Dan came to in an alley with his face on the pavement. He rolled over on his back. Garbage cans rose above him. They were swarming with rats. Shit, he thought. It happened. It really happened. I'm on the God damned street. I'm homeless. He realized he still had a bottle in his hand. He took a swig.
The rats froze. Their teeth glittered. One of them spoke. "It looks like someone's on the skids, boys."
"What's the
matter, punk?", jeered another. "Cat got your tongue?"
"The poor
kid's depressed.", sneered a third rat.
A fourth rat
leaned over the rim of a garbage can. "Hey, fellas, let's take a closer look."
They slowly climbed down to the sidewalk and crept toward him. He heard a snicker. "It looks like he's down for the count. This could be
quite an opportunity."
"See what's in his pockets!", hissed one.
"Those ears look
tasty.", growled another.
He felt a rat
sniffing at his ear. "Smells delicious."
"I saw
that ear first!"
"Both of
you are going to have to get through me!", muttered a third.
A fourth rat
cackled loudly. "For God's sake, you greedy bastards! There are two ears, plenty for
all of us!"
"Sounds like we got a damn socialist in the crowd.", grumbled the first rat.
The
second lunged. "Let's get him! There'll be more for us."
The third rat
stood in his way. "More for me!"
They were on top of Dan
now. His vision blurred and he felt himself fading in and out of consciousness.
They began to sing:
"The world's an angry world and God's an angry God.
It's survival of the
fittest and dog eat dog.
There ain't no
place for love and compassion.
It's eat or be
eaten, that's the fashion.
A rat's a rat and a man's
a man.
There ain't no
difference and that's God's plan."
Dan woke up with
a scream. His eyes raced around the hotel room and focused on the clock. If
he didn’t move his ass, he was going to miss the ship. He threw on his clothes and
grabbed his bag.
The smog hadn’t changed in Athens after twenty years. Neither had the heat. A redhead walked out of the lobby and joined him. He did a poor job of pretending she didn’t exist. His taxi didn’t show. Hers did. He mentioned Piraeus and the cruise he had booked. Her breasts swayed enticingly as she lowered herself into the cab. Her legs folded like the wings of a dove. He caressed them with his eyes and caught her heady scent as she invited him in with a nod.
He glanced around nervously as the cab pulled into traffic. Her eyes danced. She suppressed a wicked smile. She lifted her chin and looked out the window. The driver stared salaciously at them in the rear-view mirror. When they reached the pier, she sashayed into the ship and abandoned him. She made an appearance in the dining room the first night but left before he got up the courage to approach her. He caught a glimpse of her on deck and then she was gone.
The next morning was Patmos. It would have been just another pretty little island in the Dodecanese had it not been crowned with the monastery where Saint John wrote that little romp of his, The Book of Revelation. Dan walked around Skala reveling in its beauty and wondering how anyone could whip themselves into ecstatic Armageddon in a place like this. She sneaked up behind him while he was gazing into the Aegean and slipped her hand under his arm. She suggested they have a drink in a cafe. They took a small table and ordered a couple of beers. She was American. Her name was Lucia and she pronounced it in the Italian. He told her his name was Dan.
She repeated the name Daniel three times. “Why are you here?”
He fell into her enormous green eyes. “There is no place like Greece on earth. Its history is overwhelming. The blue of the Aegean is unfathomable. It’s a good place to clear your mind. When we shared the cab to the ship, you wanted to kiss me.”
“I want to kiss you now.”, she said nonchalantly. “But I won’t, not yet.”
Dan smiled and leaned back in his chair. “Why are you here?”
“Greece is the birthplace of democracy, Daniel. Saint John wrote about the end of the world here. I wanted to see where democracy began before it ends.”
“Really?”
“America is stagnant. Our country is a cesspool. President Reagan once said we are a shining city on a hill, that it was morning in America. Now it is twilight. We are at war, Daniel.”
The mention of Ronald Reagan made Dan shudder. She dropped her eyes and creased the tablecloth with a burgundy fingernail. “In the Plaka, the hair on your chest caught the sunlight."
“At war?” He wiped away a bead of sweat. “At war with whom?”
“At war with each other.”, she whispered. She reached across the table and clasped his hand.
He placed his other hand over hers. “This is a beautiful day in one of the most beautiful places on earth. I want to make love to you. You want to make love to me. If this is your idea of foreplay, I have some ideas of my own.”
She pulled her hand away and swung it off the table taking a glass with it. A waitress hurried over. Lucia blushed and apologized. “Parakalo.”, smiled the waitress warmly before turning to give Dan a cold look.
Lucia tossed some bills on the table, took Dan’s hand and led him out of the cafe. She tried to contain herself but she could not. “The time for democracy is over, Daniel. It was an interesting experiment but it never really worked. It never really existed. Democracy has always been a pretty facade to make the little people feel important.”
Play along, he thought. She's nuts but she's gorgeous. Just play along. “Are you an historian? Do you do talk radio?”
She looked at him impatiently and pulled his hand. She quickened her step. “There are two kinds of people in this world, Daniel, the powerful and the rest. I’m so sick of everyone wailing on about how they built the highways and the schools and the water system and the power grid, and that it all belongs to them. Do you realize the highest tax bracket under the Eisenhower Administration was 90%? The little people didn’t build the American infrastructure, we did!”
In your Manolos and Prada, he wondered as she pulled him into the ship. Past his cabin and up two levels to the suites, she opened a door and swung her hand out proudly at a dazzling interior. But Dan wasn’t interested in the address or the furniture and he’d had enough of the lecture. He grabbed her, swung her around and slammed her to him.
Her nails dug into his back. “We have feasted upon the world, Daniel and it tasted good!" She clasped his shoulders and pulled him against her breasts. "So good that we have begun to feast upon each other!” She reached up and bit his neck.
"Sounds like a good idea to me." He touched his lips to hers. They opened their mouths to each other. They danced out of their clothes.
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