Paradise - Part One (The Erotic Adventures of Sophia Durant) (11 page)

Stafford dove into the lagoon and swam underwater. I followed close behind. He was dressed by the time I reached the other side, and I watched him watch me as I put on my dress. He looked on with an expression of calm satisfaction. Slipping on the dress, I felt deeply content. I made a conscious effort not to smile, not wanting to give too much away.

The ride along Public Highway in the Mucielago was similarly without verbal communication. Somewhat more comfortable with Stafford, I didn’t look at him, but instead gazed out the windows at the passing countryside. He didn’t drive as fast back to the barn as he drove from it. Parking next to the older Porsche, he asked me, “See you back at the villa?”

I nodded with a smile and got in the 911 Turbo. Before I could even start it the
Murcielago had left behind a trail of dust.

I was so relaxed, my mind in such a daze, the whole way back I didn’t think of anything. I didn’t even wonder what was going on between Stafford and me. That’s quite clear, isn’t it? Quite simply, I was one move nearer my objective and I could see all the moves ahead clearly like in a game of checkers.

Thunder cracked and lightning struck sending an immediate bright flash through the gray of my room, as I lay on the bed with the
MacBook propped open in front of me. I surfed aimlessly on the tides of cyberspace. First skipping listlessly through Stumbleupon—the discovery of a another dwarf planet in our solar system, governments admit aliens are real, twisting architecture with
Mathematica
—then the news on Twitter. I saw some articles about flooding in North Florida. I checked the specific parts that had flooded. They are to the north and west of where my family and friends are in Gainesville. Archer, Live Oak, and Branford were hit the hardest. The thought that I ought to call my parents and Julie flashed through my mind, but I felt too lazy and content to do so. My dad might think I was stoned, Julie would know I got laid and neither would be too happy with me. My next thoughts made me curious and pulled me somewhat out of my contented stupor: I wondered how the event at the falls affected my future at the workplace. I began to feel uneasy and even to worry, though I can’t pinpoint the reason behind it. All I know is my content gave way to a general malaise, and a gloom settled around me that I couldn’t shake for days. Perhaps I was, on some unconscious level, falling in love with Stafford and realized it was a hopeless situation. I almost laughed out loud at the thought. Then I wondered if it was because Stafford made me miss Julie in some odd way. No, the thought had less veracity than the idea of being in love with Stafford, which really wasn’t true at all either. Perhaps I sensed the impending chaos with a sixth sense I was as yet unaware of. Inevitably, there would be a falling out with Stafford. There always is in these highly charged relationships, especially in ones where one of the partners is married to someone else. The more I thought about the situation, the more I realized how much I felt contempt for Isabella. Looking deeper still, I realized how I envied her and wished I was married to Stafford myself. Even if it was a loveless relationship, I would have security and more importantly than anything else, Savannah would be my own.

I proceeded to think what I considered to be thoughts that could only be described as deeply evil and worked hard to shake them from my head. I put the
MacBook away and concentrated on thoughts of that little baby. I realize up to this point I have not adequately described my boundless love for that beautiful baby in this diary. Savannah is the one and only thing that has made my heart sing utterly and purely since I came onboard with the Staffords. I feel somewhat mad admitting to such an inordinate amount of affection, bordering on obsession, for a little person that can’t even talk yet, and writing about it feels false. It feels as though I’m describing something that is really an out-and-out lie, but it is not. Perhaps it seems that way because in writing it I’m not able to give a satisfactory explanation as to the cause of these amorous feelings, so it feels faked because it’s unexplained. All I can say is that I had then (as I have even more so now) tremendous, larger-than-life feelings for Savannah. No, it doesn’t make sense. Yes, it borders on obsession. But as often happens in life, the reasoning behind an individual’s motivation in any given act is not always clear.

July 22, Eleuthera Island, Bahamas

I sat with Anna on one of the unnamed pink beaches on the East Coast of Eleuthera. This was some days after the incident at the falls with Stafford, after which I hadn’t seen him. The days passed pretty ordinarily, mostly with little Savannah; feeding her or carrying her off to sleep or just sitting with her, entertaining her. Watching cinema, surfing the net, or reading in my spare time, I didn’t even think about what happened at the falls other than occasionally at night as I was drifting off to sleep and couldn’t really control my thoughts. It began to feel like a strange dream I couldn’t place, or even like it never happened, and I dismissed it eventually as a fluke. I didn’t socialize with any of the maids or porters or anyone else, and I hadn’t seen Anna much at all since I skipped out on meeting her in favor of the rendezvous with Stafford.

Anna rolled a joint comprised mostly of the AK-47 strain while I looked at the pink sand below the small cliff of white rock on which we sat,
then out to that brilliant turquoise sea that faded into a darker blue beyond. Over the horizon hung a few wispy clouds. I looked at the pink sand again, wondering what caused the unusual coloration. There was a light wind that turned strong, creeping up on us, causing Anna difficulty in lighting the joint and both of us difficulty in keeping our hair out of our faces. We both wore large, polarized sunglasses that gave the view an unnatural clarity. The surreal appearance of things was exponentially increased by the AK-47. I felt in special need of the soothing effects of the AK-47 given the turbulent emotional life I was now living. I didn’t really even know where half the feelings I had came from. I snapped at the slightest things I would never have given any notice before. Example: one of the other nannies passed Savannah off to me at the end of her shift without a pacifier. Instead of going to find one, as I normally would have, I went off into a tirade that I never before could have imagined coming from me. Another example: my room is regularly cleaned by maids and one of them, I don’t know who, shifted my Macbook from one bedside table to the other when she tidied my room. I don’t know why she did it, I knew even less why I flipped out and went off the handle at the incident, cursing a blue streak aloud in my room to no one but my four walls.

