“James.”
~
“Campbell’s final wave now.”
“He needs a massive 9.5 to edge ahead of Russell for the title, let’s see if he—”
“Getting ready for the drop-in. This wave has gotta be at least thirty-feet!”
“Wouldn’t catch me dead on a wave like that, man . . .”
“No shit.”
“He drops in and crouches low—look at that speed! He’s flying! Barely keeping on his board!”
“He’s riding this barrel high up on the face, using his hand to gouge into the wave and let him stay in that tube just a little bit longer. I can’t imagine the skill!”
“Shoulder’s opening up, it’s gonna spit him out early unless he—booyah!”
“Oh my God! Oh my God! Jimmy Campbell just dropped down the face and he’s caught the second break in this wave!”
“Riding low along the foot of this wave, and he’s lower than we’ve seen him ride all competition.”
“He’s practically sitting on his board! Look at that dynamite force of spray!”
“And this barrel has him totally enclosed, can he even see?”
“Naw, man. No way—this tube’s so tight I bet you he’s the only surfer here short enough to have caught it.”
“Killer on the knees! Just waiting for him to break free—”
“There he is! Jimmy Campbell emerges from the longest tube ride we’ve seen today—two tube rides in one wave!”
“That was unbelievable! Off the hook!”
“I can’t believe what I just saw.”
“Campbell here knows he just gave it everything he has. He’s pumping his fist in the air as he rides straight out of this wave—I can hear his shout from here.”
“And a perfect fall back into the whitewater to end this ride.”
“If that wasn’t the best ride we’ve seen all day I don’t know what is. That was a once-in-a-season ride right there! Once in a lifetime!”
“This crowd is going wild. Even Davis is clapping on his feet! You gotta feel for poor Russell right now—he’s sitting on pins and needles after that showstopper.”
“This is madness—Jimmy Campbell comes from absolute nowhere to give a ride that . . . you know what? I’m just gonna say it. He gave a ride that was just as powerful as any you would see on this Pipeline coming from reigning champion Danny Moore.”
“You’re right, man. That ride had Moore all over it. The technicality, the expertise, the grace right up until the end.”
“And Campbell is what—ten years older than him?”
“Twenty?”
“Nah, man, you’re crazy! Campbell may be an old soul but he ain’t forty if he’s surfing a wave like that.”
“Alright, alright. I dig it. But still, imagine the sheer strength!”
“That’s right. Jimmy Campbell just showed us all he has a hidden talent to be reckoned with. No more tiny Los Angeles regionals for this dude.”
“We’re all holding our breath here as Jimmy paddles in—waiting on the score from the judges.”
“Folks, I think you could hear a pin drop.”
“Look at that—even Danny Moore looks nervous!”
“Campbell’s walking up out of the shallows. He’s tense. Judges are having their final consultation. I wouldn’t want to have to assign that wave a score!”
“Any moment now, folks. Any moment now . . . God.”
“Hang in there, Russell . . .”
“I might have to go over there and throttle the score outta one of ‘em . . .”
“Campbell’s waiting in the water like a statue, board floating in the foam—"
“9.8! Jesus Christ, a 9.8!”
“Campbell can’t believe it! Would you look at his face, he can’t believe it! I can’t even believe it!”
“Listen to the roar from this crowd! We’re cheering on the new champion of these Oahu shores.”
“Ladies and Gentlemen, what a show. What a goddamn show.”
“I’m shaking, man.”
“Jimmy Campbell is your 1976 Billabong Pipeline Masters Champion, and boy does he deserve it!”
“What a performance!”
“Put this in your record books, folks. This is the first time in the six years of running the Billabong that a surfer in their first year pro—”
“—in their first month pro!”
“—clawed their way to the top to win the title. What a treat.”
“We won’t be underestimating Campbell anytime soon! What a guy to watch!”
“And look at O’Brien walking over to shake his hand. Excellent surfing we saw from him today, as well, and the crowd’s letting him know it.”
