The Feathery (5 page)

Every morning before he left the apartment to go downstairs he’d glance at a black and white framed photo of his wife and two-year-old son. A flash of anger would find him. Then it would quickly subside when his mind switched to the golf lessons scheduled or a troubled kid in need of his help. On this morning, he’d initiate an attempt to guide two more lads away from their wrath and toward the serenity of a purposeful life.

Sandy joined Scott and Matt in the pro shop. Their new shorts and shirts were a much better fit than the baggy clothes they had been wearing yesterday. But Matt’s hat was still turned around with the visor in the back. Both boys had recently shampooed their long hair.

They followed Sandy to the Hole 19 Lounge. They had coffee and Danish and met some of the El Camino staff who were on break. Included in the group was the greens keeper, Harry Gladstone, and the caddie master, Billy McGinnis. Billy was a disciplinarian like Harry and Sandy planned to turn Matt over to Billy at some point. Matt left with Gladstone, and Scott followed Sandy to the practice range.

Scott’s first job was to fill the golf ball buckets used for lessons and run errands from the range. In general he became Sandy’s
gofor
. Scott watched as McNair taught golf and took in his instruction of proper setup and tempo. At times, gruff words provoked by the ache of arthritic joints in his aging body would overcome Sandy’s usually patient teaching disposition. He’d vent the anger caused by his pain by yelling at his students when their alignment was off, "Keep your damn ass behind you!"

Some players from the tour came to El Camino to have Sandy take a look at their swing. He’d introduce Scott to them, and it was a thrill for him to watch these pros hit balls while listening to their banter about the PGA tour. Between lessons, Sandy spent time with Scott, schooling him on the proper swing dynamics. From his years of experience in the game, Sandy recognized Scott’s natural ability and took on the project of nurturing it. Scott was a zealous student, eager to learn. He practiced golf for hours while making only token appearances on the tennis court.

Gladstone, the greens keeper, was tough on Matt at first and assigned the hardest jobs to him, like hours in the hot sun sifting sand for bunkers. The first week Matt was on the verge of quitting, and had a talk with Scott about doing so.

"Jeez, Scott, it’s like boot camp. Gladstone is like a frigging marine drill instructor."
"Hang in, Matt. Look how tan and shaped up you’re getting. You’ll look great on a surf board."

After three months Scott was rewarded for his work and attitude turnaround by being allowed to play the course on Monday afternoons. Because those front teeth protruded over his lower lip Matt was called, Bucky Pearl, by the caddies and wasn’t allowed to join Scott on Mondays after he’d had a fight with the caddie who’d nicknamed him that. Anyway, Matt didn’t have the fervor for golf to match Scott’s, so his punishment wasn’t a severe one.

Scott practiced and played whenever he wasn’t working or caddying, Caddying helped to teach both boys proper conduct on a golf course and instilled the discipline so lacking in their fatherless up-bringing. But it was Matt who continued to excel at caddying, and after a year, he became the most sought-after looper at El Camino Country Club. Detective Ross checked in on them from time to time and was pleased with their progress.

By the time Scott was a junior in high school, the arthritis had worsened so severely in Sandy’s hips, that he required an operation to replace both hip joints. In the morning, before school, Scott would help him get from his apartment to his wheelchair and to the range for his lessons. Sandy could still teach golf sitting in the wheelchair. He continued to observe the student’s golf swing with those clear blue eyes focused on every move, and if he detected a swing flaw he’d coach it to correction with a few words of instruction.

Meanwhile, it was golf course maintenance and pro shop duties for Scott. Matt still maintained his zest for caddying and started working some amateur tournaments around the San Diego area. On days he wasn’t caddying he could be found satisfying his other two passions…surfing on some of the best waves colliding with one of the many San Diego beaches or attending rap concerts. But for Scott it was golf and golf only, and his token tennis sessions dwindled down to none. Throughout his teenage years, Scott did well in amateur competition under Sandy’s tutoring, but his mother refused to watch him play.

During Scott’s senior year of high school, Pepperdine University offered him a full golf scholarship, and he eagerly accepted it as a stepping stone to the PGA Tour. Matt’s being teased about his protruding front teeth caused more than one fight, until Sandy paid an orthodontist to bring them in line. When Matt graduated from high school with no desire to attend college, Sandy used his connections to get him a job as a caddie on the Nationwide Tour.

They worked their last summer together at El Camino. It was the end of August when Scott and Matt were on the practice green putting for quarters. A 21-foot putt by Scott snaked its way to the hole and dropped in. Scott loudly proclaimed victory: "I’ve won the Masters. The green jacket is all mine!"

Scott’s habit of inventing a major tournament’s final day and final putt stayed with him since he’d first held a putter. He wanted to bring that form of intense concentration with him when stroking putts on the greens of competitive golf.

"Hey, dude, that’s enough. Take my quarter and quit pretending you’re at Augusta," Matt said, as he tossed the coin to his friend.
Scott put his hand on Matt’s shoulder as they walked off the practice green and said, "some day, buddy, it’s gonna be Augusta for real."
Matt’s smile offered a rare glimpse of teeth bound with silver wires. "And when it is, I’ll be on your bag."
At his table overlooking the practice green, Sandy watched as Scott’s long putt dropped in the cup. A wide grin came to his weathered face as he recalled the day Detective Ross had brought the lads to El Camino. He waited at the table for both boys to arrive for their going-away dinner. He had their names engraved on two golf clubs as going-away gifts. The golf clubs were leaning on a chair next to him…they were 60-degree lob wedges.

