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“Is Vanessa coming tonight? ” Nina asked. “I know you said she might have to go to San Diego with her family. ”

“No, she’s coming, ” Kit said. Vanessa had been in love with Hud since Kit and Vanessa were thirteen. So Kit knew she wasn’t going to miss an opportunity to be near him. Kit kept hoping the crush would fade but it never did. Hud didn’t help matters by being so sweet to her.

“But is anyone surprised Ted’s coming? ” Jay said. “He’d never miss an opportunity to come hit on Nina. ”

Nina rolled her eyes. “Ted is, like, old enough to be our dad, ” she said, getting up from the table to grab a napkin off the counter. “And anyway, I don’t even want to think about getting hit on. I’m not sure I’m feeling my spunky best lately. ”

“Oh, come on, ” Jay said.

“Maybe just leave it, ” Hud offered.

“You’re gonna let some tennis asshole make you feel bad about yourself? ” Jay said, looking directly at Nina. “The guy’s a complete douchebag and, I’m sorry, but his backhand sucks. And I always thought that. Even when I liked him. ”

“I mean, ” Kit said. “Jay’s kind of right. Also, are we now allowed to acknowledge that he was balding? ”

The last part made Nina laugh. Hud caught her eye and laughed with her.

“He really was balding, ” Nina said. “Which would have been fine if he realized it. But he had no clue! It was, like, right on the top of his head and he’d wear those visors—”

“That just made him look more bald, ” Jay said, plainly. “Why did you let him wear those visors? ”

“I didn’t know how to tell him he was balding! ”

Kit shook her head. “That is brutal. You let him walk out of the house and onto national TV with a bagel of hair on his head. ”

And they all started laughing. The four of them, erupting, at the image of Brandon Randall unknowingly balding on ESPN.

They were good at this, they had experience. This was how they began the process of forgetting the people who turned their backs.

“At least it’s Carrie Soto’s problem now, ” Nina said. “Let her find a way to tell him. ”

The good thing about getting dumped by a dickhead is that you don’t have to deal with the dickhead anymore. At least, that’s how it’s supposed to work.

The day after Mick and June’s divorce went through, Mick married Veronica. Within weeks, Mick and Veronica bought a penthouse apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan and moved across the country.

They had been married for four months before he started sleeping with the wife of a sound engineer he’d been working with, a redhead with blue eyes named Sandra.

When Veronica figured it out—she’d found an auburn bobby pin in his suit jacket—she threw a dinner plate at him. And then two more.

“Fuck, Ronnie! ” Mick screamed. “Are you trying to kill me? ”

“I hate you! ” she screamed as she threw another one. “I hope you die! I really do. ” Her aim was terrible; not a single dish so much as grazed him. But he was startled by the violence of it. The flush of her cheeks, the craze in her eyes, the cacophony of dishes breaking and a woman screaming.

The next morning, he had his lawyer file divorce papers.

As he had movers pack his things, Veronica stood in her robe screaming at him, mascara running down her face. “You are an awful man, ” she cried. “You were born a piece of shit and you’ll die a piece of shit just like every other piece of shit on this planet! ”

When he told the movers to take the bedside lamp, she hit him across his back and scratched his shoulder.

“Veronica, stop it, ” he said, as calmly as he could. “Please. ”

She grabbed the lamp out of the mover’s hand and threw it against the wall. Mick’s pulse started to race, as he watched her unravel. He grew nauseated and pale. She lunged at him and he ducked from her last grasp as she fell to the floor crying. He threw a few hundred bucks at the head mover and ran out of the apartment.

As he lit a cigarette there on the street corner, about to hail a cab to his hotel, Mick thought fondly of June.

• • •

June learned about the divorce from the pages of Sub Rosa magazine. As she read the headline, she felt some semblance of pride. She’d lasted longer on the bull than Veronica had.

Maybe, June thought, he’ll get his head straight now. Maybe he’ll at least call his kids. But the phone never rang. Not on Christmas. Not on anyone’s birthday. Never.

• • •

Still, in the rare quiet moments backstage …

In the deafeningly sober seconds before the first drink at his after-parties …

In the blindingly bright mornings before his first glass of bourbon …

Mick thought of his children. Nina, Jay, and Hud.

