Dark Beach

By Dan Ahearn

Dean McCarthy was born under a bad sign and trouble follows him wherever he goes. To begin with, his father was drunk when he crashed the car and fractured Dean's skull, leaving his son with the occasional brain seizure. Then Dean's mom got cancer and he had to take care of her as she died because his father "couldn't handle it." Things turned around for a bit when the huge white German shepherd Kota arrived. Kota is a talented dog. She can actually smell a seizure coming on and give warning. On the phone! She has other talents too less obvious but no less amazing. But then Dean got into gang trouble in his high school in New York City. So Dean and Kota have come to live with his aunt at the beach in Asbury Park. Life should be good on the Jersey shore, but it's October and it's freezing cold and somebody's killing the town's kids with drugs. On the bright side, there's Gloria, a girl who looks like a movie star and is so cool and who actually gets Dean and Kota. And after all, the beach is still the beach, right? But Dean was born under a bad sign and he finds trouble wherever he goes. Dean has to watch while a young student chokes out his life on the dirty floor of the high school toilet. So naturally he decides to poke around and find out who's behind the town's drug trade. If you're going to pick a fight with drug dealing killers, it helps to have somebody to watch your back, somebody like Kota, a huge white guardian and fierce defender. So trouble may follow Dean wherever he goes, but, luckily, so does Kota.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dan Ahearn
• Release date: Mar 11, 2012
• ISBN: 9781476396521

Dan Ahearn

Dan is a writer living in New York City. He's published two hard copy novels writing as Daniel Hearn: Bad August published by St. Martins and Black Light by Dell. His play, High School Confidential, will be published by Dramatic Publishing in the fall. His new play, Living Arrangements, is in developement. Dark Beach is his first book published on Smashwords

Book preview

prologue

I just lay there with my arms around her.

You can talk about love but nothing comes close to what I felt for her. How do you feel about the being that has given you your life? That cares so much, they have to follow you, even if it means going against their nature and disobeying you, escaping from a locked room and performing the impossible feat of tracking you down in the middle of nowhere. Not once but twice. Following you to the edge and bringing you back. What do you feel for a magical creature like that?

I say all this later, after the fact. Back then, I had no thought in my head, nothing but the smell of dog and the feel of fur and knowing what it is to be completely at one with another living thing. And glad to be alive...

1 – Greetings From Asbury Park!

tuesday morning

The surface of the ocean looked greasy in the cloudy gray morning light and low flat rollers broke steadily on the beach. I put up the collar of my leather jacket against the wind, propped my sneakers on the boardwalk railing and drank my coffee.

I turned to Kota and said, So here’s the deal. We keep our heads down and live happily ever after. No more trouble for us. Right?

Kota gave me the doubtful look and resumed her watch on the sea.

It’s not all bad, is it? At least there’s an ocean, right?

Kota looked out to sea, her white hair stirring in the wind. The way she was staring you would think she could see all the way to Europe. And with Kota… Who knows what she can do?

Boardwalk timbers creaked as a golf cart rolled up behind us. Kota stood up and turned to face them. I twisted around to see. Cops. My insides went cold and my heart raced. I thought: The guilty flee where no man pursueth. My mother always said that to me if I lied when I didn’t have to. And so I always did. Flee, I mean.

Yeah, well, when you’re running for your life, everybody looks like they’re chasing you.

No dogs on the boardwalk, kid. Especially not a wolf like that. It wasn’t summer season rent-a-cops. It was real Asbury Park Police. Although just how real is that, when you get down to it?

Shut up, New York asshole.

I stood up. It’s always good to show respect. At least to start with.

I said, Aren’t dogs allowed in winter?

Uh-huh, but it ain’t winter. Let’s go.

I mean October first. It was the end of October, practically. Halloween was just a couple of days away.

That ain’t decided by the City Council yet. And besides, the mayor’s against dogs on the boardwalk. Too much crap. Let’s go.

She doesn’t poop where she’s not supposed to, I said. Kota’s a service dog. Kota heard her name and looked up at me. What?

So? the cop said, There’s still no dogs.

There were two cops in the golf cart. Nothing like New York City cops, hauling boatloads of authority, agents of the greatest Imperial city since Venice. (You learned shit like that hanging round Mom’s admirers from New York Magazine.) These guys were more like those two ex-bouncers from the old Mudd Club that used to visit Dad when he was holding pot.

The cop who spoke was the young one. He was driving. He probably used to be a bully in high school and went into police work to make a profession out of it. He had a round blunt face, like a beer keg.

I dub thee... Officer Young Punk.

