"Holy shit," Ray said, backing into the ocean. "Are they coming for us?"
After I watched Wendy and Feliqua barrel into the surf like two bulldozers, it became apparent that Sylvan wasn't the only black person who couldn't swim.
"Oh, my God!" Paul screamed, running in after them with two water noodles in his hand. "Why can't anyone swim?"
The women were screaming and laughing and swallowing water. They kept trying to regain their footing but continually fell down until Delicious and Sylvan were able to balance each one. Sylvan made it over to Wendy to lend her a hand, but when she felt a touch, she turned around and spit in his face.
"Aaaaaahhhahahahahahhahahh!!!" was the only sound anyone heard from Delicious.
"I'm sorry," she slurred, wiping the spit off Sylvan's face. "I thought you were the beach." Then she turned in the other direction and hawked another loogie, which the wind blew right back into her face. She quickly fell in the water, but Sylvan grabbed her.
"My weave! My weave!" Wendy yelled when she was done spitting.
"I got you, girl," Sylvan told her.
"I lost two tracks yesterday when we went swimming. Everyone at church told me not to go in the ocean. You'll lose your weave in a hot second!" Then she smacked Sylvan on the ass and went flying into one of Stephanie's lit cigarettes.
"Do you really need to smoke in the ocean?" I asked her for the third time that week.
"Stephanie, I didn't know you smoked," Paul said, then started howling along with Delicious, who was still moaning with laughter while holding Feliqua like a baby in the water.
"Aaaahhahahhahahahahahahahh!"
My brother had commandeered one of the water noodles and was using it to defend himself from all the splashing. "Chelsea, can you believe Sylvan went from not knowing how to swim to rescuing people in one week? I should probably look into coaching some sort of black swim team."
"They're standing in two feet of water, Ray. Even though a black swim team does seem like an oxymoron at this point, it is definitely something to think about. In the winter you could teach interracial skiing."
Feliqua, who was definitely more drunk than Wendy, tried to sit in the shallow water, but small waves kept pushing her back on the beach. She had no upper-body control, so Paul helped her to the edge of the beach, where she retrieved her drink and lay down on Paul's lap.
"We got a Cocoa Sister down. One Cocoa Sister down!" Paul yelled to us as he took a picture of himself smiling with her.
"I didn't know there were gay traffic controllers that also lifeguarded," Ray said to Paul after he walked up to have a sip of Feliqua's cocktail. "It's okay, Feliqua. We'll take care of you."
She announced she needed a nap and fell asleep on Paul's lap. Two minutes later she was awake again and calling for Wendy.
Wendy stormed over to me and asked me where Sylvan was. "Right behind you," I told her.
"You shut up, you white skinny TV bitch. You know you need a bodyguard for that non-french-fry-eating ass." She followed this up with a smack to my ass and asked me to check her weave, which I straightened. Then I took one side of the back of her bathing suit and pulled it into the crack of her ass, where she left it.
"Black don't crack, you silly bitch!" Then she fell into the water and came back up for another round of apple bobbing.
"Get together for a picture!" Paul screamed to me and Wendy, who had already somehow made her way back to Sylvan and was mounting him.
"Honey, I need you to take care of me. They said you're a good man and a single father. I can't really swim. Hold me, Sylvan."
"Happy birthday, Feliqua!" Paul screamed into Feliqua's face, and then adjusted her weave. "Is this thing reversible?"
Delicious was now howling so hard he was literally choking on the ocean, but no one seemed to care.
Sylvan and Wendy were drifting farther away from us but managing to keep in water shallow enough to stay afloat. And then I heard him say, "Are you sure we're not being obvious?"
When I looked over, Sylvan was behind Wendy and moving like a jackrabbit while her head was bobbing back and forth and her weave was whipping him in the face. "Shhhh!" she told him. "For all those white folks know, we snorkeling. Give it to me!"
"I think Daddy's coming home," Ray announced as he got back out of the water. "I'm getting my camera."
