CHAPTER 6
It was REALLY secret -- but in plain sight. Last said, “Catch!” and jumped into my arms. I was not much over 5-feet tall. Still, this little guy could JUMP. I caught him in my arms and he wrapped his arms around my neck, saying, “Go into the pantry.” I did as he asked while he explained, “This portal was made to accommodate two at once -- two of OUR kind. It may be a little tight for the two of us, but I don’t think so. As soon as you get through the pantry door, turn around 180-degrees, grab the hook that’s attached to the inside facing of the door and pull down. Be ready, ‘cause…”
I pulled the hook (which looked like your typical hat-rack hook) before he finished the sentence and the floor fell out from under us. His finished sentence would have sounded like a passing train from above, “ we’re gonna FAAAaaaaalll !!”
We fell about 20 or 30 feet, I guess, before the tube we were in curved. It was like being on some wonderful slide on a children’s playground that went straight down before sloping -- gently at first, then more severely as we slowed, and finally we came to a dead stop lying horizontally at the bottom of that free fall, Last lying on top of me. “Get up, get UP,” I commanded as my claustrophobia or acrophobia or some kind of phobia kicked in. “I can’t BREATHE, Last. You people are going to have to slow down with the surprises, already.”
Last was laughing uncontrollably, but was able to fit in a few words: “And YOU are going to have to stop acting so precipitously, Wil -- not for my sake. Your doing things when I’m in the middle of a sentence makes me laugh. I KNEW what was going to happen.” He laughed a little more before the funny wore off. It never WAS funny to me -- nearly scared a year’s growth off of me.
I looked around to get my bearings. We were in a cave. I never HAVE been able to figure out where the missile bay is relative to the hangar below, if it IS below. The thing about being with Ocean Society members, I would soon discover, was that you often only knew what was going on at the moment. They did not live in the future, and while they enjoyed telling stories of the past, neither did they live in the past. While you’re with an aqua man or woman, you’d better be prepared to live in the ‘now.’ They certainly enjoy everything that happens as it unfolds, and they frequently seem SURPRISED at events I would have seen coming a mile away. Last tells me that’s just a function of the difference between me and most everybody else -- not between land humans and ocean society.
The cave we were in was a smooth-sided tunnel -- dark, but with light at the far end. Again, distance was deceptive. I could not venture a guess as to how far we walked before we came into the light. When we got there, there was the nose of the missile sticking out of a doughnut hole in the rock floor. There was a circular set of stairs hugging the side of the missile cone, which Last bounded up. Oh! I saw what he was doing now. The hook at the front of the missile was connected by a rope to a pulley. Last disconnected it, swung the pulley arm out of the way of the missile, and then covered the top of the missile with its hinged pointed nose.
I had not noticed when we flew into the hangar earlier, but the plane/missile -- facet-aire is what Last called it -- had a point on the front. That point had a hinge which, when opened, exposed the hook needed to pull it into place. Last was now closing that egg-shaped front point of the facet-aire back over the hook and latching it in place. He came back down the stairs, kicked the wheel latches into the ‘off’ position (like wheels on scaffolding), and rolled the stairs out of the way. “Don’t you just love low-tech?” Last chuckled.
“You and I are going to have to re-design this missile dock, Wil. That’s a project for later, but the earth is moving swiftly toward the use of radar and satellites that will discover us if we don’t make changes. I think we’ll have to start launching horizontally instead of vertically. That will make it easier on the occupants, as well as more difficult for sensors to detect. You’re going to experience ‘launch’ pain in just a minute. My guess is that you’ll want to change the missile dock tomorrow. ”
Last walked to the missile, opened the door, and pulled out the steps. Hmmm! They were still in the same position as when we disembarked from the plane. Last gave a little tug to the steps and I could see the struts which held the steps to the plane come out of a retainer and into a slip-joint. You know how, when you’re installing a light fixture or a ceiling fan, you screw the bolts into the electrical box in
the ceiling and then you fit the big holes in the base of your light fixture over those bolts? Those big holes are connected to slide holes, and you can turn the light fixture with your hand so that the bolt slides into the narrower channel of the slide, and the fixture is somewhat secure. The heads of the bolts will not go through the slides as they would go through the beginning holes. Then you tighten the bolts, assuming you made the electrical connection before you put the fixture base over the bolts, and you’re done. This was like that. Those steps, once their base was in the slip joint, swung into place for boarding a MISSILE rather than a plane, and we climbed into the facet-aire.
Apparently gravity had swung our seats from plane-ready to missile-ready. We basically lay down into the seats. I have no idea how many passengers the facet-aire would accommodate, nor how other passengers would be able to get into the seats behind us -- but there WERE seats behind us. That would be a mystery for later. Last hit a button, and I could feel the hum of our vehicle. “Air bags have to charge,” said Last. “Could use anti-grav, of course, but we try not to stress the earth anymore than we have to.”
I had no idea what he was talking about. Many times I have had to let questions hang in the air unanswered. I felt like that kid in Utumalacuopa asking his parents why the grass was green.
While I was thinking, Last hit other buttons. The steps retracted, the door closed, and seat belts hugged us tightly.
“Ready?” Last asked. “Of course you’re not ready, but we’re about to launch,” he chortled.
I did not have time to answer, and could not have caught my breath in any event. The thrusters, or whatever powered this steed, had fired and we shot out the top of the house, going from zero to a kajillion in two seconds. I had no time to notice whether the lid to this silo had retracted or we just knocked the thing out of the way. Without thinking, I exhaled, which turned out to have been a mistake. I had lost the last breath I would be able to take for awhile. I’m not sure, but I think I passed out.
“Wil. Wil. Wil…” I heard Last’s voice as if in a dream. “You might want to breathe now, Wil.” My lungs must have seized up in the empty position and forgot how to breathe. I took a huge breath of air, almost like breaking the surface of water when you’ve been underwater and need that breath badly. I gasped for a minute or two, opened my eyes (I don’t know WHEN I closed them), turned and looked at an amused Last, and said, “That was FUN!” I was trembling slightly.
“You lie, boy,” Last said, laughing unabashedly. “The first time is NEVER fun. Did you pass out, or is that your normal color when you fly?” Was he laughing AT me, or attempting to laugh WITH me? I’d fix that. I began to laugh. -- “WITH me,” I thought.
I had had my first flight in a plane just a few hours earlier. Believe me when I tell you that your first flight in a missile bears no similarity. In a plane, you enjoy the trip -- all the lovely clouds and the earth stepping slowly out from underneath you. In a missile, your blood forgets how to flow and you lose the ability to breathe. Once you reach the top of your trajectory, you level out for a brief time (unless it’s a trans-global trip) far above the clouds, and then you target your destination like a bullet. You are going so fast that you think you will splat against the ground, but then the whole body of the missile gives a violent shake and you look out the window. The wings have been pushed out the sides of the missile by springs that must be strong enough to pulverize diamonds, and you are flying in a plane -- still too fast for safety, but slowing. You notice a postage-stamp-sized piece of land surrounded by water, and you think, “We ain’t gonna try to land on THAT, are we?” I forgot that this was a facet-aire. The helicopter props and rotor sprang out and set us gently down, midst 30 or 40 small green people on perhaps a 10-acre island.
Gosh, I wished I could be amphibious right now. These people were having more fun than my BEST day. Surely some of these were children. They ACTED like children. “The water must be deep at the coastline of this island,” I thought. There were people diving into the ocean and others sailing out of the ocean -- briefly airborne before landing on their feet on the ground. They were in a frenzy of excitement. The helicopter exit steps had automatically swung back into the proper position, and Last and I de-boarded to ecstatic cries of “Last!” and “Wil!” I felt like a celebrity. Never in my life had I felt so special and loved -- and by people I had never met. I was in a fairy tale, and I was Cinderella.
“Where are we?” I asked, grinning from ear to ear.
“Oh, this is an uncharted island in the Caribbean -- uncharted by YOUR people, that is. To MY family, this is a holiday home. I’ll take you to that high outcrop of boulders you see just north of here after you meet my family. I carved a home suitable for land people inside those boulders, a lot like Telasta’s house at Ubatuba except the entrance would be nearly impossible to find if you didn’t know where it was.”
The rotor and blades of the helicopter had already come to a dead stop by the time Last and I put feet to the exit steps. As he talked we were swarmed by a mob of short green people.
“Wil Dupepe, these are my family. I will name them all, but you probably won’t remember all their names.” People were all over us. One naked lady was hugging my leg. Two boys stood right next to me -- one sitting on the shoulders of the other and the one on top was attempting to put the side of his face against the side of mine. There was even a tiny person who walked up and sat on my foot, whereupon she promptly wrapped her little arms around my leg and bit! HARD! “Ouch!” I screamed, jerking my leg back and causing the two boys to topple to the ground.
The little girl was still on my foot, but had been startled enough that she stopped biting. The naked lady who had been hugging my leg reached down and scooped up the infant, admonishing her, “Traudie! You mustn’t taste PEOPLE!” She laughed and continued, “I’m sorry, Wil. She’s still a tadpole, but we are proud of her just the same. This is the first grandchild for Last and me. Her name is Traudie. Traudie, this is your land cousin Wil. Can you say ‘Wil’?”
All I heard was a tiny vibration from the child, and Teelee -- this MUST be Teelee, since she spoke of Last’s and her grandchild and looked just like she did on the tapestry -- laughed and said, “Not with your backpack organ, Traudie. Use your tongue.” Traudie’s little hummingbird voice came out with “Weee. Weeeya!” We all laughed at that and so did Traudie. Teelee set the child in the arms of one of the boys and then hugged me again. “I’m Teelee, Wil. I did not think they would EVER get around to bringing you to me. Telasta and Joaquin have been telling ‘Wil’ stories for MONTHS now.”
“I thought you must be Teelee. You look just like you do on Telasta’s tapestry. Everything has happened so fast. I only learned about you a day or two ago, but it seems like I’ve known you forever. I’ve been wanting to meet you since the first time I heard your name. Have you talked to Telasta by relay since Papa’s rescue?”
“No! So the rescue succeeded? Are they going to have to move to the Tairua, New Zealand
“They will be able to stay in Ubatuba, thanks to Last. He gave Telasta one of those guns that shoots people with tiny hairs of chemical that make them forget, so nobody even remembers meeting Telasta. She even gave all the men involved a post-hypnotic suggestion.” I paused and gave a wink to Last. “Let’s save that story for Telasta to tell, shall we?”
“Ohhhh, he’s GOOD, Last. He’s goooood. We may not have given birth to this one, but he’s definitely family.” Then to me, she said, “The last time I talked to Telasta, she was on her way home from telling you the story of the tapestry. I intercepted her relay to Last, so I’ve been waiting to hear whether everything turned out okay. I could kick Last’s shroud for not telling me they were safe. Anyhow, she told me what you want to call me, and I cannot WAIT to hear you say the word. Say it now. Say it now.”
“Nice to meet you, GRANDMA,” I said it slowly and deliberately to her delighted squeals and hand-clapping.
“And now I have TWO grandchildren. I have my natural grandDAUGHTER and my adopted grandSON.” She turned to Last, wrapped her arms around his neck, gave him a big sensuous kiss on the mouth, pulled back and looked him lovingly in the eyes. “Welcome home, love of my life. I missed you.”
“Teelee,” Last drawled, “I have not been gone even six months. You cannot have missed me THAT much.”
“Oh, but I have, loverboy! A girl has needs, you know. Yes, yes, yes, I know you have been busy -- especially with your recent escapade to save our Joaquin and all; but you had better take care of your Teelee, lest I find somebody more interesting to play with.”
“Teelee… My impetuous Teelee,” Last was tittering now, clearly engaged in this game of flirtation. “You KNOW there IS nobody more interesting than I.” He turned to me, gave a broad wink that was loaded with meaning, stripped off his human clothing and tossed it on the clean grass, took Teelee by the hand and started running with her toward the ocean. He called back over his shoulder to me, “I will introduce you to everybody when we get back,” and the two of them dove into the ocean.
“Well that sucks,” I thought. They left me with a biting child and a bunch of naked little green people I don’t even know. Clearly all these small people were eager to get to know me. I asked, to no one in particular, “Does anybody want some maquitri cookies?” Most of them gave little shy replies of “No,” and “No, thank you,” but the boys who had been trying to touch my face said, “Yeah! Yeah! We LOVE maquitri cookies.” So I went back to the helicopter and got out the bag of maquitri cookies which I handed over to one of the lads.
“Oooooh, these are good!” they each said in turn. After they had eaten waaay too many of them, one of the boys asked, “Why are you wearing clothes? Are you cold?”
“No,” I said, “I’m not cold. It’s just that land people ALWAYS wear clothes.”
“Even when you’re naked?” one of them asked.
“Well CERTAINLY not when I’m naked. If I’m naked I don’t have ON any clothes.”
“Do you want US to put on clothing, then? Why would you want to be different from all of us when you’re in our home?”
“You know something? You’re right! I don’t need these clothes. I’ll just take them off,” and I did. It felt mighty funny and strange to be in a crowd of people with no clothes on, but since they had on no clothes, either, I was sure I’d become accustomed to my own nakedness. I soon wondered whether THEY would get used to my nakedness.
The female amphibians were just like their land counterparts, except their scales appeared when they were wet and they had no genital hair. The males, also hairless in those areas, did not appear to have any genitalia whatever. They had a sheath attached to their lower abdomen. It looked to be a muscular membrane. If they HAD genitals, they were covered by this sheath.
The Ocean Society people were openly curious about this difference. They were not shy at all about touching me. I guess they had no concept of the word “private.” I was uncircumcised, and when these new friends made that discovery by pulling my foreskin back, they all nodded appreciatively. One of them said, “Oh, I see. He has only one shroud, while we have two,” and he showed me his by pulling up the outer shroud to expose genitalia identical to my own. Only the outer shroud had scales. The inner shroud had none.
The other notable difference was that the males could pull up their outer shroud (and maybe the inner one, also -- I don’t know) without using their hands. Watching them de-shroud was like watching motorized window shades. Once this mystery was solved, my curiosity evaporated. When I became comfortable in my own skin, I stopped noticing theirs.
“Now that we are all naked together, I suppose it is time for me to start learning some names. I’ve met cousin Traudie and I know Teelee and Last. Who are Traudie’s parents?”
“I’m her father,” said one of the boys who had eaten the maquitri cookies. He looked about 12 years old. I had been treating him as if I were older than he. “My name is Toby, and this,” he grabbed one of the smiling young women by the hand, “is Traudie’s mother -- my love Corinth
It was a jolt to my system to know that Toby, then, had to be Telasta’s brother. “Telasta is your SISTER?” I asked.
“Yeah, that’s right,” he said.
“So how old are you, Toby?”
“Oh, my. I hate having to figure that up. I always have to count. Last says I’m the laziest child he has ever seen when it comes to math. I’m just no good at it. Would it help if I told you that Napoleon Bonaparte christened me? Mother gave birth to me in the waters off the island of St. Helena Ajaccio , Corsica . He died the 5th of May, 1821, on the isle of St. Helena ; but he was EXILED to that island by the Duke of Wellington in 1815. I was born a year before he died. That means I was born in 1820. That makes me … what? About a hundred and forty? Ridiculously young, I know, but Teelee seems happy that she was able to have a second child. I’m just glad to be here.” Toby laughed as he made that final pronouncement.
“Okay, now I’m confused,” I volunteered. “Telasta told me that the Ocean Society was engineered in such a way that you could not have children until you were 350 years old. How is it that you have your first child at 140?”
“Gads! You’re good. And you’re right, except that rule only applies to the females.”
“Whoa here, hoss! Are you trying to tell me that Celeste is over 350-years-old?”
“Corinth Corinth Corinth
mean, she saved the best for SECOND. Of course she always saves the best for Last.”
Maybe I’m a little dense; but once she explained the joke, it was funny to me, also. “We O/S females are nearly always surprised by pregnancy. Sometimes we don’t even know we are carrying a child till ‘bloop!’ -- out it comes. H. Bolden made us so that sex is more fun for us than for land people -- so we have sex far more often than your kind. Bolden was paranoid about overpopulation. We have not yet discovered what causes an egg to ripen, but it is a rare occasion when it happens. Toby and I are the envy of the family because of Traudie.”
“Now I’m confused again,” I said. “There must be 30 people here.”
“Twenty-eight, including Last and you,” Corinth
“Okay, 28. Last said this was his family. If Toby and Telasta are Teelee’s only children, then who are these other people and how are they all one family?”
“Not confusing at all,” Corinth Corinth
“Each of these has a mate, so they, too, are family now. Chamagne is with that beautiful bronze god Wendel,” she pointed and he smiled and waved. His scales glistened golden bronze in the sunlight. “Ort, odd duck that she is, wanted a man smart as she was so she mated with Eld -- that reddish short man with the big butt -- the one who just shoved Wendel into the water. Eld and Ort are different from the rest of us. They work too much and think too much, but if you ever need a friend, you can’t go wrong with them. They can keep secrets from the rest of us, which is amazing to me. I can’t keep a secret worth drip!”
“Hamdi, Porti, and Qandi (we call him ‘Candy’) mated with identical triplet sisters: Momi, Memo, and Meme. Don’t ask me who is with whom. See them standing over there by that tree with the red and orange fruit on it? I cannot tell those three apart. I’m not really sure that Teelee or even her brothers can tell them apart. Teelee SAYS she can, and maybe she can, but I can’t. Their scales are the same, they are the same height, even their feet are identical.
Teelee was a bit perturbed by her brothers choosing identical triplets, as it made the gene pool much shallower than she thought wise; but it has turned out okay. Each of the original 6 siblings have had one child -- except Teelee, who now has two. You will probably have all these names straight by nightfall, with my help.”
I wasn’t at all sure of that. So far, she had only accounted for sixteen of the 28 people here. I was working hard to remember that Teelee and Last had 2 children; only one of whom was here -- Toby. Toby’s mate (I wondered why they never said ’wife’ or ’husband’) was Corinth
“The girl in the pear tree,” Corinth Arctic Ocean area. They have no children yet. Ort and Eld have one daughter named Ortel. I don’t see her anywhere, but she is mated to a guy we all love -- Fankin. You will know Fankin when you see him, by a large purple mark on his left thigh. It is a permanent birthmark, but you will forget all about his blemish once you spend a little time with him. We all felt kind of sorry for him when Ortel first brought him home, but he fit into that family like it was MADE for him. Fankin is every bit as much a chemical engineer as Eld or Last. Well, maybe not as smart as Last, but close. We are all in hopes that Ortel and Fankin will have children soon. Hamdi and Momi have one son, Hammo, who found a beautiful thin mate off the coast of Zanzibar
Hammo and Zulli do not seem to have any interest in having children. Then again, Porti and Memo’s son Pormo is not even looking for a mate. I don’t guess they will EVER have a grandchild. The only one of the triplets with grandchildren is Meme. Her’s and Candy’s daughter Mequan and her mate Talqiando had triplets. These are fraternal, thank the waves, and not identical. Mayla, Dayla, and Barildo are old enough to be looking; but they, too, seem disinterested in finding mates. Okay, does that account for everyone?”
I hated to look like a spent ripple (to coin a water analogy consistent with most of their bywords), but I was counting on my fingers. My last count was 16. Chamagne and Wendel’s daughter Shawin and her mate Brolo made 18. Ort and Eld’s daughter Ortel and her mate Fankin made 20. Hamdi and Momi’s son Hammo and his mate Zulli made 22. Porti and Memo’s son Pormo made 23.
Candy and Meme’s daughter Mequan and her mate Talqiando and their 3 children Mayla, Dayla, and Barildo made 28. “Yep! That’s all 28 of us. Wow! You may be right. I might learn all these people sooner than I thought.”
(I know that I am giving you this conversation in its condensed form, and that it seems like only a few minutes had passed. Trust me, Corinth
Last and Teelee came dragging themselves out of the ocean in due time. They looked exhausted, but happy. Last looked completely different to me with no clothes on. He probably felt the same as I when he noticed I had taken on their native custom. “Hey, Wil. Looks like you made yourself comfortable while I was gone. I am glad to see it.”
“Gee, Last,” I couldn’t resist a joke, “If I had known you wanted to see it, I would have shown it to you before now.”
Teelee gave such a guffaw that she lost her breath, sat right there on the ground where she stood, fell over on her side wheezing till she caught her breath and cackled with laughter. “Oh, Last. I’m sorry, but that really HAS to be my grandson. That kind of smart-ass rejoinder can only be acquired genetically.” She laughed some more, repeating, “I would have shown it to you before now,” and kept laughing for at least a minute. Last laughed politely, but clearly did not find my double-entendre to be quite so funny as Teelee did.
It seems to me that the element of surprise is necessary to carry off a really good joke, and Last is SO smart that he’s probably almost never caught off guard.
We stayed on the family island for a little over a week. That vacation ranks right at the top for ‘most fun EVER.’ The island had a name: Perfection! It was most surely that, and more. Every aspect of Perfection was created with a fine eye for detail. The entire 10 acres was manicured, dotted with fruit trees (many of them bore all year long), with a beautiful fresh water stream flowing from the bed of boulders beside what I called the manor house all the way to the far end where Last and I landed in the facet-aire. There was a wonderful pool at the base of that mound of boulders and the artesian water sprang from the rocks, with a small pool at the top of the rocks, then cascaded in a pony-tail waterfall into that crystalline pool at the base.
I liked swimming in the fresh-water pool, while most of the family preferred the sea. I hate to admit that I was afraid of all the life forms in the ocean. The family laughed at my fear of sharks until Last came to my defense. “Children, most sharks do not bother us. We give off an odor that is offensive to sharks. Our land brothers and sisters do not exude this deterrent. You have all seen how sharks will eat seals. They will eat a land human just as quickly, so don’t be so hard on Wil. If he feels safer in the fresh-water pool, you might want to join him there. Remember, you only have this new friend for a little while and then he will be gone. Enjoy him while you can.”
Toby was an awesome acrobat. He would climb up to the top of the waterfall and dive exactly with the trajectory of the water so that he would hit the center of the only deep hole in that pool. The fall had carved a deep hole in that one spot of solid rock.
The house itself had a virtually invisible entrance at the very top of the mound of boulders from which it was carved. The exit was on the back side of the manor house and from the sea it appeared to be a shallow cave where the elements had scooped a small hole into the cliff face. I am getting ahead of myself. I have not even told you how we got into the house.
To open the door at the top of the granite mountain, Last tapped on a small thin stone that covered the entrance at our feet. One had to know the rhythm (tap tap, tap tap, tap tap) that would cause the stone to slide aside, revealing a hole much like the one in the pantry at Telasta’s house. Just like the shaft leading to Telasta’s missile silo, once I jumped into this rabbit hole I fell a few feet before the shaft turned into a slide which ultimately slowed the speed of my fall and dumped me unceremoniously onto the floor of what Last called “the Great Hall.”
This house had many more rooms than Telasta’s house, though none of the ceilings were as high as her ceilings. There were no bathrooms, which puzzled me until I understood that the family took care of all those functions in the ocean -- just as other sea dwelling creatures did. I later learned that Ocean Society members have a much lower volume of waste than their land counterparts, as their bodies were designed to utilize nearly all the nutrients they ingested. Some nutrients were used in 3 or 4 successive ways in their bodies before being discarded.
There was only one bedroom in the house. It was really huge, and it had hooks attached to the stone walls with hammocks attached top and bottom. It was like a big bunkhouse. While O/S members touched one another often and were extremely affectionate toward one another, (and I KNEW they had sex frequently because they told me so,) they had a strong preference for sleeping alone.