The other cop was older. He was the one to watch out for. I forced a smile onto my face.

I have a medical condition and Kota helps me.

Yeah? said the young cop, What does the dog do? Give you mouth to mouth? He smirked and nodded his head.

Yeah, you’re a riot, I thought, You’re ready to open for a rock band, you’re so funny. But I didn’t say it. Keep your mouth shut.

The old cop turned to face me now, his big fat ass squeaking on the cracked plastic seat. He was pissed because he had to talk. His nameplate said: WARNER

What’s wrong with you? Like I was a gnat that wouldn’t stay out of his ear.

There’s nothing wrong with me.

Keep your mouth shut.

Come on, come on, he said, impatient. He even snapped his fingers.

I have a medical condition. I smiled, trying to put butter on it for him.

Well, that’s tough, but there’s still no dogs allowed on the boardwalk. Let’s go. He jerked his head toward the street.

Be calm. I pictured my heart slowing down. Dun-dum. Dun. Dum.

I’m sorry, sir. Sir. He’ll like that. Big smile now...

But according to the Americans with Disabilities Act, a service dog must be allowed to accompany its partner into any public facility, including restaurants, schools, taxis, airplanes, stores, movie theaters, concerts, sporting events, and any other public place.

Is that so? he said, his face flat as the October sky above his bald head.

Yes, sir. That’s the law.

The young cop said, Do you have some kind of papers to show this?

According to the Americans with Disabilities Act, I said, It is illegal to ask for any special identification from dog service partners.

Officer Young Punk said, Do you think you’re a lawyer, son?

Son? He’s calling me SON, now?

No sir, but I know my rights. Don’t look away. You’re in the right.

Young Cop cracked first. He looked at Old Cop who shook his head and stared at the ocean. They had decided something. I was afraid I wasn’t going to like it. I made some slight movement that told Kota I was in trouble. She picks up on things. Kota stirred, shifting her feet. The cops reacted to her movement. The older cop pulled away from her. The younger cop flinched and grabbed at his belt. His hand was on the mace canister, not his gun. Still, I didn’t want Kota maced either. This was my fault, indulging in free-floating anger and defiance of authority. I stepped in front of Kota, to protect her.

I said (shouted, maybe), You can call my lawyer, Harold Neumann.

I opened my jacket and slowly put two fingers into my shirt pocket (to show Quick Draw McGraw that I wasn’t pulling out anything more dangerous than a rabbit) I produced my lawyer’s business card like a bouquet. I was calm. I was a concerned citizen helping the police. I was ready to do anything to be of service, maintain law and order. Also, I didn’t want to be late. Not that they cared at my new school. I had already missed nearly two months of classes, moving here, waiting for paperwork from New York City. I didn’t want to go anyway, not looking forward to the sweet hell of New Kid-ness.

I’m sure Mr. Neumann will be glad to answer any questions you have, I said.

The old cop snorted at the card in my hand and said, Harold Neumann’s a civil rights pain in my ass. I’ll be damned if I’m spending the morning listening to that fat bastard. I don’t need the card, kid. I got one at the office. Then he said, What’s your name, son?

Oh, you too, with the son crap?

Dean, I said.

His mouth twitched with frustration. Dean what?

McCarthy, I said.

How old are you, Dean McCarthy?

Sixteen. A couple of months short. Soon I could be jumping through the New Jersey hoops to get a driver’s license. If my brain would cooperate.

Why don’t you have a vest or something for the dog? It would save trouble.

According to the ADA a special identifying vest is not required. I usually bust them on that.

But the old cop’s tone had changed. He wasn’t angry anymore, so I just said, We have a leather harness she wears sometimes. People are so weird. One moment, they’re thinking of beating your head in and spraying chemicals in your face. The next moment they’re making chat like they’re on Ellen. Weird. Like, for instance, the old cop was looking at Kota and smiling. I knew he was seeing her, really seeing her, for the first time. And she’s amazing. She’s huge for one thing. And she’s white, all white. And she has pale gray eyes that look right through you. It can be spooky sometimes.

Kota is magic.

The old cop said, I know I probably can’t ask, he groaned, trying to be funny, ACCORDING TO THE AMERICANS WITH DISABILITIES ACT. But what does she do? I mean, does she do anything special?

If I have trouble she’ll get my cell phone out and call my aunt.

Officer Young Punk’s jaw dropped. No shit?

Really, I said. Proud, as if it was me that was special and not Kota.

The old cop said, She can actually dial a phone?

