Drift (Lengths)

by Steph Campbell

  I’m scarred and tough because, even if my father was right about me inheriting my mother’s love of leisure and inability to tap into true passion, I absolutely inherited his stubbornness.

  Which is why I’m on a surfboard again today when I should be finishing my chapel painting. I was able to see the enormous lantern cross shining from the glow of the candles the parishioners held last night, and it was a thing of unquestionable beauty. Instead of heading home to paint it, I headed out to drink and flirt with women. I shouldn’t be allowed to drink in this country, their laws say I can buy a weapon, but not alcohol, but that didn’t stop me. I was successful at both, but I went home alone, with a buzzing head.

  Nothing felt any more right by morning, and I couldn’t decide which irritated me more: the canvases with the half-done cathedrals or the completed ones of Lydia, her dark eyes following me all over my apartment and teasing me incessantly.

  A gorgeous, caramel-skinned Mona Lisa with twice the mystery and so much sexuality, it seemed like the canvases were wet with it.

  I paddle out again, my arms strong in the water so chilled, it only bites for a second before it numbs my skin completely. I’m able press up, find my balance, and ride the wave, but only at the outlier section. I’m nowhere near close enough to where the power curls and hammers.

  I need to be there.

  I need to throw myself into something that has nothing to do with the failures I’ve been piling high in this new life.

  This life that had so much damn potential. I shake the salt water out of my hair, sit down on the sand and take inventory of what’s out there, what direction I can hit next and hard enough to forget it all.

  “Hey, man!” A tall, scruffy guy runs to me, holding something out. “You drop this?”

  The sunlight glints off something gold and my hand automatically goes to my neck.

  “Mierda,” I mutter. I walk over and he tosses the cross necklace, the one my grandfather gave me before he died, to me. “Thank you. Truly, I can’t tell you how grateful I am. It was my grandfather’s.”

  “No worries. I’m glad I saw it before it got washed out.” The guy nods and points to the waves. “It’s busting up out there. Just the way it’s been hitting lately. I don’t even surf with my wedding ring on anymore. Makes the missus nervous, you know?”

  As if on cue, he throws a flash of a wave to a few pretty things in tiny bikinis who walk by and shake their glossy hair, giggling as they chorus, “Hey Deo!”

  “Ladies! Remember, we’re having a sale on quad-fins this weekend. I guarantee you improve your times the first chance you have to paddle out with one of those beauts.” He winks at one girl with dark hair who rolls her eyes at him.

  “I’ll be by on Saturday,” she calls. “But I want to talk to Whit. You told me to go with the gloss finish, and she was totally right. Sanded made all the difference.”

  “I’ve never argued the fact that my wife is a thousand times smarter than I am!” he yells, and they laugh. He looks back at me and grins so wide, it’s almost contagious. I find myself smiling back. “Ludicrous. My wife being nervous about me not wearing the ring. Every beach-bunny up and down this little strip knows my wife and worships the sand she walks on. Me, on the other hand? They’d throw me to the sharks for recommending the wrong wax.” He squints at me and shakes his head, his smile spread impossibly wider. “For their boards, dude. Mind out of the gutter. I’m Deo, by the way.”

  “Isaac.” I shake his hand. “You know a lot about surfing?”

  He shrugs, but I know false modesty when I see it. “I shape ‘em. And I’ve been bumming around on one since before I could walk.” He tilts his head. “Something tells me you’ve got a pressing surf question. Hit me, bro. If I don’t have your answer, my gorgeous wife will help our dumb asses out.”

  “Actually…” I point at where the waves curl beautifully, the sweet spot where I want to be when I’m out there. “I’m too slow to get where I want to go. Any tips for speeding things up?”

  Deo takes the board out of my hands and eyes it up and down. “You need a flatter board. How long you been surfing?”

  “Three weeks,” I tell him.

  Deo whistles between his teeth. “And you’re looking to crash those waves? Alright, man. Alright. I’m gonna hook you up, because you look like good people. Come with me. You eat yet?”

  “Uh, no, I haven’t,” I say as I follow him. He has my board under his arm and is talking a mile a minute over his shoulder.

