RUM, SWEAT AND LOVE: A PIRATE WEDDING IN PARADISE Part ii: WHERE HEAVEN MEETS EARTH

Continued from RUM, SWEAT AND LOVE: A PIRATE WEDDING IN PARADISE

Part i: WE SEIZE THE HIGH GROUND

It was 9:30 when Bec and I were jostled out of bed by the realization that we have half an hour to make the taxi we’ve requested to take what’s supposed to be a large group to the rainforest. The large group turns out to be Becca, Kyle and me. As everybody had hinted the night before. The Ano kids, always up for the adventure, yes. Kyle and Biggs are reliable adventure companions, truly people a man can trust to come along no matter what. Kyle and I’ve been dragging our tired asses on adventures for my whole life; Bec joined a few years ago and while we’ve had our own wild times, the epic trio was together for a few mindblowingly twisted romps across Europe and hazy times in Newport Beach when I was a supermarket butcher and Kyle worked at the Marina and Becca wore a pantsuit. But that was the past. Now we were in a private van curving around the island of St. Lucia, turning into the heart where the palms and papayas gave way to vines and rainbow-barked eucalyptus and bananas. Passing small farms and shacks with horses tied up alongside the road and chickens walking around free.

We stepped out of the van at the zipline place, dazed and tired, maybe still a bit drunk, no way to be sure. It was a small wooden deck with a house attached and cargo hangars for the gear. A lazy fog hung around the place and a pregnant bitch ran up to us as a stud lounged lazily with fleas drawing a pepper aura on him. We ate cheese and flat-bread sandwiches and downed caffeine cola drinks and strapped on the crotch-huggers, Kyle tackling the high speed flights through the trees in a tuxedo t-shirt.

“Lean back,” they said, “control your speed with your back hand as you hold yourself straight with your front.” Then we were marching on trails and up wooden steps dug into hillside. Kyle was the first one to clip onto the long steel cable and he took the it smooth. Next Bec cruised, albeit a little nervous, but flying nonetheless. I got spun around, nearly came in backwards at high speed, somehow managed to right myself just before the platform. So it began.

A morning of rope bridges and talk of Genesee Valley laced with movie quotes and rude comments about race, gender, trade, any other generalization we could mock or embrace, even about our own derelict white asses. The workers were all high school locals, comfortable flying down the steel cables, laughing as they caught some real speed but dead serious as they clip you in, yes, pay attention with the precious cargo.

Every couple rides you’d get a long one that stretched so far you couldn’t see the end. You’d kick off into the air and break through the trees and the wind blew hard across your face as the canopy plunged a hundred feet below you and the sun shone bright on you and it was truly a wondrous and pleasant life.

Our sweat kept us drunk. If measured, I’m sure it would have constituted at least a fifth of rum. All the others had bailed, painful hungover, leaving only the legendary three, The Ano Brothers with Biggs, one last time before she’s officially an Ano herself.

On the ride back the driver, a happily-married man (as everybody was always sure to tell us they were happily married and for how long and how many kids they had) named Jonathan pointed out the prison, said it was strategically built in a part of the jungle known for its abundance of fer de lance snakes, Mother Nature’s own guards.

I had Jonathan drop me off at an ATM in Vieux Fort to pick up some money, 270 EC which works out to about a hundred US. He drove off so I walked down the street, the only white face in every direction, and waited for him to return. Wild music came from a flea market to my right. On the left was a general store full of cheap booze and trinkets, tired black faces lined up as they swatted bugs and bought food and rum and Pitons.

I got a few quick glances, nothing more, as I walked alone and soon the van swept by and I was back aboard. Jonathan the driver took us to the Super J where we bought lunch meat and cheese and rolls and beers and juices and a malt for our driver. The rest of the ride we pounded beers as Bec made sandwiches for everybody, even good ol’ Johnny, who didn’t ask but when we offered he replied with a quick “Yes”. And then we were back in our rooms getting changed before making our way down to the beach where we were greeted by one goddamn wild sight.

Our clan now took up a whole corner of the beach. Every eye turned to us as we walked in and the girl and I gave each other a quick look for support before tearing off into host mode, pressing flesh, chatting people up, telling them about the flights through the rainforest.

