Chasing Forever Down

by Nikki Godwin

  Chapter Twenty

  The headlights of my car sweep around the curve in the street and stop short of Colby’s mailbox. My flip flops smack the pavement as I hurry around to the passenger side. Warmth and safety radiate from the orange lights of the dashboard, soothing me in a way that the pier’s tiki torches couldn’t.

  “Are you okay?” Vin asks from the driver’s seat.

  “I’m fine. Just drive,” I say.

  We retreat to silence as he drives out of beach house central and back to the far side of the cove that tourists aren’t aware exists. I hope to God he’s not driving back to that pier. I don’t question his intentions, just as he doesn’t question my night at Colby’s house, but I know he wants to know. He wants to know what happened, whether Colby was everything I thought he would be.

  “Go ahead and say it,” I finally say. My voice cracks just slightly, and I know I can’t stop the tears descending from my eyes. “You told me so.”

  He taps the brakes and slows to a stop in the middle of the street. “I wasn’t going to say that,” he says.

  He puts the car in park, reaches over and brushes my hair out of my face, and stares at me in the glow of the dashboard. “I was going to say that I hate that you had to see it for yourself. I wasn’t trying to be a jerk when I told you about him. I was just trying to protect you.”

  “I should’ve listened. You know more about him than I do. I just had this idea that he...” I can’t even finish the sentence.

  Every idea I had about him was wrong. He isn’t the carefree dreamer or forever chaser or fearless warrior I thought he was. He’s a coward who is scared of the freedom he’s bought himself. If manipulation and lies are his way to freedom, I’ll take another route.

  “He’s not what you expected,” Vin says, summing up all of my conclusions so simply.

  I nod. “Exactly.”

  Vin pulls the gear back into drive and continues forth into the night. He veers onto one street then turns onto the next, and I don’t think I could find my way back to the condo if my life depended upon it. We park next to a small business that’s dark and lonely.

  “C’mon,” he says. “Get out. I want to show you something.”

  I grip the door handle but hesitate. I’m not really up for trespassing or any other crazy A.J.-like adventure tonight. Seeing Colby again was enough adventure for me. I still can’t believe I chased him across the country just to find out everything I thought was dead wrong. I’m almost glad his parents think he’s dead. They wouldn’t recognize the person their son has become.

  “Haley?” Vin leans back into the car. “Are you waiting for the apocalypse? Because I don’t think it’s going to happen tonight.”

  I push the door open and step onto the pavement. An oval-shaped metal sign hangs over the entrance, but I can only see the side of it bulging out toward us. I follow Vin to the front door, and the silver letters are all too familiar. Jake McAllister Photography.

  “He had an actual studio?” I ask. “I thought he just shot underwater.”

  Vin unlocks the front door and drops his keys back into his pocket. He twists the doorknob, reaches inside, and flips on a light. But he doesn’t go in.

  “I rarely come here. I think I’ve been inside twice since he died. Topher comes out here about once a month and flips the lights on and runs the water in the back, just to keep this place from dying,” he says.

  He pushes the door open, and the room bursts with color. Surfboards, palm trees, waves, and tropical fish. More sharks, a few dolphins, and the most amazing snapshot of Topher and Vin that seriously melts my heart. I hate to ask how long these pictures have been hanging on the walls, how long they’ve hidden in this dark studio rather than being seen by the world. Shark had a gift, even if it was “just a job.”

  “But yeah, to answer your question,” Vin says, “he did have an actual studio.”

  There’s a shot on the back wall of Colby riding a wave. It’s one of those perfectly captured moments with the water curled around him and his board, defying gravity for a split second. I wish I could pull him out of the photo and replace him with Topher or Miles.

  “People ask me all the time where they can buy his work. I just give them my business card and ask them to check back with us, that it’s a work in progress. Sometimes they call back, but most times they’re just tourists who want it then or never,” Vin says from behind me.

  I turn my focus to a picture that was taken in between leaves of a palm tree. The sunset is a blend of ice cream sherbet reflecting off the ocean. I wonder if Vin would let me take it home with me.

  “I had a reason for bringing you here,” Vin says. “I thought you might want to help me with this place.”

