Story-A-Day #118: Mojitos

MOJITOS

The sun beats down in pounding waves of heat that bounce off the streets in shimmering sheets of gossamer; rippling waves that distort the vision. There is a mantra that repeats through my brain, a cyclical loop of words that forms a beat; a soothing timpani that lilts sweet relief.

The city is filled with dripping people, melting wax statues that slowly succumb to the intensity of the afternoon heat. The air itself is cooking, rendering respiration a ridiculous regimen of chokingly short inhalations. It is as stifling as a pillow to the face, as suffocating as a plastic bagged head.

I slink along, shoes sticking to the meting road tar, skin sticking to the clinging air. Rivulets of perspiration run down my back and neck. They spill in sudden bursts from my sodden, tangled mop of hair, running salty moisture to the corners of my mouth and stinging my eyes with their passage.

Swells of doubt ebb and flow. Will I even make it to where I intend to be? Will the suffocating heat overwhelm me and render my journey obsolete? The television and radio said to remain indoors, and yet here I am, wilting like a week-cut rose, stumbling through the streets in defined delirium.

I falter, but the vision returns: your smiling face framed by neatly arranged hair; a mischievous twinkle flirting from the corner of your eyes, urging me onwards. You are the destination, and the relief.

I surge forward, one sticky footstep after the next. I hear your voice, fair and smooth; lubricated and removed from the crackling drought of the summer’s day. You whisper to me, a soothing timpani-lilt of relief, calling, calling, calling, as you always do, and I answer, drawing ever nearer.

Your voice repeats in a low murmur, an echoed mantra for salvation: Sugar, lime, mint, rum, soda, mash, mottle, mix, imbibe.

I draw nearer still and see your angelic form. You stand in the doorway, your slender silhouette a tease in a flowing back lit skirt, and slowly part the door for me. I smile and step into the cool interior of your home, my words of gratitude caught in the parched grit of my throat. I smile instead, and drop onto the kitchen bar stool. I watch you drift through the smooth, familiar motions. Sugar lime and mint, mottled in the bottom of the glass; rum, soda and ice added on top, then a quick stir.

The glass drips with cool, calming condensation, a vessel of delight that mirrors my own sweaty splash. I wince as the cool refreshment trickles down my throat and spreads through my belly. You have saved me, once again, with a well-timed toast to prosperity and a miracle mojito.