Lawless

by Ward, Tracey

  “You sure you don’t want a beer?” he asks, still smiling. “We’re about to roast some brats.”

  “No, I’m not hungry. Thanks.”

  He chuckles, lifting his board onto the roof of his car. “You don’t learn, do you?”

  “Learn what?”

  “Or maybe your memory is just shit.”

  “What are you talking about?” I ask, getting impatient.

  He finishes with his board and comes to stand next to me, his hand on the car beside my shoulder. His eyes boring down deep into mine. “I told you not to thank me again.”

  “Yeah, for saving my life,” I scoff. “Wait, is that why you didn’t answer my texts? Because I thanked you for the job?”

  “Twice.”

  “Oh my God, I’m so sorry,” I say sarcastically. “What a bitch. I thanked you for being nice.”

  “You shouldn’t have to thank a person for being decent.”

  I smirk up at him. “What if that person is indecent? Shouldn’t you thank them for acting outside the norm?”

  He laughs, running his free hand over his short hair. “Yeah, you’ve got a point.”

  “Don’t ignore my texts.”

  “You gonna keep sending them?”

  “I was going to send you one tonight but I figured you weren’t going to answer.”

  He lets his arm go slack, slipping closer until his weight is resting on his elbow and his body is so close to mine his swim trunks are dripping cold salt water on my feet. “What was your text going to say?” he asks, his voice lower than before.

  I smile, sidestepping away from him. But I’ve forgotten myself and I wince as my weight shifts. As my leg catches fire.

  His brow creases in concern. “What’s wrong? Your leg still?”

  “Yeah,” I mutter, smoothing my hand gently over my thigh as it throbs. “I had the stitches out today. Turns out I have an infection.”

  “How bad?”

  “It’s not bad, I’m fine.”

  “Did they put you back on antibiotics?”

  “Yeah. Stronger ones this time.”

  “Did they flush the wound again? Was there something stuck inside?”

  My hand freezes on my leg as I frown up at him. “How do you know all this stuff?”

  He gestures to his own leg. “The coral, remember?”

  “You had an infection too? Was some stuck inside?”

  “It’s pretty common. The ocean isn’t a great place to get hurt. She’s a dirty girl.” He opens his passenger door, gesturing for me to get inside. “Sit down. You shouldn’t be standing on it.”

  I don’t fight him because he’s right. Because just four hours ago a very stern man was very clear with me about taking it easy and I need to heed that advice, no matter how much I hate it.

  I sit down inside Lawson’s car, getting all of my appendages inside and feeling crazy weird when he closes the door for me like a gentleman. He goes around the back of the car, messes around in the trunk, and finally climbs inside behind the wheel.

  “Here,” he hands me a bottled water, dripping wet and freezing cold, “you look like you could use this.”

  “Thanks.”

  He pauses with his own drink a moment from his lips. His eyes are on me, hard and impatient.

  “Seriously?” I laugh. “I can’t thank you for anything?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  He smiles before taking a drink. “In the hospital it was because I have a problem with being thanked for things like that.”

  “Save lives a lot, do you?”

  “But now I’m giving you crap about it because it’s fun.”

  “For you, maybe.”

  He chuckles as he reaches into the backseat. The movement brings him over the center consul and into my space. His chest brushes against my shoulder and I take a sip of my water to appear casual when what I really am is twitchy.

  Lawson sits back in his seat before yanking a T-shirt over his head and pulling it down his torso. The shade is familiar and it takes me a second to realize the logo on the front is the same one painted on the window at Ambrose Surf.

  “So,” he begins, “what was the text going to say?”

  I point to his shirt. “That I can’t work there after all. My doctor wants me to take it easy and rest so I need to keep trying to find something here in town. I can’t drive an hour and back to work.”

  “Your doctor said you could work but not drive?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “What exactly did he say?”

  “I told you. He wants me to rest.”

  “And you think ‘rest’ means work?”

