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HE READ THE BOOK BEFORE he saw the movie. It was an old paperback left behind in a room. He found it under the bed half bent and stained. The pages were yellow with age but the text held true. It was the cover of the book that did it for him. The illustration of the great maw leering up at the naked girl. It was enough to make his palms sweat. He glanced around and tucked it into his back pocket, finished fixing the lights, and then left. He read it at once, back in his little cabin away from the hotel.
The location of his hut was the only saving grace of his job. He would watch the waves roll over each other in a hurry to crash, retreat back, and do it again, constantly fighting for that sand, that margin of land they never kept. His shack sat on a little dune, with small patches of grass dotting the land, nearly surrounded by sandburs and strips of dead wood. His pick up truck sat in the old driveway. He could see the pink of the resort in the distance not far behind him. He was grateful for his little patch of dirt. It was home to him. And there, on a rickety lawn chair he found abandoned one night, sandy and beer-stained, he pored through the book fascinated.
The way Peter Benchley described the great white was biblical. Maybe not inherently, but from his own past, he impregnated every word. He read the descriptions of the fish over and over again and let the words lay on his lips. The scale of the shark and its intense drive for food was otherworldly, though somehow familiar. He read the entire book with a grin, his mouth growing wet as he turned the pages. It was the single greatest thing he had ever read and no sooner after he started it, did it wholly absorb him.
His entire essence hitherto was a placeholder for this book. It molded him like a piece of wet clay and made him who he was meant to be. He knew quite well that he'd never go back, and he was happy with that. What was there to go back to? What was he leaving? But more importantly, where was he heading? To eternal salvation, no doubt. Like a fissure through a prairie, the book carved him up, hot steel melted through fire and brimstone pouring through the cracks, filling the mold, and he was re-patched up to a figure – a servant.
A blank slate of a man is a horrific notion. To encounter and occupy the same space as a body that's hopelessly nothing, so crucially and irreversibly obliterated, is a frightening thought to be sure. But now there was nothing to fear. This man, this gaunt, tall, balding man now had a place. His hands no longer felt empty, and deep inside him there was a nebula from which a great drive was born. The gross, hooked, bloody star that formed in his core made up for the ones above. Equilibrium was reached. For up there, when that sunny sky turned dark and purple there was a diminishing. A great vanishing. No more ordinary stars. Not for these people, no.
When asking co-workers if they had read it, hoping to find someone to share his glee with, he discovered it was adapted into a movie. Vanessa, who worked the front desk at the resort, an ugly woman whose only redeeming quality, to the man at least, was her vast amount of meat, told him about the Spielberg film.
"Was it good? I bet it was," he said. The eagerness spilled out as spit, shiny and loose, flinging from his chapped lips.
She pulled her hands off the desk and put them by her side. She was scared of the man. Most people who worked at the resort were. He stood with a slight lean forward like he wanted to be in her space.
"Well..." she said slowly, looking at him, "It's been out since the seventies, I think."
At the end of the day, he hurried straight home. His jumpsuit was greasy from maintenance, and his face was dirty, but he didn't care. He leapt on his old desktop computer, and he searched the title and then had the movie on his screen. Watching it was like watching a dream come true. The steady hard nose of Roy Scheider, the slow camera pans over the water, the beautiful animatronics of the great white, and the classic John Williams soundtrack. The man sat in his chair frozen throughout the entire one hundred and twenty-four minute run time. He didn't blink. It crawled in through the corners of his eyes, gripping the inside of his skull to take root. He felt it all around him, pricking and tickling his skin. He felt it like plastic wrap on his mouth, hot and tight. He didn't want to breathe. He wanted this. To anybody else, it'd be labeled a mere obsession, but that'd be ignorant. Lazy even. This was a passage to the man, whom, at this point, had all but wasted away, emaciated and filthy. This was his new beginning, living and breathing the journey of the shark and the ocean holy land.
