2. 4
Julia gaped at them. “You just have these lying around?”
“I’m taking the shots now. Start them right now. After a week, you’re good to go. Then you’ll have to get your own prescription.” She went to her desk, retrieved her wallet. Handed Julia a card. “Go to this clinic. If you need money, let me know.”
Julia held the packet and the card by the corners, as if they were contaminated.
Alison put her hand on her arm. “It’ll probably hurt the first time. And you may bleed.”
This was all just too surreal. Julia fled upstairs to the sanctuary of her room and her aquarium.
Saturday morning, Julia and Alison got up early and loaded a cart full of aquarium supplies, soft food, blankets, CDs, books, and whatever else they could think of that might be of comfort to their uncle.
Their grandmother took them aside in the entrance and said, “Just to prepare you, he looks a bit odd. The doctor says he has fluid on his abdomen because of the cancer on his liver. It makes it harder for him to eat. ”
They steeled themselves for anything. Uncle Rob leaned back in his easy chair in the living room, thinner than ever, yet with his stomach oddly swollen. But he smiled brightly when they wheeled their cart in.
“What’s all this?”
“A Dunphy-sized care package,” said Alison cheerfully. “Books, CDs, videos, everything your heart could ever desire. And food. Lots and lots of food.”
“I’m afraid most of that food will go to waste,” mused Rob.
“We’ll just see about that,” Julia’s grandmother said cheerfully, taking the containers of food and carrying them with her into the kitchen.
“Good God, woman; there you go again, force feeding me like a goose,” Rob called after her. When she was gone, he added to Julia and Alison, “Not that I have much liver left to paté.”
They cringed at his gallows humor. To hide her face, Julia began gathering up the aquarium supplies.
Sensing her discomfort, Rob tried a change of subject. “You have a big birthday coming up soon. Any crazy plans?”
Julia forced a perky tone of voice. “Nothing crazy. Alison has threatened to take me to a club of some kind. And I’m going out to the Farallones.”
“Oh, I’m glad you found a way to pay for it, after all.”
Julia shook her head. “A friend of mine has an uncle who’s a fisherman, and we’re taking his boat.”
Rob’s eyes widened. “Is that safe?”
“It’s no more unsafe than any other trip out there.”
Rob considered for a moment, then shrugged. “Well, it’s nice of your friend’s uncle to take you all on his boat, just for that.”
“I got the impression that his uncle will be working at the same time.”
Rob looked confused, then smiled slightly. “ His uncle. Oh.”
Julia gave him the stink eye. “He’s just a friend.”
“He’d love for it to be something more,” grumbled Alison, “but Julia’s not going to do anything about it.”
“Why on earth not?” asked Rob .
“She claims you told her she should not let love get between her and her goals in life.”
“I’m sure I said no such thing.”
“Not exactly like that,” sighed Julia. “You said something like you wished you had not put your own dreams on hold for so long.”
“I also said I didn’t regret a single day I spent in that aquarium shop with Tim. And it’s true.” Rob took Julia’s hand. “Don’t be afraid of love. And don’t compromise. If it’s meant to be, the details will work themselves out.”
“That’s exactly what I told her,” said Alison, “pretty much word for word.”
“I don’t know if I believe in ‘meant to be,’” Julia mused.
Rob seemed to consider something for a moment. “Julia, you know where my crystal collection is, don’t you? Will you go and get it for me?”
Inside a cabinet in his bedroom, she found a small case with numerous little drawers. It was heavy for its size, but still manageable. She carried it out to the living room and set it on the table, next to all of his bottles of prescriptions.
He opened the drawers and picked through them. After a minute’s search, he pulled out a small, colorful object.
“Watermelon tourmaline,” he said. “That ought to do the trick.”
He waved Julia over and placed the small, polished cross section into her palm. She immediately saw how it got its name. It had a pink inner section, surrounded by a circle of white, surrounded in turn by an outer ring of green. Just like a slice of watermelon.
“How is this supposed to do the trick?” she wondered.
