Summer of Seventeen (11 page)

“The kids are here,” laughed Patrick.

“Asshole,” Sean muttered out of the corner of his mouth.

Aidan came over to shake hands.

“Hey, Nick. How you doin’, man? Sorry about your ma.”

“Yeah, thanks,” I said awkwardly, shoving my hands in my pockets.

I hated it when people said stuff like that to me, but I hated it more if they pretended it hadn’t happened. I guess there isn’t really a good way to bring it up. Although Jesse in my homeroom probably won the prize for the most crass comment.

“Hey, heard your mom died. Rough break. Did you know corpses piss and shit themselves because the muscles don’t work anymore?”

Sean would have punched him in the face if I hadn’t gotten there first. I didn’t get detention for that either. I got sent to the guidance office, and was allowed to do what I wanted for pretty much the rest of the day.

I almost hoped Jesse would say something else dumb the next day too, because then I could have another day of slacking off. But he didn’t. Guess someone ‘had a word with him’. He avoided me after that, although it was two days before he could see out of his left eye and another week before the bruise faded. Guy was a harmless dick really.

Sean tossed the basketball into a bush and smiled as Patrick cussed him out.

“Welcome to the Brady Bunch,” muttered Sean.

We all walked into the house together, but it was only when I was side by side with Patrick, that I realized I was a couple of inches taller than him. I’m not generally the kind of guy who holds a grudge, but I got a kick out of the fact that I could look down on him. He seemed kind of pissed about it, too.

Mrs. Wallis came out to corral the troops and send us to wash up. Yeah, really. Like we were first graders or something.

Patrick rolled his eyes but Aidan just laughed and gave his mom a hug. I saw Sean watching, something like envy on his face. The expression quickly faded.

When Mrs. Wallis saw me, she came over, acting really formal.

“Good evening, Nicolas. How are you coping, dear? And how’s that lovely sister of yours?”

Nobody called me ‘Nicolas’ except her. I asked Mom once and she said that wasn’t my name. Maybe Mrs. Wallis thought it would make me sound like a kid whose parents were members at the country club. It didn’t. I thought it was kind of amusing, but I knew it irritated the hell out of Sean. He thought his mom was pretentious. I had to agree.

“Yeah, okay thanks. She’s good.”

She nodded quickly and gave me a practiced smile. Damn, her teeth were white and really, really big, like Tom Cruise big. I wondered if she’d had more work done on them.

“Do take a seat, dear,” she said, pointing at the straight-backed dining room chairs.

I always felt like an imposter when I had to sit down to dinner like this. I couldn’t imagine why people enjoyed it; it gave me gut-ache, sitting there all tense, waiting to drop something or spill something. At the Alfaros’ house, nobody cared about that. I had to concentrate because it was all in Spanish, but even with Mr. Alfaro there, it was always noisy and fun. Not that I talked that much, but I liked being there. Here, I felt like I was taking a test.

Sean hated it, too.

Dylan wandered in, looking at something on his phone, but he turned it off when Mr. Wallis came in and sat at the head of the table. He always sat there; I guess he wanted to let everyone know that he was in charge.

Aidan and Sean brought the food in while their dad started grilling me.

“So, young man, what have you been up to this summer? Being a beach bum, like my youngest, I presume.”

I shot a look at Sean and he pulled a face before darting back into the kitchen to carry more dishes.

“No, sir. I’ve been working.”

Mr. Wallis looked surprised.

“Really? Doing what?”

“Yard work—lawn care.”

He looked amused.

“Well, at least it won’t be too challenging for you.”

Bastard.
I felt my cheeks heat up with a mixture of anger and embarrassment. When Sean walked back in I knew he’d heard because he looked pissed, but he didn’t say anything either. Maybe my father was a prick for not caring enough to want to see me even once, but at least I didn’t have to live with a prick for a father every day of my life.

Aidan looked at me sympathetically while Patrick just smirked at his father, sharing in the holy fucking joke of me doing yard work to make some money.

Mrs. Wallis said grace and then told us to pass the food around.

