CASTLE BY THE SEA first appeared in CAD Magazine in 1966. I see it as a period piece, and as such have left alone the now somewhat amusing colloquial hip slang of the time. Richard Ashby was the editor of CAD then, and I think it was he who wrote the blurb that appeared before the story: “Their castle was a pile of sand on the beach, as fragile as their love-hate relationship.” I didn’t argue with that then, and I won’t now. 

CASTLE BY THE SEA short story by Patrick Breheny

Crests of white foam, swelling and curving and crashing, carried body surfers into the shore line, while bathers dove beneath the broken waves, and children at the water’s edge ran with screaming delight in retreat of the nipping sea.

Back near Ocean Front Avenue, near the steps that descend to the beach, a red bearded young man lay on the sand, unaware of the activity. His shirtless torso was fried a mahogany tan, and he was drenched in perspiration by the August sun. He wore only a pair of Levis, with swimming trunks underneath, and even the tops of his feet were tan. By one leg was a large empty jug of port wine, lying where he had left it the night before. A thick black turtleneck sweater was folded beneath his head, put there when the rising heat awakened him in the morning and he took it off. Very close to him was an imprint, where someone else had been lying, and some clothing---a pair of Levis, two windbreakers, and a girl’s sweater.

He was smiling in his sleep, because he dreamed that he got a letter and a check from Grossman, his agent, and Grossman had sold his novel. He got the letter at Father John’s coffee house, where all his mail came, and he would turn everybody on tonight with acid, or pot, or whatever they wanted, and then he would rent that pad he had been digging at Malibu, and put something down on a car, maybe a Mustang, and get off the beach so he could get some work done.

 A blonde girl in a full bathing suit, one she wore regularly as a garment, came out of the water, her  legs bending and springing in recoil from the hot sand as she ran. The young man’s dream was very pleasant, and he was vaguely annoyed when a sudden thrust of weight on his body ended it. Laughing, the girl had thrown herself on top of him, and he groaned from the unexpected jolt. “C’mon, Eric, get up. Its three o’clock.”

He opened his eyes, and the blinding sun forced them closed. 

 “Wait a minute,” he mumbled, drifting off with a snore he could hear himself.

“I’ve been waiting all afternoon.”

 An older man and woman on a nearby blanket had been watching them with benevolently patronizing amusement, and the girl, noticing it, slid her hand inside his Levis. The couple looked away.

“Get up or I’ll squeeze them off.” 

 Eric sat up with a spring, and she darted away. He lunged at her ankles, missed because he was half asleep but, probably because she let him, managed to recover and and tackle her. They rolled in the sand, and he pulled her underneath him.

“You ready to ball, Suzy?”

“Eric, there’s three million people on the beach.” 

"Screw them,” he said, but let go and stood up. His mouth held a residual rot that only can only come from bad habits. His tongue felt to be the texture of mushroom fuzz, and he could almost smell his foul breath. It was the wine. He never got that taste from just grass; it was only when he drank too. And the marijuana was going to solve that alcohol issue, he knew it would, it just hadn’t…yet. He reached into his pocket, and had  three dollar bills--- he didn’t have to count them or look at the denomination--- what was left from some spackling and painting he’d done about a week ago at an apartment building, and he still had one joint left. It wasn’t very cool to carry it around, but he didn’t expect a bust on the beach. Still… He slipped his pants off, and threw them with the girl’s clothes.

"I’m going in the water. You coming?”

"Not right now. I want to dry off.”

“You going in again at all?”

"I don’t know.”

"That joint’s in my pocket. If you’re not going back in, maybe you can hide it a little better.”

She nodded, and he walked toward the ocean. The sand was scorching his feet, but he didn’t want to run. He began counting from one hundred, backwards. Finally, it was too much, and he raced to the cool damp shore. The water seemed very cold, and the waves covered his ankles, tugging at his legs as they washed out again. He stood stationary, and his feet were soon buried. He bent over and wet his hands, then washed his face like a cat, simultaneously using ocean water as mouthwash.

A group of kids were scooping up handfuls and shovelfuls of wet sand, dropping it in pails and carrying it back to where the water didn’t reach. They were building a castle, the most elaborate castle he had ever seen. It was several castles, really, or mounds of sand, each connected by a drawbridge of sand that was supported by interlocking ice cream sticks. The framework of sticks was wedged into the mounds, and then they lay sand on the stick bridges. Each mound had protruding levels, and the kids used rolled matchbook covers for gunposts, and stuck small flags into each “building”. They had a trench or moat around the entire project, with a bridge, again supported by sticks, crossing the moat. On the bridge, and beyond it, and at various points within the perimeter, including the connecting bridges, they had toy horses with mounted riders. Eric watched them with an unaticipated surge of envy. He walked closer, and spoke to the tallest boy, who seemed to be directing the construction.

“Is this your idea?”

“Partly,” he said. He might have been eleven. “It WAS my idea at first, but everyone else is doing stuff.”

"Are the horses yours?”

“No. Some of the kids went home and got the horses and flags. I just thought of the bridges.”

