Chapter 2
(Robbie)
Forty-seven years old and still chasing the perfect wave, and why not when I’d given up on chasing everything else?
Perfect career.
Perfect family.
Perfect love.
Yeah, that last one had kicked my ass so many times that I’d stopped believing in its existence. Years ago, I’d decided that living up to the beach bum label my extremely estranged family had slapped on me was the only thing I’d ever be moderately successful at.
I lived comfortably, woke to the ocean every morning, and occasionally entered a surf competition for nostalgia’s sake. I made my living, if one could even call it that, through instructional videos on surfing techniques and the private lessons I gave to tourists.
It helped that my name and the reputation I’d eked out on the professional surfing circuit still carried a lot of weight around here.
I’d been gifted countless boards in the hope that I’d feature them, and drop a plug for their makers in one of my videos.
Or be photographed shredding on one. I still did a few spreads a year for different magazines, which meant there was never a shortage of customers waiting to pay for my time.
I was part of a three-person commentary crew for several of the local surfing competitions and occasionally took a mic down to the sands to speak with some of the competitors about their rides.
Basically, I was a bit of a local celebrity, which meant that I got to live my life immersed in the ocean I loved when I wasn’t looking for ways to ride it.
Adrenaline junkie.
I’d been called that many times. Thrill seeker, risk taker, I’d nearly lost my life twice.
Once when a wave had rolled me into an underground cave and once when I’d gotten stung by a particularly nasty breed of jellyfish off the coast of Australia.
That’s when I’d discovered that damn near everything over there really was trying to kill you. Or at least had the ability to.
I don’t know what made me look away from the horizon and onto the beach, but I did, shocked to discover a lone figure seated in the sand.
From my vantage point, I couldn’t tell if they had a board with them that they were waxing, though it was kind of late to catch more than a handful of rideable waves.
Still, I’d had days where I raced the sunset to catch as many as possible, so I wouldn’t begrudge them a few if they paddled out.
Movement out of the corner of my eye drew my attention back to the waves, and I saw one building in the distance.
In a flash I started paddling, arms cutting through the water, eyes never leaving the swell of the wave.
Raising up on the back of my board was so fluid at this point in my life, I didn’t even have to think about it.
It was like there was some mental link connecting my body to the water, so it instinctively knew what to do.
When I dropped in to catch a tube and the lip curled over my head, I followed the light to the end, fingertips cutting a swath across the crest before I slipped out the back end.
The figure on the shore was still there, and now that I was closer, I could see that they didn’t have a board with them.
Just a toy shovel and car, a small plastic bucket, shoes they’d kicked off haphazardly and wild hair blowing in the breeze.
It looked thick, with golden highlights that glittered whenever the waning sunrays hit it.
I loved sinking my fingers into heavy strands perfumed with the essence of seawater, tugging, listening to my partner moan.
Look at me, still clinging to a hint of my poetic soul after all. Shocking with how many failed relationships I’d had. If there was one thing I seemed to have a true talent for, it was picking the wrong one.
There were several cases of “it’s not you, you’re awesome, just not who or what I’m looking for” moments, resulting in many close and treasured friendships once we came to the mutual understanding that our tastes didn’t quite line up.
That was a plus at least. It was just hard to find someone who truly wanted the same dynamic I craved.
Some said they did, but it had turned out that they only really wanted it in the bedroom.
Others claimed to be interested, but just in dabbling from time to time, maybe with some soft handcuffs or a light spanking scene.
That’s cool and all if that was their preference, but it hadn’t really worked for me.
I was looking for a boy that wanted to call me Daddy and would let me spoil him, one who wanted to spend his days on the sand with me and his nights in my arms. The problem was that I was shit at the dating and romance part that was supposed to lead up to that point.
I’d be in real trouble if the exes of the past ever decided to band together and form a club and mockup I survived a ride on the Rogue Wave t-shirts.
Enough of them knew one another that it was a very real possibility it could happen one day, especially if enough of them got upset about me refusing to take any of the dating advice they tried to give.
Now that I really thought about it, that t-shirt wouldn’t be a half-bad marketing idea.
Maybe I’d have a few printed up since I’d finally come up with several other merch ideas to help promote my instructional videos.
I could add them to the tier three boxes; those already came with five new videos and step-by-step instructions, both drawn and recorded, to help them master the tricks and techniques easier.
The best part was that since there were beginner and advanced versions of each technique, as well as several steps to master in the middle, it would take a while before I ran out of things to teach.
I had the ocean and her endlessly unpredictable ways to thank for that.
My sweet mistress knew what to do to keep a man on his toes.
There I went with the poetics again, but dammit all, I didn’t think that was too big of an ask.
I didn’t want a few stolen hours in the evening, exhaustion, slurred words, and passing out before ten; I wanted someone who looked forward to moonlit walks at midnight and sneakily baked treats for road snacks, just in case we decided to go on an impromptu excursion.
I wanted spontaneity and all the fireworks of first love.
I wanted what I’d never gotten to have as a teenager, when most discovered their soul-encompassing first crush and sobbed into their friends’ pillows following the inevitable breakup.
For as much as I’d wanted to be out, that hadn’t happened for me until I’d come to Maui and been served with papers declaring that I’d been disinherited.
As far as I was concerned, that was the best thing that could have ever happened to me.
It pushed me to devote myself to my craft and travel the world, entering and winning enough surf competitions that sponsors had rolled in and that amount I was set to inherit had turned into no big loss.
In the type of family I’d grown up in, you learned about financial matters early, with information about stocks, trading, and development being drilled into our heads the way other parents quizzed their kids on the alphabet.
We were groomed to excel in both school and sports, though I’d soon learn, not long after taking up surfing, that there was a pre-approved list of acceptable sports that riding waves had not been on.
