Free Slide by Gerald A Browne Page B

A small seafood place. It was an eyesore, had changed hands often and no owner had ever made enough from it or cared enough to want to help the wooden building fight the quicker deterioration that came with being near the ocean.
    In 1967 the larger house was sold to an anonymous buyer, who never moved in. A year later the smaller house was purchased by someone and left vacant. The restaurant went shortly thereafter, its owner glad to make a little more on it than he’d ever expected from a buyer who, represented by a real estate broker acting on behalf of another broker, remained unknown.
    All three transactions complete, titles cleared and transferred, it came out then, and the former owners bit themselves for not having held on for more, at least twice as much or more.
    Lots 10938, 10939, 10939A of Orange County tract 673 had been patiently, cleverly acquired by one large business.
    Within six months the property was transformed and there stood the Seaside Supermarket.
    On its own private bluff.
    The coastline at that spot scalloped out as much as a thousand feet. All along the edge it was a sharp drop of nearly two hundred.
    Between the market and highway was a blacktop parking area for five hundred cars. To help circulate customer traffic a double-lane drive ran around the rear of the market, but after business hours a heavy chain was strung across to prevent anyone from using it. Splendid view of the ocean, out of view from the highway, it had become a nighttime place for loving in cars. What spoiled the good thing was that too many people left evidence of their ardor.
    The supermarket itself was mainly cinder blocks and glass, a rectangular-shaped structure 120 feet deep by 280 feet long, hoping to make up with size for what it lacked aesthetically. An impression of spaciousness, increased by height — a single story equal to two and a half.
    Despite its ample dimensions, like so many buildings throughout Southern California it did not give a feeling of permanence. It seemed unsubstantial, as though put up hurriedly with little faith in the future, short-term prosperity in mind. A California habit, perhaps the remnant influence of gold rushes and earthquakes and certainly persuaded by the climate, usually so mild.
    Royal palms. Groups of them helped soften the market’s corners. Other landscaping was limited to semitropical spear-leafed shrubs, defiant full-grown growths set in beds covered with layers of wood chips, so they hardly ever needed tending.
    The northern end of the building was solid, windowless. The southern end had a high, extra-wide opening for stock delivery. There were two doors in the rear, an emergency exit and a way in and out for employees only.
    The front, the face of the place, made it appear light and open. It was almost entirely glass, large sections of heavy gauge plate glass that ran from ground to roof. Entrance-exits for customers were located extreme left and right. A special mesh gate was used to protect the glass front from outside. It was electrically controlled. From its housing along the edge of the roof it rolled out and down all the way and automatically locked itself in place. Once the gate was in down position it was impossible for anyone to enter or leave the market without switching on the automatic control mechanism. That required a unique magnetic key. Identical steel-mesh gates also made the side and rear doors impenetrable.
    The mesh gates were not part of the market’s original design. They had been installed a year after completion, because young men defying law and death at three in the morning included the parking area in their version of a Monaco-style race course. Twice cars had screeched around, fishtailed and crashed through the market’s front panes.
    Since the gates were put in, several times there had been trouble of another sort. Employees got locked in and had to call the manager at home to come let them out. Once a pair of muscular stock