The Gentlemen's Hour

23

Yeah, but he kind of gets Boyd.

He gets all the Mike Boyds and the Brads and the Jerrys.

A man works his ass off his whole life, putting up drywall on a house he could never afford, puts food on the table, clothes on his kids’ backs, and all he asks in return is the chance to ride a few waves. Like, he made that deal and it was a good deal, but then it changed as the water started to get clogged with yuppies, wannabes, dilettantes, and dot-com billionaires who can barely wax their own boards.

It’s not that they’re just taking his water, it’s that they’re taking his life. Without that Rockpile break, what he is is a drywaller, a roofer, a karate instructor in a strip mall. With that break, he’s a surfer, a Rockpile surfer, and it means something.

It does.

So what about the kids, the next generation that Boyd needs to keep in line? They have everything, they live in the houses that the Brads and the Jerrys work on. They have money, privilege, and futures (or used to have futures, nix that for Corey). What the hell are they about?

Why do kids from Rockpile emulate gangstas?

And why are you so pissed off about it? he asks himself as he drives south on the PCH, back toward PB. Because they turned to surfing, like you did, and found something different than you did? An aggressive localism? A crew? A tribe?

You have your crew, he tells himself, you have your tribe.

Dave, Johnny, Tide, even Hang.

Sunny, in absentia. And face it—it’s everything to you. Probably more than it should be.

Yeah, but you don’t go out killing people. You just go out and surf, talk some bullshit, have some laughs, bolt some fish tacos. Watch the sun set.

Good times.

So why didn’t Corey find that?

Maybe because you find what you look for.

What Boyd said about Corey Blasingame? Even in his own circle, the kid didn’t quite cut it. It was like he was trying to fill in this silhouette of what he thought he should be, but he couldn’t color inside the lines.

Boone’s cell phone rings.

Hang set it to play the first bar of Dick Dale’s “Misirlou.”

“S’Boone.”

“Boone—Dan. I have those records you asked for.”

“Cool,” Boone says. “Meet me on the pier.”

“Ten minutes?”

“Sounds right.”

Boone makes the rest of the drive back to Crystal Pier, parks the Deuce in the narrow slot by his cottage, and walks out to the end of the pier. Dan Nichols is already out there, leaning against the railing, staring out at the ocean. Something you probably do a lot, Boone thinks, if you suspect your wife is cheating on you.

Dan hands him the phone record and e-mail printouts.

“Did you look at them?” Boone asks.

“Yeah.”

“And?”

“Nothing jumps out,” Dan says. “No repeated calls to the same number, except to Melissa.”

“Who’s—”

“Her best friend.”

“Do me a favor?” Boone says. “Cross out

any

of these you can explain.”

“You could run the numbers, couldn’t you?”

“Yup,” Boone says, “any you don’t cross out. Trying to save me some time and you some cash.”

“Money isn’t my problem in life, Boone.” Dan looks sad, really beaten down. He runs down the sheet of phone numbers, crossing out line after line.

Boone says, “Dan, maybe this means you’re wrong about this. Which is, like, a

good

thing, you know?”

“I just

feel

it.”

“Okay.” He takes the records from Dan. “I’ll shout you.”

“Thanks.”

“De nada.”

Boone walks back to the office, hands the phone records to Hang. “Want to make a little extra jack?”

“Deeds.”

Surfbonics for “yes.”

“Run these phone numbers,” Boone says. “Names and addresses.”

“Moly.”

Momentarily.

Boone goes upstairs. Hang Twelve can not only make a computer sing, he can also make it perform Puccini arias standing on a basketball while juggling burning torches.

Cheerful is banging the adding machine.

“Didn’t have a chance to tell you,” Boone says. He shoves some old mags off his chair and sits down. “I took the Corey Blasingame gig.”

Cheerful doesn’t look happy. Which, of course, is his default setting anyway, but now he turns the color up on the unhappy dial. “I’m not sure that’s such a smart move.”

“It’s a macking dumb move,” Boone says. “Why I’m qualified.”

“Petra talk you into it?”

“Sorta.”

“It’s not going to make you very popular around here,” Cheerful says.

Boone shrugs. “Keep it to yourself for a while.”

Hang Twelve bounds up the stairs. “I zipped the Arabics, got tags and cribs for every sat reach-out—totally squeezy, tube blast—and went Amish for you. Foffed?”

Translation: I ran the numbers, Boone dude, and got names and addresses for every cell-phone call—it was really easy and very fast—and I printed out a hard copy for you. Happy?

“Mahalo.”

“Nurries.”

No worries.

“Late, yah?”

“Latrons.”

Hang bounces back down the stairs.

Boone looks at the printout. It has nothing to offer—calls to grocery stores, her masseuse, a boutique in Solana Beach . . . routine stuff with very few repeats. So if Donna Nichols has a lover, she isn’t communicating with him over the phone.

Sucks.

Now he’ll have to wait for Dan to go out of town and then follow her.