Reefdog

by Robert Wintner

  He laughed. “That’s not a very nice way to put it.”

  “I told you. I don’t talk like that to anybody else. Only you. I think we’ll be together a long time.”

  You do? He didn’t need to speak, with his eyes asking and her eyes confirming, till he blinked. “The missionaries were compelling. They conquered many places besides Hawaii, where monarchs didn’t interbreed.”

  “Maybe. It doesn’t matter now. I just don’t want to sound stupid.” She turned to him. “Promise you’ll tell me if I ever sound stupid.”

  “Don’t say what not.”

  She sat up. “God! What is it with you men? Not five minutes after you get what you want, you’re telling me what not to do!”

  “No. I didn’t mean it that way. You asked me to…”

  But she was only pulling his leg, laughing and showing him the true meaning of promiscuity in the tropics and what not. Immersed in her simple solution to the mysteries of the universe, he wondered how such a being could ever think herself retarded.

  Could This Be It?

  Of course, Minna Somayan was a milestone for any man and could pick that man at will, but she’d picked him—a working stiff wondering what and when, and then winning the Love Lotto. Life would never be the same. How could it? She brought spirit back to life with love. She came on from ten paces out, aromatic as pikake, plumeria, tuberose, or gardenia. Her feast for sore eyes was a luau on wheels, and what wheels they were: toes to ankles to calves, thighs and up. At the summit he jumped for joy and a bit more altitude.

  The future became incidental overnight. He felt intrusive on sexual felicitation, on appetite and need hitherto unknown, but communion was mutual and natural at sundown and ten, midnight, four, and first light because love, like time, is constant—right after breakfast, home for lunch, and mere minutes after quitting time. This is crazy!

  Yet from anarchy came reason. Each had a past. Ravi knew a nice tourist woman whose name escaped him for the moment. She was it, he’d thought, his one and only, don’t stop, and so on and so forth. Better sense prevailed because she wasn’t it. She was gone.

  Then came Marcia from San Francisco, who taught that great blowjobs could show fervent love—or need. Marcia compensated for what she lacked, but a sated man gave back the difficult truth. So smart and successful but alas, she insulted the cat and had to go.

  The real article, on the other hand, kept on coming. When one whimpered, the other followed. Between rounds they slept like the dead, like lost souls, fatigued from the rigors of catching up. Snoring like bears, splayed, drooling, pillow-wrinkled, they woke to see each other as the graceless lumps of flesh souls are born into and then wear out, and they laughed and mounted up for another awakening.

  But such rigor cannot endure, not with hope of growing old together, which was the road unspoken. Ravi sighed, dreaming or awake—it didn’t matter—recalling Crusty Geizen yelling that he, Ravi, was a bumbling idiot who could fuck up a wet dream. Ravi had nearly cried but now laughed; maybe this was it, and he was pulling it off and never wanted to wake up. This was what became of him, what he would be. Marriage had seemed unnecessary for the two decades since discovering women. The adventures were enough; thank you and adieu. Except for what’s-her-name with the spiky white hair.

  Boy, good thing she split.

  Marriage still seemed unnecessary, a socially contrived ceremony to secure commitment. Marriage was a device invented by the female faction to enhance long odds on what might last. Women historically wanted security from aging and gravity, from loss of the nubile magic. So be it. Here was love immortal that needed no such contrivance. Here was a woman Ravi would not want to lose. Pure and simple. And if life could be easier on a bourgeois formality, then let it be. It still wasn’t necessary, but he flat didn’t care.

  It happened in a blink after a rousing exchange triggered by her absence. She’d worked the swing shift at the hospital after a half day at the shop and afternoon classes. She came home to announce a promotion, one with no raise or benefits or what not. But the new title recognized her skill and service: Volunteer Coordinator. She wasn’t sure, with the paper pushing and less time on the ward where she could make her biggest contribution, but she’d give it a try because it could lead to administrative bonuses once she got her nursing degree.

  Ravi surged, his woman’s beauty was dynamic. She was a key player, like him. He disrobed her to make his contribution, which she called a benefit after all. They browsed the pornography section, and soon it was time to relax. But Ravi searched his CD pile for something to capture the moment: Annie Lennox. He didn’t miss Annie and couldn’t remember her real name. Maybe she’d be back. Maybe not. Who cared? Annie and Minna together?

