How to Be Single (18 page)

At one o'clock on the dot, the concierge announced that a Mr. Torres was there to see Georgia. “Thank you. Could you please tell him to come up in five minutes?” Georgia said in a monotone and then hung up the phone. And then we both screamed and started running around the room.

“What do we do? What do we say when he comes in?” I shrieked as I jumped onto the sofa.

“First we have to let him know that you're not staying, that we're not trying to get a two-for-the-price-of-one-type situation.”

“How do you say that without it sounding…I don't know!”

“This is crazy! Am I crazy? I'm crazy!!” Georgia said, now pacing, trying to compose herself.

“Wine! You need to be drinking! How did we not think of that before?” I was now getting into it—the train was chugging down the track and I was curious to see where it was going to take us.

Georgia raced to the minibar. She uncorked a mini bottle of wine and chugged. She passed it to me. Somehow I needed to get loaded, too.

“What are we going to talk about?” Georgia asked, nervously. “Normally on a first date you ask questions like ‘So what do you do for a living?' ‘Do you like your job?' ‘Where do you live?' But what am I going to say to him?”

I took another swig of the chardonnay. “I don't know. Just talk about Rio, ask him questions about Brazil. Ask him what that stuff is called that we like so much. The stuff that looks like sand.”

“Rio and food. Okay.”

I finished off the little bottle of wine and then opened another one.

“I'll pour two glasses, one for you and one for him.”

“Okay, okay, right, that's a good icebreaker.” Georgia got out two glasses. Then she stopped.

“Wait, what if he doesn't drink?”

“A sober prostitute? Do you think?” I said as I poured the wine, my hands shaking.

“You're right, you're right.” Georgia put the full glasses on the counter. Now we have to have a plan. We need a code word for if one of us gets a bad vibe from him.”

“Got it, right,” I said, now just pacing. “How about, um, samba dancing. I'll say that we went samba dancing and it was fun.”

“No, that's too positive. I'll get confused and think you like him.”

“Okay, how about, ‘We went samba dancing and it was too hard for us to do.'”

“That's good, samba dancing, bad, means he's bad, got it. Now what if I get a good vibe from him and I want you to leave?” Georgia was now looking at the mirror, fluffing her hair. She turned around and ran into the bathroom. She took out a bottle of Listerine and started to gargle.

“Just be honest. Say, ‘Well, Julie, I guess you should be going to that appointment of yours.'”

“Okay, good.” Georgia, now back in the room, took a big gulp from her glass of wine. She made a face. “Eew, Listerine and chardonnay, ecch!” She ran and spit it out in the bathroom and rinsed her mouth again.

Then I asked, “But what if you tell me to leave, but I have a bad feeling about him?”

“Then, after I tell you to leave, say, ‘Okay, but hey, can I talk to you for a minute about something?' and then we'll go into the hallway and talk.” Georgia came back into the room and took another gulp of wine. She made no face this time, and kept gulping.

“Okay, that sounds good.” I stopped pacing. “All right. I think we're ready.” And as if on cue, there was a knock on the door. Georgia and I froze. Then we ran to each other and excitedly grabbed each other's hands.

“I'll open it,” I said, in a burst of courage. I walked over and put my hand on the doorknob. Before I turned it, I looked back at Georgia. We both screamed silently at each other. I turned and opened the door.

Right out of a board game from the seventies, there he was, our Mystery Date. Mauro. I don't know what it is about these Brazilians, but he had a dazzling smile that immediately put you at ease. He could have been a soap star with his small pointed nose and short-cropped hair with a little product in it. He was young, around twenty-seven. Coincidentally, he was wearing jeans and a t-shirt. My first thought was,
Not gay and not
a serial killer
. My second thought was to ask,
What's a nice guy like you…
But instead I said, “You must be Mauro. Please come in.”

He smiled and entered the room. Georgia had a smile plastered on her face so wide I thought her skin might crack. In order to avoid any confusion, I said, “I'm leaving soon. I just wanted to say hi and make sure everything's…okay.”

Mauro nodded. “Yes, that's fine. Of course.”

Georgia walked over holding out a glass of wine. I could see her hands were trembling.

“Would you like a glass of wine?” Her voice seemed much calmer than her hands.

