Sensual Bachata NYC

Lionel's chest felt like vibrating rubber. The sadness about leaving his family in Buenos Aires wasn't overbearing. He could effortlessly push the thoughts away. Yet they colored all of his thoughts and emotions. The long bus ride gave him time to focus on his future. NYC lay ahead of him. He had wild imaginings from movies about the Empire State Building and Wall Street bankers in suits. His cousin Gaston had promised him how amazing everything was - and the girls!!! - and offered a place to stay. Yet all the pieces of the past and future didn't fit together. He was passing through a chasm in his life's path.

The girl a row back on the other side of the aisle, sleeping with her head against the window, was around his age of 23. He regularly pretended to look at the scenery on her side. When he saw a tower or billboard through the driver's window, he'd wait for it to pass the bus so that he could turn his head back to catch another glimpse. Yet really, he was peaking at her. Rouged cheeks to make her look like a little mamasita. The smooth skin made her look young and energetic. The hair was pulled back in a ponytail to give her the appearance of a very hands-on no-nonsense attitude. Aside from soaking in her personality, his darting eyes, knowing that they couldn't linger, exactly remembered the point they had to focus on to see the cleavage of her boobs. She was wearing a lowcut spandex top that hugged the perfectly round, succulent boobs only barely over the areolas, but she covered up with a jacket each time she stirred in her sleep. With the left side of the jacket wrapped over the right, there was nothing to see. But little by little, her jacket front would drop with the shaking off the bus. He got such a high each time that he could see the gap between her breasts. The titillation to perhaps catching a glimpse of the top of her areola kept him playing the game of watching for landmarks. She was out hard asleep with her mouth agape, showing her crooked front tooth.

The yapping of a scrawny African American had been going on since Richmond. He constantly accosted a passenger, sitting down next to them. He'd tell them how he was a friend of everyone. Then, he'd look around what that person had. If that person had a sandwich sitting on the top of their bag, he'd ask for it. He'd offer a drink from his dubious bottle of brown liquor. "If you ain't drinking with me, you ain't my friend!" he'd complain. The responses he got tested the range of people's defenses. The old guy with the Yankee's hat told him: "Fuck off before I punch you in the face." The nice graduate-student-looking Chinese politely explained that his girlfriend didn't allow him to drink for about five minutes before the bus driver came on the PA: "Stop harassing customers, or I'll throw you out right here on the freeway!"

Something was disgusting about the guy. His track pants were way too large and not kept in good shape. He had the appearance of being homeless, a slinger of all kinds of scams, and an unnerving comfort with crossing people's boundaries. It was like he had no hope and future but only the very moment and what seemed alluring to him at that moment. It's the people that don't care that are the most terrifying. He seemed like the guy who had past through arrests and was familiar with it - not like a terrible life experience but an everyday occurrence. With all that, he sat down next to Lionel.

"It is my high duty to keep you from NYC. You are the scum that comes to steal our jobs. You are a fucking, god damn illegal!" the guy barked at Lionel.

The guy seemed worked up like he would grab Lionel any moment. Lionel had been holding onto his flip knife, which he had clutched ever since he had noticed the guy. With a shy gesture, Lionel opened his palm to bear the small knife with a three-inch blade. This had been his insurance for the long and dangerous trip. All his hope to make it safely was placed onto that knife his dad had given him.

Lionel's heart pounded. The guy was very right. It was like the secret he was carrying deep inside of him had been bared to everyone on the bus. But Gaston had repeated to him many times to never admit to it. "Unless you tell them, they have to assume that you are an American. Don't let yourself be fooled into admitting it! Don't even deny it! It only makes you suspicious to why you deny it." So Lionel waited for the guy's reaction while every muscle in his body was tense and making him sweat immensely.

"I'm not gonna fuck you up with all these witnesses. Once you get off the bus, I'll stalk you and gut you like the animal that you are," the guy hissed. Then the guy got up and moved on.

The guy sat down next to the girl that Lionel had been eyeing. The guy put on a sweet tone that sounded like a deranged menace: "Hey pretty girl, you wanna be my girlfriend?"

She opened her eyes. Her quivering voice said, "I have a boyfriend." While her pale face was composed to hide the fear, her eyes were wide open with unabashed fear.