~
Sydney wonders why his cheeks feel wet, then realizes it’s from the tears spilling over in his eyes. He runs his forearm quickly across his face, grateful everyone’s too focused on James to be looking at him, then slams his aviators back down. He watches from a distance as every surfer on the beach sprints towards James where he stands, half-kneeling in the shallows, board still floating and bumping into his ankles with the tide.
Sydney catches a shocked, breathless smile flash across James’ face before he’s surrounded for the second time that day by a swarm of other surfers, cheering for him along with the rest of the crowd, reaching out to place their hands on his skin.
He won. He woke up that morning in Sydney’s bed and he jumped on a board and he won.
Sydney’s limbs are shaking. The minutes tick by, and the swell of energy exploding across the shore doesn’t die down, and still Sydney holds his ground and waits, feet rooted in the sand. Even if James spends the entire rest of the day celebrating his victory with everyone else, Sydney needs this moment—just one moment to somehow catch James’ gaze in the crowd and let him know that he’s never seen anything more beautiful in his life than the sight of James Campbell soaring across that last wave.
He racks his brains trying to think of something Danny Moore would conceivably do for the man who just won the championship he’s been known for for years. It frightens him that he can’t automatically think of the answer—that Danny is so far away he has to stand there and think hard in order to conjure him up. That he has to be conjured up in the first place.
He’s still standing there stiffly in the sand, not even able to bring his shaking hands together to clap, when a small gap forms in the swarming crowd before him. Sydney takes a step back, suddenly terrified that someone is about to point a finger at him and announce to the whole beach they saw him crying, when, like a burst of sunlight cutting through the fog, James Campbell breaks free from the surfers surrounding him.
He takes one look across the shore, swiping the wet hair back from his face, then immediately locks eyes with Sydney.
Sydney doesn’t give a shit what Danny Moore would do. His breath catches in his throat as he starts walking forward on numb legs, closing the distance between them as James jogs out to his spot at the edge of the crowd. All eyes are on them, boring into James’ back.
James slows to a stop when they’re face to face, chest still expanding under the wetsuit with his deep breaths and tracks of saltwater clinging to his tan neck. He stops, and he looks at Sydney with so much emotion it would take Sydney one hundred years to catalog it all—to parse out each enigma of James Campbell’s bared soul and memorize the look on his face, the sheen over his lips, the color of his eyes . . .
Sydney folds his sunglasses over his collar, and James swallows hard at the movement. Sydney feels James’ eyes on the hollow of his throat. Then Sydney reaches out a shaking hand, pricklingly aware of every set of eyes across the shore, and James takes it with equally trembling fingers, palms squeezing hard, fingers locked firmly in a grasp.
Suddenly the entire beach around them vanishes. The only things on earth are the sunlight above them, and the sound of the waves still crashing into the shore, and the solid feeling of James Campbell’s hand in his. James shakes his hand once, then
simply holds on. Sydney feels another tear threatening to fall loose, and he lets it, knowing they’re just far away enough from the crowd that no one else will see.
James sees, though, and he whispers Sydney’s name into the wind, his thick voice breaking on the word. Sydney sniffs hard and reminds himself he can’t hold on to James’ hand forever. That he has to let go.
With one last firm shake, Sydney pulls his fingers out of James’ grasp, mind flashing back to that first time they ever held hands at the dockyard. His skin still crackles with electricity, radiating out from his palm.
“Go on,” Sydney says in a rough voice. His thumb briefly traces James’ wrist. “I’ll be here. I’ll wait for you.” He nods back towards the crowd behind James, meaning the winners’ ceremony and the sure to be endless loop of congratulations.
James’ eyes flash a painful sadness before he nods firmly and tears his eyes away from Sydney’s gaze, taking a deep breath before fully turning and meeting head on with the crowd. Sydney immediately bites his tongue so he doesn’t open his big mouth to beg him to come back.