“You make your own magic. This will help.”
Julia was used to her uncle’s eccentricities. He kept a cauldron in his bedroom, for instance. But she carefully wrapped the stone in a napkin and placed it in her pocket, anyway. She would put it on the knick-knack shelf in her room. If nothing else, it would remind her of him when he was gone.
Rob turned to Alison. “What about you? How’s your love life?”
“Swinging as usual.”
Rob smirked because he knew she meant it more or less literally. “Who’s the latest iteration? ”
“His name’s David. He’s a waiter at the restaurant. But I’m bored with him.” As if for emphasis, she yawned. “He works all the freaking time, and now that I don’t work there anymore, he calls to check up on me about ten times per day.”
Rob raised an eyebrow. “I don’t like the sound of that. Why is he checking up on you?”
“I guess he knows I have a short attention span.” At the look on Rob’s face, she added, “Don’t worry, Rob. You know me. Guys are like wild animals – they have more to fear from me than I do from them.”
Rob’s brow still furrowed with concern, but he knew as well as Julia did that her boast was not far from the truth. Rob reached out for both of them, and they each took one of his hands.
A keen energy radiated through the over-large eyes within his shrunken face. “You’re not off the hook just because I give up the ghost. You know me; I’ll find some way to come haunt you. So I don’t ever want to see you settle for anything less than everything. Just do me a favor, and believe that you deserve it.”
Tears stung Julia’s eyes. To hide them, she buried her face in Rob’s shoulder. He put his hand on Julia’s back and said, “Good God, girl, don’t develop a flair for melodrama now. I really will feel like a failure.”
Julia and Alison both gave shaky laughs. Rob pulled Julia away from his shoulder.
“Hang on to that stone. You won’t lose it, will you?”
Julia shook her head. “I promise.”
The last Saturday in September was one of those Indian summer days when it was 85 degrees in the city. Anxious to take advantage of what would probably be the last decent beach day of the year, Julia begged her parents for the day off.
Afternoon found Julia surveying herself critically in the mirror in her new pink bikini. Alison gave a wolf-whistle as she rounded the corner into Julia’s room.
“I think it looks even hotter on you here than it did in the fitting room! ”
“Well, if it doesn’t, it’s too late now. It took half the morning just to find one with a top that doesn’t fall off of me.”
Alison, who could not commiserate with a lack of curves, grinned and rumpled Julia’s hair. “Are you ready to go? People will be showing up by now.”
Julia nodded.
“Bring some warm clothes,” suggested Alison. “We’re staying past dark and building a bonfire.”
Julia held up her beach bag, already packed with warm clothes. “But I don’t know how late I can stay. I’m supposed to meet William at his uncle’s fishing boat at four o’clock in the morning. What about David? Is he coming?”
“No, he has to work. Bastard.”
Julia put on her swim cover and sandals, and together they headed the few blocks down to the beach. Alison skipped ahead of Julia a few feet, child-like, her peroxide-blond hair bouncing along with her, before waiting for Julia to catch up. Crossing the Great Highway and climbing the dunes, the powerful waves rose into view, crashing with less violence than usual onto the shore.
It was a rare tolerably warm day on the beach, and the water glimmered all the way to the horizon. Bodies packed the sand. It took a long time for them to spot Alison’s friends and then to find an open spot of sand nearby to spread their belongings.
“Where’s Holly?” Julia wondered, looking around for their cousin.
“Are you kidding? She’s not slummin’ it down here with us,” replied Alison. “She’s up at Pacheco Beach.”
Without any further ado, Alison ripped off her swim cover and, in some masochistic ritual, ran to plunge her body in the frigid water. She surfaced with her arms outstretched and a scream of pure joy, and her friends followed her lead, as people were inclined to do.
Safely installed on her beach blanket with no one to talk to, Julia contented herself with people-watching. Surfers in abundance rode the waves. A group nearby played an impromptu game of beach volleyball. Children dug for buried treasure and built sand castles. In the distance, hang-gliders floated in the air, having launched from Fort Funston. She watched them lazily for a while .
