The Practical Navigator (32 page)

She hangs up. Terribly rude but she had no choice. The tears are coming. She can't stop them, doesn't really want to, and so to keep calm, she focuses on filling the teacup with them, one by one.

*   *   *

The truck comes into the country club parking lot and stops at the walk's bag drop, blocking the lane. Michael leaps out and rushes in.

In the golf shop, the assistant pro looks up from his magazine as this
worker
enters in dirty jeans, heavy leather boots, and sweat-streaked T-shirt.

What the hell?

“Uh—sir, can I help you?”

The grim-faced man doesn't stop. He marches across the shop past the club displays and the neatly folded sports clothes as if he knows where he's going.

“Hey! Service entrance is in the back!”

Too late. The man is gone. Shit, the assistant pro thinks, and feeling as if his job is suddenly on the line, he grabs a putter off a rack and holding it like a club hurries after the crazy guy.

*   *   *

In the card room, Neal Beacham has just been served his second vodka tonic when, hearing voices, he looks up to see Michael enter. The assistant pro, whose name Neal can never remember, is behind him, obviously having failed to halt his forward progress with—
what is the man brandishing?
—a putter. Neal Beacham feels an unaccustomed foreboding. Sitting here, playing cards with men that he thought were his friends, men that he assumes now know
everything,
has been torture. Every smile has felt colored with innuendo. Each bark of laughter has seemed like it comes at his expense.

Your daughter. I'd like a piece of that. How much?

Smirky bastards, each time they raise, stand pat, or call, they've made him feel as if he had this coming to him all along and they are enormously pleased and satisfied that it finally did.

Your wife is leaving you? What took her so long? Ha-ha!

How could he not have known? It's so obvious. They don't like him. They never have. All of them. He'll never be able to come here again.

What am I going to do without the club?

“I'm sorry, Mr. Beacham,” says the assistant pro. “He insisted on coming in. If you'd like we can call the police.”

“No, it's all right,” says Neal Beacham. Glancing at his cards, he throws some chips into the pot. “See you and raise you ten,” he says, smiling complacently across the table at Hal Weinraub, who is staring at Michael, an uncertain expression on his face. Wimp. So, for that matter, are the other two, Ed Buchanan and Ken Klyce.

He'll show these people how to act.

He reaches for his drink. “Again, you're not appropriately dressed, Michael. Why don't you come back when you are.”

“Why don't you kiss my puckered ass.”

“Really? And why don't you just—” With a hard, sudden slap, Michael knocks the glass from Neal Beacham's hand, drenching him and freezing him in his chair.

“You're not talking. I am.”

Neal Beacham cowers in his chair from the blow that doesn't come. Unforgivable. To forget that there are people in the world who don't care about the rules, people who will hurt you, hurt you badly, damn the consequences. The others at the table are just staring in confusion, doing nothing.

“You bitter, useless old man,” says Michael. “Fucking with people's lives. What did you ever do that makes you think you matter? Sitting here like you deserve something? You're lucky somebody doesn't come up here with a shotgun and show you the real world.”

“Olé.”
It's just a murmur from the Mexican waiter but it feels like a stab wound, makes Neal Beacham realize yet again how far and quickly he's fallen.

Even the hired help.

“You come near me ever again,” says Michael, “I'll put you in the hospital in pieces.” He hawks and spits. The ugly, thick wad of phlegm lands on Neal Beacham's chips. “Enjoy your game.” And with that, Michael turns back through the door and exits. Air returns to the room but not nearly enough.

“Well, that was an occasion,” says Neal Beacham, forcing a laugh.

“Shall I call the police, sir?” says the assistant pro.

“A little late, don't you think?” says Neal Beacham, growing angrier by the moment now. If he was ten years younger, things would have been different. He turns to the nameless waiter. “Clean this goddamn mess up, why don't you?”

“Wasn't that your son-in-law?” says Hal Weinraub, quietly.

“What? Yes.
Ex.
Son of a bitch. I
ought
to press charges.”