After I had been there for 2 or 3 days, I realized that I seemed to be the only one using the bedroom. When Toby repeated what Telasta had already told me, I remembered that, with the exception of ‘long sleep’, O/S people normally slept in 15-minute naps throughout the day and night. Toby said he personally preferred his naps underwater. “Now, don’t get me wrong,” he amended, “I come here for my long sleep. I am not afraid of most sharks, but there ARE things out there that can be a danger to us while we are in long sleep. Long sleep is a lot like hibernation. We wake up when we wake up. It’s very difficult for any external event to wake us up from that sleep.”
There was light everywhere inside the manor house. To turn on a light, all I had to do was touch it. Last explained that these were chemical lights -- easy on the eyes and giving off plenty of light to read by, if one so chose.
The kitchen had every modern convenience. When I asked Last about the power source for the stove and refrigerator -- both electric, he answered obliquely. It was really a non-answer, and I told him so. He elaborated: “Wil, I am a scientist. I can articulate how everything in this house works, but you are not yet capable of understanding even the basic concepts about which I would be talking. It would frustrate you terribly to hear words that you cannot begin to comprehend. I promise you that I shall not forget your questions and in due time I will answer them all. I don’t mind if you keep asking questions the answers of which you have not the facility to receive. Ask away. If it is too complex, I will just give you the look, and you will know that you’re not ready for the answer. Okay?”
I said, “Okay, but Last, I am going to need to use the bathroom in a little while. One of the guys told me there’s no bathroom inside the manor. I guess I will have to go outside. I saw the exit. Toby told me that was the only exit. I do not think I can jump into the ocean from that high up. It looks even higher than Telasta’s wells, and she was horrified that I had jumped down one of those. How am I going to get outside when I need to use the bathroom?”
“Then this is the opportunity I have been waiting for. Do you need to go to the bathroom right away, or can you hold it for awhile?” Last had excitement in his voice, but also genuine concern.
“Oh, no,” I said, “I probably won’t need to go for 2 or 3 hours. It simply seemed like a good idea to plan ahead.”
“VERY good idea. Actually, I can get you outside quickly without showing you what I have been wanting to show you. That back door has a zip line off to the side. I kept that part of the exit secret from everyone except Ort and Eld. These sea horses around here would wear the cable out with their play. Besides, that’s quite a long fall. If any of them fell from the zip line, they would land on boulders instead of water and likely die from their injuries. It has been a long time since we lost any members of THIS family. You land dwellers seem to accept death. You don’t like it, but you accept it. We do not. Now, come with me and we might solve your dilemma quickly enough to accommodate your coming need.”
He set off at a trot down one of the hallways. This house had no stairs, unlike Telasta’s. Last said that he had a preference for spiraling ramps, even though they were much more difficult to carve. Although we were essentially in a cave, the walls were beautifully hewn and the ceilings were inlaid with some type of retro-fit white shingles. There were fewer doors than in Telasta’s house. In fact, I suddenly realized that most doorways I had seen in this house were simple open portals. After we had run down the ramp and taken a fork on each of several levels, we came to a door at the bottom of one of the ramps.
“Oh, Wil, look through that portal to your left. All the rest of the family believes that to be an indoor swimming pool. It is. It is, BUT… there lies another of my secrets. You cannot use the water channels beneath that pool as an exit unless you wear an air tank, and nobody but Ort and Eld and I -- and now you -- even know an exit exists there. If you have not guessed by now, we members of the O/S enjoy our secrets.
We live lives of quiet isolation, for the most part -- just the individual and the sea -- so we embrace the hermit part of ourselves. Each of us works hard for the discoveries we make. We share those discoveries with others who have understanding and appreciation of our insight and frustrating mental gymnastics. We do not give of our mentality lightly, nor easily. I know who I am. You do not yet know who I am.
You will appreciate what I am about to show you without any REAL appreciation of what it took for me to discover the underlying principles that apply. While I MAY give you access to my tools, I also may require you to do some mental work yourself that will lead to your own discoveries. Telasta is a great teacher. I would venture to say that her primary gift is giving her students just enough knowledge to make them hungry for more and then making them feed themselves.
Now! I apologize for always starting these fun things with weighty sermons.” He opened the door in front of us, using a key that was on a string around his neck. It was a pocket door, naturally. Apparently I am not as observant as I pride myself on being, as evidenced by the fact that I had never noticed that ‘necklace’ before. We walked into the fairly large room behind that door.
Last walked to a far wall, opening a big cabinet door that went all the way to the floor and pulling out what appeared to be a giant harmonica. Then he pulled out a work table, very similar to that used for a table saw. “Help me take these things out into the hallway,” he said. They were on wheels, so it was an easy thing to accomplish.
Once we had those things in the hallway, Last went back to get other accoutrements -- all of which attached in various ways to the main part of this contraption. Finally he hooked a complex attachment to the undercarriage of that table. The attachment was connected to a battery by a power cord, to the table by clamps, and to the giant harmonica by a belt drive. I noted that the ‘harmonica’ was a folded affair that could be left the size it was while folded -- about 2-feet -- or unfolded to perhaps 6-feet or more.
“I am always adding to the house. While I have been meaning to install another exit for quite awhile, there has never been any serious need until now. THIS is my HIEMPG -- Harmonic Influence Electro Magnetic Pulse Generator -- ‘harmonic chisel’ for short. It uses a combination of EM waves (electromagnetic waves) and sound wave harmonics. The scientists of Lemuria had similar machines, but theirs were complex beyond words. I have taken nearly all the old ways and simplified them. Many of the components used in ancient Lemuria are no longer available -- especially after the second quake that sank the whole continent; so I have had to improvise, and in some cases re-invent.
I already know what is on the other side of that wall directly behind you, and I have already input the data into the brains of this chisel that will allow us to slice the pattern I designed for an exit. All I will do today is finish the work already in progress. I do not want you to think all this happens without planning. That might be what you would have thought had I not told you differently. Step back, and put on these goggles and this supplied air mask.”
He had reached back into the unlocked closet and handed me goggles and air mask, then got a set of those for himself, as well. “Your safety gear will probably be a little small. Adjust it as well as you can. I am going to make a vent hole first, in any event, and put an evacuation fan adjacent to the work site. That should keep the air from being saturated with rock particles.”
He was fiddling with different tools as he talked, bringing a small round device from his closet. It looked like a big can of beans with three legs sticking out from the top, perpendicular to the can and evenly spaced. Small round rubber sucker pads were on those legs (like the rubber suckers on those toy bow and arrow sets, so you can shoot the arrow and it sticks to the wall.) The can had a cord coming from the back side. He connected the can thing to the wall, pushing the suckers against the smooth side of the wall to make it stick, and plugged the cord into the HIEMPG.
“Put on your equipment, Wil,” Last admonished me. I did as I was told, and when he saw I was ready he flipped a switch on the HIEMPG. There was a slight humming noise that tickled the roots of my teeth -- not much dust -- but a hole appeared all the way to the outside. I could see sunlight.
I immediately removed my safety equipment, thinking the demonstration was over. “Wow!, Last,” I could not hide my enthusiasm. “I see what you did, but I don’t believe it! It might be science, but it looks like magic. I know it does not use heat, else there would have been an explosion and pieces of rock flying about. You explained what it used, but where did all the dust go?”
Last kept working. I could see a big smile on his face through the clear air mask -- doubtless proud to have been the one to introduce me to something he KNEW I had never seen before. He removed the HIEMPG canister attachment (harmonic-influenced electromagnetic pulse generator) by poking a sharp tool under each sucker foot to break the vacuum and placed a squirrel-cage fan (equipped with similar suckers) on the same spot. The fan stuck out from the hole with the evacuation jet fitting perfectly in the hole he had just made. When he turned on the fan, I realized it had its own battery power supply. Almost immediately, the air was cleared of the little dust that had been there and Last removed his safety equipment. He was still smiling, but admonished me, “This was a minor operation, Wil; but remember to never remove your safety equipment until I tell you it is safe. If and when you use this device on your own, leave your safety equipment on until you turn on an evacuation fan and the air is clear of all obvious debris, okay?”
“I’m sorry, Last. I let myself get too excited. I promise to follow your lead in future; but WOW! That was something else.”
“Yeah, I’ll admit this thing is pretty impressive. The small round HIEMPG does not make much dust at all. Nearly all the particles are carried to a distant disposal spot. Rather than pulverizing anything, this device transports the target to another space/time location.
You are right that there is no heat involved. In fact, one should be careful about the hole we just made. By altering the space/time continuum, there is a minimal period where anything invading the targeted space could be sucked into the disposal point. Not that you really needed to know that, but it’s something with which to clutter your brain.” He clearly was pleased to be able to talk to someone about technology that was old hat to him, and chuckled in a fatherly way.
Last touched the fan, as if checking to make certain it was still functioning. He put his safety gear back on and cut his eyes over at me, waving a finger. When I immediately put on my safety gear, he smiled again. He pointed to the end of the large HIEMPG table, so I lifted one end as he lifted the other. It was pretty light. He set his end of the device about 6-feet from the wall, so I did the same with my end. He nodded his head in assent, “That’s right. Now THIS,” he held up a device about the size of a quarter, which had a digital read-out on its face and shot out a red light when he pressed that face, “is a measuring device. I will hold it flat against the top of the HIEMPG, push the button, and a light will reflect off the wall to give me a reading on the distance. I want you to do that at your end of the harmonic chisel, then hand it over to me so I can get my end at the same distance from the wall as your end.”
I did as he suggested, noticed the numbers which appeared on the face of the measuring device when I pressed its top and the red light came on, and handed it to Last. He repeated the measurement on his end and nudged the table.
“That should do it, Wil. Now, look at the back of the chisel. You see the digital reading? By adding how deep you want to cut to the distance from the wall, you can get an exact depth to the hole you cut. We do not use feet or metres, so work with me on this. The distance from the wall was 3. I know that the rock wall in front of us is 8 deep. What I want to do is to cut into the wall by a measure of 3 (which means I must set the chisel reading to 6.)” He dialed the setting as he said it. “Do you follow me?”
“Yes. So far so good.”
When Last turned on the chisel, the harmonica first dropped to the floor, then the chisel turned on and the belts raised it to almost 3-feet above the floor, cutting into the rock wall in front of it as it moved. Every bit of rock from the floor to the low ceiling of the newly-formed shallow dead-end tunnel had disappeared.
“Now, move the table to the back of that tunnel. Wait just a few seconds. You can tell when the EM echo is past by the temperature. Notice how cold it got when I turned on the device. When the air temperature stops biting you, it’s safe to move into that space.”
Why I had not noticed this when he used the smaller unit was beyond me. Gosh, the cold radiated from the space he had just cut like heat radiates from a campfire. Then it stopped as suddenly as if you had poured water on that campfire. “So it’s okay now?” I asked.
“Yep. Good job, Wil. You are a fast study. Pick up your end. Let’s move the chisel to the back wall. You will have to get on your hands and knees.”
There must have been other settings Last had made on the chisel for that last cut -- settings I had not noticed, for the chisel had turned itself on when it reached the starting point for the cut and turned itself off when it reached the point at which Last wanted it to stop. This time I would pay better attention.
We got the chisel to the back wall. Last turned the harmonica so that it pointed upward instead of outward as it had been to make the first cut. I watched as he set 3 dials on our side of the chisel. He set one dial at zero, the second at .2, and left the third at 6. “By turning the cutting head upward, a zero means it will cut even with the far edge, which means the wall will be smooth and the ceiling will be higher (to a depth of 6). The .2 means the cutting head will move a very short distance. With this cut, I am setting up for the next cut -- a parallel cut to the outside. That opening will look like a very narrow hole in the rock facing. Only someone who knows what it is would venture to crawl into that hole. The back of that hole will be this chimney we are about to make with a vertical cut. Back out of this tunnel and I will turn on the chisel.”
When I was out of danger, Last turned on the HIEMPG. A few seconds later, he said, “Come back in, Wil. I’m going to need you to lift this thing to make the final cut, okay?”
“I’ll be glad to, Last. I’m beginning to need that bathroom break.” We both chuckled as Last made adjustments to the chisel while I put on my safety gear.
“Now, can you lift the entire table halfway to the ceiling?”
“I think I can,” I said as I lifted the table and chisel easily. “Is that high enough?”
“Perfect. Hold it steady, Wil.” Last held the control cord in his hand and pushed a button. In no time at all I saw a shaft of sunlight pouring into our cavern.
“Okay, you can set the chisel down now.” Last took hold of one end of the chisel as I set it down. We both removed our safety gear, and Last said, “Let’s put everything back in the closet.” He did some minimal dismantling of the device and put component parts in their respective storage boxes. He put his safety gear away, and I followed his lead with mine. Then he turned off the fan, broke the sucker feet loose, and put that away.
“You may be the first to use this exit, Wil. You earned it.” Last was smiling profusely. “Go to the end of the new tunnel and stand up. Be careful not to hit your head. I think I got the ceiling high enough, but be careful just in case.”
I crawled to the end of the first newly-cut tunnel and stood up. The last cut through which I could see the outside world was waist high. I bent over and slid the top part of my body into it. It was a tight squeeze, but Last had cut the vertical shaft higher than my head and with the last cut’s being in the middle of that wall at about waist height, it was very easy for me to fit into the exit tunnel and crawl out into the sunlight.
I squinted at the bright sunlight, looking for someplace to relieve myself, when Last popped out of our new hole. He had a roll of tissue in one of his hands. “I keep telling Teelee that it is a GOOD thing -- my being a packrat, that is. I keep entirely too much stuff in my storage closet, and I suddenly remembered this roll of tissue which you land folks need. I have kept it in a sealed container for so long I had almost forgotten it. There is a bent tree just around the curve of this hill on the side opposite the ocean where you may find a comfortable place to sit.” He laughed good-naturedly as he handed me the tissue. “I’ll wait for you here. Be sparing in your use of the tissue. I have two more rolls, but what will you use on your next visit if you use it all this time and I forget to get some more?”
“Oh, Last! Believe me, I will remember to bring more tissue from home next time I visit. This is one of those differences in our races that I did not know about before; but once learned, I never forget.” I talked over my shoulder as I hurriedly went around the corner in search of a bent tree and some privacy.
When I finished, I returned to the spot where Last had been when I left him. He was still there, and he held out to me a ‘key necklace’ identical to his own. “Put this around your neck. The others will be curious when they see you have on a new necklace, but they will respect you more if you keep your own secrets. I have work to do and Teelee will be needing a little attention as well. Take your tissue back to our closet. There is an empty canister on a shelf at the back left corner of the closet that will accommodate your tissue perfectly.
I will see you later today or perhaps tonight. If you get hungry, you should try some of the fruit of this island. You can either call Toby and he will enjoy being your culinary guide, or you may prefer to experiment on your own. The only problem with experimentation is that you will not know the name of a particular fruit. I doubt you have heard of most of the fruit we grow here. Some of it is sweet, but you might even prefer some of the mushrooms or other fruit that is not high in sugar content. Anyhow, have fun. I’ll see you later.” He turned and ran to a small Oceanside
I was really pleased to have a key to Last’s closet full of treasures. I put it around my neck and walked to the small hole we had just made in the side of the mountain, crawled into the cool tight cave, and dropped down the back chimney onto the floor that was only a few crawling feet and then a few standing feet from the closet.
“So this was a test,” I thought, noting the door to the closet was still open. Last wanted to see if I was a prompt responder. I was certain that he also wanted to see whether I would put my tissue in its proper place and then whether I would lock the door. I quickly went through the paces of doing exactly that. Once I had locked the closet door, I put the key back around my neck and exited once more through our new escape route.
I was alone. There were very few birds, which surprised me since birds have always sung their songs in the background of my explorations. Granted, the bird species at my new home in Ubatuba were completely different in KIND from the Louisiana
In addition to fruit trees, there were fruiting vines and fruiting bushes and mushrooms that grew on the soil and on trees that had fallen. I was enjoying being alone. It reminded me of my early years in Louisiana Brazil
I meandered down one lane after another, lost in thought, reliving emotions I had not had time to digest properly. I must have been hungry, for I ate as I walked -- pulling small berries, large fruit that required being peeled, plump nuggets of sweet and sour and red and green and purple and popping them in my mouth. Only once did I spit out what I had put in my mouth, and that was some type of plum. I smiled at some of the delicate tastes and then I began to cry -- softly at first; then with abandon and deep gulping sobs as I came to terms with the loss of my parents.
Once the mourning began, it escalated as my self-pity awakened more reasons for sorrow-from-loss. All my friends in Louisiana
I found a patch of verdant green soft moss next to a massive, smooth-barked tree. Here I sat and let the flood waters flow. The welcoming moss felt good as it cooled my naked body. I lay face down in its embrace, my fingers entwined under my chin, face forward and eyes open, though not really looking. I had stopped making noise, but the tears still flowed silently.
The land of Perfection
I suppose I had cried myself out. I raised up on my elbows, staring at the puzzling red bump against the clay wall; then stood and moved closer for better inspection. By the time I reached my target, I had decided that it was some kind of statue or frieze carved into the clay wall. Yes, someone had carved a perfect likeness of one of the O/S members. I reached out to feel what should have been cold clay. When my fingers made contact, that figure came to life and stepped away from the clay to which I thought it was attached. I screamed like a little girl and yelled an expletive young boys are not supposed to say. I could not help myself. I thought I had been bit by a snake or something.
The figure in front of me became clearer as it changed color and turned into a member of the O/S -- a teen-aged- looking male with a purple mark on one of his thighs. I moderated my expletive and spat out “Shoot! Fankin. You almost gave me a heart attack. You ARE Ortel’s mate Fankin, aren’t you?”
“Why, yes, I am, Wil. How nice of you to remember me. I am sorry to have frightened you. We were just playing a game called ‘Find Me.’ One person is ‘IT.’ He or she goes anywhere on the island, using any means of camouflage possible to keep the others from finding him. Whoever finds that person gets to be ‘IT’ next.”
I was still almost hyperventilating as I offered, “Yes, Fankin -- that’s all well and good. I understand the rules of the game. It is very similar to the land game ‘Hide and go seek.’ What I do NOT understand is how you camouflaged yourself to look like that red clay cliff.”
Fankin wore a puzzled expression. His brows were furrowed and his head cocked to one side as he asked, “What do you mean, ‘How did I camouflage myself’? I CAMOUFLAGED myself.”
“Look, Fankin, are you telling me that you can change your color like a chameleon lizard?”
“That’s a crude comparison, Wil. We are certainly better at camouflage than a LIZARD! We are more like sea creatures who can camouflage to look like the pebbles on the ocean floor or to appear as part of an underwater forest of vegetation. The range of our colors is almost endless, as we can color ourselves at will in stripes or swirls, spots or splashes, blue, yellow, green, tan, or red. I forget that you only recently learned of our existence. Forgive me for my incredulity. You have won a game in which you cannot participate, for you cannot camouflage at ALL. The only reason you saw me was that your crying broke my concentration. Why were you crying?”
“Oh, no you don’t, Fankin. You do not get to change the subject that easily. So if you can change your color that quickly, why do you not change the color of that purple mark on your thigh?”
“You are certainly direct and to the point, aren’t you? Yet you do not appear to be ridiculing me. How refreshingly blunt you are,” and Fankin laughed as he said it. He continued to smile as he explained, “Camouflage is an act of will. When we are in the water it is automatic, but on land it’s voluntary. I can even change that purple birthmark on my thigh for brief periods, but it always reverts back to its normal color when I stop concentrating. Our scales automatically turn the color of water when we are IN the water -- or they turn the color of whatever we are leaning against -- such as the bottom of the ocean or lake when we are startled. Our arms and faces do not change color except through an act of determination. We cannot HOLD the color change for long periods of time, but we can take on any color we think about and can maintain the camouflage for several hours. I once joined a tribe of pygmies for a month before they discovered that I was not one of them.” We both laughed at the image that created, but Fankin was not to be thrown off the track for long.
“Okay, Wil, I have answered your question. Now you must answer mine. Among my other skills, I am a trained psychologist. Even with the differences between our species I can spot a deep sorrow. You were crying over something serious. You need to talk about this. Why were you crying?”
I sat down beside Fankin. The slightly moist clay got on the palms of my hands as I lowered myself into position with my hands and knees, then turned to sit with my back against the clay cliff. I rubbed my dirty hands on my legs. The tears returned as I remembered why I had been crying. Like boys tend to do, I put on my ‘big boy’ face. Not wanting Fankin to think me weak, I made a joke about the red clay on my leg. “Look! The clay is coloring my skin. I guess I can camouflage, after all.”
Fankin was not thrown off the subject. He did not smile, but continued looking directly at me in a concerned way. I was fidgeting nervously. I crossed my arms and looked down at my feet which were extended straight in front of me. “There have been a lot of changes in my life, Fankin. During this past year my parents died and nobody will tell me why. I don’t know if they committed suicide or if my father killed my mother and then himself. The whole thing is a mystery. Everybody thinks I am too young to hear the details, but my imagination probably makes it worse than anything they could possibly tell me.
I was ready to live my life in Louisiana
I looked at Fankin, waiting for him to comment. Usually adults had something to offer at this point. They always thought they had the answer and could encapsulate that solution in just a few sound bites which, if you listened to them and did what they suggested, would solve your problem instantaneously. Fankin just nodded his head and said, “Go on. I’m listening.”
“Aren’t you going to tell me that my parents’ death isn’t my fault?”
“Why would I do that, Wil? Just the fact that you said it tells me you know that already. We are not dealing with logic when dealing with your emotions, Wil -- we are dealing with FEELING. Your old circumstances were comfortable and you lost those circumstances and were cast into a situation not of your choosing. I understand that, but I do NOT know how you internalized it. Just keep talking and explain to me what’s going on with your feelings. While I listen, perhaps you will listen to yourself, as well.”
“You know what, Fankin? You just helped me FEEL my way through this sorrow. The reason I was crying is that for my whole life before now I thought everything was unfolding logically and in a certain predictable order. I’M not in control at ALL, am I? Maybe I can make certain choices, but it is becoming clear to me that the world does not bow down at my choices and say, ‘Yea, verily!’ Maybe I will get a chance to write my own destiny -- maybe not; but probably NOT.” I began to smile.
The smile turned into a low, slow laugh of discovery. I did not want to keep chasing this train of thought, because I now understood well enough to be satisfied (for the moment, at least) that life itself dictates what one needs; what discoveries each individual should make; what pains and joys are to be written on a given life’s script. I myself had been MAKING a living (and enjoying that foul process) instead of living. I determined to give these thoughts to Fankin and then to close the discussion.
When I told Fankin what I was thinking, he said, “You are wise beyond your years, Wil Dupepe. You deal with sadness openly. If you will do that for your entire life, you will live a long and prosperous life. We in the O/S are taught at a very early age how to marshal our emotions. Self destruction is the most dangerous enemy, for it is an enemy from which you cannot hide. Sadness is not the same as self-pity. Sadness is a process. Self-pity is a state of being. When you experience sadness -- or joy EITHER, for that matter -- you are working through a passage in life; a roadway, if you will. You are going TO somewhere. With self-pity, you are in a stagnant state. If one is not careful, she or he will get mired down in that state and learn to enjoy its fruits. When we in the O/S become too concerned about the approval or empathy or even rejection that comes from others, we may allow ourselves to stagnate and let someone else dictate how our lives should be lived. In your case, maybe you felt like others were -- as you say -- MAKING your living; making your life; directing your actions and thoughts. It sounds as if you have worked through that in the last few minutes. I am not worried about you.