  “Well, let’s eat, right? I think Whit put some chili in the slow cooker. I hope you like shit hot, because that girl goes wild with the jalapenos. And her cornbread? Dude, you’re gonna want to steal her away once you taste her cornbread.” He whips around after he says that, so fast I almost crash into him. “That was a joke.” His voice is totally still and serious. “I’ll have to hunt you down and beat the crap out of you if you ever actually tried anything with her. Clear?”

  He grins, I guess at the look on my face. I’m not a small guy, and I’ve been in my fair share of fights and come out looking a hell of a lot better than the other guy, but this surfer has that maniacal gleam in his eyes that only the unhinged and love-struck share. My father calls it the la mirada de un mante desesperado—the gaze of a desperate lover.

  It’s a look you do not—under any circumstances—fuck with.

  I hold my hands up like a prisoner surrendering. “Crystal clear. I would never dream of getting between you and your lovely wife,” I vow.

  He shakes a finger at me. “I like you. You worry me a little, cause you’re such a handsome asshole, and you’re shredding water that would make some ballsy dudes do a serious double take. But I can tell you’re a good guy. You got a job? You need one?”

  “No. I mean, yes. I do. Have a job. I work for the university. I guest lecture and am part of their artist exchange hosting.”

  There are times when I pop out of the world my father has me drowning in and realize there are many men who don’t give a damn about art. Many men who make things with their hands that don’t wind up hanging on museum walls, but that are used. Useful.

  I tense, ready for judgment, but Deo seems interested in what I do.

  “Really? You gotta let me know when your show is. I love some free wine and cheese. And art, of course. Maybe you know Cece Rodriguez?” He asks it lazily, but his words are a punch to my stomach.

  No matter how I seem to try to avoid Lydia Rodriguez, she’s always everywhere I turn.

  “I know her sister,” I say slowly.

  “Ah, Genie? Did you meet her before she took off to Belgium? I always knew that girl was way smarter than she let on. That scholarship she won is freaking insane.”

  He waves me into a small, neat surf shop with boards in every state of finish stacked all over. Long curls of wax lie on the floors along with fiberglass shavings and abandoned bottles of water. I take it all in because my over-thinking brain never seems to stop, but I just want to hear more about how he knows the Rodriguez family.

  “Not Genie,” I clarify and wait.

  He undoes his wetsuit. There’s an enormous tattoo on his chest: a gorgeous half-woman, half-horse. She has dark, curling hair and is drawing back a bow, looking over her shoulder. The arrow is aimed straight for Deo’s heart.

  The face of the woman is too specifically detailed, too lovingly rendered to be a mere artistic image. This is a lover’s tattoo, and I’m willing to bet I’ll be able to identify the much-loved Whit based on that ink alone.

  I’m immediately taken by the mix of beauty and brutality in the image. My father would tell me to be careful around this man. He obviously loves with incredible abandon, and that makes him even more dangerous than he is loyal if he’s tested.

  “Shit, bro. You in trouble?” he asks, letting the wetsuit flop around his waist as he pulls on a threadbare t-shirt that advertises ‘Rocko’s Tattoos’ in a bold, clean font.

  “Am I?” I think about Cody’s warning and worry
. What is it about the Rodriguez family? Perhaps there’s some kind of gang affiliation? Some kind of underworld connections? Or just a general lean toward the darker aspects?

  “Well, no one uses Lydia’s firm unless they need to win. They don’t deal with any case that won’t make it into the headlines or law books. Is it immigration shit? Because Genie’s husband has ties to this dope agent if you need. He’s not supposed to, but he totally sends her those edible arrangements on her birthday. She helped him when he was getting his green card.” Deo rummages in a small fridge and holds a beer bottle out to me.

  I accept. “No. Not legal trouble. I know her as a student.”

  He nods. “Those Rodriguez girls are, like, perpetual students,” he says after a long pull of beer. “I guess she’s getting her PhD? I’ve always been the dumbest one in the bunch, but it’s going to be official soon.”

  “You know the Rodriguzes well?” I ask. Just how many people in Silver Strand have their lives tangled around this family?