“Look who’s here.” Her sister’s voice jarred her from her reverie.
Julia’s eyes followed to where her sister pointed. It took a few moments, but she gave a start of recognition. Only a few blankets away sat William, his knees drawn up to his chest, engaged in a similar game of solitary people-watching. She had not recognized him at first because he sat with his back to her, and because an enormous black tattoo spanned his shoulder blades.
“Is that really William?” She would never in a million years have imagined him with a tattoo of any kind, let alone of that size.
“Go see for yourself.”
Julia looked suspiciously at her. “Did you invite him?”
Alison laughed. “If I could take credit, I would. But everybody and their dog is here today.”
Julia sprang to her feet and sneaked up behind him.
“What is this?”
He turned and looked startled to see her. She had the awkward sensation of watching his eyes flicker involuntarily down her body before he forced himself to look away.
“What is what?” he mumbled.
“You have a tattoo?”
“Oh.”
“Well, you are just full of surprises, aren’t you? What is that, a seagull?” She knelt down for a closer look. “Oh no, it’s an albatross, isn’t it?”
He nodded.
“An albatross in a cage. What’s that all about?”
“If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”
“Oh! Well then, tell me and kill me quickly.”
“My brother drew it.”
Julia dared to tap it with her finger. “Your brother drew that ?”
“He’s very talented.”
“And you let him do it to you?”
“I didn’t let him ink me. I’m not suicidal.”
She looked at it again. It was very finely detailed; she could see the feathers on the albatross’ wings and the hinges in the cage. And now that she was really looking, the cage looked more like a jail that the bird struggled to escape. The head was turned in profile with the beak open and the wings outstretched between the bars of the cage.
“When did you get this?”
“About a year ago.”
She feigned shock. “That sounds dubiously underage to me.”
“This is my brother we’re talking about here. He has connections.”
She grinned facetiously at him and said, “You are a very bad boy.”
He looked both amused and embarrassed, and clearly had no idea how to reply.
“We’re sticking around on the beach until after dark, building a bonfire,” she said. “I’ll need someone to keep me company while everyone else smokes pot. Don’t tell me you have something better to do.”
“Are we still going on my uncle’s boat tomorrow?”
“Why wouldn’t we?”
“If we do this, we’d be lucky to get a couple of hours of sleep, at the most.”
“That’s what God created coffee for.”
He smiled a bit. “I don’t have any warm clothes with me. I’ll have to go home first. And I’ll only stay if I can keep my brother with me.”
He looked in the direction of the impromptu volleyball game, where for the first time she noticed his brother, nailing a serve and leering at every woman under the age of fifty who passed. For that matter, his sister Kelly was there, too. She wondered why she hadn’t noticed them earlier. Mike certainly stood out with his shirt off, with most of his torso and both of his arms wrapped in brightly colored tattoos.
“If you must,” Julia conceded. “But if you don’t return, I’ll come hunt you down.”
He got up to go talk to his brother. Free to stare unobserved as much as she liked, she watched his bird in a cage disappear into the distance.
“That is so fucking hot,” said Alison when he was out of earshot. “I felt sure you two were going to drop right there on the sand and bump uglies.”
“Jesus, Alison, I’m blushing. ”
“What? I would have done it myself if I weren’t so conscientious of our sisterly affection. Looks like we’re not the only ones, either.”
Julia looked around. It was true; a lot of other girls were watching him.
“He has no idea, does he?” mused Alison. “That’s so refreshing. He hasn’t been hot long enough for it to go to his head. You’re a lucky girl.”
“Why am I a lucky girl?”
“Oh, come on. Don’t tell me you didn’t notice. He had to carry his towel in front of him when he stood up.”
“You’re vile.”
“You’re the one panting over him like a bitch in heat.”
“Oh my God, I can’t take it anymore. His brother is over there; go talk to him. I think you’re soul mates.”