Working down the line it was the Canadiennes and of course Mom and Dad and the Bonzos and Uncle Miguel and his lady Lindy and Uncle Pablo and Aunt Kim, yes, then wrapping around to the front of the line with August and Mel and Skelly and as I finished the soon to be legendary author S. John and his wife Kristen came strolling down the beach with Red Stripe beer they’d swiped from the bar at Anse Chastenet before the water taxi had brought them around the bend of the Petit Piton.

We went from group to group, sure to have a conversation with everyone and I wanted to discuss with all of them but goddammit it’s a little overwhelming being just one couple. Still, it was, “Hello Bonzos, good flight huh?” Larry and Kay were happy and comfortable, Lynn effusive as we discussed stupidities, Spire observing, smiling, pontificating.

“Miguel and Pablo, good day, enjoy it huh? Great rum, yes, fun last night. Zip-lining was fun, Uncles why weren’t you there?”

Hugs to August and Skelly who tell me everybody’s still at the mansion but Skelly is preparing to climb the mount tomorrow and August is starting to realize how tall it is but he won’t back down, never. Yes, you’re really climbing it? Rainforest was crazy, good to see Piton beers in your hands.

Then S. John and Kristen, Yes, hello, welcome to our side of the Petit Piton, yes zip-lining was fun, put up the flag and they bring food and drink to you.

Mel hid on the last lounge chair, We have your camera, we tell her, it got rained on, hope it’s okay, she says it’s fine, it was the same camera used in Vietnam, see you tonight at the mansion, 809, for pre-party and rehearsal.

Time for escape. Kyle and I swam out to the floating island and we did flips and spins off it like we were still young. Rum and beer flowed freely on the sand. Soon it was 3:30 and time to go so I collected money from the remainders on the beach and bought 2 more straws from Dr. Feelgood.

At reception we ran into the last 2 guests, Italian-side relatives who admittedly we hadn’t expected when, so late in the game, they told us they were coming. We were delighted. The Italian cugini who understood family and togetherness in the old world style. Two of their sons had just gotten married and I congratulated them and told them this would be fun, finally a wedding where they could just relax and eat and drink.

Then it was the room and the plunge pool. And a j-bird. And a glass of Bounty. Staring out into the sea, one last calm before the storm. Once we left the room the ride was officially begun and nothing would be able to slow its momentum until it had finished.

Up to Mansion 809, my girl cussing as she walked uphill in high heels and greeted on the sprawling deck with vodka and more rum. Regrouping after the day, new members and old meeting, drinking, merriment, good vibrations, yes, it was a soiret at the mansion in the shadow of the Petit full of Cheers and good words, pictures as the wedding party rounded up to the Sunset Deck for rehearsal.

A somber moment passed as we all realized it was actually happening.

Then the rehearsal, it went quickly, easily, just direct the party down an invisible aisle, walk some parents up, family hugs, yes, then we were done and in desperate need of drink.

The Cane Bar terrace was set up with rows of round tables and Bec and I sat with our parents, asking for Chairman’s Reserve in a glass, make it a double and quick. Our group had now topped out at 29, the sun disappearing one last time behind the Petit as the breeze kicked up and steel drums floated on the breeze and we heaped plates with pulled pork sandwiches and tuna tartar and sushi and skewers

– satay as they called it – and Bec and I went around to our supporting teams with our respective bridesmaid and groomsman gifts, thank you for being here for us, yes.

Bec’s stepdad

apologized for the lack of Becca’s family at the event by playing a collection of greetings from them.

From Kyle came an impromptu intro to a video of epic proportions

he created, the kind of thing only few would be able to make and never with such meaning behind it, Bec’s and my lives from cute childhood to awkward adolescence, wonderful and embarrassing flotsam and jetsam, the greatest best man

gift ever.

Then pops stood up, talking on friends longtime and newly made, and on family from childhood with whom so many memories had been shared and this memory just another great one to add alongside the others from Thanksgiving and holidays.

It was hard not to feel the magic in

the air, especially when he spoke on that bond shared by the Bonzos who had been running together ever since my parents first got married some 35 years ago.