“Yes, that would be nice.” He took the glass and said, “Please, sit down, let's relax.” We both immediately sat down like obedient puppies. Georgia and I were on the couch, and Mauro sat in an armchair to the right of Georgia. I realized that in the midst of all our nervousness, we had forgotten one important thing: it may have been our first time doing anything like this, but it definitely wasn't his.

“So, how are you enjoying Rio?” he asked, cheerfully. As Georgia talked about the beach and Lapa and whatever else she was saying, I tried to just soak Mauro in. He didn't seem like he hated his job. He didn't seem like he was on drugs or had some big guy wearing furs and a fedora waiting for him downstairs to beat him up and take his money. He seemed perfectly content to be here with us. Maybe he was relieved; Georgia is beautiful, even in a t-shirt and jeans. Maybe he simply liked having sex with women. Why not make money from it? But how does he get it up anyway for all these women? That's not something you can actually fake. What about the really unattractive ones he must meet? Does he have an IV drip of Viagra somewhere? I had so many questions, I couldn't resist.

“So, tell me, Mauro. Do you enjoy this line of work?”

Georgia stared at me, her wide eyes trying to telepathically shut my mouth.

Mauro just smiled. Again, this probably wasn't the first time he'd encountered a nosy lady.

“Yes, very much. It's not easy to make a living in Rio, and I love women,” he said, pleasantly. I looked him over again and he still felt safe to me. But there was something about him that seemed vaguely empty. Vacuous.

I pressed on, “Is it difficult for you to have sex with women who are—you know, not…attractive?”

Mauro just raised his eyebrows and shook his head. “No woman is unattractive when she is being pleasured.”

Granted, it was a line right off the first page of the Male Hookers Manual, but it worked. The next thing I heard was “Julie, don't you have to get to your appointment?” I looked at Georgia, who was now trying to transport me telepathically out the door. Women are really just as easy as men when it comes to sexual arousal. But instead of porn, we just need a man who can lie to us and tell us we're beautiful no matter what.

“Yes, of course, I really do have to go.” I got up from my chair, and so did Mauro. He was trained well. “It was so nice meeting you.” I got my purse and put on a little jacket and walked to the door. I turned back to look at Georgia. She wiggled her fingers at me in a wave and grinned. I knew she was going to be all right. Perhaps better than all right.

I decided to take a walk on the beach to kill some time. From the sand, I looked out at the two shapely green mountains jutting out of the ocean, the mountains that many have compared to the shape of a Brazilian woman's buttocks.

I couldn't escape it. Even the mountains had a better ass than me.

As I walked along the beach, I thought about Thomas, about our time together. Maybe I had imagined it all, the connection, the romance. As I walked past the women in their string bikinis with their asses hanging out, I tried to see if there was any cellulite to be found. Not so far.

As I walked looking at all the perfect, smooth bodies, I wondered if the reason Thomas hadn't called me was because of my cellulite. He must have slept with me because he felt some connection, but then later on, when he thought back on the horrors that he had seen and touched, he came to his senses. I sat down in the sand and wondered when it ends. When do I get to feel like I'm great just the way I am? It's just too much to ask me to love myself on my own. Heterosexual women need men to tell them they're beautiful and sexy and fantastic; we just do. Because every day the world is telling us that we're not beautiful enough, not skinny enough, not rich enough. It's too much to expect us to be able to feel good about it all with just a few affirmations and a couple of candles. But as I started to get sucked into a vacuum of self-pity and despair, I remembered something: that guy Paulo had given me his phone number.

I had almost forgotten this delightful piece of information, but like someone clutching at a life preserver, I grabbed my phone and looked up his number. I dialed. I couldn't help myself. It was, after all, Rio. And Thomas had never called me.

Then I remembered that Paulo didn't speak English. I decided to text him, so if he happened to be around someone who knew English, they could help him out. I typed into my phone, “Hi, Paulo. Would you like to see me today?” Then I shut my phone and wondered how things were going with Georgia.

Were we disgusting? Sleeping with prostitutes, sleeping with married men, having one-night stands. Was this any way to be single? Before I could really ponder this any further, my phone beeped, telling me I had a text. It was Paulo. He said he could meet me at my hotel in ten minutes. As Thomas would say, “You must say yes to life.” And one of the best things about being single is that you get to say yes to life
as often as you feel like it.

I raced back to the hotel and used my credit card to get an extra room. Thank God, they had one room available. I texted Paulo my new room number and he came right over. When I opened the door, his eyes were sparkling.