The wind receded enough for Anna to light the joint. The smell of cannabis soothed my nerves and I looked forward to sucking down the pleasant curls of blue smoke. After a few long draws Anna handed the football-shaped white stick to me. I blazed the AK-47, feeling the cool sensation and hunger-inducing awareness of my lips, tongue, and throat. My vision of the cliff, beach, sea, sky and clouds seemed instantly heightened, more real and three-dimensional as the psychotropic effects of the blue curls set in. This was good shit. I remembered reading somewhere that
delta-9-THC
had psychotropic effects and reckoned the football must have contained some. Probably the reason AK-47 got its name; it came at you like the sometimes wildly inaccurate, reality-distorting three-round bursts fired from the machinegun of some hopeless sand dab in the Iraqi desert. That or because it’s trusted in the way your average Taliban soldier trusts the reliability of an AK-47 to almost never jam, unlike most things he knows in life—or both. For a brief moment I mused on the disparate lives I had just imagined in my stoned metaphor. Then Anna’s voice assailed me like an avenging angel diving in from some far off cloud.

“This is the same thing we had in the closet in St. Augustine your first day on the job,” she said in a tone that sounded sad.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.
It seems like a long time ago. That’s all. When the truth is, I know you for a a short time only. But it seems longer, like a lifetime.”

Was the hint of sorrow about a feeling of what could never be between us? Or was it because these feelings she expressed were painful since she perceived them as too beautiful for this world—a feeling reserved mostly for poets?

I was in this dramatic way mostly due to the intoxication. It didn’t seem to soothe my emotional nature at all. Rather it heightened it. Perhaps she knew about what happened with Stafford and this had something to do with that.

All of these thoughts had flashed before my mind’s eye in a split-second before she continued.

“I sometimes wish we spend more time together. You know, there is no one else here to talk to like you. Someone who actually thinks of more things than only the usual day-to-day grind.”

“I’d love to spend more time together. Here I was thinking I’d scared you away.”

“No, if I was afraid, it was only because of how much we are the same. I mean, I am from Cuba and not good in English. English is very difficult. But I think we have…ah, understanding—more than words.”

She flashed those black, soul-absorbing eyes.

“I feel it too. It’s indescribable, but very real.”

I gazed at her for an extended period, wondering what she was feeling.

She kissed me on the cheek affectionately.

I turned and kissed her, a short peck on the lips.

Then we both looked back at the view in silence for a few moments.

“Mr. Stafford favors you in a special way. All the women talk about it. He holds you in special regard.”

She said it as if she was testing my reaction.

“Where did you hear that? Who said it?” I asked, though I probably wouldn’t know who any of the women were if she mentioned them by name.

“They all do.”

“What is it to me? He’s a married man. I respect him and his wife and respectfully keep my distance.” I never took my eyes off the sea as I said this. “I haven’t even seen him for…I don’t know how many days.”

I knew how many days, it had been five since our tryst.

“He’s been away.”

I looked at her perhaps in a way that gave away my feelings.

“No one knows where. He’s coming back this evening.”

“He didn’t even tell anyone why he was going?”

“Business, of course.
What else? It’s all the man understands.”

“I see.”

“Do you?”

I looked at her again,
what was that supposed to mean
?

“I think so,” I said.

“Something happened with you two, I know.”

Anna’s manner was so matter-of-fact I found it incredibly annoying, and I felt myself turn red immediately.

“And now you are bright red like…a tomato.”

She smiled.

I thought for a moment, trying to decide whether to tell her, to brush it off, or to punch her in the face. Obviously I couldn’t brush it off, I’d just turned tomato-like as she so kindly informed me. Telling her anything would be to break a tacit agreement I imagined had formed between Stafford and me. It might also interrupt my plan.

I lunged at her, knocking her back to the white rock. I was smiling, still somewhat embarrassed, and she laughed as I pinned her down against the cliff edge.

“Don’t tell anyone anything we discuss. Do you understand?” I said as firmly as I possibly could.

“Yes. Sophia, I don’t. I will not deceive you. You’re my…friend.”

I loosened my grip.

“Something did happen between Mr. Stafford and me. I don’t know whether it’s what you’re thinking it is or not. But that doesn’t matter because I don’t know what I’m able to
discuss now and what I can’t. Perhaps in the future I’ll be able to say more, but right now I can’t. Understand?”

“Yes. Of course I do.
Crazy
mujer. Tu eres loca
.”

“I am crazy. Or at least I’ve been feeling a little crazy lately.” I helped her up and we sat facing one another.

“You fucked him, I can tell,” she said with an irritating smile.

I bumped her with one of my knees.

“You don’t deny it. It’s okay. He gets around. A real eye for the ladies.”

I wanted to throw her off the cliff. Immediately I had visions of being arrested for the murder of Anna
Seoane. Paranoid, I looked around for cops.

“You slept with him?” I asked, not knowing what else to say.

She hesitated, then said: “No, I never…”

“Isabella knows…about his wandering eye?”

“That I don’t know for sure, but I suspect…yes. She must. She is a bizarre woman. One never knows what she really thinks. But she must know.”

“I feel bad for her.”
My eyes downcast.

“I don’t. I think she is a money-grubbing whore.”

I imagined her opinion reflected the opinion of most of the maids, if not that of the porters and of all the rest of the Stafford entourage.

“Well, you know her much better than I do.”

“Probably not. They say
to know is to love
but I think
to know is to hate
. The more you know of someone, the more you feel…
mépris
.”