Stealing Home

So, this is what they mean when they say “when hell freezes over.” It was cold, not snowing yet, not raining, just cold, bitter Canadian cold. We say it twists your bones, it grabs through your nervous system up through the muscles cracking every joint in its path. You crunch your way through that glistening pile of frozen snow that’s covering the colored steel of what was once your warm safe car and soon maybe again, if she starts. You adjust for every breath as you walk, painfully filling your lungs with frosty cold chilling air. As you try to exhale it burns. This is where your tongue sticks to steel. Trust me, try this at home, go stick your tongue in the freezer. Fun eh? Your finger's numb, a man’s beard will frost to ice and forget about saving your balls if you got to go pee outside. Oh ya, there’s this big Canadian rule: Don’t ever eat the yellow snow, eh. The winds had adjusted their speed and had set their course, heading due south, south-east straight through and off the ice fields of the Arctic. Canada was bracing itself once again for another long cold one, and they ain’t talking Corona buckets here. No surrey Bob, winter was coming and that was my sign it was time to go head south, hide out, stay warm. My chosen profession permitted me to travel and work throughout the world. This winter I was heading for six months of fun in the sun, a great offer to work the winter of 2006/07 in Cabo San Lucas, San Jose, Baja Sur California, Mexico. Lands End as it’s translated, where the Sea of Cortez meets the mighty rage of the Pacific Ocean. There in Cabo is where they collide, its land marked with the Arch, a hole drilled by the nails of the tides straight through the rock mass that is Lands End. The best place to find marlin, orcas, dolphin, sharks, seals and sea otters, barracuda, lobster, giant shrimp and sail fish, plus the incredibly dangerous, vicious, most ferocious man killer of the seas, the giant squid. Cortez is the natural breeding ocean playground of the entire world for most sea creatures, sí. Everybody’s dream destination, my dream job. We stood there in that cold November night, the winds reaching through her, brushing her hair briskly one side to the other, washing itself across that beautiful face of hers. A face I had looked into a thousand times before. This night I needed to see it clearly, completely, see deeply into her eyes, her heart. It was my picture of her, my last look, you know the mind shot. The one we remember, the one that we will always keep deep inside our hearts. I swept her long jet black hair in one clean sweep with my left hand, grabbing at its silkiness in my fist then neatly tossing it up into a tail. Twisting it I held it firm between her tender dainty neck and my man sized hand. This wasn’t the first time I had her by the tail and I reminded her of it. I caressed her into my grip gently, Vicky always moved where I moved her, my other hand holding firmly across her black leather motorcycle jacket. It was so cool, the steel studs highlighting it and the jacket hugging her frame perrrrfectly snug across her precision cut ass. She always looked so stunning in it, like a model, my little biker chick I’d call her. I stood there kissing her, brushing against her, fondling her body gently. She was still filled with me, I had spent the day with her and we never left the bed. As the outer doors of the departure gates of Lester B. Pearson, Toronto’s International Airport, would slide open and closed to allow the torrent of pedestrians to pass through, “Drop off only” the sign read. We kissed and kissed deeply and passionately. I told her I loved her over and over again, how much I would miss her. The airport security guard rushed toward us, the shiny red Chevy Sunfire had overstayed its welcome. Then as if he was on a leash he stopped dead in his stride, he looked at us for a long moment and nodded at me as if to say “it’s okay, take your time with her, you may never see her again.” He turned, looked back once then he quickly rushed away to harass another drop-off violator. I kissed her again then again, each time longer, harder. I knew I wouldn’t see her for a month or so until she would come and join me in Cabo. I have to go down first to set things up, make sure the job offer is good and the details finalized, take some time, look at condos to live in, check out the neighborhood. For me, I’m good in old town Mexico, I’m easy in the hood or the quaint fishing villages. The families there are bound together from over thousands of years. Hanging with the natives, as I call it. But her, Victoria, she was gringo's girl, no princess, just real down to earth. Pure Canadian Grade A Beef, sweet as maple syrup, real sugar and spice and definitely had everything nice and oh so neatly packed away. With Victoria though she never knew it except when I’d tell her and she’d never show it, it was for me, her man. She was one of the sweetest girls I had ever been with after a 20-year marriage to the queen of nice. Victoria was a good second chance for me. They were similar in certain ways, different as day and night in others and more than I would have ever believed in one way, and that, I was soon going to find out. The four years we had spent together brought us deeply in love with each other. She was the last thing in my world that I wanted to lose. I knew she was the one I wanted to marry, spend the rest of my life with. I had plans for when she showed up in Cabo. Victoria wasn’t very well traveled, something I was intending on changing in her life. I figured I could just introduce her to my real Mexico, slowly, safely. She’d be a lot more comfortable in gringos’ lando, as the Mexicans call it, all whites or affluent Mexicans. Gated compounds, armed security, all the comforts of home behind a fence. I wanted her to feel she was safe. The place was nice, approved to her standards, somewhere she could call home. I told her there and then as I was nearing to deliver my final and most passionate kiss to her before I miss my rocket to Margaritaville. I couldn’t escape the thought that she had asked me not to go, to stay and work on the business here. It was three days before I was booked to jet out. I knew she was just scared, lover’s worry, separation anxiety, something like that. “I’ll see you soon” I said. "Everything will be fine." I loved her and she loved me. This was going to be a good move, fun for her, for all of us. I could take care of some business, grab some cool cash and Bob’s your uncle. She didn’t travel much. Victoria had never been anywhere other than the trip I took her on the year earlier to Florida. She liked it, loved it. She got the bug as I say, the travel bug. She was looking forward to Mexico and sex on the beach. I didn’t know it then but I would never hold Victoria like that again. I’d never kiss her that way, with both of us enthralled in passion. Yes I’d see her again, even spend several nights together with her. I’d also see me behind the walls of a maximum security prison, three times. I’d see everything in my world stripped from my life, stolen by two incredible con men friends. I’d also see the two men responsible for it all walking free right there in downtown Collingwood wearing my clothes, my watch, my jewelry, my shoes, using my identity, destroying my credit and all the time conning, scheming, lying to everyone in the town – family, friends, strangers and Vicky. The Collingwood OPP will ignore every possible clue. Just to make sure everyone is perfectly clear here, I’m the one that will go to jail. The two people that once loved each other, that tiered up under that cold November moon, that kissed each other goodbye in front of those electronic sliding doors - the two lovers that wanted a life together, they would never be the same. Both of them will soon be nothing more than victims.