by Smith, Skye
"But that is 'ow people in Belgium still think of Canada," said Marique.
"Naw. Not anymore. Not since we got dragged into Afghanistan by George Bush. Now we are just another puppet army of the US president. We threaten anyone that the American oil lobby doesn't like. It'll take a lot of bridge repair to get the world to see us as the ultimate peace keeper good guys again."
"So now what do you do?" asked Maya.
"Live on my medical discharge pension. That's why I live in India and charge pretty blonde girls gas money to drive them around. Back in Canada I would be homeless on what they pay me."
"Medical discharge, oh, I see," said Marique, blushing a little. "I was wondering why you weren't trying to climb in bed with us."
"Naw, nothing like that. Frankly you two are driving my shishn crazy, but I promised Maya 'look, no touch'. Besides, I'm way too old for you. I'm probably older than your fathers."
"Yeah, well, you're still in better shape than most of the men I hang with," said Marique. "Old is in what you do. Look at you. Hanging on a tropical beach in the moonlight waited to scare some birds. I can tell you that my father is not doing that right now."
"So what was the medical thing, then?" asked Maya.
"Oh, they thought I was a psycho. It took me a year to convince all the army doctors that I wasn't. Gee, that took you but a handshake. I wish you had been in the Psych ward. "
"So why..."
"I don't want to talk about it. I still have nightmares. Besides, see those birds hopping along the beach. They are on to something. Time to go to work." With that he picked up the two white towels that he had brought along to flap at the birds. They both had hotel names embroidered on them. Maya and Marique put on their widow white cloaks and followed him down the beach.
He ran at a growing group of birds and they flew up but instead of flying away, they circled up above. "See there? Look at these guys." He pointed into a sand cave in the packed sand under the bushes.
One by one teeny tiny turtles were pulling themselves out of the sand nest and dragging themselves with their tiny flippers down the beach towards the sea. "See the trail they leave? It's like a toy tractor wheel would make. You can follow them backwards and find the nest. That's what the locals do. It’s probably what the sea gulls do, too. So one of us has to stay here and keep the birds off these ones, while the others spot for more nests."
Maya stayed with the nest and decided that the most enjoyable way to keep the noisy scavengers away was to dance and swirl her cloak in the moonlight. She hummed some ballet music that she didn't know the name of and started to dance.
Will walked along the beach behind Marique, admiring her fine silhouette and the fluid, graceful way she swung her slim hips to walk in the loose sand. He moaned gently under his breath and tried to look away. He took a glance back at the elfin fairy dancing in the moonlight and then up at the circling birds above her. Was it his imagination or were the white birds creating a moon light glinted halo above Maya?
Marique began to run, calling over her shoulder. The birds had found another nest. He left her dancing in her white cloak and continued his walk. Another nest. He flapped his towels like the wings of a giant clumsy bird and felt quite ridiculous but it worked. The birds took off, and left their meal to its crawl towards the sea.
By sunrise, they were joined by a dozen or more of the local children. They had probably been sent by their parents to scoop some of the delicacy for supper, but they could not resist joining in the dance of the beautiful ferengi women that were with the crazy guy that lived over on the point.
By the time the sun actually rose, the night of the turtles was over. The two girls felt absolutely proud of themselves. They had helped hundreds of tiny sea turtles make it to the sea. Will didn't have the heart to tell them that most of those that made it to the sea would now be eaten by waiting fish.
Actually, he didn't dare tell Maya that, because she would have dived in to scare the fish away. It was not a good idea to swim in tropical waters after dark. The sharks and the barracudas came close in to shore and would strike at anything that flashed like a fishing lure, like a wrist or an ankle, or even one of those expensive stainless steel diving watches.
Twenty children accompanied them to their boat. Since everyone was late for school because of the turtles, everyone would be forgiven. They were having the best of times, and couldn't wait to tell their older brothers about the ferengi movie stars they had met on the beach.
* * * * *
* * * * *
MAYA'S AURA - Goa to Nepal by Skye Smith
Chapter 4 - Paradise, Goa
I do not want to foresee the future. I am concerned with taking care of the present. God has given me no control over the moment following. - Mahatma Gandhi.
They hauled the boat high up on the mini beach where it would be safe from some of the highest tides of the year, and they covered the gear up in case it rained before they needed it next morning, for they had promised the children to return and do it again. By the time they had been hissed at by the monkus and had reached the house, or more appropriately, the view platform with a roof, they were exhausted and ready for a nap.
Will would not let them. Not before he made omelets for everyone. The eggs were fresh from his partner's chicken coop, and the butter fresh from their churn, and the bread fresh from their oven. Fresh food was his favorite food.
Over breakfast he told them that living here surrounded by the tropical bush, he had learned something about healthy food. "When I bring fresh food into this house, I must fight off everything if I want to eat it myself. Every living thing, from birds to bacteria, from flies to fungus loves fresh food. I figure if everything in nature is trying to eat it, then it must be good for you.
When I go visiting in Canada I see all the packaged food on the supermarket shelves, you know, with the shelf life of a hundred years. It doesn't spoil because nothing in nature wants to eat it. That can't be good for you."
