The Tribes of Palos Verdes (4 page)

“No,” I say. “In our world there'll be two kings.”

*   *   *

Surfers live by the rules of the wind and moon, because the wind controls how big the waves are, while the moon pulls the tide back and forth like a puppet on a string.

I'm explaining tides and currents to my mother as I wash out my wet suit in the kitchen sink. She wears her bright yellow bathrobe and dark oval glasses, even though we're indoors.

“So now you respond to the moon?” she says.

After school she sits my brother and me down. She lists all the things to beware of in the ocean: sharks, rays, riptides, jellyfish, and especially unpredictable currents.

As she speaks, she gets very sad, her breathing ragged and rough.

“I'm losing your father,” she says, looking at Jim. “I don't want to lose you, too.”

Then she shuts the curtain, blacking out the ocean. “Stay where I can see you,” she warns. “Don't go too far.”

*   *   *

“Fuckin' ole,” Skeezer Laughlin, the biggest and meanest of the Bayboys, says to Jim at the cliffs. “There's gotta be a storm from Mexico pretty soon.”

The Bayboys are the popular surfer clique in Palos Verdes. They're the only ones who can surf Lunada Bay, the bay in front of our house, without getting hassled. Jim's always nervous when he sees the Bayboys paddle out; he doesn't know if it's okay for us to surf with them, even though we're locals. As soon as they paddle out, he comes in, trying to make me follow.

Jim nods to Skeezer, acting nonchalant. His fingers pick at the skin around his nails.

“Have a toke?” Skeezer offers Jim a joint, ignoring me. Jim drags hard, and looks out at the water. I see the veins pop out on his neck, but his expression is neutral. Both of them sit there, saying nothing. Skeezer passes the joint to Jim again. I hear a sucking sound, then a high squeal as a massive intake of smoke causes Jim to choke. Skeezer laughs, and starts to choke, too.

“See you at the bay one of these mornings,” Skeezer says, walking away. “And by the way, it would be cool if you let us use your cliff stairs.”

On the way home Jim is flushed, quiet. The bitten skin around his nails is bleeding. He wipes his fingers on his shorts.

“We can surf with the Bayboys now,” I say. “If Skeezer says we can.”

“I heard,” he says sharply.

“So do you think we should go out with them tomorrow?” I ask, very excited, poking him in the ribs.

“Maybe we're not good enough to surf with them yet,” he answers nervously.

But he's flexing in the mirror when I spy on him later.

*   *   *

This is how to be a wavegetter in the morning lineup. Set the alarm for 5:30
A.M.
in order to do a wave check by six. If you're late, you'll have to take the last spots with the other sleepyheads, and you probably won't get a turn.

If you try to sneak a ride, the Bayboys will get mad and careen their boards at you like big, dull arrows.

Our first morning out with the Bayboys, the waves are flat and unrideable. Jim and I paddle toward the lineup, sweating in our rubber jackets. Skeezer gives my brother the secret handshake and nods to me. He tells me to get in line behind all the guys.

“Ladies don't go first here,” he says.

I clear my throat. “I guess you don't get special privileges then.”

No one laughs. Nervous, I look at Jim. He keeps his eyes on the horizon, frowning just the tiniest bit. Finally one of the older guys cracks up and motions for me to line up next to him.

“She got you, Skeez,” the guy says.

As I paddle past, Skeezer grumbles, “Hell, from the waist up she could pass for a guy anyway—a real ugly one, though.”

Because there's no waves, the guys spend the morning telling their best surf stories—like the time when Skeezer's cousin's friend saw a great white shark at Angel Point, or the day Jim Dayton surfed with Jimmie Ho, the legendary Hawaiian. No one talks to me much. Still, I feel pretty great.

When the waves start to pick up after the school bell rings, Jim and I swim to the shore, hesitating on the shallow sand. Then I decide what to do. I close my eyes and turn quickly back into the water, forgetting about school, even though I'll have to spend a week in Mr. Gross's tardy detention.

I get one junk wave, closing my eyes when I fall. I stay underwater as long as I can so I don't have to hear Skeezer laugh.

