Flabbergasted: A Novel Read online

  Two stalls opened, we entered, and I could see the top of his cap over the metal wall. Awkward, going next to Officer Theologian.

  "So how many tickets you given today?"

  I heard him lift the lid. "'Bout twenty so far. Still early, though."

  "I guess most of your customers are young males in jeeps and sports cars, right?"

  He paused a moment. "Nah, it's a mix. Just gave one to some babe in a Caddy."

  "Wasn't green, was it?" I asked, curious now in my shiny cubicle. "Convertible?"

  "Green? Son, it was the ugliest green, some awful bright lime color. She drove even faster than your buddy."

  "Where?" I asked.

  "Pulled'em in front of this rest stop," he said. "Now don't go telling me they're also part of ... no way, are you kiddin' me?"

  "No sir, thanks."

  "Son," he said over the top of the stall, "y'all drive worse than the pagans."

  I dodged two cars in the parking lot, then jogged over and banged on the Jeep's hood.

  With eyes shut, his head resting against the seat, Steve looked annoyed, mired in the reflective muck of the ticketed. Back in the passenger seat, I decided to cheer him up.

  "Lime Sherbet is just ahead of us, bro."

  "Howda you know that?" he asked, reaching for his sunglasses.

  "Had a man-to-man inside with Officer Theologian. He gave Darcy a ticket, too."

  "At least Darcy can afford it."

  I gave my seat belt a yank. "He said you got off easy."

  "Hardly." And we merged back onto the interstate.

  Nearing Myrtle Beach, traffic slowed, tarried, then stopped abruptly. Exhaust fumes enveloped us and billboards hailed us, advertising everything from T-shirts to tanning oil. They were countless, colorful, and staggered in height, each straining for attention like pageant contestants with too much rouge.

  We rolled forward for a mile. A congested bridge halted the flow.

  "So this is Myrtle ..."

  "This is Myrtle," said Steve, tapping his fingers on the dash. The sun hovered just west of noon, sending white and gold lasers off our windshield. Steve tuned into a local radio station, and I heard unfamiliar music, the beat light, the lyrics lazy and beach-woven, making me want to sit under a palm tree and quit the brokerage business.

  Horns blared, engines revved, and from the top of the bridge, over the billboards, I could see long rows of condos, hotels, and assorted high-rises. We arrived twenty minutes later at the Sand Towers on the oceanfront, where concrete had begat concrete, and bottle blondes had begat bottle blondes.

  There was no grass, and the sound of boom boxes joined the roar of motorcycle gangs in echoing off Atlantic Avenue. As with downtown Tokyo, the only direction Myrtle could expand was up. Guests in one condo could borrow toothpaste from the next by reaching an arm out a window. A giant could give one a shove, and twenty miles of high-rise would topple like dominoes.

  In the parking lot, Steve checked his tire for glass. I opened the rear hatch, grabbed my duffel, and took a deep, balmy breath of the Carolina coast.

  Inside the lobby, I stood on black marble flooring, hoping the girls had arrived. The air felt cold as I leaned against the wall, over a vent, flipping through a Myrtle Beach coupon book. The one with the picture of perfect people eating greasy shrimp.

  Moments later Steve flung open the lobby door, faked a shiver as he felt the cold air, then wiped at his forehead with the bottom of his tank top.

  "Seen anyone yet?" he asked.

  `Just that desk clerk."

  That desk clerk looked up our names. He reached for a folder on the corner of his desk and scanned two columns, one twice as long as the other. "It's now thirty-four females, nineteen males. Hmmm," he said, restraining a smile. "You guys had a change of residence."

  "Different floor?" I asked.

  "No, sir."

  "Different hotel?" asked Steve, still sweaty and impatient.

  "Not exactly. Seems we ran out of room for your group, so the girls who came in agreed to move everyone into five beach houses just south of here. We made an arrangement with the rental folks at Smith Realty," he explained, handing me a sheet of directions. "The place is called Litchfield, and your house should be unlocked."

  It took us five minutes to turn left out of the Tower's parking lot, since Myrtle's main drag was awash in traffic. A huge yellowy figure squatted across the street, gazing out over a smattering of astroturf. He was twenty feet tall and the width of an elephant.

  Buddha Golf beckoned to all.

