Cut Back

by Todd Strasser

  “Thanks,” Kai replied. By now he knew better than to think Lucas’s father would offer a compliment without some other motive behind it.

  “A grom as good as you could figure to do pretty well at Fairport tomorrow,” Lucas’s father said.

  Kai nodded as he paddled over to get under the peak.

  “It would be good for Lucas, too,” Buzzy said.

  That caught Kai by surprise. He sat up on his board and let the wave roll under him. The spray from the crest rained back down on him like a momentary sun shower. “How’s that?”

  “He needs the competition,” Buzzy said. “Someone who’ll push him. You know why so many world-class surfers have come out of a small-wave break like Sebastian Inlet? They say it’s the competition.”

  It appeared that Buzzy wanted him to compete against Lucas to make Lucas a better surfer.

  “You never know,” Kai said. “It might just turn out to be the other way around, with Lucas pushing me.”

  “All right,” Buzzy said. “If that’s the way it’s meant to be, then that’s the way it’ll be. You know, I think you boys got off to a bad start. But it doesn’t have to stay that way. You and Lucas are probably the best young surfers around. You could be really good for each other.”

  Another set was coming in. The chat with Buzzy was interesting, but Kai wanted a wave. He turned and paddled into a medium-size curl that promised a longer, if less challenging, ride.

  Kai rode it down the line, doing a small cutback here and there to stay in the curl, then hopping the board in the mush, making it almost all the way in to the part of the beach opposite Sewers, where Shauna was carrying #43 toward the water.

  “Hey.” He sat on his board and waited for Shauna to paddle out.

  “I guess Bean got my message,” Shauna said as she came out.

  “I saw him this morning.” Kai said, paddling beside her toward Sewers. “He dropped the board off for you.”

  “How come he isn’t here?” Shauna asked.

  “It was a little before six and it looked like he hadn’t been to bed yet.”

  “Interesting,” Shauna said.

  They paddled out to Sewers and sat up on their boards, looking for waves. Down the beach, Everett, Sam, and Derek arrived.

  “I guess Sams hand has healed enough so he can surf,” Kai said.

  “How come you re not over at Screamers?” Shauna asked.

  “I want to ask you a question,” Kai said.

  They sat in the waves and talked for a long time. And when they’d finished, Kai had made up his mind.

  Forty

  The next morning Kai sat in the shade in the Driftwood Motel parking lot with his board, towel, extra T-shirt, and a plastic bag with some bottled water and peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches inside. Down the street the flag in front of the bank flapped toward the south, meaning there was a nice offshore breeze to hold the wave faces open. The door to the motel office swung open and Curtis came out with two mugs of coffee, one blue and the other black.

  “All fired up?” he asked, handing the black mug to Kai.

  “No.”

  “Good. Save that stoke for when you need it.”

  Kai shrugged and took a sip of the coffee. He winced at the taste of the whisky. That stuff was strong. He handed the mug back to Curtis. “Think you got your mugs mixed up.”

  “Sorry.” Curtis gave him the blue one. “I do like a little whisky with my coffee.”

  “Tasted more like you like a little coffee with your whisky,” Kai said.

  Curtis smiled and raised his mug. “Top o’ the morning to ya.”

  Kai took a sip from the blue mug. That was better.

  “So you’re off to do battle against the son of the dark warlord of evil, huh?”

  “I guess.”

  “Don’t act so excited, grom. Your eagerness is overwhelming.”

  “I guess part of me still thinks the whole thing is stupid, that’s all.”

  “It ain’t too late to back out.”

  Kai shrugged. He’d made up his mind.

  “I also hear you’re movin’ out tonight,” Curtis said.

  “Yeah,” Kai said. “My father found a basement for us to stay in for the next month.”

  “You don’t have to go, grom,” Curtis said. “You can stay here if you want. At least till the Feds get the place.”

  “’Feds’?” Kai repeated uncertainly.

  “Back taxes,” Curtis explained. “Appears I’ve been a bit negligent in my bookkeeping. Looks like if Buzzy don’t get me, the tax man might.”

