Under the Sun 

by Emily Jenniges 

“How much for the hard rolls?” I asked her. She was round like all bakery women and wearing a clean pink dress with a crisp white apron. A small boy was clutching her leg; she mumbled something in Spanish and shook him off. 

“One dolla.” she told me.

 “How about a couple of these,” I said pointing through the glass case at some frosted cakes. 

“One dolla.” I grabbed two warm caramel rolls and set them on the counter along with the rest. 

“That’s all,” I said. 

“One dolla,” she replied. I handed her a buck and she neatly packaged the breakfast into a paper bag. “Gracias,” I told her with a quick grin and started out the door. No matter what you bought at that bakery it always cost exactly one American dollar. 

I stepped out into the street bathed in the blinding sunshine. It wouldn’t feel like morning for long soon it would be hot again. I walked past the pharmacy, past the tiny junk shops. Manuel was hanging his hammocks. “Elena!” he shouted with a smile and an exaggerated wave. 

“Morning Manny!” I hollered across the street and added an enthusiastic step to my pace. No time to chat this morning, there were fish to be caught. I hurried down the street to the fish market. The air became thick with the scent of the sea. Victor and the boys from the Reina Maria (one of the most successful shrimp boats in the harbor) were cleaning the night’s catch. 

“Hey Elena! Headed for the flats?” Victor called to me. 

“You got it!” I said flashing a large smile but not breaking stride. I heard him wish me luck and I waved back, then began to jog quickly down the hill to the marina. Down the weathered dock I went to the skiff and my eagerly awaiting father. 

I plopped myself in the seat, he fired the motor and we were off. “Find anything good for breakfast Ellie?” he asked. I reached in the bag and pulled out a sticky caramel roll. It was a splendid morning and a long ride to the flats. The longer the better I thought.  

At last we approached the gallon jug used for a buoy floating in the vast scape of blue. It always amazed me.  Fishermen could leave the marina and with absolutely no electronics motor directly to the jug about 27 miles into the sea. We weren’t quite that local and had a GPS to help us navigate. 

Dad moved to the front of the boat, whistling Cat Steven’s version of “Morning has Broken.” We were adrift. I put of piece of the fresh squid on the hook and dropped it out the back. We fished for the sea bass and triggers with light tackle; it was fun with the light stuff. In a short time, Dad and I both had a nice trigger. 

We recalled the first time we landed one. We were with Ramon, a guide from Pompano’s fairly reliable guiding service we always laughed at that. When we asked Ramon what it was that we had caught he said, “To Americans es trigger fish, to Mexicans es gatillo, on the fish market es  flounder.” It felt so good to laugh with him. We recalled memories, the funny things that happened on previous trips, back when they were trips in a vacation sense, now they were much more like trips home.  

Then it was quiet again. There was something about drifting or maybe it was the old skiff or maybe the taste of salt on the air. Whatever it was, it could convince us for a time that things were simple again.  

Dad sat in the front of the boat turned away from me, the wind tossed his dark hair about. I heard him say something, but didn’t understand it. I never did when he mumbled like that. Then he turned to me and smiled waiting for a response.

 “Huh?”  I asked. 

“I said, I suppose the dorado will be up here feeding tonight.” 

“Probably” I said. 

“Maybe we should hang around and see.” Noon came and went and we washed lunch down with a few cold Pacificos. “This always tasted so much better south of the border,” he said.  

I agreed and it always tasted so much better when I was drinking it with him. Then the thoughts came. The heart sinking thoughts like what if this is the last Pacifico I ever get to drink with him. I froze. Sometimes I would just sit and stare at him. Trying to capture in my mind some kind of inerasable picture. Something so vivid and true that I would be unable to forget. He just sat leaned back in his chair with his feet over the edge of the boat like he didn’t have a care. His eyes reflected the glimmering sunlight off the water. How I wanted to sit there enthralled by this forever. I wanted to soak up every bit of his presence for as long as I could.

I wondered if he was scared. I knew he had to be, but wouldn’t let me know it. I thought if it were me, I would never go home. That’s when the tests would start again, and the treatments, the agony. Why couldn’t some time under the Mexican sun and some nice dorado be the cure?  

He started whistling the Ian Tyson song about the Navajo rug. “Ie yi yi, Katie, shades of red and blue,” I sang softly into the wind. Maybe he really wasn’t scared or maybe he just wasn’t thinking about it. I was and rarely stopped. 

The afternoon went like that, talking, not talking, laughing, recalling, and whistling. He reached into the cooler and pulled out two more beers. 

“Gonna be a pretty sunset,” he said. 

“Sure is,” I replied. The clouds were high in the sky and the sun was starting to think about her descent. It then struck me how sad sunsets are. Something so beautiful that lasts such a short time that sinks lower and lower and finally falls off the edge of nothingness only leaving behind stains on the clouds and the sky. Fading more each second until darkness takes it all away. 

We sat in the silence and a few tears made there way down my cheek. I did my best to hide this from him.  The sun floated below the horizon and a rush of some kind of energy poured through my entire body. I wanted to stand up and shake him, scream out and make him know how much I loved him. There was no way he could know how much I loved him, no way. 

We sat there finishing our beers and listening to the water lap at the side of the boat. He rose and started digging out the heavy tackle for the dorado. I brought in the lines, sat and stretched my arms far behind my head and let out a sigh. He came back and sat beside me and started the motor. Then he paused and gazed at the horizon. 

He turned to me and said, “Doesn’t get much prettier than that Ellen.” I smiled, looked as deep as I could into his eyes and shook my head. 

“Nope it sure doesn’t.”

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