"Oh, my God, you should see all the fish out there," I heard behind me, and turned around to see Ted standing there with his snorkel mask and goggles still on.
"I don't think so, buddy," I told him. "I got a couple of bigger fish, and a lot of things have happened while you were discovering marine life."
Once he surveyed the scene and was able to compute what was taking place, he put his snorkel and mask on again, turned around, and headed back out to sea.
Feliqua got up from her seat in the sand next to Paul and said she needed to go lie down. Delicious and I got out of the ocean and guided her to one of the chaise longues closest to the beach. "Delicious," she moaned. "Can you get me a ginger ale?"
Brian went to get the ginger ale while I sat down and coached her on how to projectile-vomit into the sand.
"Get it out, Fataqua," my brother said as he neared us. He had a towel in his hand and leaned over to wipe her mouth and then looked at me. "Who the fuck is Delicious?"
"Brian," I told him.
"I need ginger ale!"
"It's coming, Feliqua," I told her.
"So am I!" she moaned, and threw up again.
When I turned to go back into the water, Sylvan and Wendy were heading toward us, with Wendy very unstable on her feet. The sand was not her friend, and Sylvan was having trouble keeping them both upright at the same time. She stopped halfway to the lounge chairs and turned around to face the ocean. She pulled the back of her bathing suit in between her ass cheeks and started shaking her ass.
"Aaaahhahahahahahahhh," shrieked Delicious again.
"Oh, my Lord," Sylvan said, taking a step back and looking at me. "People wonder how the Caribbean was formed, Chels, and now I know. A black woman shook her ass, and a bunch of islands were created as aftershocks."
Paul instructed them to both bend over for a snapshot.
Wendy lost her footing. She didn't fall on her ass, which would be the obvious gravitational pull--probably for the entire island--but face-first, a header straight into the sand. Sylvan went down after her but managed to land on his side. Paul was the first on the scene with his camera in tow, and what he captured has been seen only in National Geographic. Two chocolate sand dabs, washed ashore.
There was sand in every crevice of Wendy's face. Her eyes, her ears, her nose. Brian grabbed one of the ginger ales that he'd brought for Feliqua and poured it over Wendy's head. "We're going to need a two-liter, Brian," Ray told him. "Sorry, I mean Delicious."
Ted had reappeared from the ocean and was running toward us yelling, "Oh, my God! Is she dead? Wait, keep her alive. I know CPR."
That was all Wendy needed to get her groove back. She was howling harder than any of us, but the sand was still pissed.
She was attempting to spit out some of the sand when we all played Light as a Feather, Stiff as a Board and carried her back into the ocean, where she could properly rinse off. Stephanie, of course, could assist with only one hand.
"Aren't you out of cigarettes yet?" I asked her.
"Stephanie, I didn't know you smoked!"
"Paul, shut up!" everyone yelled at the same time.
As luck would have it, the dip in the ocean was exactly what the doctor ordered for Wendy, because after that she was at least able to manage her footsteps in a more reasonable manner. We all sat in the water, exhausted, for a good hour before it started to get dark out, but Feliqua was not anywhere close to moving. She had stopped throwing up, sort of, but was firm about staying where she was. "Don't fucking touch me!" she yelled. Wendy said she needed help getting Feliqua to her room, and then she would be available to have dinner with us.
Sylvan volun
teered to stay with the girls, and Stephanie announced that she had only two cigarettes left.
"It might be time to give it a rest, Steph," Paul told her. "Your breath is like eighty proof."
Stephanie walked off in a huff, and Eva followed her. Ray was floating on the noodles, watching everything from the water. Ted nudged me and said he'd like to talk to me privately. "In the ocean, please."
Once we were back in the water, Ray took two water noodles out from under him and handed them to us. "What an amazing day. I taught a man how to swim, and he took that knowledge and saved another person. I don't think I've ever felt more alive."
"That's fantastic, Ray," Ted told him, and then turned to me. "We need to discuss dinner. Are these women joining us?"
