Beach of Black Sand

[Note: this story involves the same characters as the series "Coyoacan Mi Amor." I wanted to make it part of that cycle but it can be read on its own. Enjoy!]

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"You're in for a real treat," said Bernardo as he steered the Jeep Cherokee over the rutted road. Scrub brush lined the lanes; every few miles they stopped as a cow ambled across.

"My kidneys are bruised from all the bumping. It'd better be great whenever we get where you're taking us, Bernardo," said Dan Lissner, senior writer for a major professional services firm in New York. "It feels like we've been driving all day."

"Only two hours," said Dafna Greenbaum, grabbing Dan's wrist to check his watch. They sat scrunched together in the back seat of the SUV. Dafna felt Dan's hairy thigh rubbing against the smoothness of her leg, which he helped her shave – so slowly, with so many kisses -- the night before. Dafna and Dan had come a long way since they met online, then became digital and then real lovers.

"Two more miles and we're there," said Bernardo. "You've never seen anything like it."

"I'm sold," chuckled Dan. "You guys haven't steered me wrong yet."

While they had been driving only two hours, the group had been on the move since dawn that Friday in Mexico City. Bernardo Michelson and his wife Leah, Dafna's younger sister, Velma Martinez (Dafna's friend and fellow school teacher), and finally Dafna and Dan drove to the far corner of Benito Juarez International Airport. Roaring up to a private hangar, they parked the two SUVs and piled their luggage into a spacious prop plane. "All aboard," called the pilot, Nahum Rosenfeld, Velma's boyfriend and the director of security for Dafna's apartment building in Mexico City. They climbed into the plane, giggling like kids on a field trip.

Within minutes they were airborne, soaring over Mexico City's dirty air for points south. After about 90 minutes, the plane smoothly descended into Ilopongo Airport in San Salvador, the military airport known as headquarters for American advisors during the Salvadoran civil war. "No hassles with the commercial airport for mis amigos buenos," the boyfriend said as they grabbed bags and filed out. Two other vehicles waited for them. Dan, Bernardo and Nahum piled into one, while Dafna, Velma, and Leah piled into the other for serious girl talk. During a bathroom and pupusa break (pupusas being a Salvadoran dish, dough full of meat or cheese) at a country crossroad an hour outside of San Salvador, they rotated so Leah, Bernardo, Dafna, and Dan rode in one vehicle, while Velma and Nahum bumped along in the other.

Bernardo pointed the SUV down a sandy road, a trail, really, flanked by spindly palm trees and thatched-roof wooden homes. Finally he turned through an open gate and stopped.

"Here's the treat, Danno," he said with a theatrical flourish. "Playa La Libertad!"

"Let's take a look," said Dan, giving Dafna's warm hand a squeeze. Her fingers tightened around his. With the red-tipped nail of her middle finger she scratched his palm, up and down, and then again. Dan felt the jolt of her light touch straight up and his spine and down his crotch.

Out of the car, far from Mexico City, away from Ilopongo, Dan stepped into another world. In front of him were small cabins flanking an open pavilion with a sunken floor, a bar and refrigerator, couches and chairs. Beyond that, a large white rack held kayaks and a motorboat bobbed in a freshwater inlet. And in the distance, he saw a wavering line that stretched far to the right, a beach that vanished into the horizon at a point of blue sea, green brush, and black sand.

"Wow. Long Island Sound it's not," whistled Dan. The dark ribbon ran 100 yards down to the roiling surf of Pacific waves. "I'm impressed. So this is the black-sand beach Dafna's told me about."

"The most beautiful beach in Central America," said Bernardo. He slipped his arm around Leah and pulled her to him. "And the most beautiful women."

"My Bernardo, he's such a charmer. I could never resist him," said Leah, resting her head on his shoulder with a sigh.

Friends of Bernardo's in San Salvador loaned them the beach house for the weekend. The caretakers cleaned the place beforehand, so the couples simply brought food, bathing suits, and other necessities. Awaiting them were simple cabins (one for each couple), a sometimes sporadic supply of electricity, plenty of board games, Shabbat candles, and a motorboat to ferry them to a thickly wooded island a half-mile out in the inlet, where a small river flowed into the Pacific.

After a quick nosh the couples changed into swimsuits and headed to the surf with body boards. Dan, a novice, quickly figured out how to choose and ride the three-foot high waves far up the beach. Dafna, in her turquoise one-piece Gottex swimsuit, ripped along with him. Sometimes, when the waves finally deposited them on the shore side by side, they'd turn to each other. On the warm sand they lay, the Salvadoran jungle sun a caress through the grit and suntan lotion.

