Empty, when what you think is true is actually not.
But he feels weirdly... filled up, too.
With total positivity. Bette a friend? Who helps me figure out how to increase my “earning potential”?
This woman isn’t really a shark finner, a Mae-napper, a real-estate hustler, or arsonist? Isn’t a major criminal at all? She’s a choice woman who kissed my ear on Sunset and said she thinks I’m smart?
Slam the door on her?
Gulls keen overhead. Mae sits and looks up at them.
Bette has already shown him the LA sheriff’s report filed by her father, accusing rival Imperial Fresh of torching his fleet. She has told him that she believes him, that the Stonebreakers did no such thing. Suspects the Monterey 9 of escalating their attack on the Wu family and King Jim Seafood.
Logical enough, thinks Casey, but the facts weigh heavily on him, and on his morals and honesty. They’re both lying. Two big fudging lies, but can he spill his?
Out of the question, not on the table.
His guts tighten but he’s keeping his secret. For now. He was against the dang King Jim boat attacks anyway but he’s got his family and Brock’s Go Dogs to protect.
“Your words sound good, Bette. You tempt me with how smart and beautiful you are.”
She blushes slightly, a pink undercurrent swelling up beneath her perfect white skin. He wonders if she can do this on cue. The acting classes.
“I don’t want to tempt. I want to help.”
“But I still don’t want a manager now,” he says. “Signing those papers. That whole fifteen percent commission thing. No.”
“Then let the whole thing go!”
“Maybe if, like...”
“Seriously, Casey.”
She spreads her arms, hands balled tightly, then closes her eyes and opens her fists. “I let it go. There it goes. You should, too. Now.”
“Okay.”
Lowers her arms, opens her eyes and studies him. “I didn’t know how you would react to this news. But I’m glad you don’t hate me. The first step toward trust.”
He pulls his phone from his shorts pocket, leaves text messages for Jen and Brock. See the California section in today’s LA Times. Looks like we might have made a mistake.
Mae looks out at Moondance tied to the loading dock.
“I’ll be seeing you, Casey.”
Casey feels a nervy little rush, something forbidden but good, then:
“The bluefin are still in. Interested?”
The swell is steady and the chop is mean but by eleven thirty Casey and Bette have each caught a bluefin tuna weighing eighty-eight and eighty-three pounds, respectively.
“Glad I beat you,” he says, half seriously.
“Mine will taste better,” she says with a quick grin.
They drag the fish to preserve the quality of the best sashimi in the world, and an hour later clean and ice them in the cold well.
Casey watches her all he can without staring; admires her easy work with the rod and line, her strength and balance fighting the powerful fish, her wordless concentration on the task at hand, her swift, efficient knife work. Liked the way she helped him rope his fish in without the gaff, and was happy to help her do the same.
After hers, they sat panting, facing each other across the bait tank.
“You’re strong and coordinated, Bette. You a baller in college?”
“Too busy.”
“Being a pirate and a student?”
“Mostly student. I got bored and dropped out. Dad made me work. He was happy to have me back in the family business.”
“Back?”
“Started at eleven. Cutting bait, mending nets.”
“Were you happy to be back?”
“I like it okay. The ocean and the freedom and the money. Pretty good. I owe almost twenty grand in loans — not to the school, to Dad. He holds me to it. Holds me to a lot of things. But King Jim Seafood, we’re together, you know? Like a family. Kind of. We got different races. Different languages and beliefs. But we work hard and we have each other’s backs.”
“Sounds good.”
“Your hands and clothes get stinky, though. And you don’t stay in bed. I get up in the dark six days a week.”
“That’s tough. Me, only three, maybe four. I just have one restaurant to supply, not a whole coastline full like you guys. I can sleep an hour in the late afternoon, before I bartend.”
Bette gives him an indecipherable look, then a small smile. “You’re a good bartender. I gave you a big tip.”
“You came in because you recognized me?”
“From a magazine ad for CaseyWear. And your socials. I was with friends. You had a lot of customers at your bar that night.”
“For happy hour.”
“Oh come on, you handsome surfer celebrity!” Bette says, smiling. “Be truthful with yourself. And me.”
A few minutes later Casey tucks into a cove on the eastern side of San Clemente Island, at least as close to the island as he can get without getting run out by Navy gunboats. Sometimes the sailors are cool; sometimes they board Moondance and check the hatches and holds and tanks for contraband. Once in a while he’ll see the cannon and mortar shells suddenly booming on the island, or fighter jets bellowing in low, mangling the barren hills with rockets. Now and then he’ll see a herd of wild goats up on the grassy flats, hundreds of chewing faces looking down at him.
Casey shares his lunch with her: two peanut butter and honey sandwiches, two nectarines, a slab of grilled tuna, two chocolate protein drinks.
They sit in the cabin, eating in silence, giving Mae bits of everything. She likes nectarines. Moondance bobs at anchor and the gulls badger them overhead. The fog is long gone and the day is clear, with the westerlies cool from the stern.
“You worried about them seeing you here?” he asks.
“Would not be good.”
Casey sees a shadow cross her face, looks up but the sky is cloudless. “What would they do?”
“My father has a big temper. Lacks control of himself. But tries to control others. Family especially.”
“Violent?”
“Sometimes. My sister no longer speaks to him. Moved to New York City to get away. My mother left him years ago.”
“But not to you?”
Bette shakes her head but says nothing.
When the food is gone Mae heads for a sunny spot on deck, circles it twice, then plops down.
Another silence. Bette has her back to him, facing east toward shore.
Casey divvies up some bread crust and backhands the load to the gulls patrolling his boat. He likes having someone around but not having to talk. Bartending, you just babble for hours at a time. Enough small talk in one shift to last all week. Plus it’s just hard to hear in the Barrel sometimes — anywhere, for that matter — his years in cold water and wind giving him a growing case of surfer’s ear, abnormal bone growth in the ear canal.
“I want to talk to you about something important,” says Bette.
So much for golden silence. “You mean right now?”
“I can help you win the Monsters of Mavericks. Listen. There’s a large swell headed for Half Moon Bay. It’s freaky early for the storm season.”
“I know.”
“I talked with the contest organizers. If the storm stays on course for Half Moon Bay, the Monsters of Mavericks will be held seven days from now. The waves will be very big. I have reserved separate rooms at the Ritz-Carlton. You need to get there days early, to see the waves and the conditions. To do media, write your CaseyGrams, and post your YouTube videos. You need to rest, mingle with the other surfers, but keep your privacy. Not be over-socialized. You need to eat well and mentally prepare. You need to relax and think about surfing and not surfing. Read your Bible. I’ll drive. When we get there, you won’t have to be around me in any way. I’ll give you total privacy. Separate everything. We should leave the day after tomorrow. Take our time and not feel rushed.”