PART ONE: SUN
Chapter 1: Arrival
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MacLean drove past the Crystal Springs Reservoir, high and green in the curving Coast Range. He soon began his descent. After a few green minutes, he passed Bongard's Christmas tree farm on his right, and artichokes and horses on the steep hills to his left. He passed the Obester Winery and the Spanishtown Arts and Crafts Center. Then he passed a supermarket, already glowing fluorescently in the early evening. Turns, lights, twilight's grey glow. He drove until he had entered the State Beach. The lot was nearly empty of cars.
He parked near no one and got out. The surf thumped in his ears and it felt good. The rhythmic, mythic crash of the waves rubbed his ribs, and the sea salt licked his face; the wind damp with foam from waves broken in sandy tumbles now tousled his hair affectionately. The sky was deepening blue behind him and sultry grey above and forward to the horizon. Seagulls called to each other above the roar of the Pacific Ocean and shore birds hopped on the damp part of the sand. There was seaweed the color of old coffee and there were dime-sized white shells bleached by the sea. MacLean tasted the scent of the seawater in the air and his mouth salivated at the salt. America was at his back. He had come home.
He looked at his watch and felt connected again with the world of men and their machines. He didn't like that feeling so he took off his watch and slid it into a pocket. He thought about hurling the thing into the water but he loved the ocean too much to pollute it with a tool Man used to guess at Time. MacLean smelled the wind change: the smell of coolness, the coming of the night. The lights were going on at the Princeton Harbor and in Jake and JoJo's Saloon. They were going off in the shops on Kelly Avenue and in the two banks and the insurance agent's offices on Main Street. He looked out to sea. There were probably whales out there. "Godspeed," he blessed them. He climbed back into his car and drove into Main Street looking for some place to eat. The simple thoughts of coffee, hot food and a warm bed sang an adult lullaby in his ears. He smelled good cooking, heard some laughter and saw warm lighting in a blue and cheerful place called the san Benito House. He turned and parked on Mill Street. He heard a scrape when he moved his boot from accelerator to brake: sand had joined him in his car. He looked down and smiled at that. He had made it back to California. He had made it to Half Moon Bay. ###
Half Moon Bay is about thirty miles south of San Francisco. But it might as well be a hundred miles or a thousand miles away. Some of the water in the tide that pulls south along the San Mateo County coast may originate from San Francisco Bay, but few other ripples from the bug city (or simply, "The City") reach into the place where Arroyo de los Pilarcitos touches the Pacific Ocean.
It started out life when two Mexican soldiers were granted land across the creek from each other. They called it San Benito in the early days. The children of the two families grew and intermarried and built adobe houses around the area. Someone put up a wooden bridge so they could visit on holidays, and they put up a church to go to on holy days.
The Mexican War came and the Californios banded together on the ranchos of the area, and then the Gold Rush and Statehood came on the heels of each other. The town changed a bit as the newcomers, from all over the world, put up wooden buildings of two and even three stories. You still needed to speak Spanish, however, so these settlers called the place Spanishtown. A lot of the settlers were Portuguese and Italians, but those languages sounded much the same to the other new settlers from Ireland and the East Coast and San Francisco.
The place still didn't change much even when it began going by the name of Half Moon Bay. The Post Office still delivered mail addressed to Spanishtown and would have if it were addressed to San Benito, probably. The tallest building was still the Occidental Hotel at three stories, till it burned down in 1894. When they rebuilt it they only gave it two stories, and now the Post Office is on that site anyway.
For a time the prospect of a coastal railroad excited a land boom and inflated the prices of the lots in town and along the coast. Hopes were high that Half Moon Bay would grow up and be like Santa Cruz, a resort and shipping center linked to San Francisco. But that dream evaporated like fog in the forenoon. The railroad came and went. Prohibition came, a few made money and a few more died in the secret coves and roadhouses, and then Prohibition went too.
In 1959 Half Moon Bay incorporated itself as a city, but no one noticed much. Today it sits around its Main Street, sleeping in the sun, occasionally stirring as if it forgot to do something like turn off the water in the pea rows, and then it settles back into a misty and fresh-aired dusk. The village of Pescadero and the hamlet of San Gregorio nestle in the canyons to the south. To the north, the commercial and charter fishermen liven up the Princeton Harbor, and then a string of communities color the coast: El Granada across the Cabrillo Highway from the Pillar Point Marina, Princeton-by-the-Sea, Moss Beach, and Montara. The sea is everywhere. As you drive along Highway 1 it shines and sparkles in view. When you turn a corner on Main Street or Kelly Avenue it suggests itself in the whisper of a wave or the foghorn of the Point. And even as you rise in the Purissima and Pilarcitos valleys, the scent of saltwater touches the eucalyptus aroma and you know that the water running down the hill will find its way to the Pacific, because its destination is its destiny. ###
Needing a few household start-up items, MacLean drove to the Longs in Strawflower Village shopping center. The wind made the air fresh and new each minute. He methodically went through his list of mundane items and decided to treat himself to a Brother Cadfael mystery in the paperback book section.