He watches James walks away from him down the swarming stretch of shore. Stands frozen and alone in the sand as the lei of flowers is gently placed around James’ neck, and photos are taken with him and Russell and O’Brien with their boards. He watches as James laughs and smiles and embraces every post-competition moment Sydney usually despises and avoids. Watches as James floats with happiness at all the things Sydney normally tries to escape from as soon as humanly possible without forfeiting the championship title.
He sees them through James’ eyes now, and an unprecedented warmth settles over his skin as he waits, staring down occasionally at the palm of the hand James had grasped in his wet, salty grip.
And maybe James Campbell won’t want to go back to Sydney’s cheap little bed now that he’s the year’s biggest name in surfing along the Hawaiian shores. Maybe he’ll tell Rob and everyone else back in Los Angeles that he had a little help from Moore, and the tips were worth it to put up with him for more than five seconds. Maybe that handshake meant, “thanks for the help, kid. See you when I crush your ass at the next competition.”
Or maybe Sydney’s being stupid again for the unprecedented seventh time that day.
But Sydney knows now that he’ll wait for hours to find out. He’ll wait for days, months, years. He’ll wait forever.
18
Sydney finds a cold lemonade and relaxes under the shade of a tree for almost two hours, tracking James’ movement back and forth across the sand, willing his mind to think of nothing but the way James had looked at him as he shook his hand in front of every single person on the beach.
He wishes he could use this time to get his own turn out on the waves. His body feels restless and agitated after being confined to the dry land for so long—cooped up for two days of watching everybody else surf along his favorite pipeline, aside from testing the current the day before. He finds he’s already missing his morning surfs in Los Angeles with James after half a decade of managing just fine being out on the water alone.
The clock of their remaining time together ticks away like bombs in his head. He wants to run down there and yell at everyone to just go away—to let him have his last few hours of knowing that James Campbell’s eyes will always seek him out on a crowded beach before he has to watch James fly back to his real life on a plane, leaving Sydney to go back to a silent house where his sheets smell like someone else’s skin.
But James just looks so happy. He’s giving an interview to the Surfer’s Journal crew for next month’s edition, and taking photos for the local Oahu paper—making everyone around him perfectly at ease and thrilled where Sydney had always just left behind stale air.
Just when he’s starting to think he might run down there and physically snatch him away, James catches his gaze across the beach and gives a tiny nod towards the direction of the Jeep. He’s ready.
With a flood of relief, followed quickly by an even larger flood of uncertain nerves, Sydney springs into action, making off towards the car, knowing James will follow a little ways behind. The sun is starting to set heavy and full above the ocean, casting orange and purple lights across the rustling mountains framing the shoreline. Sydney shivers when the cool evening air settles on his skin as he makes his way through the winding side streets towards the Jeep, now parked alone on a long dirt stretch once filled to the brim with other cars.
He throws their bags into the back and fixes his hair in the side mirror, as if that could somehow convince James Campbell not to ask him to take him straight back to the motel. Then he turns just in time to see James making his way towards him, dressed back in boardshorts and a hoodie with his board under his arm and a slow, aching weariness in his step. Sydney eyes the bulging bag thrown over James’ shoulder where James has clearly shoved the lei and trophy inside, right on top of the sand-covered wetsuit, probably growing musty and damp.
The enthusiasm that had been emanating from James’ body all afternoon is gone, and Sydney opens his mouth to ask what’s wrong when James suddenly drops his board into the dirt, looks quickly side to side, and steps forward to throw himself into Sydney’s arms with a sigh. Sydney quickly catches him as James leans like a dead weight into his body, letting Sydney cup the back of his head to hold him up.
James Campbell is a genius.
Sydney hadn’t realized how badly he needed to feel James back in his arms until he has him there, deeply breathing with his cheek burrowed into the crook of Sydney’s neck, arms wrapped tightly around the low of his back. The island seems to settle and sigh beneath their feet, quietly fading into the hushed tones of dusk, as the sunset colors gently pull the palm fronds down towards the earth to rest.
After a minute, James gives one last squeeze before pulling back slowly from Sydney’s arms. He looks down at his feet. “Sorry, I just—”
“You won,” Sydney whispers.
