

“At least it’s mine,” she said.

“I get that,” Curt said. “I had to share a room with my brother till he went to college.”

“Bites.”

“Tell me about it,” he said. “Made it worse when he would sneak girls in and kick me out. I’d spend the night in his car so Dad didn’t catch me sleeping on the couch. Freeze my butt off.”

“Doubly bites,” she noted.

Curt dropped his eyes and studied his hands for a minute. “I don’t know why I just told you that,” he admitted. “I’ve never told anyone, not even Avery.”

“Sometimes it’s easier to tell painful things to a stranger than to someone you care about.”

“It’s not that painful,” he protested.

“Yes, it is,” she said. “It’s written all over your face.”

“What are you, a mind reader?” he asked with a grin.

She didn’t smile back. “So, you want to talk music?”

Curt wasn’t sure what he wanted to talk about. He was intrigued. There was something deep about her that he connected to. It’s like she gets it, he thought. Weird to know someone just a few minutes and to feel like we have a connection. Maybe it was the music.

“I heard you singing.”

She gave him an impatient look. “Yeah, I know. You said that.”

In a weird way he liked that she was suspicious and reluctant. It made her sort of challenging. And then there was her enticingly pale, smooth skin.

“You sounded pretty good. Played pretty good too, I guess, if you like that sort of music.”

“I take it you don’t?” she said, only the twitch in her left eye revealing that the criticism bothered her at all.

“Well, personally, I wouldn’t be caught dead listening to that stuff. It’s all rock for me.”

“Who do you like?”

“Who don’t I like?” he asked.

She lifted an eyebrow.

“Okay, if I have to choose, I like classic rock the best,” Curt said. “And Green Day, the White Stripes, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Nirvana.” He hesitated. “You consider that classic rock?”

“Doesn’t matter,” April answered. “Kurt Cobain wrote great songs. You know some of the same people who write songs
for rock bands also write songs for folk artists and ballads for country singers?”

“No way,” Curt said.

“Way.”

“I guess it’s all in the interpretation,” he said.

“That’s all musical styles are, anyway,” April said. “Different people’s interpretations of the same themes, the same feelings, even the same songs.”

“So, you’re saying we’re all just singing the same thing?”

“Essentially,” she said, smiling again.

“I guess that’s kind of cool,” he said, even though he wasn’t completely sure he agreed.

“I think so,” she said.

“So, the song you were singing, who wrote it?”

Instead of answering, she pulled her knees up against her chest and seemed to withdraw.

“What’s the problem?” Curt asked.

“I didn’t think anyone was here,” April said. “I guess I’m a little freaked that someone was listening and I didn’t know it.”

“Hey, it was just me,” Curt said.

A crooked grin appeared on April’s lips. “Maybe I’m just paranoid. I just work so hard on these songs, and they’re also really private.”

“Don’t you want them to be heard?” Curt asked.

“Sure,” said April. “Someday, when I’m ready.”

“You write all your own songs?” he asked, honestly impressed.

April nodded.

“Songwriting isn’t one of my talents,” he said. “No one else in the band can write worth a crap either.”

She was looking at him strangely, like she was studying him.

“What?” he asked at last.

“I’m still wondering what you’re doing here,” she said. “I mean, in my room. I’m pretty sure you’re not here trolling for a girl or a band member, and it’s hard to imagine you being into the stupid ritual bonding thing. So, what’s the deal?”

He shrugged. “I’m not really sure, to be honest. I heard you singing and I guess I just wanted to talk. I wish I was living in the house with my band, but Avery wanted us to have some separate time. She doesn’t get what the band means to me. She doesn’t understand that it’s who I am. There is no ‘separate’ between me and music. I don’t know. Maybe I thought you might understand.”

“Shouldn’t you be telling this to Avery, not me?” April asked.

“Probably,” he admitted, then decided to change the subject. “So, is it hard to write your own stuff?”

“Believe it. For every good one I write, I probably chuck ten bad ones.”

“You come here for inspiration or something like that?” he guessed.

“As if,” April muttered. “My mom brought my grandmother here for her health. She can’t work full-time, though. This,” she said, waving her hand around the cramped room, “is my
compromise. I work and help pay for some of their expenses and I get to have my own place instead of sharing a one-bedroom apartment with them.”

“Excellent compromise,” he noted.

“I kind of thought so too. So, when I’m not working, yeah, I spend time on my music. You too, right?”

He shrugged, then nodded. “We’re trying to get some gigs around here for the summer. I guess you could say we came here to be heard.”

“Then I’m sure you will be.”

“Thanks.”

“That’s cool,” she said, waving it off. “What’s the name of the band?”

“Stranger Than Fiction,” he said with pride. The name had been his idea, and he considered it one of his finest contributions.

“Killer. So, are you?”

“What?”

“Stranger than fiction?”

“Sometimes,” he said, shooting her a sly smile. He dropped eye contact with her, thinking about the band and everything they’d been through. They had started out rotating through all their garages until the parents freaked at the noise. After that, they’d practiced in one guy’s barn. It sucked during the winter because it didn’t have any heat. The second year they were together, the lead singer had overdosed and nearly died. The guy’s parents had freaked and shipped him
off to boot camp and the band had to find someone to take his place. They were trying to get money for better equipment and saving up for a recording session. Before that could happen, though, they needed better songs. It had been rough, but he knew STF could make it if they stuck together. They’d come a long way, and Curt wouldn’t let anyone stop them now.

His eyes fell on a beat-up black notebook on April’s bed. He picked it up and flipped it open.