  He glanced back. She watched him.

  “You want to marry me?” He whispered it in hoarse uncertainty, as old life drained out of him to make room for something new. Nearly tearful together, they shared another summit, this time calmly as she came to the embrace. They cried and laughed; getting married seemed so much easier than another fuck. Let life begin.

  Their love was their relief.

  She sang the song all day, not waiting in vain for his love—sang as she made arrangements with the Justice of the Peace for a ceremony at the cottage, “tomorrow?” Skinny would witness, but the State required a human.

  So Ravi called his mentor with a “Mayday. Mayday.” The lovebirds laughed, but Crusty didn’t think it one bit funny to call mayday if you weren’t really going down.

  “Crusty. Cut me some slack. I want you for my best man.”

  “You want me?” Crusty canceled his whale watch and put his four passengers on other boats and showed up in a three-piece suit and a mermaid tie.

  “Was that your bar mitzvah suit?”

  “Yeah. If that means fourth marriage and shit-faced.” On a lazy shuffle, he stepped to the line, ready to witness. It happened quick.

  The magistrate stepped up with a bible and a red ribbon place-marker that looked unfamiliar. So Ravi said, “Can I see that?” And so he saw the words would bind him forever to his true love in Jesus’ name. “Oh!”

  “What?”

  “This says ‘Jesus.’ I’m Jewish.”

  “Good news: Jesus was Jewish. He was the king of the Jews.”

  Ravi wanted to brain the guy or tell him to get out, but he said, “Are you a civil servant?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “And this is a civil ceremony?”

  “I pick my own ceremonies.”

  “Good. You pick your ceremonies, and I’ll pick mine.”

  “Pardon me,” Minna said. “We want non-denominational.” She asked Ravi, “Is it okay if he mentions a higher spirit?”

  “Sure. A high spirit is okay.” Ravi wondered if she was alcoholic but didn’t ask, fearing she might be. That was a load of wine she soaked up—but it was a load of fucking too, so… Never mind. She said she was Buddhist and hoped the magistrate understood.

  “A higher spirit is okay,” the magistrate replied, “but the son of God is not okay?”

  “I don’t want that,” Ravi said. “I won’t have that. Will you go along, or not?”

  The magistrate stared until Minna touched him. “I’m Hawaiian. We might do this again with a kahuna. We won’t have Jesus there, either.” She stopped smiling. “Jesus would want us happy.”

  So the magistrate disclaimed responsibility if the ceremony did not stand for leaving Jesus out of it.

  Ravi said, “No Jesus. Okay?”

  “Jesus is God,” the magistrate said.

  The signal seemed insistent; this was wrong. A non-Christian groom should get a licensed captain on a boat. That would be cake, with Crusty there, but his boat was over on the west side, and the channel would make everyone pukey, especially Skinny—he laughed.

  Let it go.

  The magistrate shrugged, “It’s your funeral—I mean, wedding.”

  “What a jerk,” Ravi laughed. The magistrate laughed too, so Ravi
told him, “Your humor is offensive and not funny. You insult people because they don’t believe as you do.” The magistrate shrugged again, like a good Christian or something.

  Ravi wanted to shake him up but held back—but this would affect the tip. Oh, I know about tips and what a smartass gets at the end of a trip. Asshole.

  “Shall we?”

  In minutes it was done, cast in stone and on paper. Minna served musubi with pork. Ravi let it slide—she didn’t know, and he didn’t care, but he felt the presence of those who would care.

  Let it go.

  He poured champagne.

  He tried a summer roll, or was it a spring roll? He could never remember which was fried and which was soft. These were soft, with raw vegetables rolled in rice paper, which wasn’t fried but refreshing, till Minna said, “Oh, no. Sprouts.”

  Crusty glanced up as Ravi asked, “What?”

  “Oh, nothing.” She blushed.

  “What?”

  “Look. Alfalfa sprouts inside.”

  “So what?”

