SWIM Book 1 (Complete three-hundred pages)

Day 6.2 Friday, November 24, 2017

For my daddy's fiftieth birthday, my mother decided to buy him a brand-new boat, with his money of course. It was a small yacht that my father had his eyes on for some time because it showed off his success and was sized well for speed and maneuverability. He also liked it because it was the same one Leonardo Dicaprio had when he played the role of Jordan Belfort in Martin Scorsese's movie The Wolf of Wallstreet. It was a damn nice boat, but when my mother and I watched it roll up to the harbor with a big red bow on top of the windshield, I asked my mother excitedly if I could take it for a spin with my friends, and she merely laughed and told me to keep dreaming.

My father had been thinking of taking us on a cruise this summer and had already planned for us to hit up the hotels between Monaco, New York and London. But thanks to my mother, he would be keen to the idea of hiring a small catering crew as well and of inviting only a few exclusive friends (including some potential Saudi Arabian clients who spoke English well and had their hands in energy firms, as well as Chinese real estate deals scattering all over American soil that could prove advantageous if my father stuck his foot through the door before they closed-- otherwise he would be shut out of a closing market where the big players were blooming rapidly.)

My only request was that I could bring along my friends for the yacht ride.

"By friends do you mean the five boys you've been fooling around with?" Snapped my mother, as she and I scouted out the yacht before she would agree to exchange money with the delivery men.

It's fully autonomous, Madame, said the European manufacturer, the new technology is top of its class. Just press the location on the map and the boat will take you from Thailand to Timbuctoo without you having to lift a finger to the wheel.

"We're not going to Timbuctoo," snapped my mother again, sweat beading down her hairline as the day of my father's Big-Five-O was approaching. His fiftieth birthday was a big milestone for him and was important for her. My mother wanted my father to see how much she loved him for his hard work and discipline to make their family dreams come true. Life was no easy feat to conquer, and she wanted to make undeniably clear that she believed he had conquered this beautiful life and made it his own.

My mother's irritability wasn't easy to accommodate sometimes, but I felt warm inside to know she and my father's marriage was light-years stronger and more substantial than the marriage of Craig Ferguson's parents. When it came time for my father to return from his annual eighteen-hole birthday golf with uncle Tom and his best friend Mark Jablonsky, my mother gave him the most beautiful loving kiss two middle aged partners could share and took my father out to the harbor with me to show him his new present. The afternoon could not have been sunnier, as the red ribbon on the windshield flickered with ruby, and my father's smile stretched longer than I had ever seen it stretch before. He turned his back to the present, and my mother asked how he liked his gift. He merely examined her face with all its history and love, and kissed my mother like they were in love for the first time in college again. "Are we going to dinner tonight?" she said. "I've made big plans for us. I know you love the Ciuppinos."

"Italian?" he asked, smiling.

"Mhm..." she said, as she kissed my father. (Creeping onto the boat, I felt totally invisible. But I made the most of it and looked over the hardwood floors and decided I would definitely host my next birthday on this yacht. I could already imagine a weeklong party cruise to Mexico. I already felt bad for my enemies who wouldn't receive my invitations. Serves them right for looking at me the wrong way in the halls, or for talking behind my back, or making the wrong assumptions about me and spreading rumors. They would rue the days they ever crossed me. (I had two sorry bitches in mind.))

I honestly think sometimes my mother wondered if my father was faithful to her, what with all the long business trips and everything. My mother wanted to make sure she was the best option my father still had-- I've seen the way she examines my father whenever we go to a restaurant and are served by a pretty young waitress.