Voila!
Feeling quite accomplished with my culinary venture, I arranged tortilla chips on the tray and placed the bowl in the center. I carried it to the bedroom and deposited it on Damian’s lap.
“I made you something,” I announced.
He eyed the lumpy concoction without touching it.
Dear God, he looked so rough and rugged with his almost-beard.
“Go ahead,” I said. “It’s ceviche.”
“Ceviche?” He examined it.
“Yes. It’s fish with—”
“I know what ceviche is.” He was definitely wary. “You first.”
“Fine.” I shrugged, scooping up a mouthful with a tortilla chip. “Mmmm,” I said. “It’s really good.”
Damian had a taste of it. We both chewed in silence. I swallowed. He spit out a lemon seed and swallowed. I went for another. He followed. Neither of us broke eye contact.
It was the most vile, putrid, goopy thing in the world. It tasted of bile and rotten tomatoes and Bart Simpson’s butt.
I spit it out, but Damian kept going, bite after foul, rancid bite, until it was all gone. When he was done, he leaned back, holding his tummy like he was trying to keep it all down.
“Wha—?” I stared at him. “Why did you finish it?”
“Because you made it,” he replied. “Don’t make it again.” He turned onto his side and went to sleep.
Damian got out of bed early the next morning. The threat of more of my cooking may have hastened his recovery. The first thing he did was to move the boat under a canopy of coconut trees. He covered the roof with palm fronds and secured them with a rope so no one could spot the boat from above.
Watching him work, lean and shirtless, I wondered how I had ever thought of him as ordinary. He was sculpted, but not overly muscular, with the kind of back and shoulders that came from hard work. His skin was the same color I remembered: warm sand with a dusting of bronze. He rarely combed his hair, but far from a tangled mess, it looked wind-worn and sexy, with the ends curled up from the humidity.
When Damian looked my way, I pretended I was engrossed in the seashell at my feet. I thought of our Sunday strolls on the beach, the two of us racing ahead of MaMaLu, ready to pounce before the next wave pulled its treasures back into the ocean. We only picked shells that had been battered by the waves, smashed and worn so thin that they turned into iridescent slivers of light. Those were the ones MaMaLu loved best. We made necklaces for her. I sorted them by size and shape while he carefully made a hole through them. That was the hardest part—tapping a nail through their fragile forms without breaking them.
I collected a few shells before heading back inside, feeling like I was reclaiming little pieces of me. Here, on this remote island, with no beach chairs or loud music or attentive hostesses topping up my cocktail, I was getting back in touch with myself. I didn’t care if my hair was frizzy, or what time dinner was being served, or my massage appointment, or the private cruise. There was a sense of freedom, a sense of simplicity that I didn’t know I’d been missing.
That night, Damian cooked crabs on the beach over a small fire and a pot of water. We ate them with melted butter dribbling down our chins. Okay, so he was a much better cook than me, and he would make a hell of a contestant on Survivor, but all of that aside, I thought he was a motherfucking bad-ass because he had survived my ceviche.
He slashed open some green coconuts and we sipped the sweet, light water inside. Damian didn’t look at me. Much. He kept his eyes on the water. Occasionally, he looked up at the sky. I wondered if he was scanning the area for boats or helicopters. I was pretty sure he’d tuned in to the news.
Once or twice when his eyes settled on me, he looked away quickly. I didn’t know what he was thinking or how long we were supposed to lay low. There were so many things I wanted to ask him, so much I wanted to know, but sitting beside him, watching the fire as the waves rolled in, filled me up. I felt safe with Damian. I wanted to curl up and put my head on his lap, like I had done all those years ago at the start of our friendship.
But Damian was busy. He was making holes in the shells I had picked. He was so gentle, so careful with each piece that I couldn’t take my eyes off him. His fingers felt each shell, before picking the right spot. Sometimes he caressed a shell, turning it over, giving it his full attention, before putting it aside. Those were the ones that would crack from the slightest dent, and Damian didn’t want to damage any.
When he was done, Damian threaded a cord through the shells and tied the ends. He held it up before the fire. The necklace glowed in the golden light, frail and ethereal.
“Here.” He gave it to me.
Damian had never made a seashell necklace for anyone except MaMaLu. Suddenly, I realized what he was doing. He was saying sorry. He was making up for the necklace he had thrown overboard, the necklace that had taken his mother away from him.
Have you ever held a life in your hand?He had dropped the locket in my hand and closed my fingers around it.Here, feel it.
I’d thought he was nuts, but my mother’s necklace had cost his mother’s life. And yet, here he was, giving me a memory of his mother to make up for taking away mine.
“She was my mother too,” I said. “MaMaLu was the only mother I knew.”
Huge, heavy sobs ripped through me. I reached for him, wrapping my arms around him, wanting to share this pain, this grief. Had anyone held him when she died? Had anyone comforted him? He stiffened, but let me cry. I cried for him. I cried for MaMaLu. I cried for our mothers who were gone, and for all the years we’d lost in between.
