by Inia Jardine
‘Thanks for that Lilia, although it does not change my history, or the atrocities committed here, it puts all this into a better perspective for me. But I vowed that not one cane of sugar will ever be grown on this land again.’
After we dried ourselves off, we walk back into the room hand in hand, still buck naked as it is pleasantly warm.
‘Happy Merry Christmas in advance Lilia, hope you like this’ he says as he hands me a long flat gift box and a flat square one.
‘Just being with you my Jonah is enough of a gift for me, you shouldn’t have.’
I kiss him, deeply.
I open the flat one first and burst out laughing. ‘The Best of the Goombay Dance Band’ and ‘Christmas at Sea’ by them too ...and the Boney M Christmas! Jonah, where on earth did you find these ancient treasures!’
‘Everything you say to me is important Lilia, you are important to me. I will never not listen to you as you said that was what broke up your previous serious relationship. So this here is proof that I even listen to the most seemingly insignificant thing you say.’
‘Put them on for me, anyone, doesn’t matter. Then I will open my other box.’
Jonah’s stereo starts blasting ‘Christmas at sea, far away from home...’ and he grabs my hand, pulls me up and dances me naked around the room. ‘Yes my love, I love to dance, especially with you...I am such a clever guy...I even took some dancing lessons to impress some girl but with my ancestry I have a lot of natural rhythm.’
Being with this man is just so good, I want to make him as happy as he makes me.
‘I am so glad I am not at sea and far away from you at this moment, I hate not being with you. You have more than enough rhythm my dear. You are an excellent dancer! Before I open my other gift I want you to open yours.’
‘Lilia, I am the proverbial guy who has everything money can buy, well I could that is if I were materialistic. You shouldn’t get me things with your relatively small salary. Just you being here is enough for me.’
‘Open the thing, I spend days wrapping it just so. Check out the chameleon paper! Didn’t your mother ever teach you to never look a gift horse in the mouth?’
‘That is one of the expressions I least understand but anyway thanks my love.’
Jonah opens his gift box and looks at me like a cat who just received a year’s worth supply of bubble bath, dumbfounded.
‘Lilia my love, what is this? An unmarked clear DVD? What would you like me to do with it? Record us in bed?’
‘Jonah for a life-sized plus, mature, Professor person, you are fairly stupid at the moment. Put the thing in your player and then just watch. Don’t judge a book by its cover, that’s another saying for you to remember.’
As the DVD begins to play I apologise for the quality. ‘It is unfortunately not a professional production Big J, but just a girl playing with a camera, sometimes two girls.’
‘Did you actually buy me a pirated blue movie? With two girls doing each other?’
‘No man silly, shut up and watch.’
The picture is hazy at first and then focuses on clouds, mountains in the distance and then zooms in closer to big oak trees. Then on to flowers, English country garden flowers. The scene then changes to a slow 360-degree circle to take in a small thatched house, to an open door on a porch complete with swing chair. It then proceeds to move down onto the chair to focus on the other faces I love, my beautiful cats. But Jonah doesn’t click yet as to what is going on. I don’t blame him as he has only seen photos of my cats in my wallet once when I showed them off.
Willow with his blue-blue eyes, his pink nose, his lovely creamy, ginger & gold colouring and his bushy tail, Rainbow black and white and fluffy, Flower the purest white.
The mike picks up a loud purring. ‘Say hi to Jonah, Willow’ I say in the background on the recording and I hear Jonah suddenly gasp as he ‘gets it’.
His face lights up. ‘Lilia, that is Willow...and your home?’
I just smile & nod. The camera then slowly moves up an arm which belongs to a hand stroking the cat. Mine. It reaches my face and my voice says ‘Hi Jonah, welcome to Arumvale. ’I smile for him and blow him a kiss.
‘Lilia.’
Jonah is spellbound as my camera wielding neighbour Bella takes him on a tour of my home. After a few upside down takes and more giggles as she films me in the kitchen, the camera changes hands and with me at the helm again, I focus on her. ‘Isn’t she gorgeous Jonah? She is a Mayan goddess. But way too young for you’ I add on the recording and Bella & I both giggle. ‘Hi Jonah! Come visit us soon! Bye!’ she shouts as the camera follows her down the garden path and as she disappears into her neighbouring home.
Bella relocated to Arumvale a few months earlier, to escape racial prejudices in the States where she lived and worked before. She is an independent woman in her early thirties, has long, long legs & long straight naturally sun streaked brown hair with dazzling gold brown eyes. I always tell her that she ought to have been a model and not a businesswoman!
‘Now it is just you and me Big J, I have a surprise for you. This is my room, my bed, and me, waiting for you.’ It took more backbone than I thought I had to set up the tripod as I was planning this. The shaky picture shows a somewhat apprehensive me, first closing the curtains, then switching on the bedside lamp which is draped with a beaded Indian cloth and then me slowly undressing. I wore the lacy white underwear I bought especially for this trip then, and I just know that Jonah will like it.
