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“Come on.” I push the memory aside and point to a stretch of sand by a group of rocks. “Let’s set up over there.”
“Don’t you want to be closer to the water?” Marcus asks.
“Trust me, when the tide comes in, the water will roll right up to our feet.”
“Alright man,” he claps me on the back, “sounds good.”
There’s already a handful of locals here, and when they see me as we make our way over to the spot, they give me a clipped nod, to which I nod back.
“Does everyone here want to suck your dick?” Cal laughs.
“Naw man.” I kick off my flip flops and set the backpack down on the sand. “I just know how it is, that’s all.”
He sets the cooler down and opens his chair, taking a seat. “And that is?”
“To appear to be one thing, but in my core, be another.”
Jake hands me a chair. I unfold it and take a seat as he and Marcus do the same.
“Hey man,” Cal grabs a beer out of the cooler and hands it to me, “lighten the fuck up. No need to go all David Copperhead.”
I shake my head and reach for the bottle in his outstretched hand. “That’s Copperfield, and I wasn’t. It was moreGreat Expectations. The importance of conscience over wealth, and class.”
“Man…” He tosses a beer to Jake then Marcus before grabbing one for himself, twisting the cap off, and taking a sip. “Are you sure you want to play pro ball? The amount of pussy you could get as a professor would be unreal.”
“Pretty sure,” I can’t help but laugh. There wasn’t anything else I wanted to do with my life. Baseball was it for me.
Besides, I wasn’t enamored by the idea of having a different girl in my bed every night like Cal was. I only wanted one cheering for me in the stands and waiting for me in bed at night. That sounded perfect.
“Cheers,” Jake says heartily and holds up his bottle. I lean over and tap mine to it, and Marcus and Cal do the same.
“So bro…” Marcus slides off his flip flops and digs his toes into the sand. “How do you know about this place?”
I bring one hand back behind my head, while holding my beer with the other. “The first summer I spent here one of the locals invited me to a party in the cave. He showed it to me and said I could come here anytime, but there was one rule—locals only.”
“Why?” Jake asks.
“Well…” I lift my beer and take a sip. “They don’t like the folks from Elmhurst. Money comes in, takes over the town for a couple months out of the year, then leaves.”
“That happens to a lot of vacation spots,” Cal quips. “I mean, look at Havasu. I grew up there, and sure, it was a cool spot for us Arizona kids. But now it’s like Cancun during Spring Break.”
“Yeah,” I nod. “But the beef between Elmhurst and Cherry Cove goes back generations. Those houses that line the beach, like the one we’re renting, all that property once belonged to thelocals. Then Elmhurst came in and everything changed.”
“Well,” he shrugs, “money talks.”
“Yeah, but it’s more than that. It’s the shit they stir up when they’re here. I mean, those Elmhurst kids are real dicks. Some of the locals that are our age have records for shit they didn’t even do. That will stay with them for the rest of their lives. Meanwhile those rich pricks ride off into the sunset on their privileged high horses.”
In the summer, those who staked their claim on Cherry Cove treated it as their own personal Gomorrah, and the locals had to cater to their every whim because doing so meant business, which kept the lights on and food on the table. It was like a knife in the gut, taking money from those who cared little about your existence but the locals did it because without their money, they couldn’t survive, and surviving was the ultimate middle finger.
“I don’t know,” Cal adjusts the way he’s sitting, “they seemed alright to me the other night. No one started any shit at the party.”
“Trust me, if it were an Elmhurst-thrown party, none of the locals would’ve been there. And if anyone had started any shit, the Cherry Cove folks wouldn’t have been the ones I’d have tossed out.”
“So let me get this straight.” Cal sits up and lowers his sunglasses. “You were a part of that world for what, two years, and you hated it the whole time?”
“One and a half,” I lift my beer and take another sip. “But yeah, pretty much.”
He laughs and leans back again. “So why are we here again?”