“Everything all right with your daughter?” asks Ken Klyce.

Acting as if they're concerned now.

“Fine. Are we playing cards or not?”

“I think I'm done,” says Ed Buchanan, rising.

“Put the drinks on my tab, Javier,” says Hal Weinraub, following suit.

So that's the bastard's name.

“Tough day, Neal,” says Ken Klyce. He claps Neal gently on the shoulder as he exits the card room.

Know. All of them know.

“You want another drink, Mr. Beacham?” The waiter, Javier, has picked the glass up off the rug.

“Go fuck yourself,” whispers Neal Beacham, unable to rise. Thank God there's someone in the world who won't fight back. Neal Beacham's hands are shaking. There is a ringing in his ears and he feels dizzy. He'll sit here a moment and then he'll go home. If only he knew where the hell that was anymore.

 

54

At Wind and Sea, the cars and trucks are parked up and down the street. And why not. Looking out the truck window, Michael sees that the surf is huge, six to eight feet, prime sets with surfers wiping out and going rag doll all over the place.

A car pulls out in front of him and, on impulse, Michael quickly turns and pulls into the parking place. He turns off the engine. He sags in the seat. The fury draining away.

Senseless asshole.

Taking your anger and pain out on a belligerent old man who probably shrugged it off the moment you left. What good did it do? What good does anything do?

“I'm tired,” says Michael out loud to no one. “I'm tired.” He gets out of the truck. He walks to the rocky outlook that overlooks the beach. Spectators gape and point as out beyond the reef a particularly huge wave builds and charges. In the middle zone, two surfers paddle side by side to catch it. Each is quickly up, one on the inside, close to the peak of the wave, and one on the outside. And then the inside surfer, fighting for right of way, is down and falling as if tumbling headfirst into a canyon. The water crashes over him, burying him. His board, attached to his ankle by a leash, careens crazily in the air and then is swallowed as well. Michael winces, knowing that in big surf, the leash can hold you under, that the board is like an anchor as you fight your way to the surface. That is, if you even know which way to go once the washing machine stops spinning you. Down too long and the next wave hits you and keeps you under. Another lands on top of you and there's a chance you're not coming up.

Like an avalanche, the wave continues on, submerging the parade of oncomers who are stroking furiously to get out to the heart of the lineup. On the ridge overlooking the slim stretch of sand, a lifeguard rises from his plastic chair, tense and alert. An exhausted surfer holding a split and broken board is climbing the rocks toward them. The look on his face says it's treacherous out there. There are deadly creatures lurking, waiting to feast.

Enough, Michael abruptly thinks. Enough being afraid. Enough treading the path of least resistance. Enough merely responding to circumstances. Enough killing time while time quietly kills you.

Enough.

Pulling his T-shirt up and over his head, Michael leaps the rail and runs down the ridge toward the beach. He leaps down to the soft, wet sand and starts forward. In half a dozen steps, his work boots and the bottom of his jeans take on weight and he quickly stops to take them off.

“Look at that!” cries a woman, delighted at the sight of Michael's naked white ass.

“What the hell's he doing?” another man cries out to no one in particular.

As if in answer, Michael kicks his jeans off and runs naked into the heavy surf. The freezing cold water hits him, driving him back, but he keeps his feet. And then heavy backwash from the beach takes him from behind and carries him forward into the water. His feet touch bottom and then the bottom is gone and Michael begins to swim. So easy, he thinks. So easy. His body has forgotten nothing. He used to train for surf like this. Jump rope and do pushups, run and swim distance, knowing there were going to be situations out in the water when help wouldn't be an option, that he'd be on his own.

So why is he already growing tired?

He dives forward beneath the first oncoming wave, feels its power and weight as it surges over him. Surfacing, he kicks and swims on.

How many waves to each set? How much time between sets? He should know this. Is it a rising swell or a dropping swell? He should know this too. Where does the reef begin, where are the rocks, how deep is the bottom? He has forgotten. He has forgotten how blinding the ocean can be. How deafening the ocean is. He used to know everything or he thought he did. Where did he ever get such confidence? No one has ever fought the ocean when it's angry and won.

