Charlie flew down from college to surprise me for my birthday, kicking off a “planned whole day of surprises.”
What more could one want from a long-distance lover, whose husky voice purred on the other end of phone calls, who stomped through your filthiest dreams in combat boots?
Here she was again, in the flesh, smelling like patchouli and dandruff shampoo, ready to commemorate your existence by pleasing you, her hungry touch alchemizing your every finite second together into something far more golden than daily life at home, at school, at the restaurant you waited tables at.
++++
After taking breakfast topless in my kitchenette, she walked behind my chair and tied a thick strip of black cloth over my eyes:
CHARLIE: Not another fuckin' word out of you.
My mouth watered, expecting to be cuffed to my futon frame and ridden within an inch of my life. Instead, I sat and quivered, listening as her knee-high boots clomped back and forth on the parquet floors of my studio, between my bedroom and the living room where I waited obediently. I heard the zoop of zippers, the rip of velcro, the jangle of keyrings. I could barely breathe.
I flinched when I felt her hands circle around my wrists, her lips against mine, sliding her pierced tongue into my mouth, its stainless-steel post clicking against the back of my front teeth. My heart pounded, ready for whatever was about to happen. Her soft cheek against mine, her lips barely grazing my ear, she whispered:
CHARLIE: Come with me.
ME [exhaling through my teeth]: Y-yes.
Slowly, she led me forward, one foot after the other, out of the A/C’s cocoon, into the woody-mildew scent of my building's lobby, then out into the thick grassy steam of Florida morning.
ME: Wh-where are we going?
CHARLIE: It's a surprise. Don't you want a surprise...?
ME: Y-yes... I want a surprise.
CHARLIE: Then promise me: no peeking.
ME]: I p-promise…
She led me blind to the passenger seat of my Toyota and deposited me there, rolling down the windows before driving for what felt like an hour. I was aware of our location shifting only by modulations in scent and sound: traffic and car exhaust and frequent stops becoming longer stretches down quieter streets, the chattering of birds, the tang of citrus, the eggy funk of mangrove.
The purr of pavement beneath us gave way to the grumble of gravel, throwing me around in total darkness until she slowed my car to a stop, grinding its gears and killing the engine:
HER: We're here. Let me take this thing off. Fuck, you're sweaty...
++++
When the blindfold came off, I couldn't see for a minute. The sky was a white sheet, the sun a spotlight holding me captive. As details began to sketch themselves into the glare, I looked around, orienting myself:
My Toyota was parked in a wide empty field, crabgrass lining the gravel path we'd driven down, leading to a sun-cracked asphalt road several hundred yards long. High above our heads, a tiny prop plane buzzed past, looping around to make its descent.
I looked to Charlie and she stared back, giving up nothing.
The plane came in from the sky with a creaky crunch, bouncing off the runway on wheeled chicken legs, tires squealing, rubber burning as it passed us in slow motion. The vinyl decals on its side were simple red capital letters on white: DOS RANDYS TANDEM SKYDIVING LLC, HOMESTEAD, FL, plus a rainbow flag decal.
I turned back to her, cheeks flushing. This time she smiled big, her mouth open like a happy dog, the sun glinting off the steel stud through her tongue.
HER: Surprise!
++++
You're probably thinking: I must have expressed, during my time with Charlie, stoned or post-coital or over the phone, a bucket-list desire to jump out of an airplane.
I assure you: I did not. I would never. Sky-diving is on a list of experiences in my life — like getting shot or swimming with sharks or going to prison — I absolutely never want to have. Even moderate heights sufficient to break a bone turn my spine to ice.
What's worse, with heights I get sudden intrusive thoughts; in French it's called l’appel du vide ["the call of the Void"]. When I’m near a high edge, I feel a compulsion, hear a voice whisper "JUMP!" even though that’s not what I can actually consciously want to do. I’m nowhere near ready to vacate off my "Dan Goldman" shell.
++++
The plane's engine stops and two swarthy men climb out, waving at us: paunchy and sunburnt, with permed hair, mustaches, cargo shorts, eyes hidden behind mirrored wraparound sunglasses. They approach as a matching pair:
RANDY: You are the anniversary boy? I am Randy, and my partner is also Randy.
ME [getting it]: Dos Randys.
RANDY DOS: Sí, dos Randys. Mucho gusto.
RANDY UNO: Today it's your firs' time doing the skydiving?
CHARLIE: I did it here, with you guys, last summer. But this is his first time.
