The view from the plane beckoned them to an enchanted world.

————

They departed Purgatory for Paradise. A non-stop flight took them from Purgatory, Minnesota to Miami, Florida, a shorter flight and smaller plane took them to the Bahamas and Paradise Island. Paradise Island was linked by bridge to the larger island of New Providence. They were scheduled for seven days at the Atlantis resort.

The alignment of so many mytho-biblical names with their honeymoon seemed curious. It was probably only coincidental. Adam was convinced the names were nominal benedictions for their new life together. Eve thought that was a happy thought.

They left Purgatory in winter coats. They expected the moist heat that rushed through the opened door of the plane in Miami. They didn’t expect the intensity of it. During the twenty-minute flight to Paradise Island it became normal. The view from the plane beckoned them to an enchanted world. They could clearly see the floor of the sea beneath the shallow blue-green waters. Purgatory’s grey waters were far away. They were now over the waters of Paradise.

Strangely, It felt like coming home.

Their room at the Atlantis resort was comfortably elegant. They barely used it. The white sand of the beaches and the blue-green waters seduced them. They stayed outside ‘till well past nightfall every day. Adam swam. Eve couldn't. She liked being in the water though and the way she floated so easily in the warm salty sea, and she enjoyed wading with the tropical fishes that darted all around her.

Eve recognized many of the fishes from the talk given by the Atlantis naturalist at the display pool. Both naturalist and pool were provided to educate guests to sea plants and creatures. The naturalist spoke to any group that gathered around the display pool. The fishes were living illustrations for his talk. He had a little joke to enliven his dissertation, “The water here is so clear you can see what’s coming for you”. He added that the sharks were more active toward evening. Despite the shark part, Eve enjoyed learning about the sea life. So did Adam, though the overcrowded pool brought back an unpleasant memory from childhood.

Adam remembered a similarly crowded pool, a shallow pool with no water, filled with snakes and lizards. There was a man there, too, talking about the snakes. He called himself Jungle Jake. He wasn’t a naturalist. When one of the snakes started eating another snake, Jungle Jake announced the event on loudspeaker to draw cheap-thrill gawkers to this exciting display of nature, red in tooth and claw. They came. They gawked. No attempt was made to save the snake. Adam was too young then to think of a word like disgusted, but he remembered feeling something like disgust.

Shaking off the memory, he pulled Eve to him, and they walked off to the beach where clean air and sun made bad memories not worth remembering.

Adam lost himself in the warm water and didn’t notice that he had drifted some hundred yards from shore. Eve worried when Adam swam too far from shore. She was thinking about what the Atlantis naturalist had said, “The water here is so clear you can see what’s coming for you”. She called to Adam. Adam swam back to shore. They spent the rest of that day, hand-in-hand, walking barefoot on the cool white sand under tall palms caressed by the balmy breeze that always blew.

They took their first honeymoon meal and most of their vacation meals thereafter, at the resort’s thatched-roof open-sided restaurant. Adam ordered the fried conch fritters. Eve chose grouper, baked or broiled. The menu changed with each day’s catch. Eventually, they sampled almost every variety of fish and shellfish offered - all pulled from the Caribbean hours before being plated.

After the table was cleared, they ordered drinks; straight whiskey for Adam, pina colada for Eve. They nursed their drinks under the starry sky, lulled by the soft sea breeze, and the trembling sweetness of the steel-drum band. The band played pop songs, mostly America, with an easy island rhythm. Adam thought their version of Shining Star better than the original.

Eve wanted to dance. They moved away from the tables. Adam didn’t dance but he loved watching his wife dance; her steps so graceful they seemed choreographed. They weren’t. Eve was a naturally gifted dancer. The other diners turned to watch, so too, did the band. When she finished they all applauded. Adam thought she blushed a little. It was hard to tell through her deepening tan.

They returned to their room and first night of nuptial bliss.

Next day they walked further along the beach, away from the resort and the other guests. They discovered a formation of black boulders that ran from beach to sea. Adam climbed up for a closer look with Eve by his side. The boulders made a six-to-seven-foot-high enclosure around a white sand bottom of twenty-some square feet. Submerged boulders on the opening to the sea caused the surf to break in a cooling misty spray.

The resort’s tourist attractions were far away.

No one was anywhere near.

They spread their towels on the sand, let their clothes fall away, and lay like the first Adam and Eve in unaffected nakedness. It seemed proper. The cove became their private get-away on an island dedicated to the get-away.

The Atlantis resort offered the usual tourist entertainments: gambling, nightclubs, fishing excursions, sail-boating, and who knows how much more. Adam and Eve weren’t tempted by any of these. They preferred their private cove of sand, salt-spray and overarching blue sky. The open air made them feel healthier than ever before. The sea salt thickened their hair. Their deep tans made them feel covered even when they weren’t. It felt good. It felt free.

They might very well have remained in their private cove for their entire stay, except that friends advised them they shouldn’t miss shopping at the colorful Nassau street shops.

They didn’t care about shopping, but their friends would ask about it.

The bridge to New Providence was long and unshaded. It wasn’t a comfortable walk. They saw a great heap of empty conch shells next to the bridge on the Nassau side. Conch shells are beautiful when fresh; when empty and heaped, they become garbage. Adam and Eve walked past the garbage heap of shells into Nassau. Nassau was hotter than Paradise Island. The buildings got in the way of the sea-breeze. Concrete and asphalt held the heat of the sun. The crowd of shoppers made it hotter, still. Eve found a wide-brimmed straw hat. Adam paid for it. Eve wore her wide-brimmed straw hat on the walk back across the bridge. It made her walk back cooler. They didn’t do any more shopping.

The island was abuzz on their return. A local man had been arrested for trying to sell marijuana to one of the guests. Resort security had turned him over to Nassau authorities. Neither Adam nor Eve could understand how people could get so excited about useless news they had probably gone on vacation to get away from.

They returned to the palms, the open-air restaurant and their private cove. The days passed, each as wonderful as the day before, on, and on, and on. They knew It wouldn’t last. They would think about that later . . . when they had to.

Nonetheless, scheduled eventuality increasingly cast its shadow over their dream-life of eternal-now in Paradise.

The sad day came.

They packed their bags and began the dismal return from Paradise to Purgatory.

Their friends Bill and Denise picked them up at the airport. They looked like ghosts to Adam and Eve. How could they have become so pale in only seven days? “Wow, you two got really great tans. “How was the rest of your vacation”. Denise asked the same. Adam dodged their questions, ” Sorry, We’re tired. We’ll tell you all about it later”. Eve nodded in agreement. Bill and Denise let it go. They rode in silence through the slush and small icebergs of half-melted snow.

Well, says Bill, “You sure are back in Minni-So-Cold now, I think it’s near zero out there.” They smiled at the familiar joke and gazed out at a cold world of gray and brown.

Adam pulled Eve close; their memories snugly wrapped in tropical colors.

Even in Purgatory, you’re allowed to have memories.

By K. L. Shipley

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