Sine Equals Cosine by El Sol

   Author's note: Some translations are done artistically rather than
literally.

   ----

   Como siempre, para mi mama.  (Like always, for my mother.)

   ----

   I did not want to be there, especially with the guitar weighing me down.
The crowd made me uncomfortable as soon as I opened the door.  I had made a
decision though; my discomfort meant nothing.  I looked around the
off-campus hangout.  It was surprisingly large for a non-franchise coffee
house.  Every seat was full, so people lined the walls or sat on the floor
between tables.  The faces were mostly Latin since the Images House
sponsored the monthly get-together.  They called it a talent show for young
Latin artists that attended the university.  There were stands with
paintings and sculptures on them to the left of the front door.  On stage,
a particularly bad political poet was lost in the general apathy brought on
by college socializing.

   I spotted Dacia in the front row.  The table was reserved for her, or at
least no one dared sit there before she arrived; Dacia could be vocal in
her displeasure, almost as loud as with her pleasure.  A couple of guys sat
with her trying to grasp and keep her fleeting attention.  I sighed; even
if Dacia made me feel, I had to wonder if this was worth it.

   I walked to the stage making sure not to bump the guitar case against
anything.  The case cradled my father's guitar, the last thing he gave me.
I took the steps onto the stage slowly.  A girl spoke into the microphone
announcing dates for other Latin events in the area.  She grew quiet when
she felt my approach.  Her head turned so she could stare at me.  It had to
have been in my eyes because she backed away slowly.  I grabbed the stool
the poet had pushed aside and placed it in front of the mike.  I drew my
father's guitar and sat down.  The microphone was too high; I looked around
the room as I adjusted it.  The conversations stopped as people turned to
watch.  They could sense the approach of ghosts three years dead and it
chilled them.

   I touched the guitar strings looking at Dacia.

   "Only this time," I said.  "For you, Dacia."

   It was not a long search to find the songs that said what I wanted to.
She would never know the real reasons for my selections; those were for my
heart, soul and voice.

   "Dejaria Todo (I'd leave everything)," I whispered.

   I don't know how other singers do it: there are songs that I sing and
songs that I live.

   ----

   'Lo dejaria todo porque te quedaras' (I'd leave everything for you to
stay.)

   I met Dacia at my job in the computer labs during the summer after my
freshman year.  I was an emergency hire when they could not fill shifts. 
One of the female supervisors adopted me as her little brother so I got
hours during the summer session.  Dacia was a junior that I noticed around
the lab but never worked with.  She got summer hours too and because the
lab was only open a few hours a day we worked together a lot.

   Dacia had dark-honey hair and mischievous brown eyes.  Her curves were a
danger to moving traffic.  She always wore dresses and confessed they made
her feel sexier.  I think she teased me as a way to relieve the boredom of
our shifts.  I made a good target with my inexperience.

   To be honest, she seduced herself.

   Dacia enjoyed her provocateur games and flirtations with me.  I took her
up on an invitation to meet for lunch before our shift one day, which
became having lunch together every day.  After a while, we ate dinner
together after our shifts too.  I was still surprised when she invited me
to her house.  The girls she shared it with made eyes at Dacia when they
caught sight of me.

   "Robbing the cradle, dear," the bravest teased.

   They laughed when I blushed.  Dacia took my hand and guided me to her
room.

   "Don't mind them," she told me closing the door solidly.  "They're
jealous.  None of them have ever seen a cuter boy."

   Cute was not what I was hoping for, but wisely kept my mouth shut.  I
did that a lot around Dacia.

   'Mi credo, mi pasado, mi religion' (My creed, my past, my religion).

   She was wearing a light summer dress that drifted freely around her legs
when she moved.  It clung to the curve of her bosom and hips almost as
tightly as I wanted to.  Dacia walked to the radio and popped in a CD while
giving me a wicked smile.  I knew the worst of teasing tortures was coming
but Dacia was an anathema to male resistance.

   Music was a part of Dacia's soul.  She played it constantly in the lab
and walked around with an iPod permanently attached to her ears.  Sadly,
she had neither the voice nor the instrumental talent to be a musician. 
Dacia could dance though.  She danced for me and I felt no pain.  Her hips
swayed gently with the first notes of the guitar.  She forgot my presence
as the music lifted her body from the ground.

   Dacia danced herself into my arms.

   She toppled on top of me after the third song.  Her breathing was deep
and a light layer of sweat covered her skin.  I wanted to know if she
tasted salty or sweet.  Our faces were inches apart.  I watched a bead of
sweat crawl onto her upper lip.  She moved her hips on me tracing the
outline of a painfully hard dick.

   I licked the drop of salt from her lip.

   Her eyes widened in surprise.  She grabbed both sides of my face and
kissed me hard.  My lungs burned with the desire to forget about breathing
while we kissed.  Dacia moved on top of me as the kiss deepened.  I pushed
my groin against her stomach; she danced on it as if I was already inside
her.

   I put my hands on her ass.  The desperation to have her grew too fast
for me to control.  I grabbed fistfuls of the dress and pulled it up.  I
almost came feeling nothing between her skin and my hands.  I moved my hand
between her ass cheeks to check for a thong but only a gasp of pleasure met
my touch.

   She grabbed the dress and ripped it over her head.  My heart hurt as it
drummed an impossibly fast beat.  Dacia was naked underneath the dress.  I
worked an entire shift with a thin layer of cotton between her skin and my
fingers!

