Coyoacan Mi Amor Ch. 01

Author’s note: This story is a sequel to “Love and Terror on the 5:58,” although it can be read on its own. The Spanish phrases are usually defined. The term “pendejo” literally means a single public hair, figuratively a coward or jerk. Although it can be used with affection among friends, in general “pendejo” is a severe insult.

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An electronic squeak announced Dan’s words when they popped up on Dafna’s instant messaging screen. The words swept out of a blue sky like a storm, no introduction, letting loose a thunderclap in her heart.

DAN: Hi hon. Guess what? I’m coming to Mexico City on business. Can you believe it?

DAFNA: WAAWWW! I can’t believe it! Really? When? For how long?

DAN: Next week. The managing partner of my firm’s MC office has a big presentation to a big bank there. We’re bidding on the audit work, worth mucho dinero. I worked on the written proposal, now they want me there to write the slides for the orals and coach them on the presentations. My bonus this year could triple if we win.

DAFNA: You will be very busy?

DAN: Yeah, but you know how these things work. Once it’s done, it’s done. I’ve already told my boss I’d like to stay extra days. Flying in on Tuesday, work like a maniac until Friday morning, fly back Monday morning. I’ve got lots of vacation time. One guess for what I want to do on my vacation?

DAFNA: Either go to the bullfights or fuck me in real life?

DAN: Why not both? How ‘bout I fuck you at the bullfights? A little violence, a little sex. You’ll be shouting OLE in no time.

DAFNA: Mmmm, I don’t need bullfights to get me shouting OLE. You are my bull, with the big bull cock.

DAN: You’re kind. Wellllll, after all these months maybe it’s time to find out for real, yes?

DAFNA: Como no! Of course! I am getting wet at the thought.

DAN: I will pour tequila on your cunt and drink your cunt juices and tequila . Es el mejor delicioso! Not very good Spanish, sorry.

DAFNA: My pussy knows what you mean. Chingame vaquero. You know what THAT means.

DAN: Si, si. I will fuck you like a cowboy. And you will be my Aztec princess.

DAN: Are you there Dafna? Why don’t you reply?

DAFNA: I’m OK. Just crying a little. I am very happy to know you are coming. To see you real.

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The next day, Dafna almost ran her Jeep Cherokee into the guard’s booth at the entrance to the Anglo-American School, near her apartment in one of Mexico City’s most upscale neighborhoods.

“Hola, Senora Greenbaum,” said the guard in his crisp tan uniform, raising the gate. An Uzi, safety lock off, hung at his side. “Como esta usted?”

“Bueno, Joaquin, muy bueno,” smiled Dafna. Her clit still tingled from all the orgasms she had the night before, as instant messages ricocheted between Mexico City and Stamford, Connecticut, where Dan Lissner lived. Miles and borders vanished in their electronic lovemaking. The things he whispered to her in the dark, kissing her ear, licking her shoulder, his fingers easing down her panties . . . Dafna shook her head. No, she thought, I have math classes to teach. I need a clear head for the children. I’ll summon the memory later, maybe at lunch.

Dafna ran on automatic pilot for the first class, basic concepts for youngest children. By lunch, she was teaching integral calculus to the advanced students angling for places at top U.S. universities. The dreamy half of her brain had to switch to difficult mathematics, dx/dy and all that. By the time she settled in the lunch room, she almost forgot the electrifying conversation with Dan, but it came back with a jolt.

“Hey girlfriend, you have a big smile on your face today!”

Dafna looked up. Her friend Velma, who taught English, sat down. “So, tell me, why so happy? You win the lottery?”

Dafna blushed, down to the roots of her shoulder-length light-brown hair. “Velma, remember that guy I told you about, the writer I met online? He’s coming to Mexico City. It’s for business, but he’s staying for vacation. He wants to see me.”

“You haven’t said anything about him lately. I thought maybe it was over,” said Velma. She took a bite of salad.

Dafna sipped her iced tea. “It is private. We say many things to each other. But we still talk to each other, yes. I like him a lot.”

“Does he feel the same?”

“He says he does. He is very honest.”

“The last man to visit was very honest, too.”

Dafna winced. The last man to visit was passionate and honest, she remembered, except for the small matter of the wife and child in San Diego. She found out about that small matter when she answered his cell phone while he was showering after they made love. The woman calling asked Dafna to please tell Rafael his daughter was in the hospital with pneumonia and, if it did not disrupt his business trip to excess, to please come home. “And you sound like a very nice woman,” said the caller, in a voice that suggested, through Dafna’s shock, that nothing surprised her anymore.

