Mahu Surfer by Neil Plakcy

I figured I had nothing left to reveal.
     
    “You look good, Dario,” I said. “Must be all that clean living.”
     
    He was probably thirty-five, but he’d hardly put a pound on his skinny frame, his face had no lines, and his hair, though thinning at the top, was still full enough. “Flattery will get you everywhere.” He winked at me. “And I do mean everywhere,” he said, in a low voice.
     
    His voice returned to normal as he said, “Now, why don’t you take a look around while I finish up with this customer, and then we’ll go in back and get all caught up.”
     
    He went back to the girl he’d been showing bodyboards to, and I walked around the store. The Next Wave was located just off Hale’iwa Road, overlooking Waialua Bay. The buildings in the neighborhood were all one and two stories, simple wood-frame places often with fading paint and a motley collection of clunkers, Jeeps and pickups parked outside. Most people on the North Shore were there because they loved to surf, and high-paying jobs in the area were non-existent. People spent their money on expensive gear rather than on fancy homes or tricked-out cars.
     
    When I was surfing the North Shore, The Next Wave was a hole in the wall next to a discount shoe store. Since then, Dario had moved up from occasional salesman and the store had taken over the adjacent space. A news clipping on the side wall described how Dario Fonseca, owner of The Next Wave, had been given the key to the city of Hale’iwa by a previous mayor. Maybe Dario was more serious than I’d given him credit for.
     
    I hadn’t surfed competitively in years, but I still kept an eye out for the latest gear, and Dario had it. There was some serious money tied up in his inventory, everything from O’Neill surfboards to Rip Curl wetsuits, Oakley sunglasses to Reef sandals, Croakies to Sex Wax. As you moved around the store, you could shop for T-shirts, boogie boards, leashes, and cork coasters in the shape of aloha shirts. The Next Wave also sold surf guides, magazines, signs that read Surfer Girl Crossing , and beach towels featuring the Ford woody station wagon that the Beach Boys had made famous.
     
    Clothing took up nearly half the store, with fake surfboards at the ends of the racks with face-outs of shirts and shorts. You could buy every type of souvenir gadget known to man, including miniature surfboard magnets, bottle openers that looked like shark fins, ball caps with a long flap around the back to protect your neck from the sun, roof racks for your car or truck, and plastic cups with The Next Wave logos. After I’d made a complete circuit of the store, I wasted time by trying on a couple of different pair of sunglasses, modeling for myself in the tiny mirror. I thought I looked a little like Keanu Reeves as Neo in The Matrix ; just give me a black duster and the ability to do those jumping, twirling moves in slow motion and I’d be the baddest detective in the Honolulu PD.
     
    It was late in the afternoon, and The Next Wave was busy, a mostly young crowd shopping, discussing and buying. Dario had even installed a little cyber café in one corner, serving cappuccinos and lattes and renting out time on six computers. Each of them was busy, and from the expectant looks of a number of the coffee drinkers sitting near the stations, I figured they would be for some time. I also saw a couple of people using their own laptops and realized the café offered free Wi-Fi.
     
    Against my expectations, Dario seemed to have turned himself into a solid citizen. I’d given up on sunglasses and moved on to hats by the time he came over to me again. “So, how does it feel to be out and proud?” he asked. “You’re here, you’re queer, get used to it?”
     
    “Strange,” I said. “I never wanted to be a celebrity. But now my face has been on TV and in every newspaper.”
     
    “It’ll pass,” Dario said. He gave me a smile that was half a leer. “I always knew you’d