  “What?” I spin around on the heel of my flip flop to face him.

  He walks around me to the back of the room and unlocks a filing cabinet drawer. “This,” he says, holding up a silver hard drive, “is Jake’s digital catalog. Every picture he ever took. And now it’s mine.”

  Those pictures have to be worth something, even if just to the locals and surf community who know the story of the legendary Shark McAllister. Those are the same photos hanging in Drenaline Surf and Strickland’s Boating and the walls of Colby Taylor’s beach mansion.

  “And what exactly were you thinking I could do?” I ask.

  He walks back toward me, hard drive in hand. “Frame them.”

  I open my mouth to ask a million questions, but he stops me before I can ask the first one.

  “A.J. told me, and I just thought how I was letting this place die, and I shouldn’t because Jake was about so much more than just surfing, and…” he finally stops to breathe. “This was stupid. I’m sorry.”

  “No,” I assure him, “it’s not. I just…I don’t know what to say.”

  He brushes past me, sets the hard drive down, and leans against a nearby table. “Reed said you wanted to come out here for college, and I just let my imagination run wild,” he says.

  I want to tell him to let his imagination keep running, but I can’t rationalize anything right now. I mean, it’s Vin – the same Vin who tried to sell me Honey Gold hair dye spray and protested my very presence after he learned that I’d made friends with the other bodyguards. And now he’s offering me my dream in the form of a studio and a silver hard drive?

  “You still have to graduate high school,” Vin says. “You may not even want to come back out here by next summer.”

  Oh but I will. That much I do know.

  I start to defend my case, but his back is already turned to me. He locks Shark’s hard drive back in the filing cabinet, and I feel like all of my hopes and dreams were locked away with it. He can’t tempt me with forever then tuck it away under lock and key.

  He brushes my hair back over my shoulder as soon as he’s within reach. “We’ll talk about it next summer, okay?”

  I nod and follow him back into the parking lot, back toward my car, but I stop in between my headlights and pull him back.

  “I am coming back next summer,” I say. “Reed’s already said I could move in with them. I can work part time at his dad’s store through college if my parents refuse to help me pay for it.”

  Vin leans back against the hood of my car and pulls me toward him. “You have to come back,” he says. “You’re one of us now. And I kind of…like…having you around.”

  My inner fountain of happiness rushes up and overflows. I throw my arms around Vin’s neck and hug him more tightly than I ever thought I would. His arms are warm around me, and I feel safe in a way I haven’t felt since I’ve been on this forever-chasing journey. I pull back to look at his face. The streetlights reflect in his eyes, and I feel like I’m right back in the sand watching Honey Gold soar through the air as Vin closes in on me. And Deputy Pittman isn’t here to interrupt.

  But headlights sweep around a curve in the road and Vin retreats. The car turns onto another street and fizzles into the blackness. Damn them
for ruining this moment. Unlike Colby, Vin’s breathing is steady, unfazed by the headlights. With Vin there’s no need to hide behind trash cans.

  “We should go before all the old people out here call the law thinking someone’s trespassing. You have North Carolina plates. They won’t know it’s me,” he says. He pulls my keys from his pocket, and I surrender to the passenger side.

  “Want me to walk you in?” Vin asks. We’ve been sitting in my car for a few minutes, right in front of the guest house. I don’t want to go inside. I don’t want to deal with Linzi asking questions about where I ran off to, and I definitely don’t want to talk about Colby Taylor tonight.

  “Please,” I say.

  I need to sneak past Linzi’s room without alerting her that I’m back. But the guest house is empty when we get inside. She’s probably cuddled up next to Alston in his bed. I can’t imagine that silly little argument from earlier stopping them from enjoying their last few nights together, even if they do know she’s leaving. Vin lingers in my room, like he’s waiting for me to tell him once I’m okay enough to be alone tonight.

  “I don’t want to stay here,” I finally say.

  “Want to stay at my place tonight?” Vin asks.

  My brain flips into montage mode, flashing all the pictures of Horn Island from my day with Miles. The dying, yellow apartment complex where Vin lives. The prisonlike barred window. The pit bull. The old liquor store. Ugh…the murky water and seaweed and collapsed pier that’s just rotting away in the ocean and poisoning the sea creatures. A night in Horn Island?