As he sits forward, obviously waiting for what he would like to see next, the video goes black. I have switched off the lamp in the recording and everything is dark. The only sound you can hear on the recording is my voice softly whispering, ‘Jonah, oh Jonah...I miss you...touch me please...’and then it stops.
‘Oh my God Lilia, stop fiddling in your suitcase and come here’ and as Jonah reaches for me I can see emotion shine from his eyes.
‘What’s wrong Big J? Don’t you like it?’
‘No my darling, I love it, thank you so much for sharing your world with me but I hate you having another life that I am not part of. I hate thinking of other people sharing it while I am excluded. I want to be with you like this, all the time. And by the way why did it just stop, I need to see the rest.'
‘But it is not possible right now Jonah, we both know that. We have such different and incompatible lives. Distance wise and otherwise.
I made this for you to watch when I am far away, be assured that nobody will take your place in my life wherever I am.’
I then add as an afterthought ‘I wanted to make it really special with me alone in my bed, you know, with my toys. I was too scared though that someone else would see it by mistake, like airport security or whatever. I know that you would have liked it.’
‘The real thing is better Lilia, come here’ and he lets his gaze wander over to where I am standing. The moment he realises why I am not next to him; his pleasant surprise becomes evident - as he is still naked. I have taken off the bed coverlet I had draped around me and I stand before him in the same lacy white underwear I wore for him on the DVD.
I tie my black and silver coin belt around my hips and start a slow shimmy. 'I did not bring my whole outfit; this will have to do.'
I slowly glide towards him – shimmy steps, while doing all my special belly dancing moves. The graceful wrist turns and flowing hands, the undulating upper body and belly rolls, the vibrating hips... and I can see him becoming fascinated.
'I'm not really good at this, I just do the lessons for fun but I have always wanted to show off to someone special.'
‘I only have eyes for you...’ Jonah sings to me as he walks slowly towards me. ‘...if we are in a garden or a crowded room...’ he pulls me close ‘...glad we are alone, come here you gorgeously clever thing.’
He takes my breath away as he envelopes me in his arms and kisses me so passionately that I almost need my asthma inhaler. His tongue does the hula with mine while he caresses my nec
k and I actually, truly, genuinely come as I feel him press rock solid against my panties. It must be the excitement of watching him watching the DVD that brought me close and his kisses are just so erotic.
‘Jonah, how did you do that?’
‘It’s all in the mind dear Lilia, but this might be a first for me too! Wow I’m impressed. It has only happened to me in my dreams but never without physical stimulation.’
‘Seeing as I am now so very easily pleased; may I do anything for you Massa?’
Suffice it to say that with the assistance of my belt I tie him down, star fished on his own bed, totally at my mercy. Naked as the day he was born. What a beautiful contrast he makes to the stark white comforter. I lean over him and let my fairly generous breasts caress his body lightly. I take great care in not allowing any other part of me to touch his very rigid appendage. It is basically screaming out for attention but I ignore it totally.
I concentrate all my attention on his neck, his ears, his nipples, his lovely tummy, his thighs. Then move to the back of his knees, his ankles and his toes so wonderfully clean and fresh from our recent swimming. I slowly glide over him and let my hair tickle him from top to toe. As I suck on his big toe Jonah arches back, tears loose the belt which loosely held him to the rattan headboard and erupts like a volcano.
He does not go soft at all, must be too excited, and I climb on him like he is my favourite stallion. ‘Ride Sally ride...’ and we ride off into the starry, starry sunset.
'You are going to pick belly dancing coins off your floor for months to come, and I'm going to need a new belt' I manage to get out before I succumb.
When we awake it is very close to midnight and I for one am freezing cold. It has cooled down and started to rain while we were asleep. The curtains are billowing madly in front of the open patio doors. No problem with privacy here as the court yard is totally closed off but I am still quite wary of the darkness. Jonah wakes up too, closes the doors and windows and climbs back in bed, pulls the comforter over us and folds me close in his arms. We fall asleep again and never even hear most of the storm that follows.
A shrill ringing from the old style telephone in Jonah’s room wakes us. ‘Prof Hibbert, we have problems.’ Jonah’s Estate Manager Patrick sounds anxious. ‘The storm damaged the storage sheds and most of the export coffee is ruined.’
In a voice I have never heard before Jonah clips ‘Patrick, solve it whichever way you want. Get Lloyd’s out, buy coffee beans in, fix the shed, I really don’t care how. I am not available. Put everything back into working order ASAP. You are a shareholder and I am sure you will make the correct decision. See you in a week and please do not disturb me again. I am not available. Goodbye.’
‘Lilia my darling, good morning’. The tone of his voice has certainly changed for the better since he put the phone down. I feel flattered.
‘Hi my darling Jonah, stallion of note. Top of the morning to you.’
