Chapter 19
Itoss and turn all night.
You’d think with all the sweet lovemaking I’m stocking up on, I’d fall asleep the moment my head hit the pillow.
No luck.
My dream self is trapped in a room of boxes that creak open and shut. They morph into dark rounded caves that appear and disappear.
The caves are in the sea. Waves smack against pointy rocks at the caves’ openings. I follow a shadowy form that looks like Captain Jack Sparrow with wavy hair and a silver sword.
When he turns around, it’s Keston, but even more handsome (if that’s possible), and with a feverish gleam in his eyes. One green, one grey. He grips a handful of gold coins. I can barely hear his whispers of, “There’s more where this came from. Follow me.”
As I start following him again, he stops and turns around. “Do you know where we’re going?”
I shake my head.
He grips my shoulder. “It’s a secret. Tell no one.”
His face is gone. It’s a smooth, blank nothing. I scream.
I pop up into a sitting position. The real-life Keston pulls me back down and cradles me against his chest. I poke him to make sure he’s not part of my dream.
“Ouch, woman.”
Okay, he’s real.
I close my eyes and try to sleep.
By morning I’m exhausted from the dreams.
“What was wrong last night, baby?” Keston asks as he pulls down his Cocoa Reef Resort polo shirt over his washboard abs.
“I was having the same dream. Over and over. You were in it. But it wasn’t you.” I don’t want to tell him it was him but as a cuter swashbuckling pirate.
How old am I again?
I pull on one of his t-shirts and follow him out to the sun-drenched porch. White mist rises off the dewy grass in the distance.
You know who is munching on the grass.
“She’s back.” I point at the grey and white donkey.
“I think she has a thing for you.” Keston smothers a laugh. “She didn’t start showing up until you arrived.”
“Hmm,” I grunt. “Why does she steal my clothes and not yours?”
“Yours are nicer.”
I scrub sleep from my eyes and kiss him goodbye.
“Be safe,” I say, as he cranks up his rusty motorcycle.
“Be fierce,” he shouts over the noise.
“Fierce?”
“That’s what you were mumbling in your sleep. “Be fierce.”
“Really? I don’t remember that. Did I say anything else?”
He plunks down his helmet. “No. Wait. You were mumbling, ‘Where is it?’ over and over.”
“Where is what?”
He snorts. “That’s what I wondered. Good thing you didn’t say, ‘Where is he?’ I’d have woken you right up. Find out who ‘he’ is.”
I roll my eyes. “Jealous of my dream man?”
“If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck . . . .”
“It’s a dream duck!” I shout.
He revs the engine. “That’s how they start. The sneaky bastards.”
He grins and throws me a kiss. “Call me if you want to head out.”
“Why?”
“I’ll send a car to pick you up.”
“Maybe I’ll ride your bike.” I point to the rusted bicycle with wide tires and a black wire basket on the front. Like the motorcycle, the bike’s seen better days.
“Ha! You’re better off riding the donkey through the trails than that thing.”
I roll my eyes. I can’t with this man and his cheerfulness so early in the morning.
The donkey brays loudly as if agreeing it’s better than an old bicycle.
“Fine. I’ll keep that in mind.”
An hour later, it’s barely eight-thirty, and I’m sheltering under the wide porch umbrella, washed, dressed, and sipping lemongrass iced tea made with freshly squeezed limes from Keston’s trees. The lime gives the tea a boost of Vitamin C and a kick of acid.
The sun is doing its tropical dance across the morning sky. Brightening up the day like a kid with a popsicle. I don’t think I will ever get used to how fast night and day arrive here.
One minute, the sun is setting in a glory of orangey colors; the next minute, it has bailed, and the entire sky is in total darkness.
Caribbean daybreak is the same. It behaves like your one friend who doesn’t have any chill. “Wake up already, I’m fucking HERE!”
But this sunshine and limey iced tea provide the energy I need to begin my attack on the boxes.
It’s not as if I have a job.
Not worrying about money or where it’ll come from may work for Keston. He’s following his passion for being a mixologist, creating new drink recipes, and bringing joy to stressed-out vacationers.
