Under the Skin

Daniela grabbed my arm and yanked me to her and swirled us around so that she was between it and me. I tried to get back in front of her but she held me off balance with an arm around my neck, pinning my head against her shoulder. She ordered me to pull my feet up under me as high as I could. She had the physical advantage over me in the water and I couldn’t have broken loose of her except with a struggle that wouldn’t have helped matters at all, so I drew my feet up and her legs pulled up against mine and she clutched me tightly to her, one arm still around my neck, the other around my chest.

The thing barreled past us, its rush so strong and close that the wash lifted and pushed us aside and I saw the white scars of buckshot and bullets in the monstrous fin. Its wake had a fiery sparkle and the tailfin hissed by like a scythe blade.

Daniela held me fast, turning us so we could see the phosphorescent streaks as it bore away.

Then it swung around and started back.

“Levanta los pies!” she said, nudging my leg—and I pulled my feet back up under me as high as I could. Her legs clamped up around mine and she held us in a tight bobbing tangle of arms and legs as the shark came at us again.

Daniela kicked at it as it bumped us. I saw grooves along the front of its wide flat hammerhead and saw the eye on its outer edge—black as a shotgun muzzle and twice the size. It knocked us aside as lightly as a ball of cork.

The high fin trailed its glimmering fire toward the moonbright horizon and then vanished under the surface.

“Vete!” Daniela said, pushing me off toward the distant beach.

I swam—fighting down the fear that surged at the thought of the thing turning around and coming for us again, this time from underneath and with its jaws wide.

She could’ve made it back to the beach in half the time it took me, but she stayed at my side, swimming easily and slowly and with hardly a sound, while I stroked as hard as I could, busting up the water and gulping mouthfuls of it and huffing like a bellows. I had no idea how long it was before we were in water shallow enough to stand up in. I hacked out some of the water I’d swallowed and we slogged out of the surf and staggered over to the bedsheet and sprawled onto it.

I lay on my back, panting, staring up at the stars. She hugged my chest and pressed herself against me, her face on my neck, her breath rapid and warm on my skin.

When I was finally able to talk, I said, “Jesus Christ!”

“I have never seen a martillo so big.”

“Whooo! It had to be that Black Tom bastard they tell about. They say it’s been around here forever. They say it’s eaten more than a dozen men over the years. They say it once ate a goddamn rowboat—and the two guys in it.”

“Then we must thank God we were not in a…goddamn rowboat,” she said.

My laughter started me coughing again. I propped myself up on an elbow and got the fit under control.

“What made you think,” I said between hard breaths, “of pulling up our legs?”

“My father was a fisherman. He knew very much about sharks. But he said the trick does not always work.”

Her eyes were bright and wide, her breasts pumping. I’d nearly pissed at the sight of that monster. And she’d kicked it.

I put my hand on her leg and she lost her smile and for a moment I thought maybe I was pushing things. Then she hooked a hand around my neck and pulled my face down to hers.

We kissed long and hard. Our tongues got into it. I stroked her leg and then moved my hand to her breast and she made a low sound. I pushed the straps off her shoulders and tugged down her top. Her nipples were erect under my fingertips. I put my lips to them, my tongue, and she arched her back and pulled my face harder against her. She slid a hand down my chest and belly and into my trunks and closed it around my erection.

We slipped off our suits. She sucked a deep breath when I entered her. Her legs clamped tight around mine and we rocked and rocked and it couldn’t have been a minute before I came and collapsed on her like I’d been clubbed, my face against her neck and hers against mine, both of us gasping like we were trying to inhale each other from under our skins.

After a while we were kissing again, stroking each other’s hips and ass. My cock hardened inside her. We started rocking once more, this time more slowly and gently. I had better control now and held myself back until I sensed her getting close—and just as she arched against me and gave a high moan I let myself go.

We held to each other and didn’t talk much as the night grew cooler. The moon was a lot closer to the gulf when she whispered that Senora Avila would be worried. We hugged and kissed and the press of her breasts and belly started rousing me again. She laughed low against my ear and then rolled away and stood up and went to retrieve her dress from the car hood, saying we really shouldn’t make Senora Avila worry. So I got up and got dressed and put the top up on the Terraplane. We kissed a few times more in the car and then I got us rolling.

It was a little past ten o’clock. She was right that Mrs. Avila would be anxious. She snuggled against me and hugged my arm, her legs folded under her on the car seat, her skirt high on her thighs. Her face was against my shoulder and her damp hair smelled of the sea. We rolled along without talking, just listening to the radio —“Temptation,” “Begin the Beguine.” She knew “Red Sails in the Sunset” in Spanish and softly sang along with the instrumental.

I supposed there was really no reason to be surprised that she was so bold about sex. Anybody as brave as she’d been with that hammerhead wasn’t likely to be afraid of too many things or be one for coyness. Except for whores, though, I’d never met a Mexican girl so sexually direct. Most Mex girls of respectable family made at least a show of being good girls, and most actually stayed virgin till their wedding night. But Daniela was no virgin, and I wondered how she’d lost it, especially since she was hardly more than a kid. But I didn’t wonder about it for long— because when you got right down to it, what the hell difference did it make?

The Avila porch light was on, of course, and light showed in all the windows. At the end of the street the Casa Verde was all lit up too, the card game still in progress. I parked in the shadows of an oak in front of the Avila house. We were kissing goodnight when the screendoor screeched and the senora came out to the top step and looked at us with a theatrical hand over her eyes like she was scouting the open sea under a bright sun.

In the darkness of the car, Daniela giggled and held my hand pressed to her breast. She kissed me and said, “I must go.”

“Will you have breakfast with me tomorrow?”

“Of course.” She put a hand to my face and kissed me again.

“Seven?” I said.

“Yes.”

I got out and went around to her side of the car and opened the door for her and she slung her bag over her shoulder and I held her hand as we went up the dirt walkway to the Avila porch, where the senora stood with her arms out to receive the girl.

“Goodnight,” she said. “I had a very lovely time.”

I raised her hand to my lips.

“Ya, basta!” Mrs. Avila said, coming down to put an arm around the girl and pull her away. Daniela said goodnight again and laughed like a child as she allowed Mrs. Avila to steer her around and up the porch steps.

At the door she looked back at me to smile and wave and I raised my hand to her. Then the screendoor slapped shut and the wooden door closed behind it.

I parked the Terraplane next to the rickety fence in front of the Casa Verde, and as I clumped up the porch steps and entered the parlor I heard laughter and radio music and good-natured cursings coming from the kitchen. The house smelled of cigarette smoke and fried chiles. I went to the kitchen doorway and saw Pablo Lopez laughing and pulling in a pot at the table. They were all happily half- drunk. The countertop was littered with empty beer bottles and the sink crammed with greasy plates.

Gregorio looked over at me and said, “Que tal, joven? Como te va?” Then he frowned slightly and I remembered what my face looked like.

I said everything was fine as could be, and he shrugged and said, “Ya lo creo.” I exchanged hellos with the