They would be fine, he figured. He had chosen a good mother for them. He had done that right. And he was paying the bills for all of them. He was keeping that roof over their heads, sending child support payments that were sky high. They would be fine. After all, he’d been fine with far less than they had. He gave no thought to the idea that he might break his children just as someone had broken him.

• • •

Carlo and Anna Riva had been tall, stocky, formidable people. They had one child, Michael Dominic Riva, and had tried for more but came up empty. In other families that might have meant Mick was the star, but for the Rivas it meant Mick was the beginning of a failed project, one they were sometimes tempted to abandon.

Carlo was an unremarkable barber. Anna was a mediocre cook. They often were not able to pay their rent or put anything that tasted good on the table. But they were in love, the kind of love that hurts. They hit highs so high neither of them could quite stand it, and lows so low they weren’t sure they’d survive them. They smacked each other on the face. They made love with a sense of urgency and mania. They locked each other out of the house. They threatened to call the cops on each other. Carlo was never faithful. Anna was never kind. And neither of them spent much time remembering there was a child.

Once, when Mick was only four years old, Anna was making dinner when Carlo came home late smelling like perfume.

“I know exactly where you’ve been! ” Anna shouted, furious. “With the whore from the corner. ” Tiny Mick ducked at the sound of her raised voice. He already knew when to find cover.

“Anna, mind your business, ” Carlo snapped.

Anna grabbed the pot of boiling water in front of her with both hands and flung it at her husband.

The scorching water hit the kitchen floor and a spot across Carlo’s neck. Mick watched from the living room floor as his father’s skin began to puff at the collarbone.

“You crazy bitch! ” Carlo screamed.

But by the time the burn had blistered, Carlo and Anna were snuggled up together on the tattered sofa, laughing and flirting as if they were alone.

Mick watched them, eyes wide and staring, unworried they would see him gawking. They never looked at him when they got like this.

The next month, Carlo was gone again. He’d met a blond seamstress on the subway. He stopped coming home for nine weeks.

During times like those, when his father was gone, his mother could often be found alone in bed, crying. There were some mornings, far more often than to be called occasional, when Anna did not get out of bed until the sun had passed its zenith and started its way back around.

On those mornings, Mick would wake up and wait for his mother to come to him. He would wait until ten or eleven, sometimes even one. And then, understanding that it was one of those days, he would eventually begin to fend for himself.

Anna would later open her bedroom door and join the world of the living, often to find her baby boy cross-legged on the floor, eating dried spaghetti. She would run to him and sweep him up in her arms and she would say, “My boy, I am so sorry. Let’s get you something to eat. ”

She would take him to the bakery, buy him every roll and donut he wanted. She would fill him with sugar, ply him with laughter. She would pick him up into her arms with glee, cradling him to her, calling out “My Michael, my Michael, fast as a motorcycle” as she ran with him through the streets. People would stare and that made it all the more fun.

“They don’t know how to have a good time, ” Anna would tell her son. “They aren’t special like us. We were born with magic in our hearts. ”

When they got home, Mick would have an ache in his stomach, and he would crash from the sugar and fall asleep in his mother’s loving arms. Until the chill settled into her again.

Soon enough, Mick’s father would come home. And the fighting would resume. And then they would lock themselves in their bedroom.

But eventually, whether it was weeks or months or even a year, his father would leave again. And his mother would stay in bed.

And Mick would have to fend for himself.

• • •

Mick married again, shortly after he divorced Veronica. The biggest star in Hollywood. It was a huge scandal, the talk of the town when they had it annulled the next day.

Nina saw the headlines in the grocery store while June was buying milk and bread. She couldn’t read the words on the cover of the magazine and June wasn’t even sure if her daughter recognized the face of the man that was her own blood. After all, June had cleansed their home of his music and photos. She had changed the channel the few times his face invaded their TV screen. But still, Nina stared at the picture on the front of the magazine as if she could sense its importance.

June picked up the stack of magazines and turned them around.

“Don’t worry yourself with that garbage, ” she said, her voice steady. “Those people don’t mean a thing. ”

June paid for her groceries and told herself she didn’t care what he did anymore. Then she took the kids home and poured herself a Sea Breeze.