Both Randys' necks swivel to face me, shining salesmen smiles, eyes hidden behind sunset-mirrored shades.
RANDY UNO: Okay, only him, then?
Charlie gives a single nod, a thumbs-up.
ME: Oh. Y-you're not doing this with me?
Her red-apple cheeks pulled the corners of her mouth to meet her earlobes:
CHARLIE: Tandem diving's not really a couples activity. [She gestures to Randy Uno] You're already tied to somebody.
The reflection of my face in both Randys’ sunglasses grows pale; I can feel the light inside me dimming.
CHARLIE: We always talk about facing and conquering our demons; I know this freaks you out a little, so I thought... what a huge gift, on your birthday.
Her eyes search mine, first to confirm her awesome present, then maybe recalculating her gift, possibly a giant fucking error. I'm not sure the error is Charlie's. I see her smiling against the sun; her bottle-blonde hair and black muscle tee with sweat gathering under braless breasts. I flash back to being blindfolded. How I longed to be in that parallel universe: fucked-dry and sore, being uncuffed and gently spooned.
Instead Randy Uno hands me a clipboard:
RANDY UNO: I has some legal wafers for you to sign. In case the plane crashes or whatever.
RANDY DOS [off my concerned face]: Nunca, nunca pasará. [This will never happen.]
Each document was a typo-riddled Xerox of a Xerox of a dot-matrix fax, as legally binding as the name I signed them with: "Ronald McDonald."
I swallow and hand over the clipboard and Randy Dos waves me onto the plane:
RANDY DOS: Adelante, Ronaldito.
++++
Boarding the plane with both Randys, Charlie suddenly clomps up the gangway after me, hooking the waistband of my jeans with a finger. She spins me around, latching onto my lips, biting the bottom one until there’s a spark of pain. Her hand at the back of my skull, she drags ragged black fingernails across my scalp. Time pauses, there's only breath, then it starts again:
ME: In case we crash and die?
HER: You never know, right?
++++
On board, Randy Uno explains the skydive process while Randy Dos dons — and helps me step into — a canvas harness with steel buckles.
ME: Not the birthday harness I was hoping for.
RANDY DOS: ¿Ehhhh... cómo? [Sorry, what?]
I wave my joke away. Time to be serious. I'm jumping out of a fucking airplane.
Randy Uno shows me how my harness will attach back-to-front to Randy Dos's, who is already wearing our parachute pack and will retain control of the ripcord. He explains how we'll climb to an altitude of 12,000 feet, and then Randy Dos will open the door.
The moment we jump will be up to me. I nod seriously; Randy Dos clocks my nerves. He steps forward, palms the back of my neck tight, shaking me firmly until my eyes stare into his:
RANDY DOS: Todo bien, Ronaldito. Hacemos esto todos los dias. [Everything is fine, Ronald. We do this every day.]
The tip of his calloused thumb begins to make tiny circles on the skin just behind my left ear. Staring into my eyes, he winks and smiles, searching for my face for a gaydar pingback. The only tangled bodies I am thinking of are charred after a plane crash. Energy unmatched, Randy Dos uncoils his arm like a snake and buckles us both in for takeoff.
Looking out the plane's tiny window, Charlie's on the runway watching me. She must know I'm shitting my pants. One side of her mouth smiles, half-sweet, half-mean. That hot little shit; in this singular moment she’s shaming me into doing something I don’t want to and part of me hates her. The propellers start to spin, the plane shaking as we lurch forward, slowly, slowly.
In the cockpit, Randy Uno presses play on a Discman and Gloria Estefan's "Abriendo Puertas" begins to play. I look back at the runway, at my lover shrinking to a tiny blonde ant as we rip down the runway. This feels like my viking funeral.
++++
Eight minutes later, the plane reaches 12,000 feet. I know this because Randy Uno screams for Randy Dos and he stands behind me. He is taller than me by about a foot, his chin stubble prickling against the top of my head as he checks my harnesses’ buckles and binding straps, yanking them taut.
RANDY DOS: OK! Estamos listo, Randy! [We are ready, Randy!]
The plane banks clockwise slowly as Randy Dos's free arm unlocks and slides open the door, blasting us with humid wind. My body’s entire musculature tenses, acutely focused on not pissing my pants as I stare out the open door and look down at the tops of clouds, and far below at the patchwork green/brown quilt of Homestead lying flat beneath thousands of feet of empty blue sky.