Alison looked over at Mike, as if really considering it. “Very well. But remember, Julia; if you want this to happen, you’re going to have to make the first move. He’s not going to do it.”
She bounded away to insert herself into the volleyball game beside Mike. Julia resumed her seat on the beach blanket and tried to watch, but her mind and body were occupied with other feelings. To clear her head, she decided to get up and join her sister and Mike on the side opposite Kelly. William’s sister was an intense competitor, but Julia had length of bone to her advantage. After she spiked the ball over the net to win the game, Mike high-fived her and Kelly seemed to look at her with new respect.
She scanned the beach behind her, and to her surprise found William had already returned with all of his stuff. He sat on his towel, watching them. She flashed him a smile and waved him over, but he shook his head, so she went to kneel down beside him.
“Come play; your sister needs another teammate.”
“I’m not much of a joiner.”
She gave him the stink-eye. “What does that even mean? You joined our little beach bonfire party.”
“You’d just make me look bad,” he said mildly.
“Are you in?”
Julia jumped at her sister’s voice beside her. Alison gestured toward the volleyball net. “The next game is about to start. ”
“No thanks; I think I’ll keep William company.”
Alison didn’t try to argue, even though it meant certain defeat for her side of the net. She bounded away again, and Julia and William sat together in silence for a while, watching the others play.
“I get it now,” she said.
“Get what?”
“The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. You said you liked Coleridge. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is about a sailor who kills an albatross and curses his ship. He has to wear the albatross around his neck.” She gestured to his tattoo. “Your albatross is in a cage. You’re trying to contain a curse, and it’s about to escape.”
“It’s a good guess.”
“Oh, come on. I don’t know about any other girls, but you’re not going to score points with me by being mysterious.”
“I’m not trying to score points with you.”
“Oh, now that’s a tough one. I could act nonchalant and pretend not to care. Or I could stomp off in a huff. Or I could just come right out and say, ‘What’s the matter? Aren’t I worth scoring points with?’”
He smiled and said, “I just mean it’s kind of private.”
“If it’s so private, then why do you have it on display for the whole world to see?”
“Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, it’s hidden.”
“Well, I guess today is just my lucky day.” She rose to her feet. “If you’re not going to play fair, then I’m going to rejoin the volleyball game. At least maybe they will.”
By the time she had played another few games, it was getting cooler on the beach, and the crowds were thinning out. People had started pulling out their warmer clothes and putting them on over their swim suits. After the sun set, some of Alison’s friends built a bonfire, burning pallets stolen from the Safeway store, and Julia spread her towel beside William on the sand.
Somebody had brought a jam box and popped in a Pavement CD. Forties emerged from previously hidden caches. Someone even produced a guitar, which Mike commandeered and began tuning. Julia was surprised when he played quite competently and sang “I Want To Be Sedated” in a good tenor voice .
After struggling to sing the first stanza over the roar of the ocean, Mike put his hand over the strings and called out, “Will, help me out here!”
William shook his head.
“Oh, come on!” cried Mike. Looking at Julia, he added, “You wouldn’t know it, but this loser here has a great singing voice. Used to write songs all the time.” Turning back to William, he goaded, “What’s the matter, Will? Do I make you feel inadequate?”
“I used to wish I could sing, until I heard you. Now I just wish you could sing,” retorted William.
Mike grinned at him before plunging back into the song again. His energy was infectious. The rest of the group began singing, then practically shouting along as they really got into it. When the song was over, everyone cheered and begged for more. Mike plunged into his rendition of Sweet Home Alabama. Julia joined in too, and nudged William by leaning into his arm. William smiled, but still declined to contribute his voice.
Alison, sitting on the other side of Julia, threw a handful of sand at William. “Jesus, dude, you’re a freaking stick-in-the-mud!”
William flushed red and stared into the bonfire. Alison scoffed and went to flop down beside Mike. Julia would have felt sorry for William, but his inexplicable reticence bemused her as well. She turned her back on him and plunged into the chorus of Sweet Home Alabama with more gusto than ever.