  Steve leaned down to glance through my window. "I didn't know Buddhists played golf."

  "Me either."

  Traffic thinned as we drove south along Highway 17. Billboards and Buddha faded from view, the terrain changing rapidly from tacky to understated. No more bottle blondes, just strawhatted women weaving baskets along the roadside; no more cement strips, just general stores tucked between moss-covered oaks; no more motorcycle gangs, just bicycles outfitted with wire baskets and bulging granny tires; and no more boom boxes agitating the air, just the blue Carolina sky filling slowly with pelicans, silent and flying single file.

  We turned into the seaside community of North Litchfield, admiring weathered beach homes set high atop stilts. Elevated screen porches covered the fronts, filled with rocking chairs not rocking and sand dollars not earning interest, only stuck to the screens and bleached white from exposure.

  At the next stop sign I looked skyward at tiny decks rising above the rooftops. "Feels calmer here, doesn't it?"

  "Feels like nap time," said Steve.

  "Those little roof decks are cool."

  "It's called a crow's nest, Tex."

  He made a left beside the oceanfront, and we paralleled the beach along a two-lane road, both lanes sandswept and sedate, nearly vacant at midday. To the ocean side, the dunes sprouted sea oats; wooden walkways curved between the dunes. The mounds appeared cloned, like an endless row of buried Volkswagens.

  Steve slowed for a speed bump, watched three kids drag a pink float toward the beach, and turned onto Seaspray Drive, our weekend address. He parked his Jeep beneath house number four, then reclined in his seat. "Four hours, twenty-five minutes," he said, "and thank ya Lord for safe travel."

  Standing in a driveway of crushed shells, I saw we had a house with a crow's nest, and I was up the front stairs, through the screened porch, and past a couple of whitewashed rocking chairs.

  Inside the front door, inner stairs led to the roof, then two long flights of skinny stairs to the nest. Climbing the second flight, I felt my legs complain. Reaching the rooftop, I heard the wind strengthen. Salt air tickled my sniffer. The crow's nest was only six square feet, and it squeaked when I leaned on the wooden railing.

  The Atlantic looked bluer than I'd figured.

  I could see waves breaking against a rock jetty and the sand morphing from cream to beige to dark gray as the tide receded. A volleyball game was in progress on the beach, fishing boats speckled the sea, and, far to the north-where the dunes dissolved-concrete Myrtle jutted itself through an early afternoon haze.

  Looking south, I watched a line of pelicans gliding just over the breakers, a flap of the wings and glide, now repeat. After a few minutes I turned away from the ocean and felt the breeze on the back of my neck. Three more rows of beach homes sat behind ours, and a dozen empty crow's nests stretched high their wooden necks.

  Seagulls squawked overhead as my line of sight dropped from the rooflines down to the road. Two houses over, onto another driveway of crushed shells, a large, topless sedan pulled in.

  Lime green, just like he said.

  Palm trees whizzed by in the median, and a hot wind whistled through the convertible's backseat. Blown from its habitat, a light-colored hair wrapped around my chin. I wanted to hand it, across Lydia, over to Steve in exchange for a darker one. Darcy's mane was the blondest of blonde, with the slightest gold tinge in the sunlight, cut straight at the shoulders where it flayed back
when she hit the accelerator. Which was often.

  Impossible to talk given the speed, though in the front passenger seat, Allie raised her arms as if aboard a roller coaster. An embroidered toucan flapped on her shirt sleeve, its colorful beak all aflutter.

  The girls had said only a brief hello as we jumped into the car; no formal introductions. I felt like the new guy, but at least we were at the beach. I wondered if the Pentecostals ever came to this beach.

  Darcy parked Sherbet across two spaces, then turned in her seat. "So, Mr. Cole, how much did the officer charge you for your speeding frenzy?"

  "Two hundred," said Steve, unhitching his seat belt. "And you, Miss Yeager?"

  "Three hundred sixty."

  Entering Piggly-Wiggly, I yanked five stubborn carts from a cluster and passed them around. Darcy pulled sunglasses atop her head, reached into her purse, and handed each of us an index card. "We are shopping for fifty-three people," she explained. "Just buy what's on the card. Quantities are noted on there, too."

  "Tall, organized, and lead footed," muttered Steve as we split up.