No. She just chews on it. That’s why I have this older model, so she can actually push the buttons. The phone's pre-programmed to call after a certain number of random keys are pushed.

It's still pretty amazing, he said. I didn't dislike him so much anymore. What kind of name is Kota? he said.

Her name was Dakota but I shortened it.

North or South? Officer Young Punk said. He laughed. He really got a kick out of himself, this guy. I made like I didn’t know what he was talking about. But inside, I was thinking of smart-ass, irritating things to say. Things that would get this guy to explode. Something that would get him to hit me, use that nightstick. Something that would make him put me in handcuffs and drag me down to the station. Where the grown-ups would make him apologize. But it would be too late. His life would already be ruined.

And then, my mother spoke inside me and I was ashamed of the thought. What do you want to ruin a guy’s life for? Just because he’s a jerk? Just because his feelings are so buried under years of mouthwash ads, that even with his eyes open, he’s walking around asleep? Who are you to destroy people? You’re not the one to do that. That’s not you. I shivered. That’s just the kind of thing she would say. I think she did say it once. To my father.

Kota nudged me with her muzzle and made a noise: What's the matter?

I put my hand on her head. Nothing. I'm okay.

The old cop hit the young cop in the arm to get him going. Do me a favor? If you come to the boardwalk to spend any time, put her harness on. It’ll save you some aggravation. Have a nice day. He waved and they rode away down the boardwalk toward the derelict old Casino.

I wrote a couple of sentences about this in my notebook. It’s a habit I picked up from my mother, who kept a serious journal the last year of her life. I call it The Mom Diaries. Makes them seem fun and keeps me from crying on them and messing them up. I always have a little notebook and a pen in my hip pocket.

When my mother died, my father gave me her journal, a cardboard box full of those Composition books? With the black and white marble-pattern cover you get in school bookstores? The notebooks were filled with the smooth curving handwriting my Mom learned from the nuns at Convent of the Sacred Heart Catholic School on the Upper East Side. Notebooks: My Mom’s legacy. That, and three liquor boxes full of her LP vinyl which I appropriated when she passed.

Passed? I hate that. Like she went over the hill and she's waiting just out of sight. But she's not there.

In the first composition book, my mother wrote: Dean, this is meant for you and you alone. I asked your father to give these notebooks to you when I’m gone and I made him promise not to read them himself. He’s bound with a promise I know he won’t break. It’s not that there’s things here he shouldn’t see, (although there probably will be Ha Ha.) it’s just that I want to give you something that’s ours, you and me and no one else. You, of course, can share them with anyone you want, even your Dad. Although I don’t really think he’ll want to. He’s already too sad, and I’m not even dead yet. He’s not the kind of guy that handles loss very well. So he will grit his teeth and get really rigid. And it will probably mess him up pretty bad. Everybody’s so stiff when all it takes sometimes is a little bending. Love may not be the only answer, Dean, but it’s better than the Horrible Loneliness. Please help him if you can, but if you can’t, don’t let your father take you down, too. You don’t owe him that. Don’t let that happen to you!

On the cover of each note book, print says, My Composition Book and below that are two blank lines. There my mother wrote Carol McCarthy, New York City, 2007. Her penmanship is really beautiful. Gold star.

For a long time after she died, I could bring my mother back just by choosing to. Just... Zap! She was there, her face, her voice, the good feeling of her, the love she gave me that made me feel so special and safe and good about myself. But after a while it started to get harder to bring her back. And I had to say it: She's gone. Otherwise you'd feel it.

You just forget after a while, no matter how hard you try not to. Your mind isn’t made to remember that way. This is why her journals have been so important to me. When I read them I can hear her voice so clear. And then she’s here again with me.

Down the boardwalk, I could still see the cops. They had stopped a bike rider. You can ride bikes on the boardwalk until twelve o’clock, I think. But you can’t go fast. The cops were laughing with the guy. Everybody’s happy. Then Officer Young Punk turned and stared at me, real bad ass, marking me down for future consideration.

I’ve made a friend there, all right. Two months in town and a local police hates me already. Well done.

All it takes is a little bending...

It had been a close call with those cops. If things had gone a different way – and with my temper they could have very easily – I would have spent the day with my lawyer arguing with cops and social services. Okay, that’s no big thing for me: I’ve got civil rights and a lawyer. But it would have been different for Kota. The cops would have sent her to the pound and once a dog falls into the city’s hands, anything can happen. Dogs get lost. Dogs get dead. And then all you get is a shrug and a lecture. More than anything that helped me keep my big mouth shut.

My hostage to Fate. Where did I hear that?

