After we finished up the food and Miguel and I drank the remaining Tecates over a few rowdy games of Crazy Eights, we headed back to the marina. The sun was sinking low in the sky as we tied up at the dock, and Miguel, Raul, and Alex hopped off the boat, Javier holding me back.
“You sure you don’t mind if we spend the night here?” Javier asked Raul.
He shook his head like it annoyed him to move. “No, how would you know if you want it if you don’t test all of it out?”
“The boat is like a lady,” Miguel teased. “You need to spend some time in all her tight spaces.”
I grinned while Javier squeezed me to him. “No one can compete with the one I have here.”
As expected, Raul and Alex were stony faced at that comment, but Miguel responded with a cheeky little grin. They waved goodbye and walked off, a mysterious trio if I ever saw one.
I looked up at Javier, his eyes glinting gold in the late sun. “Are we really staying overnight?”
He eyed me with amusement. “Of course, my angel. Raul is right. How will we know the boat is for us if we don’t spend time sleeping with her? I hope you won’t mind a threesome.”
I pinched his side at that comment, all the while grinning over the fact that he had said the boat was “for us,” as if I really mattered in his decisions. And as the evening fell, my worries went away with the sun. After a fresh fish dinner, he set Dire Straits to play from the cockpit speakers. Then he jumped off the boat and onto the dock, the waves rocking black liquid under the moon-filled sky.
He held out his hand for me after the opening notes of “On Every Street” began playing. “Care to dance?”
“On the dock?’ I asked. “Right now?”
He cocked his head. “Come, my angel. Dance with me.”
I made my way off the boat and joined him at his side. A breeze had picked up and the marina filled up with the sound of halyards clanging against the masts as if Dire Straits had a whole new rhythm section. Down the rows of docks, the boats glowed with lights. This place made a surprisingly romantic dance floor.
I let Javier slip his arms around me, one at the bottom of my spine, his fingers trailing onto my ass, the other holding my hand up by our faces. Being so self-conscious of my leg and my occasional limp, I was never one for dancing. But Javier was so sure and so smooth he made our moves effortless as we glided past the boat. The emotions of the song washed over me, making my eyes close.
“What can I tell you as I’m standing next to you,” he sung quietly in my ear, “she threw herself under my wheels.”
I buried my head in his neck, inhaling his scent that used to be musk and tea but now was just him mingling with the salty air. It soothed me, coating my heart, making me forget everything I knew. Yes, I was drowning again, but this time for the right reasons. There was no better reason than love.
“You know,” he began, voice low and full, “if you were to ever leave me, I’d come looking for you, on every street.”
“You promise?”
“Always.” And I knew he kept his promises.
Later, we brought our blankets and sleeping bags up to the top deck. Though the night was already sweltering enough, the breeze just enough to cool our skin, we generated our own heat anyway. I straddled Javier as he sat behind the wheel, not caring if someone was on a nearby boat and getting a peep show, my breasts glowing under the twinkling lights. I was throwing everything to the wind, all caution, all my ghosts. I came, trying to keep my cries from carrying over the water but failing miserably.
Javier quickly pulled out and pressed me down into the seat, standing above me. He finished himself off with long, fast strokes and came onto my stomach, his body tensing, his head thrown back, face to the moon. I watched him, his body framed by my breasts, as he came back to earth. The desire in his eyes was still there, not tamed by his release. He went to his knees beside me and started slowly, softly rubbing his seed into my stomach and up onto my chest.
I watched him, my heart in my throat. I’d never seen such intensity from him after sex and it was here now in full force, burning out of his gaze.
I wanted to ask what he was doing, but I didn’t need to.
“I want to come on every inch of your body,” he whispered, and somehow it didn’t sound dirty at all. It sounded clean, pure, like rainwater. “I want to rub it in you, like this, until it’s a part of your skin. I want to stain you, Eden. I want myself embedded in your skin, in your heart, in your soul.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, so I sat up and put my hands on either side of his neck and kissed him as sweetly as I could. “You’ve stained me, Javier.”
I expected him to grin in response, to look happy or relieved. But the fire never burned out. It remained, watching me like he’d never see me again. It stayed like that as we fell asleep in the blankets, locked in each other’s arms, watching the wind instrument spin like the galaxies hidden behind it.
***
I woke up as dawn was spreading in the east, the sky a smoky purple swept with pelicans. Javier was already awake, sitting in front of me, hugging his knees to his chest. I slowly sat up, holding the blanket to me, and gingerly touched his back.
He didn’t flinch. He kept his eyes focused on the sky, on the birds as they dipped and twirled in their early morning dance.
“Javier?”
I waited, biting my lip anxiously. The strange look in his eyes hadn’t passed during the night and it was only then that I was recognizing it for what it was. I must have looked like that for the past few months I’d been with him. It was the look of guilt. It was the look of fear. I realized I’d never seen Javier look afraid before. An extremely unsettling feeling sunk in my chest.
“Javier?” I whispered, trying again, my palm flattened on his smooth, tawny skin. I stroked it down the lines of his cross tattoo. “Talk to me.”