Summer of '69 // Chapter 3

With Oro’s old Schwinn in the back of the Mazda, Ari drove the young man home along the rutted rainforest road. Oro politely resisted the ride, but Rebecca wouldn’t hear of it. “You’re not riding your bike, Oro. There are jaguars!” The same rigmarole every time Oro left their place after dark. It was just a ten-minute drive back to Oro’s small family compound, his family fast asleep preparing for another day of labor. Oro shut the Mazda’s door with barely a sound, withdrew his Schwinn from the bed and trundled it up his drive with the seat lifted so the rear wheel wouldn’t click the gears. Rebecca had wrapped the Coke bottles she’d given him in some dish towels so they wouldn’t break, and they nestled silently in the bike’s front basket.

It was almost midnight when Ari returned to home base. Rebecca was asleep in bed already. Their bed was a plywood and mahogany-post frame with a double mattress pushed against the window, cocooned by two layers of mosquito netting. It was their safe reprieve from the insects that had stung his pecker today.

He disrobed, getting completely naked, slipping under the light bug screen, both layers, and getting on hands and knees to claim his spot between Rebecca and the window. Rebecca didn’t like the window spot—there are jaguars!

Just as he settled, he found Rebecca was still awake. Her back was to him but she heel-nudged his calf saying, “Oro get home okay?”

“Slipped into his house like a former virgin after the high school dance.”

Rebecca giggled. She rolled onto her back and lay shoulder to shoulder with Ari, looking up at the gathered mosquito screen flooded with light from the moon coming through the window. She said, “That fish was so good.”

“I know,” he said, “and I’d been looking forward to regular old stew.”

“You didn’t like my stew?”

He turned his head sideways on the pillow. “Open the can all by yourself?”

“I’m a regular Julia Child,” she said.

“A real artist with a can opener.”

She said, “I’ll make you your favorite when we go back home in the spring.”

“Thank you, baby,” he said, kissing her forehead. Rebecca made an amazing marble babka.

She turned her side and put an arm over his chest then changed her mind, recoiling her arm. “God, it’s so hot.”

“Some like it hot,” he said.

Rebecca did a saucy Marilyn Monroe pose for him. They both laughed.

He said, “You can’t sleep, baby?”

“I’m okay,” she said, rolling to her side again and turning her big brown eyes up to meet his. The moonlight bathed her perfect face in alabaster, making her look like one of those hoity-toity Mayflower country club girls. In the daylight, she was dark tanned and dark eyed. It made her blonde hair like burned gold.

He brushed hair back from her face, and she kissed the heel of his thumb. Sensing her woolgathering, he said, “What are you thinking?”

She was quick to answer. “What’s Oro going to do if we don’t get the grant renewed?”

He shrugged, not knowing what to say. “He’s Garifuna. Strong, smart, and capable. He’ll be fine.”

“But what happens to the country? What happens to his family?”

“I don’t know, babe,” he said. “Oro’s smart and resourceful.”

“He is,” she said then sighed.

“You don’t think he is?”

Indignant, she said. “No. Of course I think he is. He definitely is. I just… I don’t know…”

“Out with it.”

“This country is going to wither, Ari.”

“It might, Rebecca, it might.”

“It will, Ari. You know what it’s like.”

“You want to smuggle Oro back to New York?”

He’d meant it as a joke, but he could see from Rebecca’s expression she didn’t think it was a terrible idea. He said, “Rebecca… What about his family? His mom and his auntie and his siblings? We’re going to slip them all into our luggage?”

“I just worry.”

“Oro will be fine. His family will definitely be fine. They’ve got community here. They’re not hurting anyone. They’re such good people.”

“There’s more to Oro.”

“There is,” he agreed.

She turned her face up to his again. “You see it too?”

“He’s a good young man.”

“There is more. He’s… he’s full of adventure. Spirit.”

“I know,” he said. “And he’s a good dancer.”

Rebecca scoffed and rolled her eyes and batted his chest with the back of her hand.

“What?” he said. “He is. He’s better than you.”

“You should only be watching me, buster,” she said, wagging a thumb at herself.

“Believe me, my eyes were glued. I could watch you all night.”

“You practically did.”

“We’re going to wear that old record player out.”

“We should get a new one when we go back. Or maybe when you go to San Ignacio.”

