South Beach

Martha's Vineyard

Cold waves crashed against even colder rocks while a cacophony of sea birds sang their morning songs against the salted wind. Kyle’s nostrils filled with the briny aroma of the Atlantic ocean, jostling him awake from his lucid dream. Short arms sprang into the air, popping and cracking with relieving pleasure. A deep yawn erupted from his mouth as he stretched out his right pointer finger to stop the oceanic wake-up alarm on his cracked cellphone.

He arrived on the island the previous night with his family, but this year’s summer vacation house was located within a secluded plot of spacious woods. Kyle preferred a seaside view over trees, but his younger sister got their parents to agree on the privacy of a wooded cabin. Considering that Kyle was able to choose the location of last year’s trip to Martha’s Vineyard, it was only fair that Zoey was given the task of choosing this year’s location.

Kyle hated using his phone to hear the music of the ocean, but the modernized features of the two-story log cabin made his suffering bearable. Descending the wide thick logs nailed into the side of the cabin’s wall, Kyle raced his younger sister to the kitchen. Beating her by a single long stride, Kyle won the first pick of bacon from the small mountain of crispy strips steaming on the marble island.

Zoey tried to complain that Kyle cheated by pushing her out of the way at the very end, but before their parents had the chance to judge her accusation, Kyle was already chomping on two massive strips of crunchy pork. Laughing off the innocence, Zoey’s mom countered her daughter’s distress with her own private plate of mixed fruits, ketchup drenched hash browns, two sausage links, three strips of bacon, and a cheesy clump of scrambled eggs. Zoey’s face stretched with a tremendous smile and she consumed her breakfast in peace.

Scarfing down his food with belly-aching speed, Kyle washed down the salty and savory meal with a large gulp of his father’s iced coffee. Forgoing the tall glass of freshly squeezed orange juice his mom had prepared for him, Kyle needed an extra boost of energy from the caffeine. Today was the big day he had been waiting for. He was finally old enough, strong enough and experienced enough to swim at South Beach.

Chase plucked the cold glass from his son’s hand and replenished it with the bottle of Stok coffee from the refrigerator, then glanced at the digitally displayed clock on the stove. “We’re leaving here in fifteen minutes, bud. Go put your bathing suit on.”

“Fifteen minutes!” Chase shouted, annoyed at the feeling of being rushed.

“Parking is going to be insane. We’ll be lucky if we even find a spot.”

“Do you really think that many people are already there?” Kyle said.

Chase sipped his refreshed glass of coffee, laughed, and looked at his wife who was also giggling at their son’s ignorance of beach etiquette. “It’s 10:30, Kyle.”

Kyle stared at his father with confused eyes. He was fifteen years old. Ten thirty in the morning was still considered to be disgustingly early. Especially among his group of friends. Plus it was the middle of July and summer vacation. That meant he had two and a half sweet months to wake up no later than twelve in the afternoon. But today was the day he was finally going to test the adult waters of South Beach and experience the power of six foot waves. So he made a point to wake up early.

Chase could see the gears short circuiting behind his son’s eyes, so he enlightened Kyle on beach attendance time. “South Beach opens at six.”

“In the morning?” Kyle said.

“Yes. And knowing from years of personal experience, island goers start claiming their sections of sand as soon as the gates open. We’re four hours behind schedule.”

“Shit,” Kyle said.

Erica sprung around from the pantry, scowling at her son. “Language!”

“Sorry mom.”

“Go get changed,” Chase said, handing Kyle the diminished plate of bacon as an offering to lift his spirits. “Ten minutes.”

…..

Kyle threw his Star Wars boogie board into the trunk of the family’s new SUV, then raced towards the driver’s door. Opening it slowly, enjoying the soft pings and LED lights illuminating the cockpit, Kyle slid into the leather seat. Running his palms along the dark brown, double-stitched steering wheel, he hovered his foot and finger over the brake and push-to-start button.

Kyle’s attempted hot-wiring was cut short at the sound of his father’s very distinct and commanding whistle. His body froze in place as his eyes slowly rose to meet the hard eyes of his dad staring back at him while he dangled the key fob from his fingers.

“Nice try, kid. But she won’t start without the fob. Now get your butt out of my seat and get in the passenger. Remember, if we can’t get a spot at South Beach, then we’ll have to resort to State Beach. Do you want to pack your sandcastle building equipment?”

Kyle leaped from the vehicle, dramatically sighing and moaning with every step. He waved to his mother who was standing on the deck sipping her hot coffee while Zoey laughed at his distress with a mouth full of cantaloupe.

Chase blew his wife and daughter multiple kisses before ducking, then shut the driver’s door behind him. Placing the fob in one cup holder and his tumbler of iced coffee in the other, he pressed his foot onto the brake pedal while his right finger plunged into the push-to-start button. The cold start of the V8 engine growled to life, prompting Kyle to immediately open all of the windows. As the panoramic sunroof peeled back, letting in the warm sunlight and muggy air, Kyle commandeered the music. Chase blew two more kisses to his favorite ladies then slowly backed the Audi Q8 out of the pea stone driveway.