"Mi amor," said Dan. "This is a wonderful place. I like it already."

"Good for the soul to get away from the city, no?" asked Dafna.

"And the body. Must not forget the body. Or, bodies," said Dan in a teasing tone.

"Jamas!" she cried in mock seriousness. "Never!"

They returned to the compound. Bernardo was on his cell phone, trying to untangle a production snarl at one of the malquiladoras, or manufacturing plants, he managed in Reynosa, Mexico, on the Texas border. He drummed his fingers on a table in exasperation. His wet black hair hung over his forehead.

Leah walked over, a glass of ice water in her hand. "You two look rung out. Time for a nap?" she asked.

"Maybe, Dan, you would like to see the island? It is very pretty and quiet. We could take the boat," said Dafna. A Salvadoran beach towel, decorated with drawings of exotic birds and pueblos, hugged her hips.

"Take a little picnic with us, too?" said Dan. The swimming made him hungry, while the setting – sand, surf, privacy, Dafna coyly draped – created another urge. The island sounded like a very good idea.

First they took quick showers to wash off the sand, then packed a hamper with sandwiches, cold sodas, vigorously rinsed fruit, more towels, and a big green picnic blanket. Rummaging in the room for a T-shirt, Dan thought, "Why not?" and threw in the new bottle of baby oil.

"Your papers, pleeeaze," Leah joked in a mock-German accent as they stepped onto the boat for the ride to the island, a half mile from the beach house.

"You two kids have so much energy. This is a wonderful time for a siesta. I'm going to come back and climb right into the hammock," Leah chattered.

"Time away from the kids, that's what parents like to do, right?" said Dan. "Catch up on our sleep."

"You know what they say," said Leah. "Little kids don't let you rest, big kids don't let you sleep. Or is it the other way around? No matter. It's very pretty on the island. The children like to go exploring there. It has a real Treasure Island feel."

"Maybe we find a chest of gold doubloons there someday, never have to work again," added Dafna.

Dan leaned over to her. "I know where to look for a chest of gold right now," he whispered to her. His forearm brushed against the front of her swimsuit, firmly enough so he could feel her cleavage shift. Dafna shivered.

"OK, you two, last stop," called Leah as she pulled the boat to another dock. "Just enjoy. No rush for anything. Dafna, you've got the cell phone?"

"Yes, I packed it."

"Bueno. Just call when you've had enough and one of us will come pick you up. We're not going anywhere, believe me. I am going to crack Bernardo on his keppie if he doesn't stop calling his office. He may have a bandage on if he comes to get you! We'll light Shabbat candles around 7, then dinner."

"Very good," said Dan. "Thanks for the ride."

He took the basket and the blanket, then helped Dafna out of the boat. After the shower she had a scrubbed look, her hair pulled back in a ponytail, sand washed off everywhere. In the sunshine he noticed some freckles on her nose. Sneaking a look as they walked inland, he saw her lips looked different from earlier in the day. Had she applied a quick coat of lipstick? A little eyeliner? She loved those womanly arts. The pulsing in his baggy orange-and-black swim trunks quickened. His throat felt dry; I need a drink, he thought.

While Dan struggled with the basket on the sandy path, Dafna glanced at him. He looked good, even if a little silly under the green Israel Defense Forces thimble-hat that kept the sun off his head. Muscles on his hairy forearms flexed under the weight of the basket. His fingers on the basket handle looked so clean, as if he had scraped every bit of sand from beneath the nails. Who knew where those fingers would soon be lingering? Dafna smiled; she knew.

"Is not too far the walk," said Dafna. They threaded through a path leading from the dock through bushes and trees. In a minute the beach house had vanished from sight. The path rose slightly, then opened onto a clearing about 10 yards round.

"Estamos aqui," said Dafna. "We're here."

Dan picked a flat spot with mottled shade and sun on one side of the clearing. The grass wasn't too long. They spread the thick green picnic blanket, then they opened the basket. "I am hungry. All that swimming took a lot of energy," Dan said as Dafna handed him a tuna sandwich.

"Yes, vacations can take a lot of energy," agreed Dafna as she opened a soda. "All the packing and moving and setting up. The place is just so great, though. It's one of the most relaxing places in the world."

"The office can't reach me. We've got a rule: no calls during vacations," he added between bites.