We are all hermits, Wil. Even when we are involved in social gatherings, each of us is alone. We are all singularities -- no two of us the same. That means that each of us is special and irreplaceable. You and I, in this moment, are like two stars in the sky talking to one another. Nobody else can participate in this unique conversation, for there is more than a pattern of words involved here -- there is body expression, facial expression, empathy. Even with all we are sharing, each of us will leave this moment with something different, for we experience life individually. Members of the O/S, as I said, are taught the fact of individuality early in life. If we fail to accept ourselves (and others, too, as a matter of course), then we will become self-destructive. Wallowing in despair and depression may not be suicide in the classic sense; but it IS suicide. When we project our dark moods onto the surface of our lives, our internal organs respond to those signals. We in the O/S do not share most of the maladies of our land cousins. However, if we create self-destructive patterns then our bodies will co-operate to that end and shut down vital organs or even form cysts and cancers. Everything begins with thought -- individual thought. I really like you, Wil Dupepe. At some level, perhaps that matters to you. Just don’t let it matter more than it should.
My acceptance or rejection of you may be used to gently guide you; but the living is yours to do -- not mine. Ultimately, your life is none of my business. I make it my business in the moment (and whether I should or should not do that, it is a choice I make), but when we are apart, then it does not matter to me what you do. Your life is not a reflection on me and it does not impact me in any meaningful way. I won’t LET it.”
He smiled at me then and gave a broad wink, as if to seal the fact that we now had an understanding. I knew my tears were forever safe with him -- that he would share with no one else the particulars of my brief bout of self-pity. I felt immensely better. I really was grateful for the conversation, but equally determined to move beyond it and start at some fresh point in our friendship. That wink gave closure to the whole event, so I made a move to leave it behind.
“Thanks, Fankin. This talk has done me a lot of good. If I’m ‘IT’, then let’s continue the game of ‘Find Me.’ I guess you have to close your eyes and count to 20 so I have a chance to hide?”
“Yes. Finding you will be easy, however. You are not capable of camouflage. How do you expect to avoid being caught in under a minute? As soon as I finish the count, I have to let all the game participants know there is a new target and we will find you quickly. What’s the point?”
“Oh, dear Fankin, you underestimate me. What I lack in camouflage skills is more than compensated for by my cleverness. Start counting. You may never find me.”
I still laugh to this day, thinking of all those people looking for me for the rest of the day. None of them knew about the new exit. All I had to do was go inside the manor house via the new exit. Since none of the folks inside were involved in the game, I went in search of someone I could talk to. After I crawled through the tight entrance, dropped to the floor, and crawled into the main corridor, I walked up the ramp to the main section of the manor house. There were so many rooms inside this compound. I had no idea what the purpose was for so many rooms.
Once I got to the living room, I discovered Toby sitting on a nice brocade couch with Corinth
“Mind if I join you?” I asked Corinth
“What do you mean, ‘tape’?” I asked
Toby continued in his TV-induced paralysis, but Corinth
“HEY! I was watching that,” Toby complained.
“Yes, I know. You watch too much news. It is not good for you to watch all this upsetting news. You will start having bad dreams and develop depression if you are not careful. I wanted to show Wil how to operate the tape player so he can watch TV when he wants.”
“Okay.” Toby answered without any noticeable resentment.
“Corinth
As Corinth
“Wil, you seem to be lost in thought. Why don’t I leave you to your thinking for now? We can resume the tour any time. I have some things I can do, and Traudie probably needs a little rest from her grandmother; so I’ll leave you alone for a bit. Is that okay with you?”
“Oh, Corinth
“No, Wil, there’s no apology necessary. You probably ARE focusing on the task at hand. It just isn’t the task in which I have been trying to involve you. You are a special person, just as Last told us you were. You will find your way, and now is probably the best time to begin your search. Let ME get on with MY search for my child. Honestly, if it weren’t for breast-feeding I don’t think Traudie would need me at all. She thinks she belongs to the entire family, and in some ways she really does.” Corinth
There were thoughts tumbling over thoughts. All this new technology was hovering in the back of my mind, as was an awareness that there was another humanoid species on the planet. Telasta had quickly become a mainstay in my life, more so because of her relationship with Papa. I really had become comfortable in the knowledge of their extreme wealth (and by extension, my own wealth.) I was even mostly at ease in having a new family who lived unbelievably long lives and who could breathe underwater and had transportation and energy at their disposal that made the need for money insignificant. So why was I still in turmoil?
At length, I found myself at the bottom of the ramp, faced with a decision of whether to go back outside and rejoin the game of ‘Find Me.’ I quickly rejected that thought, realizing that time spent alone had more value. I still had the key around my neck and thought briefly about investigating Last’s closet. The only other two choices were to turn around and go back up the ramp or to go swimming in the underground pool next to the closet.
Thoughts of the pool jolted me out of my soliloquy. I decided to do something daring. I opened Last’s closet with my key and pulled out the box of safety equipment, which included the goggles and supplied air mask I had worn as Last and I cut the new exit. I noticed there was a gauge which indicated the air canister was fully charged. Yes, I wanted to be alone; but I was also still a boy, and a very curious boy at that. I put on the safety equipment, opened the valve that pressurized the mask, closed and locked the closet door, and walked into the underground pool room.
There were steps leading down into the water. The whole cavern was lighted with those ’touch-on’ lights. I ducked my head underwater to see whether I could breathe easily enough to swim underwater. It was pretty easy. I had heard somewhere that you had to learn how to breathe with scuba equipment, but this was less like scuba diving and more like diving with a bucket of air over your head. The positive air pressure made inhaling easy, and when I exhaled, the bubbles were forced from my face mask between the rubber and my cheeks.
I saw an underwater corridor at the bottom of the pool, and there were more ‘touch-me’ lights against the wall down that corridor. When I touched one of those lights, not only did it light up, but a whole string of lights came on in the distance. “This was going to be fun,” I thought. “Maybe I can find the secret exit that only Last, Ort and Eld know about.”
This was not a simple tube to the ocean. It was a maze, with caves and other corridors jutting off to the sides. Each passageway and each cave had lights, so SEEING was not a problem. However, it did not take long for me to realize that I had gone from one cave to another corridor and yet another passage and I was LOST. The beauty of my surroundings disappeared in the panic of my situation.
What I WANTED to do was to remove my supplied air tank to look at the gauge and find out how much air I had left, but what I HAD to do was find a way out of this mess by maximizing my own ability to think. Nobody knew where I was. There were people looking for me, but they thought I was hiding purposely -- probably outside the manor house on the island. My only hope, except for finding the secret exit, was that the island should be getting dark and maybe the game players would come back inside the manor house to discover I had been there this whole time. Maybe they would redouble their efforts to win the game and find me after all.
My life’s experience had taught me that the best thinking one can do is while he is motionless. All my discoveries seem to occur when I am motionless. I probably would never have seen the camouflaged Fankin except for the fact that I was lying motionless on that moss.
The cave I was in was massive. I was in the very center of it when the realization of my lost condition first struck me. There were no fewer than 7 corridors along the periphery of this cave. I was very grateful that all of them were lighted and I could see them. Obviously I had come into this cavern through one of those passageways, but I had no clue WHICH one. In slow motion, I turned and studied each corridor. There were not many fish in this cave and they were all very small. As I reflected on this, it came to me that these fish must surely need food, and there was no vegetation of any kind in this cave.
Therefore, these fish were simply ‘hanging out’ in this cave. This was their recreation -- their television. Their mommy would call them to come to dinner soon.
As if reading my thoughts, a school of 30 or 40 tiny fish ran in front of me and made a bee line toward one of the passages on the far side of my cave. I followed. It surprised me that they did NOT go into one of the lighted passageways, but rather swam into a corridor that was pitch dark. I was reticent to follow, knowing how likely it was that I would be going from a bad situation into an intolerable one. I swallowed the lump in my throat as the realization dawned that I would soon drown in my indecisiveness. What finally decided me was my sense of touch. I could not see beyond the opening of that channel, and I feared being bit by a moray eel or eaten by a shark. The fish had swum into this opening, so I reasoned that they were not afraid as I touched the wall of the unlighted opening, trying to force myself to enter.
It was smooth -- glass smooth. This had been cut by an HIEMPG. Whatever else I DID NOT know, I KNEW that this was a man-made corridor. I entered it without further delay. This was just barely larger than the new exit to the manor house. My body constantly touched the walls of the corridor as I swam for dear life toward the fearful end of the channel, and then… I ran out of air.
It was fortunate that I felt the last puff of air from the air tank and filled my lungs, but knew to hold my breath after that. Had I tried to take another breath, I would have filled my lungs with water. Here I was, blind, lost, out of air, and in a tube which might just lead to another flooded chamber. I called upon every reserve of willpower I possessed to hold my breath. I thought my lungs would explode or I would pass out. Then I came out of that tube and saw the moonlight at the surface of the water above me. I pulled the water with my hands, kicked it with my feet, racing to the surface which looked like it was moving away from me. My perception of distance was entirely gone in the panic I felt, but I broke the surface just before I would have passed out.
“Well,” I thought, “I found the secret exit. I do not remember HOW I found it or how to find it again, but thank Heavens I found it.” I swam to the shore, which was almost immediately below the new exit to the manor. The moon was up, and the night sky gave off almost enough light to be able to read a newspaper. I was upset, shaking with fear, and eager to keep my poor judgment secret, so I crawled into the narrow entrance, dropped down the back chimney, crawled onto the ramp where I stood up and walked to Last’s closet. I opened the door, replaced my safety equipment, closed the door, and re-locked it.
I was tired. I don’t believe I had EVER been as tired as I was at that moment. I wanted to get to the bedroom and crawl into my hammock. My head was bowed with fatigue, else I would have seen Last, Teelee, Toby, Corinth
God, what was wrong with me? The pain in my gut was immediate and severe, bending me over with its intensity. There was a pain at least as strong as my belly pain in my shoulders. I groaned and fell to my knees, then fell over on my side. I knew I was in trouble and suspected I was dying -- of what, I did not know. “Last,” I managed to croak out, “Help me. I’m dying.” My words were almost indecipherable to ME. It surprised me that Last understood anything I said.
“Where have you been, Wil?”
“Pool… Channels… Your, Ort, Eld escape route. Lost. Ran out of air.” I managed to talk haltingly, thinking maybe I had gone through some contaminated water or been stung by a poisonous fish – I could not figure it out. I felt compelled to give the good doctor Last every bit of information he might need to save my life.
Laughter! THAT’S the reaction I get for dying in front of an audience -- laughter?? Were they about to break into applause? They ALL laughed -- even Traudie. I was mortified; then they each grabbed part of my body and carried me up the ramp and into one of the medical rooms where they opened what looked like a giant stainless-steel barbecue pit and put me inside. My last thought before I passed out was, ‘They are going to BARBECUE me.’ Hours later, when I came to, I panicked again because I was trapped inside this contraption. There was a site glass on the side of the unit. No sooner had I opened my eyes and begun to panic than Last had opened the lid and stood smiling at me.
“Feel better this morning?” With his question, Last answered mine: How long had I slept?
“Much better. I still cannot believe my extreme pain caused all of you to LAUGH! What was wrong with me?”
“You were too deep in the water to come to the surface as quickly as you did. You trapped saturated nitrogen in your blood. It’s called ‘decompression sickness’ or ‘the bends.’ It strikes different people different ways from 15 minutes to several hours after they get to the surface. It CAN kill land people, but we knew we could give you oxygen and put you in a decompression chamber and you would be fine. Sorry about the laughter. We don’t get the bends. It’s just one of those things that strikes us as humorous.
Now! I have praised you often, have openly marveled at your intelligence and temperament; but maybe I was premature in my praise. Your memory does not seem to be very good -- or maybe it’s your hearing that is not good -- or possibly you just do not think the things I say are worth hearing. Correct me if I’m wrong, but did I not just say to you yesterday how important the lives of our people are? I did NOT say specifically that we do not take unnecessary chances, but I implied as much. I showed great trust in you by giving you the key to my closet. Do I now need to worry that you might pull some other foolish stunt, using my equipment without proper supervision?
Wil, you are terribly young. I understand that and make allowances for it. I am disappointed in myself for giving you too much freedom, and disappointed in you that you thought of some ridiculous adventure which you carried out without consulting me. The equipment you used to swim underwater was not made for that purpose. I DO have scuba equipment, and you were free to use it had you asked. When Joaquin came for his DNA surgery, I wanted him to enjoy Perfection, so I asked him to bring some scuba equipment. He has several sets of scuba-diving gear, so he left one set here. Can you even begin to understand the terrible pain your death would have caused the rest of this family? Can you imagine how inconsolable Joaquin would have been, knowing you died because I did not let you use his scuba gear? Your death -- and yes, you were very lucky that timing was on your side -- your death would have been a blight on my life for the rest of my life. My friendship with Joaquin and, to some degree, Telasta would never have been the same.
I dislike these weighty conversations, but until I know you take me seriously, you can expect them on a regular basis. I have already sent word to Joaquin and Telasta about your narrow escape, and they want me to take you home right away. You slept through the night last night, so why don’t you take a final tour around the island. Spend some time with Toby and Corinth
My face was red. I could feel it. There is not a word that adequately describes the humiliation I was feeling. Maybe for the first time, I understood that humility only comes from being humiliated. It was too late for me to reign in the impulsive Wil Dupepe as he decided to put on the safety equipment and go underwater in search of the secret escape route. My eyes were blood-shot. My low opinion of myself was too profound for tears. I wanted to apologize, but was too mortified to form the words. I knew that I had to get out of the decompression chamber. I threw my legs over the side of the casket-looking affair and sat facing Last. You could see the pain on his face. He had corrected me, but not because he enjoyed doing so. I could tell by the look on his face that this was as hard on him as it was on me.
“There’s not much point in apologizing, Last. What you need to hear is that I will never put you in this situation again if I can help it. I understand that I let my emotions get in front of my good judgment. If I had died, there would have been no consequence to me for my actions. I see clearly the position I put you in. Is there any possibility that I might stay here for another week, at least? I do not want to leave you without having at least a few days to repair the damage to our relationship.”
Last’s countenance went from somber to almost comical in an instant. “Telasta SAID you would not accept going home without a fight. In fact, she said she wanted you home, but if you tried to reason your way out of it, then that means you have learned from the experience and you should probably be allowed to stay. Get out of your casket, then, and go find something to do. Toby and Corinth
I do not recover quickly from heavily-charged emotion. As I got out of the decompression chamber and stood looking down at this most-amazing person, I was really overcome with sadness, joy, pain, glee -- a myriad of emotions. Last had that same gift as Telasta -- he could read my body language as well as if I had spoken aloud.
Softly, he said, “Bend down, Wil Dupepe.”
I did not know whether he meant for me to kneel or bend over at the waist, but I took a chance and bent at the waist, supporting my upper body with my hands on my knees. Last took my face in his hands and looked deeply in my eyes. “We will not discuss your poor judgment again. I treasure you, and I do not want you to suffer.”
He brought his face to my face and kissed me on the lips. My FATHER had never kissed me on the lips and certainly no other man had done so. “You are mine, and I am yours. You can depend on me, and I will depend on you. CORINTH
Last seemed always to be saying something over his shoulder. He was always in motion. His leave-taking this time was no exception. As he walked down the hallway, he turned, walking backward a few steps as he said, “We will take the facet-aire this afternoon to introduce you to other O/S communities. They have all heard about you and are clamoring for an introduction. We Ocean Society members are nothing if not nosy.” He chuckled, broke into a trot, and disappeared around the bend of the hallway.
Memory may be the penultimate treasure of existence. I really don’t know the LAST treasure, but memory is certainly next-to-last. (That’s what “penultimate” means.) Living with these virtually-immortal people had taught me many things -- not the least of which was that living meant nothing if the events of one’s history dissolved into the past with no recollection of them. My language had changed along with my thoughts, and I was keenly aware that my new kinsmen considered me to be equal to them in all ways. They did not treat me as a child, so I determined to not act as one.
With new resolve, I deposited each memory of the “energy tour” into a deep and safe recess of my mind. Corinth
There was a massive amount of JOY expressed in everything these people did and said. Even the way they walked was more dance than the plodding movements of most land people. We picked fruit as we walked. There was no hurry in their explanations. There was plenty of time for a 10- or 15-minute break here and there for me to gorge myself on all the exotic fruits planted throughout the
island. Toby and Corinth
Much of the energy creation is easy to explain, so I shall explain it to you briefly. While magnets figure prominently in at least two of their methods, the other uses nothing of the kind. Let me start with that one:
Sunlight has within it a wavelength that creates magic -- 185 nnm (nanometers.) There were big plastic 55-gallon drums placed all over the island, and Corinth
“The Facet-Aire,” Toby explained, “is essentially an internal-combustion engine. Most of the parts are plastic, so the spark causes an explosion and releases oxygen and water; but that does not cause any corrosion or oxidation. Gasoline and diesel have a certain element of danger, but the concentrated peroxide we use as fuel is much more dangerous. If any of this stuff were to be spilled on your skin, it would dissolve your flesh right to the bone. That is why we use a sealed system of pipes going from each plastic drum, traveling underground to the Facet-Aire fueling station. No part of the peroxide system, other than at the top of the barrel where the air enters under the blue dome, is exposed. All the connections where one pipe connects to another are plastic-welded, not glued. Last decided on using peroxide as a fuel rather than petroleum-based fuel because of environmental concerns. We have been moving across the globe with our peroxide-fueled vehicles for hundreds of years before this current civilization even thought of anything other than horses… and elephants… and DOGS… (grand pause)… and the occasional ostrich.”
Well, Toby’s DELIVERY of his thoughts just cracks me up. I laughed and laughed and laughed. Still, the lesson of making fuel from nothing more than sun and air and water was learned well. Whoever decided that learning should be serious and droll obviously never experienced the kind of lessons I was given by my water family. Most of what has stuck with me over the years was given with a huge dose of fun and laughter. I am still of the opinion that knowledge is best acquired in an atmosphere of excitement and enjoyment.
The other forms of power involved electricity -- electromagnetic power. The simple explanation given by Corinth
On a boulder in the shadow of the mountain dwelling was a glass cylinder (or more probably plastic or fiberglass) approximately 3-feet across. Inside that cylinder were two perfectly balanced magnetic lodestones -- the two north sides facing one another so that the top magnet hovered about a foot above the lower. There was a thick copper plate between them and an insulated copper wire connected to that plate was run out of the bottom of the cylinder and buried in the ground so that I could not see where it ran. The top cylinder was spinning very fast. Occasionally a piece of flat metal that was affixed to an arm above the magnet would drop down like a brake shoe and slow the spinning magnet. Toby told me that the natural spin of the magnet would pick up so much speed it would eventually become airborne if it weren’t governed like this.
These were only a few of the clever inventions I was shown on Perfection. Much of their medical technology, which they shared freely with me, was given with my promise that I would not share the information with any land person. Honestly, I believe that Last wanted to protect me from the over-individualized system in this society which says that if you do not possess a medical degree, then you may not share medical knowledge. As I understand it, Americans are so starched about this issue that those who give any kind of medical advice or opinion without earning a sheepskin by studying “their” methods and agreeing with “their” conclusions are often thrown in jail for practicing medicine without a license -- even if that was not what they were doing at all. I think we are all impoverished by this type of arrogance and greed. If I were to TELL you that thus-and-such harmless herb, taken in (harmless) massive doses, will cure you of this or that, what’s the harm, even if it does not work? (It DOES work, by the way.) ENOUGH!! I promised, and I must not tempt myself to break that promise.
And so I passed the rest of that morning in the delightful company of the most precocious “teenagers” I am ever likely to meet. Corinth
At the crack of noon, Last appeared. “You ready for a ride, laddie?” he asked.
“I hate to admit it, Last; but if the choice is to leave this company or stay, it is not a choice I wish to make. Is there any chance that your son and daughter-in-law could go with us?”
“Certainly -- if they want to. The Facet-Aire has more than enough room.”
Toby and Corinth Corinth
“Alright, then. The Facet-Aire is fueled and waiting in the missile silo. We are very close to the exit Wil and I made. Everyone might as well learn that entrance, so let’s get a move-on.” Last said the last line while running backwards toward our new entrance. He turned and ran around the bend in the mountain with the three of us making a losing effort to keep up.
By the time Toby and Corinth Corinth
The loading bay was almost identical to that at Telasta’s house. Adding the second row of seats was nearly like the old 2-door automobiles where the backs of the front seats folded forward and another 2 seats popped up behind them. It was extremely simple. Corinth
Within minutes, we were airborne with gravity so intense that my sinuses almost exploded in my skull. The way one’s face contorts in such heavy gravity might have been annoying had it not been such a new experience. I could imagine how I looked with my cheeks trying to stuff themselves into my ears and laughed despite myself.
Had anyone seen the vapor trail from our vehicle, they likely would have thought they were seeing a jet. Last said that American and Mexican air comptrollers stopped trying to figure out his anomalous flights years ago. They probably wrote off these un-filed flights as originating in Cuba
Our first stop was New Zealand South Island . There was a “bottomless” lake on the top of a mountain, and those waters connected directly to the ocean. I do not understand the physics which allowed that standing column of water, nor how the lake had pure water with nothing separating the water at its bottom from the ocean’s salt water. I was assured that this was the case, even though I never dove down to see for myself on that particular day.
Each place we stopped, I was introduced to every member of that clan. While the attitudes and undergirding feeling of warmth and fun were the same, there was just a slight difference in the reception I received in each place. My penis was an immediate source of curiosity and delight to everyone. Nobody even asked if they could touch it -- they just did so. I suppose I should be grateful that they taught me not to be unnecessarily coy about this part of my anatomy. What they had trouble with was my flatulence.
It seems that ocean people are not plagued with flatulence. Since Toby and Corinth
As we sat on the bank of that lake in New Zealand
They ignored my words, and began sniffing like bloodhounds.
“Dead fish,” one of them said. “More like rotten fruit, if you ask me,” offered another. “But where IS it?” still another asked. In a few minutes, I realized none of them had any idea where that odor had come from. Their theories were funnier than the fart itself.
“The wind must have shifted just as an upwind deer defecated.” This was a theory I could understand. Most of their theories revolved around animal feces, and one of them got perilously close by suggesting that a big macaw had just passed by and broke wind as he passed. It was unimportant, but comical, and I was schooled in some etiquette without having to learn through humiliation. Once I became really comfortable with Last and some of the others, I could count on a hearty laugh by trumpeting a loud and smelly fart. Corinth
We spent time in New Zealand , Alaska , Norway , the British Isles, and Japan
In point of fact, I had lost track of how long I had been gone from home. When I later had the time to figure, I was shocked to find out I had been gone from home for almost three months. It was the best vacation I had ever had in my entire life. I could not imagine having a better one in the future, but I was ready for this one to be over. Meeting all these new people, being treated as a celebrity everywhere we went, playing all day every day, laughing constantly -- I was living on a pinnacle. Feeling euphoric without an emotional break could become depressing. I needed some normalcy back in my life. I needed my family. I woke up in the Facet-aire just as Last was making the landing in Papa’s back yard and Telasta yanked me from my seat, covering me with kisses, while Papa (massive man that he is) stood to one side with a big smile and tears in his eyes.