Dafna shook her head. “Dan is not deceptive. He is a good man. We share so much. And if he is not honest? So, we have enjoyable times and then it ends.”

Dafna, do not kid yourself,” said Velma, a flash of anger in her dark eyes. “You were depressed for months after Rafael. He hurt you terribly. You were dying inside. I do not like my friends to suffer. He was a pendejo.” She paused. “Had Dan said anything about coming to see you?

“Not really. Some jokes about meeting in Texas.”

“Perhaps the jokes contained some truth.”

Dafna frowned. Had she missed a secret plea from Dan?

“Do you want him to come?” asked Velma. “You are opening yourself to pain.”

Dafna smiled. “I have to follow my heart. Others have wanted to come see me, and I said no. You know that. But with Dan . . . I would be dying on the inside if he didn’t come. I have to find out. I am going to be 48 years old. I am so tired of being hurt and being alone. When I talk with him online, I do not feel that way. He says I make him very happy. I want to meet him very much.”

“Is anybody else online making him happy?”

“So many questions! He’s in touch with other women. That’s the way we left things. We are so far apart. But he says he does not have online sex with anybody else.”

“And you believe him?”

“Yes. If he is getting close to another woman, he will tell me. He said so. Dan said he would never treat a woman the way Rafael treated me. We have no secrets.”

Velma, whose own love life was stalled, sighed. “You open yourself too easily, Dafna. We all have secrets. Saying you have no secrets is the biggest lie of all. But you feel good about this, really?”

“A little scared, maybe.”

Velma smiled. “Good! If you’re a little scared, you’re realistic. You see life clearly when you are nervous, because you are alert.”

For a minute they ate in silence. Another class of rowdy teenagers in blue blazers barreled into the lunchroom. Finally, Velma smiled, “OK, go for it. I know you are smart enough to make good choices and protect yourself. If you two ever get out of bed, I’d love to meet him.”

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The 90 minutes at the gym after school left Dafna panting. Arms, legs, tummy, butt: Dafna cycled through every machine that could sweat her in shape. Not that she wasn’t in good condition, she told herself. She cared about her health whether a man was around or not. Still, the thought of Dan coming (in every sense of the word) push her repetitions to the highest numbers ever. In the shower, hot water pricked her back as she soaped her breasts and stomach. Her muscles were sore but, like the scared feeling Velma mentioned, Dafna took the soreness as something good, evidence that she was scraping the rust off her body, leaving a soft gleam of firm muscles and buffed surfaces.

She leaned against the slippery tile wall. The water cascaded off her head, over her shoulders, in warm rivers down her breasts and nipples, past her bellybutton and streaming into the luxurious curly brown hairs of her cunt. The hair spread up and out, touching her thighs. She had to dig a bit to find her clit. I’ll give it a shave before Dan comes, Dafna thought. He said he likes the trimmed look. I will look better at the pool, anyway. Maybe I’ll be a little aggressive with the razor, give Dan a surprise. That could be sexy.

She felt a jolt. Maybe, at that very minute, Dan was thinking of something sexy for her? They had had erotic thoughts of each other at the same time before, then raced on line to share their steamy ideas. She wondered what he could do to get even hotter looking than he appeared in the photos he had emailed her. With this thick chest and curly black and grey hair on his pecs and shoulders, he joked he looked “just like our Russian mobster grandfathers.”

DAN: We’d better be careful. For all I know we’re cousins from somewhere back in Odessa.

DAFNA: That explains why we so alike. We both like to talk dirty to each other. We are both hurt too much. Both tired of sad and loneliness.

DAN: Dafna, mi amor, let’s play it like this. We are both ready to give and get pleasure. No more hurt. No more alone.

DAFNA: OK, mi corazon!!!! My heart.

The water’s warm embrace, the ache of the workout, made Dafna dreamy. One hand went to her soapy breast, while her fingers pressed against her clit. She sighed and spread her legs so her fingers could wander through the thick patch and the smooth lips beneath. I’ll play just for a minute, she thought. Her nipple hardened under her caress. Beneath her manicured fingers her cunt felt alive, exquisitely vulnerable, starting to pulse. Dan, Dan, in the shower with me, she mused. Cup my tits, pinch them, make them hard, slide your fat cock between my ass cheeks, right here, right now, let me guide you in, mi alma, my soul . . .

“Hey, leave some hot water for the rest of us, por favor.” The exasperated tone of a towel-clad, sweaty woman outside the shower stall broke the moment. Dafna deflated. Time to go.

“Si, si, un momentito,” she called. “Yes, just a minute.”