• • •

Then came the spring of 1962.

Mick was single and in Los Angeles for a show at the Greek, one of the last on his third world tour.

In his dressing room backstage afterward, Mick loosened his tie and threw back his fifth Manhattan of the night.

“You ready to come out and play? ” said his makeup girl with a glint in her eye.

Mick was already bored with her and he hadn’t even touched her. He rolled his eyes and grabbed his drink. He was getting so sick of all the people around him all the time. And yet, he didn’t want to find out what his soul had to say when he was by himself. And so, he came out and charmed the VIPs and beauties who had made their way backstage.

There were so many girls. So many women. For some reason, all of them seemed too easy lately. The way they clamored for their chance to hang on his arm, the way their makeup was all the same, their hair all sprayed in the same styles. Even their beauty seemed meaningless—what is one beautiful woman if you’ve slept with hundreds already? What does it matter if the pretty teenager in the corner is batting her eyes at you when you’ve had the world’s most famous woman in your bed?

Mick had started getting into the backs of his limos alone at night, drunk and already half-asleep. The night after the Greek was no different. Just him and his driver and a bottle of Seagram’s.

Mick rested his head against the window, watching Los Angeles whiz by as his driver sped farther toward the Beverly Wilshire. Mick was now drinking his whiskey right from the bottle. Perhaps it was the sights of his old city, perhaps it was the smell in the air, perhaps it was the reckoning that was emerging in his soul. But when he closed his eyes, June’s face appeared in his mind. Round, wide-eyed, gentle. She was making him dinner, pouring him a drink, hugging the children. Beautiful, patient, kind.

Things had been easier, then. When he had relaxed into her, in their life together. However small and simple it was. She was a good woman. With her, he was as close as he got to being a good man.

“Let’s go down to the 10, ” he said to the driver, before realizing what he was even doing. “The 10 to PCH, please. Up to Malibu. ”

Forty-eight minutes later, he arrived at the front door of the first house he had ever owned, the home of the only woman he ever truly loved.

• • •

June woke up to the sound of the waves crashing and someone pounding on the door. She put on her dressing gown.

Somehow, she knew who it was before she turned the knob, but she couldn’t quite believe it until she saw it. And then there he was at the threshold, in a stylish black suit, with a white shirt, and his thin black tie undone, hair tousled just so. “Junie, ” he said. “I love you. ”

She stared at him, stunned.

“I love you! ” he shouted so loud she startled. She let him in, if only to get him to quiet down.

“Sit down, ” she said, gesturing to the dinette, the same vinyl chairs he had sat on before he’d left them almost two years ago.

“How did you get even more beautiful? ” he asked as he obeyed.

June waved him away and brewed him some coffee.

“You are everything, ” he said.

“Yeah, well, ” June deadpanned. “You’re a whole lot of nothing. ”

He had expected this. She had a right to be angry. “What have I done with my life, June? ” he said, his head in his hands. “I had you and I ruined it. I ruined it because I got distracted by cheap women, women who don’t hold a candle to you. ” He looked up at her, his eyes watering. “I had you. I had everything. And I gave it all away because I didn’t know how to be the man I want to be. ”

June was not sure how to respond to the words she’d been dying to hear.

“I cannot live without you, ” he said, realizing he had come here to get back what he’d lost. “I cannot live without all of you, my family. I have been such an idiot. But I need you. I need you and our children. I need this family, Junie. ” He got down onto his knees. “I was sorry the moment I left you. I’ve been sorry ever since. I am so sorry. ”

June tried, desperately, to make the lump in her throat go away, to hold back the tears forming in her eyes. She did not want him to know how broken he had left her back then, just how desperate she felt now.

“Give me one chance to fix it all, ” he said, “I’m begging you. ” He kissed her hand with humility and reverence, as if she alone could cure him. “Take me back, Junie. ”

He looked so small to June then.

“Think of the life we could give the kids. The five of us, vacations in Hawaii and barbecues on the Fourth of July. We could give them a childhood of everything you and I ever dreamed of for ourselves. Anything we can think up, we can give to these kids. ”

June felt a pinch in her heart. And Mick did, too.