“Hi, Paulo!” I said, not knowing how much he could understand. But before I could say anything else, he had wrapped his arms behind my back and kissed me. His tongue was soft as a feather and touched mine slowly and gently. We stood there, suspended together in time by our lips and our tongues. It was as if all his concentration was going into these kisses, making sure his tongue never made a wrong move. We stood in the middle of the room for about fifteen minutes, kissing. He was the best kisser I had ever had the privilege of laying lips on.

Then he wrapped his arms around my waist and picked me up. He was lifting and kissing me, and it made me feel tiny. Delicate. He put me back down, and he started kissing my neck, softly. He touched my head, my hair, massaging my shoulder as he kissed. Then he gently turned me around, lifting up my hair and kissing the back of my neck, keeping our bodies close. His hands ran slowly over my breasts, down to my waist and under my t-shirt. I turned my head back to him and he leaned in and kissed me, all the while caressing my breasts with his hand. His left hand was now slowly moving down my leg, over my thigh. He slipped his hand under my long, loose skirt, and gently guided it up. Our breathing was getting faster and I let out a gasp as his hand found its way between my legs. My right hand was on the desk, balancing myself as he pressed his body against mine. He raised my left leg onto the chair by the desk. My left arm was behind me, running over his ass, his thighs. I could feel his hardness pressed right on the small of my back. He was running his fingers between my legs, searching, exploring. I was breathing very heavily now. He took both hands and slowly pulled my skirt and underwear down my legs. I stepped out of them as he pulled my t-shirt over my head. Then he took his own shirt off. I could feel his warm, smooth skin against mine. I wanted to turn around and rub my hands all over his chest, throw my arms around his waist, and look into his face, but I didn't dare move.

And then, as if this man weren't genius enough, he took his hand and reached into the back pocket of his shorts, and pulled out a condom. My mind was already dreading the moment when we would have to pull away from each other, someone mumbling something to the effect of “Do you have a…?” “Shouldn't we get a…?” But I was spared. Paulo was a gentleman and an amateur porn star and he pulled out the condom, unwrapped it, and put it on.

I imagine there are women who are really good at the whole condom transfer situation; the unwrapping and uncoiling and putting it on their waiting man. But not me. Since about age thirty-five, condoms represented to me the grave possibility of a lost erection. I don't know if it was the men I was with or something about me, but there were so many lost opportunities once the condoms came out that they began to terrify me. After a certain number of these mishaps, I just refused to go near them. I would use them, of course, but my hands would not get anywhere near one. It was going to be the man's problem. He would have only himself to blame for his lost erection. ANYWAY, Paulo had his erection, his condom, and his groove on and he gracefully slipped himself inside me. His head was next to mine, his arms, his shoulders, his biceps were all around me, enveloping me. He whispered into my ear, “You are so beautiful.” He kissed my ear. Then, his tongue slowly licked my earlobe and moved its way around, his hot breath tickling me. He was a one-man band, this fellow, as his right hand was again between my legs, hitting just the right spot, his tongue was giving me goosebumps down my neck, and he was also inside me, moving and thrusting gently, perfectly. All while standing up, thank you very much. I felt like I was in a three-way with every sensitive, sexual area being touched or kissed, but this lovely man was doing it all by himself. I was making loudish noises that I've never heard come out of me before. He didn't miss a beat as my body twisted and arched and I orgasmed. I turned around to face him and kissed him deeply on the mouth. He picked me up and carried me to the armchair, where he sat down with me on top of him, still inside me. I wanted to give him an award. He put his hands on my hips and set the rhythm. Now it was my turn to do some work, and I moved with his guidance, willing my thighs to stay strong—a charley horse would be so impolite right now. I watched his eyes close, his concentration now all going to his pleasure. But then he looked up and pulled me toward him, kissing me, his hands in my hair. We moved together, with my arms around his neck, kissing and panting, until suddenly he grabbed the arms of the chair, pulled my legs around him tight, and stood up. He walked me over to the bed and put me down. For a moment I got paranoid. Was I not doing it right? Had I gotten the rhythm wrong? Sometimes, on top, it's hard to get in the right…I pushed that thought away as his body pressed down on me, my legs wrapped around his torso. His eyes opened once in a while to look into mine and he would smile and kiss me. He was on his own now, knowing exactly how to move to make himself come. Which he did, in Portuguese, saying, “Meu Deus, meu Deus!”