They were enjoying a meal of steak, salad and French fries when, out of the corner of his eye, Scott saw his mother rushing toward the table with her tennis-pro-boyfriend trailing meekly behind her.
Diane Beckman screamed at Scott: "You think I don’t know you’ve spent all your time out here learning golf instead of tennis. You’re just like your father was. Golf, golf, golf and more golf."
Scott was embarrassed. Sandy started to rise, but sat back down when she continued her tirade.
"Now I understand you’ll play golf at Pepperdine. You’d better have a good scholarship because you will not receive one red cent from me while you’re there."
She spun around and left the table, followed by the tennis pro, before Scott or anyone else could say a word.

A DECEMBER AFTERNOON FIVE YEARS LATER

SANTA BARBARA

&

THE MONTEREY PENINSULA CALIFORNIA

W
elcome to Santa Barbara, Dude…long time no see." Matt Kemp reached into the cooler and handed Scott a can of Coors. "Are we ready for the Q?"
Scott had driven from San Diego to Matt’s condominium high up in the hills above Santa Barbara. It’d been a heady time for him…graduation from Pepperdine, work and practice at El Camino, then passing through the PGA regional Q-School qualification stages. Now, it was on to Q-School with Matt as his caddie.

"I feel like I’m ready for the final test. Did okay in the regionals."

Scott took a sip of Coors. "Hope I didn’t screw up your tour schedule." "No way. I’ve been on the bag for the same guy for three years, ever since the Nationwide Tour, and after he passed at Q-School making it to the PGA."
"I followed your player on the sport page each Monday. He made a lot of money." Scott looked from Matt’s patio at the pool and view from his condo. "Looks like your share was enough to buy these digs and more."

"Yeah, we did well. My player was a little pissed when I told him I was leaving, but he understood more when I explained that you and I’d planned this since we were kids."
"Could you get back with him if I don’t make it?"
"That’s what he promised, but you’re going to make it…then the El Camino team will start its domination of the tour." Matt punched his fist on Scott’s and a wide grin showed a row of straight white teeth in a smile no longer inhibited by the braces of his teenage years. His long auburn hair was gathered in a ponytail. And Matt was the model of a California surfer, lean and brown. His zest for rap music now swung toward jazz.

"Hey, Matt, what’s with that little gold earring hanging on your left lobe?"
"Thought you’d never ask. It’s just a token of self-expression for this golf bag toting Sherpa. Matt flicked his ear lobe with an index finger. His face turned serious when he asked, "how’s your mother, the queen of mean, doing?" He thought that question sounded too harsh. "Sorry, Scott, I shouldn’t have said that."
"That’s okay, it fits. She’s busy getting richer. We don’t communicate much…never watched me play a golf match at Pepperdine. I moved to an apartment in El Cajon after college. She divorced that tennis pro who called golf,
pasture pool
. But the good news is she’s seeing a shrink on a weekly basis."
"Good, maybe she’ll sort out her feelings about golf and other stuff.
How did you make it four years at Pepperdine without any dough from her?"
"Golf scholarship and working summers for Sandy got me through by the skin of my teeth."
Matt’s expression showed concern for his friend’s lack of support from his mother. "Would you believe my mom married a marine major after all that anti-war stuff she was into?"
"Things have a way of changing after five years, Matt. How did it go when you looped for that lady on the European tour?"
"That’s a long story, but the bottom line is, she’s a possessive bitch and I ended up getting fired by her."

Matt obviously didn’t want to expand on the firing incident, so Scott didn’t question him further.

Later, while Matt was busy grilling steaks, Scott moved over to the railing on the flagstone patio. He looked out at the stream of lights meandering down the hillside until they reached the pool of yellow that was the city of Santa Barbara, and he remembered a story Sandy McNair had told him about an incident during the Second World War near what’s now the Sandpiper Golf Course.

"Matt, where’s the Sandpiper course?"

Matt left the barbecue grill and ambled over to the railing beside Scott. He pointed to the western shoreline. "It’s in Goleta, right about there."

"Did you know that back in the early forties a Japanese submarine lobbed a couple of shells into a refinery next to the course?"

"No, that’s news. Who told you?"

"Sandy did."

"I guess Sandy filled you in on a lot of things besides golf stuff,
Scott."

Scott thought about how Sandy would sprinkle history and even mathematics into golf talk and lessons. "Yeah, he’d teach me the history and geographical features about an interesting thing near where he’d visited a golf course. When he talked about course ratings and slopes he’d give me examples of the math to determine them. Then he’d make me work out a few hypothetical ratings."

"That’s probably why you made scholar/athlete status at Pepperdine."

"How did you know about that?"

"When I worked the tournament at Torrey Pines in the San Diego area I visited Sandy, Hard Ass Harry Gladstone and Billy McGinnis. Sandy told me how well you were doing at Pepperdine. You’re his pride and joy, dude."

"We’ve both come a long way up from when we started with Sandy and Hard Ass. Harry and Billy really helped you turn it around."
"I did show some attitude then, but…" Matt pointed to his cap that had the visor in the front and they both laughed. "Yeah, even though I didn’t do the college bit like you, Sandy shared some things about caddying on tour passed on to him by those PGA players whose golf swings he tweaked. Both Harry and Billy were tough but effective, and they’ll be my friends for life."
Scott looked back down the slope, past the shoreline and out to the lights on the oil rigs beyond. "Sandy is as good as any father could ever have been to me."
"Maybe a grandfather…whatever. Have you told Sandy that?"
"No, but I will next time I see him."

In the morning they drove along Big Sur toward the Monterey Peninsula, host for Q-School at its Poppy Hills and Spyglass Hill courses. The blue Pacific was breaking on white beach sand to their left and the Santa Lucia Mountains rose gently on the right to form a corridor of beauty. Waves crashed on the rocks below, and a white speckle of seabirds darted between the blue ocean and sky. They enjoyed the scenery but they chatted endlessly about golf.