Finally at the resort, Ginny and Lisa were ready for a shower and dinner. It was an all-inclusive resort, including unlimited alcohol. They both had plans to let their hair down and meet as many interesting individuals as possible.
The resort was impressive. The lobby was filled with all Caribbean colonial furniture, dark woods, elaborately ornate with colorful cushions. A large counter, located on the left side of the lobby, was staffed with three hotel workers waiting to assist the large bus load of passengers. Ginny and Lisa walked over in the hopes of securing their room key as soon as possible.
Brenda, the first available front desk employee they reached, was a dark skinned beauty with her hair pulled severely back in a bun. Both Lisa and Ginny were admiring her smooth, flawless skin and incredible white teeth, although for different reasons. She kept stealing glances at Lisa and Ginny began to wonder if after only five minutes at the resort, Lisa already had a love interest.
With key in hand, they followed the detailed directions to their room.
"Damn, you work fast," Ginny said with both annoyance and admiration.
"What are you talking about? I was just admiring her beauty. Don't tell me you've never admired a pretty boy face before."
"Of course I have. But I never seem to have a shot of 'admiring' said face up close and personal," Ginny laughed.
"What can I say: when you got it, you got it!" Lisa said with her usual smirk.
The room was the usual, with a lot of Caribbean flare. The beds were covered in brightly colored and flowered bed spreads, and floral prints adorned every wall. The bathroom was utilitarian, with one of those underpowered hairdryers and small vanity that would barely accommodate one girl's stuff, let alone two. The best part was the balcony overlooking the ocean. It cost them extra, but waking up and being able to hear the ocean and enjoy the view seemed worth it.
Ginny stepped out and inhaled the salty air and listened to a steel drum band playing in the distance. She really needed this vacation. She had been putting in extra hours and covering for some of the other PA's lately and needed to deflate. Ginny was scanning the beach for some potential love interests when a banner caught her eye: Welcome Gay and Lesbian Alliance Members.
Ginny had been to many resorts that were hosting conferences for certain groups. She began to wonder how many non-gay vacationers would be around. Lisa joined her on the balcony, wearing a towel from her quick shower.
“Lisa, this resort isn't only hosting the Gay and Lesbian Alliance, is it?” Ginny could care less about a person's sexual orientation, but would like to meet guys who liked boobs.
“Of course not.” Lisa said. “My friend Ted told me about this and said that he only knew a handful of people coming.”
Ginny covered her head in her hands. “Does Ted know every gay man and woman who like vacationing in the Caribbean?”
“Relax... I'm sure there will be plenty of straight available guys around. You'll be even more sought after with all the unavailable women around,” Lisa said with a smile.
* * *
Well, as it turns out, the entire resort was hosting the Gay and Lesbian Alliance. As Ginny and Lisa walked by the beach to check out the party, there wasn't a straight vacationer to be seen. Lisa, who is quite adept at picking straight from gay, couldn't find one single heterosexual male in the crowd. While Lisa was gone checking with the hotel management, Ginny went to the bar and ordered a beer.
Ginny wasn't really that disappointed. After all, she was at a beautiful resort, with unlimited alcohol and incredible views. She didn't really expect to meet anyone special anyway. Ginny could make the best of it and still have a good time dancing and partying and sunning herself.
“Well, I checked with management. It seems that the entire resort was booked by the GLA. I'm so sorry, Gin. I really had no idea,” Lisa was clearly upset.
“Don't sweat it, Lisa. There are worse places to be and not have any available men around. I can still party and drink and lay on the beach,” Ginny put on her best “who gives a damn” smile.
“Gin, you're the best. If you want, I'll pretend we're together and we can both be celibate this week.”
“No way. At the very least, I intend to rip apart your choice in mate. Don't take that away from me!” Ginny said looking around at the potential.
“You may want to do a little experimenting this week. You never know what lurks in your psyche,” Lisa was always jokingly trying to recruit Ginny to play for the other team, but alas, you can't chose your sexual orientation.