“Run the Facet-aire to the underground at my house, take it up into the silo and fuel her please, Last. I hate to leave just as Wil is getting home, but there is a rather important solemn assembly which you and I must attend. You missed the relayed message while you were in the air, but all the other members of the society are ready and will be waiting for us at the New Zealand
We watched as Last jumped into the cockpit and lifted into the air. Papa had moved in and had his arm over my shoulder. “You’ve grown, boy. Come on inside and have some maquitri cookies I made just for you. You look like you could use the nourishment. Last has obviously been running the meat off your bones. You might want to go to your room first and put on some clothes. Neither Telasta nor I are prudes about nudity, but I would rather you observe the mores of land folk when you are not at Society locations, okay?”
“Oh, sure Papa. I’m sorry that I forgot I was naked in front of Telasta.”
“Don’t think twice about it, Wil. Telasta has been around for a long time and she knows what naked people look like. I just want you to get used to dividing your ocean habits and your land habits. It could become important to do so down the line.” As we walked into the house, he said, “Get dressed and hurry back. The cookies are hot and the Earl Grey tea is steeping.”
I was excited all over again. The feelings surrounding being HOME were novel once more. Returning to such a nurturing home was even better than going on vacation. I dressed quickly and almost RAN back to the living room where Telasta was laying out the cups, spoons, tea pitcher, sugar and cream and Papa was putting saucers and forks out with a platter of maquitri cookies and silver tongs to serve them. The cloth napkins were Telasta’s trademark special touch. Tears came to my eyes at how wonderful it was to be part of this family.
No words were spoken as Papa served the cookies and Telasta poured the tea. The silence of this ceremony served to intensify its beauty as we all ate and drank quietly. My attention was on the food and drink. I missed the fact that Telasta and Papa had something important sitting on the air. When I looked up, I caught that they were looking knowingly at one another and questioningly at me.
“What? What?” I asked. “Come on! Out with it! Is it a good thing or a bad thing?”
Telasta had one hand atop the other on her knee and Papa, who was sitting to her right and my left, placed his left hand over her hands. They both stood as Papa said, “Telasta has something to tell you, I think.”
“No,” she turned red. “No, I have to go right away, Joaquin. I just wanted to look at Wil for as long as I could before I have to leave.” Tears came to her eyes as she rose to her feet. “We have missed you so much, Wil. I’m so glad you are home. Your Avô will fill you in on my mischief, and I hope you approve of our plans, but I really must go.”
She paused, made a halting gesture with her right hand -- almost as if she were typing something in the air with her right index finger -- then lifted me from my seat and pulled me tenderly into an embrace. “I love you more than you can possibly know,” she said as she kissed my forehead. She turned, almost leapt into Papa’s arms, kissed him passionately before pulling away and touching the end of his nose with her finger. “YOU know…” she said and gave him another peck on the lips, then she was gone.
How this woman could pull so many emotions from me at once was always a shock. I was happy, sad, confused, apprehensive, eager, and curious in the same degree. As much happiness as I felt, the fact that Telasta was leaving for a solemn assembly made me an equal amount sad -- and confused and curious.
Papa and I sat back down. He had a very happy/sad look on his face and I am pretty sure I was in shock. The feelings of surrealism that assailed me must have shown on my face, for Amado’s countenance changed to that of a teacher almost immediately. His brows came together as he took a sip of tea. His head was bent down slightly, his blue eyes gazing up toward me, and then he put down his cup and put both his muscular forearms on his knees. He looked at me silently for a moment, then began:
“Boy, you know that Telasta has been my girlfriend for a very long time…”
“Fifty YEARS! Yes, I know, but you might as well call her your mistress instead of your girlfriend. I am not so young that I missed what your relationship is.”
“Okay, then, Wil. Have it your way. She is my lover; but she is also the love of my life. You know that I have already undergone the gene therapy. I am still in a state of changing to triple-helix DNA, since Last and his team performed the surgery several years ago. Nobody knows how long it takes for the change to complete itself.
Even Last does not know what to expect from my upcoming changes -- not exactly, anyway. I am the first land human to undergo such a DNA operation. Last has monitored me all this time since the surgical triple-helix implants. Less than a year ago, he did some tests that confirmed my change was near completion.
You know, Telasta never had to worry about fulfilling her vow to not have children before I came into the picture. She was never tempted to have sex with any of the society members because they are all so small and (without being indelicate) let me say that they are small EVERYWHERE. They may seem awfully open about sex and sexuality, but I’d be willing to bet that you saw only one or two of the males un-sheath; so you probably never realized how heavily-endowed you are by comparison. You take after me, of course.”
I only nodded at appropriate points, as I was eager to hear where all this was leading, but he was right that I had only seen Toby unsheathed -- and only once, at that. Yes, he was much smaller than I. No wonder all the members were in awe of my genitalia. It wasn’t the lack of outer sheathing that caught their attention, but my SIZE.
Papa continued, “Even after Telasta and I began having relations, we knew that she could not become pregnant. We were essentially two different species. The difference in our DNA did not allow for pregnancy. With my surgery, that has changed. She has gone to ask for a reversal of the ruling that forbid her to have children. After all, at the time she agreed to that law, there were over 100,000 society members. There are now fewer than 10,000.
We have never explained any of the population issues to you, but now’s as good a time as any. There are two great killers of society members: curiosity and depression. It is an interesting thing that many are killed by being curious and going into unsafe subterranean caves or by becoming friends with untrustworthy land people. The flip side of that danger is that losing curiosity often leads to such profound depression that suicide becomes a big concern. This is mostly a problem for the males, but then some of the females have become so depressed over the death of a mate that they suicide also.
Now you understand why Last became so furious when you pulled that stunt of using his air tank and getting the bends. He and others of the older generation are trying to teach the younger society members how to balance their need for stimulation with safety awareness. Anyway, Telasta wanted me to tell you why she is leaving. She will be gone for about 10 days. You and I really need to talk about how all this will affect you emotionally.
Oh, I left out the most important detail. I think it will make you as happy as we will be if she DOES come up pregnant, but I really want her to MARRY me. She’s not so keen on that idea, but I think she will give in. How do YOU feel about it?”
By this time, I was relieved that nothing bad was going on. I’m sure I was smiling broadly at ALL the news. “Gosh, Papa! You KNOW how I will feel about it. Maybe if you marry Telasta in the United States
“Wil! For goodness’ sakes! Don’t you remember all that paperwork we signed before we left the States when I picked you up? That was a federal judge we met with, and I already adopted you. I was already your grandfather. When your father and mother died and you and I signed the papers, you became my SON back then. Did you not KNOW that you are already adopted? Honestly, I never THINK of you as being adopted. I think of you as being my true son, and that will never change. I want you to know that if and when Telasta and I have a child, you will STILL be our son.
You know, that’s not a bad idea about marrying Telasta in the United States
“ ‘scuse my language, Grandpa, but ‘HELL no!’ “ I laughed. “If anything, I’m afraid I am a little manic. Don’t surprise me with any more good news right now, though. You know how sometime your tickle box gets turned over and you laugh so hard you don’t want anybody saying anything ELSE funny, ‘cause you’re afraid you might hurt yourself if you laugh anymore? Well, I have reached that point with good news right now. I want to sit here quietly for awhile and eat my maquitri cookies and smile myself into delirium.”
“Sounds good to me,” Papa smiled. He and I each picked up a cookie, sipped our tea, and just smiled at each other like a couple of goony-birds for about an hour. Each of us was lost in our own thoughts, but I am not completely sure that we weren’t telepathically connected. We were in some weird state, and every once and again one or the other of us would burst into spontaneous laughter and happy tears.
The next week passed like a hummingbird. Papa and I both went about our normal chores and had good conversations about my schooling. We had firmly decided on a correspondence course from some school in Florida
We also had a lot of conversations about Papa’s upcoming proposal. I certainly gave Amado all the ideas I had in my head about how to approach this whole thing. Looking back, he was really gracious not to let me know that he and Telasta could not POSSIBLY get any useful suggestion from a kid who had zero experience when the two of them had lived far longer and were much more aware of everything involved. He acted like he really appreciated my input. To this day I really believe that he did.
I had come down just a tad off my ‘high’ from all the good news, though this school business had given my manic state a little bump. Everything was solid. Everything was good and joyous. I was looking forward with some real excitement over being rich and being able to travel the world, with a maternal grandfather who could teach me things that were not available to the greatest scientific minds of the day. I was a teenager in all respects, listening to the radio avidly. None of the ocean society could sing worth a durn, but I thought I sang pretty well. I went around singing almost all day every day while I went about my daily business.
It was during one of my ‘concerts’, walking through the living room on one of my standard clouds and singing loudly, that I heard Amado in his bedroom singing louder than I was. Boy, was he off key! I laughed and changed course to go to his room to tease him about being tone deaf.
As soon as I entered the hallway to his room, I knew he was not singing.
The blood rushed to my head as my heart connected with the fact that his ‘song’ was in fact a terrible wail. My grandfather was in pain. I turned the knob on his door and rushed in to find Papa naked and face down on the tile floor.
“Oh my GOD! Papa, what’s WRONG???!!” I yelled.
He turned his face toward me, lifting his body slightly off the floor with his hands, his face contorted, as he gave a milk curdling scream. I touched his face, which was redder than I had ever seen it. He was so hot that I knew he had some sort of infection.
I ran to the medicine cabinet and got the thermometer, shook it down, and put it to his lips. “Here! Put this under your tongue, and don’t bite down,” I instructed, knowing instinctually to treat him as one would treat a small child. His eyes were wildly questioning as he obeyed my orders. I did not know what to do, but I looked at the wall clock to mark the time. Seemed like three minutes was the right amount of time for taking temperature.
I ran back to the bathroom cabinet to get aspirins and a glass full of water. As soon as the three minutes had passed, I removed the thermometer from his mouth and handed him two aspirins and water. “Take these,” I instructed, knowing beyond a doubt that he had a fever even before I read the thermometer. My eyes were very good at that age, and the 105° jumped out at me. I wanted to take another reading, but I was pretty certain his fever could easily be that high.
He screamed again. I pulled a sheet out of his dresser, unfolded it, and covered him. Then I got one of his pillows off his bed and put it under his head. “Would you rather get in bed, Papa?”
“No,” he groaned. “Too hot. Floor much cooler. What’s HAPPENING to me?” He began to cry. I was frantic -- not knowing how to help him. I thank the creator that we seem to be invested with knowledge that goes beyond anything that is taught. His tears were a relief to me. I was grasping at straws, wanting him to be well, but it seemed like the crying might mean he had passed through the screaming pain. Crying was better than wailing.
“Where do you hurt, Papa?”
“Everywhere,” he answered as he continued to cry.
I sat on the floor beside him, wanting to give him comfort and support. After a minute or two, I knelt beside him and rolled him onto his back, re-covering him with the sheet. I put his pillow down and sat on it, placing his head in my lap and stroking his face. His skin felt like dry parchment. It felt almost as if it was blistered. I lifted his head out of my lap as I got up, putting the pillow back under his head. I ran to the kitchen, got a bowl of ice and poured water over it, put a clean washcloth in the bowl, and went back to Papa’s room as quickly as I could. I thought that maybe I could cool his fever with ice water and re-hydrate his skin at the same time.
By the time I got back to his room, Papa was having what appeared to be a full-scale seizure. I had never seen anything like this before, and was totally unprepared to know what to do. “What’s wrong, Papa?” I screamed through tears of frustration.
“Cold!” he said through a shiver.
I felt his forehead and realized that the fever had passed and in its place was a chill more severe than I thought possible. His teeth were chattering, so I did not dare put the thermometer back in his mouth. Only years later did I find out that his temperature may have reached as low as 45°. His skin was bumpier than it had been before. I ran into the bathroom with my washcloth and ran hot water over the cloth, returning to Amado in time to witness his temperature shoot back through the roof.
“Papa, I have GOT to get you into your bed. I don’t know what’s wrong with you, but it cannot be good for you to lie on this cold tile floor. Now, come on and help me get you into your bed if you can.” I was pleading with him, crying the whole time. I could not bring myself to badger him, but I also knew that he was too big a man for me to lift with no help.
He struggled to his feet, but was extremely unsteady. He stayed bent at the knees, his hands touching the floor to help keep his balance. I stood at his side, holding onto his left arm. He eventually hoisted himself into enough of an upright position to sling his arm over my shoulder and stumble his way toward the bed with minimal help from me. I had pulled back the covers, and when we got to the bed he just fell onto the mattress and let me cover him.
I did not know whether the aspirin had kicked in, since his triple-helix DNA left me more ignorant that I already was. I
had no idea what kind of medicine would even WORK on a society member. I was grateful that Papa had finally passed out and the chills and fever were both gone for the time being. Maybe the aspirin HAD worked. I knew that calling a land-person doctor would be both stupid and fruitless. I also knew that there was no way to reach Telasta or Last. I was terrified as I wiped Papa’s face with the slightly warm wet washcloth. My mind was trying to sort through the unknowable.
He was taking a bath when all this occurred. ‘Maybe he is having an allergic reaction to the kind of soap he was using,’ I thought. This was only one of the myriad thoughts I was investigating -- desperate to help my grandfather.
He was not sweating at all, which struck me as strange. Don’t people normally sweat when they have a high fever? Then I noticed something else: All the hair on his chest had fallen out. He was really well-developed, but his muscular chest, which had always been very hairy, had not one hair remaining. I pulled back the cover from his arms to see if his arms were still hairy. They were not. He was unconscious still. I went to the spot on the floor where he had been lying when I first discovered him. It looked as if somebody had plucked a pig. There was hair all over the floor. I walked back to the bed and pulled the cover back from his legs. If anything, he was more muscular than I had ever noticed, but his legs were smoothe as if he had shaved them. He still had hair on his head, and that surprised me, but he had no hair anywhere else on his body.
I rubbed my wet cloth over his arm, going from the wrist up toward the elbow. The cloth was snagged by his skin -- almost like there were barbs pointing downward on his skin. In a flash of understanding, I realized that he had tiny scales. With a shock of realization, I suddenly KNEW what the problem was.
When he had the DNA transplant, there must have been some kind of accident -- maybe in Last’s formula, or maybe Last had made a mistake during the surgery. I knew that Papa had been afraid of a full transition to amphibian and that Last had agreed to do only a DNA transition. I knew that Last would never purposely have violated Papa’s choice. The transition had taken a long time, but that was expected. What was NOT expected was a full transition.
I was completely out of my element here, but a judgment call was mandated and I had no help. I was on my own. I prayed to God that my reasoning was right. If I was right, he had developed scales and he had no plinkies. His scales were too tight against his skin without the necessary lubrication. Maybe -- just MAYBE -- that small problem was causing the chills and fever.
I did not want to wake him after all the anguish he had gone through ,but I did not want him to wake up and find me gone. I shook him hard. “Papa, wake up. Papa! I’m sorry to have to wake you, but I have to leave for a few minutes. Papa!” Slowly, he roused. His eyes were half-closed and he was pretty incoherent, but I was satisfied that he could understand me.
“Papa, your DNA transplant is changing your body. You have scales, but no colony of plinkies. I remember where Telasta left that jar the day I borrowed your binoculars and spied on her without meaning to discover her secrets. She has a jar of plinkies hidden on the shore by her house. If we pour plinkies on your body, you may get some relief. You are probably too weak to answer. Just nod your head if you understand.”
He nodded weakly. “I’ll be back as quickly as I can. You go back to sleep and you won’t even miss me.” He nodded again, turned back over, and was immediately asleep.
Time stood still. It was like one of those dreams where your legs are running, but your body does not go anywhere. I was so scared for Amado. My feet were trying their best to carry me to the spot where the jar was hidden. I felt frozen in time and space. The jar was exactly where I thought it was. It was a gallon glass jar with a big mouth. I grabbed it and ran carefully back to the house. The idea of losing my grip and dashing the jar against a rock, spilling its life-saving contents, made me slow down. It felt like hours - and no time at all - had passed when I opened the door and heard Amado in another full-scale scream.
“Oh, no,” I thought, “He’s having another fever.”
As I opened the door to his room, I knew I was right. He was on the floor again, face down, in such extreme pain that he had no idea I was in the room. The lid came off the jar easily. I poured its contents carefully all over Amado, trying my best to get this water on every part of his body -- praying that this was the right thing to do.
The screaming stopped instantly, his skin turned blue-green, and I stifled a scream of my own as the skin behind his ear tore open in a bloody gash that must have been gills. Amado made a little cry, then was silent. His breathing was no longer labored, but I could not tell whether he was asleep or awake. I sat on the side of his bed and watched him for the next few minutes. Although I knew my theory had probably been right, I was still terribly fearful and worried that Papa might need even more than this.
If I had been unprepared for the screams and then the tears, I was completely at a loss when the giggles began to come from the prone figure of my Papa. “Wil! Are you here?” he asked, lightly giggling the while.
My voice was choked as I answered, “Yeah. Are you okay, Papa?”
“Well, I’m not really sure, Wil. My skin feels different. I feel like something is massaging me -- almost tickling me, but not quite. What did you do?”
Without embellishment, I told him. To this day he has no memory of the ordeal he had just gone through. Apparently the pain had been so severe that the whole incident was blocked from his memory. He was unaware, till I told him, that he now had scales and gills. He felt behind his ears with something like amazement bordering on fear. I suspect it was just fear of the unknown. “Were you really not expecting this metamorphosis, Papa?”
“Hell, no, lad! When they did the DNA transplant, they told me that I could choose whether to become fully ocean-dwelling at a later time. Last is going to be terribly upset even though it’s my own fault that this happened. Last had two vials in the operating room. I picked them up and examined them. I probably reversed their order when I set them back down. I did not think about it at the time, but looking back I remember that Last used only one of the vials to inoculate me. He put the other one back in the refrigerator. He tried to talk me into becoming fully ocean-dwelling at that time, so it is my guess that he had one vial to do DNA transformation and the other to do full transformation. I hope this doesn’t make Telasta change her mind about marrying me.”
“How do you feel, Papa?”
“I have never felt better in my LIFE!!” he laughed. “If I had known that ocean society members felt this good, I would have done this YEARS ago.”
It was pretty obvious that he was telling the truth, for Amado had a glow to his skin (or should I say, scales) that I had never seen before. He was now dry from my pouring the plinky water over him, so his color was back to normal. “Okay, son, get out of here for a minute and let me get dressed. What day is today?”
I had to think for a minute, having lost my bearings during the crisis. “I think it’s Tuesday, Papa.”
“Oh, my. Scoot now, so I can get dressed. Telasta should be coming home today, and I would like to get a little practice
breathing with my gills and trying to talk with my backpack organ -- if it is developed, that is.”
I closed his bedroom door behind me as I left Papa’s bedroom. He was singing softly (and on key, by the way), so I KNEW he was feeling very good. “Oh. MY. GOD!!” I heard him exclaim through the closed door. He yanked the door open as I was reaching for it from my side. “Look at THIS!” he was laughing like a school kid, pointing down to his crotch.
“My goodness,” I was surprised as he. “You have an outer sheath. You pretty much don’t NEED clothes any more.”
“I guess not. No real point in dressing right now, since I’m going to try out my new gills. Come watch me,” he ordered as he went out the back door.
I followed him as he walked to the spot where I had seen Telasta dive from our back cliff. “I have seen Telasta dive from this spot a hundred times, and I know exactly where she hits the water. If it’s safe for her, then it’s probably safe for me now that I am a member of the Ocean Society.” With that, he lunged off the cliff while I sucked in a fearful lungful of air.
Splash! He hit the water below with force, but not much of a plume of water. He dove with the grace of an Olympic diver. He stayed underwater for at least 6 or 7 minutes before surfacing. He came up coughing and sputtering, but laughing at the same time. I could barely hear him as he yelled up the cliff face to me, “I forgot that I couldn’t breathe from my mouth. Long habits die hard, I guess. Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! I was doing really well, and then almost drowned myself when I became confused between breathing with my gills and breathing with my lungs. I took in a lungful of water inhaled through my mouth. My nose will not open underwater, you know. My gills work just fine, though. Gosh, Wil; without becoming evangelical, I sure hope you decide to transition some day. This is GREAT!
You might as well go back inside. I plan to be underwater for some time, and there is really nothing you could do to help me if I get in trouble, anyhow. See you in a little while,” he shouted as he went back underwater. He must have gone really deep, because in a few seconds (while I stood transfixed, staring out at the ocean) he SHOT out of the water and was partially airborne, giving a shout of glee before diving back into the welcoming waves. I smiled and meandered back into the house.
Maybe I was still working off the adrenalin high from all that had recently transpired. On automatic pilot, I went about sweeping up all the hair Papa had shed, and then I mopped his room and changed the sheets on his bed and straightened the covers. I put on a load of clothes to wash, which made a gentle whirring noise. No doubt that noise masked the arrival of the facet-aire bringing Telasta and Last.
“What happened to the welcoming committee?” Telasta’s melodious voice rang from the back door. I came running from the laundry room in time to see her buttoning her blouse. Apparently she had grown accustomed to the lack of clothing while visiting her people, and had just thought about dressing as she got out of the facet-aire. She was barefoot, as her feet were now entirely too long for shoes.
I laughed as I ran and embraced Telasta, she covering me with kisses and laughing in return. There was this constant joy we experienced at reunions, no matter how brief a time we were separated. Last came through the door, leaving his vehicle on the lawn in its helicopter state. He jumped into my arms like a rowdy schoolboy and bopped the top of my head with his knuckles. “What you been up to, laddie?” he asked, “and where is Joaquin? Is he too good to greet the likes of us???”
He laughed, but you could tell that he really was slighted that Papa had not been here for a proper greeting. “Oh, gosh!” I barked. “He knew you were coming today. It’s my fault for not taking over and preparing refreshments. He is preoccupied with his new state and all the day‘s excitement. Come to the kitchen and I will fill you in on our current events while I make some coffee.”
Telasta laughed good-naturedly. “Wil Dupepe, why don’t you let me fix refreshments. Your scones are not yet up to par, and your coffee is as weak as tea. I always thought people from Louisiana
“He transitioned! I thought he was going to die, his fever was so high. He said he must have reversed the vials with which you injected him, Last. He is not only triple-helix -- he is fully Ocean Society, scales and gills and all. It happened an hour or so before you arrived.”
“Where is he now?” Telasta asked, panic very clearly stressing her voice. “He will die if I don’t get to him soon. He has no plinkies.”
“He does NOW,” I corrected her. “I figured that was why his fever was so high. I remembered what you said about plinkies, and then I remembered seeing you scrape something into a jar down on your beach the day I spied on you with our binoculars. I figured that might be plinkies, so I ran and got your jar and poured it onto Papa and then he was okay. Is he still in danger? He said he wanted to practice being a Society member before you got home. He dove from the cliff you normally dive from, and he’s acting like a kid. I hope it was alright for me to let him go swimming. I’m not really sure I could have stopped him.”
“Well, I’m damned!” Last spat. “This is my fault. I set both of those vials in the operating room and left Joaquin alone in there without even THINKING that he might rearrange things absently with his curious investigation. I am so accustomed to dealing with our own, who know better than to touch any of my stuff. I never should have had both those vials in the room at the same time in the first place. I am so angry with myself for not at least labeling the tubes. If he had DIED…”
“ENOUGH self-recrimination, Last!” Telasta scolded. “There’s no harm done. Once again, Wil has proven to be a quick thinker in time of crisis and we can rejoice rather than mourn. You did EXACTLY the right thing, Wil. And you, old man, whether you admit it or no; what you did was serendipitous. If I am going to marry this man, I want him to be my equal. Since this accident happened, there’s no longer any thinking to be done. Joaquin has gone through all the pain already, so I will not have to agonize over that, at least. I was going to try to convince him to transition, but I’ll admit it made me a little nervous that he might never forgive me for putting him through such excruciating pain.
