A Caribbean morning, bright and lovely. We queue for the buffet. She takes fruit and a muffin, pours herself some tea. I load up on bacon and eggs, coffee black. What gender stereotypes we are! she laughs. I laugh too, for the benefit of the other vacationers on the patio. We are a charming young couple, perhaps on our honeymoon. Down across the water, people are swimming and waterskiing. On the beach they are soaking up the rays.
         A lone cloud drifts across the sun, and everything is momentarily pale. I pour Tabasco on my eggs and dig in.
         A brochure advertises an inexpensive day trip to the local ruins. The concierge asks if we would be interested. She and I have been there many times already, I answer. I don’t say, We were born there, rather far below there, in a lightless cavern, from a sea of sulfurous mud. One day, just for something to do I suppose, the mud generated me, or maybe she came first, but in either case the first one crawled out of the slime and not long after the other one crawled out from the first of us. And here we are!
         We make small talk with the old couple at the next table. You’re from Oregon! We’ve never been to Oregon. But, she adds for their benefit, we hear it’s beautiful and we’d love to go sometime. I tease: I hear it’s dark and rainy all the time. Oh no, they insist, there’s plenty of sunlight. How lovely! she gushes as a light rain begins to fall. We are all perfectly dry under the loggia roof. A pleasant breeze moves among us.
         What’s that you got there? the old man asks, indicating my beach reading. I show him: It is James Joyce’s Ulysses, a heavy choice for a vacation book, and he says as much. I prefer Alan Furst or John D. Macdonald, he says. Fine choices, I say, but this book has sentimental value. I remember Dublin, dear dirty Dublin as Joyce used to say, I remember its dark stones, its rain, its Nighttown.
         He was a fine stylist, I go on: We are stonecold and pure. We eat electric light. And just to underscore the point, the power on the patio goes out. We all laugh at the coincidence.
         Now there are storm clouds. The old couple begins to reevaluate their plans for the day. If it should keep up raining, we can’t… No, these tropical storms never last long, Maggie. But look at the color of the sky.
         I’m not sure color is even the right word for it, I say. It’s not much of a joke, and they don’t laugh. The four of us are alone on the patio, the others having all taken shelter somewhere.
         We should go, says the old lady. Bill, Bill where are you? From between the tiles of the patio floor, the mud bubbles up. All the light in the sky streams into it, in waves of fading iridescent colors. We sit there and finish our meal while the rain stops and the sun returns.
         Two busboys are clearing the old couple’s table. Los turistas son un desperdicio, whispers one. Mira, la señora ni siquiera le dio un mordisco a su bollo.
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