   I wanted days to worship Dacia's body but my dick was on the brink of a
massive explosion.  Dacia smiled as she undid my jeans; she knew she was
the focus of my existence.  She got off the bed to pull my pants and
underwear off.  My dick strained to touch her, to drown in her waters.  She
took my dick in her hand and spread the pre-cum on the head with her thumb.
Trying to hold on, I closed my eyes.  I wanted to cum but it had to be
inside her.  I opened my eyes when her grip shifted.

   Dacia was on top of me.  I felt the touch of her pussy.  I gritted my
teeth fighting away the pleasure as she impaled her body on mine.  She
settled me inside her with a sigh.  Her hips rotated to find the perfect
fit between us.  Her body moved up my dick and slammed down.  I groaned
pushing away the desire for release.

   "It's okay, baby," Dacia whispered leaning down so her lips almost
touched my ear.  "Let it go inside me."

   'Mi nombre, mi fuerza, hasta mi propia vida' (My name, my strength, even
my very life.)

   I grabbed her ass and guided her almost off my dick.  I let her go and
she dropped suddenly.  I wanted to last long enough for her to peak with
me, but could not hold on to forever.  My fingers dug into her ass cheeks
and I lifted her up again.  She gasped as I retook her body with a
thickened dick.  Both of us were amazed that the feel of my cum jetting
into her set Dacia off.

   She collapsed with her forehead on top of mine.  I flipped us over,
pulled my hips back and thrust into her.  Dacia grabbed my sides in
surprise.  My dick had not softened; it felt like it never would as I
thrust into her again.

   'Y que mas da perder, si te llevas del todo mi fe' (What else is there
to lose, if you took my faith in everything.)

   ----

   I stared at Dacia as I sang.  I let her see in my eyes what I should
have said every night we were together.  I sang about everything I was
giving up to sing for her.  Her face was stunned when the last notes of the
guitar faded.  Everyone's eyes were on me; inside me, what stirred grew in
a crescendo.

   My father called me Stringbreaker the first time I clipped the strings
on his guitar.  I couldn't make it sing the way he did when I emulated his
motions on the strings but they made almost as good a tone when I snipped
them.  I always wondered if he knew the fate he sealed me into with that
name.

   Everyone clapped as soon as they recovered; people do not come to
college talent shows expecting to find talent.  A few people moved closer
to the stage.  Eyes moved between Dacia and me.  The boys at Dacia's table
got up and walked away.  They must have known her well enough to accept
there was no competing against someone whose life had been built on music
since birth.  There were also the five years I hated during which I played
and sang for hours every day.  I had hoped I would never sing again, but I
couldn't let Dacia go.  No one knew about those five years, and I didn't
feel like talking about what I learned during that time.

   I pulled a small bottle of water out of my pocket.  I took a sip looking
around the room until my eyes settled on Dacia again.

   "Next from Alejandro," I said to her.  "Aprendiz (Apprentice/Pupil)."

   ----

   'Tus besos saben tan amargos' (Your kisses taste so bitter)

   Six unspeakably glorious months followed.  I was happy for the first
time since I turned eleven.  Initially, I did not believe we were going to
be more than a night I cherished.  I woke up to find Dacia studying me the
next morning.

   "Why am I here?" she asked.

   "I don't know," I told her honestly.  "But I hope you never leave."

   The guys at the lab could not believe she and I were together.  I tried
not to do the things teenage males are known for when they have gone far
above themselves.  I did not talk about Dacia, but she got plenty of
possessive hugs and kisses when anyone was around.

   The nights were indescribable.  I felt like my body and soul fused
whenever I touched her.  She had a book under her bed on sexual positions.
It would have been enough for me to work with the standards, but Dacia's
smile when she found one she wanted to try was impossible to deny.  I did
not care about the position.  The look in her eyes when I entered her was
enough; desire, need and pleasure.

   She said the words first.  It was probably an accident but she did not
take them back.  She was visiting her parents for the weekend.  We talked
on the phone for hours during the nights.

   "I love you," she said Saturday night before hanging up.

   It should have been goodbye.

   I stared at the phone for half an hour hoping she meant it.  She said it
again the next night.  I could not deny she meant each word when she kissed
me around them on her return.  Dacia said them into my ear as she circled
her hips with my dick buried inside of her.  She settled on top of me and
whispered the words again before falling asleep.

   I did not want to say them to her.  Not because I didn't feel them, but
I thought the dream would be over with the summer.  She did not hold the
silence against me.  I almost said them several times after she did but she
put her hand on my mouth and told me to wait until they were bursting to
get out.

   'De ti aprendio mi Corazon' (From you, my heart learned.)

   I loved Dacia.

   I loved everything about her: the way she smelled after a bath or during
a bath, the weird laugh she tried to smother when I tickled her, the feel
of her hair in my hands when I kissed her, the little snore she didn't know
about, the way I felt with my dick stroking in and out of her from behind.

   "I love you," I told her the night before classes started.

   "I know, baby," she said patting my chest.  "I know."

   I slept peacefully that night.

   I can say I do not know why we broke up, but it would be a lie.  Dacia
heard inside me.  She knew in her soul what I refused to be again.  I never
played the guitar or sang for her.  I never even told her I could.  She
danced for me every night though.  Her body called, begging me to make her
happy.

   It started slow, first the flirting with other guys.  Seeing it burned
like acid.  I always expected her to leave but not to have watch her do it
in inches day after day.  The next step was the nights we didn't spend
together.  I stayed awake the first one thinking about her, and the second,
and the third.  After that, I spent them with my guitar.  I did not ask her
what she did, where she was or with whom.  I knew when she crossed the
line; she didn't say 'I love you' anymore.