  “Yes.”

  Vin waits in the car while I grab the few things I’ll need for tomorrow – change of clothes, makeup bag, toothbrush, phone charger, the basic essentials. I grab that lime green competition shirt as a last minute thought and run for my car. No one will ever know I came back here tonight. And by tomorrow, maybe I’ll be ready to face the Colby Taylor questions.

  I toss my beach bag full of junk over my shoulder and double check to make sure Vin locked my car doors. He glances around the parking lot then motions me to follow him.

  “Topher must still be at Kale’s. He’ll be exhausted tomorrow for competition. The kid ain’t got his head in the right place, I swear,” he says. He points ahead. “Five-B.”

  My head turns to Four-A when a dog barks. That chained up pit bull is on all fours watching us. I lock my fingers around Vin’s arm, and he stops en route to his apartment door.

  “Sit, Rosie!” a voice calls out. The pit bull flops back onto the concrete outside of Four-A. “Sorry about that, Vin,” the man calls out. His porch light flickers on, and I see the wheelchair before I see him. He’s an older black man with two amputated legs.

  “No problem, Luther. I know her bark is worse than her bite,” Vin says. “Come with me.” He grasps my hand and heads across the grass to Four-A.

  The dew reaches up from the green blades and leaves its mark on my flip flops. Vin doesn’t let go of my hand until we’re under Luther’s porch light.

  “Luther, this is Haley,” Vin says. “And this is my favorite neighbor, Luther. And Rosie.” He nods toward the dog.

  He wheels closer to me and reaches out to shake my hand. His arms are buff, and his grasp is tight. Whatever happened to him didn’t steal his strength. “About time you found someone special,” Luther says. “Pleasure to meet you, Haley.”

  “Same to you,” I say.

  But ohmygod I can’t even think of anything better to say because he seriously thinks I’m Vin’s someone special, and three seconds have passed and Vin hasn’t corrected him.

  “Sorry I woke you…and Rosie,” Vin says, reaching back over and taking my hand. “You know I’m usually not out this late before a competition.”

  “No, no,” Luther says. “You know my arthritis keeps me up at all hours anyway. I haven’t hit the gym the last few days, and I’m feeling it.”

  Vin laughs. “Have a good night,” he says. His fingers intertwine with mine.

  “Same to you both,” Luther replies. He wheels himself backward on the wooden ramp, and his porch light flickers off.

  We cut back through the wet grass and into Vin’s apartment. A note from Topher is taped to the wall just inside the front door. “At Kale’s. Don’t worry. I’ll sleep. See you soon. – T”

  I try not to stare, but Vin’s apartment is everything I expected. Worn furniture, old appliances, and surfboards tucked into every corner of the free space. It’s small but I think it’s just big enough for him and Topher. The dim lighting from the kitchen spills over a small table and into the living room. There’s a huge picture of the collapsed pier hanging above the couch. I know without a doubt that Shark took it.

  “You can have my room tonight. I don’t know when Topher will be home or if he’ll even come back tonight, so I’ll crash on the couch,” Vin says.

  Aside from the pier photo, the place is null of any decoration. It’s definitely a “guy” apartment. Vin kicks some clothes aside in his bedroom and apologizes for the mess. He mutters something about never having company and “you should see Topher’s room” while he remakes the bed for me.

  “I can sleep on the couch,” I offer. “I hate putting you out of your own room.”

  “I’ll be damned,” Vin says. “I have better manners than that, Haley. Give me a little credit here.” He takes my bag from me and drops it next to the bed, closing the deal.

  He shakes his head and laughs. “Have you realized every time you try to be nice to me you just end up insulting me?”

  Of course I’ve realized. “I’m sorry. I was just…”

  “Trying to be nice,” Vin finishes. “It’s cool. I know. So, Topher’s room is down the hall. Bathroom is pretty much across the hall. Kitchen and living room are back the way we came. If you need anything, wake me up. Don’t hesitate, okay?”

  I nod to keep from saying something else that could possibly insult him. He still lingers, just a minute longer, then finally says good night and heads to the living room.