They all did catch a nap, especially Marique, but Maya was woken by Will moving around and she followed him down to the mini beach. He was carrying a mask and snorkel, fins and a spear. In her swimming lessons as a kid she had been told over and over, never swim alone. She sat on the sand in the shade of an overhanging rock and watched him dive for fish.
When he came out empty-handed, she asked if she could try. He gave her quick description of the fish not to spear, basically anything really colorful, or spiny looking. The mask sort of fit, but of course not the flippers. She practiced with the spear. It had slingshot elastic running from the blunt end that launched it forward.
"The reason most divers don't catch much is because there is a trick," he explained. "When fish swim, the fish that is deepest has the speed advantage over the fish above them. It's sort of like the birds but upside down.
When birds are flying it takes a lot of energy to climb up high. Once they are up there, like that hawk up there, then he can swoop down on anything below it and overtake them. With fish it takes a lot of energy to dive deep. Once deep, they can swoop up on anything.
If you dive deep then all the fish will stay away from you. That spear is only five feet long, and the sling makes six feet. What you must do is swim overtop of a fish. He isn't scared of you because he is faster than you. Then shoot straight down into him. The trick is to know when he is less than six feet below you. Depth perception is weird in the water."
"Okay, I got it. Don't dive deep, just deep enough to be in spear range. Let me try." It took her a while to get used to the mask and snorkel. She had to remember to keep enough breath in her lungs to blow the water out of the snorkel when she got back to the top, and then immediately suck in more air before a wave pushed water back down the thing.
She tightened the mask twice, and finally it kept its suction. Now she was ready. She had never dived below the surface with a mask before. It was beautiful, like another world. Hiding in the rocks were tiny fish of every color of the rainbow, and all
the candy apple colors that hot cars came in. What a paradise.
She got better and better at just touching the surface long enough for a breath and never lifting her mask out of the water, because then she would have to reposition it again. At last she saw a bigger fish, a streamlined fish. Mackerel maybe or another of the tunas they ate the night before. She swam above it and it wasn't even fazed. She shot her spear down. It reached only half the distance to the fish.
She cocked the spear again and went deeper. The fish went deeper. It was now on the bottom. She went deeper. He played it cool. Whack, she had him. The damn thing twisted and twirled and did summersaults and tried to wrench the spear out of her hands but he was thwarted by the sling. She grabbed the spear with both hands and used it to push the fish down into the bottom. It stopped struggling.
She had forgotten something in all the excitement. She needed to breathe. She scrambled with her arms to reach the surface and kicked hard with her legs, but the damn fish was holding her back, or so it seemed in her panic to breathe. The little bugger was trying to drown her with the last of his strength. She made it to the top and blew out hard and tried to suck in, but with a swimmer.s habit she had turned her face up and so the end of the snorkel touched the water and she sucked in water.
She coughed out the mouthpiece, but now a swell washed over her and she got another mouthful of water. The second mouthful went straight into her lungs and she coughed and then sucked back more water. Now she was sinking down, and her arms were not responding to keep her afloat. The damn fish had won, or rather, they had both lost.
Everything went into very slow motion. The fish was no longer there, and neither was the delicious little tropical beach. Instead the vision she had was of almost pitch black, and the water was icy, and she was climbing up a wall using little fingers as footholds. Anything to get out of the icy water. Anything to get out of this dark hole.
That was the last thing she remembered until she felt herself being bounced on her tummy while she coughed and gagged. She was out of the surf on on the beach, bent over Will's shoulder with her head hanging down his back and he was bouncing his shoulder into her stomach and patting her bum. She coughed again and more sea water from her lungs poured down his back and over his swim trunks. "Okay, okay," she managed weakly, "enough."
He stopped bouncing her but kept her upside down his back. He was right, with every breath and every cough more water trickled out of her lungs. Finally he pulled her backwards so that she slipped from his shoulder down his wide chest. His skin felt warm against hers and she grabbed at his neck to hold herself up off the sand and against him for just a little longer.
She could feel him growing between her legs and started to wriggle in a most naughty manner as she kissed his neck. He hugged her closer to keep her from slipping down onto him and scolded her softly. Then he swung her over his hip and onto her feet, and then led her into the shade of the big rock.
"It's okay," she said spreading her legs slightly and giving him a come hither look. "I want you to."
He shook his head and tried not to look at her welcoming body. "No, I promised you that I wouldn't."
Another thought crossed her mind and he knew by how she swung her head around searching for something that it wasn't about sex with him. She looked back at him and asked, "Where's my fish?"
He started to laugh, partially from relief and partially from a remembered similar incident years ago when he had stopped to help a motorcyclist who had slid off the road. The biker had been a mess of road rash and blood and his first words were, "Is my bike okay?".
While she relaxed in the shade and got herself back together, he cleaned the fish. It was at least two pounds bigger than yesterday's. No wonder she had almost drowned. It would have been monstrously strong in the water. The good news was that she walked herself up the steep path to the house.
