I easily could have let her believe her version of the story, but I wanted to be honest with her. Small lies turn into big lies, which turn into weeping and name-calling and throwing a stapler at my framed, autographed Don Mattingly jersey. I was going to come clean. I started telling Devika about my ex-wife and about Alicia but she cut me off.
“Bobby, please. You don’t have to explain anything to me. I made you feel good. You made me feel good. Now we’re moving on. No big deal.”
I couldn’t believe it. “You’re really not mad?” I asked.
“How can I be mad?” she answered. “I was so busy drinking, dancing, and banging strangers that I didn’t even notice you weren’t there until the boat landed this morning.”
That certainly took the sting out of my betrayal. I told her that she was a great kid and an excellent ambassador for India. I had always assumed that her country was a bastion of backward-thinking traditionalism. Now I’ve learned that the whole place is filled with fun-loving, sexually adventurous party girls who drink like sailors on shore leave. That’s a much more pleasant assumption, and one that’s guaranteed to boost tourism.
Devika told me not to worry. She wouldn’t interfere with whatever I had going with Alicia. Besides, she was leaving in a few days to join her parents in Cambodia and then head back to Japan. I thanked her from the bottom of my heart. She really had helped me rediscover a whole side to life that I had almost forgotten about. I tried to hug her good-bye but it hurt my groinal area so badly that I just settled for a heartfelt fist bump.
Devika kissed me on the forehead and left. I have not seen her again since then but I wish her well every day. She’s a good person, and she’s going to make some guy (or possibly several guys, and maybe even a few girls) very, very happy.
Later that afternoon Alicia came back. She told me that her crew was shooting B-roll around the property. I nodded sagely and acted like I knew what B-roll was. She realized that I was full of shit and explained that B-roll was footage of secondary importance that would be edited into the main body of the movie as cutaways. Her point was that she wasn’t needed on set while they were filming so we finally had some time to talk.
At first I didn’t know what to say. We both kind of sputtered and stammered and hemmed and hawed until I got things going with stories about Las Vegas. Then she’d jump in with anecdotes from the places she’d seen while researching her documentary. We’d go back and forth with weird hotel stories or travel nightmares or descriptions of lunatics we’d met along the way.
I was trying my hardest not to laugh but the lady cracked me up, which hurt like a bastard. She asked if I wanted her to leave so that I could rest. I definitely did not. I told her to keep on being funny and I’d just increase the dosage of my morphine drip.
We sat there for hours until it was pitch black outside and all we could hear was the sound of the ocean and the rustle and screech of jungle animals prowling at night. Alicia had been so preoccupied with getting her film crew going and then talking to me that she hadn’t even checked into her room. I graciously offered to let her crash next to me on the world’s largest, most comfortable bed. Just until the next morning when she could get into her room.
“You have nothing to worry about,” I added. “It would be physically impossible for me to try any moves on you without bursting into tears first and begging for my mommy.”
“Wow,” she shot back. “You really know what turns me on. Have you been reading my Facebook page?”
The woman made jokes about sexual perversion and Hitler hiring an assistant director. Some people might find that inappropriate. Good for them. As for me, I laughed so hard that not even the morphine could dull the pain. And then Alicia climbed into bed next to me and fell asleep holding my hand.
One of the drawbacks of a broken pelvis—aside form the shooting pain, the inability to go to the bathroom on your own, and the complete cessation of any kind of a sex life—is that you have to sleep on your back. “Big deal,” you might say. “I sleep on my back all the time.” Uh . . . no you don’t. You might think you do, but as soon as you’re asleep, you’re rolling around like Burt Lancaster on a Hawaiian beach. I, on the other hand, could only lie on my back. So sleep was hard to achieve and it was intermittent.
Normally there’s nothing as irksome as lousy, fitful sleep. But it’s not so bad when you’re sleeping lousily and fitfully next to the right person. I’d say I spent at least half that night wide awake staring at Alicia’s face in the moonlight. I found it to be almost preternaturally soothing. It’s not just that it is a beautiful face. It is—at least I think so. But on some very profound level I felt that it was the right face for me.
