I AM POSTING some parts of my novel as I make my (hopefully, as alway) final edit. Changes I’ve made in the earlier chapters demands these changes and cuts. As I add new text, I will be deleting any previous text. Is it paranoia? Maybe.

UPDATE- Monday, April 13, 2026- I have spent time on the conclusion. The big mental challenge is wrapping in some other characters and hinting at what might happen in a sequel. “Beacons,” another north county surf spot with, conveniently, a useful double meaning.

As always, we’ll see.

Saturday, August 1, 2026-

                                    CHAPTER ONE- MONDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 1969

            “Notes. I take a lot of… notes. Your stack is bigger. Is that my… permanent record?”

            “Ah. Humor. Yes, Joey, I guess it is. But you, and your… copious notes… Do you write them as a… an aide? Visual.” 

            “As my own record, Doctor Peters. Some time I might not remember. Correctly.”

            “Susan. Please. You brought your notes, and, I’m guessing, homework, into the office; so, can I assume that your mother drove you?”

            “We took my car, Doctor Peters. The Falcon. I drove. My mother… snoops.”

            “Detective’s wife. Sure. Would you read me something from one of your notebooks? Your choice. Maybe something about… surfing.”

            “Kind of boring, but… give me a second. Okay. ‘The allure of waves was too much, I’m told, for an almost three-year-old, running, naked, into them. I remember how the light shone through the shorebreak waves; the streaks of foam sucked into them. I remember the shock of cold water and the force with which the third wave knocked me down, the pressure that held me down, my struggle for air, my mother clutching me out and into the glare by one arm.’ It’s more a story.”

            “You wrote this… when?”

            “Recently. See? Notebook. So… August… 1968. It’s me… creating a story from fragments, from what my mother told me. Or from dreams. Seems real…”

            “We can’t know how much of life is created from… fragments. But, please, Joey; the basketball practice story; I didn’t get a chance to write it down. So, the guy…”

            “I’m not here because of that… offense.”

            “I am aware. Just humor me.”

            “Basketball. Freshman team. Locker room. They staggered practice. I was… slow… getting dressed. Bus schedules. He… FFA guy… Future Farmers. JV. Tall, skinny, naked, foot up on a bench; he said I had a pretty big… dick… for a Jap. I said, ‘Thank you, Rusty,’ just as the Varsity players came in. Most stood behind him. He said, ‘Oh, that’s right; your daddy; he’s all dick.’ Big laugh.”

“’Detective,’ I said. ‘Rusty, I am sorry about your brother at the water fountain.’ I kind of… whistled, stuck out my upper teeth. Bigger laugh. Varsity guys were going, ‘Whoa!’ Rusty was… embarrassed. His brother… That incident’s in the records. Fourth grade. Three broken teeth. Year after I… came back. That’s why the… Shouldn’t have done the whistle; thought I was… standing up for myself. Resisting.”

            “Joey. You’re picturing it… the incident. You are.”

“No. I… Yes. I quite vividly picture, or imagine, perhaps… incidents. In both of those cases, I tried to do what my father taught me; tried and failed. ‘Walking away is not backing down,’ he said. Anyway. Basketball. I never had a shot. Good passer, great hip check.”

            “Rusty… He charged at you?”

            “He closed his eyes. I didn’t. Another thing I got from my father. ‘Eyes open, Jody!’ Some other freshman, Umberto, squealed… to the coach. No one else did. Rusty and I denied anything happened. It didn’t make Rusty and I… or Umberto and I… friends.”

            “All right. So, so, so… Let’s talk about the incident for which you are here. You had a foot on… a student’s throat. Yes? Yes. He was, as you confirm, already on the ground, faking having a seizure. He wasn’t a threat to you; wasn’t charging at you. Have you considered…?”

            “The bullied becomes the bully? It’s… easy, simple, logical… not new; and I have… considered it. Let’s just say it’s true. My story is… I’m trying to mend my ways. Look, Grant’s dad alleges… assault. I’m… I get it; I’m almost eighteen. Grant claims he and his buddies were just… fooling around; adolescent… fun; I can, conceivably… claim, and I have, the same.”

