“They just left,” Marco says.
“Left for where?”
“The fields.”
“ Whatfields?”
“The strawberry fields.”
Johnny feels his skin go cold. “ What? Whatdid you say?”
“The strawberry fields,” Marco says. “The old Sakagawa strawberry fields.”
Johnny feels dizzy, like the room is spinning. Shame flows through his blood. He lurches to the door and shoves it open. Staggers down the hall, through the living room, and out the door. He leans on the car and bends over to catch his breath.
It's coming on dawn.
130
The first faint rays of sunlight hit Pacific Beach, warming, if only psychologically, the crowd of photographers, magazine people, surf company execs, lookie-loos, and hard-core surfers who stand shivering on Pacific Beach Point in the cold morning, waiting for the light.
The bluff they're standing on is historic ground. Surfers have been riding that reef break almost since George Freeth, and it was way back in the 1930s, when this was still a Japanese strawberry field, that Baker and Paskowitz and some of the other San Diego legends built a shack on this bluff and stored their boards here and proudly adopted the name that the farmers gave them-“the Vandals.”
Just off to the north, the big swell is pounding the reef. Sunny stands at the edge of the crowd, her board beside her like a crusader's shield, and watches the sunlight turn the indistinct gray shapes into definitive waves.
Big waves.
The biggest she's ever seen.
Mackers.
Thunder crushers.
Dreams.
She glances around her. Half the big-wave riders in the world are here, most of them professionals with fat sponsorships and double-digit mag covers behind them. Worse, most of them have Jet Skis with them. Jet Skis with trained partners who will pull them into the waves. Sunny doesn't have the cash for that. She's one of the few paddle-in surfers out here.
And the only woman.
“Thank you, Kuan Yin,” she says softly. She isn't going to bitch about what she lacks; she's going to be grateful about what makes her unique. The only woman, and a woman who's going to paddle into the big waves.
She picks up her board and heads down toward the water.
131
Dave's out there already.
He sits out behind the massive break on a Jet Ski, ready to pull people out if they need it. It's his sacrifice, his penance, not riding the big waves. He hasn't slept-he's exhausted-but somehow he felt that he had to be here, but not surf.
There was just something that felt wrong about it, going out there and having the time of his life when he's seriously questioning what his life has even become. He can't shake the image of the girls huddled in the hold of the boat-who they were, where they were headed, whether or not Johnny managed to intercept them.
And then there's all that. Johnny's going to want some questions answered, and the answers are going to blow up life as they know it.
Which maybe isn't such a bad thing, Dave thinks as he checks his equipment-mask, snorkel, fins-things he might need if he has to get off the ski and dive into the soup.
Maybe this life needs a little blowing up.
Achange.
Even if Johnny doesn't ask the questions, Boone will.
But where the fuck is Boone? He should be out here with me and Tide and Sunny, should at least be here for Sunny, backing her up, helping her deal with the big-name Jet Ski crews that will try to block her out.
Boone should be here for her.
132
The girls look like ghosts.
Boone spots them coming out of the trees. The last of the morning mist hugs their legs and mutes their footsteps. They don't talk to one another, walk side by side, or chat and laugh like girls going to school. Instead, they walk single file, almost in lockstep, and they look straight ahead or down at the ground.
They look like prisoners.
They are. Now Boone sees two men walking behind them. They're not carrying guns-at least Boone doesn't see any-but they're clearly herding the girls along. It doesn't take much effort, as the girls seem to know where they're going. And the men are behind the girls, not in front of them.
It's a drill, a routine.
The men in the fields look up as the girls come out of the tree line. Some of the workers stop their work and stare; others lower their heads quickly and go back to work, as if they've seen something shameful.
Then Boone spots her.
Thinks he does anyway. It's hard to tell, but it sure looks like Luce. She wears a thin blue vinyl jacket with a hood she hasn't bothered to pull up. Her long black hair glistens in the mist. Her jeans are torn at the knees and she wears old rubber beach sandals. She moves like a zombie, shuffling steadily ahead.
Then she turns.
All the girls do-as if on a conveyor belt, they turn away from the strawberry fields and toward the bed of reeds.
Boone gets out of the car, stays as low as he can, and runs toward the trees.
I know I promised you, Tammy, he thinks. But there are some promises you can't keep, some promises you shouldn't.
He picks up his pace.
133
Old men don't sleep much.
Sakagawa is already awake and now sits at the small wooden table in his kitchen and impatiently waits for first light. There is much work to be done, and the endless battle against the birds and insects to be fought. It is a daily battle, but if Sakagawa were to be honest with himself, he would admit that he actually enjoys it, that it is one thing that keeps him going.