Patrick went into a long monologue about MIT and how he’d decided to choose his major. He made it sound like NASA would have a big hard-on for him once he’d finished his degree.

“And what are your plans for college, Nicolas?”

I was poised with a piece of roast pork halfway to my mouth. I laid my fork on my plate and looked up.

“I don’t really have any plans at the moment.”

Mr. Wallis looked like I’d just dropped my pants and pissed on the table leg.

“Surely you have some idea?”

“No, sir. I guess I just want to graduate high school.”

He snorted in disbelief. “A high school diploma won’t get you far these days. You need a college degree unless you want to spend the rest of your life mowing other people’s lawns.”

As he hadn’t asked an actual question, I didn’t reply. But he hadn’t finished yet.

“Even Sean, who isn’t at all academically gifted, will be going to a good school. You have to plan ahead. Your mother must have wanted something better for you than yard work.”

He spat out the last sentence and the table fell silent. Aidan looked pained, and even Dylan and Patrick seemed uncomfortable. Sean was pissed and about to say something, so I answered before he could rile up his old man.

I looked across at Mr. Wallis and met his eyes. “She said she wanted me to be happy.”

“So your mother had no ambition at all for you? You have none for yourself?”

“Nick wants to be a shaper,” Sean said, unable to stay quiet for a moment longer.

I hadn’t told many people that, because it seemed like a pipe dream. But I’d shaped three surfboards for myself in the last two years, starting from a block of solid foam, adding the stringer down the center for strength, covering it with fiberglass cloth, and glossing on the top layer that made you high if you breathed it in too much. Sean had been around quite a bit while I was doing that. The first board had been shit and impossible to balance on because I hadn’t got the rocker right, but the next ones had been pretty good.

Mr. Wallis laughed. “Really? Is surfing all you boys think about?”

“You have to be pro surfer to be a shaper and sell surfboards,” Patrick stated like I was too dumb to have thought of that. “You have to win competitions.”

“Nick was runner-up at Ron Jon’s,” Sean said hotly, talking about the surf festival that was held at the pier every Easter. About fifty thousand people showed up to watch this year.

Patrick looked surprised, but I could tell he was impressed and trying to hide it.

“Runner-up isn’t winning,” Patrick went on, his voice smug. “And the Junior section doesn’t count.”

I didn’t bother to tell him that I was runner-up in the men’s pro-am shortboard. Sean had loaned me the money for the $150 entry fee, and Julia had forged Mom’s signature for parental permission because I was under 18 and Mom been too weak to hold the pen.

The winner was a pro surfer named Michael Dunphy. He’d been cool, chatting with me, giving me some tips, and when he heard that Yansi was from Panama, he told us about a trip he was taking down there and the awesome surf spots he’d be hitting up around Isla Grande and Bocas del Toro.

“Nick’ll win next year,” Sean said. “Won’t you, bro.”

I shifted uncomfortably in my chair. I hated everyone talking about me like that. And I wished I had Sean’s confidence in me winning. I’d have to put in a lot of hours, and what with school and work, I didn’t see how I’d have the time. Anyway, I’d only done the comp for a bet, although the prize money came in handy. But I wasn’t great as a competition surfer; I preferred being at an empty break with a consistent 8-10 foot swell, with one or two buddies or by myself. Older guys called it being a ‘soul surfer’. I don’t know about that—I just liked doing my own thing.

“Nice job, Nick,” said Aidan. “That’s pretty cool! Maybe we could all head out to Shark Pit some time. You can show us how the pros do it.”

“Hell, yeah!” said Sean, and immediately got called on his cussing.

Shark Pit was a great beach break not far from us, that worked at its best when a large northern swell came in. It was a place where mostly locals went, and virtually a secret spot.

“We should show Marcus,” Sean continued.

“Who?” asked Patrick.

“Nick’s roomie.”

Mrs. Wallis looked taken aback. “You have a roommate? A school friend?”

“No, we rent out a room at home.”

Mrs. Wallis looked like she was having difficulty understanding the concept.

“We put an ad on Craigslist,” I clarified.

It didn’t seem to help much.

“You rent a room?”