  “Is it serious?” Kai asked.

  “Don’t know yet, grom.”

  Bean pulled up in the hearse.

  “Now there’s an optimistic mode of transportation given your intended purpose,” Curtis said with a smile.

  Kai picked up his stuff. “Catch you later, old man.”

  “Who knows? If there’s nothing good on TV, I might even come over and watch,” said Curtis.

  Kai put his stuff in the back of the hearse and got in front with Bean, who pulled back onto Seaside Drive. Jazz was playing on the sound system.

  “Who’s this?” Kai asked.

  “Wes Montgomery, king of the jazz guitar.”

  “It’s good.”

  “You expected bad?” Bean said. “Hey, I have to admit I was surprised when you called. What made you change your mind and decide to enter?”

  “Guess it’s just gotten to the point where it’s easier to do it than to keep explaining why I don’t want to.”

  “Psyched?” Bean asked.

  “Not particularly,” Kai said. “You?”

  “A little. But what do I have to lose?” Bean asked. “Long board competitions are like women’s golf. No one except the participants really cares.”

  They rode along Seaside Drive listening to the jazz. A Jeep passed in the opposite direction.

  “That reminds me,” Bean said. “You do anything about Goldilocks yet?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Dude, the longer you wait, the more chance there is he’s gonna unload those boards,” Bean said. “And once they’re gone, you’ve got no evidence against him.”

  “I know.”

  The Fairport town parking lot was jammed with people pulling boards off car racks and out of the backs of pickups. There were families with gremmies and groms, and old guys with long boards there to compete in the legends division. A lot of the families brought chairs and umbrellas and coolers. It was going to be an all-day competition.

  Kai and Bean grabbed their stuff and headed for the beach, which was crowded with parents putting up umbrellas and opening chairs while contestants stretched and waxed their boards. Serious amateur photographers were setting up tripods, and a crowd of walk-in entrants hovered in front of a big white open-faced tent, filling out last-minute entry forms. Trucks from Quiksilver and Billabong were there, and a big banner over the tent read FAIRPORT SURF. Packs of girls and guys roamed around talking to their friends and gabbing on cell phones. Kai and Bean put down their stuff and walked over to the tent. Inside was a long table manned by some women writing down entrants’ names. Behind them were some smaller tables where walkie-talkies sat charging off a car battery. A handful of men and women—no doubt the contest organizers and judges—stood around talking.

  “Well, well, look who’s here,” a voice behind them said.

  Kai and Bean turned around. It was Jade.

  “Hey,” Kai said. “Women’s long board or short board?”

  “Can’t I go both ways?” Jade asked. “Double your pleasure, double your fun. How about you?”

  “I’m short.” Kai jerked his head at Bean. “He’s long.”

  “Really?” Jade gave Bean an interested look. “How long?”

  “Uh, a little over nine feet,” Bean said. He nodded toward the water. “Good day, huh?”

  “Pretty good right now,” Jade said.

  “What are they predicting?” Kai asked.

>   “Waist to shoulder high with some larger sets,” Jade said. “The big unknown is going to be the wind. If it turns onshore like it usually does, it’s gonna be a mess by this afternoon.”

  “What kind of break is it?” Kai asked.

  “Sandbar,” Jade said. “So it’s kind of shifty depending on the tide and wind. One minute it’s breaking in one spot. Five minutes later it’s breaking fifty yards down the beach. You really have to watch it and pick your spots.”

  They signed in and were told to wait for their event to be called over the loudspeaker. Kai and Bean said they’d see Jade later and went back to their stuff.

  “Hey, guys!” Spazzy was jogging along the beach toward them with his board under his arm. Behind him came Shauna with Jillian.

  “Am I seeing things?” Kai asked Bean.

  “Oh, guess I forgot to tell you,” Bean said with a grin.

  Jillian came through the crowd looking around with an expression like she was walking through the monkey cage at the zoo. She was pulling some kind of bright blue plastic thing that reminded Kai of a NASA space vehicle designed for exploring the surfaces of other planets. It had big wheels for rolling across the sand, with a built-in umbrella, cooler, and basket for towels. When all that stuff was removed, it could be turned upside down to become a beach chair.