“I’ll look for one. Maybe something hi-fi. Lots of speakers. We’ll need more diesel.”

That reminded her: “Oh shoot, Ari—I really need a bath tomorrow.”

“You’re telling me.”

“Hey,” she said, offended, getting up on an elbow and tossing her golden hair over a shoulder. “That’s not nice.”

“I didn’t mean you, sweetie pie. I mean: tell me about it. I stink. We’re going to bathe it up real nice tomorrow, you and me. A good old-fashioned soak.” He slipped an arm around her waist, and this time she didn’t recoil from the heat of his body.

Her smile softened, and she said, “How is our gas situation?”

They needed diesel to run the generator. He kissed her shoulder, his lips slipping along her hot, smooth skin. “Wow, how hot did you want this bath?”

Rebecca elbowed him, and he snuffled under her hair and bit her earlobe. “Plenty of gas for a hot bath. I won’t have to go to town for at least two weeks.”

Rebecca put her palm over the back of his hand and sunk her long, skinny fingers between his, guiding his hand to rest on her hot tummy. “So tell me more about my dancing.”

He whispered, “I could watch you dance every night, all night.”

“I’m a good dancer,” she said with conceit, and he bit her collar. She burst out laughing and his hand left hers and swept up to grab one of her breasts. Her nipple was a hard nub scoring his palm. He said, “Your booby came out.”

“I know.” She recoiled, covering her forehead with a palm and wincing. “I know, I know. You think he saw?”

“He saw, baby.”

“He turned away.”

“He’s a good kid. Catholic boy.”

“He probably feels guilty,” she purred.

“Not as guilty as I feel,” he said in a Groucho Marx impersonation, bouncing his eyebrows.

“Do tell.”

“You got my motor revving,” he said, then growled and nibbled his way up her neck while she squawked and batted at him with her hands. They both laughed, then lay side-by-side again. “Got me hard as a rock,” he sighed.

Rebecca’s hand drifted down and bumped the tip of his erect penis. “Wow, Ari, you’re not even kidding.”

“Don’t,” he said, laughing, protecting it from her. “Yes, I have one now, but I meant earlier.”

“Watching me dance?”

“Watching you dance burlesque with one of those beauties out swinging around, not even a little tassle over the nipple.”

Rebecca frowned. “I thought you said you never went to one of those shows.”

“I didn’t,” he said. “But I’ve seen pictures.”

“Gross,” she said. “Stag films probably. You and that cousin.”

He laughed but couldn’t deny it. “You’re the only thing in this world that does it for me, Rebecca.”

“That’s nice to hear,” she said, warming up to him again and sidling closer, their hips touching.

He said, “Now, about this current hard on...”

“I’m listening.”

He said, “What are we going to do with it?”

“What do you do with one of those things?” she said, all innocent teenage virgin.

“I heard if you get on top of a girl,” he said, rolling over so he was on top of her, Rebecca underneath him with her legs open. But she stopped him suddenly, elbows on the mattress, hands bracing his hips from trying to put it inside her.

He said, “What are you doing?”

She showed him an unsure, quizzical expression. “You think it’s a good idea?”

“Oh right,” he said. “No. Dammit. Why would you do this to me?”

“I didn’t do anything, Ari,” she said, laughing, pushing him back. He flopped on the bed and drew his knees up, flexing them on his erection. “You did that,” she said, pointing at his erection. “I just found it that way.”

“It was all your dancing,” he said. “And you’re naked.”

“I always sleep naked.”

“You’re ruthless to me.”

She said, “We shouldn’t, right?”

“It’s probably fine.”

“Probably,” she said.

His bigger head prevailed. “No. We shouldn’t.”

He didn’t want to go into the details, turn her off from his dick forever, but who knows if it was really mosquitoes who nibbled his dick. What if it was some sort of spider? There could be toxins or venom mixed in with the pus. And therefore he wouldn’t even bring it up: You couldn’t talk about pus on your pecker and expect to get laid.

“No,” he said. “Plus, it’ll just be...”

“Itchy?”

“Fiery,” he said, correcting her.

“You want to do something else?”

“Like what?”

“Pick a number.”

“Oh, is this that Kama Sutra thing again?”

“If it involves penis inside vagina we’ll pick a different number.”