“Yes,” I said, trying not to roll my eyes.

“Your house must be bigger than I remember,” she sniffed.

“We rent out Mom’s old room,” I said quietly.

Wow, no wonder Sean wanted to get wasted all the time if that was what it was like for him at home.

I was allowed to eat the rest of my dinner in peace after that.

When we’d cleared the table, we headed out to Sean’s room to play on his Xbox.

“Sorry about the inquisition,” he mumbled. “Dad’s always like that when the four of us are together. He probably thinks it’ll make me want to be more like
them
. And Mom’s just … what the fuck ever. I can’t wait to tell them I’m taking a year out for our surfari.”

I rubbed a spot on the back of my neck.

“I don’t think I’m going to be able to afford it now.”

He looked at me in horror.

“You gotta, man! You gotta! I’m counting on you, bro. I’ve got to take some time out from school or my head will fucking explode. Come on! You
promised
.”

I sighed and stared at my sneakers. They were just about trashed. A new pair would cost most of what I already had saved.

“I don’t have the money and...”

He shook his head furiously. “You’d be a shoo-in for financial aid in college.”

“Maybe, but…”

“And you’ve got a year to save up! You can…”

“I can what?” I snapped. “Take another fuckin’ backbreaking job so I can pay for it? And what about college? Just because your parents think I’m dumb as dirt, it doesn’t mean I don’t want to go.”

“Don’t lump me in with
them
,” he yelled. Then he gave a hollow laugh. “They think I’m dumb too, so don’t worry about it. At least you’re acing Spanish.”

I gave him a wry grin. “See! Girls are good for something other than screwing.”

“Speaking of which … what about you and Yansi? Have you plugged that hole yet?”

“You did not just say that!”

I threw a pillow in his face to make my point.

“That means you haven’t!” he laughed.

“Don’t go there, man,” I said, a slight warning in my voice.

He held up his hands in surrender, then looked more serious.

“Nick, we’ve been talking about this trip for two freakin’ years. Don’t bail on me now, man. I
need
this.”

I sighed and leaned back against his bed. “Maybe I can do three months. If I work the rest of the year, maybe I’ll have enough.”

“Eight months?” he wheedled.

“Okay, four! Final offer.”

“Ah, fuck,” he said, shaking his head. “I’ll talk you into it.”

“Whatever, man!” I laughed.

Sometimes one bad decision leads to another, and another, and another, and without even realizing it you’re some poor bastard with the house of cards crashing down on top of you. It seemed solid at the time.

It started when Trey’s parents went away for the weekend. I didn’t know Trey that well—he was one of the graduating seniors, just one of the guys who surfed on weekends.

It’s like an unwritten rule that when someone’s parents go away, the party’s at their place, especially if they’ve got a pool. Then you hope that no idiot tweets it or you’re overrun with strangers and tourists.

I heard about the party from Sean, and he heard about it from Rob, and Rob had been invited by Trey’s sister who he knew from pol-sci, and he’d bumped into her when he was buying more grip-tape for his skateboard. That’s small towns for you.

I didn’t mention it to Yansi because I knew that she’d be pissed at not being allowed to go. Yeah, not the smartest thing ever. Because, like I said, small town, and word gets around.

Trey’s family were well off. Maybe not rolling in money, but his mom and dad both worked, and Trey and his sister were planning on going to expensive Boston colleges. Plus, each had their own brand new Ford SUVs, so they seemed well off to me. I wondered if Trey knew the price of a gallon of milk.

The evening began just the same as all the others that summer.

It had been a long day—hot, hard work, and the end of my second week working for Yansi’s old man. Today it had been a new client for Mr. Alfaro, and a garden gone wild, if the scratches up my arms were anything to go by. I’d spent the afternoon wrestling a tree stump out of the sun-dried dirt; a small tree—but a fucking enormous bastard of a stump. I won in the end, and felt like a gladiator, sawdust and blood fresh on the ground. And a strange satisfaction looking down into that hole, the defeated stump on the back of Mr. Alfaro’s truck.
Now who’s the man, motherfucking stump!