At her apartment, put on her nightgown and turned on her computer. Dan was online, signed in to his Yahoo account. She waited, expecting him to respond to the door-knocking sound that alerted him she was signed in.

Nothing happened. Minutes passed, and he had not sent her an instant message, even to say he was busy. This was unexpected. After his big announcement of the trip, she hoped he would jump at her. Instead, silence, growing louder as the minutes passed.

DAFNA: Hola, Dan. How are U tonite?

Nothing. I will not panic, she thought. Do not act stupid.

DAFNA: DAN, are U OK? U are online but not responding. HELLO?

DAN: Hi, sweetie. Sorry. I was just finishing up with my friend Laurie Warshaver. You know, the woman who went to Princeton with me.

DAFNA: The woman you lived with?

DAN: We lived in the same dorm. Big difference! She just broke up with her boyfriend, the ex-alcoholic executive. She’s upset.

DAFNA: U had breakfast with her the day those terrorists were caught in New York, yes? Before Thanksgiving? She made love eyes at you then, you said. Still doing it? Is OK if she does, really.

DAN: Wow, you remember everything. No, no more love eyes. Those days are gone. Just friends.

DAFNA: OK if you are more than friends. She love U?

DAN: Laurie and I are amigos, nothing more. We’re class officers, we have to keep in touch. Why this line of questions about me and other women? What gives? Something on your mind?

DAN: Dafna, you there?

DAFNA: Just, I dont know. I like U a lot Dan. Very excited about U coming down. Scary, U know?

DAN: Scared at what?

DAFNA: Scared U may not want to be with me after we meet. I’m too old, too far away, too fat, maybe you love somebody else. Maybe U hiding something. Other men do that.

DAN: Oh Dafna, you are making me sad. Yo soy triste. I would like to think I am not like “other men.” I thought you knew me better than that. Couldn’t you tell how excited I was about coming down? You’re only 3 years older. Your age doesn’t matter to me. And you know, maybe you think I am far away from you. Distance works both ways.

DAN: And fat? Please. I’ve seen your pictures. You know the Yiddish word, zaftig. That’s you. Big boobs, cute juicy ass. I couldn’t ask for more. I never liked anorexics. They’ll have to throw a bucket of ice water on me to get me off you!

DAN: Remember what we said in the beginning? There’s more to us than sex? Even if something happens in our real life – fall in love, have sex with somebody else – we still have our friendship. THAT WILL NEVER CHANGE. Please Dafna my dear.

DAN: Trust me on that. I cannot change what you think, I can only tell you what I feel. That is what I feel.

DAFNA: Is OK to be a little scared? Is a big step.

DAN: Very big. Scary for me too, coming to see you. The virtual world merges with the real world. Our body parts merge. Yikes.

DAFNA: Why yikes? You no want sex???

DAN: Oh, I want A LOT. Maybe I’ll go soft. Too much excitement. It happens to men. I’ve got insecurities too.

DAFNA: I make U hard with my mouth n tits n ass. I know what U like.

DAN: Yes, you do. More than my ex-wife ever did.

DAFNA: U make me feel good. Safe. I’m glad I clicked on your profile online.

DAN: And you make me feel hard.

DAFNA: Really? Right now?

DAN: Want me to take my cock out? So you can touch it?

DAFNA: I want to suck U.

DAN: I’ll lick your kootch at the same time. You like?

DAFNA:!!!! I am getting wet, really.

DAN: Pues, mi chica, vamos a chingar. Well, my girl, let’s start fucking.

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The flight from La Guardia to Houston was typical American landscape. The flight from Houston to Mexico City, however, entranced Dan. Ascending, the plane pulled above a city that was surrounded by the piney woods of East Texas, office towers in the distance. If the Gulf of Mexico withheld its soaring cumulus clouds, Dan could see the ground clearly, scores of miles of rectangular fields, irrigation sprays painting green on the Texas flatness. Farther south, past Victoria, getting toward Corpus Christi, the view out the window turned straggly, dry, farms mixed with scrublands of mesquite and cactus. After an hour in the air, the suburban sprawl of the Rio Grande Valley marked the southern terminus of Texas and the United States. Dan had visited the Valley before while vacationing at South Padre Island, towns strung out in a wavering line from Mission through McAllen, Harlingen and Brownsville, like bubble gum stuck to the bottom of America’s boots. And then over the Rio Grande and into Mexico.

Flying on, the landscape resembled a sheet of dry crumpled leather as the plane raced over brown mountains and stripped hills, crazy-quilt fields in fractured patterns. Approaching the capital from the southeast, Dan saw the snowy peak of Popocateptl, then the great dirty smog cloud capping the valley holding Mexico City. As the plane circled Benito Juarez International Airport, Dan had the queasy feeling that he was being flushed down the world’s most rancid toilet bowl.