Reading the book and watching the movie was prepping for some religious experience. He felt as if the two things were stepping-stones to some gruesome tabernacle, stout on an altar, blinking in a church. He was in Sunday school all over again, wearing that small little suit he had to wear for his first communion so many years ago. He knew in his heart, somewhere, somehow, he would eventually have to serve a master greater than himself. It's not as if the man was always fond of sharks, but he had always known something was out there in that water. And more telling, he knew there was some greater reason for him to be on earth. Granted, his shore differed greatly from Chief Brody’s. Amity, in the story, sat on the coast of the Atlantic Ocean, and the man, here, smelled the breeze from the Gulf of Mexico, but he felt the difference was negligible. Regardless the body of water, a master waited beyond those choppy waves expecting to be served. Watch the waves rise up and crash – right through the blur of it, you can just maybe make out the leer.
He sat in his lawn chair, and the sun set a heavy red, streaking the sky like a cut pomegranate. The clouds fluttered away pink, then darker, then even darker still, and the people on the beach packed up their belongings and left one by one. There was a smattering of car engines followed by some laughs from couples that finished watching the sunset. And soon, he was alone, far away, on either side of him. The empty pier was a mile and a half north, and the pink building was far south. He dug his bare feet into the dirty sand and drank a beer slowly. He watched little birds run like cotton balls on twigs. They scurried and scampered, and some played tag with the waves. The squawking of seagulls soon died down. A breeze blew from the south; his jumpsuit lapel flapped ever so slightly. In his mind, he could see a great white floating softly, gliding back and forth, asking for help, begging for assistance.
The man cleaned his glasses with his handkerchief. He felt the cool air blow against his baldhead. He reeked of gasoline and oil and knew a shower would be in his best interest, but he couldn't move away from the gulf. He watched slowly. The gentle sound of the sea against the shore moved him to sleep, right there, in that lawn chair. His name was Rory Eunice, and he was a destined acolyte.
When the sun rose hot in the sky, he woke up ready to start the journey. He was a man on a mission and decided his next goal. He had to see one. How could he expect to go hands and knees to his master and not have seen one before? He had to see a shark- any shark- up close. He understood well enough that the odds of a great white coming by this beach and not leaving, especially in these warmer waters of the summer, would be slim to none. He had learned the patterns of them from the novel. He took notes on it cautiously. He went inside, showered, put on a clean jumpsuit and drove the short distance to the resort building. His truck kicked up sand behind it and he watched the people on the beach blur and pass and not pay any attention. He grew angry at them.
He pulled into the back, took out his toolbox, and moved to the task sheet that was already half full. There were scribbles of people assigning themselves specific duties, and there were scribbles of people volunteering Rory. His name scrawled and janky like people were nauseated by the mere penmanship of it. He worked hard all day, on his knees, on ladders, straining his back, and wearing his knuckles. He was a maintenance man for not that great of pay, but he lived alone and required little, so he never complained. He had been taught not to from his father. God is good, and God gives what's deserved. Or, rather, that was the notion in such a tight catholic family. But it seemed to Rory, a right idiot in some regards, that this God everyone prayed to and feared wasn't all that up to snuff. He didn't care about people like Rory - people born different. People born with limbs too long and eyes too deep in their heads.
And what did Rory deserve anyhow? When you really got down to it? If you asked the large lady at the resort, she'd nervously cluck and pick at her nails. Rory knew that the God he wanted to serve responded directly and swiftly to action. None of this waiting around and praying in sterile churches for the mere chance, the slight hope that you'd hear from the big voice in the big sky. No, Rory was tired of that. Tired of the waiting and the pacing and the whispering. He wanted a new bible. A new God. A new list of sacraments that he could check off his to-do list like the whiteboard that hung in the oil closet with his name scrawled on it.
Usually, when the day was finished, he went straight home and made a small dinner and watched TV until he slept, but this time, he went out onto the beach proper. He wanted to hurry to the glass-bottom-boat stand before they closed for the evening, and he clumsily made his way, exciting sand in his work boots and sweating heavily in his jumpsuit. He stumbled up and down little mounds and tried to keep an uncomfortable smile for the patrons of the beach, a direction he was given years ago at orientation. The sun was already making its way westward. The water was becoming darker, and people were leaving. He caught the two young men just as they started closing shop.
"Hello! Hi there," Rory exclaimed. He blushed. He wiped his brow.
The older looking guy stood buff, leaning on the wooden counter, his hat backwards, "What's up, man? What can I do for you?"
