Holly Lin | Novella | First Kill

by Swartwood, Robert

  Chazz watches me. He doesn’t break eye contact. His expression doesn’t change. He sincerely looks like he’s sorry.

  I put the car back in park, shut off the engine.

  “Okay, I’ll give you a second chance.”

  The somber expression on his face cracks as he smiles. He issues a heavy sigh of relief.

  “That’s awesome,” he says. “You’re awesome. You’re not going to regret it. I’m totally going to make it up to you.”

  “What do you want to do?”

  He tilts his head back at the car. “How about we go for a drive? I got something special I want to show you.”

  So a hot guy asks you to ride in his convertible to show you something special. Gee, what’s a girl to do?

  Like an idiot, I smile and say, “Sounds great.”

  Six hours thirty minutes to go.

  Five

  The convertible is a 1967 Corvette Sting Ray.

  I know this because within a minute of us getting on the road Chazz starts telling me all about the car. How less than 23,000 were ever produced, and he has the only one on the island, which was, like, a huge deal for him because ever since he was a kid he’s loved Corvette Sting Rays and besides, isn’t this a sweet ride, just the sweetest?

  Despite the small red and white plastic cooler on the floor by my feet, making me feel even more cramped, I smile and nod and say, “Yeah, it’s sweet,” thinking maybe I should have headed back to the condo after all.

  But then as we head north up the highway, Chazz points out some of the landmarks, like Shark’s Cove, asking if I’ve been snorkeling yet and when I say no he looks at me, shocked, and says that if I’m going to snorkel, I have to snorkel at the cove.

  “But, um, isn’t it dangerous?”

  He shrugs. “It can be rocky, sure, but otherwise you should be okay.”

  “But aren’t there, like, sharks?”

  He laughs, shakes his head. “Nah, there aren’t any sharks. At least, none I’ve ever seen or heard about. You go farther out, yeah, you might run into a shark, but not in the cove.”

  “So what’s there?”

  “Fish you probably never heard of.” He squints at me. “You like fish?”

  “I’ve eaten at Long John’s Silver once or twice.”

  He laughs again. “Not what I’m talking about, babe. Okay, have you ever seen a butterfly fish?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “What about a parrotfish?”

  “No.”

  “A damselfish?”

  I shake my head.

  He squints at me again, one hand casually on the wheel. “You ever been to an aquarium?”

  “In Baltimore once, yeah.”

  “Then you’ve probably seen some of those fish. Still, nothing like seeing them in the cove. You have to promise me you’ll check it out before you leave. Promise?”

  “Sure.”

  “Say you promise.”

  “I promise.”

  He grins. “Yeah, you’ll love it. They got some really awesome stuff there. Like a goatfish. You ever see a goatfish?”

  “No. Does it, um, look like a goat?”

  He laughs again, this time smacking the steering wheel, and I have to admit it’s a great feeling making him laugh like that.

  “Not quite like a goat,” he says, “but they’ve got whiskers like a goat. Only they’re not really whiskers, not like a catfish, but these things called chin barbels that they use to feel around for food.”

  “Do they scream like a goat?”

  He pauses a moment, frowning. “You know, I’m not sure about that. I never heard one scream.”

  Okay, so sarcasm isn’t his strong suit.

  We pass Shark’s Cove and keep heading north. My hair’s not tied up and blows in the wind.

  “Where are we going?”

  He grins at me, reaches over to pat my knee. “You’ll see.”

  He doesn’t leave his hand on my knee for more than two seconds, so I’m not sure what to read into it, but it doesn’t matter anyway. Not too long after, he turns off the highway and parks and kills the engine.

  “We’re here,” he says.

  I look out past the trees at just another beach. “What’s here?”

  Chazz steps out of the convertible. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

  He leads me down the walkway to the sand. Again, I’m not a beach bunny, so one beach basically looks like every other beach on the island. I’m not sure what’s so special about this one until Chazz points out at the ocean.

  “This,” he says, “is the Banzai Pipeline.”

