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old truck. Old Bessie had been good to me since college, but she had gotten tired of being put on the back burner.
    Say what you will; Bessie was reliable as hell. I fiddled with the AC a moment, waiting patiently for the hot air scorching my face to turn cool, but it never did. “Fuck.” Add the AC to that long list of repairs.
    I slid behind the wheel and tossed the phone on the dash. I crammed on a pair of aviators and headed for A1A, waiting to merge into traffic with the rest of the morning maniacs. From the looks of their driving, people were either one of two extremes—late on their way to the office or early for bingo at the nursing home. Even gridlock couldn’t quell my excitement.
    I lived in a small apartment that was nothing special—one bedroom, one bathroom, open living area, and one assigned parking space. But the main draw was the location. According to the nearest green road sign, I lived only 3.8 miles from the beach, and it usually took a mere ten minutes in traffic to get there. It was rare that we had waves good enough to bother with, but when the conditions were right, being able to pick up a wave or two within ten minutes was ridiculously convenient.
    I actually had Trevor to thank for finally breaking down and trying to ride the waves. His fascination with the beach had inspired me to take advantage of something I’d been ignoring my whole life. After the accident, he had spurred me on to live again. Love again, or so I’d thought. And then he’d taken it all away.
    Before he’d gone to UM, Trevor had never seen the beach before in real life. Iowa born and bred, he’d confessed. As if his wheat-colored sheaf of hair and a big bucktoothed corn-fed smile wasn’t my first clue. His accent alone told me he was from some flat state where farming was more than a vague thing that happened to our food before it appeared on the shelves at Publix.
    I’d never contemplated such an existence—the beach was such a part of south Florida living that it was almost synonymous. Trevor had seen a lake, a reservoir, and fished on a couple of streams and ponds, but that was as close as he’d gotten to big water. A brief memory of him telling me that and then surprising him with our first date on the beach filtered through my mind. His smile had seemed to cover his entire face as he’d kicked off his shoes and run down the beach like a maniac.
    His smile didn’t look like that anymore. He had polished, capped veneers. I knew it was ridiculous and an opinion that only I had, but I thought he’d looked better before. As I pulled into a vacated spot, small but prime in location, I realized it was the first time in a long time that I’d thought anything positive about Trevor. Just Trevor. Trevor, my buddy, who had dragged me to South Beach after class and laughed through Jell-O shots on Coconut Grove. My roommate, eventually more, and now, finally, less. I felt a brief spurt of anger that just the thought of facing what he was had been enough to send him running into the arms of the nearest woman he could find. No, that wasn’t quite fair to Laura. She wasn’t the bottom of the barrel—was actually an attractive woman if you went for that kind of thing. Trevor didn’t. No one could suck dick like that and still be attracted to women. Trust me.
    I shook off my doldrums and grabbed my board out of the truck, not bothering to wind up the windows in the sticky heat. I grinned at the sight of a familiar figure on the water, cutting through the waves so confidently it was obvious he’d made some sort of Devil’s pact with Poseidon. Asher could surf like a professional and was the happiest beach bum I’d ever met. I stood and watched him for a moment, not wanting to interrupt his ride, letting the warm, salty surf lap at my ankles.
    With the experience I had now, I realized that on my first time out, I’d looked absolutely ridiculous. I’d researched to my heart’s content and let some sloe-eyed clerk at Ron