can't come up; you're being rolled over the bottom-bounced, somersaulted, slammed, and twisted. The ocean is filling your nasal cavities and sinuses with freezing salt water. And it isn't a matter of how long you can hold your breath; it's a matter of whether you can hold your breath long enough for the wave to let you up, because if you can't You drown.
And that's just the beginning of your problems, because waves don't come to the party alone; they usually bring a crew. Waves tend to come in sets, usually three, but sometimes four, and a really fecund mother of a set might bring a litter of six.
So even if you make it through the first wave, you might have time to take a gasp of air before the next wave hits you, and the next, and so on and so forth until you drown.
The rule of thumb is that if you don't manage to extricate yourself from the impact zone by the third wave, your friends will be doing a paddle-out for you in the next week or so. They'll be out there in a circle on their boards, saying nice things about you, maybe singing a song or two, definitely tossing a flower lei out onto the wave, and it's very cool, but you won't be there to enjoy any of it because you'll be dead.
Sunny's in the Washing Machine, and it rolls her, tumbles her, somersaults her until she doesn't know up from down. Which is another one of the dangers of the impact zone: You lose track of which way is up and which way is down. So when the wave finally lets you up, you budget that last bit of air for the plunge to the sweet surface, only to hit rock or sand instead. Then, unless you're a really experienced waterman, you just give up and breathe in the water. Or there's already another wave on top of you.
Either way, you're pretty much screwed.
Keep your head, Sunny tells herself as she plummets. Keep your head and you live. You've trained for this moment all your life. You're a waterman.
All those mornings, those early evenings, training with Boone and Dave and High Tide and Johnny. Walking underwater, clutching big rocks. Diving down to lobster pots and holding on to the line until you felt your lungs were going to burst, then holding on a little longer. While those assholes grinned at you-waiting for the girlie to give up.
Except you didn't give up.
She feels a jerk upward and realizes that her board has popped to the surface.
“Headstoned,” in surf jargon.
Dave will be out there already, watching for the board to pop up. He's on his way now. She forces herself to do a crunch, not to release the leash but so that if she does hit bottom, she'll take the blow on her shoulders and not on her head, snapping her neck.
She hits all right, hard, but on her shoulders. The wave somersaults her three or four times-she loses count- but then it lets go of her and she pushes up, punches to the surface, and takes a deep breath of beautiful air.
142
Boone gets his arms around Dan's arms and pins them to his side. Dan still has his gun in his hand, but he can't raise it to shoot.
Dan slams three hard knee strikes into Boone's ribs, driving the breath from Boone's body. Boone gasps but doesn't let go. To let go is to die, and he's not ready for that yet. He can feel his own blood, hot and sticky, running down his face.
He pivots on one hip, turning Dan around toward the river. Then he starts walking, holding tightly to Dan, pushing him toward the water. Dan tries to dig and fight, but Boone has the momentum. Dan rears his neck back, then slams it forward, head-butting Boone on the bridge of the nose.
Boone's nose breaks and blood gushes out.
But he holds on and pushes Dan toward the bank of the river. He plants his feet, pivots again, and crashes into the muddy water on top of Dan. Boone releases his grip, finds Dan's chest, and pushes him down. He can feel Dan's back hit the muddy bottom. Then Boone holds on and pushes. It's a matter now of who can hold his breath the longest, and he figures that's a contest he can win.
But he's losing blood fast, and with the blood, his strength.
He feels Dan wrap a leg around him and he tries to fight it, but Dan doesn't panic under the water and gets his leg locked around Boone's. Then Dan turns his own hips and spins. Boone's too weak to counter it, and Dan flips him under. Then Dan sits up, on top of Boone, grabs him around the throat, and pushes down hard.
Boone arches his back and tries to buck Dan off him, but he can't do it. He feels weak, and tired, and then very sleepy. His lungs scream at him to open his mouth and gasp. Take a nice deep breath of anything, even if it's water.
His brain tells him to give up. Go to sleep, end the pain.
In his mind, he's in the ocean.
A giant wave, a mountain, curls over his head.
Suspends in time for a second.
Hangs there, as if deciding.
Then it breaks on him.
Ka-boom.
143
Johnny Banzai charges into the clearing.
His badge is clipped to his jacket, his service revolver in his hand.
Harrington and the county people are right behind him, but Johnny has demanded he go in first.
Family fucking honor.
He goes in hard and fast, unconcerned with safety. He heard a gunshot in the distance and doesn't know what the hell is going on, but he hits the clearing ready for whatever it is.
Some of the men are already running. Others stand there looking startled and confused. Johnny doesn't care about the mojados — he sees three younger guys, better dressed, running away toward a line of trees, and young girls, looking around, milling in confusion.
Then he hears another gunshot.
It sounds like it's coming from the other side of the reeds, down along the river.
Johnny calls for an ambulance and sprints toward the sound.
144
Boone feels Dan's grip loosen, then let go; then Dan's body slides off him into the water. A slough of blood pillows around Boone's face. He pushes to the surface and sees, like a weird dream, an old Japanese man standing at the edge of the river.
A shotgun in his trembling hands.
In the distance, Boone hears yelling, sirens… but maybe it's his head playing games with him.
He crawls to the riverbank and pulls himself up.
Then he hears something else.
A woman crying.
A howl of ineffable pain.