   'Maldita la maestra y maldito el aprendiz, maldigo lo que amo,' (Curse
the teacher, and curse the pupil, I curse what I love.)

   She said the breakup words on a Friday night.  I did not doubt she was
giving me the weekend to put myself back together.  I did not hear the
words she used to say goodbye.  They didn't matter; it was not what I
wanted to hear from her.  I heard the last thing she said though.  It
haunted me for a month.

   "I don't know, Michael," she whispered with tears in her eyes.  "I feel
like you're not who I thought you were."

   I knew it then.

   It wasn't me she loved; it was who I was with a guitar in my hands.  The
music inside me sang to her.  It wanted out and she was the way.

   You never forget your first love.  It felt like I thought about Dacia
every second of every day for a month.  My father's guitar whispered to me
as I practiced.  I did not even realize where I was going until I stood in
front of the coffee house.  I knew she was inside so I made my decision by
touching the door.

   'Te lo debo, te lo debo, te lo debo a ti' (I owe it to you, I owe it to
you, I owe it to YOU.)

   -----

   'Aprendiz' is not a song for when you want her back.  It is for when she
has come back and you hurt her.  Pain is what she taught you: how to cause
it.  I wanted Dacia but she loved the music, a piece of me that would never
love her in return.

   They were quiet as I put the guitar away.  Eyes watched me as I made my
way to the door.  I hesitated before opening it to look back.  Dacia was
staring at me with tears in her eyes.  Those weren't the first tears a
woman cried when I sang.  I was sure they would not be last Dacia cried.

   I nodded accepting my mistake.  I should have been the music she danced
to from the beginning.  I did not know until she left that I was no longer
living in the five years that destroyed most of me.  She crossed the line
though; she had taken me back to the past for the months it took her to
walk away.

   I sat having lunch outside the student center on Monday thinking about
nothing.

   "Hello," Dacia said sitting down.

   She looked angry.  I closed my eyes and took a deep breath.

   "Why didn't you tell me?" she asked.

   "You never asked," I replied sadly.

   "I never fucking asked?!?"

   "A single question about me," I said looking towards the street.

   It was unfair but not untrue.  Dacia was a little selfish about
attention; she wanted it on her.  I was perfect for her in so many little
ways.

   "That's who I thought you were, isn't it?" she asked suddenly.

   I turned to look at her.

   "You're not my type, Michael," she pointed out.  "But there was
something pulling me to you."

   I shrugged.

   "How long have you been playing?"

   "All my life," I said.

   "Are you going to do it professionally?" she asked.

   Her voice was too eager with that last question.

   "That's a good question," a blonde woman said sitting down.

   Her blue eyes hungered at me.

   "And who are you?" Dacia asked bristling at the intrusion.

   The blonde put business cards on the table and passed one to each of us.
I continued studying her as Dacia picked one up.

   "DMC Entertainment," Dacia exclaimed looking at me excitedly.  "A
recording company, Michael."

   I nodded waiting for the blonde to say something else.

   "I was at the show Saturday night," she explained.  "I heard you sing."

   "Wasn't he awesome?" Dacia asked slipping into 'you're my new best
friend' mode.

   The blonde smiled at Dacia and shrugged.

   "Michael has a lot of potential," she replied turning back to me.

   We stared at each for a minute before she looked away.

   "You're young to be so capable of holding a crowd in your hand," she
said making eye contact again.

   "I've had a lot of experience," I told her.

   "Performing?"

   "Yes," I replied.

   "I doubt that," she pushed at me with.  "Someone would have signed you
already, but I checked.  You're on nobody's radar yet."

   "I haven't done anything in three years," I informed her.

   "You're nineteen, Michael," she said.  "That would make you a baby when
you got all that experience.  No dice, little boy.  I watched your fingers
on the guitar, you're too good for anyone in the business not to put you
under lock and key as soon as they heard you."

   I tilted my head.  She seemed to know a lot of about me having only a
Sunday to dig.  She would be dangerous with time on her hands.

   "They were private shows," I said with finality.

   Both women sat back at tone of my voice.  Dacia might have gotten the
truth while we were together but those doors were sealed shut now.

   "My name's Elizabeth," the blonde said a minute later.  "I work with the
Latin arm of DMC."

   I watched Dacia's nipples harden; there was no cold breeze.  I sighed to
myself.

   "I'd like to put something together with you for my co-workers."

   Dacia almost sprang out of her chair to hug Elizabeth.  Dacia looked at
me enthusiastically.  She reminded me of how my mother looked when she
encouraged my singing.  I pushed the business card in front of me back
towards Elizabeth.

   "Write down the address and time," I told her.

   "It's not that easy, Michael," she said with some hesitation.

   "You found me, Elizabeth," I said.  "I don't doubt you came prepared."

   She studied me for a few seconds.  I wondered if it would help women if
I wore a sign; 'I've seen the soul of one of your kind, don't bother trying
to hide'.

   "The address and time are written on the back of the card," she said
pushing it back to me.

   I picked it up and put in my pocket.

   "I'll be there," I said getting up.

   For the first time, Dacia followed me.

   ----

   I thought about Dacia on the train ride to my meeting with Elizabeth's
company.  Dacia intimidated other women and knew when one was sniffing
around me.  One kiss in front of the other lab workers was all it took to
get her message across that I was off-limits again.  The girls who saw me
perform were a little more difficult to shake.  I smiled out the window
wishing I had been there for Dacia's conversation with the most aggressive
of them.  Someone told me you could hear Dacia on the first floor of the
dorm; she and the girl lived on the sixth.

   The receptionist did not need to ask my name.  I passed her the card and
got a blinding smile.