            “But it wasn’t… fun… for you?”

            “It… kind of… was. Time’s up. My mom’s… waiting.”

            “Joey I am, I can be… the bully here. So… sit the fuck back down!”

UPDATE- Easter Sunday/Resurrection Day, April 5, 2026- I am on page 220. I tried to do some work on the novel on a different computer. Something happened and I lost all the changes. Like 2 hour hours worth.

When this happens, a writer just knows it was the best work EVER, and un-duplicate-able. HOWEVER, I did Reed it it, and… Better. I remembered most of the stuff I had liked.

If rewriting makes a work better… “Swamis” has to be… Better!

Big Ending Coming!

UPDATE MARCH 14, 2026- I AM continuing to work on the novel. I am at page 207 or the current page count of 227, somewhere over 93,000 words. This number has remained fairly consistent. Each time I edit something down or out, I seem to add something else.

I stayed up a little later than my body clock is comfortable with last night to finish the 8th episode of the PBS MASTERPIECE version of Alexander Dumas’ novel, “The Count of Monte Cristo.” Worth it. I had to find out how all the plot lines converged. Suspense. I KNOW who killed Chulo. That is not the mystery. It is the mystery to the characters. Bearing in mind that the reader only knows what Joey sees or finds out, what is intriguing to me is the discovery of clues by Joey, his growing relationship with Julie, and where and how various characters play into the final of this book.

An early scene that I took out may be back in. Jumper, back in the water after returning home, wounded, from Vietnam, is witnessed violently overreacting when Sid comes up behind him. If I spent too much time revealing Joey as capable of violence, it seems appropriate that it becomes… appropriaty.e to the story. Still working this out.

HINT- If there is to be a sequel, it would be titled, “Beacons.” A trilogy would include the title, “Grandview.” Maybe. I have to finish this one.

Thanbks

This is a continuation of Chapter 19. Julie and Joey, despite some setbacks in their relationship, are awkwardly working together to find the reason behind Chulo’s death, and who is responsible.be

Julia Cole, her bag over her shoulder, stopped a third of the way up the lower stairs. My board under my right arm, I skipped a step to join her. She skipped a step to not allow it. She stopped at the platform, waited until I joined her, and pointed to the words, “Old men stop here” carved into the water-side railing. 

“I’m fine, Miss Cole.” I took a deep breath and held it as I made the ninety-degree turn to the top set of stairs, switched my board to my left arm, skipped a step, and started up.

“Joey…” I stopped and looked back. “You can call me Julie. Please. Everyone else does. I don’t want anyone to think we…”

“’We’ again… Julie?”

“Yeah. That. And, Joey, since you’re ahead of me, is it all right if I check out your ass?” Julie set her bag down, started to reach inside, her eyes still on me. “Or not.”

Taking one step at a time, I exaggerated the side-to-side movement of my hips. Eight steps up, I could tell by the vibration in the wooden structure that Julie was running up the stairs behind me. We were even when she, then I, stopped, three steps from the top.

I let out a bigger-than-necessary breath and leaned over, tapping the nose of my board on the step she was standing on. I took another deep breath.

“Cigarette, Joey?”

“No, thank you, Julie.”

Julie’s breaths were quick and shallow. Her smile was tentative. “I called you Joey way before you got up the nerve to call me Julie.”

 “You win… then.” I was trying not to break into an uncontrolled giggling grin. “Julie?

“Yes.”

 “Julie. I will… I would like to… take my… keys and my… wallet… back. Please.”

Julie hit the pocket of her windbreaker and shook her head. She took two stair treads up, stopped, set her bag down, and turned around. “La Jolla. There’s Windansea and… there’s Blacks Beach. And UCSD. We could…”

I took the two stair steps between us in one. “We could, Julie, but…” I looked down at the bag, back at her face. We both seemed to notice how close we were. “Julie… People. What would people think?”

“Joey. Joey, if you… want, you can call me Julia.”

“Julia? Julia… you’re smiling.”

“Yeah? Well, you started it.”