Lessons in Pure Life Read online

  I don’t have to make the usual quick decision whether or not to have sex with him; I don’t have to because he seems to read my mind. Diego has the knowledge so few men do, and it involves letting me set the pace without submitting to it. I get to enjoy the sensuality of the early moments of tenderness that can speed past and sour easily. He makes me feel like youth itself – the peachy flushed cheeks, lips pink with blood and friction, eyes glowing with the magic that romance draws out of a person. So good it stings a little.

  My blood pressure beats in my lips, I even feel it tingling in my teeth and gums somehow. His breath is hot, jagged. I almost give in, nearly crumbling under that delicious-but-impossible itch only Diego can reach. He’s been everywhere, now. He knows my body by touch, but only in greyscale, from charcoal to the pearl shine of the moon. Somewhere in the glow of our endless embrace we tap into a beat. It’s our composition, the ballad of Lia and Diego in the feathers of our double breathing, the scratch of his hands in my hair along my scalp, my shy, pink gasp when he presses his hips against mine and I feel all the answers to my questions.

  We’re moving into dangerous territory.

  In the fog of our timeless, restless journey I wrench away with the last shred of clarity I can muster. I know we’re a very thin layer of cotton away from hot, gritty beach sex. And while I could be convinced to draw out that fantasy, I don’t want to give it all away. It’s not how I roll. Love for myself is stronger than my desire to, well, fuck. But only marginally.

  “Diego,” I breath, pressing my forehead to his but arching my hips so they pull free from his heavy hands.

  “Lo siento, nena.”

  He rears his head back with a rueful smile and scans my face. I kiss him softly.

  “It’s not that I don’t want to…”

  “Don’t explain. You don’t need to.” He cups half of my face with one hand and I lean into it, moonlight blinking off the tip of my nose. “I never saw beauty before you. Not like this,” he murmurs to himself.

  My eyes shut and I press affectionately into his palm, lips soft against the firm plane of his hand. He pulls me close to him again, and I wrap both arms around his neck.

  When we touched at first it was electric, sparky, but we’ve worn it off with the friction and sweat of a night’s PG-13 romance under the dry eye of the moon.

  My lips and tongue are puffy and buzzing, like how my head feels.

  It’s not enough to keep us apart. His mouth opens mine softly and he kisses me slow and deep so that I could be floating inches above the sand. The image of apples falling comes to mind – Newton obviously wasn’t seeing anyone when he discovered gravity because I’m only getting higher and higher. Nothing can hold me down, I’m already soaring. Diego's scratchy scruff and the warmth between my thighs keep my body earthbound, but otherwise gringa has left the building.

  The night vanishes and the moon fades into the sky. Like a music box fairy spinning slower and slower as the key unwinds, the red-hot urgency of our embrace relaxes into a gentle simmer. Sleepiness like soft, wadded cotton pads my perception. When I close my eyes, dreams lick at the corners of my mind.

  The early morning world is hazy and overcast. I rub my face gently and adjust my dress, trying to calculate how many hours I’ve gone without sleep, stopping at twenty-six hours because that’s enough. So tired. Should probably. Close. Eye-zzz.

  19

  It’s the melons that always draw me in. Ripe in shades of yellow and green, they’re stacked high in a fruit pyramid, daring me to send them rolling down the aisles.

  We woke up late. Last thing I remember before falling asleep is Diego rustling around all groggy, making us sun shades out of a couple of dead palm branches. It was hot and humid when I opened my eyes hours later to filtered light striping the sand.

  Diego had roused a few minutes earlier, rolled over to me and kissed the back of my neck good morning. I felt his smile wide against me, and his other good-morning “smile” lower down.

  That meant the last night actually happened, then. Diego Valverde was actually waking me up with his perfect lips and morning wood.

  As we gathered our things in a daze and got ready to head home in the harsh daylight, neither of us could find our flip-flops. He said it happens a lot, getting your sandals stolen on the beach, and that he should have thought of it. Weird to think of someone else wearing my worn-out rubber sandals. We decided to get some at the corner store on the way back to reality. Hadn’t talked about the past or future yet. Need a day’s rest and a big breakfast first.