Mel gave a speech about

spinster-hood

and how she loved Becca and approved of me; S. John spoke on lofty literary aspirations and being among closest L.A. friends; Bonzos each spoke of watching me grow and welcoming Becca to the “family”.

Linz bawled through her

meditation on friends growing up together, being protective of each other “It’s the hormones, the hormones,” explained Boots as he patted her back; August, closed it down, stood up to massive applause and delivered the old toast from our decadent years:

“May the wind always be upon your back, and the sun upon your face,

and may the wings of destiny carry you aloft to dance among the stars.”

I walked grappa around to

party-goers, lighter fluid to wild sparks and the night erupted as a pianist let it go into the air and everybody danced and posed and drank .

And sweat; never stop sweating, not unless you’re dead or dying.

Kitten unleashed the big spit and S. John and Kristen retired to drunkenness and Luca and Cynth had to make their car back to their hotel and the rest just disappeared until it was August and Uncle Miguel and Lindy and the Canadiennes and my nuclear family clan at the Cane Bar.

Classic MJ, “The Way You Make Me Feel” blared and August vibrated to the music, arms flying wide and hip steps as soon the back room erupted into our own private dance party. Somewhere amidst the original John Lennon and the Matisse print, the oversized chairs and Kate Moss topless and Heidi and Dave the Canadiennes snapping pictures, Dave and Dad breaking it down and laughing Kyle was krumping – or kripping? – and August was mugging MJ stylee as Uncle Miguel did Chippendale power thrusts and Dad did splits and the waiter busted out power moves and mom stepped to the beat and I threw a front flip. The DJ kept repeating the same song to keep it going, tourists in the other room snapped pictures, an exotic brunette smiling coquettishly as Kyle killed it until last call came and we went.

Then it was August and Kyle and me at my state room, vodka and tequila and j-birds while Becca stayed with her girls up at mansion 809. Boots came down with more rum and cigs and the night becomes hazy until it’s just Kyle and me, remembering way back when we were kids living in Fell’s Point and shared a bunk bed and when we first moved into our own rooms how scared we were of a world without each other.

My next morning for was continental breakfast on the back patio with Kyle before going up to play tennis, a game we don’t know how to play but regardless we sprinted under sheer cliffs and hit the ball without score or boundaries, why not?

The girls (and a few select men, why not?) were having a breakfast down at the Bayside, separate wedding days and whatnot.

Then for me it was down to Kyle’s villa and from there to the beach for rum on the sand and some relaxation.

“We have a bit of an emergency,” Becca’s stepdad crackled over a walkie talkie.

“Yes?”

“We only have a few of the dinner selections.” I’m a firm believer that the word emergency on the day of one’s wedding should only be used to describe a runaway bride or a hurricane. While this was anything but, it still made the hairs on my shoulder stand up so I went back to Kyle’s to drink rum, call people, be in the information center and relax poolside. August came by – somehow the crazy bastard sweat and powered and through force of will made it to the top of the Gros Piton, 2600 feet up clambering over boulders and steppes, following Skelly as she ran it like the champ she is.

“To a life lived exceeding expectations,” Kyle and I cheersed him. Soon crunch time was upon us.

I showered, practiced the vows I’d written in my head, cried, shaved, tried to make myself into a better man. Put on a fresh unworn linen shirt, the brand new suit and expensive tie, pocket square folded. Then it was time for scotch.

August arrived in his seersucker suit with his groomsman tie, poured a scotch, and with a joker grin said “Is there anyone you’d rather be here with, at this moment?” and I smiled and said no.

Elsewhere Bec was getting ready too. Her girls and her going through last paces. The princess she deserved to be, in her dream changing room with her best girls around her.

Soon Luca arrived at Kyle's room, as did my parents, and he took pre-game pictures and posed in pictures and we all sipped 12-year-old scotch until it was time for the air-conditioned taxi to the sunset deck.

“There was no reason to feel pressure, but I felt it anyway – the pressure of hot air and passing time, an idle tension that builds up in places where men sweat twenty-four hours a day.” – HST, THE RUM DIARY.

Atop the deck, final minutes stood myself and my father with Miss Imogene Mitchell, a native woman full of authority and old negro wisdoms; she was to be the one marrying us.