  “Nothing. My girlfriend told me they taste disgusting.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “It’s nothing. She said when a woman performs, you know, on a man, it’s supposed to taste like alfalfa sprouts.”

  Crusty’s eyebrows rose on that swell. Ravi said he didn’t know that and wondered what girlfriend. Never mind. He checked his spring roll for viscosity and tossed it into the hedge. The phase called getting-to-know-you takes months or years, not hours, even at warp speed. Surprises would spring out of nowhere like jack-in-the-box for a long time. He nearly asked if it was true but let go again. Mongoose would find the spring roll and join the celebration.

  Mongoose has to eat too; time to move on with life and what not.

  Skinny got a shrimp, a scallop, and a squid stacked like in a fafa restaurant that gets ninety dollars for the same entrée. Crusty finished his bubbly and a few more, taking the edge off one thing and another, easing into the lovely afternoon. The magistrate took his leave. Crusty finished the bottle and cried; he was so happy for the lovebirds and for friendship for all time. He fell asleep on a chaise in the shade.

  Wedded bliss began on contentment, transcending hunger, thirst, and desire. Propping pillows on the headboard, Ravi lay back with his beloved in his arms. They watched the minutes slide by. They dozed as if peace and quiet were consummation.

  They woke near nightfall when Crusty cleared his throat at the foot of the bed. With fond farewells they wished each other long life and a safe drive home. Crusty shuffled out to his car, far from fluidity, high and dry, not yet aground but an apparently old man.

  Back in bed, they stared again, perhaps seeking details on the future ahead. Skinny leapt from the dresser to the chair to the nightstand and onto her place by Ravi’s pillow. She wanted another entrée. Or maybe she was jealous of the exchange between those who had found the moment.

  A week into matrimony, Minna said she would be away for a few days, not to worry. He thought the better part of honor and obedience was to let it be. That worked so far, but a husband should know. So she explained that things happened so fast; she needed to visit her family to ease them into it. “You didn’t tell them?” She had not—but he knew that, or would have known, had he thought about her family. He didn’t because it felt like a full house already.

  “We eloped. You can’t tell your family you’re going to elope. Once you tell them, you have to invite them. Don’t you know, silly?”

  She had a point, and he’d been spared the mishpocha, or rather the ohana, who’d still be hanging out, sucking down the Coors Light and chopping up a few chickens and rabbits for another round of hekka in the carport, had they known.

  Okay, so go. Then come back.

  Okay, and she was gone. Relief and depression rotated. Unmitigated happiness round the clock needed a reprieve. Depression came naturally too because he did love her. He’d loved his old life, and then it changed. It was a joke on board when Ravi forgot to latch the safety cable closing the gangway when the last passenger came aboard. Harmless comments drifted down the deck about Ravi needing to lighten his load, or wanting to lose a few overboard. Nobody laughed or said boo when he left a tank valve closed, putting a diver in with an empty buoyancy compensator, so she sank, sucking on a dead reg. He snatched her back up from four feet down—okay, six feet, no big deal. Did she honestly think that kicking and screaming underwater would improve her prospects? Did she think he’d let her drown? What was that? I’ll tell you what: Not the first shred of faith is what.

  Is that the same as faithless? No. It’s not.

  Every diver has a certification card legally allowing her to dive with compressed air. The card indicates successful completion of training. The training began and ended with, Think and act. Don’t react. She had three quick release clips to remove her buoyancy compensator and lead weights in two seconds flat. Short of thinking and applying her training, she had her legs and adrenaline to kick back up to the surface. So it was on her if the power and adrenaline got covered in mush, and she flat fucking forgot her quick release. Come on, three clicks and out. And up…

  He could be partly blamed but not wholly. How could anyone think that a charter dive would relieve them of fundamental responsibility in safeguarding her own life? She hadn’t even checked her air valve.

  Fortunately, more pressing demands minimized Ravi’s muttering, and other mutters made it a rare day of no tips. Who cared? Tomorrow would be another boatload—plenty more tourists where these came from, enough for a few more days, weeks, months, and years as necessary. Tomorrow’s tourists might have the wits to dive as trained.

