scoff

Scoff: A Hero’s Tale

I stood in the piercing glare of the unforgiving sun, sporting my neon shorts and Hulk Hogan t-shirt, trying hard to decipher the infinite mysteries of the enigma known as the Rubik’s Cube. The beach was hot, the air stagnant as usual. The zinc oxide on my nose smelled like the inside of a jock strap, but it was better than having the flesh fall from my proboscis due to the dread of an Irishman’s sunburn. It had come to my attention early on in life that the Irish did not tan or burn, they crisped. My family was there with me that day at the beach, off somewhere stuffing their faces with cheetos and guzzling Tab. The idea of coming to the beach to swim was lost on them. They were eaters and eating was what they did best.

I stopped playing with the stupid puzzle cube about ten minutes after I had started. I jammed it in my pocket, but found the awkward shape made walking a bit uncomfortable, so I left it on the sand for some lucky kid to find. It would not be the first Rubik’s I had abandoned and it would certainly not be the last. My walk took me as far as the jetty at the distant, entirely secluded end of Long Beach Island. I watch with some bitterness as dead jellyfish and medical waste washed up onto the shore. I knew even than that the waste would be one thing that would define my home state of New Jersey, making in an American no-mans-land where the mafia would set up shop since their slow disappearance from the streets of New York. There was nothing I could do to prevent that from happening, since New Jersey was already famous for two things at the time: toxic waste and ignorant, horn loving, tailgating, finger flashing motorists.

I dumped a package of pop rocks down my throat and walked the jetty, taking the stones two by two, no concern for life or limb. The seagulls eyed me suspiciously as I approached. Either I would aid in their urbanization and give them scraps of fast food or I would use them for target practice. The choice I made was slightly unexpected, for I always regarded seagulls and most wild animals with quiet indifference. I neither hated nor loved them. I knew they existed, they knew I existed and that’s just how I left it.

When I got to the end of the jetty, I released a King Kong sized yell and danced around like the ten year old fool that I was. Wham was playing in my head and I was moving like George Michael. The George Michael of my youth, not the George Michael who now was famous for hanging out in bathrooms looking for a so-called good time. I didn’t hate him for turning out to be gay. I hated him because he had convinced me, without even convincing me at all, that he was, in fact, as straight as an arrow. I was slightly disappointed when the truth was revealed, but I couldn’t stay mad forever because he had done some good songs and in retrospect was so obviously, completely and fabulously, homosexual.

“Oooh, yeah!” I bellowed in the same rough voice as Macho Man Randy Savage. I was confident that no one was around and, therefore, let my insanity shine. “Yo, Adrian!” I shouted as I bounced around on the rocks. I was an epic cliché in a world of clichés. “Andy, you Goonie!” I shouted to the heavens, recalling the adventures of pint-sized miscreants and two girls that I thought were really hot at the time, but didn’t realize how “unhot” they were until the likes of Heidi Klum graced the Earth with her presence.

I fired off a dozen more media manufactured catch phrases such as “Where’s the beef?” and “Do you feel lucky punk?” before returning to the safety of the beach and, inevitably, the trappings of family life.

I was halfway there when I heard the scream. It was soft at first and then grew louder the more steps I took. I couldn’t see where it was coming from, but some of the screams were cut short by the crashing of waves. I looked out over the murky ocean and saw a white body floating out on the waves, kicking and fighting to reach shore. I quickly slipped into my Superman persona and dived headfirst into the ocean, fighting the waves and my own fear to reach the source of the screams. I pushed harder than I had ever pushed my genetically deficient body and reached the source of the screams. I didn’t care who it was crying for help, I just wanted to get back to shore as soon as possible. I grabbed the bobbing form and for the first time in my life felt a breast. It was an amazing creation, to be sure, but I was ten and didn’t much care for boob grabbing at that point in my life and even if I had, I wouldn’t have stopped in the middle of the rescue to ponder all the beautiful, beautiful things about the female breast.

It took me almost half an hour to reach the shore. When I did, I flopped down in the wet sand like a dead fish and muttered something about chickens. I don’t know why my first thoughts upon reaching the shore were about chickens, they just were. The female whom I had rescued was lying in the sand beside me, her chest heaving, eyes vacant. I didn’t think to administer CPR or anything like that. I didn’t even know CPR, so could not have done anything other than what I had seen on St. Elsewhere.

“Thank you,” she said softly, sitting up and retrieving the remains of her breath.

I was still muttering about chickens and didn’t even think to utter something in return. I watched in awe as the beauty I had rescued rose to her full five feet, eight inches. She helped me to my feet, gave me a pat on the shoulder and smiled into my eyes.

“Really, thank you,” she said and planted a kiss on my cheek.

I was dumbfounded. The only woman who had ever kissed me on the cheek up to that point in my life was my mother and kisses from her were never as sweet. How could a kiss from her be as sweet when her breath smelled like coffee and cigarettes? At the moment, I could think of nothing else to do but nod, so that’s what I did. Later on in life, the encounter would become a part of my X rated fantasies. I wish I had known then what I know now about men, women and sex, but I was a dumb kid who found truth in the Wuzzles, turned to He-Man for advice and watched the Facts of Life to learn …. Well, the facts of life, I suppose.

“My mom is going to kill me,” the young woman said, still staring into my eyes, still wearing that big beautiful smile. “Thank you again.”

And with that, she was gone, out of my life forever. Even to this day, when I tell people about the girl in the ocean, the girl I saved, they scoff and view me as a big fat liar trying to pass off the glories of my own imagination as reality. I know for a fact what happened that day on the beach and I suppose that’s all that really matters. Even now you, the reader, doubt my words. But this matters not to me, the teller of this tale. I know that someone is alive today because I was ready for action, even though I was scared out of my wits at the time. I suppose the true essence of heroism is not needing people to pat you on the back and say ‘good job’. But it would still be nice to find that girl and show her off to all my friends, all for the glory of saying “Meh. I told you so.”