Her first words to her friend were not, "I almost drowned," but, "You should see the size of the fish I speared!" Eventually Marique heard the whole story, and convinced her to dry off and warm up in the sun and then catch a nap in the bed. Maya thought that was just a fine idea, and within fifteen minutes she was lying under the mosquito net of their suspended bed.
"You know," Maya told her sleepily. "Under the water I remembered that like, this was the second time I almost drowned. The first was when I was a little kid. I was exploring the old mine on my mother's land and like, I fell down a hole. It was sort of a well, with icy water at the bottom. The water saved me from the fall but then tried to freeze me to death."
"Shhhh," said Marique, stroking her on the neck. "you survived both times."
"Yes but in the mine I survived because I climbed up what I thought was a mouth in the rock with teeth. I climbed up the teeth. Now I know what I was climbing. Quartz crystals. The mouth was a quartz vein."
"Ah, so you think that the old man at the ashram was right. You kept your aura after childhood because of crystals."
"Maybe," said Maya and fell asleep. Much later, she was woken up because they were whispering. If they had been talking in normal voices she would have slept right through it, but the whispering caught her attention and she turned her head to listen.
"I promised Maya that I wouldn't," he whispered.
"That was before you saved her life," Marique whispered. "My mother always told me that with dogs and also men, you should punish the bad behavior and reward the good."
"That’s very generous of you, but..."
"Shush, you will enjoy it. I just learned some new positions. For the man they are exquisite."
Damn her, Maya thought suddenly flushed with envy and jealously. She always gets the man. Then she felt guilty. All this trip she had been telling her that she wasn't going to sleep around. That she was trying to be faithful to Karl and Erik. It was probably a good thing that it was Marique who was rewarding this man. He was a good man, a very good man, and he deserved it, deserved her.
Besides she thought, suddenly realizing the risk she had taken with him on the beach, who knows what her aura would do right now if she had sex? She had no real idea. It could be that the man would be sexually, like, completely finished at her first touch. How frustrating would that be? And what if her aura made him lose consciousness, or worse. No, it was better this way. Marique was doing her a favor. She should be thankful. She turned a little so she could listen to the whispers.
"Marique, please stop teasing me. I am really enjoying having you two dancing around my house as guests. I enjoy the romance of it. If we do this, we may lose the romance, change the feeling."
"Okay, I guess, but remember, all you 'ave to do is ask."
Maya couldn't believe her ears. How could any man say no to Marique? If she were a man, no way could she say no. She pretended to be waking up, and sat up and stretched. They were both just outside the house, leaning their bums back against the wall and passing the scope back and forth. There wasn't an inch between them.
Just as Maya could charge the air around her with her aura, so could Marique charge the air around her with her sexuality. When she turned it on, every movement she made became a seduction. When Marique walked away from Will, she did so in such a way that Maya was expecting Will to reach for her and pull her back to him and ravish her on the spot.
Will watched her, to be sure. He stared at her, and took in a full measure of her sensuality, but he did not move, did not grab for her. Marique offered Maya her glass of beer and sat with her on the bed. "Sheesh," she said, sounding a little pissed off, "that 'as never 'appened to me before. I offered myself and 'e said, 'maybe'."
Maya took a long slow drink of the beer, and then she rolled over to place her feet on the floor and padded over to stand behind him but on the inside of the wall. He heard her soft footsteps behind him, but he did not move. He was using the scope to watch something down on the mini beach.
She put her palms together and raised her aura, and then she crossed her right arm over her bare breasts and assumed the pu
shing pizza pose. She bathed his back with her aura. For ten minutes nothing happened, but then she saw him slowly lower the scope and pull his broad shoulders back and arch his back ever so slightly.
"Is that a trick you are doing by reflecting the breeze? It's so delicate."
"It is the opposite of withdrawing into myself when I touch a psycho," she whispered. "With normal people I am drawn into them."
"So you are not touching me at all?"
"Not at all. What is touching you is my aura, only my aura. Would you like a full massage with it?"
"I'll have to check my calendar and make sure I'm not booked up." He turned slowly until he was facing her, and her aura was tickling his chest. "Now would be good."
"Then go and lie on your bed so the net will keep the flies from bugging us."
"Wait, my bed? Marique just..."
"I'm not going to seduce you. We are not going to seduce you. This is truly is about massage."
* * * * *
They left Will in a sleep-like trance on his bed, and they went down to the mini beach to practice with masks and snorkels. It was too hot to sit in the sun, and the sand burned their feet, but the water was fabulous, clear and warm. They played in the water for almost two hours and got so good with the snorkel that they spent most of the time six feet or more under the surface.
Eventually, they had to get out of the water. Despite the warmth of the sea, it had still brought their core temperatures down to where they couldn't stop their teeth from chattering. The sun was not so fierce now, and they warmed themselves by working on their tans.
Marique looked up at the house and there was a glint from the lens of the scope. He was watching them. "I think 'e is a voyeur, you know."
"Or simply our lifeguard watching out for us," Maya replied. "Maybe he is nothing more than he says, a romantic who does not want to ruin a good romance with sex."