I could still see my father’s sneer during our first family vacation here, as I’d stood beside the new local friend I’d made, clutching a borrowed board.
“Do not let your grandfather see you with that thing,” he’d hissed.
I knew he’d had plenty more that he wanted to say if he hadn’t heard my grandfather’s voice growing louder as he headed our way.
I’m sure I could guess how that lecture would have turned out if he’d had the chance to give it.
McKay’s don’t ride surfboards. Fortunately, what my grandfather had to tell him proved to be far more scandalous than me running around trying to catch a few waves and pick up the local slang.
Now I was considered a local, and Robbie McKay of the Portsmouth McKay’s, formerly of Inverness by way of the very grandfather my old man had been so worried about, no longer existed outside of the old family bible.
Gram-Gram would never have allowed anyone to deface that.
Pretty sure the rest of them had done their level best to erase me following the disinheritance, especially as my face and name started appearing everywhere.
Even more so once Rogue Wave was added to it, but that was a story for a whole other time.
The McKay’s of Portsmouth had been much too formal for me.
I never was very fond of fancy or standing on ceremony just to be seen looking stern and rigid.
The old man had always claimed it was about breeding and reminding folks that you came from a noble line.
All I ever saw it as was being snobby, just like living in a house on snob row.
It was little more than an endless stream of sterile dwellings cleaned by the underpaid.
I preferred a bit of sand here and there, especially if it was deposited from in between the toe beans of the cat who allowed me to share its home.
There was another wave waiting; I just knew it, even while remaining steadily aware of the figure still lingering on the beach.
Were they watching me? Shading a hand over my eyes, I could just make out the motion of him lifting something to his lips.
Ahh, a picnic for one. I’d had my fair share of those over the years.
I decided to leave him to it then, even as my stomach let out a little rumble, reminding me that I hadn’t eaten since lunch.
One more wave, just one more, and I’d look to fill my empty belly, perhaps with a trio of cocktails. Shrimp, crab, and a whiskey sour. Those always went down smoothly, especially if Birdie was making them. I think she was working tonight.
She was if it was Friday.
Was it Friday?
I think it was Friday. Shit, losing track of days was easy with the life I led.
The last wave was a bit of a gnarly one, and I wiped out before completing the ride.
As I emerged, I caught sight of the man watching me, bathed in red-gold hues and shadows, his expression impossible to make out.
For a moment I wondered if he’d been worried when I’d taken that spill, then dismissed the thought as highly unlikely.
It hadn’t even been that big of a wipe out.
I was hit with the tantalizing aroma of spicy, pungent seafood broth from the bowl they held. The moment I smelled it, I knew just what they’d ordered and had a very good idea of where they’d gotten it from too. The same place my grumbly stomach demanded we go.
“Nasty spill. Are you okay?” He asked as I strode from the water a few feet to the left of him.
His voice had a rich timber to it and a hint of an accent I couldn’t place.
Not Southern or New England, but definitely not California or anywhere else on the West Coast. Somewhere in the Midwest, maybe, which wasn’t a place I was very familiar with.
I tended to avoid landlocked states while feeling sorry for those stuck so far from my beloved ocean.
“Naa,” I said, straightening my spine and squaring my shoulders. “That’s pretty typical for bad dismounts on this beach.”
“Bad dismounts, huh? Is that what they’re called? Reminds me a little of bull riding without all the stomping hooves.”
“Waves stomp just as hard and heavy as hooves; trust me, you don’t want to be smashed by a mammoth, especially if you’re not used to taking hits.”
“The only hits I enjoy are the occasional ones I take after a long, frustrating day at work, to wipe the memories of the office from my brain.”
“If they are the kinds of hits I’m thinking of, I’ve been known to enjoy a few myself, without the prompting of a desk job, no offense. Life wasn’t meant to be lived behind walls.”
He chuckled, though I detected a hint of bitterness in his tone.
“You’ll hear no arguments from me about that,” he replied. “Buildings are dreary, and time passes much too slowly. Unfortunately, the only good job I could find after college happens to be in one.”
“What’s your field?”
“Video marketing, but since nothing was available when I was job hunting, I landed in the social media advertisement department, which is a whole different beast. Kind of like your waves. They vary a lot more than I care for. I’d rather spend my time working with a videographer and creating storyboards for shoots. ”
“Have you ever shot on the beach?”
“For a school project once, I designed one for sunscreen and cast a few people from the theater department to help me shoot it. It wasn’t a beach like this one, though. It was a manmade one surrounding a lake near my school.”
“And where was that?”
“Minnesota.”
Well, at least I’d pegged the accent right. My stomach picked that moment to remind me that I still hadn’t fed it yet, so I tucked my board beneath my arm and gave him a wave.
“Time for me to dip and find some food, Minnesota. I hope to see you around. You picked a good spot for a picnic; unfortunately, the smell of it is making me hungry. Too bad you didn’t pack for two; I would have loved to stick around and shoot the shit with you about all the benefits of having an outdoor office. ”
“Next time then,” he replied. “And it’s Nova. Nova Jenson, not Minnesota.”
“Robbie McKay,” I said before turning and heading up the sand.
“As in Robbie Rogue Wave McKay?”
“The one and only,” I called back as I continued walking away, though it did send a surge of pleasure through me over the fact that he knew my name.
Beach fame was one thing, which just left me wondering how an office dweller in a landlocked state had come to know anything about me. But more so, I hoped to make that next time a reality and would if he came back to my beach.
Look at me, claiming it like I owned even a single grain of sand.
Only it was mine in every way that mattered, though I sure as hell wished I had someone to share it with.
When the thought popped into my head, I knew I had to pursue it, though I rarely surfed off the same spot two days in a row.
I might not chase things anymore, but I’d mastered the art of putting myself in the position to be caught.