   "Right this way, Michael," she said with a happiness that sounded
sincere.

   They had setup a small audition area in a conference room.  I sat on the
stool in the middle of the room and took out my father's guitar.  It was
ten minutes before Elizabeth walked in with seven other people.  I thought
that was a bit much.  Only two of them were male: an older gentleman and
younger one that that projected a certain air of disdain.

   "Hello, Michael," Elizabeth said brightly.

   She went around the room introducing me to everyone.  The younger male
waved dismissively.

   "I've told them about you so all we really need is to hear you perform a
couple of songs," she said sitting down.

   The young man snorted rudely.  I turned to face and he challenged me
with his eyes.

   "Well?" he asked contemptuously.

   "You seem to be working under a misconception," I told him.  "I don't
really give a shit whether I sell a hundred million albums or never make
one.  I do know if I record my music it will sell, so you're on the edge of
losing your company money."

   "Joseph!" the older man said before the younger could retort.  "Let's
see if Elizabeth's ear for talent is still true.  She has brought in more
successful artists than anyone here except myself.  I've never seen her so
enthusiastic so I imagine this will be interesting."

   Joseph settled down deciding he did not want to challenge the older man.
I caught the smile of a few of the women; Joseph must have been unpopular
with the ladies.

   "So young man," the older gentleman said turning to me.  "What do you
play?"

   "What would you like me to play?"

   "What can you play?" he asked with a smile.

   "My father loved classical, and my mother preferred Latin," I told him.
"I loved them both."

   "Your parents or their choice of music?" he asked.

   I nodded.

   "Well, I keep telling these children they need to respect the masters,"
he said throwing a grandfatherly smile at the women.  "How about we start
there?"

   I thought about it for a minute but from where deep inside a piece came
to me.

   "This one time, Elizabeth, for you," I said looking at her.  "Sleepers
Awake!  from Cantata 140."

   It was not the most difficult piece I could play from memory but
considering the circumstances, it seemed appropriate.  I never planned to
audition for anything; practice in the silence of my room a few hours a day
was all I needed until Dacia left.

   The feeling was the same as when I was a boy, a swelling of music inside
until it completely filled me.  I barely held on to the mast of the ship I
became while the storm waged through me.  After I finished, I sang
'Kilometros'(Kilometers) and then 'Toca Para Mi' (Play for me).  It did not
matter what they wanted.  I had whom I wanted; they were part of the price.

   "Not what I was looking for," Elizabeth said thoughtfully when the last
note faded.

   "Not what you were looking for?!?" one of the other women exclaimed. 
"Are you fucking crazy, Elizabeth?  If you don't want him, I'll manage him.
Can we put out the first album with just him and the guitar, Gabriel?"

   "What do you mean, Elizabeth?" the older man asked waving away the
question.

   "It didn't feel like when you sang in the cafe for Dacia," she said
staring at me.  "You're good.  Hell!  Shannon's right, you are worth
risking putting out a pure acoustic album first but you played with my
heart strings Saturday night."

   "I broke them," I said with a smile.

   "What?"

   "My father called me Stringbreaker because I chopped his guitar strings
into six inch strips once," I said forgetting where I was.  "My mother said
it was the perfect name when I broke her heart strings with the first song
I ever wrote.  You're the first person to use those words in a long time."

   "You write your own music?" she asked.

   "At times."

   "You're not making this easy, Michael," she warned.

   "So I can leave?" I asked her seriously.

   "No," Gabriel commanded.

   I shrugged.

   "Do you have one of your songs that we can hear?" Shannon asked
curiously.

   I sighed knowing I was beaten.

   "I wrote something last month," I told them.  "Enamorado Sin Ti".  (In
Love Without You)."

   There was silence afterwards or maybe I couldn't hear anything.  I wrote
it for Dacia but I did not have the desire to play it Saturday night.  They
whispered among themselves for a couple of minutes leaving me alone.

   "Are you okay, son?" Gabriel asked coming to stand in front of me.

   I gave him a small smile.

   "You meant it, didn't you?" he asked.  "You really don't care if you
ever record an album."

   "I had a nice career in IT planned out for myself," I told him.

   "A career in IT, is there anybody on that career path that actually
planned on it?"

   "I did," I said quietly.

   "Son, God doesn't throw talent like yours around," Gabriel said.  "Do
you know what some people would do to be in this room, never mind have
everyone here convinced you're the next big thing?"

   "I'd give it to any one of them."

   "How old are you?" he asked.

   "Nineteen," I told him.

   "You have to practice for years to play like you do, Michael," he said
curiously.  "Why bother if it wasn't to make music your life?"

   "Music was my life until three years ago.  It ended."

   "Someday you'll have to tell me what you mean by that," he said with a
smile that he should have only given to another old man.

   I guess that is what I was inside.

   "When I tell it in a song, you'll know," I told him.

   "So never," he said with a smirk.

   "Yeah, just about then."

   ----

   Elizabeth caught me at the elevator.

   "Don't you have several meetings to go to?" I asked her.  "I mean
doesn't breaking out a new artist take planning."

   "Gabriel wants to think about it," she told me stepping into the
elevator.  "You're more versatile than I expected.  He'd like to take
advantage of that.  He wanted me to ask if you play electric."

   "Tell him I like the way violin solos sound on an electric guitar."

   "Hmmm," she said.

   She leaned back against the wall of the elevator staring at me.  I had
nothing better to do but watch the numbers drop.

   "What is Dacia to you?" she asked halfway down.

   "You seem to know a lot about me, even her name," I said.  "Why don't
you tell me?"

