Read Online The Tribes of Palos Verdes by Joy Nicholson - Free Book Online

don’t say anything, he draws up his shoulders and smirks.
    â€œOh, you’d look all right in a bikini.” He slaps me on the back. “Don’t be so sensitive.”
    I smile but don’t look at him. Later I cut him off and snare his beautiful ride on a good three-footer.
    â€œDon’t be so sensitive,” I say when he shakes his fist at me.
    But it’s not just hair and swim trunks, there’re other unspoken rules. P.V. surfers never wear colored wet suits, or anything bright or modern, no neon. They only wear black wet suits, holes patched with duct tape, discolored with resin stains. They have one- or two-fin boards. They don’t ride squirrelly, stupid, tricky tri-fins, and don’t like anyone who does.
    Secretly, I don’t care that much what anyone wears. I don’t even care if they surf in sopping wet Levis like some Vals do. For me, the only thing that’s sad is watching people go to work in their suits and ties.
    It feels so great to walk away and go surfing.
    *   *   *
    My mother is reading a book by a famous TV psychologist who says most of a person’s personality traits are in their genes when they’re born. She tells Jim I was born with the same sneaky gene that my father has, that’s why we’re in cahoots, ganging up against her all the time.
    â€œMom says you and Dad are alike,” Jim says thoughtfully. “She knows you have secrets with him.”
    I tell him it isn’t true. My stomach twists around, the way it always does when Jim gets nervous about me.
    â€œNo women like you. The towel girls hate you, too.”
    â€œThey shouldn’t,” I say. “I don’t even talk to them.”
    â€œThat’s just it. You don’t talk to anyone but me. You go around giving people creepy stares all the time.”
    I tell him I don’t feel comfortable around anyone but him.
    He sighs. “I just want you to be normal. I’m tired of defending you to everyone.” Then he tells me to forget it, I wouldn’t understand.
    Even though I offer to give him my new Surfer magazine, he doesn’t respond.
    Instead he says he wishes I were different, sometimes.
    *   *   *
    My brother and I are in my parents’ bathroom brushing our teeth, because our own sink is stopped up with dog shampoo and fur. Jim is in a really bad mood because my mother was crying all night, and he had to go sleep in her room. Quickly he rifles through my father’s rows and rows of vitamins.
    â€œI dare you to take these,” he says, pouring out nine bright pink capsules of niacin into his hand.
    â€œWhat are they?” I ask suspiciously.
    â€œJust vitamins, from Dad’s shelf.”
    â€œIf they were just vitamins, you wouldn’t be laughing,” I say.
    â€œDon’t be a pussy, just swallow them, they aren’t gonna kill you.”
    â€œIf it hurts, I’ll kick your ass,” I say.
    â€œOh, you will?” He is punching me, knocking the wind out of me, bending over my face like a hippo. “Kick it then, kick my ass, big mouth,” he says.
    I lie on the tile stunned, trying to breathe. He leans in close, looking very strange, angrily pushing the pills in my face.
    â€œGo on, tough girl, or are you scared?” He flaps his arms like a chicken’s wings, clucking, “Bok bok bok.” His eyes are bugged out, sweaty hair stuck to his forehead.
    I grab the pills from his hand and swallow them, my eyes closed.
    Within minutes my face is flushed bright red, my palms and feet are itching like crazy, my heart is pounding too fast. I am gasping for air. “How come you made me do that, Jim? I thought we were best friends.”
    â€œOh, man,” my brother says, dropping down next to me, hugging me. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
    And then I’m comforting him, trying to stop him from bashing his head against the