An odd look crosses over James’ face before he finally meets Sydney’s eyes. He shrugs, and a faint light washes over his skin with the fading sun. “Yeah, I did.”
Sydney leans down and quickly places a dry kiss on his mouth before he can convince himself not to. James sighs through his nose, then brushes his cheek across Sydney’s before pulling away.
All afternoon, Sydney had stared at James moving through the congratulatory crowd and fretted about what he could possibly say to James Campbell—the man who just conquered his fears, and stunned surfers from all over the world, and became a champion there for the entire earth beyond the horizon to see.
The man whom Sydney now realizes he loves more desperately than the feeling of his own wet board beneath the soles of his feet.
But he doesn’t say anything at all as James turns to climb into the car. He rubs his palm over James’ bicep through the soft fabric of the hoodie, giving a brief squeeze, then throws the surfboard into the back before climbing in and starting the engine. His heart constricts in his chest when James’ hand immediately goes to his knee.
They’re silent the whole drive back. James calmly stares out the window like he didn’t just live one of the most insane days of his life, and Sydney pretends it’s taking absolutely all of his concentration to drive on the roads he’s known for years.
Finally, just when they reach the beginnings of the road leading down to Sydney’s beach, James speaks.
“It’s weird,” he says under his breath, his chin in his hand. “I feel exactly the same.”
Sydney wonders whether he missed an earlier part of the conversation, too lost stealing glances at the reflection of the island sunset off the tips of James’ soft eyelashes.
“Hmm?”
James’ other hand doesn’t leave Sydney’s thigh. “I just mean—I’ve wanted this, to win something like this, since that first day Rob told me about the surf scene after I came back from ‘Nam. Going to work every day and surfing with him, every smaller competition back home, all the . . . all the fucking money I ha
d to save, and the time—this is all I would think about.”
Sydney stays quiet, impatiently gripping the wheel, as James gathers his thoughts. He pulls into his usual parking spot in the shade of the trees and cuts the engine, prickling a bit at the sudden silence in its wake. He watches James stare at the hints of purple ocean in the distance through the window, framed by golden palm fronds and liquid pools of glittering sand. A cool breeze winds through the Jeep, rustling James’ hair, and Sydney wants more than anything to feel those locks of salt-dried hair against his cheek.
After another minute, James continues. Sydney wonders if he even realizes that they’ve parked.
“I thought I’d finally feel like I was doing what I’m supposed to now, I guess. Like I could move on and start actually doing something, you know? Live like everyone else in their thirties. Get a sponsor and solve all my money problems and surf as my job. Get a . . . get a magic house and a wife and kids to just appear in my life, nice car to drive. Better clothes.”
James sighs and grips Sydney’s thigh even harder with his palm as he continues to stare out through the sea of trees. Sydney wonders with a cold shiver whether James had felt him flinch at the word ‘wife.’ He wonders if he’d been imagining the way James had flinched, too.
James shakes his head, and his voice grows rough. “God, that all sounds like hell now,” he says. “I mean I just . . . I just went out there and won the fucking Billabong and I don’t feel a goddamn change at all. Just, exactly the way I was two days ago. A week ago.”
Sydney grips the steering wheel tight with his hands. He wonders desperately where he himself stands in the continuum of ‘what’s changed about James Campbell and what hasn’t’.
His inhale, when he remembers to breathe, sounds incredibly loud. “And is that a good thing?”
James shrugs. He rubs one palm over his mouth as the other slides down to Sydney’s knee. “I don’t know—I think so,” he finally whispers.
Sydney doesn’t know what to say. James is acting the complete opposite from what he’d expected. All day—since the moment James had caught that first major wave against O’Brien and proved that he wasn’t backing down without a fight—Sydney had been waiting for a laughing, cheerful drive home (if James even decided to come back home with him in the first place). For breathless smiles and kissing in every corner of his house and letting James throw him down onto the mattress and take him.
The Sea Ain't Mine Alone Page 33