Kyle finally picked a song then stuck his arm out of the window, twirling his fingers through the hot wind. As Ocean Avenue by Yellowcard spewed out the speakers, he tried to sway his father. “I get my permit in two weeks. You’ve let me drive before. Around Boston. There’s so many fewer people on the island. Why can’t I drive here?”

“Your mother doesn’t know about those times. And this isn’t the Subaru. This baby has twice the horsepower.”

“And it’s twice as cool.”

Chase smiled. Agreeing with his son. “And it's twice as cool. Now put on your seatbelt.”

Kyle clicked his belt into place then tried again. “Please dad. Mom doesn’t have to know.”

Once the Audi reached the main road at the end of the winding driveway, Chase put the vehicle into park and unbuckled his seatbelt.

“What did you forget?” Kyle said with an attitude.

“With that kind of tone maybe I should rethink this.”

“Rethink what?”

“Letting you drive.”

Kyle whipped his head around and brought his twiddling fingers back into the vehicle. Processing shock and uncertainty, Kyle studied the grin plastered across his father’s face. It was the same face Chase always made when he was going to let Kyle do something Erica would not approve of.

“What about mom?”

Chase smirked. “She doesn't need to know, right?”

Kyle’s face exploded with pure excitement and he raced around to the driver’s side. Gently closing the black pearlescent door, he meticulously studied the light and gadget infested spaceship-like cockpit as a professional pilot would right before take-off. He read the illuminated numbers on the speedometer and smiled at the amount of power he was about to have control of. He nervously wondered if he was going to be able to handle it, having only driven a four-cylinder Subaru and a two-cylinder Chevrolet in Driver’s Ed class, but his father reassured him that he would be fine.

Making a few driving adjustments with the console buttons as well as a few digital changes within the ten-inch dash monitor, Chase configured the Audi out of the paddle-shifting sport mode and into the more conservative, and safe, automatic drivetrain.

“You’ll work your way up to sport mode,” Chase said. “Now, when you’re ready, put your seatbelt on, shift the transmission into drive, engage the left blinker, check both ways twice, then slowly pull out.”

…..

After a few minutes of test driving the Audi on the quiet and wide paved road, Kyle was confident enough to head towards the southern tip of Martha’s Vineyard. Turning left onto the Edgartown West Tisbury main road, Chase allowed Kyle to try out the power of the supercharged V8. Delicately pressing his toes downward, Kyle brought the speedometer to seventy-five miles an hour. The overall speed wasn’t what wowed Kyle, it was the quickness of getting to that speed from zero.

“Alright bud, reel her in a bit. The speed limit on this road is fifty-five.”

Kyle eased up on the gas, bringing the digitalized number on the dashboard down to a steady fifty-seven. Chase was a Boston Police officer and personally knew most of the local officers and state troopers stationed on the island, so he wasn’t worried about his son getting a ticket.

Correct about the parking lots being filled up, Chase instructed his son to start scanning the dune wall for a street spot. Driving back and forth down the sandy pavement for a solid twenty minutes, Kyle was finally able to snag an opportune spot of a departing family of five. Yet now came the tricky part. Parallel parking.

Waiting for the annoying procession of passing traffic to give him enough room and time to successfully complete the multi-step maneuver, Kyle turned the wheel hard to the right. Easing the tail end of the Audi into the spray painted rectangle, he quickly peeled the wheel back to left - flawlessly sliding the pointy nose of the expensive SUV safely behind the rear bumper of a green Ford Fusion. Kyle was the best parallel parker in his Driver’s Ed class and he yet again showed off his skills. This time in front of his dad, and in the new Audi. He took a moment to boast at the probing drivers looking for open spots.

“Impressive,” Chase said.

“Does that mean I get to drive home?”

Chase laughed, packing his wallet, fob, sunscreen and iPhone into the beach bag strewn across his feet. “We’ll see.”

Popping the trunk with the wave of a well-placed foot, Chase handed his son a much larger beach bag than the one he was carrying, a retractable beach chair, and a small backpack cooler of bagged ice. Chase used both hands to retrieve the large multi-colored umbrella, as well as the larger cooler, which was stuffed with turkey and apple sandwiches, seltzers, bottled water, crackers, an elegant variety of cubed and sliced cheeses and meats, and a large container of macerated strawberries. His wife and daughter would be joining them in a couple of hours. Zoey wanted to walk around Edgartown first and look for a new pair of sunglasses. The pair she brought with her slipped out of her hands on the ferry and were accidentally crushed beneath the feet of the hectic exiting procession.

Too excited to wait for his dad, Kyle took off down the road, sticking tight to the dunes and the inside of all of the parked cars. As he approached the large part in the wall of sand, the gawking entrance to South Beach stopped him cold. This was it. The moment he had been waiting six years for. Scoliosis made it difficult for Kyle to swim, but thanks to many years of physical therapy and sheer determination, he was finally ready to take on the strong waters.

