Page 162 of Sunset Beach
Drue followed Jonah to Yvonne’s house in his Audi, and he was at the wheel of the ten-year-old Acura, which they’d washed and vacuumed and waxed until it sparkled like it was new.
She waited in the Audi while Jonah got out and knocked on Yvonne’s screened door.
The rusted-out Plymouth was in the same place it had been on her last visit. The hood was still raised, and the same two tires were still missing.
When the grandmother appeared in the doorway, Drue sank as far down in the seat as she could. After a moment’s discussion, Yvonne came out onto the front stoop. Jonah handed her the keys, then pointed at the gleaming silver Acura.
Yvonne’s hands flew up to her face and she screeched something unintelligible. Then the screen door flew open. Aliyah walked slowly over to thecar, her face enveloped in a wide, blissful smile, followed by her grandmother.
Yvonne ran her hands over the hood and and then the doors and the trunk of the car, exclaiming so loudly that the neighbors across the street emerged from their homes to see what all the fuss was about.
Jonah made a dash for the Audi, and before Yvonne had time to react or ask questions, Drue had already driven away and was halfway down the block.
“That was fun,” Jonah said. “We should give away cars bought with ill-gotten gains every week.”
“What was Yvonne hollering?” Drue asked. “She was so excited, I couldn’t quite make it out.”
“‘God is good,’” Jonah said. “I bet she said that a dozen times.”
After they got back to the cottage, Jonah suggested lunch at Sharky’s.
“Really?” Drue wrinkled her nose. “The food’s not even that good.”
“That’s not the point,” he said. “Sharky’s is our place now. The place where it all began. Just humor me, okay?”
They ate mediocre grouper sandwiches and were about to walk back to the cottage when they noticed a crowd gathering a few hundred yards up the beach at the Gulf Vista.
“Wonder what’s going on?” Drue asked.
“I know,” Jonah said. “Today’s the day they start demolition of the original wing of the hotel, to make way for the new spa. Let’s go watch.”
“Why?”
“It’s the little kid in me,” Jonah said. “I love that stuff. Dump trucks and backhoes and excavators.” He tugged at her hand. “Come on.”
She reluctantly followed him up to the point where the beach ended and the resort’s property line began. The crowd had swelled to nearly a hundred people, and the gate had temporarily been replaced with orange plastic construction netting andDANGER—KEEP OFFsigns.
The glass in all the windows of the now-vacant building had already beenknocked out, leaving gaping holes in the façade that resembled rotted-out teeth. A backhoe’s claw chewed into the top of the concrete structure and the roof collapsed inward.
“Cool,” Jonah said, awestruck.
Another backhoe on the south side of the building was busily ripping into the concrete foundation of what had been a three-story parking garage. With each bite into the building, the claw swivelled around and deposited a load of debris into the bed of one of a line of half a dozen dump trucks.
“Why are they digging a hole there?” Drue asked.
“I saw a rendering of the plans for the new spa in the paper,” Jonah said. “I think there’s going to be a new indoor pool there that’ll be connected by a wall of glass to a pool on the other side.”
His eyes were glued to the proceedings. “I always thought if I couldn’t be a lawyer, I would love to be a heavy equipment operator,” he said. “I don’t care what you say, that’s artistry, when you operate a machine like that.”
“Bulldozer ballet,” she muttered.
“Exactly.”
The sun beat down on her neck, and she was growing bored with the proceedings. “Can we go now?” she asked.
“In another minute,” he said, still mesmerized. As they watched, the backhoe clawed deep into the growing pit. A hard-hatted construction foreman in a yellow safety vest blew a whistle and at his direction, the driver of the first dump truck drove away.
The second dump truck driver pulled forward, but before he’d moved into position, the backhoe operator miscalculated and prematurely released the claw. Debris rained down over the bed of the dump truck and onto the ground.