  I set my drink down in the cup holder hard, the cold water sloshing dangerously close to the open top.

  He holds up his hand. “Before you go off on me, can I tell you something?”

  “What?”

  “You’re hot.”

  I sigh. “Are you kidding me, dude? Are you ever not on?”

  “I’m not hitting on you,” he promises with a grin. “I’m telling you that that’s why they hired you at Ambrose. It’s a sausage fest down there. They were looking for a hot beach girl to spice things up. Pull in the high school guys. I told them I knew a beautiful girl with basic knowledge about boards who could count correct change. The second they saw you, you had the job.”

  “That is…not that much worse than how I thought I got the job anyway,” I reply unhappily.

  “You didn’t blow Don, did you? ‘Cause you did not need to do that.”

  “You’re gross.”

  “I’m not. A blowjob is a beautiful thing.”

  “Yeah, if you’re not the one with a nose full of ball hair.”

  “You’re blowing some unkempt bros.”

  “I’m not blowing anybody,” I groan. “Least of all the bald old guy with the ugly Hawaiian shirt in the back of a surf shop.”

  “You could do worse.”

  I ignore that entirely. “It doesn’t matter why they hired me. I can’t stand there at the register for an entire shift.”

  “Wear V-necks. They’ll let you sit on a stool and the guys can look down your shirt.”

  “Even if I were okay with that, I can’t make the drive. It’s too long.”

  “How many days a week?”

  “Four.”

  “I’ll drive you.”

  I stare straight ahead at the darkening horizon, my heart slowly rising in my throat. The blue-black water rolls toward the shore with glowing white tips that form and fade so slowly it’s like sleeping. It’s like a dream you can’t get your head around before it’s gone and you’re on to the next. It’s a dream I thought I understood.

  Then one day I woke up and it turned out to be a nightmare.

  “Rachel?”

  I jerk my head around to look at him. He’s concerned again, his eyes electric and strange in the low light. “Yeah?”

  “You spaced out there for a second.”

  “Sorry,” I laugh nervously. “I’m tired. Long day.”

  He reaches out and starts the engine. “Buckle up.”

  “What? No. Where are we going?”

  “To your house.” He pulls his seatbelt into place, snapping it securely. “I’m driving you home.”

  “Lawson, no, you can’t. My car is here.”

  “Give me your keys. I’ll get one of the guys to help me drive it back to your place later.”

  “I can drive.”

  “You shouldn’t have been doing it before and I’m sure you’re not supposed to be doing it now.”

  “It doesn’t mean I can’t,” I protest, bristling as he puts the car in reverse. I reach for the door but he’s already moving. “Stop, seriously.”

  “Buckle up, seriously.”

  “Stop the car.”

  “No.”

  “Lawson Daniel,” I snap, irritated.

  He grins. “I know you’re mad but I’m not watching you hobble across this lot to your car and drive
home in pain.”

  “Everyone needs to calm down. It’s not that big of a deal.”

  He slams on the brakes. The car jolts, throwing me toward the dash. I brace myself with my hands and my feet, crying out in uncontrollably when a band of pain wraps around my thigh and clenches it tightly.

  “You asshole,” I gasp, my throat closing tightly against the pain.

  “How big of a deal is it now?” he asks dispassionately.

  I turn my head to glare at him, stunned by his empty tone. When I see his face it’s even worse. It’s blank, all concern gone. “What is your problem?”

  “Quit acting like it didn’t happen,” he tells me firmly. “Quit acting like it’s no big deal. You could have died, Rachel. You could have drowned, you could have been eaten, you could have lost your entire fucking leg in the mouth of a shark.”

  “Shut up!” I shout, the words exploding out of me in a roll of rage I didn’t know I had in me.

  Lawson isn’t impressed by it. “It’s okay to be hurt and it’s okay to be scared, but you gotta get over it. You’re hurt in your head as much as you are in your leg and you can’t just act like it’s not happening and expect it to go away.”

  “What do you want me to do? Cry about it?”