“Don’t wait for me,” Chase said, finally catching up with his son. “Go find us a spot before there are none.”

“Are you sure?”

“Look behind you.”

Kyle craned his neck and gulped at the massive line of heavily armed beach goers who finally found spots to park. As he counted the number of chairs, umbrellas and coolers being carried by the swarming horde, he knew what he had to do. Turning back around to meet his father who was doing his best to seem like he wasn’t struggling to pull the heavy cooler, Kyle nodded, kicked off his sandals, bent down, stuffed them into the Black Dog beach bag, then took off running.

Six-foot waves crashed and rolled across the entire beach, sweetly drowning out the manic voices of the thousands of sunburnt humans. The sight was just as beautiful as he remembered. Emerald green and periwinkle blue water basking in the golden hue of the summer sun. Flocks of seagulls flapped above, the sun blackening their silhouettes, while their gritty ground forces probed the sand for abandoned camp sites.

The strip of beach stretched as far as his eyes could see in each direction. Trying to guess the length in his head, he also counted the number of lifeguard stations. He counted seven decently spaced apart red towers. He thought about looking for a piece of property near one of the towers, thinking it would be a safe idea just in case the currents proved to be too dangerous. But Kyle knew his skills, and trusted them. Plus, he was newly single and wanted to show off a little. This was about to be the best summer of his life.

Squinting his eyes, he scanned the area from east to west. Finding a gap in the crowd a few hundred feet away from a lifeguard tower, and close enough to the water without being at risk for high tide, Kyle hustled over as fast as he could.

Stating his claim with ease, save for shewing away a couple of raggedy looking seagulls who were inspecting the area for remnants of food, Kyle sank the feet of his chair into the warm sand. Dying to get into the water, he worked quickly on laying out the four towels, using his sandals and hardcover books as anchors to prevent them from flailing. The Stephen King novels worked the best because of how thick and heavy they were. With the grid of towels laid out in a suitable arrangement, making sure his sister’s wasn’t next to his, he pulled out the Bluetooth speaker and began pairing it with his iPhone.

Rapidly pressing the volume button down, Kyle twitched his face into an awkward apology to the nearby elderly couple who cocked their reddened necks to the sound of a loudly swearing Eminem. Expecting to get scolded, he was shocked to see them both giggle and nod their heads to the beat. Laughing off his embarrassment, Kyle switched to Post Malone and made sure to keep the songs playing at a respectable volume.

“Little help,” Chase said, sinking into a depression in the sand.

Kyle jolted around and ran over to help his father. Lifting the back wheels of the cooler out of the sinking grains, he helped push until it was safely parked beside their towels. Chase reached into his beach bag and pulled out the squirt bottle of sunscreen. He thoroughly applied it to both arms, neck, and legs.

“You need to put more than that on,” Chase said, handing his son the bottle.

Kyle snatched the tube from his father’s hands and quickly rubbed it into his skin. Covering all of the essential burn zones, save for his back, he donned his swim shoes and stretched out all of the joints in his arms, elbows, hips and knees. His stomach growled at the thought of his father’s turkey, lettuce, cheese and apple sandwiches, so he unlatched the cooler and eyed one of the tinfoil wrapped treats.

“We eat as a family,” Chase said, using his foot to close the cooler’s lid.

Kyle jerked his fingers back, barely getting them out of the way in time. “Seriously? You know Zoey is going to take forever to pick out a pair of sunglasses. Can't I just have one bite?”

Chase felt bad so he reached into his bag and pulled out a strip of beef jerky, maple bourbon flavored, and offered it to his son. Kyle snuffed the gesture and moaned in annoyance. He hated jerky, all flavors, and his father knew that. He had no choice. He was going to have to wait to eat.

“Can I at least go in the water?” Kyle said.

“As long as you stay in sight. With waves like those, the current will be strong.”

“I’ll stay close.”

Chase noticed his son brush off the warning. “I mean it Kyle. No wandering. And don’t go out too far.”

As he watched the sunburnt spine of his son jog towards the water, a familiar voice rang in his ear.

“Great spot babe,” Erica said.

Surprised to see his wife so soon, Chase stumbled up out of his chair to greet her. “Kyle picked it out. He had to fight off a couple of angry seagulls to get it though. Tough kid.”

Looking behind his wife, expecting to see his daughter, he saw other children that did not belong to him. As he was about to ask his wife where Zoey was, he heard a young girl scream from the water’s edge. Instinctively knowing the tone of his only daughter’s voice, Chase frantically scanned the area until he located her position and what she, and now others, were all horrifically screaming at.

Thrashing beyond the cresting waves, chaos ensued. The incoming currents stained the golden sand a deep burgundy, and lifeguard whistles echoed across the entire beach. His eyes studied the faces of all of the retreating swimmers, yet none of them were of Kyle. Fighting through the frenzy, Erica ran to retrieve Zoey.

Frozen in fear, an elderly man, with his trembling hand pointing towards the ocean, spoke gently to Chase.

“I think that’s your boy.”