Dancing in the Costa Rican Rain

Chapter One

I counted fourteen steps, and could see that each one caused Alfonso immense pain. We reached the bottom of the stairs. I wiped his sweaty brow and my own with the corner of one of the blankets. "My jeep is a hundred or so yards away," I said softly.

"Christian, what are you doing?"

I turned guiltily around to see Bharlina. Her round and youthful face expressed exasperation, but her bold eyes always neutralized that unpleasing aspect. She wore a Guatemalan huipil shirt, with a blue design on white silk, worn loose, not tucked into her jeans and falling past her waist. Against her light brown skin, the stunning effect on her svelte body was evocative. She wasn't a hundred pounds, but her breasts stuck out unabashedly. It made her seem impossibly attractive, especially given that she wore no makeup except lipstick, and no jewelry except bangles.

"I've found a wounded man," I said apologetically.

She brought her hand through her thick black hair and gathered it at the back, a movement that indicated her anger. "He might be one of Somoza's men."

"You don't mean one of the lepers," I said, sorry about it as soon as it escaped my lips. My chances for more sex today had just disappeared. She swore in Urdu. I realized that she had called me a homosexual and the bastard son of a pedophile. I had been translating her expletives ever since our first fight, over two years ago. "Okay, what?" I asked.

"We're not in the safest place in the world, you know," she said. "He is likely one of Somoza's. You'd better check."

"There isn't time to check whether he is 'us or them,' is there? Help me get him to the hospital."

She looked at me in defiance. Again she swore in Urdu. She said my mother had mated with monkeys, and that my family was as ugly as a baboon's ass. "Let the Sandinistas worry about it," she added.

"He says the Sandinistas shot him."

"What did I say? Remember, we're guests here, but if we're caught helping Somoza's men, we will be asked to leave. I want to cover this story."

I grunted and bent over Alfonso. "Are you with Somoza?"

"I'm the President of Nica Airlines," Alfonso uttered in painful gasps, lifting his head to look at Bharlina.

"What did I tell you?" she asked.

"Did you want me to shoot him, girl, and we could both watch him die?" She spun on her heel and began to walk away from me.

"Does this mean you're not willing to help me?" I called after her. She turned around and came back, cursing again in Urdu. She said that my penis was like thread and was only good for flossing her teeth.

"I'll drive," she said.

I gave a little laugh and made to kiss her, but she pulled away. As we rushed to the jeep, I removed Alfonso's wallet from his back pocket and looked at the identification.

"Alfonso Memorio, just like he stated," I said. I put the wallet into my own back pocket.

"That doesn't prove anything," she retorted. "You would expect him to at least give his right name."

I laughed again. "You crazy bitch," I said to myself, then added aloud, "He said he wasn't with Somoza. That's good enough for me."

"Allow me the courtesy of thinking what I want about a stranger for whom we are risking everything so that you can fight against the left in your own pathetic way."

The open jeep came into sight. I turned the cart toward it and considerably picked up my pace. She hustled up beside me.

"Let me talk if we're stopped," she said. "Whatever you do, don't admit to anyone that you're an American, or that this man is the owner of an airline."