“Do you mind if I mention God, even though this is a civil ceremony?”

“Sure, God’s welcome in our house.” She nodded and told me and my dad how long she’d been married and how many children she had.

Dad took me aside when the girls arrived so I didn’t see the bride. He told me how marriage is tough; how sometimes one will want out and it’s up to the other to fight and how this goes back and forth. He asked me if I was nervous as we stared at the beach far below, the Caribbean stretching to the horizon like a great blue parchment as clouds tickled the nearby mountaintops.

The night before Spire had asked me the same thing.

“Just before my first wedding my best man had to walk me back and forth for an hour. That shoulda been a sign that it was a bad idea. But you’re not feeling that, are you?”

“Nope.”

“I didn’t think so.” With a smile. “No, that’s how you know you’re doing the right thing.”

Becca was in the spa as we assembled in the portico at the spa’s breezeway, waiting for Uncle Miguel, whose shuttle had been late, and staring angrily at the bastards who wanted to start before he arrived. Watching as the rain clouds blew by. Waiting.

The Uncle arrived. Music started, THE LUDLOWS by Horner. My boys line up on my side, in a line. Then my parents walk me up to the arch. Then the girls, all smiling and winking, carrying bouquets.

I first saw her glow a few steps in front of her. Escorted by a man of casual bearing did nothing to dull her brightness, her beauty but rather that strengthened it like a contrast sharpens a black and white image. She was wrapped tight in an elegant gown she wore just off the rack, a flower in her hair, a white bouquet in her hand.

“She looks beautiful, man,” Kyle leaned in to whisper and I nodded as my eyes became wet like the air, humidity, yes. But no. It was love, however measured or foolish that might sound in today’s world but it was love. And the woman I would spend the rest of my life with was, somehow, and certainly counter to anything I deserved or expected, the most beautiful bride I’d ever seen.

“It’s just you and me,” she exhaled, smiling, taking my hands and looking into my eyes. Yes it was, and would be, forever.

Mrs. Imogene Mitchell started with a few words from the St. Lucia Chamber of Commerce and Tourism Board tailored especially to this occasion. She said we were in the middle of the breasts of the island, nestled in the pitons. Then she welcomed us to the family of married people. She spoke of its challenges and its blessings; of how we are now one, sprinkling in a bible verse about how Becca was made from my rib. Then it was time for us to read our vows.

The girl spoke of our past, our struggles and triumphs; how I was the man she’d always wanted. How she first realized I was more caring than she had thought I would be, of how I accepted her, loved her for her faults in spite of them. She spoke of our great family and how much love I showed to our animals. She vowed that she wouldn’t become a crazy cat lady. That she wouldn’t wear my business socks and that she would always make sure there were eggs in the fridge. She told me she would always love me. Then she gave me the yellow pieces of paper on which she’d written her soul, our soul, and smiled.

I stared into her eyes, held her hands, and said:

“I knew I liked you the first moment we met, when you cheersed me, bought me an Irish car bomb, and told me how excited you were to move to California. I knew then you liked having a good time and you liked adventure.

“I knew you were something special when, a few days later we went out to dinner and your friend told that joke, the really offensive one I can’t repeat here, and you busted up laughing. I knew then that you had the same twisted sense of humor as me and that I could listen to that laugh forever.

“I knew I was in love with you on hour 17 of my drive from Jackson to Boulder. I called you to say I was going to be another hour and you just said ‘Take your time, you have a good girl and a cold beer waiting for you.’ That was when I realized how caring and how patient you were.

“And I knew I loved you sometime that Fall when I, living the dreamlife I’d always wanted of being a ski bum, found myself calling some girl thousands of miles away, every day. It didn’t make any sense. But that’s love. Love doesn’t make any logical sense. It’s felt, not thought, something that can’t be explained or organized but it’s still real since it can make a man call a woman thousands of miles away.

“Since then we’ve had a lot of ups and downs. And you’ve still been that adventurous, fun, funny, caring, patient, BEAUTIFUL woman through it all.

“We’ve got big dreams, baby, you and me. And what may come in this life may come. But as long as you spend it loving me like you do and I you, I will consider myself – no, I will be – the luckiest man in the world.”