  The sky is clear and the moon is bright, making it possible to see a few people out on the water. Some of them have glow sticks attached to their boards. A few other people are on the beach, watching the water.

  Chazz says, “The Pipe is considered one of the ten deadliest waves in the world.”

  “You’ve surfed here?”

  “A few times, yeah. But I never went full in, you know? I’d just—” He pauses, shakes his head. “Forget it.”

  “No, what?”

  He looks at me for a second, as if debating whether or not to continue, and then sighs. “See, I haven’t been surfing very long. It’s only been less than a year now since I moved out here.”

  “Where did you move from?”

  “Kansas.” He grins at me. “Can you believe it? I never even saw the ocean until I was in high school and some friends and me drove down to the Gulf of Mexico during the summer. I mean, okay, the Gulf isn’t the ocean, but it was the largest amount of water I’d ever seen.” He shakes his head. “It was amazing. I don’t mean to sound corny or whatever, but it was amazing.”

  A large wave comes in, bringing with it two surfers, and there are hoots and laughter out on the water, a few people on the sand even clap, and then it goes quiet again as everybody waits for the next wave.

  “After that,” Chazz says, “I started learning so much about the ocean. I learned about surfing and decided that that’s what I wanted to do someday. My parents thought I was crazy. They wanted me to go to college and take business classes.” He snorts. “Could you see me working behind a desk all day? Nah, it wasn’t for me. But I agreed to go. I applied to all these colleges in California, not because I cared about college, but because their schools were near the beach. I ended up going to Allan Hancock, which is a little college just outside Santa Barbara. Lasted only two semesters. I flunked out because I was surfing most of the time. My parents were pissed, which I guess was to be expected, and so I said fuck it and bought a plane ticket and flew out here. Say, where do you go to school?”

  “Huh?”

  “What college,” he says. “I’m guessing you’re here on some kind of spring break, right?”

  Before I can stop myself, I say, “Georgetown.”

  “Nice.” Chazz looks impressed.

  I flash him a smile. “I’m just a freshman this year.”

  “Ah, I gotcha. So that means you’re, what, nineteen?”

  “Yep.”

  “Too young to drink then, huh?”

  “Unfortunately.”

  Chazz looks around the beach like it’s crowded, leans in close to whisper, “Well, I got some beers in the car. I won’t tell anyone if you don’t.”

  “Sounds like a plan.”

  “So you come out here with friends?”

  “Yeah, just some friends from school. But they haven’t been much fun since we’ve been here.”

  “Do they have boyfriends? Because I can wrangle up some guys, we can all hang out.” He squints at me again. “You don’t have a boyfriend, do you?”

  “No boyfriend.”

  “You promise?”

  “I promise.”

  He smiles. “Nice.”

  I ask, “Have people died surfing out there?”

  He nods slowly, watching the incoming wave.

  “Aren’t you scared, then?”

  He doesn’t answer right away, just kee
ps watching the water. Finally shrugs. “Of course I’m scared. The whole thing terrifies me. But it’s exhilarating, too.” He looks at me again. “You ever surf?”

  I shake my head.

  He grins, touches the small of my back. “Maybe I’ll show you sometime.” He jerks his head back toward the trees and the parking lot beyond. “You want to go for a ride?”

  Six hours to go.

  Six

  Chazz opens my door for me. At first I think it’s a sign of chivalry, but then I realize the actual purpose is easier access to the red and white plastic cooler on the passenger-side footwell. He opens the lid and pulls out two bottles of Corona.

  “Sorry,” he says, popping the cap off and handing me a bottle, “don’t have any limes.”

  As I’ve never had Corona before, I’m not sure why this should matter, but I smile anyway and take a sip.

  “Wait, wait,” he says, popping the cap off his bottle and tossing it aside. “We need to toast.”

  Embarrassed, I wipe at my mouth and hold up the bottle.

  Chazz clinks his bottle against mine. “To tonight,” he says.

  I don’t say anything, just smile again and wait until he takes a sip before taking another sip.

  He grins at me. “Ready?”

