by J T Kalnay
“You go home tomorrow Joe?” Salvaro asks.
“Si. Manana,” Joe answers. He has been learning some Spanish.
“And you go the day after?” Salvaro asks me.
“Yes.”
Has he asked because he is trying to schedule, or is there something else behind his question?
Dinner tonight is Mahi Mahi. Again it is amazingly large and as fresh as fish can be. The flesh is firm and almost sweet. The surfers who have been here for several days are tired. And their experiences are beginning to repeat. They have been to this restaurant before and they are beginning to count the days until they return home. The regularity of the tides, of the length of the days, of the waves. It is seductive and yet repetitive. After three or four days here you have either decided to head home with amazing stories or you have decided to go native and to stay here. I have decided to do both. To go home, but to return next spring, with Joe. I will tell him after dinner. Before I have my way with him.
On the way back along the dark, twisting coastal highway Salvaro swerves to avoid an eighteen wheeler that has come too close to our side of the road. He says nothing but we can all sense that chemical coppery stink of tension and of a close call. I grip Joe’s thigh and he pats my hand.
Salvaro carts us up the hill in the dark and I do not even offer any pretense about going to Joe’s bungalow. No surfer needs to hear another fabricated excuse. Though they all wonder why they see me emerging from my own bungalow in the morning after seeing me enter Joe’s in the night. I feel no need to explain to anyone. I am in Costa Rica with my lover and I make no excuses or explanations for either. I do not explain, I do not complain.
We arrive in his bed and I am kissing him and rubbing myself on him. I start to descend, to take him in my mouth. He stops me.
“No. I want to be inside you,” he says.
I look in his eyes.
“You don’t like it when I do that?” I ask. These are the most words we have spoken while having sex since I have met him.
“That’s not it,” he answers.
“Then let me,” I say. I move lower.
“Wait,” he says.
I continue to move, even while I look up at him. I have him in my hand, his dick is barely an inch from my mouth. I wait for him to arch his hips up, to acquiesce, to do my bidding. He arches and I take him and it is over quickly. He comes hard and convulses and then dissolves into nothingness.
I work my way up beside him, lie beside him.
“I’ve decided to come back here next spring with you,” I say.
He smiles through the tiredness and the satisfaction.
“And I’ve decided to do the lighthouse tour with you this fall,” I say.
His smile spreads. He is happy, and he is in love. Now he has July and October and January and next spring to anticipate.
“Why?” he asks. He is asking me to say that I love him. But I don’t love him.
“Because I want to,” I answer. It is not the answer he wanted, or expected. He thought that on this, our last night in Costa Rica, after a week of ocean and jungle and sex and vanilla scented breezes that I would tell him that I love him. He was wrong.
He rolls towards me.
“Will you stay with me tonight?” he asks.
“No.”
“Will you stay until I can be inside you?” he asks.
“No. And I’ll be gone with the surfers before the driver comes for you, so we should say ‘good night’ and ‘see you in July’ right now,” I answer.
He takes me in his arms, hugs me, holds me. I wonder if he will let me go.
“Why didn’t you want me inside you tonight?” he asks.
So he did notice.
“Because I wanted to do that for you,” I answer.
“But you don’t get anything out of that,” he says.
“You’re wrong. I get something out of it. I get to see my lover feel that. I get to feel your intensity in my mouth, in my hand. I get to know that I have given you the release, the completion.”
“But you don’t come,” he quickly answers.
“I came three times today,” I answer. I do not tell him that I also get something else. I get to control him. I get to dictate what he will do and what I will not do. I didn’t know this about sex. And I didn’t know it about me, although I suspected it. I do like control. I like to control him. Knowing that I can control him like this in some way liberates me to let him make me come in the daytime, to let him have his way, to let him be the man on top and inside while I am the woman below, the receiver. Knowing that I can be in charge, at any time, with just my mouth and my hand and that he is powerless to stop me, makes me able to slip away into the nothingness of the day.
If I had known this twenty years ago would things have been different with Rick? Would I have been different? Or would I have been with someone else? Someone who was able to take charge but also to relinquish control. Someone willing to be dominated in the way that I dominate Joe? Or would my domination have doomed my marriage even sooner?
“I will see you in July,” I say. I kiss him on the lips, on the cheek, on the forehead. I roll off the bed and dress. He starts to rise, to give me another hug, another kiss. I put my hand on his chest and pin him gently to the bed. I kiss him again on the lips, again on the forehead. He stays in the bed and I leave his bungalow.
No drivers or Joes or exes or any other dream lovers come to me in my sleep tonight. I am alone in my bungalow in Costa Rica, with the ocean on one side and the jungle all around. My dismissed lover is asleep four hundred yards away up the hill, and there is a day by myself waiting tomorrow. I have no dreams, just peace.
Joe
“Ready? Listo?” the driver asks.
“Si,” I reply.
His bags are in the van, and it will be just Joe and the driver making the trip to San Jose. Just the driver returning.