Wil, you are going to have to finish the scones, after all. I am going to dive into the ocean and find the love of my life.” She reached for the top button on her blouse, looking at me as she turned. “Better close your eyes, Wil Dupepe. I am not going to swim in these restrictions.” She walked through the kitchen door and into the living room, intent on
sailing through the back door and diving into the ocean. Instead, she screamed.
The sonorous and melodious voice of Avô echoed into the kitchen as Last and I followed Telasta into the living room. “Well don’t let ME stop you from undressing,” he said to Telasta, whose nimble fingers had frozen as they unbuttoned the bottom button of her blouse.
“Oh, my beloved! Oh, my husband-to-be!” She was quivering as she glided purposely and slowly toward Papa, took each of his hands into hers, and pressed her body against his. I would have turned away had I known what automatic function was about to happen. His outer sheath lifted, and then his inner sheath pulled up, as well. I had never really WANTED to know just how well-endowed my grandfather was; but now I knew.
Amado was not oblivious as to what was happening. Ever the gentleman, he turned his back on Last and me -- putting an arm around Telasta’s waist and holding her to his side. “Would the two of you excuse us for a little while?” he asked.
We muttered something -- Last grinning salaciously -- as we turned back to the kitchen. We did not go back into that room for several minutes. When we did, we saw that Telasta’s clothing lay on the floor exactly where we had seen her a few minutes before. “I don’t think I need to be in a hurry with the refreshments,” I said as I went to the closet
for hangars. Last gave a hearty guffaw as I continued, “I’m going to hang Telasta’s clothes on the bottom branch of that tree in the back yard. I do not want her to be uncomfortable, coming to the house naked.”
“You don’t know my daughter very well, Wil Dupepe, if you think a little skin and a few scales are going to make HER uncomfortable. They will be gone for awhile -- you’re right about that. The only reason they went off was to satisfy your sensibilities -- not hers. Joaquin probably still has some degree of shyness about nudity, but Telasta would not care if you WATCHED. You ever see another animal in the animal kingdom be prudish about public sex? No, sir. Not one. That kind of phony modesty was contrived by land people. I suppose your mores have some value to you, but our kind does not have a CLUE what purpose it serves.” He laughed again. “Yeah, hang her clothes down there. It won’t matter to her, but I’d bet that Joaquin will appreciate it.”
Last and I made some tea and sat to talk. After an hour or two, I decided to continue my cleaning when Last left to put up the facet-aire. I did not make refreshments. There was no telling when everybody would get home.
It was nightfall before my giddy grandfather and his glowing girlfriend came through the back door. She had put on the clothing I had hung on the tree, but Papa was still buck naked -- sheathed this time, but naked. “Excuse me a
moment,” Papa said to no one in particular as he took his right arm from around Telasta’s waist and went to his room.
“Now, where were we?” Telasta asked. “Oh, yes. I was about to make some scones. You probably figured out that there was no need to fix refreshments for awhile, huh, Wil?” she chuckled in a low voice. “I’m glad you did not make anything. ‘ no point. Besides, it will only take me a few seconds to prepare everything. I take it Last went to put up the facet-aire. We noticed it was gone when we came up the hill.”
“Yes… and yes,” I answered. There were absolutely TOO many thoughts ping-pong’ing around the inside of my head. I was incredibly happy that Telasta was home, happier still that she was happy about the way things turned out with Papa’s evolution, delighted that Papa was young enough to have carnal thoughts and a love worthy of his focus, and more than ready for refreshments.
Tea time (or coffee time) around here was always a joyous occasion. I had kept the water simmering on the stove. As there was probably a gallon or more hot water, Telasta opted to use some of it to dash into a dry flour mixture. THAT made me happy all over, for I knew she was making cream puffs.
“Do you want me to make the filling for the cream puffs, Telasta? We still have plenty of cream cheese, powdered sugar, and crème fresche. Should I use the mortar and pestle to pulverize some vanilla beans?”
A tiny giggle erupted from Telasta. “You catch on quickly, Wil. Yes, I am making cream puffs and I would LOVE for you to make the filling -- WITH vanilla, please. You have lots of questions flitting across your face. I like working with you in the kitchen. As in so many other areas of your life, you seem to know what to do and when to do it without trying to outwit or outplay anybody else. Oh, here’s the love of my life NOW,” she brightened as Papa floated into the kitchen, wearing some very light white gauzy pants and matching pullover shirt with a deep ‘v’ neckline that showed off his massive chest and no sleeves which put a spotlight on how large his arms were.
He had his back to the island behind which I stood, and put both arms around Telasta’s waist, nuzzling against her hips with his. “Stop that!” she laughed, slapping at his arm with one hand while holding in the other the bowl in which she beat the flour with a wooden spoon. It was obvious that his transformation had created a constant state of amorous intentions. I had not noticed before, but the transformation had also taken a good twenty years off his face. His limp had disappeared. Gone were the tiny wrinkles around his eyes. Gone, too, was the slight film he had had over his now-sparkling blue eyes. He laughed at the slap, and held her closer, nibbling at her ear lobes.
“I’ll take care of you later, my love,” he whispered loudly.
“And vice versa, man of my dreams,” she chortled.
“Oh, God! Do you two have time for anything or anybody else?” Last asked as he closed the side door behind himself. “You really SHOULD keep that door locked, Wil -- especially after the kidnapping incident.” His voice was uncharacteristically sharp. His tone made me a bit defensive.
“Okay, Gramps; but that door was the last thing on my mind when I came through it with that jar of plinkies.” My voice had an edge to it that mirrored his.
“Sorry! You’re right. Don’t be offended, grandson. You KNOW I love you with all my heart and trust you even more than that.”
Dad spoke up at that, swelling me with pride with his words. “Yeah, I really have not taken the time to thank you for saving my life, Wil. You have done so many things right in the recent past, we should all give you eight or ten ‘get-out-of-jail free’ cards for anything you might do wrong. Did Telasta tell you about her solemn assembly, or did I interrupt too soon for that?”
Telasta and I spoke at the same time, “You interrupted,” and she continued alone “too soon for that. I forgot that Wil is the only one out of the loop. I filled your papa in on events while we swam (he had to practice using his backpack organ, you know) and MY papa was there DURING the assembly. There’s not much to tell, really -- at least not the short version which I’ll give you now.” Without a lot of embellishment, Telasta told how she had lobbied for the return of her rights of procreation. She must have memorized her speech before standing before the assembly, for she repeated the entire argument (or so it seemed) to me. It was compelling. She most likely WON the argument when she pointed out how few Society members remained in existence and how few children had been born in the past hundred years.
“We have no guarantee of immortality,” she had offered. “Furthermore, now that I have interfaced with our land brothers and sisters, I am accepted as one of them. Recent events prove how easily we can manipulate public opinion among these land people, just as Teelee and I did all those millennia ago with her fountain. One of the biggest fears we all had when we voted that I remain celibate was that our kind would be discovered because of my size. That is no longer an issue when they believe me to be one of them, and in this day and time NOBODY believes our kind even exists. I have already broken the letter of the agreement concerning celibacy, even if not the spirit. As long as Joaquin was double-helix, there was no danger that I would become pregnant. Since that has now changed, I COULD become pregnant. I have no intention of giving up the love of my life. Since he may now be able to make me pregnant, I ask that the rest of you add your permission to my own and rescind the law forbidding me to make love. Bear in mind that I will break the law if I must, but I would rather you change the law.”
Her speech lasted only ten minutes or so. When Telasta stepped from the podium, her father took the stand. Last, as moderator, addressed the crowd: “So do we have a consensus?” They all answered in a happy shout, “Aye!” “From henceforth, the law forbidding children to Telasta is rescinded.” The solemn assembly ended with the entire assemblage standing and applauding, shouting, crying, happy to allow Telasta to partake in the birthright of them all.
It was years later before I heard any of the rest of the story. Quite a few of the females wanted to know how Telasta survived Joaquin’s ‘stabbings’ with his huge ‘swordfish.’ Almost all the Ocean Society was scandalized when they heard that Telasta planned to MARRY Joaquin. “It’s STAVERY, I tell you,” Teelee (and others) repeated again and again -- to which Telasta replied, “Yes, but I’ll let him go out for groceries occasionally.” The concept of one man and one woman for LIFE seemed a severe punishment to these people whose lives spanned centuries and millennia.
Reportedly, Telasta told her mother, “Now, Teelee, I do not intend to keep him chained to the bed. Eventually he will probably become like my own father and leave me to follow his own pursuits for years at a time.”
“Months!” Teelee corrected. “Only MONTHS! Your father has NEVER left me for years. I would find somebody else if he ever did such a thing. A woman has NEEDS, you know.”
“Yes, Mother. I have heard you say that often; but you just pointed out that Last is in thrall to you -- with or without the marriage vows, so what’s the difference.”
It was reported that Teelee gave a big sigh at this point and said, “Nevermind! I’m tired of fighting. It’s your life, and if you want to live it as a slave, who am I to stop you?”
The narrative ended and Telasta took a small breath to deliver her final sentence, “but I had no idea that Joaquin had already made the transition and would be so eager to try to make children on the day I returned.”
There was laughter all ‘round. Telasta had dipped out dollops of dough onto a cookie sheet and placed them in the hot oven. I put my bowl of Bavarian Cream ingredients under the mixer and added the vanilla which I had pulverized with the mortar and pestle during the telling of the tale. The mixer was noisy, and Papa had moved to the second island and sat on one of the tall stools at the back side of the island, his elbows on the countertop and his chin in his palms. He looked adoringly at his bride-to-be. I swear he was growing younger by the hour. He looked almost as young as Telasta.
When the mixing was complete and I turned off the mixer, Papa said -- mostly to Telasta, but including the rest of us, “You ready for a wedding, then?”
“If it’s the only way I can keep you to myself, then I suppose you will have your way with me, Mr. Dupepe.”
“I’ve already DONE that. Will you take my last name?”
“I thought you would take MINE.”
“You don’t HAVE a last name -- not really. We made up ‘Ferragamo’ for the sake of legalizing you. I guess I will take your last name, though, if you want me to. You should not have to give in on everything, after all.”
Telasta’s look as she turned her gaze upon Papa would have melted steel with its look of pure adulation. “No, my love. ‘Ferragamo’ was my last name in name only. I am the only Ocean Society member with a surname. Once I marry you, I will have the only surname that has ever meant anything to me. It should be a name that binds me to you and you to me. That name, which also includes the name of my son -- my ONLY son; should be ‘Dupepe.’”
It would have been sickeningly sweet had not the sentiment been real. To take the edge off the sweetness and bring the conversation back to some semblance of normalcy, I offered, “I may FEEL like your son, and you may FEEL like my only mother; but until you adopt me, neither will THAT be real. I mean, you guys have already done a lot of stuff, but you’d better get a move on.”
“Right!” Avô said. “So you’ll marry me, then?”
“Yes, I will, and I’m of the same opinion as Wil -- the sooner the better.”
We spent the rest of that night, all four of us, discussing marriage plans and adoption plans and such. Papa made a few calls in the late morning hours. Ubatuba is two hours ahead of Louisiana Louisiana and ownership or part-ownership of at least half a dozen concerns in the USA U.S.
After all the calls were made, the adults had things they wanted to do. Having spent a traumatic day yesterday, then talked all night last night, I was the only one who needed sleep. I excused myself in the early evening and told them they could find me in my bedroom. Maybe they waved or said ‘goodnight’ or something of the sort. I didn’t CARE about reactions at this point. I hit the bed without even undressing and did not wake again till morning.
Papa was sitting on the side of my bed, one hand on my chest. “Wil. Wil. It’s 6 o’clock. I hate to wake you, but if you do not get up for a little while you are going to get your days and nights confused. Arnold
I gave a big stretch and smiled up at my papa. “Yeah, I had a really good sleep. I’m ready to get up. Thanks. Would you mind telling Arnold
“Sure. Take your time. Telasta and I are entertaining him. Even though he cannot remember about all the kidnapping events, his emotions still tell him that he can be comfortable with us. You know what? I am surprised at how comfortable I am with HIM. You take your time and I will have a cup of coffee waiting for you.”
I crawled out from under the cover. My clothes from this morning were in the laundry basket in the bathroom. Papa must have taken my clothes off of me. I got a towel from the cabinet, threw it over the towel rack just outside the tub/shower combo, and turned on the faucet to get the water warm. It only took a minute for the hot water to get to the faucet. I added the right amount of cold water, turned on the shower, and got in.
As I dried off and put on fresh clothes, socks, and shoes; I thought what a nice way this was to start the day. The memory of my old room in Louisiana Arnold
“Hey, sleepy head! Where have you been these last few weeks? I’ve missed you.” Arnold
“Oh, gosh, Arnold
“It’s alright, Wil. We told him you spent the summer with your mother’s people in Louisiana Arnold Arnold
Before Papa got out the door, Arnold
“Thank you, Arnold
“Wow! That’s some news, huh, Wil? When are they getting married?”
“Probably in a week or two.”
“So how did he know I would be gone?”
“Gone? Where? When?”
“He said he thought it would not be possible for me to come to the wedding. If they get married after this week, I’ll be back in the States. I’m going to college.”
“Well, THAT’S good news -- and bad news, too. I’ll miss you, but you really need a good education. Papa did not know you were going back to the States, as far as I know. They are not getting married here. They are getting married in Louisiana
“Louisiana Baton Rouge Baton Rouge
This was my friend -- not my BEST friend, but a loyal friend. I had to remind myself that this was Arnold Arnold Arnold Arnold
The wedding was not going to happen as quickly as we all wanted it to happen. There was too much preliminary work to be done before we could all travel to the States, and we had a great deal of preparation to do in Brazil
My correspondence courses were now an established part of my life -- I had an “A” average in the second 6-weeks of the courses. Telasta had moved into our house, though it could be argued that most of her life (and Papa’s life at this point) was spent in the ocean. Neither Papa nor Telasta slept very much, so they were able to spend a lot of time together while I slept and then spend large chunks of time with me.
We did so many things together as a family in that first month after Telasta’s return from the solemn assembly. I found myself harking back to the way Toby and Corinth
There were many times when Papa and Telasta were absent for days at a time. During those times they had a tutor to come in and test my knowledge on many subjects. I would be turning 14 the last part of this year. I was in the eighth grade, but my pace had been accelerated by the constant infusion of knowledge from Papa and Telasta, PLUS all the help the tutor gave me. I was already doing college-level work in some areas.
My desk had always been in my large bedroom until Avô Amado’s transition. Everything ended and began again with his transition. Several times I got up from my desk and went to the kitchen for a snack only to find that Papa had been here and left again without my knowledge. I hated to be so petty as to let that bother me, but it did.
After that first month of constant attention from Telasta and Papa, I was more or less on my own. While I understood with my head that Avô was feeling better and looking younger than he had in many years -- so naturally he was going to be clicking his heels and sowing his oats -- none of his adventures included me. We had done a role reversal wherein I was now the staid and studious adult while Joaquin had become the adolescent (or RE-adolescent.) I had heard older people say many times, ‘If I could go back to being a young person and know what I know now…’ Well, Papa had done just that.
The solution to this brewing resentment was simple: move my desk into the living area of the house. Papa had no intention of leaving me out of his life. It was just that there was so much MORE to his life these days, and he was conflicted over how to utilize his newfound freedom. One might think that such an enlarged life would best be served by more regimentation. That’s true -- it would. Realistically, however, when there is an abundance of anything then the need to budget is lessened. Papa went from having maybe a hundred years to live to a life that was hard to measure from the front end of it, and he went from being able to live anywhere on earth to being able to live anywhere on earth, air, or water. The entire globe was his oyster.
There was another thing that now separated us: diet. Avô and I had eaten nearly every meal together since I first came to Brazil
Moving my desk to the living room caused me to be more religious in my studies, as I had this constant cliff-top view of the ocean and only had to walk to a window in the front of the house to see mountains, so my mind and senses were better stimulated when I stayed at my desk than anywhere else I could have been. The other benefit of staying at my desk in its new location was that when Avô Amado made a quick dash through -- naked all the time now -- I could catch him and he would be compelled to sit for a cup of Earl Grey tea and regale me with tales of his new adventures. Telasta was almost always with him, but rather than come home with him she usually went to her own house.
Finally, I had to confront all my concerns and emotions. Once I had a clear mandate in my head, I cornered Papa during one of his pit stops and told him that I wanted him to schedule a family assembly for Telasta and him and me.
“What’s wrong, Wil? I mean, I know that Telasta and I have been neglecting you for the past month or so. We are working so hard toward the final arrangements for our marriage and our new upcoming family life with you that we have no time for family life with you. Ironic, isn’t it?”
“Yes, it is. That’s part of what I want to talk about. Actually, I’m not even certain myself whether I can identify all the issues about which we might need to converse. I only know that I’m getting close to an emotional crisis and I need help from my family. When can we talk?”
“I’ll go get Telasta right now, Wil. We always have the time. It’s just that we are doing so much that we seem to NEVER have time. Why don’t you go get some cream puffs out of the freezer and put on a pot of coffee. I’ll be right back with Telasta. It won’t take her but a second to get dressed.”
“No, Papa. Tell her not to bother with clothing. In her most comfortable life, she doesn’t wear it and you don’t either. The family I’m being adopted into is an Ocean Society family. Let ME get used to the way YOU live. When a llama suckles an orphaned lamb, the llama does not have to BECOME a lamb. She’s going to be my mother as you are my father. I do not look on her with lust OR with shame. It’s a cultural thing. Back in the states there are nudist colonies. Those people raise children and those children are not psychologically damaged by having naked parents. If it will make the two of you more comfortable, I will take off my clothing when we have family time together.”
“Okay. You’re right; and that brings up some other subjects we need to talk about. I’ll be back in a jiffy.”
Papa moved a lot faster these days. He was out of his chair, running out the door, diving from the cliff before I had time to fill the coffee pot with water. I smiled and gave a sigh of relief that we could be so different and yet still make room in our lives and thoughts for one another. It was comforting to know that I could say what was on my mind without fear of reprisal of any kind, and that my folks would try to come to some compromise with me.
I had just popped the cream puffs in the oven when Pops and Telasta came through the front door. They had decided to walk from Telasta’s house, so they were fully dressed except for shoes. Both of them had such long feet that I’m sure nobody makes shoes that would fit them. Seeing Telasta for the first time in nearly a month made me shy with her, and she picked up on that immediately. All I could think of for breaking the ice was, “Hi!”
She did not even say that much. She merely walked behind the island where I was, came up behind me, and wrapped her arms around me with her face against mine. We stood that way for quite a few seconds before she said in a whispery voice, “You okay?”
“Yeah,” I said, “I think so. Let me turn off the oven. It’s hot enough so the cream puffs will finish cooking, and if I turn it off maybe they won’t burn.” I smiled, but was not in a mood for laughter. “The coffee pot and cups are on the table. Why don’t we sit there?”
Papa sat at the head of the table, Telasta on his right and I on his left. He automatically placed his right hand palm up on the table and she placed her left hand in his. They were smiling like teenagers in love, looking at one another every few seconds. “Telasta wanted you to know that the clothing thing is a non-issue.”
“Joaquin,” she interrupted in a gentle tone, “I can talk for myself. Wil, I have not been avoiding you at all, and certainly not for anything so silly as clothing. We have just been extremely busy trying to make everything happen without too much trauma. You know that all the wealth of the oceans is available to me. That has not been the case for Joaquin up till now. Most of the Ocean Society have our own stashes of gold and jewels that we have gathered over the years. Long ago, I showed Joaquin where all my stashes are -- all those on land, that is.
Over 90,000 members of the Ocean Society have died since the last of our species was created. Each of those people left hoards of wealth behind, and at least a few members know where all that wealth is hidden. It was important for Joaquin to know where all our family wealth is hidden, so that’s one of the things I had to show him. Then we have had to test all the functions of Joaquin’s new body, including the shark aversion glands. The only way to be sure his body could handle certain poisonous venoms was to get him bitten. Poor man has been bitten over a hundred times in the last month. The most frightening thing to which he had to be exposed was a Great White shark. They are mostly immune to our shark-aversion glands. Joaquin had to learn how to deal with them in close proximity without getting eaten.
In short, everything works. He has also had to undergo a rigorous schooling process, from learning a whole new vocabulary with his backpack organ to making voluntary adjustments to his gills when the salinity of the water changes. There are limits of temperature our bodies will withstand, as well. We have shown your papa where the underwater vents are that blow out water so hot it will take off meat all the way to the bone. He now knows how to address lots of potential problems he had not even dreamed of. Underwater living is quite different from land living. I did not want him to make those adjustments on his own without the advantage of my training and experience. Last volunteered to do the training, but he pretty well guessed that I might want to help in training my own mate. So that’s what we have been doing. I trust you understand.”
“Yes. I do NOW. Hmph! I didn’t think about any of that kind of stuff. I just thought you and Papa were out there trying to make a brother for me, pretty nearly every minute of every day. Yeah, I was feeling pretty neglected. This is one more time I’m feeling foolish for not trusting you guys.”
“It’s not a matter of trust, Wil,” Papa offered. “Families need to know what other family member are doing. Call it a lack of trust, or call it concern. When you love somebody, you want to know that they are okay -- physically, emotionally, even sexually. You probably felt like we were not thinking of you at all, when in fact we were thinking of you all the time. We’re home now. Everything that we needed to do is done, and boy! has that been a whirlwind bit of business. We borrowed one of Last’s facet-aires and traveled around the globe at least twice. We could never have swum everywhere we needed to go.
We also went to Louisiana
I took the liberty of telling your mother’s family and my brother about my engagement. Tentative plans are for the wedding to take place next Thanksgiving. We will certainly invite your aunts to the wedding. They may not come, but my brother almost surely will. Did you ever meet my brother?”
“I met two of my father’s uncles one time when he took me with him to their homes. I believe my father was wanting to borrow money from them. We got rather a cool reception, as I recall; but I remember them both. Let’s see, they were named Avon and Ariel, weren’t they?”
“That’s right. Boy, you have a good memory. Ariel died last year, but Avon is doing well and he and I are still good friends. He does not know much about my life, but he is a good man and I would like for you to know him. I probably cannot visit him again after the wedding, since he is likely to notice that I am not aging. I will tell a small lie at the wedding and tell him that I have had plastic surgery in order to keep my young wife interested.” He grinned, but I could tell he still had something on his mind. He looked down at Telasta’s hand entwined in his, then cocked his head at an angle and looked at me. “What do you call Telasta’s father, Wil?”
“You mean ‘Last’?”