  Unlike Crescent Cove, you can’t hear the ocean late at night in Horn Island. Instead there are car alarms, barking dogs, and that damn creaky couch in the living room. It looked old and worn, and I bet Vin is feeling every spring in the cushions each time he tosses and turns…which is a lot. At this rate, neither of us will get any sleep before the competition tomorrow, and he needs it more than I do.

  I push myself out of his bed, which doesn’t squeak every time I move thankfully, and let the streetlight pouring through the window serve as my path to the bedroom door.

  “Vin,” I half-say half-whisper, just in case I dozed off for a minute and Topher came in earlier.

  “Yeah?” he calls back.

  “Come here,” I reply.

  The couch croaks out a battle cry or two, and then I hear footsteps. When Vin steps into the doorway of his bedroom, he looks more defeated than the day of the storm. It’s the most innocent I’ve ever seen him – white Strickland’s Boating T-shirt, black boxers, unspiked hair, and sleepy eyes. He reminds me of Topher. And gosh, I hate saying he looks unbelievably cute.

  “Everything okay?” he asks. He attempts to fight a yawn, but it’s useless. He’s exhausted.

  I pull him into his bedroom and shut the door. “You’re not sleeping on the couch,” I say. “You’ve tossed and turned since you went in there. Just sleep in here. I’ll take the couch.”

  He reaches for the doorknob. “Haley, we’ve already had this discussion.”

  I grab his arm. “Then just…stay in here…with me.”

  He pulls his arm back and laughs. “That’d make me quite the gentleman, don’t you think?”

  His face is unreadable in the darkness. I shouldn’t have closed the door. I could see every bit of his tired eyes in the dim glow from the kitchen.

  “No one will know,” I say. “And it’s not like anything’s going to happen. I’m the girl who slept with drunken A.J. all night, remember? I can hand
le you.”

  Vin sighs. “I’m going to hell.”

  “Right…because selling Honey Gold on The Strip didn’t put you there.”

  I grab his arm and drag him toward the bed. I climb in and take the side near the wall. Vin settles in next to me, keeping a safe distance to be the gentleman he seems to think he is.

  “Thank you,” he whispers.

  The silence is long and awkward, and I can’t sleep. Vin has resituated himself too many times, and I know he’s still awake. This isn’t helping us sleep any better than when he was tossing and turning on the creaky couch.

  “Haley,” he finally says.

  I keep my eyes to the ceiling. “Yeah?”

  He props up on his elbow and turns toward me. “If your parents refuse to pay for you to go to college out here, I’ll pay it. Drenaline can pay it.”

  I turn my head from the ceiling to him. “You can’t do that. You’ve already got Topher to worry about. That’s not your responsibility.”

  “You have to come back,” he says. “You belong here.”

  Even though my heart is gushing with all kinds of happiness at hearing that, from Vin of all people, I can’t let him take that on. I prop up on my elbow and mirror his position. His back is turned to the window with the streetlight glow, but I don’t have to see his expression. I know by the tone of his voice that he’s serious.

  “You can’t pay for me to go to college here. I’m not your sister,” I say. I refuse to let him take responsibility for Topher and me.

  “I know,” he says. “I wouldn’t kiss my sister.”

  Oh those butterflies. They’re familiar, like the day I climbed on the back of that yellow jet ski with A.J. I ease back into the pillow.

  “You haven’t kissed me,” I whisper.

  Vin pushes up from the bed and leans over me. “I can’t because you’re still talking.”

  This is the loudest silence I’ve ever heard. My heart thumps, dogs are barking, and there’s a siren somewhere in the distance. Vin’s fingers entangle my hair, and he leans in. The third time is such a freaking charm because this time he kisses me – no headlights, no Pittman, nothing in this world to come between us – just me and Vin and the smell of his aftershave.

  I wrap my arms around him and pull him closer. Every bit of that intense iceberg melts, and I feel safe in his arms, like I could stay right here forever with his lips against mine, his hand in my hair, in this perfect Horn Island night. He inhales deeply when he pulls away.

  He lies back onto the bed, closer to me than before, and pulls me nearer. I settle into the crook of his arm. He moves my hair back from my face, kisses my temple, and whispers, “Good night, Sunshine.”