Chapter 11
Jon's house sat on the harbor side of the island, a hundred yards from the bar and a world away from it.
The porch faced the water. The steps went straight to the sand.
A blender lived on the railing next to a pair of salt and pepper shakers that had been there so long the labels had faded.
A cooler sat beside the door with the permanence of furniture.
Beck pulled in just after noon. He'd been invited. Jon had called that morning, not Kirstin. Just Jon. His voice easy and warm, the sound of a man who was already on his porch when he dialed.
"Come by the house around lunch. I'll make margaritas."
The gravel lot beside the house held Jon's truck and nothing else. A surfboard leaned against the garage wall, waxed and neglected. Fishing rods stood in a rack by the door, dusty, more decoration than equipment. A wind chime made of bottle caps turned slowly above the front steps.
Beck walked around the side. The harbor opened up, blue and flat, the docks visible in the distance. The air smelled like salt and warm wood and the faint sweetness of tequila. The blender had already been running.
Jon was on the porch. Barefoot. Board shorts.
A faded t-shirt with a hole near the collar he'd clearly decided wasn't worth fixing.
A Corona in his hand with the lime wedged in the neck.
He was sitting in a chair that had been sat in so many times the wood had molded to him.
The cushion was sun-bleached. The armrests were smooth from years of salt air and skin.
"I didn't call you over here to do the typical dad thing," Jon said. "Just figured we should know each other since we both love the same woman."
"We've only been seeing each other a month."
Jon smiled. Reached into the cooler beside him and pulled out a Corona, cold, dripping, and handed it to Beck.
"I run a bar. My currency is people. I know that girl better than anyone, and I may not know you, but the only people you two are fooling is yourselves."
Beck took the beer. He sat in the other chair. The wood creaked under him. The cushion was warm from the sun. The ocean was right there, twenty feet from the porch steps, steady and flat, the light on it so bright he had to squint until his eyes adjusted.
"Fair enough," Beck said.
A boat moved through the harbor, slow, trailing a wake that reached the shore a full minute later and lapped against the sand and disappeared.
A radio was playing somewhere inside the house, low, something with a steel drum and a guitar, the door propped open so the music drifted out and mixed with the water and the wind chime.
Jon took a long pull of his Corona. "How's the shoulder?"
"Getting better."
"Kirstin tells me you've been working with the kids at the facility."
"Tyler and Noah. They're good kids."
"Tyler's been coming into the bar since he was six. Used to sit at the counter and drink Shirley Temples and tell me about his batting stance." Jon shook his head. "Kid never stopped talking."
"He still doesn't."
Jon laughed. The sound was loose and easy and it carried across the porch and out over the sand. A pelican was working the shallows, diving and surfacing, diving and surfacing, unbothered by anything.
"She doesn't open up much, kid." Jon threw back another long pull of the midday Corona. "Honestly, I'm glad to see it. But that's my baby girl and I don't want to see her get hurt."
"I'm not going to hurt her, Jon."
"Nah, son," he said. "You're not the type to string a girl along. I can tell that already."
The shift from kid to son happened between two sips of beer. Beck felt it land.
"She doesn't want for herself," Jon said. He was watching the pelican. "If you're serious about my daughter, and I think you are, maybe you can get her to want something for herself. God knows I've tried."
Beck turned the Corona in his hands. The condensation ran down the glass and onto his fingers and dripped onto the porch boards, which were already stained with a decade of the same.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean she runs my bar. She runs it better than I ever did.
" Jon finished the Corona and set it on the railing beside two empties.
"She was fourteen when she started helping with inventory.
Fourteen. Better at math than me before she was in high school.
By the time she graduated college, the bar was hers whether either of us said it. "
"What did she plan?"
Jon looked at him. The ease was still in his face but something under it was steady. A father talking about his daughter to the man she was falling for.
"That's her story," Jon said. "She'll tell you when she's ready."
Beck nodded. Jon had drawn the line exactly where it belonged.
"Another beer?" Jon said.
"Yeah."
"Or we could switch to margaritas."
"It's one in the afternoon."
"It's one in the afternoon on a porch on a barrier island in Georgia." Jon stood and walked to the blender. "Margaritas."
He poured the tequila without measuring.
Lime juice from a bottle he kept in the cooler.
Ice from a bag that was melting in the sun beside the steps.
Triple sec from a bottle that lived behind the blender permanently, same as the salt shakers.
He hit the button. The blender screamed for ten seconds and Jon poured two glasses and handed one to Beck and sat back down.
The margarita was strong. Salt on the rim, lime on the edge, the tequila present and honest.
"That's good," Beck said.
"I've had practice."
The afternoon opened up. Jon made the first batch and Beck said it was good and Jon made a second batch and it was stronger.
They talked about the island, about the bar, about Ocala.
Jon wanted to know about the Ford in the garage and Beck told him and Jon said his first truck was a Chevy and it was terrible and he loved it.
They talked about fishing, which neither of them did, and agreed they should start, and both of them knew they wouldn't.
The sun moved across the porch. The shade shifted. The ice in the cooler melted further. Somewhere inside the house the radio moved from steel drums to something acoustic and the music came through the screen door and sat on the porch with them.
Jon told Beck about opening Sailor Jon's when Kirstin was four. The first year when he wasn't sure it was going to make it.
"Did you ever think about closing?" Beck asked.
"Every day that first year." Jon poured another margarita. "Best mistake I ever made."
The empties accumulated on the railing. The Coronas gave way to the margaritas and at some point Beck lost track of which round they were on. Jon Green was the easiest man he'd ever sat with. Different worlds. Same frequency.
They talked about the release. Beck didn't plan to bring it up. Jon asked. Simple and direct.
"You miss it?"
"Every day."
"But you're still here."
"I'm still here."
Jon looked at him for a long moment. The pelican was gone. The harbor was flat. Whatever he was reading on Beck's face, it satisfied him. He poured the last of the margarita and split it between them.
"Good," Jon said.
The porch was in full shade now. The sun had moved behind the house and the light on the water had gone from white to gold. The wind chime turned. The radio played. The cooler was empty except for water and half a lime. The blender was dry.
At five fifteen Beck realized he hadn't checked his phone in three hours. He pulled it out and found four texts and two missed calls from Kirstin.
"I should probably call her," Beck said.
"Probably."
He dialed. She picked up on the first ring.
"Hey."
"I've been texting and calling all day."
"I lost my phone."
"Beck, are you drunk?"
"A little. I may need a ride."
"It's five twenty-five. Where are you?"
"Your dad's."
"Oh my God. I'll be there in thirty."
He put the phone down. Jon was grinning.
"She's going to kill us," Beck said.
"She's going to kill you. I'm her father. I have immunity."
"That doesn't seem fair."
"Fatherhood has its privileges."
Jon reached into the cooler. It was empty. He set it back down.
"Heads up," he said. "Next Friday is her birthday. She'll never tell you."
They sat on the porch and watched the water. The sun was low and orange over the harbor. The bottles and glasses lined the railing. The blender was empty. The cooler was empty. Five hours had passed and neither of them wanted any of them back.
Thirty minutes later Beck heard tires on the gravel.
She came around the side of the house. She stopped at the bottom of the porch steps and took in the scene.
The Coronas on the railing. The margarita glasses.
The blender. Two men in chairs with their feet up and sunburns on their arms and the look of men who had spent an afternoon on a porch deciding they were fine with each other.
"Hey, baby girl," Jon said.
"Now I have two of you to deal with."
Jon laughed. Beck tried not to and failed.
She walked up the steps. She gave Jon a quick kiss on the cheek.
Then she looked at Beck.
And she smiled.