  Now I stand under the bright lights next to the fruit section, overstimulated. Better wake up, Lia.

  Bright red strawberries, long green papayas, small round watermelons the color of winter pine needles hiding a pink, polka-dotted secret inside. Oranges, lemons, limes, cherries, peppers, and bananas draw me with their vivid natural beauty and sweet perfume. Sugarcane has been cut and stacked next to long, brown cassava root, ginger root, glossy purple eggplants, and massive white melons I wouldn’t know how to pick up or prepare. Pineapples that will taste sweeter than any I’ve had are on display in front of the citrus aisle. They look like a gang of miniature palm trees with their punk tops and rough chain-link-fence skin.

  I tiptoe on the cool tiles, looking for a display of cheap rubber flip-flops. They’re always in these places. I wonder what size Diego takes.

  There’s a familiar, chemical smell – the tropical convenience store scent of slightly different food prepared for warmer climates. The same smell the Bimbo bread has.

  Diego has his back to me as he puts items in the shopping basket: corn tortillas made fresh, eggs, cereal. He wears his frame effortlessly and pads around barefoot with athletic grace. I alter myself, mincing around, while he makes the space adapt to him. If Diego is barefoot, then the world around him is a gymnasium, a sumptuous green lawn, his ground.

  Curious, I try it, lowering my heels and ignoring my germophobic instinct. The cool floor is comforting when I’m just walking about the place like it’s home. At my own pace. Is this what it’s like to be a man?

  He pauses by the fruit, deciding. I enjoy the view, watching him palm a watermelon before he scans the room to find me by a clearance section near the checkout.

  I’ve found a bin of ugly discount sandals that look too big for me but too small for Diego. They may have to do for now. I grab two pairs.

  Distracted by a basket with bright colors, I start digging with one hand through cheap nail polish in shades of red and pink. The bottles clink together softly, their yellow price tags peeling off at the corners.

  Diego sidles up, a private smile in his voice just for me.

  “Which one do you like, gringa?”

  The word that began with a sneer and then merged into a playful nickname has become a honey-dripping gesture, a bond between us. I like the way his language fits him. I like how it sounds about me.

  I pick the loudest, rowdiest ketchup red and raise an eyebrow. He’s found a way to hunker down while standing up, eliminating unnecessary space between us. Eye to eye we reflect the same spiky-dreamy expression back and forth. Imagine amber maple syrup mellowness veined with lightning.

  The crackle of twenty-some hours of adrenaline, dopamine, and alcohol is starting to fade as the day ripens. It’s turning into a relaxed, pre-sleep haze. I don’t want to pay any attention to my body or anything else in the physical world (well, except the discount polish), but my limbs start to feel stiff and heavy. So ready for a long nap.

  “Why not introduce me to your compañera?”

  The words cut into our reverie like a slasher film, stabbing several times in quick succession. Spoken in a loud voice, as though the man who said them hasn’t been told to quiet down in a long time. The words in English wading through a granite-thick accent. You can almost hear the dream burst.

  We snap our heads to attention, turning away from each other and straightening up to face the tall, stern-as-fuck man addressing us.


  Those 007 eyebrows, the dead-straight line of his lips under a retro mustache. Slanted brown eyes that might be beautiful if they weren’t scraping up and down my body with disapproval.

  Goddamn it, I was right. It’s my airport nemesis, Mustachio Valverde.

  “Eh, Diego?”

  Prickly, facetious.

  I hear Diego draw breath before sighing heavily.

  “Caught” is the word spinning in my mind. It’s not like we were kissing, but we may as well have been, all starry-eyed, sharing intimate space.

  A quick glance up at Diego shows a startling change from the way he looked moments earlier. The openness on his face has been positively shuttered, sleepwalker deadness in its place. He stares at the floor somewhere between himself and his father.

  “Papa…”

  “Preséntanos.”

  Diego looks at me warily, an apology in one eye and an unreachable distance in the other.