After a while, William said, “I’ll be right back.” Julia watched him retrieve a couple of bottles of beer from the previously hidden source. When he came back, he held one up and raised his eyebrows by way of offering one to Julia.
She smiled and accepted. He opened it, handed it to her, and sat down beside her.
“Cheers,” she said, clinking her bottle against his. They each took a swig.
“So you sing and write songs, too?” she asked when Mike had finished Sweet Home Alabama.
“Used to.”
“You used to do a lot of things. Are you sure you’re not still sneaking around, writing poems and songs and singing when no one’s looking?”
“I do still, sometimes.”
“Ah! The truth comes out.”
Mike had moved on to “Blister in the Sun” at the request of Alison, who knelt behind him and hung about his neck and shoulders. Julia turned to William and said, “I would like nothing better than to hear you sing right now.”
But still, William shook his head. She shrugged and turned back toward Mike, singing badly at the top of her lungs. When she glanced back occasionally at William, she found him staring down at the sand, digging little trenches with a stick.
She was all but ready to scrap any plans she may have had to make a move on him tonight.
Mike exhausted his repertoire and the jam box took over again. Somebody passed around a joint. Julia declined, and he offered it next to William, who also declined.
“Would you have done it if I hadn’t sworn you to be my comrade in sobriety?” she asked when the joint-passer moved on.
“Probably not, honestly. I’ve been trying to stay away from it for a while now.”
“Oh, so not only have you tried it, but you’re a reformed pothead.”
“With brothers like mine?”
“O, ye of little resistance.”
“I’ve resisted a lot of what my brothers have offered me.” He poked her on the arm with his beer bottle. “What about you?”
“You mean have I tried it? No, I really haven’t. I’m so allergic to cigarette smoke, I’m afraid to even try. So don’t scorn me; it’s just pure self-preservation that’s kept me on the straight and narrow.”
He took a swig of his beer. “It’s probably all a load of bullshit, but the whole gateway drug thing panned out in my brothers’ case. Of course, they probably would have gone on to the harder stuff even if pot never existed.”
“The harder stuff?”
“My brother Jimmy is a meth head. That’s the real reason he started stealing cars. ”
“Really?” Julia sat stunned for a moment. “Did Mike ever have a problem with drugs?”
“He at least messed around with it quite a bit. For now, his passions seem to be alcohol and tobacco. And tattoos. And women. We’re an addictive family. If it’s not a substance, it’s work, or something else.”
Julia shook her head. “You and him – brothers? It doesn’t compute.”
He peered sharply at her. Looked away again, and took another swig of his beer.
“Out with it, man,” she prompted.
“He’s not as bad as you think,” he said. “I watch his back these days because he watched mine once.”
Her eyebrows lifted. “What do you mean?”
“He and Jimmy used to run together. For the longest time, Mike did whatever Jimmy told him to do. But the older Jimmy got and the more addicted to meth he became, the meaner he got. Mike has never been one to run away from a good fight, but it’s just not in his nature to be cruel, any more than it is in mine.”
He stopped here. Gently, she prompted, “What happened?”
He stared ahead into the bonfire. “When I was twelve, I was pretty much a little shrimp who liked to write poetry and songs, and cook, and play with cameras. It just didn’t quite jive with what Jimmy thought a guy should do, and he beat the shit out of me all the time, even though he was twice my size. Called me a fag, and a little cunt, and told me he’d better not catch me at it again. So I kept on doing my thing, but I learned to hide it. Periodically he’d come pick on me, knock me around a little bit. It went on like that for two years. Then, when I was fourteen, he finally caught me at it again. Dragged me out of the house by the hair and tore a chunk right out of my scalp. I have no idea what he was going to do to me, but he was tweaking so bad he was out of his mind. Mike saw it happening. By then he was big enough to stand up to Jimmy. He found my dad’s gun and came after us. He kept him off me from that point forward.”
Flabbergasted, Julia pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them. “Why didn’t you ever tell me this before? ”
He smiled wryly at her. “Why would I have ever told you a thing like that?”
