Marisi
Ornstein
The sun vibrating and searing from Miami Beach’s ocean is blinding in a way that’s assaultive, asserting to the world the magnificent grandiosity of the Fontainebleau Hotel.
It’s the first day of the year, somewhere in the 80’s, and anxiety is running high for the Christmas and Hanukkah crowd from New York, Toronto, Philadelphia, Jersey, Montreal and Cleveland, all flying home tomorrow to frigid climes.
The daily morning lounge chair scramble is in full swing up at the pool under the shadow of the famous high dive platform towering against the sun way too high up in the air.
Pool attendants dart from lounge chair to lounge chair, robotically turning down the cushions at the speed of light, accepting folded twenties for placing starched white and bright blue towels to perfect spec, and accepting fifties and hundreds for holding the most cherished lounge chairs.
A few cocaine induced skirmishes spark among the husbands, but the fights are quickly quelled by the wives in their high hairdos and screaming jewelry, the morning sun sizzling their coconut oiled skin.
Even the seagulls are feeling the morning anxiety, wildly diving, swooping in low and fast, grabbing food right out of hands, scaring the living shit out of everyone involved.
In the cool, peaceful shade of a spacious royal blue private cabana on the beach, complete with a shower, Leo Sanger and Beatrice McCarty have just finished making love on a pillowed bed and are catching their breath.
Beatrice kisses him and leaves the bed to take a quick shower.
Leo slides on his Persols, wondering how Beatrice’s energy can be compassionate and so vicious all at the same time.
She dresses in an intricate yellow lace over-shirt and red Pashmina, wrapped just shy of her bikini line and pours fresh orange juice from a table offering fruit, coffee, ice water, tea and fresh blueberry muffins.
“Come back to bed, Beatrice. Please.”
“I have a meeting.” She hands a glass of juice to Leo and he gazes at her through Italian forest green glass, “Let’s have breakfast together.”
She holds up a blueberry muffin, “I only have time for this.”
“Where are the kids?”
“She’s safe with Will.”
“Beatrice, I beg you. Come back to bed.”
She smiles and lets her Pashmina fall to the floor.
Will and Veera are walking on the beach, far from the hotel, carrying sticks of drift wood to pop the blue neon hell-balloons, the Portuguese Man-O-War dotting the beach, careful not to step on their long translucent purple tentacles that deliver a painful venom stinging like your skin’s on fire.
Will is wearing Levi’s Five-O-Ones that he cut off and has an old knife with a heavy wooden handle sheathed on his belt.
As they stroll, he notices something bobbing in the waves and realizes it’s an old man in the water. He whips a knife off his belt, shoves it into the sand and dives into the ocean after the old man. He manages to pull him back to shore and lays him on the beach, as tourists gather around.
Veera stares into the man’s purple face, “Is he fuckin dead?”
“Come on.” Will scoops up his knife, “Let’s get outta here.”
As they walk, Veera pops a Man-O-War and steps directly onto its tentacles, “Willie! The motherfucker stung me! My foot’s on fuckin fire!”
Will tosses his stick, throws Veera over his shoulder and runs all the way back to the Fontainbleau with Veera screaming and crying the entire way.
He sits Veera on a bench in the Man-O-War Station and douses her foot with vinegar and gasoline.
A Lacoste clad family walking from the pool area to the beach pauses. The mother leans down to Veera to ask, “Are you okay, honey?”
Veera looks at her like she’s out of her mind, “No, lady, a motherfucking Man-O-War stung me. Can’t you see I’m crying?”
The woman is stunned, and becomes momentarily immobile. Her husband gently takes her hand and leads her away.
Will pours more vinegar, “Feeling better?”
Veera nods, “Thanks for helping me, Willie, I love you very much. You’re a very good big brother.”
“Thanks, Veera, I love you very much, too.”
Beatrice and Leo come running and Veera snaps back into screaming and crying even louder than before.
Leo picks Veera up and kisses her, “I heard you crying all the way from the cabana.” Veera hugs her father tight with one arm and holds up her foot with the other, “Ouchie.”
He kisses her foot, despite the vinegar and gasoline, “Did you step on another jellyfish?”
She sits up straight, “Dada. They’re not jellyfish, they’re a marine hydrozoan and they floated to Miami Beach all the way from Portugal. Can you believe it?”
Leo lowers his shades, “I can’t. I can’t believe it.”
Beatrice awkwardly rubs Veera’s back.
As Veera reaches her arms out for her mother, Beatrice hands her a blueberry muffin, but it drops before Veera can take it, and explodes into smithereens on the ground.
Veera looks down at the carnage of her Mama’s blueberry muffin as a storm of frantic seagulls engage in a vicious battle over bits of blueberry scattered on the ground.
Beatrice wraps her Pashmina around her Chanel bathing suit, “I have a meeting.”
She takes Will’s hand before he could respond and walks up the path from the beach to the pool. Leo follows, carrying Veera.
Will glances up to Beatrice, “Mama, where’s your meeting?”
“Here in the hotel.”
“Who with?”
“A man from the Union.”
“Can I come?”
“Don’t you want to go swimming?”
“I’d rather go to a meeting.”
Beatrice stops walking, “Sure, but, this time, please speak only if you have something to say. And if there are candies, leave them.”
“Deal. I don’t like candy anymore, anyhow. Gonna stick with Bazooka, cause it ain’t candy, it’s bubblegum.”
Beatrice corrects him, “It’s not candy.”
“Exactly. It’s bubblegum.”
When they arrive at the pool area, Beatrice hands Veera’s orange Pashmina to Leo, “Will’s coming with me.”
Leo nudges him, “Come on, Will, take a swim with us.”
Will shakes his head, “I already swam, rode a bunch of waves, pulled a dead guy out of the ocean. I had a full morning. We got a meeting.”
Beatrice winks to Leo, “Have fun on your Dada Day.”
Without a word, they turn and walk away, followed by an imposing man in a dark suit named Scratch, who sticks with Beatrice wherever she goes.
Leo watches Will walking away, and Veera sees the hurt in his eyes.
She tries to comfort him, “He loves you, Dada. It’s just, he doesn’t trust you.”
Leo grins as he watches his son walk away, “Smart boy.”
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