   "You could be my next promotion," she told me.  "I want to know
everything about you."

   "What does Dacia have to do with career advancement?"

   "Musicians derail, Michael.  I also prefer to know my obstacles with a
man."

   I turned to look at her.  Three steps were all I needed to press her
against the wall.  She sighed opening her mouth for my tongue.  The bell
sounded for the lobby.  I stepped away from her.  She took a deep breath
and leaned over to press the button for the top floor.

   "So what is Dacia?" she asked staring at the numbers as they climbed.

   "The love of my life."

   "You throw those words around carelessly."

   "No, I don't."

   She was quiet after that.  When we reached the top floor, she pressed
the button for the lobby again.

   "So what am I going to be?" she asked without looking at me.

   "You throw those questions around rather lightly."

   "No, I don't."

   "You are our future," I told her.

   "Our?"

   I tapped the guitar case against the wall.  She looked at it and nodded.

   "Want to get something to eat?" she asked.

   "In your apartment?" I asked with a smile.

   "You're different sometimes," she said thoughtfully.  "Like today with
your music.  It was fantastic but a little cold until you sang about
Dacia."

   "You knew it was about Dacia?"

   "She's the love of your life, right?"

   "We're different people with different people, Elizabeth," I told her.

   "Who are you with me?"

   I tapped the guitar case against the wall again.

   "Who does Dacia get to sleep with?"

   "The one that loves her."

   "Can we trade?" she asked stepping out of the elevator.

   She knew the answer to that question so I did not bother saying
anything. It wasn't a long drive to her apartment.  I put the guitar case
next to the door and looked around.

   "This has to cost you a pretty penny," I told her.

   "I get paid well," she said pulling out a bottle of white wine from the
refrigerator.

   "I'm not old enough to drink," I told her.

   "You're here with me," she said pouring a glass.  "Isn't that against
the rules of love?  Why worry over a little thing like underage drinking
when you're breaking someone's heart?"

   "I'm not breaking any hearts," I told her.  "I don't drink."

   "Any particular reason why?" she asked.

   "My own."

   "You know the silent type went out of style some time ago."

   I walked to pick up my guitar case and opened the door.

   "Michael, wait," she said grabbing my arm.  "I'm sorry."

   She did not meet my eyes when I turned to look at her.  I put the guitar
case down and closed the door.  She drank her glass of wine and poured
another.

   "Does Dacia know why you're like this?" she asked suddenly.

   "No."

   "But she could have?"

   "You're very intuitive," I said.

   She nodded slowly.

   "Inquisitive, too."

   "I'd like know everything about you," she said.  "So does Dacia know why
you're like this?"

   "A month ago I might have answered her questions," I said honestly.

   "But not now?"

   "Why do you want to know, Elizabeth?"

   "Maybe she can get me the answers I want."

   "No, she can't," I said with a sigh.

   "Why not?"

   "I wasn't what she wanted," I said looking out her window.  "Dacia
didn't care about answers then or now."

   "You're what she wants now though."

   "I'm not who I was a month ago.  Different people at different times
too," I told her.  "Where's your bedroom?"

   "You're very cocky," she said.

   I took a step towards the door.

   "That door over there," she said hurriedly.  "Why the fuck am I behaving
like this?"

   "Make believe I'm Gabriel's age, Elizabeth," I said.  "You'll deal with
me much better that way."

   "You're only nineteen, Michael."

   I opened the door to her bedroom and stepped inside.  I was lying naked
on her bed when she walked in.

   "No one's this confident," she said staring at me.

   "Tell me to leave," I said.

   "Fuck you, Michael," she said unzipping her dress.

   I did not know a woman could be so elegant naked.  I got out of the bed
and put my arms around her waist.

   "I'm ten years older than you," she protested but not about what we were
going to do.

   I looked into her eyes; what I had lived wasn't there.

   "No, you're not," I said before kissing her.

   Being with her was cold fire that burned uncontrollably without
destroying.  I tilted her head back to kiss her neck.  Her breast fit
perfectly in my hand.  The nipple rose as I passed my thumb over it.  I
woke the other nipple gently.  I turned us around and lay Elizabeth on the
bed.  There was mystery in her eyes as I got on top of her; she closed them
when my lips touched hers.  She wrapped her arms around me and pulled me
down.  Her mouth opened to take my tongue in.

   I kissed a line down her neck until I could draw circles around her
nipples with my tongue.  She gasped at the moisture and ran her fingers
through my hair.  I took a nipple into my mouth with a hard suck.  She
pushed her chest against me wanting more.  I switched breasts and got the
same push of desire.

   I trailed my fingers down her stomach, past her pubic mound and into
moisture.  She moaned as I opened her lips.  I moved my face up until I
could kiss her again.  Her tongue penetrated into my mouth in imitation of
my finger below.  Her pussy gripped me tightly for a second and then
released.  Her nails dug into my shoulder when I pulled out of her.  I
moved my hand up until two fingers pressed against her clit.  I had
gathered her wetness so my touch on her sensitivity was smooth.  I pushed
her tongue back into her mouth with mine.  My fingers moved in small
clockwise circles.  Her legs opened as the pleasure she felt gained a
focus. She drove her hands into my hair and pulled me closer to her.  I
deepened the kiss and sped up my fingers on her.

   "Oh God!" she whispered breaking our kiss.  "Oh, my God!"

   I fucked her pussy with my fingers while using my palm to keep
stimulating her clit.  Her legs locked around my hand but it was too late.
She raised her hips and groaned as the orgasm subsumed her.

   "No, please no!" she begged when I began to kiss my way down her
stomach.