“A little engineer,” he said, and kneeled to examine it. “What are you gonna to do when you’re finished?”

“What do you mean?”

"I mean, you going to leave all these toys and flags here so people can see you castle?” “

"I don’t think so. My father is coming down to take a picture. We’ll probably kick it apart before we go.”

Eric looked from the project to the kid.

“Why do you want to do that? Why don’t you just take the toys home and leave the castle?”

 “Cause somebody else will do it we don’t.”

Eric stood again. He had cooled off in the ankle deep water, and now didn’t really feel like getting wet. What could he say? He wanted to tell him he was wrong, but he knew he could be right. Some jealous kid might kick it apart. He walked away, back to Suzy, and wondered if Father John had any mail for him. “Ready to go shopping?” he asked when he reached her. She nodded and they got dressed. He reached into his pocket and the joint was gone. In storage or smoked to a roach? She laughed, put her thumb into the waist of her Levis, and snapped the bikini bottom.

“It must be all wet.”

“It’ll dry. I’m just damp.”

“How much money you have?”

 She put her fist out and opened her hand. In her palm were a dime, a nickel and three pennies. With his three dollars that was---well, anybody can count that high, even stoned.

They walked to a small market three blocks from the beach, where prices were a little better. They were in the store about ten minutes when they went to the check-out counter. They had a big bottle of wine, two packages of macaroni and cheese, a can of tomato sauce, a package of spaghetti and several chocolate bars. They took the groceries to Father John’s, went in the back way, and put them in the kitchen. There weren’t many people around. Through the open service window Eric saw two chicks out front at the coffee bar, and a cat with bongos on his knees was tripping drum rhythms in a booth.

In the kitchen, somebody had potatoes boiling in a pot on the stove. “You girls eat yet?” Eric asked through the doorway. Before they could answer, he tossed them the package of spaghetti. Suzy put water on for the macaroni, and they ate the candy bars. Eric was opening the wine when Father John rushed in, also through the rear door, and turned the gas off under the potatoes. He was massively built, with white hair and beard, and he always seemed in a hurry.

“Eric, man, I got a letter for you. From Grossman. Must be what you were looking for.” He reached for a small stack of envelopes on the refrigerator. Shuffling through them, he pulled one out and handed it to Eric.

 “Anything for me?” Suzy asked.

Father John laughed. “Suzy, baby, you using this address. I never get any mail for you.”

“I know. Nobody writes to me.”

 Eric ripped the envelpe open. It was only a letter, he could feel there was no check. The note was in Grossman’s handwriting. “East Coast says no, Eric. It’s their opinion, and mine, that the novel might be publishable, but only after revisions. I'll return the manuscript and my suggestions as soon as I get it back from East Coast. Regards, Stu Grossman.” Eric crumpled the paper inside a tight fist and swung at the wall, but not hard enough to break any knuckles.

“Hey, man, the paint.. I guess that wasn’t what you were expecting.”

Eric attempted regaining cool. “Not exactly.”

Suzy was dropping the macaroni into the boiling water, with an expression he'd started seeing lately, had trouble interpreting, but didn't like.  He also thought,  despite his tantrum, that she seemed grateful, relieved he wasn’t getting anywhere. He stepped behind her and said, “Suzy, you look like you’ve been balling Batman.”

 She turned slowly, and said "Don't take it out on me, Eric." Said it with a quiet seriousness. She was often quiet when stoned, but rarely serious, and he decided he'd leave that alone. Father John closed and locked the hinged hatch at the serving counter between coffee shop and kitchen, then locked the rear door.

 “I scored this afternoon,” he said.

The grass was in a plastic bag in a drawer, wrapped in a towel. He took a handful from the bag, and began sifting it through a strainer, onto a piece of newspaper. When he had enough, he took cigarette papers from his pocket, and rolled three joints. He gave the first to Eric to light. Eric took two deep, sucking drags, and passed it to Suzy, who did the same, and passed it to John. Soon the room was different, and when the joint was finished, they laid the roach aside for later, and lit the second one. The macaroni was ready, and Suzy, using another strainer, drained it, spread the cheese, and served it on three plates. Father John had re-lit a low flame under his potatoes, then seemed to forget them, perhaps with the intention of settling for some manner of potato stew tomorrow.

They were all sitting again around the grass pile. Eric thought Suzy was pretty stoned, and to prove him right, from nowhere she said,

“Father John, you know Eric was going to leave me?”

John was preoccupied with his own trip, and slow to answer. “Eric wouldn’t do that.” “

"Yeah, he thought he was going to sell his book and split on me.”

“No, Eric wouldn’t do that. Would you, Eric?”

“That’s it, ask him. What’s the matter, Eric, why don’t you answer? You were gonna leave me, weren’t you?”

“You’re on another bum trip, baby.”

"Let's blow some more pot,” Father John said to divert the children from conflict.