"Good!" Dafna said. She had made great progress taming Dan's gotta-check-voicemail work habits. Only his ex, Rebecca, could call in case an emergency involving their daughter Shayna.

They chatted about the trip so far, Dan's impression of the ride through the rolling Salvadoran countryside.

"People everywhere. It's amazing. You think you're in the country, then you see a bunch of people walking from God knows where," he said.

"Crowded country, lots of children, not much land," said Dafna. The crowding was worse even than Mexico, the resources sparser.

"Lots of children means lots of sex," said Dan. "That doesn't mean it's good sex, of course."

"For the women here, often, no. Just a chore. Very sad. They miss a lot of pleasure."

"Leah sure seemed chipper, like she didn't want things to be too quiet," mused Dan.

"Leah likes you a lot. She wants you to be happy here," said Dafna. "She hopes we are having fun. Leah just feels a little anxiety with visitors, until she knows they are OK. We get that way of thinking from our mother."

"God bless Jewish mothers. Where would we be without them?" Dan asked.

They ate in silence. The food and the lulling wind, mixed with the early afternoon sun, made them both drowsy. Animal urges of frolic and siesta collided and, almost against their will, Dan and Dafna agreed to a nap.

"Just a little snooze, then we get up and look for buried treasure, right?" said Dan, putting his head on a rolled-up towel.

"Riiiiight. Next time we bring shovels and dig like pirates," said Dafna, settling herself beside him.

Dafna drifted off with the surf murmuring on the shore, waves tumbling over the black sands as they had for eons. The sound washed over her. Waves of sleepiness rolled over her body. Her body was like the warm beach and the sleep like a tide that covered and reshaped her, pressing her down against the earth so the exhaustion could drain away. In minutes they were both totally out.

From the blankness of sleep a tiny light flickered in Dan's brain. The heavy tropical air pushed him down. He yawned. It felt so good to lie in the warmth, his head on the towel, a breeze stirring the trees. Ever so slowly, the light spread. His eyes stayed closed. He remembered where he was. Salvador. Vacation. Dafna. Island. Alone.

His t-shirt felt sticky from the heat. Without getting up he pulled it over his head and threw it aside. There, he thought. That's better. Dan was lying on his left side, curled slightly, his right arm flopped over his chest. Opening an eye with effort, he saw Dafna just inches away on her side, on the verge of flopping on to her stomach.

He scooted closer, moving his pillow along the way. Their bodies lightly touched. He put his right arm on her shoulder, which felt warm and moist. A few more scoots and adjustments and they were spooning, her body cradled against his, his arm slipping down across her stomach to pull her lightly to him. Dan closed his eyes and gave her shoulder blade a kiss, followed by the most gentle of squeezes with his arm.

"Mmmm," Dafna murmured, still asleep but now lifting the same little window of consciousness. "Mmmmmmmm."

Dan drifted back asleep. The island air was a weight pinning him to the blanket, locking his eyelids a bit longer. The pillow felt so good, Dafna's naked back against his chest was curving, warm, feminine, fragrant, irresistible. The light in his mind grew dimmer, fainter, just a firefly in the night, blinking and then flying elsewhere. So content . . .

Slowly the light flickered again, two fireflies' worth this time. He followed their looping path, together and then apart, close then in the distance, and finally swooping high and low in the darkness in tandem, as if connected and knowing perfectly what each other desired.

Dan sensed the flexing before he truly felt it. Something was moving, ruffling the waves of sleep like wind against the ocean current. Groggy, he couldn't place what he felt. Then the fog burned off just enough so he could assemble the sensations. Dafna was pushing her rump against him. With a little wiggle she moved backward so his swim trunks brushed against the tight fabric of her Gottex suit. He pulled her closer.

"Nice," he said softly.

Eyes still closed, Dan kissed the shoulder in front of him. It tasted clean and womanly and a bit salty from the sea air. Dafna pushed her ass against him, a little firmer. He felt a tingle in his crotch.

He opened his eyes and focused on Dafna's back and ponytail. Worth another kiss, he thought, so he planted his lips on the skin near the swimsuit strap. At the same time he tapped his fingers on Dafna's stomach.

"Mmmm, feels goooood," Dafna whispered. She put her hand on his. Their fingers intertwined on her stomach. Dan moved his left arm and rested his hand on her left shoulder, the one against the picnic blanket. He ran his fingers from her neck all the way down her forearm, and at the same time licked her back, along her spine.

"Mi amor, don't stop," she said drowsily.