I am gripping a metal bar for dear life when Randy Dos comes up behind me, buckling his secured harness to mine. Now wearing me like a puppet, he steps closer toward the edge of the plane, and the abyss just beyond it. My legs have no choice but to follow.
ME: Wait. Waitwaitwaitwaitwait. [My driver stops.] I thought I was going to decide when we jump?
RANDY DOS [hands pantomiming]: Jump? Si, ahora we jumps!
He/we take two more steps until the toes of my sneakers fold themselves down to clamp onto the deck. Randy Dos's arms reach around me, grabbing my wrists, yanking me out of the plane, slapping my palms flat against the rusty white metal of the wing. This is the point of no return.
ME: OoooOOOoOoooo god oOo goddd—
We/I were fully half-in/half-out of the plane now, leaning against the wing of the plane, my hands gripping its riveted curvature, fingernails searching for anything to dig into.
RANDY DOS: OK! Vamos! [Let's go!]
I did want to conquer this fear, but every instinct screamed that leaping out of an airplane meant self-destruction. Looking down at the farmland below, my animal claws clamped the wing, shaking like a dog during fireworks, refusing to let go.
Hissing through my teeth, cursing my own chickenshit fear, I cursed Charlie for sending me up here. Fate and death and betrayal closed in, even from behind me where Randy Dos began to slowly inch me out the door of the plane, gently bending his knee into the crook of mine, forcing my foot to lose contract with the plane deck, shifting my balance, my heart in my throat, realizing I had already lost all control of this situation even before his other knee bent my my own, both feet now off the floor, I floated in the air, a split second stretching out like a rubber band, my entire life collapsing into a single word:
No.
We tumble, silently, into speeding wind. Two bodies, strangers, bound together, falling into the sky. I gasp, breathless, then scream, my cheeks flapping in the wind. Everything is bright, blue, wind, speed, flying but also falling. There's sunlight on my face. I have never seen the sun so near, like a neighbor, like the eye of a loving god.
Something inside me, below my belly button, releases and I feel an upwards river unlock, a waterfall in reverse and I scream from deep down inside, fully alive, eyes tearing, nose running, falling toward the earth at hundreds of miles an hour.
I hear and feel Randy Dos belly-laugh against my back. One of his hands pats my shoulder a few times, then grips my shoulder muscle, super-macho.
RANDY DOS: Lo soltaste? [Did you release it?]
I start laughing too but the reverse-waterfall continues to gush and jet up and through and out of me. My arms spread wide, heart open in complete trust. High above us, the airplane buzzes away like a horsefly in a slow loop. There was nothing to be afraid of, nothing up here but joy.
Against my back, I feel Randy Dos still laughing. I imagined my joy, my release, was so contagious I'd passed it to him. What a beautiful moment, what a gift of unexpected human connection. Another warmth began pressing against me from behind, pushing and swelling in between my butt cheeks. Randy Dos moaned loudly, shifting his weight, letting his hands slide down to rest on my hips, pulling me closer, slowly rubbing his pulsing erection against me.
Aside from the woman on the ground who'd paid to have me thrown out of an airplane for my birthday — and despite the not-alone nature of tandem skydiving literally in its description — my being up here in the sky felt personal to me, an internal, spiritual release of long-held fear. Leaping into the void, exorcising a demon, this ritual held no space for Randy Dos's penis.
Gentle as a handsy teen's prom date, I lifted his hands one after the other off my waist. His hips tilting away, a thin sliver of air now separating our bodies. And as both of us quickly pretended that moment had never happened, the ground suddenly seemed to fill more of my field of vision than it had before. We were falling quickly and literally back to earth.
I panicked. I didn't know the word for "ripcord" in Spanish:
ME [pantomiming]: R-Randy! Arrib— shit, wait— arranca el cabo! El cabo! [Pull the cord!]
Grateful for the distraction, he snapped to attention, pulled the ripcord. With a loud whoosh, nylon scooped up air and yanked us upward another fifty feet before we settled into a descending float.
From horizontal freefall, our bodies were now vertical, legs dangling, pulled by gravity at a slower speed. As the ground expanded beneath us, Randy Dos kicked at the backs of my knees again to get my legs up in the air for landing.
RANDY DOS: Levanta las piernas, Ronaldito! [Raise your legs, Ronald!]
Behind me, his ribcage stretched and twisted as he grabbed the parachute's cables on the left and the right, tugging down hard, turning us into the wind, guiding us toward the now-visible Dos Randy's landing spot where I could see my car and Charlie waiting on patchy crabgrass.
