The sun melts the steely surface of the ocean like an acetylene torch. Your Toyota Corolla’s air conditioning system pumps soft, sterile air onto our goosebumped arms, as the watercolor sun smears away the faint green of the dashboard. The lenses of your chocolate-colored sunglasses steal a fleeting look at us in the rearview mirror. Our beach blanket lies tousled across the back seat–crumpled and frayed at its corners like a page torn out of a travel magazine. A few surfers race towards the water in wet suits. Their restricted legs shuffle into the foam as their boards catch their stomachs before the crest of a wave. The harried call of a California gull rings out over the throb of the surf.
Gaudily-colored parasols stand askew in the sand like oversized cocktail umbrellas. They shade the sunburnt faces of children clutching damp sand castles, into which their imaginations burrow and find asylum. The parasols screen the lenses of polaroids and iPhones cradled by infatuated youngsters, intent to catch the ephemeral thrill of a tender moment like a surfer catching a wave. These beach umbrellas shelter coolers full of glassy Coronas flecked by melting ice, primed to glimmer gold in the afternoon lux as friends shout “cheers” to a promotion, an engagement, or just the end to another goddamn week of work. They shield the frenetic circuitry and pulsating bass of boomboxes poised next to sleek, tanned bodies and beautiful faces that bob to the arrhythmic interjections of Tom Petty over the ocean’s own tempo.
Our parasol screens the light from your milky torso and the threadbare beach blanket, the outline of your freckled shoulders, and the divots your toes unknowingly make in the sand.
“The sand’s so warm,” you remark, taking up a handful and letting it run through your fingers.
I hum in assent, and adjusting my position on the blanket, “When I was younger, I used to come down here every weekend and just lie out in the sand. I’d soak up the sun and then run out into the water. It’s funny: the cold was such a shock and such a relief at the same time.”
“You were lucky to grow up by the beach. A real beach I mean.”
“I guess.” Hardly a real beach by my estimation. I prefer your kind of beach: the craggy rocks, the swirling fog, and the precise impressions our footsteps leave on the cold shore. I prefer your beach’s quietude to the bustle of tourists in broad hats, flitting in and out of quaint shops that sell overpriced shaved ice and shell necklaces. Squatting behind the beachgoers, a long, dark pier supports an autumn-colored ferris wheel that methodically turns and raises the hands of passengers in unabashed, childish delight. I once rode that ferris wheel in the fourth grade with a girl named Stacy who smelled like blueberry markers. I recall my heart bouncing like a shell necklace inside the collar of my shirt, as we gripped each other’s hands tightly and dangled between the turquoise potentiality above and opalescent obscurity below.
“Well, it certainly distracted me. For better or worse.”
You roll over on the beach blanket and face me with those chocolate-colored sunglasses, a wry smile spreading across your lips.
“Isn’t that what we all need sometimes? A little diversion?” you tease with a melodramatic toss of your head.
I roll my eyes. You could be so corny sometimes. But I don’t mean that in a negative way. “Corny” is a nostalgic-kind-of-happy, like watching your favorite romance flick that lusty film critics label as “passé” and “not cool anymore.” It takes guts to not try and be cool. I wish I was more like you. I turn my gaze towards the stretch of beach to my right.
***
Like a child chasing an errant beach ball, I watch a clean-cut man and sun-kissed woman
emerge from a parked van, and slice through the machinations of the beach crowd. They stride over to the ankle-deep water, followed by a small camera crew. The crew begins snapping pictures of the two models who yelp and laugh at the pass of each icy wave, their arms wrapped around each other in a photogenic embrace.
“Look over there! A photoshoot,” you say with the piqued interest of a gallery-goer.
I’m looking. Those will certainly make very pretty pictures. That is the kind of love that makes for great pictures but not great paintings. Everybody typically stumbles across that kind of love once or twice in their life: a flattering snapshot of faded jeans and tangled limbs covered by a thin filter of artifice. That is the kind of love that adorns the walls of dimly-lit, aromatic clothing outlets and sells people on a sunset-soaked reality they wish they could pull over their shoulders like a Taiwanese-made jacket. But who the hell needs a jacket in Southern California? Neither of us are artists per se, but I think we’d know how to go about trying to paint our love: start with grey sheets of fog applied in wide, wet brushstrokes, the creases of a 3-year-old crumpled movie ticket, your dog Ellison’s collar hung across a harsh line etched in charcoal, a branching, skeletal piece of driftwood in the foreground, your cold right hand (which I held through the sleeve of your fleece jacket), a good luck note scotch-taped to the canvas, a fireplace, a glass of the cheapest sauvignon blanc, a pair of high heels tossed across a worn futon, and the gutted back half of your Corolla splattered with vanilla ice cream from Ghirardelli Square.
“Geez get a room,” I say, stifling an awkward laugh. What must it be like to fake love for a living?
I feel your warm, sunny arms unfurl across my back and watch your fingers mesh across my chest. I feel your cheek anchor against the back of my shoulder.
“They’re pretty, huh?” your squished smile utters.
I nod in assent. Look at us being pretty now. Maybe the cameraman will take our picture. Dear god, I hope not! I’d much rather be corny and hold your hand, tune out Tom Petty, and listen to your breathing on this golden ribbon of granular glass.
“I’m gonna jump in the water. You wanna come?”
Pausing, “You go ahead, I’ll watch our things.”
I struggle to my feet, wiping away the stray grains of sand sticking to my shorts, and stride past the models, camera crew, and into the water. I feel the familiar chill–that alchemy of shock and relief–wrap around my ankles and climb up my legs. The din of the beach softens slightly as I push myself further out. My tip-toes give way to weightlessness as my arms fan out in wide, looping strokes. The waves lap against my chest and stir some visceral, primordial impulse from beneath the sediments of my conscience. I want to lay back and tailspin in the waters of my youth.
Something tethers me back to the present. I turn my eyes back to the beach. You’re still sprawled across the beach blanket. You’re waving at me. I can’t tell if you’re smiling, but I sure am. Now it’s my turn to be corny. Kicking my legs vigorously, I hold my arm high above the water and wave my hand with the enthusiasm of a little kid showing off for his mom’s camera. Would this make for a nice photo? I’m not sure. There might be too much glare from the sun. There might be too many beachgoers in the way–all yearning to surrender to a current of sentimentality so ghostly and primitive that they don’t even know it’s there. The photograph’s edges might be too smudged by nostalgic fingers. Who knows if this would make a good picture? There’s one thing I’m sure about: our love in Santa Monica would sure as hell make a nice painting.