There was a sincerity in his voice that caught Rory be surprise. There was vulnerability in his eyes too. This was not one of the typical beach boys Rory watched. Though he looked the part, this guy was different. He seemed to have good in his heart. Rory could tell, and it made him uneasy, like he was going to be caught doing something wrong. Like if anybody came after him it’d be this man right here. This man named P.J. Neil.
"I was just wondering," Rory started. He consciously tapped the wood with his knuckles to seem casual. A calculated effort that fooled no one. "Do you ever see sharks?"
"Do we see sharks?" P.J. asked. He didn't stand up straight, the question didn't deserve his full attention, but he was intrigued. It was a question he usually expected from a child.
"Yes. On the water. Do you see sharks?"
"Not as many as you'd think," chimed in the smaller one. "We go out about a hundred yards past the drop, but it's mostly coral and some snappers and some grunt occasionally. I've seen some sharks now and then, but that was when the water was clearer."
Rory's eyes grew wider, "What types? Do you know?"
"I'm not an expert, but I guess like nurse sharks, you know, the calm ones, and some bull sharks too... Those are common around here, right?"
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure," agreed P.J., "but that was when the water was clearer. Nowadays, it's too sandy to really see past a few yards."
"But, they are down there, right?" Rory asked. It came out more urgent than he wanted to give. His glasses slid down his nose a bit from the sweat. P.J. noticed the man's jumpsuit. The sleeves were tight and ill-fitting.
"Yeah, probably," P.J. said. And then he stood up straight and gripped a padlock from the counter. They were closing up their little hut, and P.J. was glad his younger brother Dennis was close by. The tall man made him feel nervous. Even the way he stood in the sand seemed off, slanted like his bones didn't develop correctly. The way his lanky arms pinched in at the sides like he was always squeezing in somewhere, and how long his fingers were.
Rory watched P.J. handle the padlock. He knew it was time to leave, so he suppressed the rest of his questions. His eyes traced the muscular outline of P.J. and his brother. But it was mostly P.J. His thick neck and strong jawline. His tan skin kept his hard edges and ridges in place. The way his chest heaved when he breathed. Rory nodded goodbye and walked back home. After locking up their little hut, the one the resort provided, the two boys walked in the other direction, and P.J. turned to his brother.
"Did that guy creep you out?"
"I've seen him around some at the Seashell," Dennis explained. "He's the maintenance man there, I think." Dennis walked with more confidence in his step and spoke with his chest out. It was mostly hot air, but P.J. appreciated the theatrics.
The two Neil brothers walked on, their sandals leaving tracks in the soft cold sand which was slowly turning from dull white to cool gray and even later to a black blue.
"I think I want to swing back and double check that it's secure," P.J. said, looking back at the boat. Rory was gone, and the beach was clearing. The sun was making its way to the horizon as the last dying rays dazzled the stragglers determined to watch it.
"It's fine,” Dennis objected. “I can see it from here. It's just sitting there like it did all day."
And P.J. nodded. He ignored his gut and walked with his younger brother back home to their small pastel apartment farther south down the beach. They shared a unit together and ran the kiosk for the Seashell during the day. Their uniforms were bright blue and floral. P.J. examined his brother in the orange glow. The sun was now halfway gone, and it back lit Dennis’s profile like a painting or something to be admired.
Back inside their apartment, they drank beer and made food. They ate chicken and rice and had a bag of steamed vegetables. They sat on the couch and watched TV, and Dennis rambled on about the women he kept eyeing and the ones eyeing him. It was a small living room with a couch patterned with conch shells, fish, and coral. It was garish on its own, but everything in the apartment was that way. The curtains hung heavy. They were made of thick polyester, but felt like plastic. The lamps were shaped like manatees. The carpeting was the type you put in a kids' playroom, the really tight down stuff that seemed to bounce.
They lived there, just the two of them, and this was their life. Dennis had no aspirations past what beach bodied girl he was going to sleep with next, and P.J.'s were long since abandoned. Their father paid the rent for the apartment, which, being the worst one on Marisol Island, was where a majority of the Seashell's staff was put up. It also was at a discount on account of their father working for the Seashell in a great way. These boys were young and had no responsibilities past waking up and going to work. For Dennis, it was great. He drank his beer and got tipsy each night and would go to some club or bar or girl's room. But P.J. lived in a state of gray. Not necessarily depression or anxiety, but something deep inside him slowly unwound – like a ball of twine unraveling, filling him up with reasonless apprehension. He watched the light from the window grow dark and darker, and soon, five beers in, the clock said ten.