  “Have you? Since it happened, have you cried?”

  “No.”

  “That’s messed up.”

  “Who are you to tell me how to feel?”

  That gets him.

  He hesitates, his eyes on mine but his thoughts are a million miles away. A million minutes to another time and another moment that I don’t understand because I can’t see it. Not the way he does.

  “You’re right,” he eventually answers quietly. “It’s not my business. But let me drive you home tonight at least.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I want to.”

  That’s all the answer he gives me and as it turns out it’s all the answer I need. If he’d said it was because I’m hurt and that I can’t drive myself, I would be out of that car so fast his head would swim. But he makes it so it’s not about me. He’s not doing me a favor so I don’t have to thank him – not that he’d let me anyway – but it saves my pride. That’s something I’m starting to realize is important to me. Something I’m pretty sure Lawson already knew.

  And for the second time that day it occurs to me that Lawson Daniel is more clever than anyone suspects.

  I sit back, buckle my seatbelt, and even though we don’t speak on the drive home, he convinces me to take him up on his offer. I agree to let him drive me to Malibu.

  Chapter Eight

  Two days later and Lawson is in my driveway again. It’s becoming a habit. A thing. A thing that doesn’t feel insane anymore and that’s what’s so damn freaky about it.

  “I feel bad about this,” I tell him, lowering myself carefully into Lawson’s car.

  He doesn’t help me but he waits until I’m inside before getting into his seat behind the wheel. When he turns on the engine cold air blasts blissfully from the vents, making me sigh in relief.

  My fever is gone but this summer is a scorcher. We’re only a week away from July and the temperatures are already kissing the underside of one hundred during the day and dropping down to the seventies at night if we’re lucky. It’s cooler down by the water and I hear from Katy that parties have been going on just about every night. I also hear that Lawson is always there and that he rarely goes home alone.

  “It’s no problem. I’m down there all the time anyway,” he promises me. “The surfing in Malibu is insane.”

  “Better than Isla Azul?”

  “Everything is better than Isla Azul,” he mumbles, backing out of my driveway and quickly pulling us away from my neighborhood.

  I’m grateful my dad is at work at the body shop. He wouldn’t be happy to see me in a car with Lawson, though I’m sure he’ll hear about it through the grapevine before we even make it out of town.

  I wonder, in the version he hears will I be wearing any underwear?

  I point to the roof of the car where I saw a surfboard strapped to the top. “What’s her name?”

  Lawson grins. “Didn’t I introduce you the other night?”

  “No. Super rude of you.”

  “Christa.”

  I wrinkle my nose. “Christa?”

  “What’s wrong with Christa?”

  “I don’t know. I think I prefer Layla, though.”

  “Yeah,” he agrees heavily. “Me too.”

  I sneak a glance at him. His tone is almost sad but his face is perfectly calm. At ease.

  “Why don’t you still use her?” I ask.

  He smiles, leaning his body to the left against the door and expertly driving us down the coast with one hand. “Aren’t you the one who gave me a hard time for surfing at all after what happened? Now you want me to use the same board I brought you to shore on?”

  “Like you care what I think,” I laugh. “You’re still surfing. Why not use the board you love?”

  “I told you. She’s retired.”

  “Because of me?”

  “Yeah.”

  I blink, staggered by the honesty of his answer. “I wouldn’t care if you used it. The idea doesn’t bother me.”

  “Of course it doesn’t,” he jabs under his breath.

  “What?”

  He looks at me briefly, appraising my expression, and decides to shift the gears on the conversation. “Look, it’s not a big deal. That board…” he laughs to himself, shifting his hand on the steering wheel. “You’re gonna make fun of me for this.”

  “For what?”

  “That board has a weird vibe now.”

  “I jinxed your board?”

  “Not you. Not specifically. More like that day.”

  “Does it have bad juju? Can you get a gypsy woman to lift the curse?”

  He shakes his head. “I knew you’d make fun of it.”