  “Lia, meet my father, Joaquin Valverde. Papa, le presento a Emilia Noble.”

  The words take awful long to come out. It might be the sight of Genesis approaching, followed by Cata and a dark, good-looking man who I take to be Mr. Genesis. It feels like my big, light soul is filling up with heavy, gray smoke.

  They wander up to us, first puttering slowly toward Papa, and then stopping just behind him as they notice Diego.

  Genesis’s husband is about her height, with skin shades darker. He wears a fitted, pale blue oxford shirt with the sleeves cuffed, strong forearms hanging loosely, with his hands in his pockets. Gray pinstripe pants show long, athletic legs. He’s got a touch of gray at the temples. I didn’t expect him to be much older than her, but it makes sense. They’ve got the same impeccable style and intimidating beauty.

  The familiar face of his wife is what jars me so much. I can feel my brow furrowing as we exchange a brief look. Her lips are pressed together in a non-expression. I can’t tell whether she’s so angry she needs to control herself, or if she’s upset, or shocked, or what.

  My boss. My friend. My lover’s sister. Can she possibly be all those things without our friendship imploding?

  Two teen girls trail behind, looking confused and then delighted, recognizing Diego. One of them starts to chatter, but Genesis shushes her with a wave of her hand.

  The younger girls have long and glossy black hair and brown, tilted eyes like their father, Joaquin. Asuncion and Conception.

  The girls haven’t seen me yet; don’t see me, because they have no reason to connect their beloved big brother with a stranger. They’re dressed in tea-length sundresses, white cardigans, and ballet flats, clones except that one is taller and has boobs.

  Why are they all so dressed up? I scan my memory for a holiday or funeral, but it’s all blank. They’re in their Sunday best.

  Oh shit.

  “I take it you’re not on your way home from church.” Mr. Valverde smiles humorlessly, gaze cold and irritated.

  In another situation, I might laugh with Genesis about how similar Diego and his father are. My stomach sinks uncomfortably as reality slams into me. This is not a good situation. They’ve just come from church, and we’ve just spent the night on the beach together. This’ll go well.

  Diego and I face his family side by side, but we’re not touching. I feel far away from him, from all of them, and naked in the artificial brightness. My dress is thin and revealing, particularly in the air-conditioned room that’s starting to chill me.

  Mr. Valverde approaches warily like I might be contagious or an unpredictable animal. He humiliates and infuriates me, laser-scanning me and stopping back at my hair, which must be a tangled, windy mess. I look down at myself and see dusty brown knees, my dress wrinkled and dirty.

  The way he looks at me is like there’s something between myself and his grating expression. Like I’ve got his son’s handprints on me, like he can see every intimate touch I felt and hear the sighs I uttered over his flesh and blood.

  Now the Bible sisters have found me, their Siamese cat teeth beginning to show as they process me. “What is she?” they wonder. Won’t they stop staring at me, goddamn it? The entire family is ripping me apart, razor-gazers slicing me with ragged-edged judgment.

  “Mucho gusto,” I offer.

  The words sit there like cold potatoes. Nobody wants them.

  “Otra chica americana inocente, mi hijo. Otra puta.”

  Now he’s done it, that judgmental asshole. “Puta” means slut. I whip my head at Diego, who’s gone almost gray. He’s sad and hard like a man who’s about to do something he’ll regret. Genesis’s husband steps closer, between the two of them, with his arms up ready to hold either one back.

  “Slut” is such an easy word for a man to say because it doesn’t apply to him. Why is my body always getting me into trouble? It’s just me, being human. If I were a man, would anyone ever look at me that way? Shame me for being a fertile, sexual person in a world where I’m told not to walk around alone at night because I might get raped? It’s such a fucking double standard.

  “Why don’t you just lift my dress up if you’re going to imagine you know everything about me?”

  It’s my voice but deeper, the words coming out more quickly than I can think about them. This is the sound of my temper breaking. My feet stand flat on the ground.

  Diego shuts his eyes for a moment too long, like he’s taking one last moment to pretend everything is still soft and easy.

  “Don’t get involved, hay,” Joaquin condescends sharply.