Did I ever think that my wife’s face was “the right face for me”? An excellent question. And the answer is that I certainly never thought that her face was wrong for me. I just never thought about it. In eight years of marriage (and a few years of dating before that), there was never a moment where it all just clicked into place and I realized it was the right fit. I liked her—I loved her—and I really wanted us to fit together. But just because you want something, and you work hard to make it happen, doesn’t mean that it’s right.
Staring at Alicia’s face I had no way of knowing what the future would hold in store for us. But I knew that I wanted to find out. I knew that this was something that was worth pursuing. And at that moment I felt a real sense of appreciation for my wife and everything that she had put me through. It wasn’t just that the divorce inadvertently led me to meeting Alicia. It was that the journey from New York to Ireland to Las Vegas to Thailand had changed me. I was different than I was before. I’m not going to say that I was better now. But the changes allowed me to realize that Alicia was someone special and that was enough for me. That felt about as good as anything could feel. And I wasn’t going to let this one go (assuming that she felt something similar—and I was pretty sure she did seeing as how she was asleep in my bed holding my hand).
Fortunately I finally fell asleep for good before I composed a frigging sonnet for her. When I woke up she wasn’t lying next to me and I had a moment of sheer panic. Was it all a dream? Had she actually been there but came to her senses and fled the country? Was I really dead after all but this wasn’t heaven—it was hell?
Two seconds later, Alicia came in carrying a tray of fresh-cut papaya and a pitcher of mango juice. It was heaven.
36
There’s one more wrinkle to my history with Alicia. I didn’t find it out until she’d been in Thailand for a few weeks. She and her film crew were meeting in my bungalow and they were going over the shot list for the day. They wanted an impressive establishing shot of the lagoon and I suggested that they climb a little hill about fifty yards behind the main building and shoot down onto the property from there. They were all pleased with the suggestion and headed out to set up. It struck me again that the Cove was an odd place for Alicia and her crew to have chosen. None of them knew anything about it. Even if she had agreed to preserve the secrecy of its location, how had she found out about it to begin with?
Alicia explained that I was right—she had never heard of the Cove in her life. But she was filming a segment of her documentary at a little-known but world-class bonefishing hotel in the Bahamas when she struck up a conversation with a guest there. When he found out what she was doing, he told her all about the Cove. Then he offered to make some calls and he got her in.
It all made sense and I wouldn’t have thought any more about it if she hadn’t gone on to say the following: “He was an amazing guy. Really smart and really nice. The only weird thing about him was that he showed up for a six-week stay in the Caribbean with nothing but a set of golf clubs.”
“Hold it,” I said. “What’s his name?”
What do you think she said? Of course—it was Rick. We double-checked personal details. It was the same guy. Her Rick was my Rick. That’s right, people. Talk about preposterous serendipity. Rick bumped into the love of my life and
then sent her to Thailand to make my dreams come true. Talk about a kick-ass guru . . . I owe that guy more than I could ever repay.
Alicia and I spent the next two months at the Cove. She never bothered checking into her room. I didn’t leave my bed for the first three weeks and she was by my side every night. Our relationship grew slowly. It was obvious how we felt about each other but my delicate medical condition made it impossible for things to get too physical too soon. But that was fine. Actually, it was great. We really got to know each other before we, well, got to know each other.
And we did get to know each other, if you know what I’m talking about. Once again, I’m not getting into details here because I’m a semi-gentleman and this is the woman I love after all. But you may be happy to know that we fit together as well on a physical level as we did on all other levels. God knows that I was happy to know that. When I finally got medical clearance to get busy, we dedicated ourselves to making up for lost time.
And as good as the sex was with Devika, being with Alicia was something completely separate and apart. I have no interest in parsing the differences between fucking and making love. I leave that to the great poets as well as the mediocre rappers. All I know is that I love Alicia and that permeates everything I feel, think, and do.
Some people might think that I’m a sucker. I had a chance for an orgy with a gaggle of sexy porn chicks and I chose monogamy with a documentary filmmaker. Well, whatever. Let each of you face that choice and then see if you can live with the decision. I am blissfully happy with the option I went with and I have absolutely no regrets.