"A pretty girl like you can always handle two boyfriends," the guy set after.

Both were thrown forward against the seat in front of them. The driver had slammed on the breaks. Everyone was startled to silence, listening to the alarm blinkers of the bus ticking away. The bus stood on the emergency lane with cars wooshing past it on the left side. With a pneumatic hiss, the front door opened. There was nothing but garbage and poorly growing bushes due to the car exhaust fumes outside.

"Get the fuck off my bus right now!" yelled the driver, not even using the PA.

"Hey man, I swear I won't bother anybody anymore. I only had enough money for the bus ticket. Don't throw me out. I'm begging you. C'mon! Give me a chance. I won't say a single word!" the guy was truly terrified and near crying.

"You sit right behind me for the rest of the trip," the bus driver said and closed the door.

Lionel felt a big hand grabbing under his right armpit and pulling him up. The big, middle-aged, white lady with the curly hair that had been knitting pulled Lionel to his feet and dragged him out to the aisle. Then the lady shoved Lionel down into the seat next to the cute girl and told him: "Be a gentleman and protect her. You should have done this way earlier!" For a quick moment, Lionel duck back to his old seat to get his backpack. Then he dutifully sat down next to the hot girl.

His neck was so tense, he couldn't even turn to the side to look at her. His cheeks were burning with embarrassment. He felt nervous around girls. He was scared that she knew that he had been checking out her body over and over. To him, she was royalty, but she was also anxious about having a dateable guy that close to her. She didn't want to show her interest in him either. So she tried to act cold like she didn't care and mumbled dismissively, "Dios mío, no tiene remedio." She spat out the last word with her lips like he was a joke who couldn't do anything.

Then she worried if she was looking good. She got her little makeup mirror out. She touched up her lipstick. She repainted the masquera. She noticed that the rouge on her cheeks was maybe a little too heavy. She toned it down with a bit of powder and some smudging to disperse the rouge.

While she did all that, he looked straight ahead, but all of his inside attention was focused on her. Every little sound, he paid attention to. The clicks and clacks of her fingers had such feminine energy. He could smell her girly sweat. After all, they had been on the bus since sunrise, and the sunlight was fading now. He got aroused. He had a long and big boner. He tried to ease the wood with careful touches so that it would like snug against his belly and creates the smallest bulge in his pants. He'd carefully tug on his wallet in his pants, get a handkerchief out of the other pocket, and shift in his seat. With each movement, he moved the wood a little bit more into a snuck position rather than a standout position.

Then she spread some perfume on her chest and went to sleep. The smell of sweetness, spring, and perfume alcohol lingered in the air. He had lived a pretty sheltered life. Being in the bubble of an attractive young woman heightened his senses and scared him. He didn't dare say anything. He didn't dare move. It took him ten minutes until he dared to scratch the itch on his skin. She stole glances at him. He wasn't sure if she was threatening him to not dare talk to her or if she felt snubbed that he wasn't talking to her. But when she dozed off again, he kept staring at the cleavage of her boobs. He was helplessly driven to determine if he could see the bottom of her bra by staring between her boobs - helplessly like a moth is drawn to the fire and burns.

When her hand fell onto his lap during her slumber, he got such a boner feeling the soft, feminine energy of her hand oozing into him. He let it fill him entirely. There was such joy, levity, and life in him feeling the connection to the divine, feminine source. When a pothole shook her awake, she pulled her hand back startled, then discovered drool from her mouth down to her chin, and wiped it away embarrassed. They never talked or even exchanged a glance directly. The backpack between her legs had a nametag with a name that he would burn into his mind for eternity: Aurora.

New Jersey, the armpit of America. Port Authority, the den of scum of every stripe. The Big Apple, the capital of the world.

Lionel's foot stepped off the Greyhound bus steps onto the waste blackened, soiled pavement. Thus ended his journey from Buenos Aires and began his new life. He found himself in bay 431 on the fourth floor of the multi-story bus depot. A tent encampment of homeless people filled the dark shadow parts of the cavernous bus bays. A guy in a wheelchair was picking at the scabs covering his entire leg. A guy with puffy air and wicked eyes spit out odd names in a quick, hushed, and excited rapid-fire, which obviously advertised his drugs. He stood next to a group of four uniformed, body armor-wearing homeland security officers with machine guns slung over their shoulders. The uniforms were squeaky clean and brand new.

