I tried a few times to get up at three in the morning to experience misa de gallo at least once, but I’d never been a morning person, and it proved to be a nightmare in the end. Joaquin didn’t care, though he made sure to call me a “shaggable atheist” for the hundredth time since I arrived. Not that I minded, either.
Fresh from Mass, confidence and spirits raised as they always wer
e when he returned home from church, Joaquin took care to wake me up for breakfast. There were no words to describe such an erotic transition. That shift from dreams of childhood and my youth, of long-forgotten faces and voices, all rising from the ashes of my past to swaddle me in familiarity and comfort—to the very real, very visceral experience of Joaquin settled between my spread legs, one brown hand rough and firm against my thigh, the other fucking me with two oiled fingers, his mouth soft and wet around my cock. Dreams would fade as they inevitably did under his handling, and I’d become an adult in a breath—naked and aroused, helpless under my lover’s weight, my senses drowning under the sights, sounds, and smells of smog, star lanterns, rice cakes, beggars, crowded churches, and indefatigable hope.
I made it to church once—for misa de aguinaldo on Christmas Eve. We didn’t drive to either of our families for Noche buena afterward. Arriving home after midnight Mass on Christmas Day allowed us another opportunity to celebrate our rare time together. With Joaquin’s maid gone home to her parents for Christmas, we had the house to ourselves. Like a Wildean decadent, Joaquin ate naked on his back in the living room before the Christmas tree while I sat astride his hips. His dick fixed me against him as I alternately fed him and sampled dessert off his chest, demonstrating my approbation by grinding my hips, groaning at the luxurious feel of being owned yet again. I hoped that he felt every inch of my body around him, and that he listened to it—the pliant heat a wordless reassurance that, yes, I’d always been his.
Samaya
FRANCES JONES
JUST AFTER THE SUN crested the pines, Chokyi took six withered walnuts from beneath the tree in the monastery garden. He peeled back the dried flesh and set them on the stone wall, tapping their shells lightly, beckoningly. Soon a squirrel drifted down on its fleshy wings, chittering as it landed. Chokyi held the nuts in his hand, teasing the squirrel, which sat on its woolly haunches, scolding him and swishing its tail.
They played this game each morning; always it was a struggle for Chokyi to stay quiet, to resist the laughter that gathered in his belly and tickled up his chest. Just when he was ready to burst, he would open his hand and let the squirrel have its pick of the nuts. It would clutch one in its tiny paws and bound along the wall, away from the monastery and into the deep shade of the pine forest.
The game was one of the only things that entertained Chokyi after so many years living and working in the monastery. When it was full of monks, Chokyi often wished it were empty, as it was now. The others had left a week ago to perform a blessing ceremony in the village of Yangpachen. Chokyi’s task was to stay behind and look after the temple and grounds, a task they rotated once each season.
But when he was alone, Chokyi found himself longing for the slap of the monks’ bare feet in the halls, the drone of their chants drifting from the temple windows, the clatter of their chopsticks when they ate. Even a monk can only contemplate so much silence, so much emptiness. Now, it would be some days before they returned, dusty and solemn-faced and ready for tea.
By noon dark clouds had stormed the landscape. Chokyi paused from his bowl of rice to watch the rain pour through the canopy of conifers outside the window. The steel-gray water fell in sheets, soaking the hillsides and drumming against the walls.
Its music was a welcome change from the silence of the Himalayan foothills, but with guilt Chokyi dreaded the tasks it brought: finding and patching leaks in the roof, placing bowls under the dripping ceiling, clearing leaf litter from the gutters. He longed to sit in the sun, to drowse, to feel the Buddha’s hand brush the top of his head with invisible fingertips. He reminded himself to stop longing.
Chokyi finished his midday meal and retrieved a large basin of rainwater from the porch, using it to rinse his empty clay bowl. He set handfuls of richly flavored vegetable rinds to simmer in a deep pan of water over the hearth. From the kitchen he gathered a handful of bowls, knowing that as the rain pounded the temple, water would breach the roof.