But not everyone is born knowing what their passion is.
Like me.
I don’t have any natural talents. For forty years, I’ve gone to school and followed the professional path my mother encouraged: doctor, lawyer, or engineer. I chose a lawyer.
With a father who is a painter, and a mom who is an English professor, we never had much money growing up. It was “finances,” or lack of them, that drove a wedge between my parents.
So, although Keston urges me not to worry about making money, it’s hard to ignore. Mom insisted I choose a profession that paid well so I would not have to struggle in life. Now Keston is asking me to undo a lifetime of beliefs.
My deepest belief is that if I don’t hustle, I’ll die.
But, would I die?
Not according to Keston who says he will take care of me.
A loud braying interrupts my thoughts.
“I didn’t ask you,” I holler in the direction of the donkey. “And leave my clothes alone.”
Silence.
“Please.”
I tidy up the kitchen, check emails, and heart my girlfriends’ latest Insta posts. Then I meander down the hallway toward the den. A sense of peace fills my soul at the lack of deadlines and expectations from anyone.
I never asked myself what I wanted to do. Maybe it’s too late for that.
Maybe when you reach forty years old, you stick with what you invested all your time and education into. Make the best of the life you created.
“Hee-haw.”
A racket outside diverts my attention from the philosophical question of what to do with my short, precious life on earth.
“What is it?” I sigh, heading out the front door into the scorching sunshine.
The annoying donkey is trotting across the dirt road straight toward Keston’s porch.
“Shoo!” I yell, waving my hands about like I’m a human scarecrow.
If I were in my office in midtown Manhattan, I would not be yelling at any donkeys right now. Something to consider.
The donkey stares at me with its big, slanted eyes. I must admit it’s kind of cute. A hint of mischief shines through its tilted eyelashes like it’s daring me to do something.
I shake my phone at her.
It shakes its head back, sending a ripple through the black mohawk growing between its ears.
I hate to call Keston at work. I need to handle this situation.
Hmmmm. Where does this animal live anyway? Is it unhoused? Should I put up flyers to locate its owners? And if it has owners, why haven’t they built a fence to keep it in?
“Where’s your mommy and daddy?” I ask it.
The donkey stares me down like we’re playing poker and it’s trying to guess my next move.
“It’s no secret,” I assure the donkey from the porch, keeping a safe distance from its front and back hooves. “I want to get you to the right person. So, you’ll be happy, and I’ll be . . . happier you’re not eating my clothing.”
I get nothing back. Just a long soulful gaze taking me in.
“Why are you watching me like that? What do you think this would be like? You and me cuddling up and watching Netflix together?”
The donkey kicks up its heels, spins around, and heads toward the clothesline.
“Don’t you dare!” I raise a fist.
My threat is as meaningless as the donkey’s remorse.
In seconds, it clamps ginormous teeth around the hem of my jeans, dragging it from the line.
Oh, hell no.
I grab the first thing my hand finds. Keston’s t-shirt, left here since yesterday’s lovemaking.
“Shoo! Go away!”
I run down the steps but stop at the edge of the yard.
We have a standoff.
The donkey hee-haws at me. I wave the t-shirt like a matador with a raging bull.
The donkey grins maniacally, its teeth lined up like a white picket fence.
It seems to be saying, “I was here before you, missy.”
“Go! Get!” I shake the T-shirt in front of its face.
The donkey drops my jeans and I grab them off the sand.
“Go home,” I shout hopefully at the grey and white animal. It trots down the dirt road, its backside swaying, its white-tipped tail flicking the air, like it’s saying, “Get a life, woman.”
“You and me both,” I mutter.
I hurry into the house, clutching my jeans to my chest. I’m sure I feel donkey saliva on my denim.
Ewww!
If nothing else, that face-off has my blood pumping. To say I’m scared to get bitten by the donkey is an understatement.
Although Keston promised it wouldn’t hurt me. His exact words were, “Jesus rode a wild donkey into Jerusalem in the New Testament. I think this one is fine.”
“Have you seen those teeth?” I’d countered.