Like a striking cat, the ground suddenly leapt up to meet us, both sets of our legs pounding back to earth like thunder, my knees taking the force of impact and toppling as Randy's kept going and he tumbled over me, deflating nylon swishing behind us.
Emerging from under the parachute in a tangle of cables, Randy Dos and I started to cackle, dusting ourselves off and clapping each other, alive and on the ground again. Soon, Charlie joined me under the nylon, scooping up my face in a kiss.
CHARLIE [her energy matching mine]: How was it?
ME: That scared the fucking fuck out of me... but so worth it!
++++
She did have other plans for me.
We went out for sushi at my favorite place on South Beach, ordered a large platter that came in a wooden boat. She poured expensive sake into my mouth from tiny cups that had the creamy aftertaste of banana cake.
I told her about Randy Dos's erection and she spit bullets of flying-fish roe, admitting she’d probably masturbate about it later. Thinking of her touching herself, I remembered I was still waiting for my birthday sex marathon after relinquishing full control of my day to her. After the bill was paid, she told me:
CHARLIE: Okay, now it's time for your real present.
I whined. I whispered “Oh, yes please” to myself. I salivated like a trained dog.
We left the sushi bar, wandered a few blocks, had another drink or two at Mac's Club Deuce. Sitting at the neon-lit dive bar at 1 am, just two more creatures in a crowd of coked-out frat boys, leather daddies, a rapper's entourage, drag queens, and actual career drunks, her fingers traced my leg, up my thigh under the bar. The edges of my vision were getting swimmy from liquor, and more than anything, I felt exhausted from being cock-teased all day.
ME: I can't feel my face.
CHARLIE: Then it's time.
I turned to her, my face a question. She smiled big, teeth apart, tongue back, steel piercing standing erect. She led me out into the night, then across the street toward the humming neon sign that read "Tattoos by Lou."
++++
It was too bright inside. I squinted against the fluorescent tubes on the ceiling. There was a massive older man behind the counter, red-faced with curly hair the color of steel-wool.
OLD MAN: Little man, are you drunk?
ME [burping with indignation]: Who the fuck’re you?
OLD MAN: I'm fuckin' Lou.
He pointed to a sign posted on the wall, a list of Lou’s Rules of Service, third of which was: "No tattoos or body piercings will be performed on a visibly intoxicated guest."
CHARLIE: He's not drunk. He went skydiving for his birthday a few hours ago.
Lou stopped, looked at her with a grumble:
LOU: You're the one who called. Pre-paid.
CHARLIE [finger-guns at him]: Ping pong.
LOU: Back here.
Lou led toward the back; Charlie led me by my hand, wouldn't meet my eyes.
++++
Inside the small room, Lou had me lie down in what looked like a dentist's office chair. I protested; I told him I didn't want to get a tattoo. Not tonight, not spur-of-the-moment.
LOU: Relax man. Your girl paid for a tongue piercing.
My eyes flicked to Charlie’s, wide and burning blue:
CHARLIE: I know you love the way my piercing feels on you; imagine giving that too. [grinning] Besides, you'll play with it all day and think of me.
Twice in one day with this girl. All I wanted was to get well-fucked for my birthday.
Lou turned away to fill a plastic cup from the mini-ice machine. When he turned around to place it on the chair-mounted tray, he’d put on latex surgical gloves. I could still see the thick hairs on his knuckles through them.
LOU: Take two ice chips and hold 'em to either side of your tongue until it gets nice and numb.
I wasn't sure I wanted to do this at all. But I'd just jumped out of an airplane a few hours ago, was I really afraid of a little needle? I held that thought for a moment; thought of screaming my heart out in freefall just hours before. It filled me with a new confidence. No, I was not. I put the ice chips in my mouth, my tongue between them like a sandwich.
While I waited for all feeling to fade, Lou rooted around in a black toolkit, pulling out not a needle but a three-inch steel spike, thick as a pencil sharpened to a point.
He held it up for me to see; I just laughed. I stuck out my tongue and Lou seized it, jamming the metal spike right through. It didn't hurt, but it made a noise as it was punctured — a pop-wheeze as air came through the other side — that turned me green. My head swam and at the last minute, I swallowed back the hot rush of vomit.
++++
From there, I was jumped, pierced, done. Charlie and I drove back to my place. She went to take a shower, to get clean before we got disgusting. I undressed on my bed, my swollen tongue still tasting of blood. By the time she came to bed, I was out, full-on snoring.
She never visited me again.