   "Ssshhhh!" I said licking a circle around her belly button.

   "Michael, please I need a break!"

   "Not yet," I admonished putting her legs over my shoulders.

   She smelled like sunflower musk should and tasted almost sweet.  I
licked up the remains of her orgasm before focusing on bringing her a
second one.  The first strokes of my tongue were gentle reminding her body
of pleasure only a minute old.

   "Please!" she whispered.

   I sucked on her clit softly.  She moaned as I licked it.  I let her go
and dug my tongue as deep into her as I could.  When I gave her clit
attention again, she was ready.  I pressed the flat of my tongue against
her and licked up fast.  The flick of my tongue caused her hips to jump and
a short gasp to escape her lips.  I smiled not having expected it.  I did
it again and so did she.  I licked her ten more times and each time her
hips jumped while she gasped.  I only stopped because she tried to rip my
hair out from the roots.  I sucked her clit hard and licked it fast from
left to right.  She screamed and turned her hips trying to escape.  I
wrapped my arms around her thighs preventing any motion.

   "JESUS!" she screamed as I sucked and licked even harder.  "FUCK!"

   Her flavor darkened as she pushed her hips against me no longer trying
to escape when another orgasm struck her center.  Her thighs tightened
around my head until I could not hear the sounds that escaped her mouth. 
It didn't matter, her body was telling me to keep sucking and licking.

   Finally, her grip relaxed.  I put her knees in the crook of my arms and
moved upward.  She kissed me through the taste of her passion.  Her hand
moved down between us to take a tight grasp of my rampantly hard cock.  The
instant my dick touched her pussy I pushed forward with the strength of my
hips.  I levered my hands below her body to take a strong grip on her ass
cheeks.  Spreading her, I pulled back and took everything Elizabeth's body
could give me.  I swallowed her scream.

   It wasn't making love or having sex.  It was animal fucking, desperate
surges of need.  My dick pulsed as I pounded into her without thought to
her pleasure.  I'd given her two orgasms.  It was my turn; her nails
ripping into my back wasn't a protest though.  I buried my face into her
neck and she bit my shoulder hard.

   "HOLY SHIT!" she groaned as her pussy put me in a vise grip.

   I bared my teeth fighting through the new tightness of her orgasmic
hold. I fucked in and out of her feeling the orgasm begin to grow inside
me. She must have felt something because she hugged me tightly with her
arms and legs.

   "Yes!" she encouraged into my ear.  "Cum inside me!  Cum inside me!"

   My thrusts became shallow at her depth as I drove myself over the edge.
I pulled back one last time and thrust in hard.

   I burst into her.

   ----

   "Do you touch Dacia like that?" Elizabeth asked while I dressed the next
morning.

   She was lying naked on the bed studying me.

   "Why do you ask?"

   "I like to know my place in the world," she said.

   "No."

   "You should."

   "Why, Elizabeth?"

   "That's the way she wants you to touch her."

   "It's not the way I want to touch Dacia."

   "Did you play and sing yesterday because you wanted to?" she asked.

   "Are you psychic?" I asked.

   "Intuitive, remember?"

   "So what do you want?"

   "For you to look at me the way you look at her," she sighed.

   "Does any woman want what she has?"

   "Every woman wants it all, Michael."

   "You can't have it all."

   "Dacia could have."

   "She didn't want me, Elizabeth."

   "Don't I get a shot at everything?"

   "I know the way out," I said.

   Dacia was waiting in my room when I got home.

   "Where were you?" she asked.

   "With Elizabeth," I said walking to the window and staring out.

   "Why?" she asked.

   "She can guarantee everything...  we want," I replied.

   "So you fucked her for it?" she asked.

   "I wanted to," I said simply.

   "You said you loved me!" she protested with pain in her voice.

   I turned to look at her.

   "I remember you saying the same thing," I told her.  "I also remember
kissing you with the smell of another man still clinging to you.  I took a
shower first but it's okay if you don't want to kiss me."

   I looked out the window again.

   "You did this to get back at me?" she asked surprised.  "I thought you
were better than that."

   "A musician is only faithful to his music," I said quietly.  "I did it
because my body wanted her and it's not my body you want anyway."

   "Do you still love me?" she asked.

   "Yes."

   "As much as before?"

   "Yes."

   "Lucky for you, I like girls too," she said with a sniff.

   I was still young enough for that to give me pause.

   ----

   Dacia and I walked into the auditorium.  There were hundreds of kids
waiting to audition.  The one on stage was doing his best not to embarrass
himself and not succeeding.

   "Have you heard of the Latin reality show Protagonistas?" Elizabeth
asked walking up to us.

   "El Cara a Cara (The Face to Face)," Dacia said with a wicked smile.

   "My mother and I watched it religiously for two years," I told
Elizabeth.

   "Are you okay?" they asked at the same time.

   I smiled inside hoping they never felt death's grip on their heart like
I had a second before.

   "I'll be fine," I replied to neither in particular.

   "It's a great opportunity to expose you to the Latin audience,"
Elizabeth told me.  "This show is watched by millions, Michael."

   I nodded.

   "They're doing another one for musicians this year," she told us.  "DMC
is putting up the recording contracts so we asked that you be given an
audition."

   "I thought I pretty much had a contract," I said.

   "We want to break you outside the US market first.  Here you might be
bottled into a single musical category," she said.  "We need to make you
very visible and Protagonistas is shown in almost every Latin country."

   I nodded slowly.

   "Arrange for me to be next, Elizabeth," I said as my stomach heaved
violently.

   "I can't do that, Michael," she said.

