Brazilian Bathroom Line

"Well, it's scary. So I threw myself at it," I paused. I had seen Ramon naked last night, but they probably expected me to never have seen a naked man in America because the customs are so prude and the depression stopped us from flirting. So saying "yes" would lead to follow up questions that could get me in trouble. So I carefully rephrased, "Oh, I have never seen a man naked. There is no flirting back home."

"So are you a virgin," Neve jumped to the personal question.

"Oh, my gosh," I gushed. "I haven't been with a man. They are so depressed in America that they don't show any interest. But when Marisol sent me photos from Brazil, I checked out the men in the background. They made me curious."

"Let's say that gentleman over there were to put his arm around you, what would your reaction be?" Neve pointed at a black guy who had the look for a soccer star who was short to be fast at changing directions optimal to play for the defense.

"I feel intimidated thinking about it. I don't know what to do. I don't know what he would do. He feels so perfect like he knows everything," the words and emotions were gushing out of me. I felt completely at ease opening up to Neve. Yet a voice deep inside of me whispered, "You are not usually this open with people." A big voice told me to hush because it felt good and I was making friends. And that voice deep inside of me whispered, "Did she drug you with oxytocin precursors?" I had heard about reporters doing that to the people they interview. Her questions felt oddly like an interview.

Neve shot Marisol a look that said, "I told you so!" or "That's it!" They were coding something. Then Neve interrupted the whole thing by laughing!

"You don't know anything about me!" said Neve. "Marisol and I met at a workout class. We were both in a salsa training boot camp. I work as an on-scene reporter. I'm on my way to do some clothes shopping. Tonight, I have to do interviews at an art gala. I'm looking for an outfit that'll make me look like the subject of a Renaissance painting."

Neve seemed good at deflecting suspicions. I still felt like she had interviewed me, even though she had insinuated that her questions were the habit of a reporter. I noticed the silence from Marisol. It felt like Marisol was very deferential to Neve, as if she were her boss, and Marisol only dared following Neve's lead. Why were my senses so heightened to notice all these nuances? Did Marisol feed me something in the morning drink to cause that?

Neve's arm went over my shoulders to hug me from the side. I felt the urge to cuddle in with Neve to rest my body on her side, my cheeks resting against hers. I never had felt so cuddly before. I felt a pulsating warmth in the center of my chest. Her arm over the side of my body caressed the side of my torso. Marisol's face looked anguished like she felt jealous about the closeness. The deep voice in me whispered to get away from the manipulative Neve, but the warmth of her body made me snuggle closer into her.

"I can't wait to introduce you to people," said Neve. "You'll fall in love with Brazilians and how playful and open we are."

I noticed Marisol moving her head in strange patterns. I couldn't figure it out at first, but Neve was talking plenty in my ear to watch Marisol. Then it dawned on me. Marisol was shooting a video. She was moving her eyes in patterns that would make a good camera motion pattern. A crazy thought entered my mind. Marisol might be livestreaming me. Could she be running a channel to document my immigrant experience? That was way crazy! But Neve was intensely interested in me and almost completely ignored Marisol.

Suddenly Neve stood up and said that it was her stop to leave. Marisol seemed noticeably relaxed once Neve had left. Her head went to her normal resting place. I thought about the sad expression that I had seen on Marisol's face. I hugged her from the side as I had hugged Neve and squeezed her tight. A soft smile chased over her face as if she was regretting something that she had done. I realized that in all this time, I had never really warmly hugged my sister to hold onto her.

I asked her, "I've never asked how you are doing. Are you happy with your life?"

"Oh, Fia!" she said with a very sad face. "It's going to be alright," she said with a tone like nothing was alright at all. I sensed she was carrying a big burden, and it wasn't the place to unload it. "I'm trying to get my foot in the door for a new career."

I realized that moment that life is always a struggle. In Brazil, they had so many wonderful things and life so easy. Yet once you have that, you don't think about it anymore. Instead, you move on to the areas of your life that aren't working yet. Any resolved struggle only frees you up to face the next struggle. Even though it looked like paradise to me, it wasn't paradise to the people living in it.