Alicia and I are still together. Sometimes we’re both in LA. Sometimes we’re both in New York. Sometimes we’re apart. Sometimes we travel the world together. It doesn’t really matter because we share a connection that time and space cannot sever. I realize that makes me sound like a spiritual goofball and I apologize. Nothing annoys me more than hearing the unwanted vocalization of someone else’s special inner beliefs.
I like to keep things simple. Some people wonder how they’re supposed to make it through each day with all the misery in the world. And I’m aware that the world can be a horrible place. I have no answer for the doubters and the nay-sayers. I’m not here to convince anyone of anything. All I know is that—yes, it’s easy to be sad. But it’s also easy to be happy. How are you supposed to be happy? I have no idea. I don’t even know you. But here are a few things that make me happy.
1. A walk-off home run—preferably delivered by a New York Yankee.
2. Picking an apple off of a tree, eating it in about five bites, and throwing the core at the base of the tree.
3. Watching the back nine of Masters Sunday and then going to see the Guarneri String Quartet with Alicia.
4. Driving a convertible (as long as it has an automatic transmission).
5. Throwing a tennis ball to a dog and having him bring it right back to me and dropping it at my feet (and not having it be too slimy).
6. Seeing a stranger carry another stranger’s stroller up the steps of the subway.
7. Riding a power mower across a large expanse of uncut grass.
8. Going to Madrid and eating twelve different types of tapas in twelve different bars in one night.
9. Flopping the nuts to win a poker tournament at Foxwoods.
10. Holding Alicia’s hand.
Whenever I have a chance, I go back and revisit some of the places where I spent my year abroad. Sometimes Alicia comes with me. Sometimes I go alone. I’ve seen Colin several times. He got an Irish passport and is now leading tourists through the many sights, sounds, and tastes of Temple Bar. He told me that Giovanna got married to Teodoro and that they already have three kids. Mathematically this seems impossible unless at least two of them are twins.
The faces always change in Vegas but I still get comped to that supersuite whenever I go to the Bellagio. I make sure to blow enough money at the tables to maintain the rep and then I tip everyone like a gangster. Most of the time I meet up with Rick when I’m there. We get in a few rounds of golf and then we hit the sports book hard. We still play crazy trifectas although recently we’ve been working on an even crazier series of six-way parlays that we’re trying to copyright as “sexfectas.” There has not been a great deal of interest from anyone else on that front.
Alicia and I spent two weeks at the Cove recently. I hesitate to call it a honeymoon because that word has always sounded a little tacky to me. We did get married just before going there, however, so I guess calling it a honeymoon would be more accurate than tacky. I won’t bore you with the wedding details. It was very nice. Rick was my best man. Everyone’s family got along. There was plenty of drinking but no fighting. It was lovely.
We had a delightful reunion with Maliwan. She’s still riding the Vespa I bought her and is now engaged to a local fisherman who actually remembered me from my dive off of Peter’s boat. I haven’t seen Peter since that morning in the harbor near Laem Kruat. I heard that he created a new sitcom about a horse barn but I don’t know if it’ll ever see the light of day.
Alicia and I were both disappointed to discover that Chula no longer works at the Cove. But we were pleased to discover that he is now the chairman of the linguistics department at Chulalongkorn University—otherwise known as the Harvard of Thailand. It’s clearly a perfect fit, as it says “Chula” right there in the name of the school.
So that pretty much wraps up where everyone is these days. As for me, well . . . on the roulette wheel of life, I find myself happily bouncing along from number to number never knowing where I’ll land, but content no matter where I end up. Alicia and I are together forever (fingers crossed) and life is good. As for my ex-wife, I wish her well. I hope she’s not too upset with me for writing this book. Lord knows I’d be pissed off if she wrote one.
The End
I would like to thank the following people for their creativity, support, advice, and money: Rick Brenders, Paula Diaz-Reixa, Claire Dippel, Alicia Ezpeleta, Alexandra Gottlieb, Cristina Gottlieb, Lucas Janklow, Scott Manning, Colin O’Neill, Eric Price, Will Schwalbe, Jamison Stoltz, Martin Wilson, and Warner Bros.
*I have no idea what this means.
1“Bob Sullivan” is a pseudonym. All you Bob Sullivans out there, please don’t sue me.
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