“Thanks, but no thanks. I'll stick with the stick,” Ginny said eliciting a face from Lisa.
“How do you deal with that thing!”
The night was, from Ginny's point of view, very interesting. There were people from all over the US and the world. Ginny was talking to a group of guys from Portugal. They were very excited not to be judged and to let their hair down. They found it very funny that Ginny was not gay and spending the week at the resort.
Dinner was quite an affair. There was a huge buffet set up in the main dining room. Long tables with everything from fish to chicken to goat were laid out in huge chafing dishes. There were rice and pasta dishes as well as an enormous array of desserts. Cakes, pudding, cookies, and fruit tarts were arranged on the last table in the line. Ginny realized that she would have to work very hard not to gain an enormous amount of weight.
Ginny filled up her plate and sat next to Lisa at a big round table that seated ten. Immediately, Lisa introduced Ginny as her “straight” friend who was very understanding. Ginny smiled embarrassingly as the others at the table said how great she was to be such a good friend.
The table was mostly women, with one male couple to balance the estrogen. The conversation mostly revolved around their real lives, occupations and hobbies. One woman, who was drop dead gorgeous with long blond hair and clear blue eyes, was telling the group about her work with troubled teenagers. Ginny watched her as she spoke. The woman was clearly exaggerating her perfection, so it was easy not to like her. It was even easier not to like her if she wasn't exaggerating. Ginny just sat and listened as she ate her dinner.
Ginny dug into her buffet feast. She decided that if she couldn't suck face with someone she would either later forget or want to forget, she could at least try some of the local cuisine. She chose “some kind of stew” with meat that she couldn't identify. It was actually quite tasty and not at all gamey. She finished it up, along with various side dishes and two desserts.
After dinner, Lisa and Ginny went to the dance club. The alcohol was flowing and the music was blaring. Ginny could feel herself beginning to unwind as she got up often to dance to her “favorite song.” In other words, anything with a beat. Lisa was already mingling heavily, but would often join Ginny to dance. Ginny had always loved music. Her parents brought her up in Classic Rock, her older siblings had her grooving to all things 80's, and she had recently acquired a taste for alternative. One thing she couldn't stomach was anything by those lip syncing artists: Brittany Spears, Christina Aguillera, those annoying boy bands and especially any singer chosen on American Idol.
Of course, after several shots of “whatever,” one could dance to anything, look foolish, and still have a great time. Ginny was getting funky to some kind of rap, when a couple of guys began sandwiching her in between them. Ginny hardly noticed and cared even less. She could not be stopped. She finally had to sit down or fall down.
“You okay?” Lisa looked at Ginny with some concern. “You look a little pale.”
“I think so. I'm think I'm just jet lagged,” Ginny replied even though she had never felt like this before on the way to a destination. Sure she would feel tired and sick coming home, but never at the beginning of a vacation.
“I'm going to bed. I bet I feel better tomorrow.” Ginny started to head back to the room. About halfway there, she realized that she was going to throw up and very soon. Looking around, she noticed some tall bushes and ran around them just as she hurle
d. It took several minutes to recover long enough to make it back to her room. She was forced to smell the sweet cloying scent of some exotic plant. Usually, it would have been soothing, but when forced to vomit in the bushes, it became very nauseating.
She finally returned to the room, only to have to vomit again and again and again. Dear God , Ginny thought, what is going on?
Ginny's first thought was maybe she drank more than she could handle. As she lay on the bathroom floor, thanking the tile for being so cool against her face, she thought about how much she had drank. Yes, she had several shots, but that was about it. She wasn't mixing and she only had water with dinner. Then she started to think about dinner. Mystery Stew. What the hell kind of meat was that any way , Ginny thought grimly. Oh God, please don't let this be food poisoning!
