“Yeah, and your outfit for that company is making me wonder if perhaps I’m going to be a bit of a third wheel. If so, I can always politely excuse myself and give you some alone time with Ernesto the Kissing Bandito.”
“Don’t be stupid. I already told you I’m seeing someone.”
“Yeah, and perhaps that someone is the Kissing Bandito.”
“So, now you’re thinking Ernesto might be my mystery man.”
“The thought kind of crossed my mind after I saw that dress.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Ernesto and I are just friends, and I would have thought you already understood that after our earlier conversation.”
“Wait, which one? We’ve had quite a few.”
“The one where I said that I can kiss Ernesto because it doesn’t mean anything, but I can’t kiss you because it could mean something.”
“Oh, yeah, that one—well, that dress kind of put my mind into a kind of lustful holding pattern.”
“Is it really that alluring?”
“Well, if you put on that dress to have dinner with me, then you could be damn well sure that a boner would definitely be on the menu—literally lying across the menu.”
She smiled.
“So, how do you know that I didn’t put on this dress for you?” she asked.
“Wait—did you?”
“I guess you’ll never know now,” she said, as she stepped out the door of our little bungalow and headed towards the camp’s cafeteria.
Fucking women had a capacity for cruelty that knew no bounds, for a statement like that, even made in jest, was enough to harden my manhood and bring about the ominous inklings of a minor case of blue balls. I followed her out, and my eyes instinctively fell upon her backside, which was looking delectable as it swayed beneath the thin fabric of her dress. Sweet mother of blue tinted balls. If there were any woman on earth currently capable of eclipsing my angst ridden feelings for Estelle it was Professor Hot Sauce.
We reached the cafeteria, and I quickly realized it was a mobile kitchen, or, more accurately, the off-road equivalent of a roach coach. It was a converted van that had all the amenities of a standard kitchen, and, like the other van, had solar panels and a battery system to keep its refrigerators and freezers operating. Around it were several picnic tables, and two of them resided under an awning enclosed by screens, so they were clearly the finest tables in the house during the hours when the mosquitos came out to dine. We chose one of the two covered tables and set out plates, napkins, and silverware, with the final touch being candles.
“I hate to sound like a broken record here, but this is looking pretty romantic. Are you sure you don’t want to be alone with your Latin lover?”
“No, and I would do the same thing regardless of the company.”
“Really? So, if Ernesto weren’t coming over, you would have worn the red dress and lit the candles for me?”
“Probably not, as I wouldn’t want you to get the wrong impression and hope to revisit what happened at the waterfall.”
“Anyone ever tell you that you play with men like they’re yo-yos?”
“Excuse me?”
“You know—up and down—up and down,” I said, as I flicked my wrist to demonstrate my point.
“No, has anyone ever told you to man-up?”
“Actually, yes.”
“Good, so you won’t be offended when I tell you right now that it’s just a dress, so man the fuck up.”
“Fair enough. I guess I’m going to go freshen up and perhaps take a nice cold shower in the hope it might help with the dizziness from being spun around at your fingertip.”
I left Professor Hot Sauce and headed for our guest bungalow, all the while thinking that Professor Blue Balls might be a more accurate nickname for my lovely hostess. I grabbed fresh clothes and walked over to the shower and hung my stuff over one of the walls, only to realize I might just have a minor dump in me. Perfect, I’d make this an all in one stop, and, unless King Chalupa and his minions had a bathroom fetish, I should be more than able to get it done without interruption.
I examined all three stalls and decided on the one to the far left, because it was the cleanest and most remote. I laid a sanitary cover down, dropped my shorts, and placed my backside upon the comfortably warm plastic seat. Interestingly, the toilet’s seat was several degrees warmer than room temperature, and I gazed up and saw that the portable structure had a perfectly placed skylight that allowed the sun to have shined directly onto this humble commode for the better part of the day. It was as though heaven itself were blessing this dump, and a real warmth was spreading through my body and bringing peace and tranquility to replace the recent turmoil created by Alessandra. I sighed audibly, closed my eyes, and felt pure serenity. That is—until I heard the outer bathroom door open.
“Tag, I think we should talk.”
Sweet mother of defecating goats. This was my curse. For some reason, the universe had decided that it was the job of the opposite sex to use every opportunity to intrude and torment me on the toilet. Alessandra had already done it at the faculty housing, and now she was repeating her performance by desecrating my peace in my one place of worship in this fucking camp. As if our relationship hadn’t already been challenging enough, she had found a way to also ruin my special time.
“Really? Because I think we should give each other space—as in space to take a shit and a shower in peace.”
“No chance, as I didn’t like what you said about me treating men like yo-yos. I’m not trying to fuck with you. I honestly don’t know what came over me at that waterfall.”
“Hey, we were both equally guilty, and it’s fine, because I’ve obviously got other things on my mind at the moment. So, let’s just call it even and move on.”
“No, I think we should discuss this.”
“Fine, just not now.”
“No, we’re working together, so we should really resolve this.”