  “I’m practically a long lost Rodriguez son. Kind of like they’re the Corleone’s, and I’m Tom Hagen.” He shrugs.

  I choke on my beer. “Like The Godfather?”

  “That’s right.” Before he can say more, the bell over the shop door rings and a girl walks in.

  I see her carrying a pile of books, her hair in neat curls, her dress sexy, her face smiling. But, in my mind, I can hear the sound of her hooves and see her arm pulling back the string of a bow.

  “Whit, this is Isaac. He’s a friend of Lydia’s, and I found his grandfather’s cross on the beach before it washed out. Also, he needs a flatter board because he’s embarrassingly good, but not fast enough on the beginner’s shit he’s trying to make work.” He circles his arms around her tiny waist, buries his face in her hair, kisses her neck, and holds her tight.

  It’s both incredibly affectionate and a clear warning. He may as well have pissed in a circle around her: he’s telling me that this woman is his.

  I respect that.

  “It’s nice to meet you, Whit. I hear you make very spicy chili. That’s exactly how I like it.” I hold out my hand and she takes it from her place inside Deo’s arms and shakes, then cranes her neck to look at her wild-eyed husband.

  “Did you just meet him, like, five minutes ago?” she demands, her dark eyes full of flabbergasted delight.

  He snorts. “How could I have gotten that rundown in five minutes? It’s been, like, a solid fifteen.”

  She looks back at me, her pretty brown eyes flashing. “He’s so like this,” she says, as if he can’t hear. “He’ll just start talking to anyone, and he’s instantly got a new friend. Seriously, don’t let him scare you. You look nervous. He’s a huge teddy bear, I promise. Even if he seems like some kind of crazed stalker.” She waves us both out. “I was actually coming to tell you that dinner is almost done. And, yes, I do make a really spicy chili. I’m so glad you like that. Deo only pretends to.”

  He shakes his shaggy hair. “Woman! I love all your spice.” He raises his eyebrows at me. “Sorry if I spooked you, man. If you don’t want to have dinner, that’s cool.”

  “I’d love to join you for dinner if you have enough. I have a change of clothes in my car. How far is your home?” I ask.

  “We definitely have enough. And we can walk it, man. Whit and I are true beach bums. Grab your crap and away we go.” He claps a hand on my shoulder, but his eyes are glued on Whit with this kind of obsessive magnetism.

  My father warned me to stay away from men like Deo. But his more urgent warning was to never become a man like Deo.

  A woman is to be sampled, enjoyed, explored, and left for someone else to love. Give your heart to a woman and you lose your sanity, your passion for your work, everything that makes you a man.

  My natural inclination is to call him a bullshit artist. I hated the way he treated my mother, and equally hated watching him shed women like snakeskin, leaving a trail of weeping, forlorn ex-lovers so devastated he would rush us out of town to avoid seeing them unravel.

  Much as I hate all his theories on love, there’s a voice in the back of my head that chuckles blackly, warning me that I can try to rebel all I want: I have too much of him in me to escape his fate. There have been so many gorgeous, amazing women I’ve wanted to love, but I’ve never managed to fall.

  Maybe ultimate solitude is just my fate, passed through my blood.

  I’m brooding over all of this when Whit’s voice breaks through my thoughts.

  “That’s so cool that you know Lydia, Isaac. I just found out she’s swinging by with Cohen and Maren tonight. That’ll make us an even six.” She winks at me, and I feel like a horse-woman has trampled my heart and shot an arrow through it.

  Lydia?

  At dinner?

  “Dude,” Deo says, his hand shaking my shoulder. “You okay? Seriously, I was joking about beating you up before. You’ve got nothing to be nervous about.”

  “Deo!” Whit cries, then looks at me. “I apologize. My husband suffers from severe diarrhea of the mouth. Please ignore ninety percent of what spews out of it.”

  “I do,” he admits as we watch Whit gather her books and flip off the lights.

  “C’mon, you two! It’s getting cold.” She crooks her finger at Deo and strides out the doorway.

  Deo looks at me, those eyes of his a strange gold color and lit like flames. “You’re cool right? Because I really was joking. Mostly.”

