My Life above the Blue Iguana

Two 'lost souls' looking to reconnect with themselves

Have you ever found yourself early in the morning, getting out of bed, stretching, trying to center your chi, aligning your chakra's getting ready for the day ahead and then you FART and realize you've just set the tone for the entire day? Sometimes I feel like that, living here in this three room apartment over 'The Blue Iguana Café'.

People say to me...."S**t Mason, why don't you move if it bothers you that much?"

And I always say....."Well buddy, farting isn't much of an annoyance once you get used to it." Plus I get my drinks half price from the bar downstairs AND I just happen to be screwing the owner."

Before you ask, the answers is yes.

Yes the owner of café is a woman and yes it's the kind of screwing in a good way that everyone or most everyone enjoys. Just thought we ought to clear up any homoerotic fantasies you people might be having about me.

     Nope, I'm strictly a ladies man or rather a man that would nail most chicks if they'd let him. Now I'm not movie star handsome but I have boyishly good looks and TONS of wit. Let me tell you tons of wit will get you laid more than boyishly good looks any day of the week.... but having boyishly good looks helps.

    

     I had spent the day wandering around Key West. From Flagler Ave. to the White Street fishing pier and back. Days seem to go on forever down here and stretch achingly into the sometimes even longer nights. By the time I was done with my meandering around town I had worked up a hearty thirst so the first order of business when I got back to the 'The Blue' was to get Diedra to give me a ice cold bucket of Corona's beer, half price of course. With lime. It was one of her so called fancy tourist tricks. Give'em a galvanized metal bucket filled with ice and beer and another one with oysters and 'POOF' you an instant Parrot Head. I'm not going to explain to you what a Parrot Head is. You wanna know?

Google it.

Diedra handed me the bucket,

"Hey Mason do you just use me for cheap beer or do ya really love me?"

"Awe c'mon Dee you know I'm into you for your cheap beer."

"A*****e"

"Yep" I agreed. We both smiled. Its kind of a game we play. She pretends to be all passive aggressive and I pretend to be an a*****e. Except I know I really am an a*****e. I took the bucket of beer upstairs turned on the T.V. and sat there thinking, for a long, long time. Somewhere between 'Days of our Lives' and 'Judge Judy' I switched over to vodka and tonic.

    

     Thinking can do that to a man sometimes. Make you switch hit drinks till you don't know what the hell your drinking. All you know is that you're killing important brain cells. Well....not that important. I try to focus on the ones I devloped learning algebra and one semester of economics at the local community college.

    

     At some point I noticed Dee had entered the room and was going about doing her 'after work' stuff. Quick shower, denim shorts and a loose top t-shirt that showed a little side b**b. I was working on my fourth vodka tonic and my third pack of Kools when Diedra got that look on her face, sighed and said.....

 "You know, I know you're an a*****e pretending to be an a*****e don't you?" Oh s**t, I thought, she figured me out. "You know what? Everyone thinks your an a*****e"
"Yes Dee I know I'm an a*****e. But I am a lovable a*****e."
"What do you mean by that?"
With a slow smile forming at the corners of my mouth I said "I been practicing on you for the last 10 yrs."
blink blink... She stood there eyes blinking with a deer in headlights look on her face. That's Diedra for ya though. When confronted by some brand new astounding fact she automatically reverts to the last disagreement we had, whether or not she won it or I did. Inevitably the decade old argument about "We never go ANY where or DO anything." came out of her mouth nonstop for 20 interminable minutes and then I told her...

"Jesus Dee I like to drink at home....Because I don't want to share my high with 59 yr old sex kittens, drunken buttholes that think they are 10ft tall and bullet proof or guys named Shirley, Tina, Alice, or Peggy. I remember one time....... Sitting at the end of the bar, and after 12 beers I walk down to the other end and buy this guy that's been talk'n all night a beer. Cause I'd didn't mind the way his face looked. 27 beers later I walk down to the end of the bar again and this time I punch him in the face. Cause I don't like the way his face looks. Once I got so drunk Dee I thought I was a Jedi Master and I used the Force in the men's room. I guess it was the Dark side because I couldn't s**t right for a week. Next time I'll just try some natural fiber and yoga."

"OK Mason what evar!" I just wanted to have a little fun and maybe go somewhere for a change and I....."

 I abruptly cut her off from another 20 minute tirade. So with that little pouty look of indignation on her face she strolled over to me with those long legs and sat in my lap. I fired up another Kool took a sip off my 'vodka T' and I said "Look Dee I'm sorry....I'm a little...naw f**k it...I'm a lot drunk and I tend to get a mouthy. It's just been me and the cat for the last few hours sipp'n gin in this shithole apartment.....and the cat thinks I'm an a*****e to."

"Hey, this shithole apartment just happens to be attached my life ya know?" Dee was pissed, I could tell.

 "Your right I'm sorry. It's my life also because it's your life too. You forgive me?"

"For being an a*****e?" she smiled.

"Yeah, well that and forgive me of loving you just a little to much for your own good." I could see her literally melt. I'm such a f*****g Romeo when I want to be.