“Yes. That’s what Telasta calls him, too. Recently I have been giving a lot of thought to the names we give people. ‘Wil’ is a good name for you. It fits. However, there are times when I call you ‘son’, and Telasta likes to call you ‘baby boy.’ You call me ‘Beloved’ and ‘Papa’ and ‘Pops’ and ‘Grandfather.’ I like every name you call me. Even so, you are almost 14-years-old -- nearly grown -- and there is one name you never call me: Joaquin. Honor is too big a thing to fit into the package of how we address someone. Honorifics, like ‘Mr.’ or ‘Mrs.’ or ‘Father’ do not create honor. Honor comes from the heart. While it cannot be seen by the untrained eye, we clearly know when someone presents with an attitude of honor or an attitude of
sarcasm and dishonor. There are some clear signals when someone is being disrespectful toward someone else. I would like for you to call me by my name. I want you to know me as I am, and that means knowing me not only as your ancestor and benefactor, but as your friend. Now that my place on this earth is fairly free from the fear of death, I am slated to live a longer life than you unless and until you transition. So we are the same age. We are contemporaries. What do you think? Could you do that? Could you call me by my name?”
“Give me a day or two, Papa. Ever since I came here, you have filled an office in my life -- the office of ‘father.’ For children to call their parent by a first name is not without precedent, but neither is it common. Do you remember those 3 Cavanaugh boys in Leesville , Louisiana Jonesboro
“Fair enough, then.” Papa wrinkled his forehead. I noticed that none of the lines remained once he released that facial shrug. “What other business do we need to discuss? Do you have anything else, Telasta?
“Did you run over the details of adding Wil to our bank accounts? and did you mention to him that we are thinking of moving to Paris
“Paris?!” I asked. “Why do we want to live in Paris
“I think he’s finally become comfortable with the money issue, Joaquin. You see where his attention went, and it was NOT the bank business. Well, Wil, the main reason we want to live in Paris Paris
I was just a little giddy with this news. “Most of what I ever heard about Paris
“Well, and then there’s that. Yes, I didn’t want to say it, but your father was very aware that Paris
That brings us to the other subject I asked about. Joaquin, did you get Wil signed up on our bank accounts?”
“No, I did not. I shall do that first thing in the morning.”
“I know you already taught Wil how to drive, which means he needs somebody to teach him to drive.” she laughed. I am kidding, but I really do want to spend some time with him, teaching him some of the finer points about driving. He will be getting his driver’s license when we go to Baton Rouge
“Hold your horses there, my young heifer. It’s traditional for the FATHER to teach his son to drive.”
“Oh, Hell, no!” Telasta laughed lightly. “I have SEEN you drive, and there’s no way in God’s green earth that I’m going to let MY son model that.”
So it was settled. Telasta and Dad did not leave me again (during waking hours, at least) from that moment until the wedding. And that clothes issue? Telasta is a clothes HORSE!! We flew to Rio one day. She bought over $50,000 worth of clothes and shoes just for herself. (Last created a foot cream that safely accelerated the shrinkage of their feet, so she was able to get some really cute shoes.) I have no idea where she put all those clothes. Pop’s closet is big, but it’s not THAT big. Maybe she stored them at her house.
Driving was fun. We still had the Jeep, but Telasta wanted me to learn to drive the Mercedes which she kept at a rented house in Rio . She said that Papa wanted to buy his brother Avon a Mercedes before the wedding. By practicing in her Mercedes, I could take my licensing test in a car with which I was familiar and then give it to Avon . Like every other subject, Telasta was the best driving teacher ever.
CHAPTER 7
Because of the realization that my folks treasured my life, as evidenced by the time they spent with me, I became much more interested in their lives. We had a lot of fun together on the zip line, among other things. Papa taught me how to scuba dive, which was not nearly as complicated as people make it out to be. He and Telasta shared secrets with me that they shared with no-one else, not even Last.
Ocean Society members who have land homes usually choose to live near the hiding repository for their major fortune. “Home is where the heart is” came to have a whole new meaning on my first day of scuba diving while my parents swam with me. Not only was it fun, but it was a multiple ‘eureka’ moment.
The water was like glass. My vision was excellent to a distance of at least a hundred feet. Both Papa and Telasta looked like they were dressed in shimmering leotards. Papa was more green, while Telasta was varying shades of blue with flecks of gold. I couldn’t help thinking that with Papa’s outer shroud and Telasta’s interesting color pattern, it was doubtful that anybody would see either of them as being naked. In fact, except for their lack of scuba gear, another diver might not even realize he or she had seen an Ocean Society member.
Just underwater, within 20 meters of the spot where we always hit the water as we flew from the zip line, was a cave. I was new enough to the ocean that I was still afraid of all the interesting life forms. I would NEVER have approached that cave without Papa’s encouragement. He was signaling me to follow Telasta into that cave as he was doing.
The entrance to the cave was half lighted -- enough to be able to see that there was a sharp turn to the right at the back of the cave. Papa got to that turn seconds after Telasta had disappeared past the turn. I noticed that the corridor to the right became better lit, and suspected that Telasta had lights in this cave similar to the lights in the cave under Perfection.
When I made the turn, my suspicions were confirmed. This corridor was not smooth enough to be manmade, and the lights nor their switches were obvious enough to be found by any accidental intruder. Immediately after the right turn was a left turn. This corridor was CLEARLY manmade. Once again the influence of Last was evident. This manmade corridor went forward about 10 feet, then there was a tight crevasse straight upward before reaching another tight channel forward again.
The final tunnel opened up once I got past that last channel. It was extremely dark at this point, and doubtful that any accidental investigator would have come this far. Telasta pressed another light switch and my vision was restored.
Both Papa and Telasta were trying to talk to me. I almost laughed aloud when I realized that the humming noise I kept hearing was the two of them using their backpack organs as they looked at me and pointed toward the far end of the channel, then pointed at a small opening off the side of this tunnel. All I could do was respond to their hand signals, as I had not even BEGUN to understand their underwater language.
I swam to that point where they gathered near a big hole in the wall of the tunnel. Once I joined them, Telasta showed me where to touch in order to turn on a light. What a sight this light revealed. We were looking into a cathedral of a cave. It was beautiful. It appeared that this had been built by the hand of man in an age long past, then conscripted and modified by the ocean in the centuries since. At the point one would have expected to see an altar at the front of this vast space was a grand staircase curving up to the roof of the cave. Telasta led as we all three swam up the stairs and opened what had until now been invisible. The point where the stairs ended had not been recognizable as doors until Telasta opened them and turned on a light just past them.
When we were all three inside the doors, Telasta closed them. Just a few more steps and my head came out of the water into air. I heard Telasta’s voice say, “You can take off your face mask, Wil. This part of the cave is vented to the outside. I have to use a sump pump occasionally when the water rises too high from those doors. If you ever come here alone, be sure to close the double doors or you will flood this cave.”
This would more properly be called an office than a cave. It was well-lighted. There was even a roll-top desk against the far wall. To the left of the desk was a walk-in safe. I had a friend once whose father was a banker. He had taken us into a similar safe, except this one was much larger.
“This is our bank, Wil. To be more exact, this was once the gold reserve for Lemuria.” Telasta’s voice was almost reverential. I knew she did not worship money. Perhaps she was feeling a reverence for that long-dead civilization. “I built my house, and your Papa later built his, on the site of the ancient city of Utumalacuopa Brazil
We stepped into the vault together. I do not know how deep the vault was, because there were stacks of gold blocking my vision. On a shelf in the left front side of the vault were stacks of paper money, divided into various currencies. There was even a stack of old Confederate money. There were trays at the right front side of the vault filled with various precious gems, sorted by type -- one drawer with hundreds of emeralds, sectioned off by cut; another with rubies, similarly sorted and so forth. I suppose I had expected Telasta’s treasure trove to more nearly resemble the picture I had in my head of a pirate’s cave -- vats overflowing with gold and sparkly things, necklaces and rings set with huge precious stones -- we have all seen that picture; but true to form, Telasta was organized. She came from organized people, and they all came from an organized civilization.
“Most of the gold has been here since Lemuria sank,” Telasta explained. “Every time I found a sunken ship or junket, I felt free to add paper money or anything of value to my hoard. Occasionally I came upon a vessel that was still in process of sinking. If I saved even one person from drowning (and I did that many times), then I considered everything taken from that vessel as belonging to that person.
I remember one time that I put a man ashore. He had a large knot on his head from an injury sustained when his ship had run aground during a storm. He was unconscious, but I got him out of the water in time to save his life. Everyone else onboard had drowned. He had on an ugly striped uniform and was wearing leg irons. While I was not highly knowledgeable about land people, I had heard stories of how certain men enslaved other men. We in the Ocean Society have NEVER believed slavery to be just.
While that man lay unconscious, I swam back to the ship again and again, bringing money and gold and anything of value back to where he lay, placing it all on the ground around him. I removed his manacles, using a key I had found on the belt of what must certainly have been a dead guard. Most of the drowned men on that ship were poorly dressed. However, when I went into the closet of one of the nicer quarters, there were beautiful sets of men’s clothing -- everything from suits to shoes and monogrammed handkerchiefs. I removed the slave clothing from the man and dressed him in the better clothing, then I left. I often wondered whatever became of that man.”
Telasta’s stories often made ME wonder what made her tick. She had a sense of justice that did not depend on the other person’s education, religion, race, or social standing. She knew right from wrong and always chose that which was right. The fact that her treasure was so well hidden told me that she was nobody’s fool, regardless how good-hearted she was. Now that she had revealed this treasure to me, I knew that she trusted me and that she expected me to adopt her way of thinking as my own.
As we left what I came to call “the treasury”, Telasta said something to Papa before she swam back the way we had come. Papa and I waited in the main corridor just outside the cathedral cave until she returned. Again, Telasta said something with her backpack organ and we all swam toward the far end of that corridor. She must have gone back to turn out the lights.
The exit to the ocean on this end of the corridor was configured very similarly to the entry below our house, and thus it was unlikely that a diver would accidentally find it from either end. I did not know where we were -- not at first. I blindly followed Papa, with Telasta still in the lead.
When Telasta headed for the surface at a high swim speed, I could tell that she struck the surface fast enough to become airborne. Papa did the same thing and he, too, disappeared through the water ceiling above me. I, of course, was ill-equipped to fly anywhere. I swam to the surface, stuck my head out of the water, and removed my face mask. We were at the exact spot where I had first seen Telasta’s true nature -- directly below her house. Telasta was already dressed. She gave me her hand and pulled me onto the boulder where she stood. Papa had on his pants and was pulling a shirt from the large jar where it had been secreted.
A lot happened during that year before the wedding. I had another birthday -- number 14 -- and again nobody offered to celebrate; not even a ‘happy birthday.’ It bothered me, but how could I complain when every day was so full of life and love? Maybe I should have said something, but if I had to remind somebody to wish me a happy birthday, then I did not WANT their well-wishes.
The question, “Why is there a grand piano in our living room?” was answered one evening as Pops and I sat on the patio playing chess. Telasta was better at chess than either of us, but she found it boring. She said that once all the permutations were memorized it became no more interesting than tic-tac-toe. Being a family does not mean everybody has to participate in every event. For Telasta, as for me, knowing the other person was in the same house was enough. This particular night I came to appreciate the fact that Telasta knew how to play by herself.
And play she did. At the time, I didn’t know Chopin from Shubert; Ravel from Ringo Starr; Malaguena from a minuet; Bartok from Britney Spears. Papa beat me at chess and beat me badly that night. Whatever she played on that piano, she played it with such skill and such heart as I had never heard. Hearing her play was more like being inside the music than listening on the outside. Forgive the analogy, but it truly was like being part of the ocean rather than sitting in a boat on top.
I continued my correspondence courses all the way through 1962 and ‘63, including the summers. While I had technically only finished the 9th grade, Papa kept telling me that I could probably pass final exams for graduation at any point in time. Remember, I was learning all the time -- if not from my course books, then from Papa, Telasta, Last, Teelee, and sometimes Fankin or his father-in-law Eld. When I could follow the reasoning of Last, Fankin, or Eld for more than a ten-minute conversation I was proud of myself. Listening to them was like post-doctoral work.
Exposure to such deep-thinking people had me questioning my own reason for existence. I can date the beginning of my search for meaning back to that first trip to Perfection. If self-entertainment was not a raison d’etre, a reason for being (and it clearly was not), then what was?
Transitioning had never been formally offered to me. I wasn’t yet convinced that I wanted such a gift, if gift it was. Living an indeterminate period of time might be attractive to lots of people, but to me it lacked the sense of urgency that drives most mortals. I decided early on that I worked better under pressure. I KNEW I did not want to look like a 14- or 15- year old for the next twenty or thirty years, for one thing. Someone once told me that I was old at five years old. In my mind I was always grown, and I darned sure wanted to LOOK grown. I decided that if Last ever DID offer me the gift of transitioning, I would not consider it until I convinced myself it was what I really wanted.
I began to ask the hard questions of both my new parents. They helped me to isolate the things that were already important to me. It was important, for one thing, to tell the truth -- if not all the time, then close. It was important to feel emotions -- my own and those of the people around me. Imagination was important, as was working to bring into being that which existed in my head. Puzzle-solving was important, which is why Papa loved working jig-saw puzzles, word puzzles, riddles, and learning to read the intentions of others. He could tell more about a person in seconds by reading their faces than most psychiatrists could tell in months of therapy. Helping other people to achieve their goals was important -- to both my parents and to me. Telasta often quoted something she had read: Give a man a leg up, not a handout.
I knew I was lost. I had thought about my reason for being and what my purpose should be for months and still was no closer to an answer. Finally I decided to simply live and learn. If there was a deity (I was pretty sure there was), then it was HIS responsibility to guide me toward the path for which I had been created.
Papa allowed Brolo to take me to some of the family business facilities in South America where I met the managers and learned how the businesses were conducted. We frequently stayed in the homes of the managers on these jaunts. Brolo promised my folks to see that I kept up with my correspondence courses on a daily basis, though my self-motivation made that promise unnecessary. We were never gone on these trips for over a week at a time. Papa and Telasta did not want to risk another emotional event like the last time they were absent for so long.
Just before Brolo collected me in the facet-aire for the autumn inspection of one of the coffee plantations (Pop called it the ‘autumn inspection’ only because his bookkeeping department was based in the U.S.
The week of the wedding had finally arrived. We got to Baton Rouge Brazil Baton Rouge
Our plane was probably not observed entering Louisiana
Nobody at the airfield was alerted to the uniqueness of our steed. Everybody who worked at this private airstrip was paid off handsomely by my folks. You could never convince any of them that a crime had been committed.
The caterer met us and drove us to a local Mercedes dealership where Papa paid cash for a brand new top-of-the-line powder-blue Mercedes. From there we drove to the Hilton where Telasta had rented the penthouse suite. There were a flurry of telephone calls to and from that suite, and only one of them was for me -- from Arnold
After we talked, Arnold Arnold
We drove to the LSU campus where they gave me the grand tour. Ronnie and Arnold shared a room in the football stadium. Living conditions seemed Spartan to me after living on one of the most beautiful coasts of South America, but Arnold was so much happier than he had ever been in Brazil
Ronnie had a night class, so we dropped him off at the university. I really did not want to spend time with somebody new. I wanted to spend some time with Arnold Arnold
“Shoot, Arnold
I’m sure the shock I felt showed on my face. “Might as well just ask the question,” I said out loud. “Doesn’t your family have lots of money? I mean, you have this fine car and you’re paying out-of-state tuition. Don’t you have anything saved up? I don’t mean to pry -- just asking -- and you can tell me to mind my own business if you want.”
“No, that’s okay, Wil. I don’t have to pay out-of-state tuition for a couple of reasons. My mother’s family is from Louisiana
“Yeah, I caught it; but I figured if you didn’t want to be completely open about that, then I was not going to force your hand. So did your father kick you out of the house?”
“He disowned me. I get nothing -- not now, not when he dies. I’m on my own. I got a couple of scholarships to come to college, got a grant to cover book costs and lab costs, and then I got a loan for the rest that I need. The car was my mother’s graduation gift to me -- before Daddy told her I’m gay. Oh, well… I don’t have any family, anymore. You probably don’t want anything to do with me now, either.”
“Oh shut up, you big sissy. You are a better man than your father will ever be, far as I’m concerned. I was really pissed off at you for hinting about your orientation. I thought you knew that my friendship was unconditional, and it hurt my feelings that you didn’t come right out and tell me. I always kind of knew that you and the female of the species did not mix. Then there’s your preoccupation
with body building. It all fits. I have still not had sex with a girl, so who knows? Maybe I’m gay, too, and just have not found out yet.” I laughed at this point, since I was already having fantasies about sex and they NEVER included another man.
“I really doubt you are gay, Wil. My ‘gaydar’ is pretty good, and you have never triggered any alarms. Besides, you would be having fantasies about other guys by now if you were gay.” He must have read my mind.
“Laying all seriousness aside, Arnold
“Absolutely not! You’re right if you are thinking that he’s ‘family,’ but he is too much of a girl for my taste. Yuchhhh!”
“Let’s get back to the ‘dinner’ discussion. Is there a good seafood restaurant around here? I have plenty of money, and it’s burning a hole in my pocket. Take me someplace nice, and I’ll pay for the gas and dinner.”
“ Are you sure, Wil?” he asked, and I gave him a strong affirmative nod. “Okay, then,” he cranked the car, pulled out of the parking lot, and left rubber as we ran through a light that was in process of turning red.
“You ran that red light, Arnold
“No, Wil. I’m pretty sure it was pink; you know -- when the yellow light is almost red. There’s a gas station just off campus. Let’s gas up and then we can run over to Nicholson Drive and go over the bridge to Brusly (Brooly). There’s a great seafood restaurant there. It’s noisy and casual and lots of the college kids eat there.”
“Sounds good to me.” I offered, as he pulled into the gas station. He filled up while I went inside and paid the bill.
We rode in silence till we got to downtown Baton Rouge
your friend about your new life. I always thought how much I’d like for one of my aunts to come to Brazil
Seems like the restaurant was named ‘Hymel’s’ -- pronounced ‘E-mels’. It was rustic, but really really good. There were eight or ten college kids sitting at a long table next to ours and one of the guys at the end of the table yelled to the guy at the other end, “How are them crabs, Larry?” to which Larry replied, as he grabbed one of the big crabs from his plate and tossed it to the other end of the table, “Here, try one.” Well, the guy at the other end caught the crab, but all the juice from that crab went through his fingers and hit him full in the face. Everybody laughed like they were having a great time.
I was so concerned about Arnold Arnold
After we ate, I paid for the meal, then he drove me back to the hotel. “Give me a minute,” I said as I jumped out of the car and ran toward the front lobby. “I’ll be right back.” Over my shoulder, I yelled as I ran, “You got time to stay just a few more minutes?”
“Yeah. Sure. My class is not till 6:00 in the morning.”
“God!” I thought, “He’s not going to get much sleep if I don’t let him go home in a few minutes.” I hit the open elevator door running, punched the penthouse button, and waited for this slow-poke elevator to get me to my folks. When the elevator doors opened, there was Telasta, sitting on a bench outside the door to our suite.
“Thank goodness!” she cried as she jumped up. “We have been worried sick about you. Are you okay? Where have you been?”
Telasta and I walked into the suite together, Papa waiting just inside the door. I told them both everything I had done. “I’m really sorry I worried you. I guess we should have come by here before we went to Hymel’s to eat. Have you two eaten?”
“No,” Pops said. “I think the restaurant downstairs is still open. They have a great vegetarian plate. You want to go down there and fill us in on Arnold
“Sure, Joaquin, but there’s something I need to do first.” I told him about Arnold
“No, son. Wouldn’t mind at all. I’m proud of your kindness. Instead of giving him money, how ‘bout you ask him to come in and talk to me while we’re eating. I probably can pull a surprise or two out of the hat that will meet his needs without making him feel like a charity case. Besides that, I don’t want him to think you have the hots for him. You can give someone the wrong idea by being too kind.”
We had gotten on the elevator during this talk, which ended just as the elevator doors opened at the lobby. “Okay, Pops. I’ll be right back.” I began to run backwards, so I could say, “Meet you in the restaurant,” turned back around just in time to run headlong over a guy in a wheelchair. I did the damnedest avoidance dance and vault you ever saw and managed to catapult myself over the guy by touching only the armrests on his chair and rolling onto the back of my neck on the floor, doing a full roll-up back to my feet, giving a red-faced “You okay?” to the guy (he was fine) and running out the door, still hearing Telasta’s resonant laughter. I could have died.
“Yeah, sure!” he answered as he gave it the gas and whipped into an empty parking spot at the side of the lobby entrance. He jumped over the door without opening it, left the top down, and ran over to where I was about to enter the lobby.
The restaurant was dark. It took quite a few seconds for my eyes to adjust as we walked in. “Over here!” Dad said from a table halfway down the row of tables against the wall. We appeared to be the only customers at this time of night. “Have a seat,” Pops said as he half rose from his own seat and shook Arnold
“Thank you, Mr. Dupepe. It has been a shock. I still wish my father could understand; but he has made it clear that we are done talking and he wishes I had never been born.”
“You’re a good man, Arnold. You are who you are, not what he wants you to be. Wil says you are in pre-law because that’s what your father wanted you to major in.”
“Yeah, but that was before he knew me. He probably wishes now that the name ‘Palazzo’ was not on the pre-law roster at LSU.”
Telasta entered into the conversation smoothly and with grace and sympathy at this point. “I am really sorry that your father does not understand you, Arnold. You seem to be a lot more comfortable with yourself than the last time we talked. It bothers me that all parents don’t feel about their children the way Joaquin and I feel about Wil. We do not CARE what he does with his sexual organs -- that is, within the parameters of mutual consent. We are going to love him and support him for the rest of his life. He is lucky to have been born straight. You’re lucky to have been born gay. There’s enough love in this family to include you. Your family gave you up. They cannot have you back. You are ours now.” Arnold
“Oh, Ms. Telasta, you are going to make me cry one of those really ugly cries. I was almost sensitized to being hated for no reason when you come in and hit me in the heart with loving me for no reason.” With that, he grabbed the napkin in front of him, shook out the utensils onto the table, buried his head in his napkin and just sobbed and sobbed. I didn’t know WHAT to do, but Telasta ran around the table and knelt on one knee, pulled his chair to face her, wrapped her arms around him and let him bury his head in her neck and cry till he was done.
“Well!” said my father as things bubbled back down to normal, “THAT was unexpected. And that changes what I wanted to talk to you about. If you get adopted by Telasta -- even informally -- that puts you in a different position with me than you were before. I own a couple of apartment complexes just off LSU campus. I am about to fire the management company that has been running them for me. What I WAS going to offer you was a part-time job looking after my properties. I am still going to offer that to you, but you just got a pay raise before I even offered you the job. You interested?”
“Yes, SIR, I’m interested. You’ll have to teach me how to do the job, but I’m pretty sure I can handle it.” He was smiling now and looked to be about as comfortable as could be. Of course, there were all those subliminal memories of past history that probably helped his comfort level.
“I’ll start you at twelve-hundred a month plus a furnished apartment -- utilities included. You will have to quit your current part-time job. How many hours a week do you work at the restaurant?”
“Twenty.”
“Well, then, I’ll expect you to work 20 hours a week at the apartments -- and not a minute more. Telasta and I will have to let you go if you don’t keep up your grades, you understand?”
“Yes, SIR!” Arnold
“Look, Arnold
The food came. Arnold and I excused ourselves and left them to enjoy their meal. Once we got outside, we walked over to Arnold
He got in his car and started the engine. As he backed out, I stood to one side. He put the car in drive and stopped, turned his head and looked at me with a smile so big I thought his face skin would crack. “I’ll see you Wednesday, Chief.” I raised my hand as he rolled away.