  Lydia and Allie stood on the back rail of their carts, pushing off with one foot, like they were on scooters. They were coasting toward fruits and vegetables when they disappeared.

  Armed with the milk and cereal card, I made for the dairy section. Fifteen gallons, said the card, so I loaded five gallons of 2 percent, five of skim, and five of vitamin D fortified, wondering where I'd put twenty boxes of cereal. The cart felt heavy as I wheeled it around, rumbling past meat and seafood, tires clunking and milk sloshing but gaining momentum as the cereal aisle came into view. Flakes or puffs, puffs or flakes? Cutting the corner, almost on two wheels, I was a chrome locomotive.

  Then a smashed locomotive. The jolt stopped us cold; my arms tingled.

  On the floor lay five bags of grapes, uninjured, and two tomatoes in critical condition. Red guts stained the tiles just below the Fruit Loops, and Allie Kyle was in hysterics. She picked up an injured piece of tomato, said, "Poor guy, he's a goner," and without hesitation flung it at me.

  Thick, red juice clung to my shirt. I grabbed a stray grape and, taking dead aim, bounced it off the side of her head. She was bent over, almost snorting, trying to slide another piece of tomato off the slick floor when a fleet-footed clerk entered the battle with a mop. "I'll get this for ya," he said, swiping tiles.

  "Sorry," Allie said, glancing at my T-shirt. "I've been out of the country for a while and just lose it sometimes."

  I reached past her for the Raisin Bran. "I won't tell you what we threw at girls while growing up in Texas."

  She pushed onward, back toward the veggies, talking over her shoulder as she turned the corner. "Your vitamin D sprung a leak, Jay."

  An odd introduction, for sure. But a decent start.

  Five carts overflowed at the register, Steve Cole bringing up the rear, loaded with white bread and cheap bologna. Darcy's cart contained more t.p. than a man would use in a lifetime, plus gourmet coffee, premium jam, and ten bags of Pepperidge Farm Brussels Mint cookies.

  "We forgot the chips," said Lydia, counting bags of bananas.

  "Can you guys get another cart?" asked Darcy.

  "Yeah, get another cart," said Allie, pulling in with fresher vegetables.

  Our cashier girl with pierced tongue said that'll be $614.52. An eager grocery boy asked if he could help us unload. The girls said sure, and we made our way to the lot in a cart convoy; Allie pushing veggies, Steve pushing chips, and Darcy pushing a lifetime supply of t.p.

  She unlocked Sherbet's trunk, and we peered into the large, empty space, then back at the even larger amount of food.

  Lydia tossed in the first bag and said, "Shopping good, logistics bad."

  The sixty-odd bags loaded into the trunk and the backseat and the front seat, but where would we all sit? There was only room for four, even if one sat on a lap. "Oh well, but here's a tip for ya," said Darcy to the grocery boy, and she handed him a ten.

  "I'll go next door and look for flip-flops," said Allie, backpedaling. `Just come back for me in a bit." And off she went.

  I wanted to stay behind also, but Lydia was on my lap now, Steve straddled the Raisin Bran, and Darcy floored it because she said the milk might go bad and she wanted it cold to wash down her Brussels Mint cookies.

  Back in North Litchfield, we unloaded the bags into five weathered houses-three for girls, two for guys-and I was glad we guys didn't get house number two, the pastel pink one.

  "No kidding," said Steve, setting down plastic bags. "No way would I stay in a pink beach house."

  "Men are so self-conscious," said Lydia. "I love our pink house." She opened a package of Oreos on her counter, took two for herself, and passed them around.

  I poured us all a tall glass of overpriced skim. "Natural wood, Lydia a nice, manly exterior."

  "Oh, brother."

  In all of her considerable height and blondeness, Darcy paused on the porch stairs to gaze across the dunes. "I really wanna get out on the beach," she said, and an unspoken request hovered behind her words.

  "So do we," Steve said, cleaning his shades but missing the message.

  "Could one of you guys take my car and go get Allie?" she asked, clarifying herself.

  "Sure," I said, already three steps below. And she tossed me two keys attached to a rabbit's foot, severed from the body of a helpless, lime green rabbit.

  Getting into her shiny and abundant classic, I thought I looked too obvious, volunteering so quickly. But maybe this was directly from God. Maybe God was granting me opportunity, what with my willingness to help out, plus the fact that I'd been to church, on time, for two consecutive Sundays.