He dashed from the main building across the deck to the temple, feeling the cold rain sluice across his bare head and sneak its way beneath the folds of his saffron robe. He paused at the entrance to the temple, bowing low to the large golden Buddha who sat in the center of the room. The Buddha’s expression never changed; he gazed serenely down at Chokyi, one hand raised and the other touching the floor, unperturbed by the storm that had settled over the land.
Chokyi tracked the sound of dripping water and placed bowls in four locations in the temple chamber to catch the drips. He then returned to his place before the Buddha to make sure the offerings of blossoms, oranges, and water were still adequate, though he had checked them that morning. Bowing low once more, he lit several sticks of incense, folded his legs into lotus position, and let his mind drift into stillness.
The sound of water drips almost merged with the constant susurrus of the rain as it fell everywhere, everywhere, everywhere. Although Chokyi had had plenty of practice with his meditations, he still struggled to find that empty place. Today, the water dripping into those wooden bowls crowded his ears, distracting him.
He imagined himself as a silver fish, thrashing with all his might against the current, just to reach the stillness of a mountain pond. With a sudden and deep breath he plunged into it, his thoughts as dark and sheer as a mirror reflecting midnight.
In the dream he was seven years old again, sitting with his mother as she read to him from a book about the railways of China. Trains, those massive steel structures clattering down miles of track at exhilirating speeds. As she read, he closed his eyes and imagined he was riding on the caboose, watching the landscape vanish rapidly into the distance, feeling the wind across his scalp. There were no trains in Tibet when he was a boy, so he had to dream them.
He longed to do the simplest thing: to purchase a paper ticket and step up onto the car, to feel the jolt as the train pulled loose and boosted its speed. He could go anywhere, become anybody. But in the dream, just as he stepped up to the ticket counter, everything was lost in mists and darkness and the dripping of the leaky roof into brimming bowls of water.
When Chokyi opened his eyes, dusk had fallen over the hills. The rain was unceasing. He returned to the main building and took up a broom to sweep the floors before the light vanished completely. With each sweep of the bristles he chanted, forcing himself to stay present within the words and their rhythm as he cleaned: “Om amoga-shila sambara sambara, bara bara maha shuddha sattva pema, bibu shitabuntsa, dhara dhara samanta avalokite, hung pe soha.”
As the rain thundered in the growing darkness, his chanting grew louder. Both sounds competed for the Buddha’s ears. But as he paused to take breath, he heard the sound of bells chiming at the gate. Someone was asking for shelter.
Chokyi tucked the broom away and quickly lit a lantern, raising it above his head as he went to the doorway of the monastery. There, standing on the footpath in the downpour, was a small figure whose face was obscured by the darkness. Chokyi waved his hand, beckoning the stranger inside.
As the pilgrim came closer, he saw it was a girl—no, a woman, small and slender, her clothes and travel pack drenched and dripping. “Bhikshu,” she said softly to him as she stepped onto the porch, bowing low in greeting. “Many blessings. I was caught in the storm and have been searching for shelter.”
“Please, come inside,” Chokyi said. He led her into the kitchen and gestured her to a large stone bench by the hearth, where a small fire continued to burn. “Warm yourself. I am Chokyi.”
When she set down her pack, Chokyi noticed that a long, sheathed dagger jutted out the top. A ragged hank of fringe tied to its handle caught the firelight, shimmering dully. Looking away from the weapon, he bowed to the woman and gestured for her to sit by the hearth. Then he fetched a bowl and filled it from the kettle of broth that was stewing over the fire. He offered this to her.
The woman pushed her long hair away from her face and took the bowl into her small, perfectly formed hands. “Bhikshu. I am
Pasang,” she said, blowing air across the surface of the salty, hot broth so that she could drink it.
Chokyi returned to his sweeping, not wanting to intrude on the stranger’s meal. It had been months—no, more than a year—since he had seen a woman, and never one within the monastery grounds. This high in the foothills, the monks rarely received travelers.
When he looked up to check on her, he found that she had emptied the bowl and removed her rough jacket and tunic, which she was spreading on the hearthstone to dry. When Pasang saw that he was watching her, she covered her small breasts with her arms. But just as she lowered her eyes modestly, she raised them again, looking directly at the monk, letting the edges of her full mouth curl into the hint of a smile.
“Forgive me. Do you have any dry clothes I could wear?” she said.