I went back to the restaurant in time to spend a few minutes with my folks while they ate some kind of artichoke dish with a rich dipping sauce. It smelled delicious. We talked about Arnold
Pop would be wearing a sky-blue tux, since that was one of his favorite colors and he wanted people to share in his joy. He thought this tux represented happiness.
Telasta was to wear a calf-length white gown with a beautiful seascape hand- embroidered on it. I had seen the gown that she commissioned. It was probably the singularly most beautiful dress I had ever seen.
The wedding itself would be in a private room off the main party area -- attended only by Pop and Telasta, the Justice of the Peace, and me. After the papers were signed that made them officially a couple, we would join all the guests they had invited and have a celebration.
I doubt that my folks slept at all that night. They slept so infrequently and only cat-napped then. I slept one of the most restful sleeps ever. I missed the sea breeze, but I set the air conditioner to the perfect temperature for me. I had forgotten how warm it could be in Louisiana
The next morning, I went downstairs for breakfast at around 8:00 a.m. Since Telasta and Pops had not been in the room, I thought maybe they were having breakfast, but not in the restaurant. I ordered a nice Denver
“Pardon me, sir,” he said in a clipped English accent, “but I presume you are Mr. Wil Dupepe.”
“Yes,” I said.
“Please forgive my intruding into your breakfast. Take your time eating, but I will be needing to take your measurements after you eat. I am your father’s tailor. He wishes for me to advise you on your dress for the wedding and to make alterations to whatever suit or tuxedo you choose from the ones I have brought for you to try on. I have taken the liberty of bringing several shirts and I shall order several pairs of shoes that should arrive for your inspection by the time you finish eating. You may find me in the lobby when you are ready.”
“Thank you,” I answered. “I shouldn’t be more than a few minutes. What is your name?”
“Jives, sir. Terribly sorry I forgot to say. Very good then. Thank you, sir. I shall take my leave.” He pivoted nicely and walked away from me as if there were a plank strapped to his back side.
The omelet showed up within a minute of Jives’s departure. I began eating when Arnold
“Hey, buddy. Have you eaten?”
“Not yet. Your father came to my class and waited for me till it ended. He wanted me to meet some tailor guy up in your suite. Mr. Joaquin should be here any minute. He’s just parking that fine Mercedes. He told me I’d probably find you here. I do not know how in the world he knew what class I went to this morning.”
The waiter showed up just then. “Could I bring you a menu, sir?”
“What are you having, Wil? I think I would like one of those and a cup of coffee, if that’s alright.”
“Get whatever you want, Arnold
The waiter left. Papa put his two massive hands, one on my shoulder and one on Arnold
He got two different answers simultaneously: “Great!” I said, with Arnold Arnold
Papa laughed. “Yeah, I kinda thought that might happen. Listen, I will have some movers coming to your dorm this afternoon to move you to your new digs. I took the liberty of asking your roommate Ronnie if he knew your schedule, and he did, so I have commandeered all of your free time for the rest of the week. Hope that’s okay with you.”
“Sure, Mr. J. I’m yours to command. You said this apartment was furnished, so all I need to move is my clothes. I can move those by myself. I mean, I appreciate the offer of help, but you really don’t need to trouble yourself with that unless you just want to.”
“I DO want to, Arnold. All I need you to do is give me the key to your dorm room. Here’s the key to your new apartment.” He handed Arnold a key, while Arnold
along with Wil, for your wedding clothes. We had intended to have only Wil and Telasta and me stand in front of the Justice of the Peace for the ceremony. We have invited over 200 guests for the celebration. Our vows are none of their business. We only want family for that part of the wedding. We will look to both of you boys to play host to our guests. Do you mind doing that?”
“Not at all,” we both answered. “You want ME to stand with you, Mr. J.?” Arnold
“Yes. Is that a problem?”
Laughter from Arnold, “No, sir. No problem at all.”
The food came just then. We finished the meal with light-hearted banter. I was not surprised at how comfortable Papa was with Arnold , but I was really stunned at how quickly Arnold
After the meal we collected Jives from the lobby and went up to the suite. Papa’s tux was already ready. Jives had me strip buck naked to measure me. Poor Arnold
“Yeah, well I’m gonna turn my head when you take off your clothes. I don’t have any interest at all in seeing your junk.”
“Candy! We call it candy.”
“I just BET you do.” Papa busted out laughing when I said this.
The fitting did not take long, the shirts only took a couple of minutes each, and I put on my street clothes. Arnold Arnold
Jives talked to us enough to know what we wanted to wear. Both of us followed Papa’s lead and chose tuxedoes. Jives suggested we wear black tuxes made from the same type cloth as Joaquin’s with cumber bunds made from Papa’s blue tux material, so of course that’s what we settled on.
Jives left as the shoe-choosing began. We both wore a size 14 shoe, and both of us wanted slip-ons. The shoe salesman tried to talk us into patent leather. Neither of us liked that. Both of us chose alligator. This guy never let us try ON the shoes. He made us take off our shoes and socks and roll up our breeches legs, then he went into the bathroom with a sack and a bowl and a big wooden spoon. When he came back out, he had mixed up some plaster of Paris with which he made molds of our feet. Once he got the hardened molds off our feet, he labeled each mold, put them in a cardboard box, and left.
“Alright, boys! Telasta and I are going to need a little private time, so why don’t you take the car, Arnold
“Yes, sir, I have plenty. Don’t worry about anything. Will 7 o’clock be good for dinner?”
“That’s fine.” He was leading us toward the door with his hands pushing against each of our backs. “We will be eating Lebanese. It’s all vegetarian, but I doubt if either of you will notice.” He opened the door, escorted us out, gently closed the door to just a crack open, put his mouth to the door and said, “See you tonight,” and closed the door.
“You get the feeling our presence is no longer required?” Arnold
We went down the elevator and out the lobby to the parking lot. The powder-blue Mercedes was not hard to find, especially since Joaquin had parked it sideways across 2 parking spaces at the farthest point in the parking lot. He was serious about protecting Avon ’s car.
The drive down College Drive to where it crossed Perkins was an easy drive. Arnold Arnold
“I knew these guys were at my apartment,” Arnold
Not only did they have Arnold
One of the women who was helping arrange Arnold Arnold
“Thank you, ma’am. I appreciate the offer, but I’m afraid my boyfriend would not appreciate it very much.” He put his arm over my shoulder. The girl turned red-faced and left. I was still red-faced; but Arnold
“Okay, the look on her face was funny, but it was NOT very funny to get a laugh at somebody else’s expense -- especially over her intention to compliment you. Don’t do that again.” I was like an old fuddy-duddy giving a dressing down to a youngster. Looking back, I wish I had just enjoyed the joke. I DO laugh about it today.
One of the guys who had helped set up Arnold ’s apartment came over to us, handing a key to Arnold
“Yeah, I guess we’d better check. Mr. J may ask. Wil, you read the list. Call it off to me and I’ll check, okay?”
I took the long list, calling off items room by room as Arnold Arnold
“Okay, fella. Thanks a lot for all you guys did. You can go now, and I will probably be seeing you on campus or around town.” The boy nodded and lifted his hand to wave goodbye as he left. Arnold and I stepped outside his apartment door. He locked the door and we turned back toward Uncle Avon’s car. “We probably ought to go to my old apartment and tell Ronnie where I live, okay?”
“Yeah, sure. I’m good with whatever. You didn’t notice your new phone in the apartment. I checked to see if there was a dial tone. Since there was, I wrote down the number that was on the front of the phone so I can call you. Here,” I handed him a slip of paper, “I made you a copy of the number, too. Put it in your billfold so you can remember the number to give it to Ronnie and your friends.”
“Say, thanks!” You could tell that Arnold
The parking lot to the stadium was almost completely empty. In fact, we had seen very few cars on campus since I had been here. “Where are all the people in this college, Arnold? I thought this place would be buzzing.”
“It’s Thanksgiving week, Wil. That class I had this morning was a make-up class. Ronnie had a night class, but that was also unusual for this week. Everybody’s on vacation.” He parked the car and we both got out and walked up the stairs to his old apartment. “Ronnie should be here. His folks are just as rich as mine. They disowned him when he came out -- same as mine did. Your dad invited him to the wedding so he would be able to celebrate Thanksgiving with me. I thought that was really nice.” We had reached his old apartment and Arnold
“Hey, man!” He gave Arnold Arnold
I should have known that the name didn’t mean much to Arnold Arnold Louisiana
I reached into the trash can and retrieved the number. “No, Doofus. Pambo is one of your father’s goons. Don’t you remember? He’s the one who saved Old Lady Telasta from drowning. You were there, weren’t you? You probably need to talk to this guy. Seemed like a nice guy to me, and I’m pretty sure he doesn’t have the hots for you. Maybe your father has had a change of heart. You’d better call Pambo, especially since he said it was important. It probably is.”
“I guess you’re right. Mind if I use your phone, Ronnie?” He stepped past Ronnie and picked up the phone and dialed as he was asking. There was a pad beside the phone. Arnold Arnold
He hung up the phone with a shocked look on his face. “Wow! Good thing you didn’t let me throw away that number. He couldn’t tell me much, but it sounded like this might be a matter of life or death. Somebody’s watching him. The number I called him on was a pay phone next to the convenience store. He’s going back to his room to make some kind of excuse to his partner-in-crime so he can sneak away with us for a little while. C’mon, let’s go.”
We ran down the stairs like somebody was chasing us. As far as we knew, they might be. I got in the back seat with Ronnie so Pambo could be in front and could maybe talk with Arnold Arnold Arnold
Pambo came running from a cluster of oleanders where he had been hiding. He opened the front door and jumped in, ducking down almost onto the floorboard and in a loud whisper ordered, “Go. GO!”
When we got to Highland Road , Pambo sat back up in the seat. “That was close. I heard my partner Karl Ann Fissenships talking to somebody just before you got there. I’m pretty sure she didn’t see me. I told her I wanted to go to the grocery store to buy some cigarettes. She thinks I took a cab. You’re going to have to go by the store so I can actually GET some cigarettes. It’d look pretty strange if I came back without ‘em. I told her I might grab something to eat while I was out. She didn’t care. We don’t have anything to do till Thursday, anyhow.” Pambo turned toward Arnold
“Yeah,” Arnold
“Alright, then. I really need you to get word to your father about this situation. You know, for some reason, ever since all that business with Old Lady Telasta I have trusted you almost as much as I trusted your father. Still and all, I cannot risk telling anything to your dad, ‘cause if he let anything slip to the wrong person it could be my head; and I mean that literally.” Pambo was talking almost too low for us to hear him in the back seat. I leaned forward and put my elbows on the front seat so I could hear it all.
“Karl Ann -- my partner, you know -- was in Sao Paulo
I know, I know -- crazy talk. I got no idea where she got all these ideas, but she’s determined to prove her point and then she says she’s gonna get your daddy fired for malfeasance -- whatever that means. She even broke into the funeral home after Old Lady Telasta died, and she pried open the sealed casket. She said she proved her point, since all that was in the casket was some ashes. I tried to TELL her that the old lady was cremated and put in the casket, but she weren’t havin’ none o’ that. I have never seen anybody more obsessed with something than Karl Ann is. She made me come up here with her to Mr. Joaquin’s wedding. Pull over here and let me go in and buy a carton of smokes.”
“Anyway, like I was saying, she plans on us crashing the wedding. I got no idea what she’s planning to do, but she claims she can PROVE Ms. Telasta is a mermaid. I sure hope Mr. Joaquin doesn’t find out about this. He has a lot of power. I wouldn’t want to be on his bad side. You said you were gonna keep my secret, Wil, so I’m counting on you now. Listen, ain’t no sense in you takin’ me to lunch. I told you what you need to know. How ‘bout I just catch a cab back to my room across town and if Karl Ann sees me, she’ll believe I took a cab to the store and back. Arnold
“One of you guys has to get up here in the front seat with me. I don’t want anybody thinking I’m your chauffeur.”
“You go, Ronnie,” I said, and when he got out and piled into the front seat, Arnold
“Let’s show Ronnie my new place, what say?” He dug into his pants pocket and pulled out his own car keys. “You have to drive my car, Ronnie. Pipsqueak here doesn’t have a license. We’ll stop at the stadium to get my car and you follow us. I’ll take you to my place first and then we’ll take the Mercedes back to the hotel. You can pick me up there.”
“It’s all good, girl,” he said to Arnold
“Hey,” I said, “I am supposed to be getting my license right after my birthday. Papa says we are going to stay for a couple of weeks after the wedding for that very purpose.”
“Oops! No deal, Lucille. I happened to overhear your pop talking to somebody on the phone. He said he was leaving the states on the first and he could not meet with them.” Arnold
“Oh, well! That’s okay. Telasta taught me how to drive. I drive really well in Ubatuba; but I don’t much think I want to drive in Paris Louisiana
“Paris PARIS Arnold
“Oh, I forgot to tell you. ‘Mom’ and Pop are going to Paris
“Oh, gosh. Yes, it is. Mr. J picked me up from class. I was on automatic pilot, driving back to my old apartment.” He whipped into that parking lot -- again, it was pretty empty. Ronnie and I both got out. Ronnie got into the Sting Ray and I got into the front seat of the Mercedes with Arnold
When we got to the new apartment, Ronnie was super impressed. “Gosh, man! You hit the jackpot. So if you manage two complexes, you are going to need a new painter. I mean, I guess the old management company hired their own painters. You think you might be able to hire me as your painter?”
“Let me get my feet under me, Ronnie. I have not had any orientation, so I have no idea how much latitude I will have when it comes to such things as hiring and firing. If it turns out that I’m in charge of such things, I’ll sure give you a chance to show your stuff. Come on, guys. Let’s take Mr. J’s car back to the hotel and drop his keys off at the desk. I take it you’re buying lunch again, Wil?”
“Yep. Those are my instructions from Papa. Do you think we could go to Hymel’s again? I really liked that place.”
It took almost no arm-twisting for both guys to agree to Hymel’s, so we took the Mercedes back to the hotel and dropped off the key at the desk. They put the key in an envelope and sent a bell-hop to slide it under the penthouse door. I was glad that they did it that way, because Papa was pretty clear that he did not want to be disturbed until 7:00 this evening. When we went back to Arnold ’s car, Ronnie handed over the keys and Arnold College Drive till it became Lee Drive , turned on Nicholson, passed the new apartment and the place we met Pambo. It was probably after noon when we got to Hymel’s. We spent several hours over that meal. We had hours to kill, and there were a few college students who stayed behind. We got to visit with them, cutting up and laughing like crazy. We finally left the restaurant at about 5 o’clock. Ronnie was not ready to go back to his place, with hardly anybody on campus and nobody to spend time with, so I invited him to come with us for Lebanese. I knew it would be okay. We ran by Ronnie’s apartment where he picked up a change of clothes. Then we went back to Arnold
At 6:45 I called the hotel suite from Arnold‘s apartment. Joaquin answered the phone. Ronnie and Arnold were in the living room of the apartment and I was in the bedroom so I could speak privately to Papa. I asked him whether it would be alright for Ronnie to come with us to supper. Since we could not talk confidentially in front of Arnold Arnold Arnold ’s loyalties -- for me to not tell Arnold
I went back into the living room after I hung up with Pops and told them Ronnie was more than welcome to come along for Lebanese. I told them both to be prepared, because Telasta’s vegetarian food sometimes tasted really weird. Ronnie said, “Well, hon, you know that a queen is supposed to have a wide range of taste. We will probably love it. YOU, on the other hand…” and they laughed loudly as we went out, locking the door behind us.
The hotel room suite was dimly lit with candles when we got there. There was a nice aroma, with a backdrop of cooked food. Telasta met us at the door and gave each of us a hair tussling and kiss on the cheeks as we entered. There was a table set on the balcony with Plexiglas room dividers blocking the wind and waiters standing at the ready in the center of the room. Papa stood at the sliding glass doors leading to the balcony. He bent his arm at the elbow, bowed slightly to the right, and gave the traditional arm and hand signal that means ‘come this direction’ and said, “Gentlemen, this way, please.”
It was a fantastic meal. One of the shocks of the evening for me was the taste of the grits, which turned out to be hummus. I loved the stuffed grape leaves. Both the other boys had had wine before, but NEVER had they tasted anything as fine as my papa served that night. Neither had I, for that matter. This was a special celebration. My folks pulled out all the stops. I thought that wine might be as much as a thousand bucks a bottle. I found out much later that the price tag was almost 20 times that.
Each of us offered toast after toast, which toasts became sillier with each bottle we drank. Telasta’s metabolism does not allow her to get drunk, but I swear she had more fun on that night than I had ever seen her have. I suspect her elevated mood had more to do with the private time she and Papa had shared than the food or wine or the company of 3 rowdy boys.
As we reached the end of the evening, Arnold Arnold
The waiters cleared the tables, put everything on carts, and left us with large smiles on their faces from the large tip Telasta had given them. The two boys thanked my folks for a great evening, Arnold
As we waved at them from our door as the elevator doors closed behind them, I said, “I hate for Arnold
Papa chuckled. “He’s sober as a Baptist preacher. I gave him a little concoction to drink while we were in the bedroom. Oh, and he told me about Pambo. Once again, he proves to be a loyal friend.”
The next two days were wonderful. There was so much joy when we saw Papa’s brother Avon and met his family. His children were my second cousins or something like that. It was a little shocking to me that my father came from such a refined family and my mother had obviously been from the wrong side of the tracks. Aunt Flora Bell and Aunt Jenny Sue had married good old boys and they and their families were ignorant and proud of it. They were fond of saying, “Ain’t NOBODY better’n us. Just cause they has book learnin or money don’t make ‘em no better’n us.” Though I agreed with their basic premise, it really offended me that they were so ready to make excuses for mental laziness. Honestly, I wanted better for them.
The time I spent with my paternal side of the family gave me more information about my grandfather than I had known. From what they told me, Joaquin’s first wife had been the same type person as my own father had married. After Joaquin left, my father was raised by his mother -- a woman with no values and little knowledge; so I suppose he was attracted to the same type woman -- my mother. As grateful as I was that Papa had adopted me, I must admit to having a subliminal resentment that he abandoned his son -- my father. Either Papa had improved with time or there was a very good reason in his mind for the actions he took.
Uncle Avon had to be knocking on 70, but he looked really good. He was fairly upset that his brother Joaquin looked like he was 30. Uncle Avon was not buying Papa’s cover story that he found a young wife and had a lot of plastic surgery to keep people from assuming Telasta was his daughter. “No, Joaquin, it’s hard for me to believe plastic surgery can make a man look as good as you look at your age. You have a wonderful, understanding, beautiful fiancee. That probably has a lot to do with it; but raising this boy may have more to do with keeping you young than anything else. I can’t wait to see what your children look like.”
“Now, Avon ,” Papa said, “don’t be putting a hex on me about having children. I may LOOK young, but you know exactly how old I am. Do you think a man my age would be WISE to have a child? I will be doing well to get Wil raised.”
All in all, the visit with that side of our family was completely enjoyable. I wrote down names and addresses and telephone numbers with a promise that we would keep in touch. I gave them our address in Brazil
It is difficult to remember what happened and when it happened during those few days before the wedding. All I know is that things happened according to some divine plan. If we had not got here when we did, Arnold
Late on the day before the wedding, Telasta and Papa and I had gone to the hotel early to prepare our clothes for the wedding and for Papa to make all the final reservations, pay off the right people to get Telasta’s citizenship papers in order, touch base with Last regarding the Paris residence, and pack the suitcases which were sent to the facet-aire in Denham Springs before we went to bed. There was a timid knock on the door. Telasta was busy in the master bedroom and Papa was on the phone, so I answered the door. There stood Aunt Flora Bell and Aunt Jenny Sue looking very country and out of place, but with heads held high and making an effort to look comfortable.
Aunt Flora Bell
I did not know whether to hug them, as I normally would have, or to politely turn them away. It had been almost three years since I had seen them or heard from them, and neither had wanted to have me around back then. They caught me so completely off guard that my mouth was open. I stood holding the door open and looked over to the desk where Papa was hanging up the phone at that very minute.
“Tell them to come in, Wil. Come on in, Flora Bell, Jenny Sue. It is good of you to come.” He came forward quickly and cordially gave a brief hug to each of the women, ushering them into the living room and seating them in the luxurious wing-back chairs that were part of the penthouse suite’s elegant appointments. “Wil, get the girls something to drink.” He turned back to my aunts and asked, “Hot chocolate or Coca Cola?”
They both spoke at once. “Coke would be nice.” They sat on the edge of their chairs, each clutching a purse in their laps, dresses falling to mid-calf and very serviceable stout high-heel shoes.
“Are you coming to see Wil, or to come to the wedding tomorrow? This is quite a drive from Mansfield
“We don’t need no charity from the likes of you, Joaquin Dupepe,” Jenny Sue spat out.
“Now, Jenny Sue, you hush now. Joaquin ain’t never done one bad thing to us and you know that we are here to ask for help, so you best be nice.” Flora Bell had always been the ‘take-charge’ sister. She addressed Papa as I set the cold drinks on the end tables next to each chair, “Thank you, Joaquin. We ‘preciate the thought, but we got a real good deal on a motel room up on Plank Road, north of town. We knew you was in town for your wedding and we would be right proud to attend, ‘cept we ain’t dressed right for such a fine affair. My old car broke down at the motel, so we took a chance and caughted a taxicab over here to see you. We got that nice invitational you sended to us, and it had all the pertiment information that told us where you was staying. Both of our has beens is working as roustabouts and they go out in the gulf out of Venice
Joaquin gave that disarming smile he is so famous for, just as Telasta entered the room from the bedroom. Pops stood, extending his outstretched arm toward this ravishing blonde who, in her high heels, was taller than he. “Ladies, my future wife -- Telasta Ferragamo.”
The women sat slack-jawed at this elegant and beautiful figure, while Telasta walked like a dream and stretched out a hand of welcome to each of my aunts. “So nice to meet you ladies. I hope my lover is taking good care of you.” She knew exactly what she was saying. Maybe her use of the word ‘lover’ was meant to expand the lives of these two or maybe she was giving them something to be scandalized about for the rest of their lives. One thing was certain, two seconds in the life of Telasta would live for years in the lives of these two.
Joaquin’s eyes twinkled as he looked at his bride. “I am going to try to take care of them. They are almost kinfolk, after all. What is the name of your motel, Flora Bell, and what kind of car are you driving?”
“It’s the ‘Amble Inn’ and my car is a yeller 56 Studebaker.”
“Okay, girls. Just give me a minute on the phone and I’ll take care of this problem. You visit with Wil and Telasta for a few minutes while I make a phone call or two, okay?”
“Thank you, Joaquin Dupepe. I’m sorry I was cantankerous earlier. I was just scared you was going to say ‘no’,” Jenny Sue gave one of her rare apologies. “Where is you from, Miz Ferragamo? Is your name one o’ them Eye-talian names? I once knowed some Bindo’s from up Keithville way near Shreves Port, and they said if a name ended with a ‘o’ it was probably Eye-talian.”