“Please, ” he said. “I love our children. I need our children. ”

He was picking the lock on her heart like a burglar at the front door. Almost, almost, almost, and then, “I’m ready to be the dad they need, ” he said. Click. It slid open.

June took his hand and closed her eyes. Mick kissed her on the cheek. “Mick …” she sighed.

There, in her pajamas, Mick still in his suit, June moved her mouth toward his and let him kiss her. His lips were full and warm and tasted like home.

When Mick pulled back to look at her, June looked away but took him by the hand. She led Mick into the bedroom. They fell to the bed, as June pulled Mick onto her. They rushed as they clung to each other, their hearts swelling as they moved, their lips pressed against each other, their breath one breath. They both were under the same spell, that delicious delusion that they were the two most important souls to meet.

This was what June had ached for, every day since he left. The feeling of his attention on her, the way he moved his body with hers. He touched her in just the way she had grown desperate to be touched.

Mick fell asleep soundly moments later, complete. June stayed awake the rest of the night, watching his chest move with his breath, watching his eyelids flutter.

When morning came, she felt as if the next chapter of her life was starting, the part where the family lives happily ever after. As June started preparing breakfast, Nina woke up and walked into the kitchen.

She could not quite make sense of the sight before her. Her mother was making eggs and toast for this strange man seated at the table. He was in trousers and an undershirt, drinking a cup of coffee. He looked eerily familiar and yet she could not place him.

She asked what she did not know. “Hi, ” she said. “Who are you? ”

And Mick, undeterred, smiled at her and said, “Hi, honey, it’s Daddy. I had to go away for a little while. But I’m back now. Forever. ”

1: 00 P. M.

Jay rolled up his trash and walked it over to the garbage can. “I have an idea, ” he said, with a grand pause.

“So spit it out, ” Kit said.

“When was the last time we were all riding together? Like, actually, all of us, ” he asked.

So often now things got in the way of the four of them just being out there on the water. Jay and Hud were traveling all over the world and Nina was always on some shoot. But they were all here now. They all had the afternoon free.

“I’m in, ” Kit said.

Hud nodded. “Me, too, ” he said. “Family shred. ”

Nina looked at her watch. “Let’s do it. The waves are great at my place. We can head there. Especially since I can’t stay out too long; the cleaners are coming. I should be there to let them in, make sure they’re all set. ”

“Can’t you just leave the door unlocked with a note? ” Jay asked.

“No, I mean, you know, I should greet them. Make them comfortable. ”

“Make them comfortable? They are going to clean your house, ” Jay said. “You are paying them to make you comfortable. ”

“Jay …” Nina started. But then that was it. “Are we gonna hit the surf or what? ”

“Fuck yeah we’re gonna hit the surf, ” Kit said, offering a high five to Hud, who took her up on it.

The four of them cleaned up their lunch and said goodbye to the staff and made their way to their cars.

It would be the last time they all surfed together. Even though Jay did not know what would happen over the course of the evening—did not know just what awaited them all—he did know that.

Mick’s life came into focus for him during the summer of 1962. He was on hiatus from touring. His new record was already in the can. And he had moved back in with his family.

Every day, he woke up with the satisfaction of being the man he meant to be. He was paying the bills and buying June and the kids whatever they wanted. He took June out for romantic dinners, he read stories of heroes and soldiers to his boys.

Still, his daughter held a piece of herself back from him.

Nina was not charmed by Mick like June was and she was not aching for his presence quite like the boys. But Mick remained determined to win her over. He would tickle her in the living room and offer to sing her to sleep at night. He would make her cheeseburgers on the grill and make sandcastles for her on the beach. He knew, over time, she would soften.

One day, he believed, Nina would come to understand that he was never leaving again.

“Marry me, Junie. One more time, this time forever, ” Mick said to June in the dark one night after they’d made love quietly, as the rest of the house slept.

“I thought last time was forever, ” June said. She was half-joking, and still angry, but entirely happy to be asked.

“I was a boy pretending to be a man when I married you the first time. But I am a man now. Things are different, ” Mick said, pulling her toward him. “You know that, right? ”

“Yes, ” June said. “I do. ” She’d seen it in the way he kept close to her, the way he never stayed out late, the way he drank half a pot of coffee in the morning to get up with the kids and almost no booze at night.