“OK, I think I need to make you aware of something—something very important, and it’s something that could affect our safety and, indeed, our lives,” I said.
“Go on,” she said, suddenly sounding a little concerned.
“OK, here it is, and it’s deadly serious. Whenever one of my dumps gets interrupted, terrible things happen—and I mean terrible.”
“To your anus?” she asked, stifling a laugh.
“No, obviously not to my anus. I’m talking about to me and those around me. We’re talking real life and death consequences.”
“From being interrupted in a bathroom?”
“Yes.”
“Are you making this up right now just so you can avoid talking to me?”
“No, I’m serious.”
“OK, then let me tell you, Tag—you are a yo-yo,” she said, barely able to keep from laughing.
“I know it sounds crazy, but I’m being serious, and this curse goes all the way back to my early childhood.”
“Well then, please do explain,” she responded.
I proceeded to recount the history of some of the more memorable experiences that brought me to believe in my unusual bathroom curse. The first had occurred when I was five years old and attending a 49ers football game with my parents. It was the late eighties, so children were actually still allowed to do things without direct supervision, and one of them had been taking a shit at a public venue. I was all by my lonesome, and, with little more than one turd set free to the bowl, two teenage assholes broke into my bathroom stall and looted my pockets for change. There was obvious emotional scarring as well as the indignity of the assault on my person, but it was the outcome of the game that was most alarming. The 49ers, who were currently undefeated that season, lost that day’s game to an inexplicable interception, and fate, at that moment, revealed to me a major insight that was to become the bane of my existence.
“It’s just a coincidence,” she said.
“No, because some years later in high school, I was getting ready for senio
r prom, and my mother accidentally walked in on me while I was still on the toilet. That night, the engine of my beater white Honda Civic overheated and blew a head gasket and forced me and my date to hitchhike the rest of the way to the hotel where the prom was being held. The only car willing to stop and give us a ride was a Volkswagen van full of hippies on their way to a Grateful Dead tribute concert. They were smoking dubious amounts of pot, and my date and I were so inundated with the smell of cannabis that the principal gave us detention for the last week of school. Then, a number of years later, in my junior year at Stanford, the girl I was dating knew of my phobia and decided to test it by throwing a half full bucket of ice water over me while I was taking a shit. On the way to my first class of the morning, I cut across one of the sports fields and had a stray javelin fly into the spokes of the front wheel of my bike. It locked up and sent me flying over the handlebars, whereupon my shorts caught on the brake lever, and I ended up naked from the waist down, lying on the grass with my willie whipping in the wind. It probably sounds funny, but I would likely have died from some kind of head injury had I not been a martial artist and known how to properly roll out from a forward fall.”
“What happened with the girlfriend?” she asked.
“I broke up with her but decided to get back together that night when she showed up at my door wearing nothing but her thong underwear and an overcoat.”
“I should have guessed.”
“There’s more—a lot more. Years later, in the military, an interrupted morning dump caused my teammate’s parachute to not open properly, and it left me alone to complete a nearly impossible mission—the mission that got me shot and ended my military career.”
“That all still sounds like coincidence to me,” she said.
“I’m just getting started. The next event took place several months ago and just happens to have included Estelle. She interrupted my morning dump, and two hours later I was involved in a plane crash.”
“Bullshit.”
“True story, and if not for the incredible efforts of the flight crew it would likely have ended in complete disaster. Now, I’ll finish this torrid real life tale with an incident that occurred only a month ago while I was attending a close friend’s wedding in Hawaii. It was during the rehearsal dinner, and, in a panic after eating some tainted poi, I mistakenly ran into the women’s restroom for an emergency dump.”
Alessandra did her best to stifle another giggle, but it was too much, and she was soon in the midst of a full belly laugh.
“You can laugh all you want, but the next morning, the bride was accused of a murder she didn’t commit, and the entire wedding was put on hold until I could prove she was innocent. Two more interrupted dumps later, and two men involved in the affair were murdered, and I was nearly gunned down by a team of former Delta Force soldiers. I’m telling you—all of these occurrences cross the boundary of coincidence and reside firmly in fact.”
“And just who were the people interrupting all of those dumps?”
“Women, mostly.”
She laughed yet again.
“Indeed, so, in reality, women are your curse.”
“They sure are—now can you please leave before you cause some kind of catastrophic event?”
“No, as I said before, I didn’t like our last conversation.”
I buried my head in my hands and audibly groaned.
“Haven’t we already moved far enough along that it’s no longer our last conversation?”
“No.”
“You realize that you already interrupted one dump today, and if you continue to ruin this one, a fucking volcano is going to erupt, or there will be a catastrophic earthquake, or perhaps even fucking King Chalupa will come out of hiding and level this fucking place to the ground.”
“There are no active volcanos or major fault lines within this specific area, and King Chalupa is a myth.”
“I’m just trying to make a point.”
“So am I, and I want you to understand that I would like nothing more than to explore those feelings that came out at the waterfall this afternoon, but I’m trying to do the right thing here—for both of us—and you’re making it out as though I’m some kind of jezebel cocktease.”