  Solitude should relax and regenerate a love-bent man. But the old routine closed in. I need a few days to explain things to my family. What? That she’d married a white guy? Worse yet, she’d married one from a cult that eats Christian babies for Passover. But they might like that. Who knew? Still, she’d left, and that was wrong. Then he remembered that he was married and in love.

  And what about his family? He would face a gauntlet on his marriage to a shiksa—an oriental shiksa. Basha Rivka would fire from all directions, beginning with the children not yet born to Ravi and what’s-her-name—what would they be? How would they know, and so on to emotional fatigue, to the most pressing question: So when, tell me, do I get my grandchildren?

  The next day wasn’t so bad, till Ravi stared off at meaning as the boat came up askew on the trailer. Somebody yelled, so he backed it down for straightening. Anxieties revolved around Minna. Minna smiling. Minna sleeping. Minna chatting. Minna listening. Minna riding on top. Minna whimpering, oh, oh, oh.

  Ravi smiled again, hoisting empty tanks.

  She scolded him on the overbearing needs of men, and he stifled the obvious questions. Questions would surface eventually, and he would get to know his wife. Two weeks already felt like long ago. She could touch her lips and then his, easing a pang with a fingertip. With his second beer in hand and more in the fridge, he faced an empty afternoon. It felt unnatural to keep thinking about her, and surely he would think of something else, by and by.

  “Meow.”

  “Yes, I’ll think about you. I always do, but you know it’s not like that with you and me. I mean, you’re Skinny. I mean…” I mean, this is nuts. What’s-her-name was right—I’m reasoning with a cat; it’s out of touch. Not every cat is as reasonable as you, Skinny. But still.

  Scanning key scenes was like a movie about two young people everyone wants to fuck or watch them fuck—the plot was thin but the action compelling. Minna was a fantasy applied and easy to recall. He pondered gifted directing and new angles.

  He reflected on love and depths unknown. He’d been blessed, living high as the rock stars, pro jocks, and politicians. Dive instructors were forgotten far inland, but dive leaders alone could showcase their wares so the women could shop, as women like to do. The difference between watermen and rock stars, athletes, or politicians wa
s that women on vacation weren’t pale or raggedy with nipple rings and cootch tattoos, clawing their way backstage. Tourist women didn’t need a speech or drugs or the dark. They took care, building careers and raising children, looking good in the light of day, with a fancy for something sinful but harmless. Where better than three thousand miles away, or six? Who better to bang than the bronze man with the rippled stomach and bulging Speedos? They saw his gift as he explained the rules for not dying on the dive ahead. He moved among people and equipment, his leadership fat-free and easy.

  Was that a facecloth rolled up in those Speedos, or was he happy to be here? And what a view it would be, over the ripples to those gray-green eyes. Oh, and those eyebrows, framed by those sandy, sun-bleached curls and the cute little hook in the nose.

  Women observed. Some offered, subtly or abruptly, eyeballing or leaning in to press the urgency. “Are you free later?”

  He often said no, he was not free later, with the assurance that, “I am not a womaner.” Oh, they understood, but he finally got corrected.

  “That’s womanizer.”

  “Womanizer?”

  “Yes. You mean you’re not a womanizer. I love that. I love that you turned me down. Let me tell you what I had in mind…”

  So from time to time he gave in. The cruder crew stood no chance because they couldn’t stop eating and drinking, but they coached—as long as they could distinguish strategy from disrespect. Even so, he came away from nature’s bounty feeling relieved but used. These encounters highlighted the shortfall of a service career; who ever heard of a banquet in fast-food format? Some dive instructors worked the buffet, snatching dishes and avoiding the encumbrance of a sit-down. Like all crew, Ravi loved the sinful richness.

  But regrets in love earned the nickname “Avid Ravi.” He could not disguise the mourning after, so Avid Ravi stuck like a nickname can, harmless but poignantly profiling his vulnerability. Newly arrived women took heed, inferring that Ravi was avidly loving, which he could be. But they often left him bereft. Intimacy felt intimate, after all, and didn’t happen so often. Then it went away. Ms. Right had yet to stick around, so the seven-day cycle often began anew, as if hope or something sprung eternal.