  When Spazzy’s sister saw Bean, a big smile appeared on her face. Kai watched in disbelief as she actually walked up and kissed him on the cheek. “Hi!”

  “This is so cool!” Spazzy was twitching and ticking so much that Kai wondered if he’d exhaust himself.

  “You’re gonna compete?” Kai asked.

  “What do you think, dude?” Spazzy asked. He pointed at the white tent. “Is that the sign-in?”

  “You bet.”

  “Gotta go sign in.” Spazzy headed for the tent.

  Jillian was instantly alert to her brother moving toward a group of strangers who might not understand his behavior. “I’ll do it for you.”

  “No,” Spazzy said. “I’ll do it. It’s my competition.” He got on the line, twitching and ticking and making funny sounds. Some gremmies in front of him turned and stared, then whispered to each other and made faces.

  Spazzy hardly seemed to care. Then again, he had to be so used to it that it didn’t matter. Jillian started to unpack the space vehicle. For the moment, Kai, Shauna, and Bean were alone.

  “How?” Kai asked in a low voice.

  “You know all that sleep Bean said he wasn’t getting?” Shauna said.

  Bean blushed and scuffed his foot on the sand.

  “You did it just for Spazzy?” Kai asked.

  “No way!” Bean blurted out. “Dude, this is for real. She is beautiful and brilliant. I mean, sure, I argued on Spazzy’s behalf, but either way, I’m totally jazzed.”

  Kai couldn’t believe it. Just the idea of Jillian in the passenger seat of Bean’s hearse was a hard one to swallow. The rest was simply amazing.

  Spazzy came back. “This is so cool! I’ve never been to a competition before. And I’m in this one.”

  “I had no idea so many people surfed,” Jillian said, gazing around at the crowd.

  “My guess is there are about a hundred and fifty surfers here,” Bean said. “The rest are families and friends.”

  “And in some cases,” Shauna added, looking past them, “enemies.”

  Kai followed her eyes. Lucas and his crew were coming toward them.

  Forty-one

  “Well, if it ain’t Mr. Competition himself,” Sam said with a smirk.

  Kai ignored the taunt and looked around. Runt was there, but Everett and Derek weren’t. “Where’s Everett?” he asked.

  “Said he had something else to do,” Lucas said.

  That seemed a little strange to Kai. Next to Lucas, Everett was probably the best surfer in the crew.

  “Well, see you out there,” Kai said.

  Lucas nodded. He and his brahs headed over to the tent to sign in.

  Kai and his friends commenced to do what competitive surfers everywhere spent most of their time doing at competitions—waiting and watching. The first rounds of the day would be fifteen-minute heats. Six surfers would compete in each heat, with three eliminated and three moving on to the next round. The men went first, then the boys. Next came the juniors—the group Kai, Spazzy, and Lucas’s crew were in. Everyone listened for the first heat to be called: “Rodney, Jackson, Herter, Moncure, Rhodes, and Winthrop.”

  “We’re in the same heat!” Spazzy said to Kai, then jumped up and grabbed his board.

  Kai picked up his board.

  “Good luck!” Jillian called. “Be careful!”

  Spazzy and Kai walked over to the pole where the event flags were. The beach marshal was handing out colored jerseys. Spazzy got a light blue one and Kai got yellow. Soon all six contestants were gathered around the marshal. They eyed one another, trying to figure out who the serious contenders were. Spazzy twitched and made some strange noises.

  “Okay, boys, we want you to have fun out there,” the marshal said. “Just keep it clean and respect one another’s spaces. No snaking or drop-ins. We’re pretty serious about that. Any interference will result in automatic disqualification.” He checked his watch. “We re doing water starts today, so you can head out there now. Soon as the green flag goes up, you can start to surf. It’s a fifteen-minute heat. We’ll give you an air horn and yellow flag when there are five minutes left.”

  The six contestants hit the water. Two of the kids, one in pink and the other in white, started to paddle hard, as if they were in a race. Spazzy started after them, afraid they might get a head start.