After one final run through the PowerPoint presentation for the Audit Committee meeting, he shut down his laptop and sank into his seat. Mexico City, again. How long had it been? He last visited with his ex, Rebecca, in December 1993, just before the peso crisis shredded Mexico’s social fabric. Rebecca was pregnant, they were relieved if anxious, the trip was a frequent-flier lark on his part after they attended a wedding in Houston. She was dubious – why not Florida? – but game. Then the pollution, altitude, and morning sickness smacked her down, so she spent most of the trip exhausted and wretching and reading Anne Rice novels in their room at the Hotel Maria Cristina, near the Zona Rosa and fortress-like U.S. embassy. Alone, he grabbed a map, subway tokens, and pesos for great swings through La Capital, in the last sweet days before the crime explosion made footloose tourism too risky. The strange trip grimly symbolized their marriage: when one was happy, the other was miserable. Dan and Rebecca could never synchronize their emotions, hence each resented what the other felt. And now, their patience and love long gone, they had ended the marriage.

The plane kept circling. Thoughts warred in Dan’s head. Work, the mad stress of getting the document and presentation right, Dafna down there nervous and waiting and wet. How would it be? What did he want? What did she want? Could any reality match the dreams dreamed over the months of electronic passion? The whole notion of traveling 3000 miles to see Dafna, savoring her body and heart, then returning alone to the workaday grind of a Metro-North commute and office politics struck him as insane.

Well, too much sane behavior had mucked up Dan’s mental health for too long. Caution left too many what-ifs in his life. Any time he did something a little crazy, Dan felt delight that he rose above his oh-so-responsible approach to life. He smiled. One rule guided Dan’s post-divorce world. There were no rules, no “I should” or “I should not.” Within the bounds of honesty, civility and safety, everything was an option. He could not wait to see Dafna. Maybe great pleasure, maybe agony, probably not tedium. But he had to find out for himself.

His mind drifted back a decade to the first trip to Mexico City. The last day glowed in his memory. Rebecca had recovered enough to go shopping in the Zona Rosa. That was her desire. Dan grabbed a backpack, snacks and maps and jumped on the metro at the Cuauhtemoc station near the hotel. By 10 a.m. he arrived at the Viveros station, at the edge of the famous Coyoacan neighborhood. Rural up to the 1940s, Coyoacan was swallowed by the devouring mass of Mexico City but retained its upper-class charm and smart bustle. Cafes, art galleries, bars, cobblestone streets and freshly painted stucco buildings gave Coyoacan the feel of Greenwich Village or Cambridge (although those areas lacked shotgun-toting security guards, he admitted). For hours he wandered, with lingering stops at the Frida Kahlo Museum and the Leon Trotsky Museum, art and bloody politics mingling in his mind. Rebecca and Dan left for Brooklyn the next day. Departing, Dan felt frustrated, that for all his wanderings he had missed some essential part of Coyoacan. Next time we’re here, he thought, we’ll take another look around.

A decade later, that next time had arrived. Only now, there was no “we.”

His mind drifted to a more recent past, two nights before, the last long chat with Dafna.

DAN: I’m staying at the Maria Cristina. I like the place and it’s close to our offices, on Paseo de la Reforma.

DAFNA: Niiiiiicce. Better than a corporate hotel. I luv the fountains there.

DAN: Muy romantico. The Hyatt’s not very romantic.

DAN: I requested a room with a king-sized bed. Just in case you like me.

DAFNA: Silly! Good springs???

DAN: We’ll put it to the test.

DAFNA: Meet you at the airport honey?

DAN: That would be soooo nice, but no. The office will have a car and driver meet me, take me to the hotel. That’s the security policy. They started that after somebody got kidnapped by taking the wrong kind of taxi. I’ll get cleaned up then I’ve got to go to the office. This is a big proposal.

DAFNA: [uses crying smiley]. U make me wait for Ur kisses?

DAN: It’s hard for me, too. But this proposal is huge. I’d rather meet you when my mind is clear. After dinner? Come to the hotel for a drink?

DAFNA: Not safe to come in late. Unless I STAY, maybe?

DAN: Damn! There’s nothing I’d rather do but I have to be in the office at 8:30 to review documents and start coaching for the orals. I need to sleep. So, so sorry.

DAFNA: I coach you with your orals.

DAN: MMM, we do orals together soon. Lovely thought. I’ll get back from the office late, but we can talk maybe?