Paco's Story

It was another of those lovely, almost seductively warm, breezy summer evenings that those of us fortunate enough to have lived in South Florida, had come to expect.

While the temperature that day had nibbled at the 96 degree mark on the old-fashioned Coca-Cola thermometer that so pleasantly hung on a post by the boat dock, the evening was an invitingly mild 69 degrees.

And so it was that out of the 40 or so sailors, only two of us remained into the evening. Sipping on lemonade, eating cookies and telling stories, we watched as the golden sun inched closer to the horizon.

With about 45 minutes of sunlight remaining, Paco, a local dock hand pulled up to wish us a wonderful evening. He was on his way home and would be back the following morning by 6 AM if the past were any prediction of the future.

I motioned to Paco to join us. He backed up his 72 Ford Pick-Up, a rickety machine with a beastly engine recently acquired from an aging, 82 year old construction worker and his wife. Paco loved that truck and we all loved
Paco.

Paco, Bill and I were speechless as the evening’s beauty, interrupted only by the 20 or so boat laid out on the beach in the foreground. It made an impression on us. Then, Paco said, “why not a quick sail before sundown, it is such a lovely night?”.

Bill looked at me and smiled.

A quick cat-trax to the water and we were cruising along the bay with only the lovely mangroves and wildlife that made southern Florida what it was then.

It was as if those 45 minutes of sunlight evaporated more quickly than the ice in my cold drink that hot summer day. I, for one, knew that I had to inform the others that we had to get back to the beach. It was getting dark.
I am sure that these words resonated in the ears of my passengers like dreadful news passed to a knowing, doomed soul. For we all knew it was getting dark, we just hated the mere thought of putting this graceful machine back on land for the night. She truly belonged on the water.

With the boat safely ashore, Bill depart for home and his toe-tapping wife April. April so worried when Bill was at the these events past dark. A lifetime of marriage
to a sailor made her painfully aware of what a late arrival could mean.

Paco, however, did not seem so eager to leave. He looked at me deeply and knowingly. It was as if one thousand words were said that moment. Paco and I softly embraced and fondled each other for what seemed like ages.

I unlocked the dock house door. I led Paco by the hand. His soft, supple 19 year old brown skin still radiating from the evening flight. Adrenaline raged through his body and I could hear his heart pounding out loud.

I bent Paco over the port hull and pounded his butt like a butcher tenderizing meat. I, a mustache wearer since the 60’s, keep mine trimmed and within the borders of my mouth. I do so, not because it gives me the flattering look of Adolf Hitler, but because it so nicely frames the **** of a teenager. Many mistakenly believe that the **** of a youth is the same diameter as that of a grown male. It is not. An aroused teen’s **** is approximately 9/16th
of an inch used while that of an adult male is nearer the 13/16th mark.

After painting Paco with my love, I realized what I had done. Paco was dearly loved and those at the marina would shame me if they came to learn not only of my homosexual predilections, but of my unwillingness to bravely
face the future with Paco on my arm.

“I must kill Paco”, I remember thinking. Over and over and over, these terrible words echoed through my brain. “Kill Paco”, “Kill Paco”.

I kept a tire iron in the dock house as a result of a passionate, on-again, off-again love affair I’d had with a ‘68 Triumph. That fine lady went through tires so fast that it seemed as if I were constantly changing them.
I abruptly swung the tire iron through the air with the grace of an Olympic discus thrower.

The thud with which it hit Paco surprised even me. Paco was down and, without question, out. I proceeded to chop Paco’s torso into small parts. I loaded the parts into an old drum that I’d kept in the dock house.

Necessarily so, my new ritual had become dropping parts of young Paco in the bay during the remainder of the weekend sailing. I’d drop a leg on downwind. An arm
would be deposited during the gybe. If the out tide held up, I felt I could have ridded myself of Paco by finish.

Some special parts, like Paco’s **** and his penis were kept in my sailbox for years. Then, in the early 90’s, I got roped into providing trophies for the local regatta. Not knowing what to do with the many parts remaining, I
became creative.

I’d unscrew the cheap plastic trophies and insert a body part into the trophy. A little superglue here, some tape there and the recipient would never know the contents of his or her trophy. True to my form, I’d reward those with body parts according to their finish.

To the 3rd place finisher, I’d insert an unimportant body part, say a kneecap, into the trophy. To a 1st place finisher, well, I’d insert a testicle or some other
meaningful part. The sailors that had trained longer and spent more money, he or she deserved the testicle was my way of thinking.

Feeling heat from the local law men and receiving suspicious stares from Bill and the others at the marina, I decided that it was only prudent to cremate what was left of Paco. The ashes, ironically, were deposited into the
resin I used when resurfacing the bottoms of my hull. Now, whenever I sail, a little of Paco goes along with me. The way the hull slips through the water reminds me
so much of Paco’s tender, sweet butt.

Beloved Paco sails with me to this day “Ahhhhh” those lovely summer nights in south Florida. I love sailing.