Julia considered. “Fair enough. But it sure would have explained a lot about you.” She felt guilty for having judged him earlier. This sudden, intimate revelation unleashed a renewed flood of tenderness, even admiration. “How did you find the courage to keep doing your thing at all?”
“Sheer stubbornness. It’s a Quinn family trait,” he said with a rueful smile. “Plus, my grandmother. She supported me when no one else did. All of my mother’s family are very musical. I think the poetry and songwriting is just an extension of that.”
“Who put this grunge shit on?” Alison’s voice tore through their solitary confidences and brought them back to the group. She jabbed a button on the jam box, silencing the music and popping open the CD player.
“Damn straight,” called Mike. “Here, put this on.”
“The Replacements? You’ve got to be kidding me.” She flung aside his offering and said, “From now on, it’s DJ Alison, no requests taken.” She slammed another CD in and pushed play on Bjork.
“I kind of like grunge,” said William mildly after listening for a while. “I like The Replacements, too. But I guess they’re not my favorites.”
“They’re better than hairspray metal. I’m so glad that’s over now,” said Julia. It dawned on her to wonder, “What is your favorite?”
“I guess Led Zeppelin is probably my go-to for the moment. That, and Pink Floyd.”
Julia did not particularly like or dislike those bands. Come to think of it, she had never really paid them much attention.
“I like all kinds of music,” she decided to reply. “Except, apparently, hairspray metal. But other than that, when I say I like all kinds of music, I really mean it. Not a lot of people who say that really mean it.”
They listened to “Human Behavior” soaring out of the jam box. It was a fitting soundtrack to this stage of the night, when everyone was high or tipsy or both. The bonfire mellowed as well, and she found herself shivering. She stood to stir it a bit, and when it roared again, she flopped down beside William, as close as possible so that their arms pressed against each other. He did not flinch or try to pull away from her.
She turned to look at him, and he met her gaze a bit shyly.
“It’s pretty late,” he observed quietly.
She nodded, and knew they would have to part ways soon. But she was not ready to part ways with him, sleep be damned. She remembered her sister’s words, and decided to take a leap of faith.
She let her fingers wander. Let them crawl across the sand to brush against his fingertips.
He did not try to take his hand away. Though she looked straight ahead into the bonfire, she was blind to it. She let her hand slide across the top of his a bit more. Dared to stroke it with the tip of her thumb.
His fingers wriggled loose, then came to rest again, loosely intertwined with hers.
She dropped her eyes down between their bodies. Took in the proportions of his hand, the knuckles, the skin that was browner than hers, the nails trimmed short. Her pulse slammed in her ears at an unprecedented pace. She willed herself to look up into his face. To kiss him, if he would let her.
She heard tittering all around them, and snatched her hand away. When the tittering didn’t stop, she glanced around for the cause. Several people stared off to the left of where Julia and William sat. There, she spotted her sister. With Mike.
Apparently Alison had taken Julia’s suggestion about Mike a little too much to heart. They sat a ways off by themselves, but made no attempt to hide their passionate making out. As Julia watched in horror, Mike’s hand reached up Alison’s shirt.
Julia sprang to her feet and, without thinking, bolted to where her sister and Mike sat.
“Alison!”
Her sister either did not hear or ignored her, so Julia seized her by the arm and jerked her to her feet.
“What the hell?!” screamed Alison.
Julia dragged her sister away from Mike, ignoring the laughter that followed them from all sides. “You might want to get a rubber before you go any further with that one,” she whispered fiercely. “For that matter, you might want to gargle with Listerine a few minutes, too.”
“How the hell is this any of your business?” hissed Alison.
Julia dragged her back to her spot next to William and snatched up her belongings and Alison’s as well. William sat rooted to the ground, apparently incapable of action. Julia dared not look him in the eye.
“We’re going home,” snapped Julia.
“I am not!”
Julia whirled on her. “What about David?”
Alison glared.