Two more joints, and then another, and the afternoon is long and becomes night, and conversations are laughing and picking up the last phrase of what someone else said and expanding it, and only realizing that they’re not with you when the take your last words and shoot off (maybe that’s what I was saying; no it wasn’t) but why stop them it doesn’t matter the macaroni’s cold on the floor that’s funny it’s getting late the band’s coming soon its eight o’clock Father John will be opening the door and that was some good shit you and Suzy can hang around have a cup of coffee and pick up on the jazz that was what he said wasn’t that what he said. John stands up he is opening the door but Eric doesn’t want to hear the jazz the bottle of wine is still almost full he picks it up and takes Suzy and they go back to the beach out of the wind in the shadowy privacy of the long wall of the athletic club extending far into the sand.

Much later, Eric had his arm around Suzy, and they were sitting with their backs against the wall. Neither had spoken for a long time; they dwelled in solitary, wandering thoughts. Eric was the first to speak. “Where’s that joint, Suzy?”

“I dropped it in the sand.”

“Here?”

 “Here. You know, Eric, I think I’m a toy."

Eric laughed. “Wow, baby, you’re really going on bummers lately.”

She didn’t say any more, and he shook her, and she still didn’t speak. He sifted through the sand around her and in front of her, it took a while, but then, voila, a sandy joint. He wiped it on his shirt, flicked off remaining grains of sand, and they blew it. That did it! It was always the same with grass, you got as high as you thought you could get, and then when you blew some more you went somewhere else. Wow, man! The moon was coming at him. He grabbed Suzy to hold on , because for a second he thought he’d fall into the sky.He laughed convulsively, so hard he fell into her lap and held his palms against his stomach, but nothing was funny. It was all so bad, and he kept on laughing. Suzy was rapping, and it was bugging him, and he tried not to listen, which he wasn’t anyway, but the sound was so irritating. He was always apprehensive when he got this high. Who knew what anything was cut with? Oregano, Drano, cat piss? By accident or on purpose? Who knew? Some sick fuckers in this world. He’d had the horrors once, and was afraid they were coming again. He sat back up. Suzy’s arms were around his neck, and he couldn’t stand her rapping, and her hanging on to him, and he tried to say “Stop rapping, Suzy,” but he couldn’t even understand what he said, and he pushed her off him, and she wasn’t rapping at all, she was just tripped out, stoned, and she lay down on the sand, with her hair covering her nose and cheek, and looked like such a sad little girl that he wanted to say “I love you, Suzy” and he thought that he really did, but he couldn’t say it, because he loved something in her that he loved in himself, he supposed, if he ever had the courage to say “I love you Eric, something in YOU”, but he couldn’t do that either, and Suzy was alright, she was just stoned too, so he got up and walked to the deserted water line, carrying the jug of wine. In there was a familiarity grounded in reality, an old friend and enemy that could banish any bad drug trips.

Grossman was bouncing the novel. Maybe he should get another agent? Who? Grossman knew what he was talking about.But all that work. How could he revise it again. He had revised it six times .

As he walked, he saw the mounds of sand where the expansive collection of castles had been. They were kicked apart as promised, but they still had bases, with a few bridges intact, and the kids had overlooked some of the flags. To Eric, it looked like an abandoned desert outpost, lying desolate for years.

Suzy had cigarettes in her jacket and he went back. He took one from her pocket, and lay with the back of his head on her lap. Lighting the cigarette, he thought, a lot of guys would give an arm to get next to this chick. This was something new of hers, this balking, this feeling that she was being taken for granted. They'd had a brief discussion about that very topic recently. She had said to him, "I don't know why I keep staying with you." That had devestaed him, yet he'd tried replying glibly, joking---though as the impromptu words came out, thought he's gone too far---"You must be a masochist, Suzy." He got none of the usual banter from her for that. Instead, she'd brooded, contemplating it for longer than he thought any flip remark should merit.

Yet she stayed. He knew she wasn't a masochist--- maybe just  too insecure to let go of their "staus quo"?... their... image?...their what? They had each other, some friends, an approval from them, an identity as a hip couple, and---not much else.

He really didn’t know if he would have taken her with him. She was the best he’d ever done. And without her he'd just be lying here alone, another bum on the beach. But she represented the beach and the bohemian scene, and to Eric that was a depot he was in, a transit point---he couldn’t bring himself to metaphorize where he was as being even a train station, much less an airport--- waiting for the big express bus for success to arrive . So why not get Suzy a ticket? He figured that was probably how people ended up getting married. All moot at the moment. He felt her breathing beneath him, relaxed and even, and he could hear her snoring softly, far away. Slowly he sank into a dreamy wine and marijuana slumber. He could see their figures, lying hidden beside the wall, their breathing diminished beneath splashing waves and the drone of the wind and the rolling sea. In sleep tonight was another presence, with all the other constants that stalk the subconscious, saying sleep is no hiding place, castles crumble, and Eric knew that in the morning, when the mothers came down to the beach with their children, he and Suzy would still be lying on the sand, where they had been the morning before, and the morning before that, as permanent, in an era, as the wall that sheltered them.  

Copyright, all rights reserved, by Patrick Breheny