‘If I don’t see her each day I miss her' – he sings like Frank Sinatra. 'Hi baby.' He kisses me. 'Do you know that I love you? You look so cute when you are all messed up from sleep and loved up from me’.
‘I feel like a wreck. A thoroughly used but sated one. I also know that I love you though. We are such clichés Jonah; why do I feel like this whenever I am with you? I want to sing like Eliza Doolittle.’
‘Because we belong together. I have just reconfirmed in my mind to sell this place as soon as possible. Do you know that we had a huge storm last night, it wreaked havoc with my crops? I could not care less though. Just want to be with you. We can go anywhere you want.’
‘Got the gist of that from your telephone conversation. He spoke quite loudly. Jonah, I have a life you know. I am not independently wealthy like you. I have to go back home to my cats and my job in a weeks’ time.’
‘Well, your life is on hold for a while, you and I have an appointment. First though, your gift which you never opened last night.’
‘Sorry Big J but you distracted me.’
He hands me the box, and I open it. In front of me lies the most glorious diamond and opal bracelet I have ever seen. It sparkles like dew drops in the morning sun. 'Jonah it’s magnificent. I have never received anything even remotely as beautiful. I’m speechless.’ I kiss him.
‘Diamonds are your birth stones and the opals are because they remind me of you. Soft and white. Not as beautiful as your smile though. It makes me speechless. And hard. Now get away from me to the shower and dress casually, you have twenty minutes!’
‘I want to show you my town. Rocky Point is a bit of a sleepy hollow but it is fast becoming touristy. I am not sure that I like that idea. Most beautiful places are ‘discovered’ and commercialised, after which they are sadly never the same again.’
We have breakfast on the deck of the Rocky Point Café which fortunately for us mostly survived the storm. Everyone here knows Jonah and they are very pleasant, almost to the point of being indulgent towards us. We are both ravenous and each order the Whale Fruit Platter (big enough for a whale not containing whale! - as they state firmly on the menu) plus feast on cup after cup of the locally grown coffee. I have never before had such a huge breakfast but I finish it all.
Jonah and I are surely working off enough calories for it not to worry me. While enjoying the refuelling of our worn-out bodies we watch the yachts and fishing boats swanning around the bay. The ocean is a crystalline azure/aquamarine colour, clear and clean. The beaches are filled with debris though as the storm washed all the flotsam & jetsam onto the sand during the night.
‘Jonah, I have a very South African habit. When I lived there, I loved to go for long walks on the beach and I was forever walking deep in the water to try and find pansy shells. You would know them as sand dollars. I always got soaked while looking at some or other shell or treasure that the waves brought to the intertidal zone. An ended up looking like a hobo person, a bush sleeper. I love beach combing. Can we go later please?’
‘Of course Lilia, but first we have another appointment. See, I have tickets.’
‘Tickets? Are we going on a boat ride?’
‘That is tomorrow, today it is something else. Clue: A lovely Australian lady who you remind me of.’
‘Oh my. Poor woman. Can’t wait to see the poor unfortunate soul!’
I never knew that a relatively small place like Rocky Point would have a cinema. A small but very grand cinema though, red velvet covered chairs and heavy curtains. Must be one of the relics from the Plantation days. It is so old that there are no huge neon signs with ‘NOW PLAYING and Forthcoming attractions’ so I have no idea what we are seeing. There are only a few retirees in the cinema as it is the morning show and most people are at work. They all wave to Jonah and once again I realise what a public figure he must be in this relatively small community. He must be quite used to life in a goldfish bowl. It would drive me mad; I always keep a low profile while doing my thing. I am not a very social person at all.
The movie starts and the most glorious sounds fill the small auditorium. The acoustics are better than a £1000 surround sound system. I recognise the particular sound of one of my favourite bands, ELO, The Electric Light Orchestra. The accompanying angelic voice of Olivia Newton-John fills our ears. The movie is called Xanadu and I saw it almost 30 years ago in South Africa when it was first released.
'You organised this for me? I am very flattered kind Sir.' He never ceases to amaze me with his thoughtfulness.
‘Have to believe we are magic...nothing can stand in our way...I’ll bring all your dreams alive ...’ we sing together. It is wonderful sharing the same old music with a kindred soul.
‘Jonah this movie was made for us! I can't for the life of me roller skate but I love it, have always loved it. Now it is even more special to me. Can we come and see it again please? Soon. I love this music; it takes me back to my youth.’ I am in high spirits and feel transported to a world of fantasy, dreams and ecstasy.
‘Whenever you’re
away from me...I only have to close my eyes and suddenly I’m where you are...’ this must be our song Lilia. I love it too, especially the delectable Ms Goddess. You really look like her.’
‘Oh thanks Jonah but you must never let her hear that. She is so gorgeous and I am just an old frump.’
‘No you are not Lilia, I wish I can physically hurt the guy who got that into your head, why do you feel like that about yourself? You are so pretty. Like I said the day we met, a real woman, not just skin and bone.’