   "You should've told me this was what you were planning," I said angrily.
"Either I'm next or it ends here."

   "Why are you..." she said and then covered her mouth with her hands. 
"Oh God!  You said your mother and you watched Protagonistas religiously!"

   "What?" Dacia asked putting a hand on Elizabeth's bicep.

   I figured on Elizabeth finding out what happened to my family.  Her
desire to know everything about me would have driven her and all the
records were public.

   "I'm so sorry, Michael," Elizabeth said regretfully.

   A lot of people told me they were sorry; it didn't change anything.

   "You're next," Elizabeth promised hurrying away.

   "What is she talking about?" Dacia asked me.

   I walked away, maybe a month before I would have answered her question.

   ----

   People whispered as I stepped on stage.  The order of auditions had been
violated and they wanted to know why.  I took my father's guitar out of the
case and sat in front of the microphone.  They would know soon enough.  I
adjusted the microphone to the right height and took a deep breath.

   "Desde este dia y siempre, para mi mama (From this day and forever, for
my mother)," I said into the mike.

   'Amiga Mia' is a famous song in the Spanish-speaking world.  Alejandro
Sanz sings about being friends with a woman who is in love with one of his
close friends.  It's not the standard cliché though, just a song where he
tells his female friend that her story, her feelings, and her pain are
important to him because she is his friend.  I sang it from a different
place and to a different woman.

   'Amiga mia, lo se, solo vives por el,' (My friend, I know, you only live
for him)

   My first memory is about everything I was for eleven years.  I was two
and half years old.  I had a pair of wire cutters in one hand and my
father's guitar on the floor.

   **clip**

   I remember laughing.

   **clip**

   "Michael!" my father yelled when he came into the room to find me
cutting the strings into even smaller lengths.

   I jumped and cried from the shock.  My mother rushed into the room to
pick me up.  She kissed my tears away and admonished my father for making
me cry.  He had the remains of the guitar strings in his hands and held
them out to her.

   "Teach him how to play then," she told him reasonably kissing my cheek.
"He'll have something better to do with a guitar than cut the strings."

   Nobody had to tell me what love was.  I saw it in my father's eyes; he
could do nothing but smile while looking at my mother.  I turned to her and
saw the same thing in her eyes.  I don't know how they had enough room in
their hearts to love anything but each other.

   I was raised in a home full of love and music.

   My father taught me the guitar.  His training was classical but as much
as he loved the music he lacked the spark of talent to play professionally.
His love must have created the talent in me when I was born, as much as he
loved the guitar that was my potential.  Other fathers might have cracked
the whip or done worse, but his smiles were all the reward I needed to
practice for hours on end.  My mother loved our playing but my eighth
birthday is when she became another focus in my music.

   I did not need friends because I had my mother.  She dropped me off at
school and picked me up every day.  She answered every question I asked and
played with me every afternoon.  She tucked me into bed with a kiss each
night.

   I do not know why but from somewhere I decided I wanted to give her a
present on my birthday.  I chose a song; I don't even remember which one. I
practiced it in secret until I thought it was perfect; not good enough for
my mother, but at least it was perfect.  She cried through my performance.
She picked me up for hugs and kisses.

   "Mi amor, (My love)" she whispered.  "Mi amor.  Mi bello, bello amor. 
(My love.  My beautiful, beautiful love.)"

   My mother insisted on singing lessons.  They were after school before my
father got home so they would not interfere with his time with me.  My life
was the guitar, singing, and my parents' love.

   'Amiga mia no se que decir, ni que hacer para verte feliz' (My friend I
don't know what to say or, what do to see you happy)

   If there is a more evil word than cancer, I haven't heard it since my
mother spoke it two weeks after my eleventh birthday.  Death is a word, a
concept, a phrase.  'Mama went to heaven.' Cancer is the angel of death
sitting down at the dinner table and eating your serving of platanos
maduros (fried plantains).  I did not know what that word meant but there
was fear in my mother's eyes.  My father wasn't in the room; I wanted him
to tell me why my mother was afraid.  I had to ask a teacher what cancer
was.  She cried and made me afraid.

   My father found a place to hide in a daily bottle of alcohol.  How can
you expect a child to survive when his father is broken by a single word? I
do not call it survival, but I lived for my mother as she lived to see my
father smile again.

   My mother's pain was not just physical.  I did not have to be an adult
to know that.  She went to the doctor a lot but alone.  The second month of
doctor's visits, she found me sitting in the backseat waiting for her.

   "No, Michael," she said with tears in her eyes.

   I ignored her and played my guitar on the way there.  The other patients
did not seem to mind when I sang quietly in the waiting room.

   My father moved out of the master bedroom in the third month of my
mother's ordeal.  I spent as much time in there with her as I could.  It
took two months for her to learn to cry in front of me.  I was singing when
her tears began to flow.  Her chin was up afterwards and I thought I had
found a way to ease the emotional pain in her eyes.

   My singing teacher was a woman and had no problem teaching me in the
bedroom.  My mother was hugs and kisses after every song.  The teacher
didn't mind the interruptions either.  I refused to take music lessons
except with my mother there; guitar lessons were the only time that my
mother and father spent in the same room anymore.  I think I should not
have insisted.  My mother cried, soul deep sobs, when he left the room
after every lesson.

   I did not see my father cry until the end.

   'Amiga mia, princesa de un cuento infinito' (My friend, princess of an
endless story)

   There were months of hope and laughter.  Days when we almost forgot our
world was my mother's disease.  The visits to the doctor were sometimes
feared and other times wished for.  My mother took me in to those rooms
with her.  She made the doctor explain each new hope for the cancer to be
beaten.  My mother believed it but I saw something different in the
doctor's eyes.  He did not.  I believed enough for him and me.  I believed
enough for my father too.