As a physician's assistant, Ginny knew what the recovery time for food poisoning was: at least two days from the onset and that is just to start feeling somewhat normal again. This could be a real vacation killer, thought Ginny. I'm sure it's just jet lag combined with alcohol. I'll be fine by tomorrow.
Lisa didn't return to the room until the middle of the night. She found Ginny still lying on the floor in front of the toilet.
“Geez, Gin, what's wrong?” Lisa looked so concerned despite her drunkenness. Her slurred words were almost comical to Ginny, who had little to find amusing in the past few hours.
“I don't know. I've been calling Ralph on the porcelain phone since I left you in the club. I'm hoping it's just too much alcohol and not the mystery stew from dinner,” Ginny said in the most pathetic voice. She looked up at Lisa and knew immediately that she had met someone already. “Can you please help me to bed and then you can tell me about your new friend.”
Lisa was amazed by how each of them knew when the other had gotten lucky. It was like some kind of badge they wore, but only the other could see it. Lisa tried to be gentle when getting Ginny off the floor, but being inebriated herself made the whole scene comical. She dropped Ginny a couple of times and then Ginny had to help her stay up on the way back to their beds.
Ginny threw off her bedspread and climbed into bed with her clothes on. She was just happy to lie on something soft. Lisa was raving about her “new” friend. She was a photographer from New York and she lived in a loft and went to great bars and lived like a gay version of Sex and the City. As Ginny half listened to her best friend of many years, she wondered how drunk she was to buy that load of bullshit. If her “new” friend truly lived like she said, Ginny was a secret agent with the CIA.
Ginny's last thought before going to sleep was how much fun it would be to make fun of her friend over being so gullible when she's drunk.
Any hopes of feeling better the next morning were quashed. Ginny managed to sleep occasionally between exhausting bouts of vomiting. Lisa woke the next morning to find Ginny back on the bathroom floor and not able to move. She quickly got Ginny's pillow and a blanket to try to make her more comfortable. Ginny looked so pathetic that Lisa's heart just dropped. After the mix up with the resort being “all gay” and now she couldn't even get out of the bathroom. How much more could her dear friend take?
* Chapter 3 *
Ginny spent the first few days of her vacation in bed in her room. Her only consolation was being able to see the ocean and listen to its soothing, gentle waves crash on the beach she couldn't bring herself to sit on. Lisa was constantly checking on her and bringing her toast or water. No one could ask for a better friend.
Ginny's only other friend was the pile of romance novels Holly had given her. During the long hours of lying in bed, unable to move or risk a new vomiting session, Ginny would lie reading book after book. When she wasn't sleeping, she was reading about all the people who had love lives and got to have earth shattering orgasmic sex, even when it was their “first” time. She read about past lives in worlds that seemed to be perfect despite a lack of decent health care, running water, solid roads, or technology of any kind.
Well , Ginny thought morosely, Holly was right about one thing: the sex parts are pretty hot. Not that it would do Ginny any good, even if she did feel better, with an extreme lack of potential partners. And so, when not sleeping or sitting on the toilet so the offending food could escape in other ways, Ginny was either lying in bed or sitting on the balcony. To keep entertained, she became engrossed in past lives and ridiculous problems.
Why doesn't she just stand up for herself , Ginny would think while reading a particular passage. She shook her head in disgust that women would ever allow themselves to be so subjugated by men. Ginny was not so naïve to realize their predicament, but at the very least, they could withhold sex until their “perfect” man came to his senses.
On the third day, Ginny started to feel better enough to go and sit on the beach. She was still extremely shaky about eating in the dining room though. She'd often make Lisa go and get her some bread and water. “At least I won't gain a bunch of weight on this vacation,” she told Lisa when she returned with the food.
“If anything, I'm pretty sure you've lost some weight,” Lisa retorted. “You know, the gaunt, stick figure thing is so in for all the models.”
“Something tells me that no one will mistake me for Kate Moss,” Ginny smiled back. “And that's okay with me, since I like having boobs.”