  “Hey,” Kai called in a low voice, trying not to attract the other surfers.

  Spazzy turned back. “Yeah?”

  “Don’t waste your strength,” Kai said. “It’s a water start. They won’t raise the green flag until we’re all out there. Those guys are just burning adrenaline.”

  Spazzy slowed down. “Thanks.”

  The six surfers got outside. The air horn blew and the green flag went up. Almost immediately, pink and white tried to get rides on waves that were going nowhere. Kai had a feeling that unless one of them got incredibly lucky, those two weren’t going to be much to worry about.

  A set came in, and navy blue caught a wave and did a snap with a nice spray, then tried to get into the pocket again but ran out of juice. Kai knew he’d be a contender. The next wave in the set was rearing up, and both Spazzy and Kai were close enough to take it.

  “Go on,” Kai said.

  Spazzy paddled into the wave and popped up. The wave looked like it might peel without sectioning, and rather than try a ride-ending trick, Spazzy wisely decided to go for distance and length of ride. Kai heard hoots and cheers from the beach.

  Another wave was coming and Kai and the remaining surfer, a kid wearing red, paddled for it. Kai was farther inside so it was his ride, but the other guy either didn’t see him or thought maybe he could steal the wave. With the kid blocking him and no room to go anywhere, Kai did a sharp bottom turn, went up vertical behind the other surfer and tried to get some air going over the lip. In no time his ride was over and he bailed. When his head came back out of the water, he could hear a voice distorted by a megaphone. He couldn’t make out the words, but he knew the meaning: The guy in red had just been disqualified.

  Since his ride had been cut short, Kai didn’t have far to paddle to get outside again. By now Spazzy had come back from his long ride.

  “Too bad that guy dropped in on you,” Spazzy said. “Looked like a nice wave.”

  “That’s life,” Kai said. “Looked like you had a good ride.”

  “Good? You mean great,” Spazzy said. “I really lucked out.”

  Another set was coming in. “See if you can do it again,” Kai said.

  “You sure?” Spazzy asked. “I already got one.”

  “So get another,” Kai said.

  Spazzy took off on the first good w
ave. This one looked like it might close out ahead of him, so he threw some spray with a snap, then tried to scoot around in front of the breaking section in the hope of getting past it. The white water caught him and he bailed out.

  The other guys caught some waves, but didn’t do much with them. Then Kai took off on one and actually managed to get a half-decent cutback and tailslide out of it. Once again he heard hoots and cheers from the crowd on the beach.

  The air horn went off again. The green flag went down and the yellow went up. As if desperate for a last chance to prove themselves, pink and white grabbed the first waves that came along and again couldn’t do much with them. Spazzy caught another and smartly went for distance and duration again. Kai kept glancing at his watch, then at navy blue, and then the incoming waves. He and navy blue could almost read each other’s minds. Given the choice, they both wanted the last ride. It was like a game of dare. Who’d go first? But with only five surfers in the heat and three going for sure to the next round, Kai was already pretty certain Spazzy had made it and he had nothing to lose.

  A wave came. At the last second Kai spun around. It wasn’t that he was trying to fake out navy blue, but he wanted to take the wave late and the face steep, to get up enough speed to boost air. With the sound of the folding lip crackling in his ears, he took off and popped up, compressed into the bottom turn and launched off the lip, rotating as hard as he could, without a clue as to how he was going to land.

  It felt sort of between a one-eighty and a flip, and the amazing thing was, he actually landed on his board before pitching headfirst into the wash. When his head popped out, it was just in time to hear the final air horn and see the yellow flag come down and the red one come up.

  The first heat was over.

  Forty-two

  Kai started to paddle in. The six entrants in the next heat were already on their way out. Lucas and Sam had been thrown together with four other surfers Kai had never seen before. As Kai passed Lucas, he said, “Good luck.” Lucas scowled back. To Kai it was an insight into how the guy’s brain worked. Everything was either black or white, friend or enemy, good or bad. There was nothing in between.