“You got a sense of humor?”

“A guy gets hit by a rock.”

“And?”

“That's it.”

A wave is rising and Michael dives again. Not deep enough and he is pulled and kneaded this time as if in a giant baker's hands. Momentum lost, he surfaces. He takes a breath and chokes as froth fills his mouth and throat. He coughs, treading water, knowing he is now adrift and sliding in the impact zone, where crashing wave meets sucking undertow. He swims. Tries to. Where is he even going? Where was his father going? Out to sea? Back to shore? Michael sees the next wave peaking in front him, and pulling in a ragged gulp of air, he starts to dive. Too late. The wave grabs him, pushes him up and back, flips him over and slams him down. Deadweight, far heavier than water, he both falls and is driven toward the bottom. The bottom, where it is peaceful. Yes, he thinks. At last. The maelstrom is overhead. All the turbulence is back onshore. Here, it is just like in the dream. Here he can drift. Here he is a clairvoyant, seeing not the future, but the present in all its different machinations. He wonders if this is how his father felt while swimming, wonders if Thomas Hodge was visiting the people he loved, as he gave himself over to the ocean.

Michael sees Fari is in her bedroom, packing a suitcase. She is taking clothes from a bureau drawer. She is surprised to find something under a blouse. It's the good-luck bracelet, woven red yarn with two tiny jade mandarin ducks. Michael bought it for her on a lark when they walked into a cheap sundries shop one evening while in Old Town. The ducks, the shopkeeper told them, represent love in Chinese culture. As far as Michael knows, it was the only time she ever wore it. She considers it a moment. She puts it carefully into her suitcase.

He sees Anita. She is in her car, driving up a long hill. Her face is vacant; her eyes are dull. Michael knows now that he had been waiting, waiting those seven years, for her to come back. He expected it, he counted on it, assuming that when she did, that all the issues would be behind her, that she would have somehow resolved them. They would be in love again and Jamie would be cured by their love. They would all go back in time together. It would be Talujah again.

So stupid. A child's dream. A fairy tale.

He sees the photo of Anita and Jamie, taken at the mall, on the sunshade of the car. And then Anita grabs it and tosses it into the backseat. Out of sight, out of mind. The car races up and disappears over the crest of the hill and is gone.

Michael sees Penelope. She is in the makeshift garden in the backyard, on her knees, talking to her flowers. “No, this won't do,” she says. “You've got to grow. I know you would have done better at the old house. There were friends there, dear friends. But you owe it to them not to give up … you've got to grow.”

“No. Quit that stuff,” Michael says. “Be quiet.”

And now, Michael sees Jamie. His son is behind his mother, naked and violently stimming; shaking a garden trowel, moving to an arhythmic inner music, mumbling to himself. “Even if you're not there, you love me … llamas! There are llamas … would you change me if you could?”

“Would you still be you?” Michael asks his son.

“It doesn't matter,” Jamie replies. “Because you love me … love me … you love me…”

“How much?” whispers Michael.

“To infinity and beyond.”

No.

As if waking but not in bed, Michael begins to claw his way toward the surface. The clairvoyance is acute now. On the shore, a lifeguard is running toward the surf with his long rescue board. “I don't see him!” someone screams. “He's not coming up!” another voice cries.

No, Michael thinks.
No.
He knows now without any sense of doubt that his father was trying to come home, that Thomas Hodge was swimming as hard as he could. He ran out of strength, that's all. The ocean was too much for him.

I am not my father.

Michael's head and shoulders erupt up out of the water. It takes a moment to remember to breathe and when he does he feels ecstasy. The water takes him, pushes him, holds him buoyant. He is fine now. In his element. No big deal. You go down, you come up. Even afraid, you keep swimming. What else is there? The ocean and life are one and the same thing. Calm at times, rough at times. Always beautiful. Amniotic fluid has the same composition as seawater. The ocean carries us. The ocean is inside us.