Page 17 of Stony Point Summer
“Instead ofjail, thank God,” a girl of about seventeen reminds them. She doesn’t even look up from rolling paint across the boardwalk’s planks. “Withnoformal charges pressed against us.”
“Lauren’s right,” Matt argues while pressing his balled-up tee against his neck and shoulders. “But it’s only because we stoleLipkin’sboat that we’re painting the entire boardwalk this week instead.”
“Listen, homie,” this Kyle tells him as he drops his paintbrush and puts his friend in a headlock. “I remember very clearly that Maris said if wereturnthe boat—which we did—it’s not stealing. It’s borrowing.”
“Isaid that?” the girl in tie-dye asks.
“Sure did, Maris,” another teen adds. His brown hair is moppy; a bandana dangles from his jeans pocket as he sands a rough strip of the boardwalk seat.
“Whatever, Neil.” This tie-dyed Maris then raises the volume on the nearby boom-box radio. “Time for a break.”
“Yeah,” Neil tells her, “because you’ve been workingsohard … Not!”
“Come on, ladies,” Maris calls over. “Group sing-along!”
To put it mildly. Within seconds, a full-blown concert of some diva’s anthem begins on the Stony Point boardwalk. Maris, Lauren and the other two girls, all wearing shorts and skimpy tops, line up side by side. Raising faux paintbrush-microphones then, they belt out the love ballad blaring from the boom box. The girls’ dance steps are synchronized, as if they’ve done this before, plenty of times. Their feet slide and stamp in unison on the boardwalk planks. Their voices rise to the summer sky while singing about being touched this way, held that way. And when they bust into the refrain—Baby! Baby! Baby!—and truly sing that it’s all coming back to them, you’d really believe they’d beensoloved.
Neil stops sanding long enough to roll his eyes before turning to a guy further down the boardwalk. “Jason!” he practically yells over the song, all while swiping that bandana across his sweating face. “Hey, Jay. Grab me a water from the cooler.”
Working beside Kyle on the seatback rails, Jason sets down his paintbrush and glances over at the quartet pining about needing someone. And he does it. He walks to the boom box and changes the station, blasting fuzzy static until he lands on something better. Something to break up the girl band. Some Dave Matthews’ song that getsNeilsinging to only Lauren, pleading forherto … crash into him.
Jason shakes his head and drags his hand through his sweaty hair. The sun is pulsing; the salt air, heavy. Even in the heat, he wears work boots with his cargo shorts, the boots looking like they’ve seen a construction site or two. Jason and Kyle seem a little older than the others, maybe nineteen or so. Around them are open cans of white paint. And a supply of sandpaper, paint rollers and brushes. On this hot afternoon, the raspy sound of sanding wood, and the swishing sound of wet bristles dabbing the boardwalk all blend with the cry of seagulls and breaking waves.
And with more singing as the girls jump into the D.M.B. song, too.
But with the commissioner eyeing them from the beach now, they’re soon back to dipping paintbrushes and pushing rollers.
Except for Jason. Lifting the bottom of his white tee, he wipes the shirt fabric at his face before heading to a large cooler set beneath the shade pavilion. “Eva,” he says as he walks past the girl who started the arguing when she bemoaned Kyle’s boat-theft idea. “Need a water?”
“More like a cooldipin the water,” she answers, eyeing Long Island Sound sparkling beneath the sun.
Walking by Maris then, Jason reaches over and gives a light snap to her stretchy tattoo choker.
“Jason!” She swats at his hand as he passes.
“How about you, Paige? Lauren? Want some water?” he asks them.
“No,” they both say—both also pushing paint rollers across the boardwalk planks.
“Go with the grain!” Paige tells Lauren beside her.
Lauren stops and leans on the extended pole handle attached to her roller. She wears only a scant bathing suit top over utterly shredded denim short-shorts. White paint drips from her paint roller onto the thin sneakers she also wears. If she didn’t have that pole to support her, it looks like she’d simply melt to the boardwalk in a puddle of sweat. “Bet you never picturedthisday,” she says to Paige beside her, “when you were puking over the side of that boat.”
“How much wine did you down that night, Paige?” Eva calls out from where she and Maris paint the boardwalk seat.
“No memory,” Paige calls back, then stops rolling paint. “But between the liquor and the rocking boat, shit, I was wrecked.”
“Yeah, that’s what I said,” Lauren agrees, then dips her roller into the paint tray. “When I held back your hair while you heaved.”
“Dude,” a lanky teen calls over from the sand. He’s sprawled out on a beach towel, but manages to sit up and point to the boardwalk. His hair is wet from a recent swim; salt water drips from his red board shorts. “Think you missed a spot, Neil.”
“Shove it, Vinny,” the guy with the bandana in his pocket calls back. “You should’ve been busted, too.”
“Seriously, Vincenzo. Now you just get to chill on the beach?” Kyle asks, holding out his arm, fingers straight up. “Talk to the hand, man.”
“FYI,” Vinny fires back. “Paidmydues when you losers left me in the water toswimto shore.” As he says it, he puts on sunglasses, reclines on his towel and soaks up some rays.
“Hey, I had Kyle throw you the life ring,” Neil reminds him from where he’s sanding the boardwalk seat.
