The Surf Guru by Doug Dorst

my name because she thought her brother was irresponsible and because she liked me from when I was a kid. Trace and I had grown up together, watched our parents’ marriages blow apart at the same time, stayed close even after one strange summer when my dad was sleeping with his mom. Got closer, maybe.
    The baby started to cry. Trace held up the bill and sniffed it. “For fuck’s sake, Phil,” he said. “The money stinks. You got trench foot or something.”
    What did he expect? I’d been walking around in a desert for four days without any socks. We’d packed in a hurry.
    My head hurt. I leaned against the wall and stretched my legs out on the seat and tried to pretend I was somewhere better.
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    Earlier that night, Trace and I had gone to the fireworks show, which was held at a football field that looked like it hadn’t been used in years. No goalposts, no scoreboard, just a rectangle of sandy dirt and rocks with patchy scabs of turf. Lots of families sat on blankets out on the field. High school kids sat in the bleachers, and every now and then you’d hear a bottle fall on the gravel below or roll down the metal steps. We sat up on a little hill with some people from the bar. Trace had shot pool with some of them, and they liked us because he’d told them we were outlaws. They called us Butch and Sundance.
    We drank and waited. Finally Trace shouted, “When the hell is this going to start?”
    A short, bald guy named Roy passed him a bottle of bourbon. “You got somewhere to go, Butch?” Roy said. Everyone laughed. They knew we were stuck.
    â€œThey’re waiting for the fog to blow through,” Roy went on.
    â€œIt’s not going to blow through,” I said. There was only the faintest breeze.
    â€œIt’ll clear up,” Roy said. “We’re not supposed to have fog. We’re not even supposed to have clouds this time of year.” We’d met Roy our first night in town. He walked with a limp, told us he was wounded in Vietnam. Later we heard that Roy had never been farther than Barstow, that he limped because he took some shrapnel in his legs when the transmission in his VW Squareback exploded. So you didn’t know whether to believe this guy when he talked about clouds.
    â€œThey should just cancel it,” I said. “What’s the point?”
    Roy said, “Son, you don’t cancel the Fourth of July. This is America.”
    Then the show started with a loud, crushing thud that I could feel in my stomach and throat. There was the faintest glow of green from inside the clouds. People whistled and clapped, but I couldn’t see why. More fireworks went up. Some were like thunderclaps and war-movie cannons; some were smaller, sharper, like cracks of the bat, a roll on a snare drum, popcorn popping. But it was just noise. Noise, and muted flashes of light just bright enough to remind you of how much you were missing.
    â€œThis place is killing me,” I said.
    â€œAs shitholes go,” Trace said, “it’s not so bad.”
    â€œWe’re supposed to be moving. That’s the whole point. North.”
    Trace drank a long swallow. “Well,” he said, “we could steal a car, if you want.” He sat up straight. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of that sooner.”
    I shook my head. “We don’t need that kind of trouble,” I said. Although looking back, it was probably the best thing we could have done.
    He lit a cigarette, nodding, and looked out across the field. “We’ll be in Alaska before you know it,” he said. He passed me the bottle. “Think of all the money we’re going to make. We’ll save up and get our own boat for next year. We’ll get a boat with one of those Viking heads on the front.”
    â€œBoats are expensive,” I said. “I’m pretty sure.”
    â€œI’ll find a way. I always