  My just reward.

  I was alone at the wheel of motorized ice cream. In Texas, old Cadillacs were white and had horns mounted to the hood. But then Texas didn't have Buddha Golf or music that made you want to sit under a palm tree and quit your job.

  The Caddy felt awkward, like it didn't quite fit between the road stripes. The steering wheel, huge and knobby, appeared to have been borrowed off an eighteen-wheeler.

  I mashed the gas, and the monster lunged onto Highway 17. Smaller vehicles gave way in the passing lane, and I felt like a teenager in a borrowed car, nervous as he picked up his first date.

  At the storefront I pulled to the curb. Sunlight glinted off the hood. I fiddled with the radio dial, then reclined the seat as Mr. DJ spun yet another beach song.

  With the passenger door already open for her, I listened to the lazy beat and rested my head against Sherbet's beige vinyl. Allie exited the beach store during the third verse, her dark brown hair bouncing as she walked.

  "How's the shopping?" I asked.

  "No flip-flops for women. Sold out."

  "So, Allie," I said, noting her tan as she slid into the seat, "you always toss food at the new guys?"

  She smiled and shot me a wry glance. "Not usually. But, hey, that was a pretty good shot with the grape."

  "Ex-Little League pitcher," I said, pulling back onto the highway.

  She adjusted her seat belt, then turned to face me. "Can I ask you something?"

  "Sure."

  "Do you know if Steve is seeing anyone?"

  Sherbet veered onto the shoulder, then back between the stripes of Highway 17. Allie awaited my response, her face quizzical.

  "Steve?" I stammered. "I think he went out once with Darcy."

  "One date doesn't really mean much, Jay."

  Neither does one piece of tomato.

  Surfing looked so effortless at first glance, so at-one-with-nature. Looked macho, as if the universe of attentive women would expand thirtyfold by the mere fact that you held a board under your arm, never mind the farmer's tan.

  His name was Ransom, and he had not been in the singles class the two Sundays I'd visited North Hills. I figured him for a local, so dark his skin, so confident his stride.

  In bright orange shorts, Steve Cole joined him to swim through t
he breakers. Waves in South Carolina, from what they told me, were normally little more than ripples, but a few five-footers swelled and crashed through late afternoon as approaching thunderstorms loomed out over the Atlantic.

  The absence of sun pulled the girls off the beach, and only two surf fishermen remained, besides the three of us. I peeled off my T-shirt, waded to waist deep, and dove into water that was warmer than expected. Drops of cold rain shocked my neck, so I dove again.

  Ransom lay on the yellow-and-purple board, his mop of brown hair flopping down across dark surfer eyes. A wave swelled and began to roll over. With a quick burst of arms and legs, he popped to his feet, tilted left, then right, cutting with the breaker and gaining speed. Broad layers of spray shot up over the wave, the wave shrunk, and Ransom rode till the ripples ceased. Very cool, the way he rode those ripples.

  "We can do this, Jarvis," said Steve, bobbing to his ears.

  "We can drown and have our flesh eaten by crabs."

  Big, sloppy drops pelted the ocean.

  "Like ridin' a bike," said Steve, watching our new friend paddle back.

  "Who's next?" asked Ransom, shoving his surfboard at us. I caught it by the nose and inspected the slick finish. In a loopy, tropical font, church words were inlaid on his board-a psalm among palms.

  "You did this art yourself?" I asked, climbing on.

  "Praise me later," he said. "Time to surf."

  I sprawled across the board, and a wet reality rushed in: the slickness of wax against my stomach, the saltwater on my tongue, and the newness of seeing the ocean from surface level. In steady rhythms, beach homes and sand dunes disappeared then reappeared.

  "Start paddling when I yell go," said Ransom, one hand gripping the board.

  "Toward the beach?"

  "Of course, toward the beach. Then push up with your hands, get your feet planted."

  "No training wheels on this thing?"

  I felt a push from behind and beneath. The swell lifted and powered me forward. I rose to my knees, wobbled twice, and heard only the roar of ocean as I placed my left foot on the board. For a split second, I felt like the big kahuna. But then the nose dipped, shot me forward, and there I went, head beneath knees, knees beneath feet.