She was in the same aisle further up with the magazines. Behind her was the warm soda and the charcoal briquettes and the fire extinguishers, and next to her were the key chains and flashlights. MacLean stopped and pretended to look at a crossword puzzle digest.
She wore a black leather motorcycle jacket, a form-fitting minidress, black tights and low black boots. She was curvy and voluptuous, and he figured she had to be intelligent since she was reading The Atlantic. He kept turning to her and then she looked up and straight into his eyes.
Under the purple eye shadow and the aggressive magenta lipstick and the midnight mascara was a perfect face. She had lovable cheeks and a mouth like a bow. Under all the paint she had a sweet face. Under the superficial expression of jaded experience she had her own collection of beliefs she accepted on faith. She was in that time of youth when you cast away the colors and music of childhood; in that time when you reach, scrambling, for all that is left, and try to save some torn fragments of all you threw to the wind. She looked about 24, was dressed about 20, and the wisdom in her eyes was beyond her years.
She opened her mouth as if to say something, but then looked away. Closed The Atlantic. Took it to the checkout stand and paid. Left.
MacLean was home before he realized that he'd walked out, paying for everything except the crossword digest he still held rolled in his hand. Chapter 2: The Meeting ================
For the next month MacLean was occupied with tasks: finding a place to live, re-registering his car in California, and calling his contacts for work. Although he had headed out to the Golden State with only a vague idea of where he'd get his work from, his luck had been as full as his optimism. In a week he had an assignment revising a manual for a program called JumpStart, a software package specifically developed for service station owners. He worked on both versions: one for affiliates of the big oil companies and one for independents. MacLean had found a niche in the world of computers. Engineers can create brilliant programs but manufacturer-issued user manuals and tutorials are notoriously confusing to the purchaser. Many manufacturers simply don't bother with a good manual, leaving it up to a third party to market an "X Made Easier" book a few months after release. But the young president of Macrosoft, Karl Lynx, wanted his software to win the award for Best Manual (among other honors) in the PC press; when MacLean left his calling card and brochure and references, Lynx leapt at the opportunity. He immediately signed MacLean to edit manuals for his next two projects: On-Vine (a program for wineries) and StageManager (package to help theatres build subscription sales and automate operations and recordkeeping in general). Macrosoft had its headquarters over the hill in Redwood City, about a half hour drive for MacLean.
MacLean was set now, with money coming in, his PC power-stripped, surge-protected and humming, the hum coming from a new tape backup drive that he had splurged on but which offered protection against data loss, which in his case could be his livelihood--the manuals he painstakingly created. His apartment was a studio above a bakery, cheerful and sunny, with food in his fridge and wine on his table. The bottle he had placed there to be opened when he saw her again.
He had not stopped thinking about the woman since that evening in Longs, and he hated himself for not having spoken to her, or asking her something--where she worked, her telephone number, anything--to get an idea of how to get in touch with her. He found excuses to go to that combination drug and discount center, but she was never there. He had lingering Saturday morning coffees at McCoffee's and sat in the window at San Benito House, befriending Siobhan ("Just say Shove On, and you're there,") the barmaid and enlisting her assistance. He would work at his assignments in two shifts, from 9 to 12 and 2 to 5:30, and look for her before and after each. A month had gone by and it was raining slightly. This late afternoon he was restless and felt like walking even though his clothes would soon soak up the wetness floating in the air. He started thinking about his life and found himself again irresistibly drawn to the Pacific.
At the beach the rain made sad holes in the loose sand. The breaking waves seemed confused by the water entering them from above. A few solitary figures, an old man picking up bottle caps and shells, another middle-aged man surfcasting, and a young Filipino guy in a tan suit smoking a cigarette and staring at the sea, populated the strand. MacLean kept walking until no one was around him. He saw a hill and debated whether or not to climb it. His body said yes and so he did, and at the crest he saw her sitting wrapped in a purple poncho, staring at him. She had set out a bottle of wine and two glasses. ....
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. Feb. 2000; Oct. 2001