The morning was spent in a lounge chair on the beach, reading more about the incredible lives of fictional characters. There was a nice breeze blowing and the ocean was calm and glass like. Ginny was content to watch the other guests frolicking in the water or participating in the unlimited water sports available at the resort.
Around noon, Lisa came by with some more bread and a little ginger ale to sooth any remaining discomfort. Ginny noticed that the sky was getting dark. “Are we in for a storm?” she asked Lisa, who had taken the chair next to hers.
Lisa surveyed the landscape. “Looks like it. They have those storms all the time. You know, the ones that only last a few minutes, then it goes back to blue and beautiful.”
“It would cool things down for tonight,” Ginny replied. “I love to listen to the rain when I'm sleeping. The only bad part is that I usually have to get up to pee.”
“Nice,” Lisa said with a laugh.
* * *
As it turned out, it wasn't one of those storms that ends after a few minutes. It was an unbelievably violent storm that tears everything up. Ginny got her wish, to listen to rain as she tried to sleep. Unfortunately, the sounds of lounge chairs hitting the side of the hotel and trees being thrown back and forth was enough to keep her up all night waiting for something to come crashing through their balcony door.
Lisa and Ginny were sitting together watching the carnage outdoors. “Is it only me, or does this ring of the 'worst vacation ever'?” Ginny asked while watching some sign fly past the window.
“You're not dead, so technically, it could be worse,” Lisa replied.
Ginny turned and stared at her friend. “Are you trying to jinx me? Haven't I been through enough?”
Together they laughed over the irony of it. Two minutes later, the lights went out and the two friends were left in the dark. “Great, just great!”
“Do me a favor,” Ginny asked Lisa, “Don't miss the toilet when you have to go in the dark!”
“Agreed!”
They tried as best they could to sleep, since they had nothing else to do. Lisa wondered if anyone was at the dance club when they lost power. She could imagine them all huddled there, too scared to walk back to their rooms. Lying awake in the dark, she started to envy them.
In the morning, the worst of the wind was over, but the rain continued. Lisa went over to the lobby to see if they would ever get the power back, while Ginny continued to sit in the room, reading yet more romance novels. She began to stare out the balcony door and wonder how she managed to get it so wrong.
I've traveled all over the world. I've met people from dozens of countries. I've seen wonders of the world. Where did I
go wrong on a crummy beach vacation! She thought to herself. No men, not feeling well, no power, no sunshine... I don't want to think how it can get worse!
With that thought, in popped Lisa, wet from head to toe and looking extremely unhappy. She was carrying a box with their hotel room number on it.
“Good news or bad news,” was all she said as she sat on a chair by the bed.
“Good news, please,” Ginny replied.
“I got this box of necessary supplies to survive the rest of the week if we wish to stay. It has candles, matches, a couple bottles of water and some sort of protein bars.”
Ginny did not look amused. “And the bad news...”
“If we leave and head back to Montego Bay, our chances of getting a hotel room are nil. The airport is shut down until clean up can be completed and the resort will not refund any money because it was an act of God.”
“So, there won't be any food provided?” Ginny wasn't all that disappointed.
“They will have the kitchens up by tonight, but most of the food will be packaged. This is to get through today.”
“Well, it seems we have no choice but to stay here a few more days.”
“My thoughts exactly,” Lisa did not look amused. “I bumped into some of my new friends in the lobby and they are planning on having a party in their room tonight. We, of course, are invited.”
Ginny didn't know if she was up for a night of “girl” talk. She hadn't slept, she'd barely eaten and now she was sitting in a hotel room, with no air conditioning and no power. At the moment, she was a little defeated. “I'll pass. Besides, I have all these books to read. How will I get by if I don't find out what happens to the pirate and his new girlfriend?”
“I'm sure this goes without saying, but next time you totally get to pick where we go!”
A Lesson in Passion Page 2