Now it was my turn to laugh.
“Um—jezebel cocktease? Now, that is an awesome nickname!”
“It’s not supposed to be.”
“It is, and you can forget Professor Hot Sauce.”
“Tag, I’m trying to have a serious conversation.”
“I understand, and I think we can both agree that what happened at the waterfall was a random and isolated event, so I want you to know that I’m perfectly fine with our platonic relationship and that you should feel free to get as many spicy kisses as you want from Ernesto the Kissing Bandito.”
Alessandra groaned.
“You know what? Now, I really regret kissing you under the waterfall,” she said.
“Well, I would also like to say that I regret it, but, honestly, I don’t. It was awesome, and I shall always enjoy the memory of it, and perhaps I’ll even do so in the shower with the help of these two ladies right here,” I said, referring to my hands.”
She stewed for a moment then finally responded.
“Well, in that case, don’t forget to wash your hands before dinner,” she said, as she turned to leave.
Alessandra exited the bathroom hut, and I realized I had just brought our little argument to an end by making a veiled threat that I was going to think about her and our little moment together on the waterfall while I masturbated in the shower. Truly—I was not proving to be a master of debate, but rather just a masturbater. Still, I brought our discussion to an end, though I suppose my beautiful and spicy fucking guide was getting under my skin and mixing with my already turbulent emotions regarding Estelle, and that meant I really needed to suppress any silly romantic meanderings that I might have in regard to Professor Hot Sauce. That moment we shared was just a kiss under a waterfall. Well—a kiss under a waterfall in the middle of a jungle downpour. I suppose it was also a kiss under a waterfall in the middle of a jungle downpour that happened to be preceded by a day of excellent conversation and perhaps the perception of a little sexual tension. Goddammit! I was letting my imagination get the best of me again! I therefore decided to get Professor Hot Sauce out of my head by finishing my dump and stepping into a nice soothing shower and spending that time worrying about the real problem at hand—namely sixteen missing fellow Americans. I turned on the taps, lathered up, and let the moving water and refreshing scent of soap and shampoo drastically improve my mood. By the time I was rinsing off, I was ready to face the world.
“Fuck it! I’m going to find those fucking scientists, and if King Chalupa and his minions are the culprits behind it all, then I’m going to fuck those fuckers right in their ancient asses for dragging me to fucking Costa Rica. Then I’m going to rescue those scientists and give Estelle a whole lot of shit about her fucking upcoming wedding.”
I turned off the taps and stepped out to find Alessandra standing over by the door, and she was holding a towel in her hand and gazing at me in all my nakedness.
“Do you often give yourself pep talks in the shower?” she asked.
“I do, as a matter of fact.”
“Interesting, did it help?”
“I think so. What brings you back in here?”
“I figured you’d need a towel,” she said, tossing it over.
“Thanks.”
She glanced down at my gentleman region then smiled at me.
“So, how was I?” she asked.
It took me second to remember my stupid threat, and I tried to think of a witty response but found myself lost to her penetrating gaze.
“Nothing could ever be as good as how it felt in real life,” I said.
“Agreed,” she said, as she smiled, averted her gaze, then left the room.
All was suddenly very quiet except for the few remaining drips of water
that seeped from the showerhead, and, as I thought about our exchange, I was happy to realize that we were back to a normal operating friendly relationship. I dried off, applied pleasantries, then dressed and rejoined Alessandra back at the roach coach.
“Any sign of our guest?” I asked.
“Not yet, but he can’t be too far away, as he’s usually very punctual.”
I was very tempted to ask how she knew that little fact, but I decided it might jeopardize the fragile truce we had informally enacted. Instead, I scavenged around the coach and found a stash of Pilsen beer and opened two bottles and handed one to Alessandra before holding mine up to toast.
“What shall we toast to?” she asked.
I gazed at her in her lovely evening attire and smiled.
“How about friends without benefits?” I joked.
“Funny.”
“And a little tragic.”
“Yes, so let’s just toast to being friends,” she said, as she clinked my bottle.
Just then, we heard a voice and turned to see Ernesto arriving on foot with a large bag over his shoulder, and he smiled as he gazed at Alessandra, with his exceedingly white teeth glowing in the fading light of the day. He put down the bag and again embraced her before kissing her square on the lips, only this time she looked ever so slightly uncomfortable. Progress!
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The Attack of the Kissing Bandito
THE KISSING BANDITO turned his attention from Alessandra to me, and his smile was equally warm as he held out his hand. We shook, and I was happy to find out that he had a normal grip and abstained from any of the typical male posturing in which guys tried to crush the other guy’s hand. Perhaps Ernesto was as nice as he seemed, and my making fun of his propensity for kissing the ladies was an unfair assault on his character.
“Sorry I’m late, but it’s a beautiful night, and I decided to walk.”
“You’re not worried about King Chalupa and his minions?”
“No, definitely not, and I have spent many long days and nights wandering throughout this area, and I can say without doubt that I’ve never seen any ancient monarchs—or their minions.”
The Chalupa Conundrum Page 21