We left the subway and walked up ten flight of stairs to the surface street. A short walk, we came to a modern looking oversized shack. This was a sports gymnasium near the beach. There were already plenty of women in the waiting area with white sport sneakers on. The room felt crowded. The smell of sweat was in the air. I could see through an internal window the previous class on their hands and knees doing mountain climbers. Their body were bouncing up and down. The butt cheeks were high in the air.

Marisol opened two small cubbies with her implant. We got each a pair of white sneakers in our size. The most fascinating thing was a window that let us peer into a darkened room with only red lights. Bats fluttered around in it. The red light was invisible to them. Probably, the window on their side was tinted to keep their room dark. Those little beasts were tiny little furry monsters with long, thin, and flappy wings. Their high metabolism made them move so fast. They couldn't stay still when they were hanging upside down. Tiny mosquitoes seemed to be flying around in the room, which they were hunting with erratic flight patterns.

"You can have some of my rage," said Marisol. She said "rage" as if it were a brand or something harmless to be consumed.

When it was five minutes to the full hour on the clock above the receptionists, a light turned on inside of the bat room. The bats jumped into the air and flew scared into little hand-sized cubbies on the wall that faced the receptionists. The waiting women lined up with the receptionist. The receptionist reached into a particular bat cubby, expertly held the bat in her hand, and pulled it out. Then she pinched the cheeks of the bat so that the bat mouth would open wide and expose two long fangs. The first woman in line leaned over the counter. The receptionist dipped her index finger on the free hand into a jar of fruit nectar. Then she painted the fruit nectar onto the side of the neck of the first woman. She held those tiny bat fangs against the skin of the first woman patiently until the bat snapped and bit the woman. Then she stored the bat again in the cubby.

It seemed like each woman had her own personal bat, and each bat knew which cubby belonged to it. Marisol explained that the bats were all infected by a rage virus. The virus caused intense aggression, which would provide the motivation for an ultra hard workout.

When it was my turn, I carefully observed how the receptionist painted the side of my neck with fruit nectar. The two fangs felt very delicate as the rested against my neck, but the bite was savagely hard. I was a little panicked about being infected with a lethal virus. I saw the two women waiting at the entrance of the door, shoving each other aggressively. One bumped her chest into the other to push the other away from the door. When the winner of the bumping contest turned back to see the "competition" behind her, her eyes were bloodshot red. I was shocked but started to feel a steely resolve in my body that overcame the hesitation. At the idea of getting equally bloodshot eyes, I had only a growl as response, "Bring it!"

We started with two bounces in a deep squat, followed by a high jump to the fast drum roll of electronic music. I pushed so hard into the ground like I hated the earth. My mouth was raspy from the hard breathing within seconds, but the rage in my gut made me push harder. Next, we had to throw our chest on the ground, jump up, air kick high, and back down. The rage was absolutely amazing. No matter how sore I got and how lactic-acid-filled my muscles got, the rage in my belly kept making me push on harder. Sweat ran down my body in streams. With building confidence in my physical ability, I folled the lead of the instructor to get into a low push-up and then push so hard that could rotate my body in a 360-degree turn and land on my arms again. For a moment, I looked at the butt in front of my face, completely glistening wet.

Halfway through, a woman in the first row, rolled her angle after landing from in the air double leg switch to back into a lunge. She fell head first on top of the back of the woman to her right. A short push-and-pull fight ensued between the two women. The aggression in the room was intense. Angry glances were exchanged during isometric poses that required holding in uncomfortable positions. Like when we were sitting legs straight out and had to push our arms down at the side of our butts so hard as to lift our butt and legs off the ground and hold it there. The instructor was on a little stage inside of a cage, that seemed like needed protection.

When the instructor told us to roll on our back for rest, I was still ready to go. I was so pumped up. But the moment, I lay still, I felt myself passing out into slumber. For a moment, I was roused again, when I felt the fingers of the instructor looking for a spot on my neck. In the half shadow of my mostly closed eyes, I had seen her make the rounds from person to person, briefly crouching over their heads. She found the spot and pressed her index finger in. There was a sharp prick pain again. This must have been the antidote to rage. I completely passed out.

