Page 45 of On Fire Island

Ben had no choice but to get between them—though his choice of words was questionable. He came back with, “So, where’s your wife?”

A childish grin took hold of his face until the angry bald man let go of Shep, whose eyes were now popping from his head, and went for Ben. I worried Ben would go full-on Mike Tyson on the guy, especially since his jaw and fists had been clenched since the day of my diagnosis. I wondered if he could even feel physical pain in his current numb condition. While the release of a good punch may have done him good, his opponent was massive, and I had no desire to see him in the afterlife just yet. Luckily, he wiggled from Red Hat Guy’s grip.

“Let’s go!” Shep yelled, grabbing Matty by the collar with one hand and the lone beer left on the table with the other.

They bolted from the bar. The bad-ass day-trippers followed but lost interest as soon as they saw my guys jump on their bikes.

The three of them hightailed it home, adrenaline overriding fear. It had been a long time since Ben or Shep had found themselves in that youthful position of facing down a fight, and I didn’t imagine there were many playground brawls at Matty’s posh prep school. They were all feeling pretty brave and brazen. When they realized they had surely escaped, they slowed down to catch their breath, and allowed themselves to laugh with relief before riding off in silent, albeit wobbly, retrospection.

Ben’s face was especially joyful and seeing him happy—seeing the twinkle I had fallen for reignited in his eyes—it lit me up too. Matty’s face went from giddy to queasy. His drinking experience was negligible and had probably comprised a few beers at high school house parties and glasses of watered-down wine at his localChinese restaurant in the city, known for not carding minors. Three or four shots of tequila followed by a beer or two were surely over his limit.

Shep was leading the way, humming a few rounds ofpa rum pum pum pum. He was downright chipper. If he didn’t think there would be an occasion for condoms in his future, I doubted he’d imagined partaking in a good old bar fight. He pulled the lone beer from his coat pocket, popped off the cap with his teeth like a boss, and looked back at the other two, holding the bottle in the air in victory. He turned back around just at the point where the midway street ended and didn’t have the time to right himself. I yelled, “Watch out!” as his bike hit the fence, catapulting him over it and into the Kerchaikens’ vegetable garden. Of course no one heard my warning, except possibly the Kerchaikens. The lights in their house quickly switched on and I thought back to their last interaction with Ben and Shep on the beach. The widower card would surely not double as a get-out-of-jail-free card here.

Matty and Ben jumped off their bikes and peered over the fence at Shep, sprawled out among Mrs.Kerchaiken’s prized tomatoes.

“Let’s get him out before anyone notices!” Ben quietly instructed Matty, who looked like he would be little help. It was too late anyway. Mr.and Mrs.Kerchaiken appeared on the sidewalk: bathrobed, barefoot, and simmering with anger.

Ben whispered to Matty, way too loud, “Oh Jesus, of all people.”

Matty was clueless as to the origin of Ben’s reaction. I was not. If you remember, there was bad blood between Shep and the Kerchaikens.

Mr.Kerchaiken put his phone to his ear and slowly pronounced, “Bay Harbor Security?”

Of course, he had them on speed dial.

With the stakes raised, Ben and Matty got themselves together and tried, unsuccessfully, to pull Shep out of the garden. “No need to call security over this. I’m sure they’ve got their hands full with that Goldilocks Intruder.”

“Good try, Ben. I’m calling.”

“It’s true,” Matty added. “You shouldn’t bother them over this.”

Mr.Kerchaiken ignored their pleas and spoke into the phone while Ben and Matty attempted to retrieve Shep.

“We’ll be out of your way in a minute,” Ben pleaded.

“We’ll see about that.” Mr.Kerchaiken grinned sinisterly as his wife nervously begged them to be careful of her tomatoes. They both heeded her warning and stepped gingerly.

“If I am not mistaken,” Mr.Kerchaiken admonished, “this is the last straw with Mr.Silver and a bicycle.”

The threat got Shep’s attention, and not in a helpful way. He stood up on his own and protested.

“That was ten years ago! Give it up, Kerchaiken.”

Shep had famously ridden Kerchaiken’s Schwinn into the Great South Bay after a poker game went south. He reiterated his decade-old complaint of “He cheated!” while inadvertently crushing a tomato under his left foot. Mrs.Kerchaiken’s rising concern turned to panic.

“Careful... my tomatoes!”

There was really no avoiding them. Shep lifted up his foot cautiously but landed on one and then another. With each brutal crush, Mrs.Kerchaiken became more and more hysterical. “My tomatoes! My tomatoes!”

Matty and Ben tried their best to control Shep, but when Matty joked, “He’s like a human whack-a-mole!” the two of them completely lost it.

Shep hesitated, I imagined trying his damnedest to pass on the joke, but as was usually the case with Shep, landing the punch line overrode any thread of human decency. He stood up straight, pressed his feet together, and jumped from tomato to tomato to tomato. Each landing yielded a shriek from Mrs.Kerchaiken, which was hard to hear over Ben and Matty, who were now lying on the ground in hysterics. They were laughing so hard that they couldn’t breathe, and Matty’s complexion grew greener and greener. Three Bay Harbor Security guys showed up just as the scene accelerated to bedlam. One of them crunched a piece of the now-broken beer bottle under his shoe. He picked it up and examined it.

“Are you drinking?” he asked Shep.

“Are you buying?” Shep answered back, without missing a beat.

I was so glad that Ben had mourned with these guys instead of my great-uncle Morris and my cousin Shirley. Who’s to say that shiva need be such a sober affair.

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