An old escalator with dim lighting took him a level down while he waited behind people with humongous, cheap bags. He himself had only a daypack on his shoulders, which were all the belongings that he had taken on the five thousand miles journey. The note with directions from his cousin Gaston guided him through the long underground tunnels with throngs and throngs of people pressing past and against him to the A train. Riding the underground serpent singing its song with squealing steel tires, he made his way to the L train.

He set himself for a long train ride. A gang of five guys dressed in black embarged on the train with lots of gusto. They pulled a speaker on rollers and blasted music. They jumped onto the overhead handholds like they were gym equipment. They threw themselves head over on the pole. Then they rushed from person to person with a hat asking for money before the doors opened at the next station, and they ran out. After the train left Manhattan for Brooklyn, the crowd of evening commuters thinned until he was almost uncomfortably and unsafe in a near-empty carriage that went above ground because it was cheaper that way in the poor areas.

Myrtle-Wyckoff was his stop. He was the only one stumbling onto the platform, searching for the red exit sign. Everything was abandoned in the station. Walking through a maze of stairs, he found his way aboveground. An empty gas station and a chicken fast food place had the lights on. Once he started walking down Palmetto Street, there was scant street lighting. Only neglected residential buildings and piles of trash bags lined the street. The graffiti was thick on any surface. Most of it was unintelligible scribble, but in between, there were masterpieces like the woman that was half beauty and half tigress. A pink jewel between her eyes shined light onto all the people of the planet beneath her.

After doubling back a couple times, he found 539. The house number had fallen off, but the paint was fresher where it had been protected by the numbers. As Gaston had told him, he didn't try to look for a doorbell but instead sent a text message on his disposable phone: "Your cousin Lionel is here." It took five minutes, and the door opened to show yellow indoor lighting. Curly-haired, a purple-golden shirt all the way unbuttoned to reveal his toned belly, a bottle of beer in one hand and a vaporizer in the other, Gaston waved Lionel to come inside. With a big warm hug, the cousins hugged each other. "Oh, man, you've made it out! NYC is either going to crush you like a cockroach or make you a king. Let's find out what you are made off!" said Gaston with a lot of laughter.

Gaston pulled Lionel inside. There was a simple wooden kitchen table with plastic lawn chairs around it. Half torn food boxes of cereal, pasta, and Indian packaging were all over the counter. Old, dirty pillows were lying on the floor. "Make yourself at home, but some of the brothers are already sleeping," invited Gaston and pointed at the guy on the couch under a crochet blanket sleeping. Gaston pointed at a lit-up laptop screen in the distant corner of the living room and added, "I've got to get some coding done tonight, but let me show you where you can sleep." While moving past the sink, Gaston filled up a used Coca-Cola cup with tap water and handed it to Lionel.

They moved into the adjacent bedroom. A queen-sized mattress without sheets lay on the floor, surrounded by a cluttering of clothes, magazines, and shoes. "The left side is yours," said Gaston. "It's close to the window. The sun is really bright. Sorry, bro, I got dips on the darker side." Lionel took in the dank environment and noticed that Gaston was only wearing one bunny slipper. The other slipper had probably disappeared into the melange of the apartment. "I gotta get back to coding right now, but tomorrow morning, I'll take you to a job possibility. I got your back!"

Gaston went to the living room to fetch the laptop and sit on the floor with his back to the wall. He started typing furiously. Lionel looked around. This had been the big moment that he had been looking forward to for months. Now, it was here. It felt underwhelming. He tried to take in his new environment and scanned the room. Another guy was lying next to a wall on a sleeping pad in his underwear. In between the rummage on the floor, there were feminine items like a bra, a broken lipstick container, and a single silver high heel. Lionel wondered if a female guest had left things behind or if a girl was part of the roommate pack. He also noticed the thumping of the music more clearly. The Latin island beat seemed to come from the probable bathroom.