"I don't think Feliqua is having dinner tonight, Ted, but Wendy doesn't look like she misses many meals."
"Oh, my God!" exclaimed Steph. "Oh, my God!"
I looked back and saw Delicious, Paul, and Sylvan wheeling Feliqua on a chaise longue away from the beach up to the pool area. "I'll be back for dinner!" Wendy yelled over her shoulder as she mounted the steps to the hotel. The three of us ran out of the water and followed them.
"What are you doing?" Ted yelled. "Are you taking her to her room?"
"We're not fucking staying here. We heard there was a swim-up bar. Our hotel's down the beach!" Wendy told Ted. "You better put on your dancing shoes. I hear you move like Michael Jackson."
Boom was the sound the lounge chair made every time it hit a step.
Feliqua would groan a little each time. "Ow."
"This is some crazy shit," Wendy announced. "You white people are CUH-razy."
After getting Feliqua up the stairs, we had to pass the pool area, which to our surprise was holding a screening of Pirates of the Caribbean. Delicious and Sylvan put on their happy faces as they strolled through various couples watching a movie over a candlelight dinner.
"You guys," I whispered. "We can't wheel a black woman through a movie screening in a chaise longue. There's got to be some sort of law against that."
"We've got to get our girl into a taxi, Tracy. Chunky Chocolate is going to ride back with me to drop off my girl, and then I'll be heading back for that barbecue. Yeah, yeah, yeah. A girl's gotta eat. I swam the shit out of that ocean today!"
There was no point in trying to make less of a scene than we were already making, as we were in full view of all the moviegoers. We just kept our heads down while we pushed a person in a chaise longue along the path in our bathing suits. I volunteered for Feliqua to sleep in Sylvan's room until I looked at Sylvan, who wasn't smiling. At least it looked like he wasn't smiling; it might have been too dark to tell.
A security guard came running over to us and handed me a bathrobe. "Mrs. Handler? Can we be of some help?" That's when Ted decided to make a quick left and go up to our room.
"We're good, thanks," I reassured him. "We're playing hide-and-seek. She's just pretending to be asleep." Wendy and I walked on either side of the chaise longue in order to stop Feliqua from falling onto the concrete. Paul was following closely behind, vacillating between picture mode and video mode. There was clearly too much footage to capture for any documentarian. We had to make sudden, corrective moves every time we hit a set of stairs or a proverbial speed bump, which would result in more grunts from Feliqua.
"This is the best fucking night of my life," Wendy shouted. "I think I might pee myself. Sylvan, you're gonna come with us in the taxi, right, motherfucker?"
"Aahhahahahahahhhh!"
"Brian, do you need me to give you the Heimlich?" I asked him.
"It's fucking Delicious, Tracy!" Wendy corrected me.
"Baby, I ain't gonna let nothing happen to you or Feliqua," Sylvan told her. "I'll come back to your hotel and make sure you are safe."
"Damn, you motherfuckers know how to party!" Wendy screamed. "Especially you, white bitch! I'm 'bout ready to piss myself!"
"You think you're going to pee yourself?" I snapped back at her. "Do you have any idea what condition I'm dealing with? I can't take much more of this. We just wheeled a person in a wheelbarrow off a beach, through a movie screening, and on our way to a lobby."
Feliqua grumbled again, and Delicious asked if she was okay. "It's too bumpy," she slurred.
Wendy was Feliqua's closest kin and had made it clear she would be speaking for her until Feliqua came back to life. "She's gonna be fine if this little anorexic bitch would stop her bitchin' and enjoy the beautiful night." I guess Wendy wanted to show me some affection, because her next move was to shoulder-check me into the bushes, which turned out to be a fitting place to relieve myself. When I was done, I rolled over and lay on the sidewalk while Paul took pictures of me in my own puddle.
Once he got the shot he needed, he moved on to the matter at hand or, as he described it, "to see the girls out."
"Bye!" I yelled after them. "Bye, girls!"
"Oh, I'll be back, shitface!" Wendy hollered.