     For 30 seconds no one spoke or moved. I moved her off my lap got up and walked to the bedroom door and with a wave of my hand and a bow I said.....

 "So, wanna go to bed with me?"

"Since no one else is available at the moment, sure"

She slipped slowly past me dragging her hand across my chest. I turned out the light and closed the door behind us.

                  

     Yeah, Dee and I had a real good thing going. Marriage was definitely not on the menu. She had been married once before to the previous owner of the Blue Iguana. It wasn't a good marriage he used to beat her so she killed him. Oh, not in the way you think, not like murder or anything. They were in the middle of intercourse and he had a heart attack or rather she gave him a heart attack. So ownership of the Blue Iguana transferred to her.

 Lucky me.

    

     Sleep never came easy to me and I was NOT a morning person. So try, if you can, to calculate the odds of drinking all night, having incredible, explosive, mind blowing, orgasmic, animal like sex with an incredibly hot Puerto Rican chick, sleeping till noon of the next day and having a pencil thin laser beam of sunlight travel billions and billions of Carl Sagan space miles through the solar system, across the face of the planet Earth, to Key West Florida, through the palm trees, up the face of the building to find a small crack in the blinds on the window, traveling 20 feet across the semi-darkened bedroom to strike me in my right eye at the exact moment I open it.

Incalculable you say?

Bullshit I say because that's exactly what happened.

So the odds are pretty f*****g good.

    

     I could hear the hawkers out on the street corner hawking their wares. I must be the only person in the world to use medieval terminology to describe street people in Key West. Who the hell says hawkers anymore anyway? Diedra slammed open the bedroom door, a plate of sliced mangos in one hand and a Margarita in the other.

"Good morning handsome."

"Where is he I'll kick his a*s?"

"Whose a*s?"

"This handsome fellow you're talking about."

"Mason."

"What?"

"Don't start it's too early."

"I thought it  was afternoon?"

"Well, it's early for you and I ask you not to start. Here, have some fruit and some liquid motivation and come downstairs when you're resuscitated. I have something I want to talk to you about."

 With a quick kiss on my forehead she sauntered over to the table were box of touristy T shirts, in pastel colors, waited to be hung on hangers, for touristy tourists to buy them, at a 300% markup from wholesale.

Sexy hot and smart.

Told ya I was lucky.

    

     She picked up the box as I arose from the bed. My now rumpled shirt contrasting nicely with my bed head. She whistled at me.

"Oh my, sexy man!"

 I grabbed a pillow off the bed and threw it at her. She squealed and darted out of the room with the box of the pastel touristy tee shirts.

Reviews

[Darkimmortal]

"I working on my fourth vodka tonic" I think you missed a "was somewhere in there" "You know what? Everyone thinks your an a*****e" You used the wrong form of your there. "OK Mason what evar!" I just" There are two sets of quotes in this line, might wanna take one of them out. " "Your right I'm sorry." Wrong you're again. "sauntered over to the table were box of touristy" Were should be where, and there should be an "a" in there too. YAY! Grammar over, so now we get to the good part.

First of all i am usually not one for stories like this, but you managed to keep me interested so you can pat yourself on the back for that. I think what kept me entertained was the snarky and sarcastic voice of the narrator as he explained what was going on around him. At one point you made me actually giggle, with the calculating the chances of the light hitting him in the eyes. It was so clever and funny! I would like to see more of this is you have it, is has a unique and interesting style and i like the way that it was written.

[icelandicblue]

I love Key West it is place where time follows a different line and the sun rises and sets at the point of east and west that is a wonder to behold. Then of course there are the bars aplenty, the hawkers and the guy who weaves those grass hats. A place where you can get buckets of crabs in months that end in r. It's touristy (I admit, iIve been to the Mel Fisher museum which I still thought was cool) but it's filled with energy yet there are quiet little places nestled in old town. The relationship in the piece feels real, it's running in place, staying on a schedule of its own, a little like Key West itself. Life goes on at the Blue Iguana...it feels like it needs a sequel. The characters need a second act.

[Raymond Federle]

I admit this story has kind of stalled for me. Some time soon I'm going to start further work on it.

[icelandicblue]

My advice, take it or leave it, bu it needs a bit more character development on each of character to add a more interesting and in-depth view of them separately as well as coupled. You've got a pretty well defined setting now the characters should also be more three dimensional.

[Brittany Zedalis]

I was laughing uncontrollably at the Jedi Master part. You know, I lived in Florida for 2 years and never went to Key West. Lame.
I really like this so far, though. Super awesome job!

[Raymond Federle]

I grew up in Florida. about 30 miles north of Daytona Beach. Lived there from 1977 till 2005. with extended vacations, holidays and walk-abouts around the country and the international scene between 1990 and 2000. Although I don't live there any more an NEVER plan on going back I still carry with me many fond memories. Thanks for reading and reviewing! :)

[Brittany Zedalis]

Lucky, haha. I moved there when I was 8 and lived there till I was 10. I consider it my hometown because all of my real growing up happened there. I miss it terribly.

[Raymond Federle]

This is something I started but it lost momentum. I was think about moving forward with it. Let me know what you guys think!!! :)