Dennis was on the phone in his room making plans for the night, when P.J. got up, swayed a bit, and left the apartment. For a second, he reconsidered in the hallway. It was an open-air corridor, where he could hear the swell of the night tide. The coolness of the air blew through the courtyard. It smelled like the sea and the road. He knew Dennis was right. The boat would just be there, sitting, untouched, boring even. But he couldn’t shake the thought. Nor could he place his finger on the nervousness he felt. In a way, it made him feel like a child. Like when he knew knew knew that nothing was in the closet or under the bed, but he still wanted his father to check for him. Because what if? Even if he could see into a magic mirror the image of the boat locked up and secure, he needed to be there himself. He needed to feel the heavy chains in his hands, feel the weight of its own safety. So he set out drunk and dizzy.
P.J. went towards the shore where the small wooden dock branched into the tide. The boat was on land. If they left it in the water, it would be beached when the tide went out, or if the ropes were too loose, it could be taken out with it. In truth, there were plenty of ways to gauge how the tide would act, but like most things in P.J.'s life, he chose the easiest way. Instead, they kept it out on a metal rack that they used as a trailer when they traveled with it. When the morning started, they would roll it into the water and tie it up to the dock.
It was fairly light for a boat its size because there was nothing to it. Most of the floor was clear Plexiglass bolted down, bordered by two tin benches for people to sit on. The rest of the boat was mostly fiberglass and wood. Then there was the little motor at the stern and the bridge at the bow. Its small size was another contributing factor as to why they were getting fewer and fewer customers. People were more eager to ride on bigger boats with huge nice glass bottoms that had the ability to go much further out. P.J. didn't care much, though. He wasn't at all that passionate. It was just a job to him like any other. At night they kept it heavily chained to the rack, and P.J. was supposed to turn in the keys at the front desk, which he did. He approached the white boat, and the waves tumbled, and a little bird darted from his path.
The encounter with Rory sat sideways in P.J.'s stomach. He didn't like the way the man grinned when asking about sharks. The entire exchange felt off-putting. When P.J. got to the boat, he double checked the heavy chains by tugging on them, and they didn't budge. He removed the tarpaulin and made sure nothing on the bridge was tampered with, and he checked the motor as well, and feeling satisfied, he put the tarpaulin back. He took a breath of the sea breeze, now cooler as the water temperature dropped. Then he turned around to head back.
Standing far off in the darkness, on a sand dune, was the silhouette of a figure. He couldn't be sure from where he came, but he knew it was the maintenance man from earlier. The shade stared back with its hand in its pockets. Wind blew.
"It's all locked up for the night," P.J. shouted, but his voice was carried off in the wind.
Nothing happened. The figure stood there like an apparition, something you'd see at the foot of your bed in the dead of night. Tall with sloping shoulders. A distinctly sharp head without hair.
"I said it's locked up for the night," P.J. said again this time a little less assertive. He felt his own feet poise themselves in the sand in case he had to run.
A moment passed, and then the figure turned and left, and P.J. wiped the cold sweat from his neck. He watched him go, and he denied himself feeling nervous. Soon, the shade disappeared in the distance, and then P.J. went home looking over his shoulder. He told himself he was looking at the boat.
When he got inside, Dennis was showering. P.J. sat and drank another beer on the sofa. He thought of the boat by the sea and of the figure on the dune, and a slow dread dripped into his stomach. There had been plenty of times he had to shoo away kids from fiddling with the boat. There were even times when he had to shoo away grown men, typically drunk tourists or homeless people, from riding it and hollering like Ahab. But this situation was different. The tall shadow stood in that darkness content. Like it was enjoying what it was seeing.
Meanwhile, Rory made his way back to his hut. There was an excited urgency in his step like he was an adventurer. The way P.J. shouted at him made him feel dangerous. When he got home, he curled up in his bed, cracked open the good book and started reading it again. Once he got aroused, he spent himself into his sheets, and then he fell asleep in it. The night was still across the island. Then even the ocean slowed to a stop as if it to take a breath and prepare for what was about to happen.