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“Because Albert doesn’t just give stuff away. Not any more.”
Quinn laughed nervously. “Look, brah, don’t tell me I can’t do this, okay? I’m not hurting anyone.”
“I never said you were hurting anyone,” Sam said. “But look, Albert’s going to sell this fish to whoever will give him whatever he wants: batteries and toilet paper, whatever else he figures out he can control.”
“Sam. I got, like, twenty pounds of good protein here.”
“Yeah. And it ought to go to the people who aren’t getting enough, right? Mother Mary could serve some to the prees. They’re not eating much better than the rest of us, and they need it more.”
Quinn dug his toe in the wet sand. “Look, if you don’t want me to sell or trade the fish to Albert, okay. But look, I have this fish, right? What am I supposed to do with it? Someone needs to put it on ice before long. I can’t just walk around town handing out pieces of fish, right?”
Once again Sam felt the wave of unanswerable questions rising around him like a tide. Now he had to decide what Quinn did with a fish?
Quinn continued. “Look, I’m just saying I can haul this fish and any others I get up to Albert and he has a refrigerator big enough to keep it in good shape. Plus, you know how he is: he’ll figure out how to clean it and cook it and—”
“All right,” Sam interrupted. “Fine. Whatever. Give it to Albert this time. Till I figure out some kind of, I don’t know, some kind of rule.”
“Thanks, man,” Quinn said.
Sam turned and headed back toward town.
“You should have come in and danced last night, brah,” Quinn yelled after him.
“You know I don’t dance.”
“Sam, if anyone ever needed to cut loose, it’s you.”
Sam tried to ignore his words, but their pitying, concerned tone bothered him. It meant that he wasn’t keeping his mind secret. It meant he was broadcasting his foul, self-pitying mood, and that wasn’t good. Bad example.
“Hey, brah?” Quinn called.
“Yeah, man.”
“You know that crazy story Duck Zhang’s talking about? Not the cave thing, but the part about, like, flying fish-bats or whatever?”
“What about them?”
“I think I saw some. Came shooting up out of the water. Of course, it was dark.”
“Okay,” Sam said. “Later, dude.”
As he walked across the beach he muttered, “My life is fish stories and Junior Mints.”
Something was nagging at him. And not just Astrid. Something. Something about Junior Mints.
But weariness swept over him and dissolved the half-formed thought. He was due at town hall before long. More stupidity to deal with.
He heard Quinn singing Bob Marley’s “Three Little Birds” to himself. Or maybe to Sam.
Then the sound of the putt-putt outboard motor starting again.
Sam felt an intense stab of jealousy.
“You don’t worry,” Quinn said, echoing the song.
“I do.”
“Caine?”