I was watching Kota watching the cops. Guarding me. She knows what’s what.

I put my hand on Kota’s head. She pushed back but kept her eyes on the police. Then she looked at me.

Are we in trouble again?

No.

Life’s unfair and there is no justice. Wherever you go there are cops and gangsters, bureaucrats and solid citizens with hoops to jump through.

And it pisses me off.

Don’t hurt this dog, Dean, just because you’re an asshole.

Welcome to Asbury Park, I said.

Kota said, Woof. Kind of low and unconvinced.

2 – Born to... Run? Be Wild? Lose? Love You? Die?

It was 7:30 when Kota and I finished breakfast at Tony’s ‘The Waves’ Café on the boardwalk. My aunt does many things but she will not cook. Gail runs a tab for me at The Waves and that’s mostly where I eat breakfast. I eat, they put it on the bill, and Gail pays at the end of the month. It’s pretty cool. Tony is never awake before eleven, so mostly I dealt with Lydia, who was not exactly Tony’s wife. She was the one who opened the café at six a. m. Lydia is Italian and I really like her. She was born in New York City, too. Sometimes we talk about the old home town like a couple of immigrants to the New World.

We already have a thing. I always say, Lydia, we come from an island off the coast of the United States. (New York’s an island, get it?) Then, she gives me the Bronx cheer and we laugh. It’s not a great thing, but it’s a thing.

In New York, Kota and I used to eat breakfast every morning at Sammi’s Halal Food Cart on the corner of Broadway and 116th Street near Columbia University. It’s a little box on wheels with an actual guy named Sammi in it cooking halal food. Halal is like Islamic kosher, prepared according to strict religious laws. So it may be a little cleaner with fewer chemicals and poisons. Anyway, that was the hope.

So breakfast at Tony’s was the new routine. Kota and I had actually been in Asbury Park since the last week in August, but I’d ditched as much school as possible. In fact, this was my first full day. Before, we just came in to meet with the principal and his henchman and discuss what to do with me.

I was a little nervous. It was more than typical New Kid crap. You typical New Kids don’t have a big white German shepherd with you wherever you go. A complicated dog that has her own adjustment to go through. It’s tense.

Add the fact that my new high school is eighty percent black: We stick out. Our first day would be like, Hey everybody! There’s a new white kid in school and he’s got a big white dog that he brings to class ‘cause he’s sick or something and if he starts to die the dog knows how to save his life or something! Let’s get him!

I was just wishing the beginning would end. At some point we would be old news. But I was running out of reasons to stay home. I had to start.

Kota and I were used to being the sore thumb, as in sticking out like a ... When my mother died, father and I couldn’t handle staying in her home on St. Marks Place in the East Village. Too many memories. So we moved up above 110th street in New York City. My father did a kind of shady deal with drug buddies and got a rent-controlled lease in a big building that used to be grand and impressive. But now not. For instance, there was a big brown rusty water stain on the wall in my room, which would never go away, no matter what paint we put over it. It kept coming, like the Zombie Apocalypse.

I liked the Upper West Side. There was Riverside Park and the Hudson River. I could see New Jersey across the river, never thinking I’d end up here. There was pizza and movies on Broadway. And Sammi’s Halal Food Cart, of course. I used to walk through the Columbia Campus sometimes, pretending I had the brains and money to go to a school like that. It was a totally different New York City from the East Village. It was like a fresh start.

All of which is to say, I miss New York. Nothing against Asbury Park. It’s just once you get used to 24 hour pizza and Chinese delivery in any weather and the street show and seeing your home town featured on TV all the time, it’s hard to get used to the anonymity and the lack of services in a place like AP.

I know: But you live on the beach! Yes. I’m a spoiled brat and I suck. I hate myself already.

Anyway, my school in NYC was in Harlem, so I’m used to being the minority. I kind of knew what I was in for.

My family are New Yorkers. My father was a union stage electrician for rock bands and big events in New York City. It’s a family job. His father, his uncles and his grandfather were all members of The Union: Local One, IATSE (International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees). It’s the coolest job. You’re backstage. You meet the stars. If they’re cool, you even hang out together sometimes. And somebody cool, like my father was when he was young, somebody that knew how to help tour sound engineers reproduce the sound of the records live in each venue, somebody who, in his way, was vital to the music business, he was really on the inside. He and my mother went to all the parties. He mostly worked at Madison Square Garden since around 1985, so just imagine the bands he dealt with. So cool. But he went downhill with alcohol and drugs after my mother died. The sad story of my dad.