The next day Sylvan had an early flight, so I didn't get to see him before he left, but he sent me a text saying that he wanted me to know he never had sex with Wendy and that he only got dry-humped by her: "please trust that she was the aggressor, chelz. I did get to see her booty which was nice and big, like a full moon."
I showed the text to Ted after I stopped convulsing.
"Oh, my God. He's worried you're upset? Little does he know, this is what you live for. That's the main difference between you and me, Chelsea. I consider last night a mockery. You consider last night one of the best nights of your life and a huge success."
"Maybe I do."
"I've never seen anything like that in all my life."
"Well, you've obviously been running with the wrong crowd. It was like God came down from the sky and handed me an Easter basket. An Easter basket with three chocolate bunnies."
I turned sideways in bed to face Ted. "Did I ever tell you that my favorite holiday used to be Black Friday?" Since I have one African-American friend, when I found out about this holiday, I thought: It's about time. I was psyched that she would have a day just to relax and celebrate herself for being black. I also thought it was really nice that Black Friday took place the day after Thanksgiving; if my friend worked for someone who didn't take advantage and give her a four-day weekend, she could still get off work by telling her boss that she's black and Friday was her day. I had forgotten to get my friend Loni a gift for Black Friday a couple of years ago, so I ran to the mall to get her a new weave. The place was a disaster; all the stores were having sales and there were people everywhere. That's when I found out what Black Friday was. I've since turned my attention to Flag Day, primarily because I'm a fan of June.
"That's a pretty dumb story," Ted declared, when I was done.
"Thank you," I replied. "I appreciate you taking the time to listen."
Chapter Eight
Dear Asshole
Against all good and reasonable judgment, my mentally retarded father insists on renting his Martha's Vineyard summer home at astronomical rates, mostly based on how much income he perceives the family who's renting makes. His assessment depends on three factors: their vocabulary during the initial phone conversation, the region of the country they live in, and how much experience he thinks they have in being taken advantage of.
The following is an e-mail my sister Sloane forwarded me from one of my father's renters after the renter and her family made the mistake of paying to stay at our house.
July 16, 2008
This is a lovely letter from last week's renters. They came after dad stayed for 1 week and chose NOT to have maid service after his stay or attempt to clean up after himself AT ALL before leaving the house. He is cagey about who he brought to the vineyard with him which means it was one of his Jamaican girlfriends... enjoy.
July 14, 2008
Mr. Melvin Handler
35 Morningside Drive
Livingston, NJ 07039
Dear Mr. Handler,
This letter is intended to follow up in writing on the telephone conversation that you had with my husband, on Tuesday morning, July 8, 2008. During that conversation, my husband detailed to you a number of problems and deficiencies that we discovered on July 6th and 7th upon our arrival at your home on Martha's Vineyard, for which we had contracted a week's rental from July 6-13, 2008 for the price of $7,900, including a $150 housekeeping fee, plus a $500 security deposit.
Our initial realization upon our arrival was that the house had not been cleaned. There was food left out on the counter, in the cupboards and in the refrigerator and freezer, most of which was well past usable condition. The counter, stovetop, toaster and table were covered with crumbs and food stains; the oven and refrigerator shelves were very dirty. Someone had left a package of squid (bait?) behind in the freezer, which had melted (due to freezer problems described below) and dripped smelly, fishy puddles onto the bottom of the freezer unit. We all spent the first several hours in our "vacation home" cleaning the kitchen and bathrooms and sweeping floors. As you might imagine, that was hardly the way we had hoped to begin our stay on Martha's Vineyard.
Also, the grill was filthy to the point of being unusable. My husband went out and purchased tools to clean it, and he and a friend (that hasn't spoken to us since) spent several hours scrubbing grilling racks, burners and the inside of the grill to remove grease and food debris, and hosing it down before we could reasonably cook on it. By this time, one of our other friends had already gone to the local hardware store and purchased a new grill for $479.95 which we had shipped back to our house in West Virginia at the end of our week for another $275.00.
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