  The responsible part of me wants to suggest maybe we should wait until he’s done with his beer before we get back on the road. But the irresponsible part—the one that’s reckless and always eager to lie to my parents—punches its counterpart in the throat and leaves it on the floor coughing for air.

  “Let’s go,” I say.

  We continue north on the highway. Up past Kawela Bay and Turtle Bay Resort, which Chazz says are where all the rich assholes go. He pauses, sneaks a glance at me, asks if I’m staying there.

  “Nope.”

  He laughs. “I knew it! You’re too cool to be one of those uptight losers.”

  Not much of a compliment, but I’ll take it.

  We drive for another ten, fifteen minutes. Chazz doesn’t play any music, and we don’t talk, and that’s okay. The sky is clear and the stars are bright. The wind keeps whipping my hair. I’ve finished the Corona and just hold the bottle, not sure what to do with it. We pass a few cars heading in the opposite direction, but for the most part, it seems to be just us on the road.

  That is until the Sting Ray begins to slow.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask.

  Chazz doesn’t answer, his focus on the ocean side of the road. He slows the car completely until we’re at a crawl, and then he says, “There it is!” and guns the engine, jerking us forward.

  We turn off the highway onto a road … if a road is what you can call it. It’s only dirt and gravel.

  Chazz turns off the headlights.

  I look at him. “What are you doing?”

  “We’re not supposed to use this,” he says. “Don’t worry, I can still see where we’re going.”

  The moon is bright enough to illuminate the narrow road. Some of the trees are overgrown, their leaves and branches scraping against the car. For some reason, I expect Chazz to be pissed about this, but he doesn’t seem to mind. Then we enter a sort of clearing and Chazz parks the Sting Ray and grins at the empty bottle in my hand.

  “Ready for another?”

  Out of the car then, two new cold bottles of Corona extracted from the red and white cooler, Chazz pops the cap off my bottle and hands it to me, and I wait until he’s opened his in case he wants to clink bottles again.

  He doesn’t. He guzzles from his beer and points out at the beach and the ocean beyond.

  “What do you think?”

  “It’s beautiful.”

  I say the words without thinking and immediately want to kick myself. Do I sound sappy? Maybe, but the truth is it is beautiful. This little section of the beach doesn’t look public at all. This isn’t a tourist destination. This, I realize, is one of those secret spots that only the locals know about and refuse to reveal to strangers. Because they don’t want people telling other people who will tell other people so that everybody will know about the spot and ruin it. This is a secret spot.

  “Thought you’d like it,” Chazz says. He takes my hand and leads me past the car toward the beach. “This place doesn’t really have a name, nothing official, but I like to think of it just as the Hidden Cove. Sounds stupid, doesn’t it?”

  “Not at all.”

  “The best time to come here is late at night. There are moments when there are no cars passing out on the highway that it’s completely quiet. Like you’re the only person in the world. Like you can get a sense how the world was before … well, before we all came along. You know, back at the beginning of time.”

  The sand is flawless. Completely level and smooth. It makes me think of a fresh snowfall before anything disturbs it.

  Chazz is still holding my hand. “Come on, let’s go in.”

  “I don’t have my bathing suit.”

  He looks around the deserted beach. “I won’t tell if you won’t tell.”

  As we near the beach—Chazz slipping off his shirt and shorts—I hesitate. That responsible part of me is screaming that I don’t even know this guy. Yeah, okay, he’s hot, but so what?

  Then again, I’ll probably forever hate myself if I don’t do this.

  “What’s wrong?” Chazz still has on his boxer shorts, his other clothes tossed aside. “Hey, if you don’t want to take your clothes off, you don’t have to take your clothes off. No pressure.”

  Shit. Now I feel like a loser. For some reason, I think about Tina and what she would do in this situation. She’s not a complete prude, no, but would she actually go skinny dipping with a stranger?

  Oh, what the hell.

  I hand Chazz my beer and start unbuttoning my shorts. Before I can pull them off, though, a noise shatters the perfect silence.

  Chazz whispers, “What the hell is that?”

  We listen. For the first couple seconds I can’t tell what it is, and then all at once something clicks into place, and the noise makes total sense.