“Will you let this new man marry you? ” he asked, pushing the hair away from her face.

June smiled, despite herself, and gave him the answer that both of them knew was never really in doubt. “Yes, ” she said. “I will. ”

• • •

That September, June and Mick remarried at the courthouse in Beverly Hills with the kids by their side. June wore a pale blue sheath dress with white gloves and three short strands of pearls around her neck. Mick wore his signature black. When the judge declared them married again, Mick grabbed June and dipped her, planting a kiss on her lips. Theo, Christina, and the kids watched as June laughed with her whole body, so delighted to have once again given him her soul.

“Be the man you tried to tell us you were, ” Christina said to him, just after the ceremony.

“I am that man now, ” Mick said. “I promise you that. I promise to never hurt her like that again. ”

“Them, ” Christina said. “Never hurt them like that again. ”

Mick nodded. “Believe me, ” he said. “I promise. ”

As the family walked out of the courthouse, Mick winked at Nina and grabbed her hand. She smiled just the tiniest bit in her lavender dress, so he lifted her up into his arms and ran with her through the parking lot.

“Nina, my Nina! Cuter than a ballerina! ” he sang to her, and when he put her down, she was laughing.

Afterward, Mick and June did not leave for a honeymoon but, instead, drove home to the beach. They said good night to Theo and Christina. June heated up a leftover casserole for dinner. Mick put the kids to bed.

June took off her dress and hung it up in the closet in a plastic garment bag, dreaming of giving it to her daughter one day. It would be a physical testament to second chances.

June was pregnant before the year was out. And by the time Katherine Elizabeth Riva was born, Mick had stayed for so long, been so doting, that he had even won over tiny little suspicious Nina.

“I don’t remember now when you were gone, ” Nina said to him one night as he was putting her to bed before leaving to do a few kickoff shows in Palm Springs. His new album was about to be released, he was back in the spotlight. His publicity team was churning out the story of his redemption. “Ladies’ Man Becomes Family Man. ” He was dressed up in his black suit. His hair was slicked back, showing his faint widow’s peak. He smelled like Brylcreem.

“I don’t remember it, either, honey, ” Mick said, kissing her on the forehead. “And we don’t ever have to worry about those things again. ”

“I love you this much, ” Nina said as she reached wide with both her arms.

Mick tucked the blanket tight around her. “I love you double that. ”

Nina was in it with all of her heart now, as only those who have been hurt and learned to trust again truly can be. It is as if once your heart has been broken you learn of the deepest reserves it carries. And she had given up her reserves as well this time.

Her dad was here and he was staying and he loved her. She was his girl, his “Nina-baby. ” And every once in a while, when Mick was feeling emotional, he would pick her up and give her a hug and admit to her the truth: She was his favorite.

In the comfort of that love, Nina bloomed. She started singing Mick’s songs with him around the house. “Sun brings the joy of a warm June …” they would sing together. “Long days and midnights bright as the moon …”

Nina became entranced by his voice, fascinated by his ties, riveted by the polish of his shoes, smitten to tell her friends at school who her dad was. She was proud that she had inherited his eyelashes, so full and long. She would sometimes stare at him, as he read the paper, watching him blink.

“Stop staring at me, sweetheart, ” Mick would say, not even moving his eyes off the page.

“OK, ” Nina would say and move on to something else.

So casual was their affection, so comfortable were their bodies and souls next to each other that there could be no rejection, no discomfort.

Now and then, in the early hours of morning, before everyone else was up, Mick would wake Nina up to fly a kite as the sun rose. Sometimes he would be fresh and clean, having just showered and shaved. Other times he would be getting home from a show, still tipsy, smelling a little sour. But either way, he would gently sit on Nina’s bed and he’d say, “Wake up, Nina-baby. It’s a windy day. ”

Nina would get out of bed and put on a cardigan over her nightgown, and the two of them would walk down, under the house, onto the beach.

It was always early enough that almost no one was there. Just the two of them sharing the dawn.

