Letters

I’d seen this coming. Reading these lubricious pages, Dad, you may imagine that the prospect of nineteen more days of the foregoing would appeal to me, especially with the added sweetening of their being therapeutic for Jea

Then how to set her down gently? I kissed her (on the behind: she’d stood to wipe my leaking semen off her with a Kleenex, and perhaps to not watch my expression as she wound up her plea) and asked her to give me overnight to think about it. I really did have my reasons, I reminded her, for pla

Through di

In fact, sleepy from alcohol and the long day outdoors, I was simply saying Let’s turn in, but she understandably mistook my gesture: once in the cabin she slipped to her knees and popped Old John into her mouth. I stroked her hair and let her go at it for a while, half wishing the chap would stand lest she feel rejected, half hoping he wouldn’t so she’d get the message, and mainly hankering for sleep. She scolded him playfully, tried a few testicular and rectal accompaniments; neither he nor I could’ve been less interested. I raised her up, chuckled something about old folks needing their sleep. She tensed in my arms, first time since the Dorset lobby, and turned her face away when I said good night.

Not much sleep. I heard her drinking and smelled her smoking cigarettes in her berth off and on through the night: two Verbotens on my boat, but there was no point in making a fuss. I wished heartily our berths were reversed; tried to stay awake lest she go up on deck without my hearing her; but fatigue overcame me. Near dawn I woke alarmed that she might have gone overboard, deliberately or accidentally. On pretext of using the head I got up to check and found her heavily asleep, a full ashtray and the empty gin bottle (it had been only a quarter full) on the cabin sole beside her. She’d turned in naked; the cabin air was wet and chill, the sky gray in the first light, my head dull with solicitude and short sleep. I drew her bedsheet up, disposed of the butts and bottle, turned off the anchor light, and went back to my own berth, wondering what I’d have to deal with later in the morning.

But to my great relief, she behaved herself. We stayed abed late for two old sailors; at nine I heard her pumping the head and took the opportunity to enter the cabin, discreetly pajama-bottomed, and light the stove for coffee. She stayed in there awhile, but there are no toilet secrets on a small boat: I was gratified to hear no vomiting, just the cozy sounds of female urination and, more and more cheering, the turn of magazine pages. I put out apple juice and aspirin; put the aspirin back as too obvious. Let her ask for them. She asked instead, from the head, neutrally, for her blouse from the hanging locker and clean underpants from her bag, also a cigarette from her purse if I didn’t mind. When I handed the items in to her, she herself suggested, without looking up from her magazine (an old New Yorker) that I radio the yacht club about cabs and flight times; she had an open ticket, and was sure they wouldn’t mind calling the airline and radioing back the information. That way we wouldn’t have to rush. But she’d like to get started as soon as possible. Never mind breakfast for her; all she wanted was coffee.

I made the call; no need for her to leave the island before noon. Jea

Now, Dad: your old son is a prevailingly benevolent, even good man. But he has never presumed to moral perfection. My relief and pleasure in Jea

I plead by way of extenuation only that, had Jea

I held her a few moments by the hips, Dad, breathing hard and wishing mightily to fall atop her; then withdrew, postcoital remorse surging in like the tide through Knapps Narrows, and rose to wipe myself on our beach towel. Jea