  He flashes me a smile that seemed so friendly on the beach, but looks slightly predatory in the shadows of his shop.

  Instead of feeling any sort of worry, I feel envy.

  My father always preached to me about passion in my work, but it’s passion in life that I want. I want to feel an ounce of what Deo feels for Whit for a woman.

  Or I think I do. The old adage about being careful what you wish for crosses my mind as I prepare to eat dinner across from Lydia Rodriguez, the mystery woman who I can’t figure out or stop obsessing over.

  10 LYDIA

  Now that Cohen knows about my jobless status, he and Maren have put me on some kind of unofficial suicide watch. My brother, notorious for ribbing me every chance he gets, is suddenly caring and considerate. And my lovely sister-in-law checks in on me every few hours with a cheerful text or phone call.

  I’m going to go fucking insane if those two don’t stop!

  At Cece’s urging, I did some digging into the firm’s policies and drafted a firmly worded letter asking for the exact terms of my suspension in writing and a meeting in thirty days to decide on an outcome.

  Funny. I never thought about using my law knowledge to take such simple precautionary steps before. I guess I was waiting for someone else to do it for me. For someone to need me so much, they called me back. I haven’t heard a damn word from the people who once told me I was the ‘goose that laid the golden egg.’

  This entire experience has made it so damn apparent how expendable I am. And how truly alone.

  Well, alone when it comes to coworkers.

  When it comes to family, I’m so freaking smothered, claustrophobia is setting in.

  “This is so nice of you guys, but I was planning a quiet night in with some sushi and a few hours of Netflix,” I say in my most cheerful voice.

  Maybe Maren and Cohen heard “arsenic and a noose” instead of “sushi and Netflix,” because they exchange a worried look and have an entire irritating silent conversation—the kind couples who know each other inside out can do with just a few looks.

  Earnest, worried looks.

  Ugh!

  “You’d really be doing us the favor,” Maren lies glibly.

  “That makes no sense, Maren. Why in the world would coming to Whit and Deo’s be doing you a favor?”

  She’s way less glib when she realizes she probably needs to come up with some reason why to support her ridiculous statement. I cross my arms and enjoy watching my sweet sister-in-law squirm, feeling more like my old lawyer self than I hav
e in weeks.

  Yes, maybe I am the evil queen who enjoys giving Snow White that poisoned apple. In my defense, I only enjoy it because I know for sure her prince will come wake her up with a kiss—my brother’s chivalrous like that.

  “Because…um, of course…well. Um, Whit makes so much chili when she cooks!” She looks hopefully at Cohen, who’s pulling some hideous sweater I haven’t worn since high school out of my hall closet and pushing it at me.

  “Right. So much chili,” he says like this is the clear and sensible answer. “We can never finish it. She has this huge pot she makes it in. We need you there to help eat it.” He shakes the sweater at me, and I grab it and toss it on the couch.

  He’s not even concerned with the lack of logic, and I’m way too tired to fight both of them off. Plus, I know how freaking bull-headed they are when they get together.

  “Okay. I’ll go and eat chili. But then I have to get back.” I stalk to my room, and Cohen calls out, “Great! Did you hear back from the firm? Do you have work to get to?”

  I close my eyes and knock my forehead against the doorframe, praying to be hit with some instantaneous fever that will render me unable to leave my comfy little apartment.

  I stand up straight, eyes wide, panicked images of Cohen and Maren providing twenty-four hour nursing care dancing through my head. I seriously need to be more careful what I wish for on the off chance that it comes true.

  “No, Cohen,” I growl as I throw on my favorite leather jacket and run a brush through my hair. “You know damn well I don’t have my job back yet. I just got confirmation that they received my letter. I’ll have to wait for them to address all twenty-three of my bullet points. It would take a few weeks if they had nothing else at all going on at the office. Considering the amount of personnel they need on the case we were all working on, I’ll be lucky if I hear back in the thirty days.”

  Cohen crosses his arms and looks down his nose. I never noticed how tall and broad-shouldered my little brother has gotten. Wasn’t he a sullen, gawky teen slumping around our parents’ store just the other day?