The kite was red with a rainbow in the center of it, so bright you could see it even in the fog. Mick would let it get sucked up into the sky and he’d hold on tight. He’d pretend he could barely hold on. He’d say, “Nina-baby! I need your help. Please! You have to save the kite! ”

She knew it was an act but she delighted in it anyway and she would reach out, grabbing the string with all of her might. She felt strong, stronger than her father, stronger than anyone in the world as she held on to that kite, keeping it tied to the ground.

The kite needed her and her dad needed her. Oh, how good it felt to be important to somebody the way she felt important to him.

“You’ve got it! ” he would say, as the kite teetered in her hands. “You’ve saved the day! ” He would scoop her up in his arms and Nina knew, knew in her bones, that her father would never ever leave her again.

• • •

A year later, Mick Riva was performing in Atlantic City when in walked a backup singer named Cherry.

He never flew home.

2: 00 P. M.

The four Rivas were straddling their boards in the ocean, floating at the peak, all in a row like birds on a wire. And then, as the waves curled in, they took off, one by one.

Jay, Hud, Kit, Nina. A revolving team, with Jay the self-appointed leader of the pack. They soared past one another and paddled back out together, and when a wave took one of them too far down the shore, they worked their way back to their four-man lineup.

The first wave in a gorgeous set came in and Jay was primed for it. He got himself into position and popped up on his board, and then out of nowhere, Kit dropped in, cut him off, and stole his wave.

She smiled and held out a sisterly middle finger as she did it. Hud watched, mouth agape.

Kit knew that you can only bogart a wave from someone you are confident will not beat the ever-living shit out of you. Because waves that beautiful are rare. That is the thing about the water, it is not yours to control. You are at the mercy of nature. That’s what makes surfing feel like more than sport: It requires destiny to be on your side, the ocean must favor you.

So when you are granted a sick wave like the one Jay thought was his—chest high, with a hollow face, peeling quick and clean—it is not only a bull’s-eye but a jackpot.

“What the fuck! ” Jay said, after cutting back quickly to avoid colliding. He grabbed the rails of his board to slow down. He hung there in the water, watching his little sister take off down the face of the wave until it slowly let her go, like her spot on the Ferris wheel was touching down.

She laid her chest down on the board and started toward Jay.

“You really can’t pull that shit anymore, ” he called to her as Kit paddled out, duck-diving under the swells.

“Oops, ” she said, smiling.

“Seriously. Cut it out. Somebody’s gonna get hurt, ” Jay followed up. “I can’t always tell if you’re about to drop in on me. ”

“I’m in full control, ” Kit said. “I don’t need you to make room. I’ve got it. ” He really didn’t understand, did he? How good she was.

But Hud saw it. Her confidence, her control, the chip on her shoulder.

“Kit, I’m seriously pissed at you, ” Jay said. “Like, apologize at least. ”

Hud took a wave out and then bailed once it all started to crumble. When he popped back out of the water, he saw Jay and Kit both floating on their boards, bickering. He spotted Nina walking out of the ocean. He watched her walk her board back over to her shed. She made her way up the steep stairs that led to her home.

Hud knew she was heading in to welcome the cleaning staff. She was going to offer them all a glass of water or iced tea. If one of them broke a plate or a vase, if they forgot a room, if they didn’t make the beds the way Nina liked, she would still thank them profusely. She would overtip them. And then she would fix it herself.

It made Hud sad. The way Nina lost herself in always putting others first. Sure, Hud tried to put other people first. But sometimes he was selfish. Clearly.

But Nina never said no, never stood in anyone’s way, never took anything. If you offered her five bucks, she’d give you ten. He knew he was supposed to like that about her but he didn’t. He didn’t like it about her at all.

Hud lifted himself over a soft wave, letting it buoy both him and his board, and paddled out to where Jay was. “Nina went in, ” Hud said. “For the cleaners. ”

Jay rolled his eyes. “For fuck’s sake. Would it kill her to live a little? ”

In the late sixties, the counterculture had discovered the beauty of rustic Malibu and settled in along the mountains. The beaches were overrun with surfers on their brand-new shortboards—cooler and more aerodynamic than their older brothers’ longboards. Teams of young dudes and the honorary dudette took over the water, running in packs, claiming coves for themselves, rushing poseurs out of town.

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