I only woke up because Marisol kept kicking me in the side with her sneakers. She had been kicking me for a while. "Come on! They need to clean the room for the next class!" she told me. I was so out of it. I rolled onto my belly to try to get up to my feet. But my arms were like jelly. My body hurt everywhere. Especially my abs made me want to vomit. She bent over to grab my right shoulder with both her hands, pulled me up, and dragged me out of the room. I couldn't hold myself up with my feet. So I pressed my body as best as I could on top of her like a tomato vine that needs a stick to stand up. Wow! Brazilians do this two or three times a day. My life is going to change. A newfound respect for all the gorgeous bodies that I had seen on the subway entered my mind.

We walked out of the gymnasium towards the beach. We passed through a gate, where I had to close my eyes again because it misted waterproof sunscreen. There was a big round glass building at the beach with white tablecloth restaurant service. I snuck a peek at the sand beach while we continued to walk around the building on a beautiful walkway of rustic stone plates and vines growing over it. A bathroom line asked us to queue up to get into a yellow and red striped tent that looked a bit like a festive circus tent. Not even in Brazil have problems like long lines for women's bathrooms been solved.

There was no line for the tent with the men's restroom, but a guy was standing there. He looked like a tan Italian guy with a neatly trimmed full beard as to be more of a shadow than a beard. His head hair was styled to rise high like a pompadour. He held a sign in front of his chest that said: "Posso ser útil." I asked Marisol what it meant, but she only said, "nothing!" He had a smile on his face - a frozen kind of smile like someone waiting to get into someone's grazes for a long time. Marisol seemed to avoid looking in his direction. She shifted leg to leg, feeling impatient about getting to the bathroom. She told me that Ramon was going to be at the restaurant soon. She didn't want him to be disappointed and wait.

She wasn't the only one being impatient. There was lots of headshaking from the women in line and grim looks at the women coming out for perhaps having taken too long. I was so ready to get something to drink after that workout and especially to sit down. One woman seemed especially impatient. She had come after us and seemed flighty from the first moment to not even try standing in line. With a wave of her hand, she got the guy with the sign to walk over to her. His smile brightened immediately, and he jogged over to her. She grabbed him by the arm to push him against the vines. She stepped to face away from the line and made sure that her front was covered by her back. The guy got on his knees in front of her. His head was right in front of her groin. I could only see his top hair past her hips. She stood a bit bow-legged. She seemed to guide his head closer to her. "Ah," she sighed, letting her head fall back. She seemed to go limp standing. I heard the guy swallow hard and rapidly. After a minute, she shook her hips abruptly a few times. He got up, beamed a huge smile, and wiped his mouth carefully. They both walked off independently without exchanging any words.

Standing in line has a way of quieting down everyone. The mind goes into a suspended state that creates a sensation in the moment of waiting forever, but time actually speeds up. Minutes or hours can pass by with barely a dint on our memory recording. That quiet gave me time to draw in. In that quiet, I felt a deep longing for my familiar world in America. That old leather couch gave off a musky smell that filled the living room and was still noticeable in my room. I craved to smell the musky old smell again for the sensation that it gave me - a sensation that was like a touchstone, a place where I found inner balance. In those quiet, lonely, dark nights in my room, I felt a stability and permanence. It wasn't that it was awesome. I was burning with a longing to get out of there and to here. However, the familiarity of it felt like me. Losing that sense of familiarity, I felt like I had lost myself.

Can a human re-home? Will I find a new place of home? Will whatever foreign way that I feel inside of myself now become familiar at some point?

When you face a threatening situation, it's easy to focus at the challenge. Getting to Brazil, it all was a threatening challenge. But now I was here. I was merely waiting for a restroom to get ready for lunch out on the town. This was my first day of everyday. The idea of living day-to-day felt like vapid death. I could see different lifepaths rolling out ahead of me. I'd need a job - at first, a seemingly huge challenge for an American but then a mundane entry-level job. I could indulge in all the fun heels that I wanted - at first, a magical Alice-in-Wonderland adventure to indulge in the fashion previously inaccessible to me, but after the tenth pair, the thrill would wear off.

My sister didn't talk with me, not really at least. I had no clue what was going on inside of her. She explained the world to me and made plans for me. She didn't open herself up to me. I was her pet - like a dog that you take to the dog park and groomer. We played roles for each other instead of taking down our masks. The more naked you get the greater the psychic mask becomes.

