After I had left the library, thanking Stanty for his invitation and wishing that I had not withheld the fact that I didn’t swim—a fact I knew would become obvious, if it was not already, and whose withholding, when revealed, would embarrass me—I went to my room to change into trunks.
I joined Paul and Sonya, drying each other after their swim, and, now, lying on pads under the sun.
“Good morning, my dear John.”
I welcomed her ingratiating greeting. “Morning, Sonya.”
“Hey, man.”
“Hi, Paul … man.”
Soon, the sundeck would become a place of congregation for us. For as long as we might abide the fierce heat (occasionally going to the small bar at the end of the deck sheltered there by a canopy and the shade of a large tree, its branches hovering over a demarcation and spilling into the sundeck while we drank water, chilled juice, and eventually Cuba libres, drinking and conversing), we would lie on lounging chairs, or—closer together—on pads, close enough to sense the heat of each other’s body, as I am doing now, lying on a pad next to Sonya, not lying down yet, no, but sitting propped on my elbows to look at our bodies.
Next to me, Sonya is golden. Beside her rests the caftan she wears over her sunning suit when she leaves the sundeck, a veily, almost transparent covering that embraces her body. I can feel my tan darkening—soon surpassing Paul’s, which is brown, the film of fine hairs on his oiled body turning blond. I detect the sweet scent of clean perspiration and mango-tinged tanning oil.
Paul sat up, to reach for a cigarette in the pack next to him. He has a unique way of smoking. He will light the cigarette, cupping it against a breeze even when there is none. He will inhale a few times, flip any ashes away, and quickly stub the cigarette on his palm, an action so quick and expert that he is never burned.
I looked away from him and lay back. I didn’t want him to see me glancing at his body, in competition, not desire, no, only because my eyes, while comparing bodies, had noticed what seemed to indicate the prominence of his endowment. In my adult life, I have concentrated on my whole body as the object of attraction, but I am also secure with my endowment, and always competitive. Still, it annoyed me that Paul seemed to emphasize the bulge between his legs—but then, it was possible that his sunbathing next to Sonya, with the top of her bathing suit removed, accounted for a slight arousal, and therefore a misleading impression.
“I swam there today, all the way!” Stanty shouted as he appeared before us—and I began to think of his entrances as “appearances.” He was dripping wet from swimming as he waited to make sure everyone noticed his presence.
When Sonya saw Stanty, she adjusted the upper part of her suit, covering her breasts, an endearing gesture of discretion.
“My darling, perhaps you rowed there?” Sonya said.
“Maybe. But I could have swum.”
“Of course you could,” said Paul.
“Of course,” echoed Sonya.
It annoyed me that Stanty had interrupted sensual moments with his breathless declamation.
In an unsurprised tone that indicated a familiar reaction toward Stanty’s claims, Paul said, “You went all the way to the island?”
“Yeah, and—” Stanty squatted next to us.
The neighboring island was apparently the basis for an evolving story by him, told and enhanced, to assert his bravery, as if he were the star in his fantasy play. “And—?” I was curious to hear his embellishment.
“I think there’s someone still there,” he said gravely.
“Who do you think it might be?” Paul coaxed out his story.
Stanty shook his head, as if considering the question seriously. “I think—you know.” He pondered. “I don’t know—I think there’s something dangerous about that island.”
“Stanty—” Sonya cautioned, in her kind tone.
Paul said easily: “Maybe you’d better stay away from there.”
Stanty shrugged, ready to close his story on that hint of danger. I was sure that both Paul and Sonya pretended to believe his stories; he himself might not expect to be believed.
He sprang up, moved over to where I lay, and squatted next to me. In an urgent but lowered voice, a whisper that excluded the others, he said: “John Rechy, will you come with me? We’ll row there and check that place out.”
“Sure,” I said, to placate him, “but not now.”
“Okay, then, but soon,” he said and walked away.
Had he wanted to tell me something private?—he had sought me out in the library earlier. I dismissed the thought and gave no credence to his fantasies.