So he can only sympathize with Tash concerning his problem; he can’t really claim to offer any help out of his own experience. It’s a difficult situation, no doubt about it; it is, in fact, a dilemma. Choosing either course of action means painful consequences. Change to suit Erica, remain the same and lose her; what will Tash do?
As night falls they talk less and less. Events from their childhood, events from the world news. Among the blurry stars overhead the swift satellites and the big mirrors slowly move, north, south, east, west, like stars cast loose and spinning off on crazy courses of their own. “Death From the Stars.” “No lie.” Sandy shivers in the wind, watching them. He pulls out soggy Togo’s sandwiches and they eat. Afterward Sandy feels a bit queasy. “Marijuana reduces nausea, right?”
“So they say.”
“Time to test it out.”
It works only indifferently.
To their left OC bounces up and down.
The coast an unbroken bar of light.
The hills behind bumpy loafs of light.
Lights stationary, lights crawling about.
A flat hive of light, squashed between black sea and black sky.
The living body of light.
A galaxy seen edge-on.
Sandy retires to the cabin in the left hull, leaving the first watch to Tashi. He wakes to find Tashi drowsing over the tiller in gray predawn.
“Why didn’t you wake me?”
“Fell asleep.”
“I take it they didn’t show.”
“That’s right.”
“Tonight, then. Hopefully.”
Tashi retires to his cabin in the right hull. Sandy has the dawn to himself. Gentle offshore breeze blowing. Tash had the tiller and sail set perfectly, even in his sleep. Sandy can see Catalina to the north behind him, and San Clemente Island poking up over the horizon to the south, perhaps another ten or fifteen miles ahead.
The stars and satellites wink out. Color comes to sea and sky. The sun rises over the mountains behind San Diego. Morning at sea. Sandy thinks about his usual schedule and feels blessed. Hiss and slap of water under the hulls. So peaceful. Maybe it’s true, what Jim always says; there was a better way of life, once, a calmer way. Not in OC, of course. OC sprang Athena-like, full blown from the forehead of Zeus Los Angeles. But somewhere, somewhere.
Midmorning Tash comes up, they eat oranges and make cheese sandwiches. They sail around San Clemente Island just to pass the day. It’s strange: scrub-covered, except where erosion has ripped out raw dirt watersheds, the hills are everywhere littered with wrecked amphibious landers, tanks, helicopters, troop carriers. And the west side, the side away from the mainland, is heavily pocked with bomb craters. Top of one hill gone. Another is covered by a mass of concrete, from which springs scores of radar masts and other protuberances.
“Is it really a good idea to pick up sixty liters of illegal aphrodisiac right under the Navy’s nose?” Tash inquires.
“Purloined letter principle. They’ll never expect it.”
“They won’t have to! Those surveillance arrays up there will probably analyze the goods by molecular weight. And hear our conversations.”
“So let’s not talk about it.”
Their instructions are to lay to, four miles directly west of the southernmost tip of the island. They do some compass work and establish triangulated landmarks that will keep them near the spot after dark.
The southwest end of the island is benched in a series of primordial beaches that terrace the hills a hundred feet high or more. They can see some goats on one terrace. “Those must be the most paranoid goats on earth,” Tash remarks. “Can you imagine their lives? Just peacefully eating sage, when suddenly wham bang, they’re being strafed and bombed again.”
Sandy can’t help but laugh. “Horrible! Can you imagine their world view? I mean, how do they explain it to each other?”
“With difficulty.”
“Like flies to small boys are we to the gods, or something like that.”
“I wonder if they have a civil defense program.”
“Something about as good as ours, no doubt. ‘Hey, here they come! Run like hell!’” They laugh. “Like flies to small boys… how does that go?”
“Need Jim here.”
Sandy nods. “He’d enjoy this, those benches and all.”
“Should have brought him instead of me.”
“He’s got class tonight.”
“So do I!”
“Yeah, but you don’t have to teach it.”
“Not most nights, anyway.” They laugh. “Hey, did you know he’s seeing a woman who teaches across the hall from us?”
“Good for him. Beats suffering with Virginia.”
“No lie.… I wonder what ever happened with Sheila. I liked her.”
“Me too. But Jim is…”
“An idiot?”
“Ah, hahahahaha. No, no, you know what I mean. Anyway, maybe with this teacher.”
“Yeah.”
After dark the island gets more active. As they eat more sandwiches they hear roars, clanking, grinding, the soft feathery whirr of combat helicopters. All without a single light anywhere, except for one red on-and-off to mark the high point of the island. Once or twice Tash spots the bulk of a helicopter against the stars. Then swuBAM, BOOM, and the island is momentarily lit by a ball of orange fire blackened with the dirt it’s thrown up. Both of them jump convulsively. “Damn!”
Tash laughs. “Let’s hope none of those things’ heat-seeking targeters lock on to us.”
“Tash, don’t say that!”
“They’re like clotheslines, tied from firing platform down to the target, which is located by its heat. Infrared system. Then you clip a bomb on the clothesline, and down it slides.”
The island elaborates: whooshBOOM.
“Lucky we don’t have any heat here.”
“Just us.”
“Well hey! Maybe we ought to go in the cabins?”
“Nah. These are the best fireworks we’ll ever see, unless they draft us. Every burst probably costs a hundred thousand dollars.”
“Man, that’s a lot of money!”
“No lie.”
The battle exercises go on for an hour, until their ears begin to hurt. When it ends Sandy retires again. “Wake me this time.”
Tashi does, at 3:00 A.M. They appear to be at the same heading off the island. All is dark and calm, there’s hardly a breeze. Up and down on a deep groundswell. Salt air fills Sandy to the brim; he’s suddenly happy.
Tash is in no hurry to retire. “Do you ever think about leaving OC?” he asks.
“Ah, yes, I suppose so. Sometimes.” Actually it has never occurred to Sandy; he never has time to think about that kind of thing. “Santa Cruz, maybe.”
“That’s just OC north.”
“What isn’t?”
“I was thinking of Alaska.”
“Wow. I don’t know, man. Those winters. The people I’ve talked to from up there say it’s a manic-depressive life, manic in the summer and depressed in the winters, with the winters twice as long. Doesn’t sound like such a deal to me.”
“Yeah, I know. But it’d be a challenge. And it’ll always stay empty, because of those winters. And it means I could get out into the real world every day, you know?”
There’s a strain in Tashi’s voice, a kind of poignant longing that Sandy hasn’t heard before. He thinks, When you’re on the horns of a dilemma, you do your best to find a third way. But he doesn’t say this. “That would be something, wouldn’t it. Surfing might be a problem, though.”
Tash laughs. “No more so than here. The crowd scene is too much.”