   At least, I thought I did.  The doctor was right though; hope and belief
do not beat cancer.  Love does, but my mother needed a love that fled
death.

   The first song I wrote was for my mother.  I wanted to tell her what we
would do after she was healthy: dance, sing, be happy, and find my father
again.  Every song I wrote for those years was for her.

   She was incredibly beautiful.  All children think their mother is but I
knew it.  The day her hair started falling out from the chemo, she cried
for hours.  The only Spanish words my father knew were 'mi bella' (my
beautiful).  My mother did not think she was beautiful now.  I tried to
tell her she was, but she didn't need to hear it from me.

   The second year, I had to learn how not to cry until she fell asleep.

   I asked the doctor if my mother was going to die.  He tried to lie; I
never thanked him for that.  I lay in my bed staring at the ceiling.  Sleep
couldn't find me around the tightness in my chest.  My mother was dying.  I
walked into her room and crawled under her bed.  I made sure my crying did
not wake her.

   I was twelve years old.

   She found out that I slept under her bed every night a couple of months
later.  She tried to make me stop but every morning I was there.  When I
became too big for that, I slept at her feet.  I needed to hear my mother
breathing for sleep to take me.

   Her pain drove the third year.  She lost so much weight that I could see
the bones of her cheeks.  I sang and played for my mother.  It was the only
time I saw her smile.  She told my singing teacher that she almost did not
feel the pain when I brought the music back into her life.  I played until
my fingers bled, and sang until my throat ached.

   She continued fighting.  The doctor could not believe it.  The cancer
ravaged her body and he didn't know how she kept going.  I would have told
him.

   My mother loved my father.

   She fought for five years; I sang and played every one of those one
thousand eight hundred and twenty six days.  My father never came to her.
He never said the words that belonged to her.  I don't know if he said a
single word to her in those five years.

   I was holding her hand when she died.  I held on to it until she turned
cold.  I didn't have tears left to cry.

   My father was waiting at the dinner table.  He did not look at me.

   "Mi bella is dead," he said.  "My wife is dead."

   The tears finally fell freely from his eyes.  He brought his hand from
under the table.  The gun was already cocked.  He put it to his temple; I
thought guns made a louder noise when they were fired.  They told me that
if the bullet were foot and half to the left my father would have killed me
too.

   'Que toda esta historia me importa porque eres mi amiga' (That all of
this story matters to me because you are my friend.)

   ----

   I put the guitar away with the tears almost blinding me.  I found them
again almost three years after my mother died.  I still didn't cry for my
father, but at my mother's gravestone I learned to let the saltwater free
again.  It was the day I told Dacia I loved her.

   I picked up the guitar case and walked off the stage.  Everyone was
quiet and turned their heads to watch me leave.  There wasn't a woman in
the room that did not have to wipe tears out of her eyes.

   "I love you," Dacia said when I stood by her.

   "I..." Elizabeth started to say but stopped to squeeze her eyes shut.

   I left.

   ----

   Dacia and Elizabeth were in bed whispering to each other when the call
came.  Elizabeth pounced naked from the bed to her purse.  She dug her cell
phone out and answered it.

   "You're in," Elizabeth told me.

   Dacia screamed and danced around the bed.  I watched her naked body. 
Dacia did not need music to move sensuously.  Elizabeth leaned down and
kissed me.  I buried a pair of fingers into her pussy.  Dacia grabbed my
face and turned it towards her.  It took a couple of seconds for my eyes to
soften.  She smiled as Elizabeth turned me back to her.

   They sat back on the bed and whispered between them again.  I shook my
head.  I was surprised to find both the women waiting when I got home. 
Dacia did not tolerate rivals and I doubted Elizabeth was in love with
sharing.  They were in my room as if they were best friends and I wasn't a
man between them.

   I closed my eyes and thought about my parents.  It was three months
after they died before I picked the guitar up again.  My father's first
lessons were all I could play for days.  I did not sing again until I did
it to get Dacia back.  I strummed those first lessons while listening to
the women.

   I opened my eyes to see them kissing.

   "So tell me about Michael's mother," Dacia said to Elizabeth who looked
at me.

   Elizabeth had the story right, but not the details.  She did not know my
mother was my friend; my closest friend, my best friend, the only friend I
would ever allow.  She did not know I liked bad movies because I used to
cry in the back of an empty movie theatre where no one would bother me.  I
would never tell them about the last time my mother went outside, an
Alejandro Sanz concert.

   My family's story was mine.  A lot of people would say if I spoke it
would be easier to bear.  What did they want me to say?  That sometimes
love, an absolutely beautiful love that made a child happy, could not face
death.  The stupid ones would tell me that my father did not really love my
mother or maybe he didn't love her enough.  The others would be worse
though, because I would have to see their faith in love die a little.

   My mother never stopped loving my father, not for one second of any day
in the five years he was not there for her.  I did not know how she could
hold on to her love, but as the bullet passed I understood.  His soul died
every inch with her and I made him do it alone.  In those five years, both
of my parents were dying but I only saw the suffering of one.  I abandoned
my father when he needed me too.

   The two women did not say anything for a long time.

   "How do you do it?" Elizabeth asked finally.

   "Do what?" I asked softly.

   "That room," Dacia answered for her.  "Everyone was with you while you
sang."

   I looked between both of them.

   "Mi mama canta conmigo." (My mother sings with me.)

   The End
   