As the conversation among my aunts, Telasta, and me progressed, I became aware that what these women lacked in language skills, they more than made up for in genuineness. They were coarse in the extreme, but really quite nice once you got to know them. By the time Papa had taken care of their problem, we were laughing and honestly enjoying one another. Clearly they had fallen in love with Telasta. Flora Bell said more than once, “Gosh, I really do wish we had better clothes so we could go to your wedding, Telasta. You are one Hell of a lady, and I mean that in the best way. It weren’t Joaquin’s fault that our sister Sheila’s mother-in-law -- Joaquin’s first wife, you know -- cheated on him with the mail man. It like to of killed Joaquin when she run off and he couldn’t find her or Paul -- you know, his son -- for years and by that time his son didn’t even know him no more. It’s a crying shame, too, ‘cause Wil’s father might of had some hope if’n he’d o’ had Joaquin in his life. I reckon we all took her side even when we knowed she was wrong, cause we KNOWED her and we didn’t really know her ex -- you know, Joaquin.”
As Papa came back and sat on the couch facing Flora Bell and Jenny Sue (I was sitting in the straight-backed chair at the bottom of the room), Telasta said to him, “Swap with you. I need to make a call while you visit.” They smiled at one another like lovers do. This love affair of fifty years was just getting started.
“Well, girls, your problem is solved. One of the bell hops at this hotel has a cousin who is going to pick up your car tomorrow. He’s going to send me the bill. You don’t worry about that, now. I called the ‘Amble Inn’ and one of my men is driving over there to pay for your room and bring your clothes back over here. They said you could put your key in any mail box and it would be returned to them. I already got this hotel here to set you up in a room just a few floors below this room. It isn’t the bridal suite like this one is, but then again YOU are not getting married.” They all laughed at that as Telasta rejoined us.
“You two may not be GETTING married,” she said, “but you are most certainly GOING to a wedding. My dress-maker is bringing dresses in your sizes to your room in just a few minutes. I believe you will find clothes and shoes that are suitable for a wedding. I hope you don’t mind coming to our wedding. You will need SOMETHING to do while your car is being fixed. Might as well come to a party.”
I had never seen my aunts happy before. They were always as miserable as my own parents had been, but my folks had just lit a fire under them and turned back the clock to girlhood for these two. They were absolutely like two children going to the fair for the first time. They only stayed a few minutes after that. The doorbell rang and the bell hop was there to take them to their new quarters.
The wedding itself was set for 10 a.m. tomorrow morning. The party would begin at 11 a.m. I hated being the only slacker in this family -- the only one who required 8 hours of sleep. Apparently Papa had hired a valet to make sure I was ready on time. He waked me up at 6:30. I swear he was Jives’ twin brother. This guy would probably have bathed me had I let him. He called himself my ‘manservant’. I hoped I was dressed and he was gone before Arnold
I was completely dressed at 7:30 with the clothes and shoes the valet had brought from the tailor and my manservant (named ‘Jove’ if you can believe it) inspected me and declared me suitably attired. Jove fairly PUSHED me out the door and escorted me downstairs to the dining room where I was to join the rest of the wedding party. It was hard for me to believe that Arnold
Jenny Sue and Flora Bell made an appearance next. They were unrecognizable. Not only had Telasta’s dress maker decked them out in the most beautiful dresses they had ever worn, but she had sent a make-up artist to do their hair and make-up. Until they opened their mouths, I had no idea who they were. They were incredibly beautiful. The stiletto heels made each of them look a foot taller, and Jenny Sue’s uni-brow had been plucked or waxed, which made her look much less like a cyclops. While they would not be at the wedding itself, Papa thought it better if they took breakfast with all of us and rode with us in the limousine to the site of the wedding. The thought came unbidden that Cinderella’s sisters had been magically transformed.
Breakfast was strictly vegetarian or fruit. We had fig and strawberry crepes with fresh heavy whipped cream, cheese grits, dry cereal, and a table loaded with flowers and peeled and seeded fruits and melons. Over the last couple of years I had become accustomed to such sumptuous fare, but the look on Flora Bell’s and Jenny Sue’s faces told me they were impressed. It was just the four of us for this regal outlay. Pops and Telasta showed up just as we were finishing. Pop gave a whistle at the girls. “You look like a million bucks!” he exclaimed. Arnold
The sisters immediately became coquettish. “Thank you, Mr. Joaquin. Miz Telasta helped us an awful lot. We wasn’t always this beautiful, you know.”
I guffawed! Couldn’t help myself. Aunt Flora Bell looked at me quizzically, so I grabbed my tickle box and held it still while I said to her, “You really ARE beautiful, you know.”
“Yes, I know,” she said -- her face as serious as could be. The coarse honesty of my aunts was one of those things I had completely overlooked before I was taken from them.
Just then the concierge opened the restaurant door and leaned inside. “Your limo is here, sir.”
“Very good,” Papa answered as he grabbed an apple and took a bite. “You hungry?” he asked Telasta.
“Not yet. I believe I will wait and eat at the party. All of my energy is focused on you for now. I wish Last were here.”
Papa put an arm around her waist and said very tenderly, “I know, love of my life. You know he would be here if he could.”
“I know.” Her eyes were moist, but her focus really was on Papa and I knew she was happy. “Let’s go.” She turned and led us all out the front of the building to the portico where we boarded the limousine.
I must have thought the Baton Rouge Country Club was out in the woods somewhere. I was expecting at least a 30-minute drive. Imagine my surprise when we made a ten-minute drive and we were there. “This is it!” I thought. “In only a few minutes I will have a new mother. She is already filling the role of mother, but when all the paperwork is signed she will be legal -- or maybe I’m the one who will be legal.” I hardly noticed when the aunts were whisked off to be entertained while Telasta, Papa, Arnold, and I made our way to a small interior room where we met the Justice of the Peace. He had all the forms, and there was a podium with a script from which he read. This was not a religious ceremony at all, but I have never had a moment that felt more holy.
I do not remember any of the words that were said. I was more or less in a trance within my own thoughts. The vows that each had written and memorized were beautiful beyond belief. There were allusions to earth and wind, fire and sky, ocean and forest; and throughout it all were words of such powerful love as I had never believed possible. At the end of the ceremony, the officiating justice declared that they were now wed. He brought out papers that would be sent in to the secretary of state. Among those papers we all signed (Arnold and I signed the wedding documents as witnesses) were adoption papers. I was now an OFFICIAL member of this family, and it was good. I entered a new level of confidence with a new sense of belonging.
I really did not want to go to a party. I wanted to be alone; and then… as we left to join those who had arrived for a party… the door opened and I saw Pambo among those who had arrived early. With him was a redhead who could only be Karl Ann Fissenships.
Of a sudden, I was alert. There was zero desire to be alone, though I must admit I had a strong desire for ALL of us to be anywhere but here. I knew that I would need to play host, and so would Arnold Arnold Arnold
I thought Pambo was going to laugh. He probably knew what was going to happen next. “You’re full of shit, Arnold
“Clever,” I thought. “Karl Ann knows very well that they were NOT invited to the party, so she is covering by pretending that they were invited by the first person they knew. She also parlayed her introduction to Arnold
“Certainly,” Arnold
“No, let’s wait awhile. I would rather meet her after all the guests arrive. I wouldn’t want to bother her so soon after the nuptials.”
Well, it was a lame excuse, and I knew perfectly why she wanted to wait. She was going to create a spectacle in front of a large crowd. “I’ll find you when I’m ready for the introduction, okay?” This girl had some kind of nerve, I’d give that to her.
“Okay, then. See you in a little while,” Arnold
Aunt Jenny Sue and Aunt Flora Bell were more or less my responsibility. I made my way to them as more and more guests arrived. It was an unseasonably warm day -- not unusual for Baton Rouge
Most of the guests quickly found that they could order any drink they had ever heard of and these bar tenders could come up with the recipe. All of my mother’s people were Baptist, which meant they were all tee-totalers. Not any more, since my aunts had both discovered frozen daiquiris. They were more loquacious than ever, having a great time, inventing new words with each conversation. I know they thought their use of language was impressing the devil out of all these new friends of theirs. I turned away. They were doing fine on their own.
The wedding cake was set up by the pool. Arnold
“Yep, and it looks like the show is about to begin.” Telasta’s answer did not give me any clue what Papa was talking about. Red tail?? Were they talking about Karl Ann?
Karl Ann motioned above the crowd to Arnold
Karl Ann moved rapidly. I moved as quickly as I could to intercept her. For some reason I was afraid she might have a gun or that she might try to do bodily harm to my mother. The protective instinct kicked in. Karl Ann had a clear path to Telasta, while I was boxed in by people wanting to be close for the cake cutting. I tried to intercept Karl Ann. I was not fast enough.
From my angle of observation I could tell that Karl Ann fake-tripped just before she got to Telasta. She acted like her bumping into Telasta and shoving her into the swimming pool was completely by accident. It was not. This had apparently been her plan all along. I panicked. I knew Telasta’s scales would give her away in the next few seconds.
As the scene unfolded I became more and more confused. First of all, Joaquin immediately lost his composure and began to yell, “Somebody save her. My wife cannot swim, and neither can I. Help! Help! Telasta is going to drown. Somebody, please…HELP!”
I tell you, I did not know whether to laugh or slap Pops, attack Karl Ann for her treachery, or what to do. Pops caught my eye and did a partial wink so I would see him, but nobody else would interpret it as a wink. To any other onlooker it would look like an eye-twitch or facial tick caused by stress. Telasta was thrashing about in the water, occasionally coming to the surface and yelling, “Help!” Everyone was frozen. They did not seem to know what to do. Telasta had stopped moving -- stopped coming to the surface -- before Arnold came to himself and jumped in, tux and all, and dragged her out onto the pool surround.
An overwrought Joaquin immediately began to do CPR on his new bride, crying insanely and yelling, “Don’t you leave me. Don’t you leave me! I love you, Telasta. Come back, Telasta. Come back!!!”
There was a cough as Telasta rolled onto her side and ejected a huge amount of water from her mouth. Her hair covered her gills, but I did not understand why her scales were not in evidence.
“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I slipped. I did not mean to knock her into the water. Is she okay? Let me get close to her. I NEED to know she is alright.” Karl Ann’s pleas were totally inappropriate. There were three of us who knew exactly what she wanted.
“I’m okay, everybody. I’m okay,” Telasta sat up while Joaquin blocked Karl Ann from getting close to her. Telasta crawled onto her knees and pushed herself to her feet with her hands. “Bring me a change of clothes to the bathroom, Joaquin,” she said, “and a towel for God’s sake! I’m a mess and I’m damned if we are going to let a minor thing like this ruin our wedding.”
As Telasta kicked off her shoes, I noted that her feet were still very small. She ran barefoot toward one of the club’s bathrooms as Joaquin crooked his finger to one of his men and ordered him to get the pink suitcase from the limo and meet him with it at that bathroom. Karl Ann was hard on Telasta’s heels. She was determined to see what no one had seen before -- a naked mermaid. She got to the bathroom door scant seconds after Telasta went in.
“Don’t come in! Don’t come in!” Telasta pleaded, pushing to keep the door closed from Karl Ann’s insistent shoving. She was careful not to win this tug of war. She acted like Karl Ann had overpowered her to get into the bathroom, but as Telasta let go of the inside of the door, she went running toward the stall -- all the while pleading, “Don’t come in. PLEASE don’t come in.”
Telasta’s red bushy tail was holding up the back of her dress. She got into the stall, but not before Karl Ann had got an eyeful of that long red tail. “Damn!” Telasta said in a frustrated tone. “Damn!” as she reached behind her and yanked her tail through the door into the stall. She locked the stall door behind her and kept calling out to Karl Ann, “I’m okay. Thank you very much. I’m okay. I don’t need any help, but thanks just the same.” She was acting extremely nervous inside the stall, lifting the back of her dress and pulling her panties down, trying to force her wriggling tail into a bun shape and restrain it by pushing it down into her panties. At no point did she look up, where she would have seen that Karl Ann was standing on the toilet in the next stall, watching over the partition to see everything that was going on in Telasta’s stall.
Disgusted, Karl Ann stomped from the bathroom just as Joaquin arrived with the pink suitcase. “Is she okay?” Papa asked.
“I hope you know you just married a God damned werewolf, you idiot!” Karl Ann spat. She went on out to the patio and began to shout, “Telasta is a werewolf. I’m not kidding, folks, this bride is a werewolf. Pull down her panties if you don’t believe me. She’s a damn werewolf.” By this time, she had worked herself into a lather. She was screaming and turning red in the face. Telasta appeared just then and Karl Ann was virtually foaming at the mouth, yelling, “Pull down her panties. Pull down her panties! She a f’ing werewolf, I tell you.”
Yes, the police were called. Karl Ann kept yelling as they dragged her away. “You can’t do this to me. I am an important person. I am with the CIA, and I have been investigating this woman. She’s a mermaid… uh… uh… and a WEREWOLF! You have to arrest that woman. Pull her panties down. You’ll see, she’s a f’ing mer.. Uh.. Wolf!”
“Lady, calm down,” the policemen kept saying, “and watch your language. Far as I know it’s not illegal to be a mermaid OR a werewolf, unless they do something illegal. Just why would I want to pull down her panties to prove she’s a mermaid? Are mermaids built different? How would you know, anyhow? Are you some kind of lesbian mermaid to know so much about mermaid physiology.” You could tell the cops considered her to be a nut case. They were getting a real kick out of this. I saw poor old Pambo watching all this unfold. He had his hands over his face.
All the wedding guests were laughing more than ever. Of course some of them were drunk, so that helped. Telasta had changed into a beautiful going-away dress. She and Joaquin returned to the wedding cake, cut the cake and fed a piece to each other. The server came out and finished cutting the cake to serve to all the guests. After everyone had eaten and drunk enough to be satisfied, my aunts were morphed into people I truly did not recognize. When toast after toast had been made by many of Pop’s friends and employees, and Telasta stood to tell those gathered how much she appreciated their presence to solemnize the joining of her life to Joaquin’s and Joaquin spoke of the moments that matter in life -- after all that, the 6 who had come in the limo left in the limo.
Once we got back to the hotel, we saw that Jenny Sue’s Studebaker was sitting in the parking lot. The mechanic had left her keys with the front desk. “Let’s go see if your car runs, Jenny Sue,” Papa suggested. We all walked out to her car while she got in and turned the key. The gas tank was full, and the motor purred.
“Gee Whiz, Joaquin. This car hain’t never sounded this good when she were new. I don’t know what kind o’ hoo doo mechanic you hired, but you always get the best, don’t you? I don’t know how we can ever thank you. Wouldn’t you let us give you SOMETHING on this bill or the hotel room?” Jenny Sue’s inebriation was still visible.
“Sure, Jenny Sue! Give me a dollar and we’ll call it even.”
“Whut? What you talking ‘bout, Joaquin? A DOLLAR?? Ha!!”
“Yes! Give me a dollar and come have one last drink with me.”
“Alright, then. I’ll drink to that, but then we gots to go. There ain’t nobody in Mansfield , Louisiana
“Arnold Arnold
Telasta, who was holding Joaquin’s left hand, turned loose of his hand and walked around behind Arnold Arnold
I went upstairs to the penthouse suite just in time to see the aunts coming toward the elevator, saying goodbye to my folks. I held the elevator door for them and kissed them goodbye on their cheeks. They were both very happy, but almost sober. “That sure was a lot of smiling, Pop. I guess you gave them that same drink you gave Arnold
“You guessed it,” Papa laughed as he closed the penthouse door I had just come in. “You need to find something to do for the next little while. Telasta saved out a change of clothes for you to wear tomorrow, but all the rest of our stuff is already at the facet-aire and we are ready to go, for all intents and purposes. I apologize that we cannot stay here long enough for you to get your driver’s license. It’s my wedding night, so you will excuse me if you don’t see me again before morning. You can stay here or go anywhere in the hotel complex you want to go. We will be in the master suite. I would prefer you not wander off, just to be safe. There are some really nice magazines on the coffee table by the balcony over there. You can sit in that same chair and watch TV. Oh, what the hay; you’re old enough to find something to do without my help. I’ll see you in the morning.” (Over his shoulder, as he broke into a trot toward the bedroom,) “Coming, dear.”
I hate to admit that at almost 15-years-old I was exhausted. The emotional roller-coaster that had been this day had taken its toll on me. I turned on the TV and sat in the deep cushioned chair by the French doors that led out onto the balcony. After clicking through the few channels this city had, I knew this was going to be a very dull evening for Wil Dupepe. It felt good. I got up and turned off the TV and opened the French doors, enjoying the warm breeze that came in the balcony; then sat back in my chair and watched the sun go down. Sleep overtook me in the warm late-autumn night, but a light touch on my face woke me with a start.
Here stood Last, still shorter even though I was seated. “Hey, grandson. Quite an adventure you had at the wedding today, eh?”
“Last! You shocked me. How did you get in here?”
“Easily. You left the French doors open. I closed them because it’s getting cool outside. I came here yesterday in my mini-facet-aire. It is a one-person vehicle; black, small, and hard to see -- especially at night. I watched the wedding festivities. It looked to me to have been a lot of fun, maybe especially that crazy Karl Ann and her drama. You have to fill me in on what happened to make that crazy bitch think my daughter is a werewolf.”
Wide awake now, it really was fun telling Last all about the events surrounding Pambo and Karl Ann. He had heard a lot from his eaves-dropping vantage point nestled in a tree at the edge of the country club patio. He knew more than I in some respects. Joaquin and Telasta had not told me that they were wearing body suits to the wedding -- just in case somebody spilled water on them. They were each wearing what amounted to an extra layer of skin. At least that’s what Last figured. Last said that one of them must have also de-chlorinated the pool, else the dunking could have done damage to Telasta. “It is a good thing that your folks were alerted to the danger. Maybe this will stop the witch hunt once and for all.”
“Wil, I cannot stay for long, so there will not be time for me to tell Joaquin and Telasta everything I want them to know. When I saw you sitting by an open balcony, I realized this was my perfect chance. There are some things I want to give you, some things I want to tell you, and some things I want you to tell my daughter if you would do that for me.”
“Last, you KNOW I’ll do anything you ask me to do. One thing you have taught me is how to hush and listen to what you have to say. Do I need to write anything down?”
“No, baby boy. You will be able to remember well enough, and if you paraphrase what I say, the meaning will still shine through.
I want you to tell Telasta that this wedding (and weddings are contrary to what our people believe in) has my blessings. Teelee may hold onto her outrage, but she loves Joaquin as much as I do and she will soon get over her anger. Our people believe it is wrong to create a legal agreement that connects two people when the essence of that agreement has little to do with law and everything to do with heart. Tell her we love her. Do NOT tell her we forgive her, for there is nothing to forgive. She has simply chosen the tradition of Joaquin’s people over the traditions she was reared with. Love is a powerful thing. I understand.
That’s all I want you to tell Telasta. Next I want to talk to you about your relationship to the Ocean Society. We all love you as one of ours. We consider you to BE one of ours, but Wil, nobody ever told you the reason so many of our kind have died.
It is time you know the whole truth, for I am conflicted in my desire for you. On the one hand I want you to transition and live as long as our kind live; on the other, I fear for you if you do. You see, the death of over 90% of those we have lost is attributable to land people who think exactly as Karl Ann Fissenships thinks. We have gone from being a treasured member of humankind to being the prey of land folk. I personally know the stories of the deaths of many of my people at the hands of greedy and curious land people.
While I would like to tell you the stories to enlighten you and make you aware of the danger to my daughter and son-in-law, I hate the idea of burdening you with a memory you may have for the rest of your life. We began our existence as a group who were celebrated. I think we may now be seen as freaks and side-show attractions.
Vampires have never existed. They are a figment of an over-active imagination. If vampires had ever existed, they would long since have been eradicated, for those who created them in their fertile imagination created them as evil beings. We, on the other hand, seen by few, but imagined by many, are thought to be what we are: good, thoughtful, harmless, and helpful to the race. It is because we are different (and in some ways, better) that mankind must not know us. Just because they believe we might exist does not mean they believe we do exist, and it needs to forever remain so. Land folk do not celebrate any variation from their individual norms. Pity. That’s the end of what I wanted to tell you. Now I have something to give to you, Joaquin, and Telasta.
These three platinum rings (and he produced 3 beautiful rings from his pocket -- each set with a perfectly clear stone about the size of a butterbean) I give you. They are for protection. Dipped in water and removed from water in a certain pattern -- dip dip (pause) dip dip (pause) dip dip -- will make the crystal into a resonating beacon which will cause this ring I wear (he held it up for me to see) to glow red for Telasta, blue for Joaquin, or yellow for you and I will come to your rescue. I have a small label attached to each ring so you don’t get them confused. Please wear the ring at all times. You never know when you will need it.
Now, Wil, you know more of Ocean Society abilities than perhaps any other land person. There is one more critical ability that we have of which we have not told you and of which only Ocean Society members are aware. It has saved my life more than once. Know this: we do not depend on magic. Nothing we do is any more than advanced science. We are not like vampires. If we get shot in the heart, we die. It does not take a silver bullet to do the trick. We can survive more severe wounds than most land people and we heal far quicker, but we are not immortal. Our reduced numbers are proof of that. Remind my daughter to not tempt fate. Her love for you and her trust of your wisdom means she will listen to you.
Now, is there anything you need to ask me or say to me before I go?”
“Gosh, Last, I wish you had not asked that. Mom and Pop plan for us to move to Paris
Last studied my face for several seconds. “You don’t want to go to Paris France
I gave a lump-in-my-throat half-hearted whine, “Okay.”
“Even though I CAN live anywhere,” Last continued, “ my heart is with Teelee and she has a strong attachment to Perfection. When there were huge numbers of our kind, we swam the oceans from pole to pole like nomads. I wonder if our current tribal condition is not a result of evolution. Perhaps the old nomad state contributed to all those deaths. Maybe it is safer for us to live in a more controlled environment -- one with which we are more familiar. Having said all that, I suspect you are homesick, eh?”
Somewhat sheepishly I said, “Yes.”
“And just where IS home for you, my boy?”
“I want to go home to Ubatuba. It does not matter to me whether we live in Telasta’s home or Joaquin’s, just so long as I can look at those mountains, that ocean.”
“You should have said something sooner, child. You are going to have to go to France New Orleans
“No, they did not. Here lately I have been waking up at 6 or 7 in the morning. They are spending time in the room -- not sleeping, but in the room, I suspect. I plan to go to breakfast. They will probably meet me in that restaurant.”
“Let’s do it this way, young Wil. Here is a card with the home telephone number where I am staying,” and he handed me a plain white card with a name and number on it. “When you see Telasta or Joaquin, have Telasta call me at this number.”
“Okay, Last. Thanks for listening to me or, really, for MAKING me talk. I didn’t want to be a problem, so I was not going to say anything. I’m just so homesick I don’t know what to do.”
In a low, advisory voice -- not chiding at all, but more like a good friend giving somber advice -- he said, “You SHOULD have said something, son. All of the adults here are aware that you are not flighty, not spoiled, not demanding and petulant. We might not be so eager to listen if you were any of those things; but you have been very good, kind, stable, eager to learn. In short, you ACT like one of our blood children. It is time to speak your mind. You make it difficult to put you on the RIGHT path when we have no idea WHAT path you are on. Talk, boy, talk.” He smiled, “Gotta go!”
That was the end of our visit. Last has never had a problem with saying goodbye and leaving abruptly. This visit was no different. He simply kissed me on the lips, opened the balcony door, and jumped over the rail. I was shocked and ran over to the rail, expecting to see Last splattered on the parking lot below. Instead, there was Last floating in the air a few feet from the balcony, smiling broadly at me. He probably knew he would get this reaction from me. “Remember, I told you we don’t like to use anti-gravity. That does not mean we NEVER use it.” He laughed, pushed a button on his belt, and shot away into the dark.
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