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“Come here, you little piece of shit,” the guy repeated.
The muffled sound of his voice told Rafe it was the tattooed cigarette smoker doing the talking.
“Feed it some cheese Twisties,” came the high-pitched voice of his friend.
“Alright,” tattooed guy said. “I’m gonna give him one and then you keep him steady.
“What are you gonna do to him?” a third voice asked, sounding more amused than concerned.
“You’ll see,” tattoo guy said.
Rafe finally opened his eyes and looked left. There he saw the guy with the cigarette squatted down handing a Twisties cheese chip to a seagull while purposely blowing a cloud of smoke into its face.
“I think his leg’s broken or something,” the guy with the high-pitched voice said, his scrawny voice and beanie cap covered head reminding Rafe of a character he saw on a cartoon as a kid. “Look how he waddles.”
“I fucking hate these birds,” the third guy said, his head bald and beet red, taking on way too much sun. “They’re beach cockroaches. Always begging for a handout.”
Assholes.
The seagull squawked as the tattooed guy flicked its beak. The bird’s feathers went crazy, but he was injured and couldn’t move much.
“Hey!” Rafe yelled, jumping to his feet. “What the fuck is wrong with you, man? It’s just a gull.”
“And?” the guy replied.
“What do you mean and? It’s a helpless bird, man,” Rafe replied.
“Shit, I’m sorry,” tattoo guy said. “Guess I shouldn’t do this then.”
Before Rafe could close the distance between them, the guy turned and kicked the bird, sending it flying across the beach. Even his two buddies were shocked. Normally, Rafe wouldn’t resort to violence. He prided himself on keeping his cool. He was tough, but he wasn’t mean. More importantly though, he had a soft spot for animals. Especially any sea animals, and he considered seagulls part of the ocean environment.
Rafe caught up with the guy just as he turned back to him with a laugh, holding both hands up, thumbs toward each other in a field goal symbol. Rafe’s heavy heel broke through his hands and smashed against his chest, sending the man soaring backward in the same direction as the gull.
“Motherfucker!” the bald guy said as he swung a closed fist at Rafe.
Rafe lifted his forearm and blocked the lazy punch before swinging his own hand upward and smacking the man’s jaw with a solid backfist. The guy grunted and stumbled back. The scrawny dude thought it was wise to use this chance to attack. He was wrong. Rafe ducked his punch, grabbed the man’s fragile arm, and pulled while lifting his own body up. The guy flipped over Rafe’s shoulder and landed hard against the ground. One more kick sent his buddy, the bald guy to his knees, clutching his stomach, fighting back the urge to vomit.
The tattoo guy was back on his feet and rushing at him. He jabbed left, then right, then left again. Rafe dodged and weaved the way his uncle had taught him. Not once did he feel worried about his wellbeing. This guy didn’t stand a chance. If anything, it was more like a game. He slapped the guy’s fists, keeping close contact with him so the guy would never be far enough away to gain any power behind his punches.
“Fuck you and that seagull!” the guy said through clenched teeth as he ran at Rafe with what seemed like the intention to spear him or tackle him, but Rafe sidestepped him easily, grabbed the back of his head, and leapt, slamming his knee into the guy’s face.
Tattooed guy fell to the ground in a crumpled-up heap. His buddies rushed to his side and helped him escape. It wasn’t like Rafe was going to chase them. He was more worried about the seagull than he was about these pieces of shit.
“Hey, little buddy,” he said as he approached the bird.
It had taken quite the brutal assault but remained alive and well. Rafe picked it up gently and soothed down its feathers, being careful not to touch its injured leg.
“You’re gonna be okay,” he promised. “Becca will take care of you. Let’s get you out of here.”
The waves were dying down and that was a good thing because he was exhausted. If it weren’t for the bird, he would have returned to the water to ride a few more waves before they became nothing but choppy sea. He’d surf until the ocean called it quits, and the bigger the waves, the harder he surfed. Only when the water calmed he took a break. The beach was his home. If he could live there, he totally would. The ocean was the fucking life. It was the life he and his best friends, more like brothers, had decided to live.
Fuck a suit and tie, fuck changing oil, fuck serving food,
fuck crunching numbers and arriving on time to meetings. All I need is the sun, the sand, and the water.
Beanie, Hightail, Squid, and Rafe. They were like a gang, if gangs didn’t care much for drugs, fighting, and breaking the law. His brotherhood only gave a shit about one thing…surfing. Unfortunately, he’d had to leave his brothers behind when he got the job in Queensland. They weren’t far away, down in Sydney, but they weren’t sitting next to him on the beach sharing a laugh and talking shit about the day they had ahead of them either. They did swing around from time to time to do part time gigs in a touristy area called LampaVille on the outskirts of the Queensland beaches. That’s how his buddies got by. They did only enough work to put a hot plate on the table, a cold beer in their hands, and some sort of roof over their heads so they could make it to the next wave. As much as Rafe hated working, he couldn’t half-ass it like the others. Bumming around could only get you so far. It was time he put his oceanography degree to use. If nothing else, his degree had gotten him closer to the water. Who could complain about a life on the Australian shore?
As he cradled the bird in his arms and glanced back at the ocean one final time, he thought he saw a fin in the distance, but then again, the ocean was good at playing tricks on the eye. He envied things with fins. Like angels in the water, they only ate to survive. They didn’t attack unless provoked. They were pure souls and Rafe would trade everything for a chance at riding the waves with them.