Okay. Now, the main thing about me, unfortunately: I have seizures, due to a head injury I got in a car accident when I was ten. The seizures didn’t start all at once but they gradually became a problem when I was about twelve. There is a little pocket of rust in my brain where old blood had clotted. It probably ought to be removed but who wants brain surgery? Besides, the doctors can’t guarantee they won’t make things worse by rooting around in my brain. The seizures are mostly controlled with medication, but sometimes I don’t rest or forget to take the meds and I have problems. You wouldn't know any of this to look at me. There’s just a deep scar at my hairline where they peeled back my face to fix the damage to my skull.

Anyway, my father couldn’t deal with it because he was driving the car and he was drunk. His way of coping was to seek counseling from the nearest bartender. He started getting hammered full time after Mom died. It was bad, but we were surviving. He was still plugging up for the occasional rock band at The Garden. I was able to function, more or less, and keep the situation at home on an even keel.

Then I had a bad thing happen to me. I had a seizure on the street in New York. I lay there for a long time before anybody thought to help me. To be fair, people probably thought I was a passed-out drug addict. By the time somebody called 911, some jerk had gone through my pockets and I had bled out about a pint of blood from the cut where I hit my head falling. Like the song says, born under a bad sign. If it wasn’t for bad luck, I wouldn’t have any luck. At all.

That’s when my father’s sister, Gail, found Kota. Kota looks out for me. Dogs like Kota are rare and hard to get, but Gail always makes connections. She happened to know somebody who knew somebody that introduced her to a woman who ran the dog training program in a women’s prison upstate.

I sometimes wonder about the woman who raised Kota from a puppy, named her Dakota and trained her and what crime she committed to be in jail. Whatever it was, she did a good job. Kota knows her stuff.

I did get this letter which came with Kota and I keep it in my mother’s copy of E.E. Cummings: Complete Poems 1904-1962 (her favorite poet) which I keep in the same box as her journals, The Mom Diaries.

To Who It May Concern,

I address this to you that way because I am not allowed to know who Dakota will go to. But I got permission to write this letter and send it along with Dakota wherever she will go. And it broke breaks my heart in two when she goes. It’s so difficult to let her go because she did so much for me. I raised her from a puppy and she is such a dear dog. I have bad epilepsy which is why I was eligible for the Seizure Dog Program here at (name blacked out) Prison for Women. You don’t know but prison is a depressing place and I can say that having a dog to be with all the time was a life saver and Dakota is real good dog. She smells knows when I am going to seize and she warned s me. But also I swear she knows what I am thinking. She sensed when you are down or sad and knows just how to comfort you. Like at this moment she is very sad staring at me with real sad eyes because I think she knows it is our last day. I am trying to picture a beautiful life for her so she will see it and feel that from me and not feel afraid. I only hope the beautiful life I imagine for her will be true. I am crying right now when I think how much she means to me and how much I will miss her. I just wanted to tell you who are so lucky to have this magic animal come into your life that she will love you and protect you. She will be a strong right arm for you. And all you have to do is give her food and love her back. She deserves it more than I can say. This goodbye is forever between her and me. But I will never get over her and I will pray every day that she will be happy and healthy in her new life and a good service dog. Which I know she will.

Thank you for listening,

The signature had been removed by the prison authorities.

This letter makes me worry about what happened to Kota’s first partner. She seems pretty messed up. And so sad. I just hope she’s okay and was allowed to have another dog. I don’t know how I would be able to handle it, if Kota was taken away from me.

Ordinarily, dogs like Kota only go to younger kids with more serious seizure problems than mine or mobility issues. But Kota had been disqualified from the program and they were looking to place her basically as a pet. We were never told the reason but I think it’s because she’s too big, too active and therefore the wrong fit for a little kid. She’s an official service dog, of course. She can smell a seizure coming on and warn her partner just fine. But she couldn’t do all the other stuff a little kid would need like being real gentle and cuddly.

But Kota’s just right for me. Since Kota came, I’ve been a lot better. I credit this to not being so scared that I might have a fit and be helpless. I know Kota’s there to help me. And she’s better too. At least that’s what she says. All right, she doesn’t actually talk, but she might as well, her expressions and gestures are so easy to read.

Also, don’t freak out because I said fit back then. There have been people in therapy sessions I’ve been in, who go crazy if I say fit. God, it’s just a word, people. Peel your underpants out of your crack and chill. I say harsh things to keep it light and not feel so sorry for myself, which, before Kota came, I had a major tendency to do. After I seized up in the street, I was afraid to go outside. I had a big-league depression. I say a lot of non-PC stuff to keep up my morale