Noticing that there wasn't much to be done and it had been a long trip, Lionel figured that he'd brush his teeth and go to sleep. So he knocked on the bathroom door. Gaston called out, "Just go in there! They can't hear you with the music." So Lionel pushed the door open. "Love me! Love me! Love me!" bellowed the Latin singer with romantic intonation. Two couples were inside the bathroom in a deep embrace with their legs enmeshed like they were humping each other. However, the guys were evidently very focused on moving the women's torsos back. Like fluid, the women's body moved into undulating waves molded by the manly hands. Right as the music changed to a metal drum, they started shuffling side to side with intensely sexual hip swings. The guy with the mustache noticed Gaston in the doorway and asked: "Do you dance bachata?"

"I don't know how to dance. I don't even know what bachata is," replied Lionel.

"Son, your life has no meaning. Make your cousin take you to a class," said the mustache guy. One of the hot women barely opened her eyes to glance at Lionel. She was wearing jeans cut-off so short that her buttocks showed. Her top was a bra. All the skin on her body was glistening from the dancing. They went back to being entirely focused on their dance. Lionel shoved a toothbrush in his mouth and watched them through the mirror. They didn't seem to care about him watching at all. The women appeared to be in heat because their bodies were so fluid and submissive to the manly hands pushing and pulling on their hips, backs, shoulders, bellies. It was mesmerizing to see the men dipping the women's heads down in a roll that made their whole bodies follow. Then the men lifted the women into the air and swirled them from one of their shoulders to the other. All that happened in the tiny bathroom between the sink, toilet, and shower stall.

Lionel would have loved to keep watching the two couples dancing, but he was considerate and left for the mattress in the bedroom. The pom-pom-pom-ting of the music continued. He'd fall asleep, wake up from an intensely vivid dream processing everything he had seen on his trip, notice the music still playing, and return to slumber. At some point in the night, Gaston joined him on the mattress. Lionel didn't stir to let Gaston know that he was awake, but they both fell asleep quickly again. When Lionel during a brief waking noticed the slight light of the morning sun breaking up the night sky, the music was still going. The music had been stuck on the same song for a long time. The drawn-out "porque" of a love-drunk Latin singer kept repeating endlessly. Lionel had become intimately familiar with the sound, almost grown attached to it, but was still disturbed at the endless repetition for a couple hours at least.

Gaston didn't seem to be a morning riser. The sunlight was flooding the room already, but Lionel was glad to get more sleep. He felt dog tired after the long trip. All the sitting had been more tiring than a hard workout. Eventually, a phone alarm went off. "Aw, shit!" hissed Gaston. "Get your stuff. We have to get going!" Gaston had jumped up in his underwear, blue boxers. Gaston through on a crumbled pair of slacks and a white shirt. "Let me see what you have!" said Gaston and opened up Lionel's backpack right away. A pair of black pants and a leopard print t-shirt from the backpack landed on Lionel's face.

"Hey, that's my oldest and most worn outfit! Let me pick something nice! I only got that in case I have to do some labor!" protested Lionel.

"Na! That's perfect for the job!" insisted Gaston.

As Lionel didn't seem to have privacy, he didn't change his underwear but slipped into the clothes right away. Lionel followed Gaston into the bathroom. With a big hiss, Gaston pissed into the toilet. One dancer couple was sleeping in the bathtub with two pillows. The other was lying in the living room and sleeping. That's when Lionel noticed that the music had been gone a while. Passing the kitchen, Gaston pulled two beige packets about the size of a letter out of a cardboard box. He handed one to Lionel. "Expired army rations," Gaston explained. "They cost only 50 cents each in bulk and are practically good for eternity."

They rushed out into the street. Nearing the subway station, the hustle in the street increased. A cart guy cut slices off a giant piece of meat on a roast. Someone hustled to sell shoes, books, and jewelry spread out on the floor. The cell phone store advertised in big colorful letters over every single window. A disturbed homeless gave a sermon in the most gospel choir-like tone like armageddon was about to come. The coming subway rumbled so hard that the ground shook. Gaston showed Lionel the art of turnstile jumping. With a smooth placement of the hands left and right on the machine, he tucked his knees to his chest to lop over the turnstile. Lionel went right under the turnstile, not daring to have his feet get caught and fall face forward.

Finding an empty seat on the subway, Gaston showed Lionel how to bend the MRE package so that the heating element would break and get activated. Lionel almost dropped the package because it got instantly so hot. After tearing the package open, he found a pouch with lasagna and a pound cake for dessert in it. Not having had much to eat for 24 hours, the expired MRE tasted mighty good.