The surfers left for the beach an hour before sunrise.
“I thought it was dangerous to be in the ocean at sunrise?” Joe asks. “Because that’s when the sharks feed,” Joe says.
“Sometimes we see a shark, sometimes a shark bites someone. If you are in the ocean long enough you will see a shark,” the driver says without commitment. He has been instructed by Salvaro about how to discuss sharks with the surfers.
“But isn’t it most dangerous at sunrise and sunset?” Joe persists.
“Do you miss her already?” the driver asks.
Joe is unprepared for the rapid change in subject. Wonders whether he should discuss Shannon with this driver. But the driver has been in the ocean with them several days, helping to push the surfboards out through the surf, helping the beginners surf in the white water. He has shared at least a part of the week with them, and there is a connection.
“Si,” Joe answers.
“She is very beautiful. Mas bonita,” the driver says.
“Si,” Joe answers. He recalls that the surf instructor in North Carolina said the same thing. Apparently Costa Rican men find Shannon attractive.
“Is she your girlfriend in America?” the driver asks.
“Sometimes,” Joe answers.
The driver gets the slightly confused look on his face that appears when a gringo has turned a phrase that he is unsure how to parse. Joe recognizes the look.
“She lives in Ohio, one part of America, and I live in North Carolina, another part of America. It takes an entire day to drive from one place to another. When she is in North Carolina she is my girlfriend.”
“And when she is in Costa Rica she is your girlfriend too,” the driver adds.
“Si,” Joe answers.
The rest of the drive passes in silence as the driver concentrates on the hundred turns on the alternately good and then potted and rutted road that leads to the airport.
“Pura Vida,” the driver says as he shakes hands with Joe.
“Gracias,” Joe answers.
Shannon
The water is warm again this
morning. Salvaro says it is warm almost every day. That there are only a few days when a current comes in closer and makes the water cooler. But never cold. The water is never cold. The air is never cold. It is either warm or hot, never cold.
She has caught several waves this morning on the smaller board that Salvaro has brought for her.
“You are ready to turn,” he says. “Try to go along the wave, along the shore, not straight at the shore,” he teaches.
She heeds, and turns, and rides along the wave rather than rushing down the face and getting ahead of the wave and then having to catch it again while it is breaking.
The ride along the face is slower, longer, more in control, less of a headlong rush and more of a building smoothness. She tries to turn back over the wave like she has seen the young boys do, to avoid the blender, but she has not yet mastered the trick.
She paddles back out.
“Good,” Salvaro says. He smiles. His student has learned. She gets it. She doesn’t fight the ocean, or fight him. She gives herself to the ocean. He thinks about the doctors and lawyers and businessmen who come to his surf camp and who fight the ocean. The waves evict these rigid men and women quickly and sometimes hold them under. But not Shannon. She yields, and in yielding gains some measure of control over the uncontrollable Pacific.
On the beach the surfers rinse. There is only Shannon and two others today. Others will arrive tomorrow when Shannon leaves. Salvaro offers her fresh watermelon, fresh mango.
“You did good today,” he says. “Maybe you will come back and learn some more?” he asks.
“I will come back next April,” she answers.
“With Joe?” he asks.
“I will be here, Joe will be here, but I will come by myself and leave by myself,” she answers.
“You are a couple?” he asks.
“Sometimes,” she answers.
Salvaro has seen much in his years running the surf camp and in his years travelling the country and the world as a surfer. Has seen every type of relationship between men and women and men and men and women and women and every possible combination. He understands her half-answer. Prods no further.
“Is that house over there for sale?” Shannon asks.
“Si. But it is not a good deal. It has been for sale for a long time. The owner thinks he will take advantage of an American.”
“Oh,” Shannon says.
“I know some houses that are in a more quiet place, that are on the ocean, that are also for sale. Their owners are friends of mine, they would not take advantage of my friends,” Salvaro says.
“You know everyone don’t you?” Shannon asks.
“No. But I know who I know, and I know who I can trust and I know who I cannot trust. I feel like you are someone I could trust,” Salvaro says.
Shannon looks into his eyes, tries to decide if he is coming on to her. Decides he is not. Decides he is a friendly man who cares about his guests and who has had some small satisfaction watching Shannon connect with the Pacific and with his home.
“I was born and raised here,” he says. “My grandparents came here on a boat, along the coast. There was no road. They fished and grew vegetables and hunted and found fruits in the jungle. The road is new. From my lifetime, not theirs.”
“Are they still with us?” Shannon asks.
“My mother is, she lives near these houses I will show you, if you would like to see a house.”
“Yes I would like to look at a house today, before I go. And then when I am in America I will think about the house. Is there a lawyer you trust? And a contractor? In case I like this house?”
“Si. And I have friends in America that you should talk to first. Friends who have bought here. You should talk to them first.”