“I got a better idea,” he said, this time putting his arm around her and kissing her collar and neck. She melted to him, instantly sighing. “That’s it,” he said.

His hand slipped down her perfectly smooth skin, over her haunch, Rebecca sensing where he was going, easing one knee back behind the other, and opening her thighs. His fingers slipped through her damp thatch and found it hot and matted already.

“Wow,” she purred, and he put two fingers inside her. She gasped softly near his ear. “Okay,” she whispered, “it’s like high school.”

“I got you in the back of my dad’s Bel Air.”

“Your dad had a Studebaker.”

“You didn’t know even know me then. I could tell you it was anything.”

“I’ve seen the pictures.”

“It’s a hot-rod Studebaker,” he whispered, getting back into character.

“And you’re the captain of the football team,” she sighed.

He laughed and bit her neck again, plunging his fingers in and out, now using three. “Holy cow, Rebecca,” he said, “you are absolutely a puddle.”

“It’s the heat,” she moaned.

Ari gritted his teeth, smiling, biting back the words he wanted to say but feared she might not like: it was dancing with Oro. It was dancing with that good-looking guy with the muscular body and the spine made of rubber, cutoff jeans and his long legs and muscles in his stomach. And he was okay with that. But if he said it, it might lead them down a different path. And he liked the one they were on. He said, “I thought of doing this when I was watching you dance.”

“You didn’t want to fuck me?”

“I wanted to fuck you so bad, Rebecca. I’m fucking you right now. Three fingers, baby.”

She gasped, ran her nails down his back, giving him a crazy dose of the shivers. He finger-fucked her quicker, the sounds of her wetness loud underneath the bug tents, a flat reflection of her gasps bouncing off the single-pane window beside the bed. Her hand gripped his erection underhanded, and he drew in a brief hiss through his teeth. She didn’t heed it. She kept stroking, thumb on the top side, and he had to tuck his hips back to hide his length from her to prevent his dick from actually catching on fire.

While he continued to finger her, she brought her hand to her mouth and licked her palm, then put her hand back, and he was hesitant but offered her his erection again. She closed her slick little grip around his cock. When she pumped it twice, he winced and hissed again.

She said, “Does it hurt?”

He opened his eyes and met her big browns, the pupils wide and open to bring in as much light as she could.

“It’s like fire, but it feels good.”

“It’s just gonna make it worse,” she said, running her hand down to his balls and playing with them. “Oh my poor Ari,” she said, full of compassion. “Lay back.”

He rolled over to his back, stretched out his body, putting a forearm across his eyes. She kissed his chest and his lean stomach. He could feel her moving his dick around, examining it, looking for the bug bites. Then the warmth of her mouth slipped onto him.

He let out a quavering moan, drew his knees up briefly then stretched his body out flat again. She was careful with him, so tender and loving, avoiding the mosquito bites but using her tongue and her mouth to please the unbitten parts of his eager erection. “God, that feels good,” he said.

“I want you to come,” she whispered, then returned her mouth to his cock.

He looked down at her golden head bobbing in his lap, delivering huge pleasure to him. The best lover he’d ever had. The most tender and caring and thoughtful. “You’re so good to it,” he said.

She kissed his cock, thumbed over his balls saying “I love it,” then returning her mouth. Bobbing, tonguing.

Soon his stomach had tightened like a cable, and he drew in a long breath. Rebecca let her mouth slip from it, used a finger and thumb to jerk him off, sliding her touch between two bug bites without igniting the heated itch they wanted to scream.

“I’m coming, I’m coming, I’m coming,” he chanted, knees rising again.

“Come, Ari,” she whispered, “come on your belly,” and he did, groaning and twisting and shooting semen onto his belly and up to his chest.

He collapsed when it was done, flopped like a big lead weight laying on their thin mattress, looking up at the bug tent. Rebecca tongued his stomach and his chest, gathering up what he’d ejected, consuming what she sometimes whispered to him was her jungle protein. He took her head in both hands, caressing her with pure love as she cleaned him up.

When she was done, she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and collapsed next to him. He rolled to her side, but when he put his hand down between her legs she said not to.

“I want to, baby.”

Rebecca laughed, taking his wrist in both hands and guiding away his hand. She said to him, “I like being horny.”