Half Moon Honeymoon
by Stephen Newton
In the spring of 1965, Jake married Betsy one week after Lisa told him she was pregnant. He would have happily married them both had the law allowed it. Instead, he bought Lisa a two-way plane ticket to Mexico City, where she could have a safe abortion, and enjoy a sunny, but brief vacation, while he and his bride were on their honeymoon.
Betsy’s oil-rich Texas parents, Frank and Ladell Starr, treated them to a luxurious week at the Ritz Carlton at Half Moon Bay, less than an hour’s drive from their San Francisco apartment. It was the Starr’s way of making up for not attending the hasty justice of the peace wedding in Sausalito. There was, after all, no time for a real wedding back in San Antonio, since Betsy was nearly 2 months along. Propriety was more important to all concerned, they decided, than a lavish formal affair. Besides, in a year or two, the couple would move to Texas, and Jake would become VP of the Starr of Texas Oil Company, so Frank could have more time for golf.
The drive along the Pacific Coast reminded Jake of Italy’s Amalfi Coast, which he visited courtesy of Uncle Sam’s Army during a glorious month’s furlough in Italy. He rented a car and drove as far as Positano, where he was spotted by an Italian film producer who offered him a job as a stand-in for the male lead, whom he closely resembled. He never saw the film, but the heady experience of being in the company of other beautiful people while it was being shot, left him wanting more of the good life.
Betsy said she was famished, and joked that she was eating for two. Jake smiled, but his thoughts were with Lisa in Mexico City. They stopped for lunch at a small restaurant along the Cabrillo Highway near Mavericks Beach. While they ate, they enjoyed a spectacular view of the Pacific.
Having grown up in Malibu, Jake loved the ocean, something he would miss in Texas. Before his stint in the US Army, he had been an avid surfer. What days of splendor those were, he thought.
Betsy reached across the table and took his hand in hers. “Jake, honey? Where in the world are you?”
“Love you, babe,” he said, squeezing her hand, and letting it go. “I’m just a bit overwhelmed. I’m going to be a father. We’re going to have a baby.”
After they ate, Jake paid the bill, while Betsy went to the restroom. “Meet you at the car, sweetie,” she said.
“You got it, love-bug,” he said.
Jake left the restaurant and crossed the highway to a service station, where be bought some breath mints for Betsy, and a pack of cigarettes for himself. The attendant, a teenaged boy in grease stained overalls and a tee shirt, rang up the sale and took his money. As he handed Jake the change, he looked out the window and exclaimed, “Hot damn! There she is again.”
Jake followed the attendant outside where a red convertible was sitting next to the gas pumps. He recognized the woman sitting behind the wheel as a TV star. He turned to the boy and asked, “Is that—?”
“Sure is,” the boy said. “Stopped here a couple days ago for gas. I think she’s got a beach house around here.”
Jake tore open the cigarette pack. He could hear the surf crashing on Mavericks Beach. There was still no sign of Betsy.
“Need a light, friend?” The celebrity was walking straight for him. “At this point in our relationship,” she said with a teasing smile, “you offer me a cigarette, or ask for my autograph.”
“I’ll do both,” Jake said, beside himself. He shook a cigarette from the pack and offered it to her, and then took one and put it to his lips.
She lit a gold lighter and held it up for him, cupping his hand in hers as he leaned forward. “It gives me great pleasure to give you fire,” she said, in character as the femme fatale she played on television.
“I love your show,” he said, by way of thanks.
“So, you’re a fan?” she said, blowing smoke at her sandals before looking him up and down. “But, you’re so gorgeous, you must be in the business. An actor? An agent?”
He shook his head. “I wish, but, no such luck,” he said modestly. “Long ago, I had a small part in a film I never got to see.”
She touched his jacket, pressing her index finger into muscle, and letting it linger an extra beat, while she looked him in the eyes and said, “Italian silk, if I had to guess.”
Jack smiled and shrugged. His heart was racing. He wanted to hold her and smother her with kisses.
She looked around. Hers was the only car at the pumps. “Where’s your car?”
Jake glanced across the highway, where Betsy’s VW was parked. There was no sign of her. “While I was inside, my date drove off and left me stranded,” he said, hardly believing he had the nerve.
“She is a seriously disturbed woman to leave a hunk like you behind. But you can’t hang around here. I’m headed back to LA, and I’d love to have you along for the ride.”
Jake took the car keys from her, and together they drove south. There was talk of spending the night at the Ritz Carlton. Jake couldn’t believe his luck.
Stephen Newton is a writer based in Southern Appalachia. His most recent fiction is featured in Two Sisters, Drunk Monkeys, Cagibi, The Ice Colony’s Lo-Fed Chronicle, The Write Launch, and Litro Magazine USA. Newton also wrote and directed two feature length documentaries: “Outcasts: Surviving the Culture of Rejection” (2014) and “One Night in January: Counting the Cost of Homelessness” (2020). For more information, please visit stephenanewton.com.