There is something in his statement. A warning, but not an overt warning. It is subtle, like everything about Salvaro is subtle. How he moves on his surfboard, how he reads and feels the waves, how he introduces topics and how he answers questions. All his words are directed towards having the listener come to their own conclusion. Except his orders in the water. ‘Paddle, paddle, paddle, UP!’ Or ‘get off the board’, or his other orders. The contrast between his command voice and his Zen voice, the separation between the tones, gives greater import to both.
“Thank you for everything,” she says to Salvaro after dinner. Her trip is over, she will not see him in the morning. The driver will pick her up after the surfers have left. She can sleep in, then have breakfast in the main house, and then ride to the airport.
After dinner she walks to her bungalow.
A few minutes later she hears a light knock on the door. It is the driver.
“I will get you at eight,” he says.
“Eight,” she says.
“Is a beautiful night,” he adds.
She can tell he wants to be invited in. She can tell that he wants to be close to her. He is so beautiful, and so young. She comes to the front screen, leaves the bungalow, and stands on the porch with him. He is uncomfortable to be seen on the porch with her. Salvaro has warned him about visiting the guests.
“Can I come inside?” he asks.
“No,” she answers. She puts her arms gently around him, softly kisses his lips. She steps away from him.
“You kissed me,” he says. “But you don’t want me?”
“No,” she says.
“Is it Joe?” the driver asks.
“No. It’s you. You’re so beautiful, and so young. My body wants you. But I’d never be able to get you out of my mind, and I’d never be able to come here again.”
The driver cannot understand, but he accepts, and steps off her porch.
Salvaro backs away from the window where he was watching the driver who thought he had escaped up the path unnoticed. Salvaro chalks a second demerit against the driver’s name.
In the morning, at eight, Salvaro collects Shannon from the main house.
“You’re taking me to the airport?” she asks.
“Si. It is a rest day for the surfers, and Tino has taken them to the park. So I will take you to San Jose and I will greet our new guests.”
“Gracias,” Shannon says.
“I liked the house,” Shannon says. “And the area. Do you think the price is fair?”
“Si,” Salvaro answers. “You can afford it?” he asks.
“Si. I am a very wealthy woman,” Shannon offers unbidden. “I was lucky a few years ago and now I am wealthy.”
“And Joe?”
“Joe is wealthy too. But not like me. He is a very successful businessman. He sells coffee.”
“In Costa Rica, people who say they sell coffee are really selling drugs,” Salvaro says.
“I will warn him not to describe himself as a man who sells coffee when he is Costa Rica,” Shannon laughs.
Salvaro laughs with her. He is comfortable with her, and with her contentment.
“Are you sad to go home?” he says.
“No. I am ready to go home,” she says.
“It is good to have an adventure, but good to go home,” Salvaro answers.
“Exactly. Yes that is it exactly,” she says.
She smiles at him and he smiles at her and they spend the rest of the drive talking about the house and about Americans who have bought houses in Costa Rica so they could be warm in the winter and so they could surf.
“I look forward to seeing you next year,” Salvaro says.
“Pura Vida,” Shannon answers.
“Gracias,” he says.
Shannon
“You look great,” Cara says to Shannon.
“I feel great,” Shannon answers.
“How was it?” Cara asks.
“It was different. The ocean was always warm and the waves were always there. The waves are different from at Topsail. They’re all waves, wave after wave, with an orderliness to them and a longer time between them. As though they had the entire depth and breadth of the Pacific to gather and so they’re in no hurry to cr
ash on the beach.”
“Sounds erotic,” Cara says.
“It does. You can’t believe how much sex I had there. Three or four times a day. I thought I was going to kill that poor man,” Shannon says.
“And only with Joe?” Cara asks.
“Yes only with Joe,” Shannon answers.
“But there were other choices?” Cara asks.
“Yes.”
“So you’re that serious about Joe that you didn’t follow through?”
“That’s not it. The one man wasn’t my type, and the one boy was just too beautiful. There was one man, but I don’t know if he’s married or in love or anything. So it wasn’t about Joe.”
“Who are you and what have you done with my sister?” Cara asks.
“What are you talking about?”
“I’ve known you a long time sister. And I’ve never once heard you talk about men like that. Never once heard you admit that you had other choices, and why you did or didn’t see it through. You’ve always thought no-one would notice you. And now, trust me, with that hair and that tan and your figure and your new attitude, I can’t imagine the man who wouldn’t notice you.”
“Really?” Shannon asks.
“Really. You’ve always had that quiet beauty thing working, but now it’s like someone is shining a searchlight on you. Wait. You’re not pregnant are you?” Cara asks.
“No. That’s impossible. You know that.”
“No it’s always possible.”
“Not for me. I’m certain. I had a hysterectomy.”
“How did you have a hysterectomy and I don’t know about it. When was this?”
“It was last year, in May. My doctor told me I had to have a hysterectomy.”
“And you didn’t come to me for a second opinion? You didn’t even tell me?”