*   *   *

Mr. Gross, dean of detention, claims he's dangerous when mad. “I'm a Scorpio, don't cross me,” he warns the class today.

He orders each of us to write an honest letter of apology, and turn it in at the end of class for him to read. I struggle over what to write, then decide.

“I'm not sorry at all. I hate school, I hate everything except surfing, and that's the honest truth.”

Mr. Gross keeps me after detention the next day. He's very nice, not like a scorpion at all. He says he has a deal for me; he won't give me extra detention if I rewrite my letter of apology properly.

I write him a letter that says:

Dear Mr. Gross,

I guess you want me to lie—

I am sorry for being late.

Medina Mason

“Thank you, Medina.” He takes out a bottle of Liquid Paper, smiling to himself. Quickly he applies a thick white stripe through the middle of my letter so that it says:

Dear Mr. Gross,

I am sorry for being late.

Medina Mason

“I
do
appreciate your honesty,” he says, eyes twinkling.

*   *   *

My brother loves stars. For our birthday, we go to Joshua Tree National Monument where you can see every good constellation in the world. But then my father smiles at a blond lady in front of the Tourist Information Center, and my parents start fighting.

“Why don't you just go to a motel with her right now,” my mother says.

“Maybe I will. Maybe I'll just fucking leave.”

My brother and I have never heard my father curse out loud before. I laugh, but Jim shakes his head, mad.

“Let's run for it,” I say. “Quick! Before Dad drives away!”

I pull Jim with me, running free under a perfect, blue desert sky. “We'll hide from them, make them really sorry,” I tell him.

We crouch behind Treasure Rock, giggling as they call our names. I plead with Jim to hide with me all day, telling him we can climb to the very top to scare them, we'll hold hands and pretend to jump.

But when my mother starts to cry, Jim goes to her, head down. He takes her hand, and says he's very, very sorry. When he finally looks back at me, his face is tense like a rubber band being pulled extra tight.

Later that night, Jim shows me the crab formations in the stars. I try to see them, but only see little points of random light.

“Those aren't crabs, really,” I say.

He turns, lying on his back on top of a wooden picnic bench, and looks into the sky.

“Those stars there are its head,” he says. “See where its body curls around?”

I lie next to him until I think I see a crab with only one pincer.

“What are you two whispering about?” my mother calls out angrily. “Come here, Jim.”

Twenty minutes later she's laughing happily, lying in the mouth of the tent with my brother, searching in the sky for The Hunter.

*   *   *

My father returns at 9:30 in a rental car so he can drive home early. My mother says I have to go with him, even though Jim says it isn't fair. On the way home, my father barely talks. He frowns at me and says, “No, Medina, I don't want to listen to the Rock and Roll Hit Parade.”

When he drives very fast, he smiles a little.

*   *   *

Two days later my brother comes home from Joshua Tree. He's tanned, rested, glowing. He says our mother was in a great mood the rest of the trip; they lay under the stars telling ghost stories, staying up all night.

She even drank a beer, sang Beatles' songs around the big campfire while Jim played guitar. “Can you imagine our mother drinking a beer?” he asks, laughing.

I shrug, jealous, as he describes the fun they had, the moonlight cookouts and visit to famous Loco Rock. At Loco Rock they had a long talk. “She feels so alone here,” he says sadly. “The stupid tennis ladies don't like her, and Dad always picks on her.” His eyes darken, he balls up his fist, hits the bed in emphasis. “Dad is such a jerk.”

“Oh,” I say quietly, sick to my stomach.

“She needs a man to protect her,” he says fiercely. “When she feels better she'll be normal again.”

He warns me to be nice to my mother if I want to keep his respect. He puts his hand on my shoulder, pats it like my father does. Then he smiles shyly, looks at me in wonder. “Mom thinks I'm more of a man than Dad ever was.”

*   *   *

When Jim and I were six, we visited Sky Lake, Michigan, with our father for the day. He was lolling on the sand, looking at the pretty girls stroll up and down the shore in their pastel bikinis, spritzing their hair with lemon pulp, giggling. Watching them untie the backs of their shiny suits, faces to the sand, soaking in hazy sunlight. Watching them and dreaming.