"I will never stop," said Dan between kisses and licks on her back. Yes, he was waking up. He could feel his cock surging against his swim trunks. He pushed back against Dafna's ass.

"I think you like, yes?" she said.

"How can you tell?" he said.

"A woman knows these things. Secret knowledge."

"Let's share our secrets."

"I want you Dan. But that is no secret. I need you."

"I like the sound of that. Tomorrow? Next week? What's the time frame?"

"Silly. Right now. Feels so nice to have you kiss me. Your hands and kisses make me melt."

"The way your ass is pushing against me, I'm doing the opposite. Not melting. Getting hard." He slipped a finger beneath her shoulder strap and ran his finger up and down, pulling the strap from her skin.

She shuddered. "Hard like a rock, or hard like a math problem?" she said dreamily.

"You're the teacher. You tell me."

Dafna rolled over slightly and placed her slim hand on Dan's crotch. The pressure of his cock against the swim trunks was getting downright uncomfortable. "Hard like a rock, yes. A woman can tell those things about her lover."

"Is that what we are Dafna? Somos novios?"

"Si, si. Amigos y novios. Friends and lovers."

"I like the way that sounds. Say, what's under this strap?" Propped on his elbow, Dan slid the strap off Dafna's shoulder so it hung loosely. "What a lovely shoulder. I need to give it muchos smoochos." And he did, planting one kiss after another on Dafna's shoulder, her collarbone, her neck, her ear, sucking her earlobe, cupping her shoulder with his hand to hold it steady while his lips brushed the rosy flesh.

"Aye, amor, I need more of you," said Dafna. She was awake now. She rolled over and wrapped her arms around Dan, pulled him close to her on the blanket. "Kiss me kiss me kiss me," she said.

Her passion burst upon Dan. She held his head with her hands and they kissed urgently. Her lips and his lips touched and they bonded, souls in flight together, two fireflies soaring. Dan threw his leg over Dafna and pulled her closer, so her suit slipped along his bare chest and stomach. His hips flexed, pushing his hardened cock against her cunt through his trunks, two layers away from real contact.

"I'll kiss you over and over again. I want you so much, right now," said Dan. His heart pounded as they embraced and rolled on the blanket. He had a distinct image of them making love like the last two people, two bodies where the sky met the earth and sea, the most elemental point of contact for man, woman, and world.

Their kisses sparked a swirl of groping. Their hands roamed freely as kisses long and short covered their faces. Dafna loved Dan's ferociously hairy chest and shoulders, so bearishly masculine, no smooth boy he. On an impulse she kissed the golden chai around his neck, the Jewish symbol of life.

"L'chaim," she breathed. "To life."

"Let's live long and prosper," said Dan.

"Very good, Mr. Spock."

Dafna rolled on her back, eyes closed against the glare. Curled at her side, Dan found her simply breathtaking. The ponytail, the light lipstick, the ragged breathing of arousal, and her warm good heart made him feel unbearably tender toward her. Everything just felt right.

"I love you, my dear," he said.

"Oh my Dan, I love you so much. My heart is full."

"We fill other things, too."

"Mmmm. I need you to fuck me pretty soon."

"I hear you. But first . . ." Dan sat up and untied a string on the front of Dafna's swimsuit. The fabric loosened and he slowly lowered the right strap down, pulling the suit off her right breast and moving her arm through the shoulder strap. She smiled broadly as the sun touched her exposed flesh.

"Ahhhhh, you are making me warm," she said.

"Just getting started, mi amor."

She felt his fingers tremble as they touched her full, freckly breast. Tentatively he put his fingertips on her, and she felt a shock arc between them at the contact. "So pretty," he said. He moved closer to her, his eyes intent on her breast. His fingers stroked over her pink nipple, so sensitive that Dan's touch — nothing firm, like a butterfly wing on her – made the nipple harden. She moaned at the mind-melting sensation.

"You like, I see. Good. I need to give your boobs lots of attention, the way you like it," Dan said. Dafna felt his warm, clean hand circle her breast. She felt so naked and exposed, open to the sun on the island of the black beach.

Opening an eye, Dafna saw Dan staring intently at her breast. He looked so solemn she worried that something bothered him.

"Dan, you look like you never saw bubeletas before. Is something wrong? Do I not please you?"

Dan smiled. A boyish grin eased her anxiety. "No, no, nothing like that. It's just, I like looking at you. Outside like this, it's like we're making love for the first time. Everything is new. And you know, I did see some very nice bubeletas just last night. These do look familiar."