Westlake Soul (24 page)

“That ain’t no way to treat a stick, man,” a voice to my left said. Made me jump, too. I snapped in that direction and saw Vix sitting on the fringe of the beach, all but hidden in the sea grass swaying behind him. He looked at me and smiled. His crinkled eyes caught the setting sun, as bright as new pennies.

“Surfing sucks,” I said to him.

“Are you kidding me, man?” he said. “When you get up on a wave . . . man, feels like you’ll live forever.”

“But I can’t get up,” I groaned. “Been trying all day, and my arms are killing me.”

Vix smiled wider and shrugged. “Well, one thing I know . . . you’ll never get up if you quit.” He looked at the ocean, his eyes on fire. “It’s like learning to walk, man. First time you try, you fall on your ass. Second and third time, too. Then eventually you get up, and you
stay
up. And that’s not just walking, man, or surfing. That’s
life
. The whole goddamn ride.”

“I guess,” I said.

“Yeah, you guess,” he said. “Pick up that stick, man, and come back tomorrow. If you can get to your feet and stay there as a baby, you can for damn sure do it as a young man.”

I nodded, picked up my board.

“You can’t be afraid, man.” Vix said, and looked at me. “Not if you want to be alive.”

So I went back the following morning. Vix wasn’t there, but the ocean was. Like it always has been, and always will be. I put my board in the water and within a few sets, I was on my feet—a little wobbly, for sure, but on my feet.

And alive.

So alive.

You fall on your ass. You get up . . . and eventually you stay up.

I haven’t backed down from a wave, or a challenge, since.

Surf’s up, superhero
, Dr. Quietus said.
Show me what you’ve got.

It wasn’t your beach in paradise, I can tell you. The sea was so dark, and the sand so pale, that it looked like I had fallen into one of those nightmarish art house movies shot entirely in black and white.
Eraserhead Goes Surfing
, perhaps. The sun was a blanched eye boiling in a sky the colour of burned chrome, and the air smelled not of salt and seaweed, but of decay and smoke. At least the beach was sandy (littered with small bones, but sandy), although off to both sides I saw spikes of rock, like giant broken bottles. Easy to imagine the ocean taking me, smashing my body into them, ending me forever.

Definitely not paradise.

He spoke with the ocean’s voice, heard in every crashing wave:
This is it, Westlake Soul.
Cresting, breaking hard, and spitting cold spray.
This is the end.

Khalil Gibran, the noted Lebanese poet, wrote, “You would know the secret of Death. But how shall you find it unless you seek it in the heart of life?” Vix had told me the same thing, although less poetically:
You can’t be afraid, man. Not if you want to be alive.
I had, since my accident, resisted death . . . run away. Better to turn my face. To hide. But the secret of death—or any inevitability—is to not be afraid of it. Nothing is accomplished through fear. Once tamed, anything is possible.
Anything.
That’s not only the secret of death, brothers and sisters . . . it’s the secret of life, too.

The whole goddamn ride.

I stepped closer to the water. Felt the wind skimming off the backs of waves.

That’s it
, the ocean said.
Come to me.

No one else on the beach. No one to save me this time.

I was on my own.

Come . . .

I nodded and my hair blew across my face and the ocean was black and wild but I wasn’t afraid. I kept walking, my board tucked under my arm. My first board, of course—the thruster from Ron Jon’s that I had learned on.

This is it . . .

I stepped into the water. Cold surf bubbled around my ankles. There was no need to read the breaks; it was all heavy, and I wasn’t backing down, anyway. I pushed off and paddled out to deeper water, body-surfed the first few waves to gauge speed and power. My board shook beneath me and I gripped the rails hard. The ocean boomed and I saw shapes in the surf. They looked like pale hands, drowned faces.

I’m ready for this
, I said.

Dr. Quietus laughed. He raised his black arms and brought them down hard.

It was like the horizon hunched its shoulders. From left to right, as far as I could see, a growing ridge of water, rolling toward me.

Here I come, Westlake Soul.

Swelling, filling the sky.

You don’t stand a chance.

This was the wave—the end. One way or another. I was either getting the better of it, or I’d be cremated with Angus Young’s guitar pick by the end of the week.

It came at me like spread wings. Unthinkable span. I faced the beach and started to paddle, trying to get up enough speed to glide into the wave. My stiff arms ached but I didn’t stop. Worked harder when I felt the wave behind me. It sounded like war. Grenades exploding. Guns firing. Missiles hitting their targets. I heard screaming, too. There was a mile of water beneath me and it was packed—I was
sure
of it—with screaming bodies. I paddled harder and felt the push behind the board. The power was incredible but I managed to pop to my feet in one fluid motion. I carved the face and dropped down, hard as a block of granite. The board kicked beneath me and I came close to losing it, but shifted my weight at the critical moment and maintained balance.

Cold spray in my face, biting my skin. It stung my eyes, tasted like sulphur.

Dr. Quietus roared and reached for me with thick, dark arms. I caught a burst of speed and almost lost it again, but drove into the flats to hit my bottom turn. I ascended the wave and, with growing confidence, launched into an aerial. I soared, twisting three-sixty through midair—weightless, like I’d hit orbit—and saw the wave falling beneath me.

Falling . . .

But I was flying. Breathlessly high and with a booming heart.

One last gnarly trick.

I looked down and saw that the ridge of the wave had become the top of a wall.
My
wall. Rebuilt. Towering and powerful.

I grabbed my board and flew over it—came down on the face of a different wave.

Cool and blue.

A different ocean.

I spilled from my board, hit the water and went deep. Could’ve kicked to the surface, but I enjoyed the feel of the ocean around me too much. So cool. So alive. It streamed into my hair. Into my eyes and mouth. Around my muscles.

It felt like being held.

I went deeper, through schools of fish like mirror shards, and pods of singing humpbacks. Down, into a layer of darkness, and beyond . . . where lobates flowed around me like natural satellites, and were dragged deeper by my diving mass.

My name is Westlake Soul, and these are our final moments.

Westlake . . . baby . . .

Bottom of the ocean. Darkness all around, but a whisper of light above. Like a window that has been painted black, all but the thinnest crack. And I can see out, at the sky, perhaps. Surf City Blue.

I should swim closer . . . take a look.

Open my eyes.

Soon.

For now, though, I like how the current rocks me from side to side. It feels so different.
Cool
, for one thing. Comforting, too. I know that if I project from my body—with the last of my superhero power—I will see Mom holding me. She will be stroking my face with one hand. The other will be curled into mine. Tears falling. Salt water on my lips.

Baby . . .

I’ll feel her love—a breathtaking miniature sun—and remember what she asked me when the ocean was cold and dark.

What do you want, Westlake?

I will surface. Grab her hand and squeeze firmly.

“More,” I will say, and open my eyes.