  A vehicle is on the hidden road, the leaves and branches brushing its side, its running engine barely a whisper as it creeps toward us.

  Five hours twenty minutes to go.

  Seven

  “Shit,” Chazz whispers. “Shit, shit, shit.”

  He drops my beer on the sand, scrambles to grab his shorts and T-shirt, all the while whispering, “Shit, shit, shit,” as the vehicle creeps closer.

  It’s running without headlights, which is weird, but then again, that’s how Chazz brought us here too.

  “Is this private property?”

  He whips his head in my direction. “Huh?”

  “Are we trespassing?”

  Before he can answer, the vehicle breaks through the trees. It’s a black panel van, which is ominous enough, but then it stops next to the Sting Ray and just sits there, its engine idling. Nobody gets out.

  Chazz has gone silent. He stares at the panel van parked fifty yards away.

  A minute passes. The only sounds are the ocean lapping the sand and the panel van’s idling engine. Because of the angle, we can’t see who’s behind the steering wheel, or if there’s anybody else in the van.

  “What do we do?” I whisper.

  Chazz doesn’t answer.

  “Hey,” I whisper with more force. “What do we do?”

  Chazz blinks. Glances at me. Glances back at the panel van. “I don’t know,” he says.

  The van’s engine goes silent. For some reason, this causes me to jump. I watch the van, but nothing happens.

  Another minute passes. The only sound now is the ocean lapping the sand.

  Okay, so this is definitely getting creepy now.

  “Let’s go for a walk,” I say.

  Again Chazz doesn’t answer.

  “Hey.” This time I snap my fingers to get his attention, and when he blinks again and looks at me, I say, “Let’s head down the beach.”

  He sha
kes his head, almost imperceptibly, and though he doesn’t voice his reason why not, the answer is suddenly clear to me. The Sting Ray. He doesn’t want to leave the Sting Ray. Whoever’s in that van might be here to murder us for all we know, but for Chazz it doesn’t matter, because he doesn’t want to take the chance of something happening to his goddamned stupid car.

  “Fine. Then let’s leave.”

  Foolishly, I take a step forward.

  At that same moment, the van’s driver’s door opens. As does the passenger-side door. As do the rear doors. I don’t see the rear doors opening, but I can hear them, just as I can hear the sudden shuffling of footsteps on the hard dirt. Pretty soon four figures appear ahead of us. They look like shadows in the dark. We can’t even see their faces, but that’s because all of them are wearing black masks.

  Chazz grabs my hand, shouts, “Run!” and suddenly we’re moving down the beach.

  The four figures give chase.

  I can run pretty fast on a good day, but these flip-flops are slowing me down, and it doesn’t help that Chazz won’t let go of my hand. I try to wiggle free of his grip, give myself more space to run, but he squeezes tight, and then all at once he trips over his own feet and goes sprawling forward, and because he won’t let go of my hand, I go sprawling too.

  The figures have almost reached us.

  I scramble to my feet, kick the flip-flops off, start to run away again, but pause to check on Chazz. He’s making it back onto his own two feet, but he’s slow about it, and once again I’m foolish by grabbing his arm and trying to help him up, away from the four men who are now only yards away.

  We don’t stand a chance.

  They grab us at once.

  Along with the black masks, the men are wearing black pants and shirts and gloves.

  I struggle, but the two gripping my arms are so much stronger than me that it’s not even funny, and without much effort they drag me back up the beach.

  Behind me, I can hear Chazz struggling too, shouting and cursing, and then I hear what sounds like him being punched in the chest, and then he’s not shouting and cursing anymore.

  Up the beach we go, toward the thin tree line, then into the clearing. I’ve stopped struggling, but as we pass by the Sting Ray, I attempt to wrestle my arms out of the intruders’ grip, and when that doesn’t work, I jump toward the Sting Ray to plant both feet on the side of the car to give myself some extra oomph. But one of the men sees what I’m doing and pulls me back, which causes me to lose balance, and instead of my feet kicking off the side of the car, my one foot connects with the Sting Ray’s side mirror and bends it forward.