  “You’re being serious?”

  “I was, yeah.”

  “Sorry,” I apologize, trying to sound contrite.

  The truth is that I do get it. I understand that almost all athletes are at least a little bit superstitious, so it doesn’t exactly shock me that Lawson hung up the board I bled on. What’s throwing me for a loop is the ‘vibe’ comment. It’s a little earthy, a little too spiritual of a term for a guy I’ve always seen as nothing but a beer swigging, pot smoking, sex fiend. I’m still getting used to Lawson being a human being. He’s been a caricature to me for so long – a hot guy with a cocky grin, a board under his feet, beer in his hand, and a joint between his lips – that it’s hard to wrap my head around him being… I don’t know. Real, I guess.

  “It’s alright. Christa’s a good board,” he says with a shrug. “She’s solid. I’ll stick with her until I find another one like Layla.”

  “Does the board make that big of a difference? I mean, you’re crazy talented. I would think you could surf any board any time.”

  He looks at me sideways, his brows raised skeptically. “Can you play any piano any time, to perfection?”

  “Yes.”

  He laughs at my bold answer, the sound rough and rumbling in the small interior of the car. It swirls around me, coming in close. Pressing against me, edging out the cold air and warming my skin.

  “Alright, yeah, ‘cause you’re good,” he says, still chuckling. “But would you enjoy it? Can you love the music you’re making out of any piano anyone puts in front of you, or does it matter? If you were told the keys were real ivory and an animal was killed to make them, would you feel good about pressing them?”

  I sigh, relenting. “Yeah, you’re right. It would make a difference. I wouldn’t want to touch that piano. I definitely wouldn’t want to make music on it.”

  “And if you’re not loving it, then why do it?”

  “I’m surprised you knew I play piano.”

  He scoffs. “Come on, Rach, give me some credit. We’ve gone to school together since we were fiv
e. I know you play the piano. Shit, you played at graduation!”

  “You remember that?” I ask doubtfully.

  “It was only three years ago.”

  “Yeah, but I assumed you were baked out of your mind at the time.”

  He smiles, his throat constricting with a silent chuckle. “Unless Kermit the Frog really was our valedictorian, yeah. I was baked. But I remember you playing and I remember it being beautiful.”

  “What’d I play?”

  He briefly meets my eyes and my challenge head on. No hesitation. No doubts.

  “Today,” he answers confidently. “Smashing Pumpkins. Fucking. Beautiful.”

  I smile. “I can’t believe you remember that.”

  “Why not? You remembered that I was baked.”

  “You were always baked.”

  “And you were always being beautiful,” he replies quietly. Earnestly.

  It’s the second time he’s called me beautiful in as many days and, yeah, I’m counting. I’m trying to watch my back here. I’m in dangerous waters. Murky, uncharted waters, and I’m trying to see the sandbar this time before it’s too late.

  ***

  They give me a stool along with a tank top a size too small for me that says ‘Ambrose Surf’ across the front. It rides up to nearly my belly button and I’d tug it down to cover my midriff if that didn’t mean the top would pop right off my breasts. But I let it go because whatever. Seriously, that’s where I’m at with the whole job thing. With this summer in general. Whatever. I need the money and if I was a bartender or a waitress at one of these clubs here in Malibu, they’d be asking me to wear the same. Probably worse.

  The assistant manager, Marvin, sets me up at the register. He asks me if I’ve ever used a cash register before, I say I have, and he walks away. That’s my training. It’s a pretty laid back place and I notice right away that what it really is more than a store is a hang out. There are times all throughout the day that Marvin and the owner, Don, spend over an hour shooting the shit with customers about pretty much everything under the sun and in the surf. They swap stories, talk waves, and when a regular comes in for no other discernible reason than to say ‘what’s up’, they’re greeted at the door like Norm walking into Cheers.

  “Law!”

  He walks in slowly, one hand in the pocket of his cargo shorts, the other waving to the room of seven or so guys greeting him.