“Gol dang, children. It’s the motherfucking beach,” Maggot said, getting out of the truck, unfolding himself like a jackknife. He stretched his long arms wide and bounced on his toes.
“Let’s not rush to judgment,” I said. The sand was dark brown, like a worn-out welcome mat to the drab pavement of lake. But Emmy was singing “Beach, Beach, Baby!” and skipping sideways across the parking lot, a leggy colt in her skinny jeans and tall leather boots. The three of us climbed over a small fence onto the sand. The entrance was a locked gate beside a little block of rest rooms and vending machines, all deserted. Fast Forward lit a cigarette and leaned on his truck, watching us in his usual way, head tilted back, eyes narrowed.
This sand patch was no more than fifty or sixty yards wide, with log pilings holding a rope fence on both sides. Beyond that, the normal dirt and woods resumed. Somebody had just scooped up truckloads of sand and dumped it here, thinking no one would be the wiser. This fake beach moreover was pretty gross due to what all people had left there: flattened drink cups with red straws poking out of the lids, the black remains of a campfire. A torn white bra, half buried in sand. Maggot lit a joint and started singing about Margaritaville. Emmy formed big balls of wet sand one after another that fell apart as she threw them at us. Both those two were laughing like kids. I got a bad feeling as regards their interest in reaching the real ocean.
“You all, this is not the beach. You know that, right?”
“Stepped on a cow flop! Blew out my tip-top,” yodeled Maggot, swaying his hips and tiptoeing across the sand in his weird boots.
Just to prove the entire world was against me, a seagull curved in and landed near us. Big, white, we’ve all seen the pictures. It stepped along the brown scum at the water’s edge, keeping a mean eye on me. “Hell-o-o, this isn’t the sea!” I yelled. The seagull paid no heed.
Our curly-headed Marlboro Man was still over there in his cowboy boots and tight white T-shirt tucked in his jeans. I didn’t really trust him, but maybe never did. A kid in my shoes takes what power he can find. As far as him and Emmy, no guess. She’d been flirty all day, wearing a soft blue sweater that buttoned all the way up the back, seemingly designed to make you think about taking it off of her. How would she even get that on by herself? Fast Forward had driven left-handed with his arm draped around her, but seemed his usual self, like he’s just waiting for a better offer. From time to time asking her to crack open another tallboy from the case at our feet.
Now we watched him flick away his cigarette butt and stroll towards us, getting over the fence in one motion like clearing a hurdle. No bad knees. Quarterbacks let others take the fall. “Me oh my,” he said, taking it in. “What have we here? Ask and you shall receive.”
“Not the ocean. Not the beach,” I said.
He walked towards the water. I stared at his pointy-toed footprints in the sand. He leaned over and scooped up a squashed yellow Styrofoam clamshell stained with ketchup and held it up to his ear. “Shhhh.” Finger to his lips. Eyes wide. “I can hear the ocean.”
I picked up a crushed beer can and fired it at the seagull. The bird flew away.
Emmy laughed her starry laugh. Fast Forward grabbed her hand, twirling her around, and just like that they were doing a two-step: his left hand holding hers and his right spread wide on her shoulder blade, pushing her backward with little steps. Like they’re hearing LeAnn Rimes singing “Can’t Fight the Moonlight,” and too bad for the rest of us if we’re not. Maggot crouched on his long legs, elbows on knees like a praying mantis, looking pouty. They’d obviously done this, gone out dancing. Emmy would place her demands. They looked like a movie couple, Emmy matching his steps, her back arched, smiling up at him. The outline of a thick wallet was worn into his back pocket. They twirled around the beach and then he lifted her by the waist and set her on one of the posts of the rope fence. Emmy raised her pressed-together hands above her head and stood balanced with the bright moon rising through black pines behind her. She looked perfect up there. A church steeple.
Then Fast Forward grabbed her around the waist, flinging her over his shoulder like a grain bag, Emmy laughing and kicking her legs, and the beauty was over.
Hungry Mother was a joke on us. We’d not eaten all day. It was decided Fast Forward and Emmy would go into the town and pick up Pizza Hut or something. We pulled money out of our pockets to give Fast Forward, and Maggot and I were left behind like additional trash on the fake beach. We dragged a log to the water’s edge to sit on. The moon was more egg-shaped than round, but seemed proud of itself regardless, laying out a shiny silver road across the water to our feet. Come on up, said the moon. Our faces and bodies were painted with silver. Looking at Maggot from the side, his nose and chin outlined in light, it dawned on me he wasn’t a kid. He’d grown into his square, shaved chin and Adam’s apple. And seemed to be dialing back the makeup. Maybe that was all just him now, the long, black eyelashes his cousins used to want to kill him for. I wondered if he was in love with Fast Forward. Like all of us.