Take my roommate Lisa. She was always dressed in flabby old sweatpants and a sweater combo. Her breathing would be long as she laid on the couch, her ribcage lifting and rising under the crochet blanket. She was an overweight pile of human with little motivation beyond the regular interruptions of her rest to haul herself into the kitchen for another cookie or cupcake snack. She never flushed the toilet. She always hugged you when you were sad. Her face was puffy and easy to read. She was a simpleton, but I knew her inside out. There is a trust that comes with that, which allows me to relax.

Maybe, I was the archetypical spy nursing my aspirations of coming to Brazil, never letting anyone in. Just as in America, I couldn't let anyone know that I wanted to go to the place, which everyone judged so much, here in Brazil, I couldn't let Marisol know about the invitation that Ramon had given me to watch them having sex, my discovery of job termination, and that I could tell that she had a thing with the doorman. Why can't we talk openly to our loved ones? All our worlds are so fragile. The more we espouse in life, the more fragile our construct of our world becomes.

I looked her over, standing next to me. Her face was pensive. The blue eyes had pale striations. Her forehead was feminine, delicate, and rounded. The muscles were strong and visible on her bare body - not like a strong athlete but a refined Greek statue. Her brown, fine hair was open in the back like the mane of a mare. She was beautiful, but the look she espoused was the standard of ideal of woman standing around us. Perhaps, she was shy and afraid to make her own mark - a lasting fear to fit in that travelling aboard and stealing a husband to live there had left her with. Her bone structure appeared airy like that of a flighty person that always had to get out of the way to avoid being bruised. Seeing her like that made me feel a bit defensive for her like I wanted to do anything to protect her from harm.

Thank god! We made it into the restroom. The restroom obviously belonged to the fancy seaside restaurant because the yellow-white motif and freshly cut flowers created an elegant ambiance that invited one to feel rejuvenated rather than hurried to do desperate business. I would have lingered to smell the big red tulip and the exotic orange stalk like flower next to it. Marisol went straight for the cabinet with wooden drawers about the size of an oversized matchbox. She pulled out one drawer after the next eagerly. I could only see that there was something plastic wrapped inside.

With some glee, she got two plastic wrapped things from separate boxes and reported, "Corsair are the trendiest beachwear. I'll show you how to put them on!" she grabbed me by the hand and pulled me into a stall.

The surface of the toilet, floor, and wall was shiny. A clear coating an eighths of an inch thick covered everything. With zest, she battled the plastic wrapper, which was way fiercer than it needed to be. She slipped out of the white string wrapped around her. I was still a little bit shocked to see her actual nipples and pussy. I had gotten used to seeing naked bodies, but to see actual genitals was startling like I needed to blush and hide my glance. She fumbled with her pussy a little bit and quickly had a little piece of fabric covering the mere outline of her labia. I heard two sharp snaps. When she snapped on the pasties, they made a crunching sound. Seeing my startled face, she explained, "Oh, these snap on so that they don't come off in the waves in the ocean!"

"We are late for Ramon," she explained, while she pulled my baby blue string down my body. She bent forward to get a good look on my pussy. Her fingers felt for my left labia. I squirmed. There was so much sensation in those nerve endings and a touch by someone else there so foreign. With the precision of a doctor, she caressed the length of my right labia. She got her finger under it to loosen any stickiness from natural moisture. She straightened and smooth the right labia. I had never paid so much attention to my labia.

Then she took my bathing suit bottom out of the plastic wrapping. It was baby blue. On the inside, there were two long skinny rods touching each other, and two of these sets on each side of the bottoms. She pressed onto the two rods. They were bendy and separated in the middle. She held the oval the two rods made next to my right labia, and pulled the skin through it. Because I didn't have curtains, she had to pinch the skin together and work it. Her dexterious fingers massaged as much labia skin through the opening as she could. Then she let the skinny rods snap together. I felt like a rubberband had been snapped at my pussy. I drew the air in sharply. But once together, the sensation was tolerable. "You'll soon forget about it," she assured me, apparently knowing the pressure that I was feeling.