HUEVOS RANCHEROS SENOR

They're Guatemalan, said Susie, and they have the best breakfast around here by far. They ordered two specials (Sunday), which consisted of a tortilla with refried beans, fried egg, tomato, lettuce and chili. Louis said it was delicious, and deserving of a rave review. Simplicity in all its splendor. He ordered another plate when barely half way through the first and asked Susie what she wanted to talk about. You, she said. You, you, you. She wanted to know when he was thinking of coming home again, or how much longer he was planning on staying on this side of the world, which might have amounted to the same thing, she wasn't sure, maybe he'd be off somewhere else again, as soon as the trail told him to. She wanted to know whether he was any closer to finding what he was looking for. Nothing in the end, he told her, that aided his translations of the letters, but, all the same, there was something to be said for sitting on the land where some of the work seems to have at least been written. The smell of the sea for instance. The dry air. The severity of the sun in the early afternoon. The isolation. Nothing though to indicate that he was getting any closer to actually finding the man who wrote the letters. Or least find out what happened to him. Susie smiled. I want to stay, she said. I've taken leave from work. There's time. She said they should keep on driving once the festival was finished. Just pick up and go. She heard something about Byron Bay and its surrounds. Heard it was worth a visit. Louis had heard something similar, and he didn't need much persuading at this point. Some sea on the skin might have been just what was needed. Another mouthful of tortilla and beans and he knew she was right. The Guatemalan hospitality was working wonders. He almost felt new again. They ordered a coffee and some chocolate covered coffee beans and then walked around the festival site some more, hand in hand. Eventually they were back at the tent again, where they napped in preparation for the new year's festivities. Louis was relieved, for he was exhausted. He tried to relax and enjoy the surroundings while they were ambling around, but it was no use. He couldn't help but keep searching the faces that passed by for clues, for some sign of recognition, for how he would imagine the author of the letters, one Anthoniszoon van Aken, otherwise known as AVA, to look if he were there, even though such a thing seemed near on impossible, but still he couldn't help it. And so it was a relief, he said again, to lie down and rest, to lie down and stroke the soles of Susie's feet with the tips of his toes, before slipping off into slumber. Trying to think of nothing but the breathing between them, rolling in and out like the sea. And when he woke there were vivid images of a dream by the ocean, with diving dolphins, and clouds that appeared to weep tears flowing up toward the stars in bright daylight.