I was a stick figure with buck teeth, but my brother was already perfect. We were playing with blue plastic pails and silver spoons. Making a sand city, just feet in front of the water, a city complete with houses, shops, a zoo. A wave came up suddenly, crashing into the walls of the city, licking away its foundations. Jim dove out of the way, a tear plopping down his chest, his lower lip trembling.

I locked hands with him, dragging him into the ankle-high water, pushing him deeper and deeper. Telling him, “It's just a lake. It won't hurt; don't be afraid.”

He followed, toes, knees, thighs, gingerly. The whole time I gave him words of encouragement, holding his hand tightly, not letting him run. Whispering.

“Let's go in, let's go all the way past our necks.”

I told him he could have my Mr. Microscope if he'd go in to his waist. Mr. Microscope was our favorite toy; we used it to look at each other's spit, each other's hair.

Then my father came loping toward the water, looking from left to right, making sure the bikini girls thought he was just going for a swim. He spanked me quickly, looking around, smiling at the women, hissing in my ear.

That night, grounded in my room, I looked at magnified tears under the Mr. Microscope, yelling to Jim to come and see, but he stayed away, eating ice cream with my mother. He wouldn't give me anything to examine. He wouldn't give me the time of day. Later I smashed Mr. Microscope and threw it into his room.

*   *   *

“I don't think you should be such a smartass to Skeezer,” Jim says when we're smoking pot in my room. We're funneling the exhalations out my bedroom window through a rolled-up surf poster.

“He's the one who picks fights.”

“You've got to give him time to get used to you.” Jim looks at me, biting his lip. “He doesn't like girls surfing. He thinks it's stupid.”

“I think he's stupid,” I say. “Plus soon I'll be better than him.”

Jim smiles, his eyes red and swollen. He rolls over on his belly, and takes aim at me with a rubber band. He asks me again to please act right in front of the Bayboys.

“If Skeezer says something to you, just keep quiet. It's easier than fighting him.”

“How come you never stand up for me?”

He exhales, long and deep. “I stand up for you all the time, even when I don't want to.”

*   *   *

My father wants us to be classical pianists, fluent French speakers, tournament soccer players, and ace students. After all, he was at the top of his class. He's the first to laugh at his own jokes, the first up in the morning. He's a runner, a long-distance jogger, up at five, one foot out of the bed, stretching before he lunges for the door.

“Got to beat the birds.”

That's what he likes to tell us, dewy with sweat, cold and smiling, after his run, before his wheat germ–banana shake.

He likes to say it's not winning or losing that's important, it's how
quickly
you win. How hard you run, how fast. He slaps us on the back and encourages us to be “the toughest, fastest surfers in Palos Verdes.” But I tell him surfing isn't like that.

“How do you win then?” my father asks.

“You just stay on top,” my brother explains, irritated.

*   *   *

I'm going fast, flying through air, unstoppable. It's 4:30 after school and there's a freak small swell at Angel Point. It's two to three feet and round, not very mushy. The waves are softly capped, pushing against the bottom of my board, rocking me from side to side.

I'm about to wipe out, but I pretend I'm the wing of a plane, soaring through the air, above trees and rocks and grass. I don't fall off even after I've counted to five. Then I hit whitewash, and the board bounces hard under my feet, as if hitting pavement. There's a thud and I jerk to the left without warning, falling headfirst.

The water slaps my face and chest as I fall, stinging until I land in a soft nest of seaweed. Slippery fronds envelop my legs and stomach as I gasp for breath. My hands are wind-milling wildly until I stop going under.

Before I can reach my board, it's spinning high in the air, pushed by a wave back to the edge of the shore, eddying on the sand in the shallow water.

A piece of hair wraps itself tightly around my neck. Another wave slaps me in the back, tumbling over my head, pushing my face into the water. When I finally come up again, I'm shaking.

Jim is watching me. He gives me the thumbs-up.

Jim never laughs when I fall.

*   *   *

I read in
Surfer
magazine about all the different kinds of waves.