We signed papers up on the deck, drank champagne and then switched to cold rum punch. Sweat had run through my fresh linen shirt under my jacket and I accepted it as such, swimming through it to thank people for coming, posed for pictures caught by a crowd of no less than 10 cameras, ate salmon crackers and other assorteds. Mingled with folks, everybody mixing it up, family and friends and all of us so goddamned happy on that cliff with cold drink and good food in our hands. The love, there's the rub, it was all about the love.

People started disappearing. Eventually everybody had been whisked to the beach but us.

Breathless, me and the girl alone atop the cliff, beginning l'avventura, staring out to beyond the horizon. The only time we’d be granted such vision. Sizing up the possibilities and the challenges. It was us against the world, we knew that and we accepted it. We breathed deep. This was the first chance everything had to settle, to sit for a beat, just like Sinatra said a good drink should. The sun dipped behind the edge of the Petit Piton. We took a last breath and nodded to our wedding concierge. We were ready.

A golf cart brought us down to the stone steps and we arrived to our assembled crowd as they clapped for us, tables set under a tent on the beach for dinner at sunset. So began drinks, food, merriment. I argued with the red-and-lazy-eyed DJ, then Andzrej the stepdad took pictures at the waterline. My wife and I sat at our own table in the middle, drinking it all in. Steak and conch ceviche and scotch for me, salmon for my wife – Jesus, my wife – wine all around.

Kyle gave his speech. He winged it, just like the wife and I had always winged our whole life together. He spoke of welcoming her to the family, of us as young kids missing each other and how we’d always be there for each other. Kitten spoke too, talked about how much she loved us, loved Bec, how she didn’t like speaking but was so happy to be there with all her closest friends and us.

A gray tomcat had been hanging around the night before, calmly watching our wedding videos. He'd taken a liking to the girls, holding close to Bec. We hadn't seen that cat before but we saw it one time more during the wedding reception. He seemed to understand what was happening. He belonged there. Rumors were whispered about him as the reincarnation of David P., back from beyond, refusing to miss his daughter's wedding. He truly seemed to know more than a stray cat should.

Then it was time for the first dance, a mélange of sways and spins to Red Hot Chili Peppers’ HARD TO CONCENTRATE, barefoot on a wooden plank thrown down on the beach. The cake-cutting with Becca stuffing a massive piece of cake into my mouth. The floor going wild for the next hour or two and it’s my uncles and my friends and parents and extended family, August and Kyle dancing with Skelly and Mel and Luca and his angel Cynth,  getting down like we used to when we were young and stupid and Linz, six months into a new life throwing it with the best of them as Boots bumps and grinds and takes breaks only to pose with everybody there as he’s become a mascot of sorts. We tear up the dance floor, even S. John and Kristen, I’ve never seen them dance before, and the whole party breaks into a dance circle like some comical BRING IT ON with a magical white hat being passed around to determine the next dancer and Mel does a worm and an uncle fakes an ankle break and mom impersonates MJ and dad and I mirror each other with footwork and more splits and so on and it devolves into “Soul Train” mixed with “The Grind” and a drunken “High School Musical” though the dance floor is just a plank on the beach and it’s too hot to worry about rhythm, though Uncle Miguel’s lady seems to be a dancing rhythmic machine (the whole Latin thing) and I look over and realize I haven’t seen Uncle Pablo and Aunt Kim get down since their wedding, over 10 years ago. The Bonzos have to leave, early flights tomorrow and the rest of us men sit down to smoke cigars while Bec and Kristen and Mel pull up their dresses to wade into the sea bare-assed and cool down. Again the night ends with everybody in the cold air conditioning of the Cane Bar, the new Mrs. Ariano and I doing a final lap of thanks and one last drink before escaping to our room.
The dress won’t come off, damn knots, and I try to rip it with my teeth, try to use a corkscrew to cut it, call the maid frantically for scissors, suggest we burn it off, Christ. Finally, I pull the knot apart with my teeth, the damned dress and corset, all of it, comes loose and the girl can breathe for the first time all day. And so can I. Husband and wife, nothing more, breathing together forever, yes, yes, that’s right.