  “I’m very much involved. I’m standing here in front of you, so yes, my perspective is valid. And you can’t just look at a person like that, you know. Not me, anyway. It makes me feel very uncomfortable!”

  Uh-oh. I’ve shouted the last few words and moved toward him. Now that I’m out here, I don’t know what to do. I want to backpedal from this crazy-eyed man who looks like he’s about to cry he’s so pissed off. His forehead veins have gone all 3-D.

  “Mujer sin dios. It’s people like you who pollute my country,” he spits, nostrils flaring. “Spreading your garbage everywhere like it’s your backyard. Opening your legs like a prostitute.”

  He raises his head so he’s actually looking down his nose at me, as if he even has to try.

  “Enough, Papa!” commands Diego. I expect him to step between us, but he doesn’t. He doesn’t look at either contender directly, like he’s biding his time.

  My face starts to burn because other people are noticing, and I’d really, really like to get home and hide under the covers for twelve hours. I want to forget this happened and return to last night.

  Genesis pulls my arm and leads me away, taking the rubber sandals out of my hand and dropping them on the display. I float behind her, trying to catch Diego’s eye, but he won’t look at me.

  “Let’s go,” she orders, zombie voice.

  “But—”

  “You can’t reach him right now. They need to talk this out. It’s an old fight, Lia.”

  It doesn’t make me feel much better. All the love has been wrung out of her voice, and it’s just the practical rind of information being exchanged. We exit the store together.

  “Can you walk from here? It’s close, right?”

  “Uh, yeah, really close.”

  My eyes fill with tears and I can’t speak. I turn away from her fancy figure that is a blur. It stands still watching me and sighs.

  “I have to go. You will be okay?”

  It’s not a question. She’s switched off.

  “Yes. Thanks, Genesis,” I whisper, throat closing.

  She doesn’t answer, and I walk in chaotic thought until I hit my front door, unlock it, and slink up to the bathroom miserably. The rush of the shower blasts over the sobs I can’t help but heave into the air. I would be hurling black thickets of smoke if feelings were reflected in physical form. The bathroom would be smoggy with the soot of my soul.

  I’m mad and hurt. I’m terribly sad. My lips are still raw and bitten from h
is kisses, and we’ve been torn apart. I’ve been slut-shamed by an old fart who needs to take seventeen vacations. He’s a hurt old bastard, that one.

  My big cry feels pretty good, and the shower washes me clean, at least on the outside. I know I’m feeling worse than I should because of not sleeping. But I can’t keep the sickness at bay, the one that keeps me worrying that I’ve said too much, insulted the family beyond repair.

  I couldn’t have done it any other way, though. I’m not doing that again, being someone’s bitch to boss around or a doll to behave appropriately, within the parameters of plastic. Diego’s life is his own, and his dad shouldn’t be nosing in on everything. It’s not for me to figure out.

  I lay in bed in my PJs with the blind closed. Katherine had left me a note to say she’d be back tomorrow. So much to tell her that I consider not saying anything at all, just to avoid going through it all again. Highs so dreamy; lows so bitter.

  Finally, I admit defeat and take a Gravol to knock me out. I can’t stop my mind from racing, and I know I need rest so I can look at things clearly. The gauze of drowsiness flutters around me softly, and at last I feel myself tumbling into a heavy sleep.

  20

  I punch the seven, the last digit in Genesis’s phone number. Nervous as a first date. School starts again tomorrow, officially. I don’t want to show up to work with this drama hanging between us. I know I have to talk to her and make things right.

  Ring. Ring. Ring.

  Relief increases exponentially with each unanswered ring. I can just leave a voicemail, or text her.

  “Si?” goes her voice live through the airwaves. Ugh. Confrontation. Here goes.

  “It’s me. Lia.”

  A beat of silence.

  “Hi, Lia.”

  “Um, cómo estás?”

  “Bien, bien. Better than you’re doing, yes?”

  I laugh, surrendering. “Probably. I feel awful. I didn’t mean to hurt anyone, and it seems I’ve fractured your family.”