it all out to where she would be back on the bottom kicking up sand and busting coral. Then she would add too much air in and be back up at the surface again. This was getting old quick. She just couldn’t get it.
I got tired of this so I just let her hang out at the surface for a bit while she tried to fight her way back down. I started feeding the fish dog food; those little shits loved the stuff. After feeding the fish, I took the group over to a huge cluster of fire coral. Nasty stuff. You touch it and it lives up to its name. I gestured to my students not to touch that’s when I notice the lawyer more frantically trying to get back down. She forgot that her body needed to be vertical, legs pointing down, to let the air out.
I swam up to her, positioned her scrawny torso so that it was vertical, grabbed her power inflator and pressed the deflate button, dumping all the air out of her BC. She started sinking like a rock. She was too busy trying to equalize her ears to notice that her legs were drifting up, jack knifing her body into a “V”; Butt first and still sinking.
Holy crap, she is going to land on that fire coral! And she did, ass first. There was no way I could have gotten to her in time. I watched as her body sprang back up like she’d just sat on a porcupine. Oh man, that hurt.
When we got back to the beach the lawyer was actually in good spirits. She thanked me and even gave me a tip. I said good bye as I watched her and the rest of the group walk back to the gear area. Her ass was hellish, it looked like it had been flogged repeatedly. She had vicious red welts from one ass cheek to the other. She would definitely not be sitting down the rest of the day. Oh well, she signed the waiver.
Island Hopping in the Belly of a Cruise Ship
The Radisson Diamond was not the average looking cruise ship. It was much smaller than the standard Carnival, Norwegian or Holland American lines; however, the vessel was, by far, more posh and ritzy than the others. It was geared towards the more high end cruise ship passenger and they paid top dollar for it. There were more crew and staff than passengers, so that tells you how well the filthy bastards got pampered. The ship’s design was odd and looked like an oversized, top-heavy catamaran with a blue and white paint job.
I told Limy Dave that I’d fill in as an instructor on the Radisson Diamond for two runs. I was reluctant at first to teach on a cruise ship. I didn’t want to be in such close proximity to my mortal enemies, the terrible “cruise shippers.” I thought about it for a while and out-weighed the pros and cons. I came to the conclusion that diving on the islands where the ship would port out weighed the cons. Besides, I planned on a heavy liquid diet that would help me tolerate the situation and, what the hell, it was only for a month or so. I can handle that. Veronica would be done with her run on one of the Princess Cruise ships at the same time I’d be finished and we’d meet up on St. Thomas.
The Raddison had just came from its Mediterranean tour and was about to start her Caribbean season. I was excited about the island posts the Radisson would hit on the two runs I’d be aboard. She’d start off in San Juan, Puerto Rico, then St. Martin, the Cayman Islands, Curacao, Aruba, finally through the Panama Canal to Costa Rica. Then, after dropping off the passengers and picking up the new ones, she’d run back through the big ditch to the San Blas Islands, Cartegana Columbia, San Andres Island and Cozumel Mexico. The last stop was in Key West before ending in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. I’d be able to dive at most of these stops. It was going to be a blast even though I’d have students with me on the majority of the dives.
I jumped on the Radisson Diamond in St. Thomas and met up with the other new cruise ship dive instructor, Pretty Boy Damon. The ship was just finishing up its first Caribbean run and Damon was getting into the whole teaching on a cruise ship gig . He also had been working on St. Thomas for a dive operation called Underwater Safari’s located on the main cruise ship dock in Havensight. I had came across Pretty Boy a few times at Coki Beach while I was teaching a class and we hit it off. He was from Long Beach, California and looked like he came right out of a GQ magazine. That’s why I, and the other instructors at VIDSS, called him Pretty Boy. St. Thomas was the last stop on the Radisson’s first Caribbean leg before she headed to Puerto Rico to pick up the next cruise. Her deafening horn blew seven times as her mooring lines were released. We were off and running.
Greeting Party
Pretty Boy and I were part of the greeting party for the new passengers coming aboard in San Juan. We were both dressed like the Men In Black but without the shades. The first day was always a big event with top staff lined up in formation, wearing first class uniforms. It was an impressive sight, no doubt, seeing the captain and crew standing like naval soldiers, the chefs’ with their immaculate white uniforms and big white chefs’ hats, the stewards and bartenders as well as the activity director. But clearly, to me, the most impressive and jaw dropping site was the house cleaning girls. They were all dressed in French Maid uniforms, all were donning ruby red lipstick with their hair pinned back and all of them were drop dead gorgeous. I couldn’t take my eyes off this one maid that had deep brown eyes and big boobs. I was drooling like a high school boy.
“That’s the one I’m going after,” Pretty boy said, under his breath while trying not to point so obviously at a beautiful french maid with jet black hair and a smooth, milky complexion. She was hot alright, but there was something about the girl with the deep brown eyes. I felt like jello inside.
After greeting a few more passengers and introducing myself as one of the scuba instructors, I tuned my eyes back to the group of french maids. I was caught off guard. Brown Eyes was staring straight at me with a mischievous smile painted across her face. My heart skipped a few beats. I couldn’t breathe. I was scared and wanted to bolt out in a mad, panicked dash. No longer did I feel like jello. Now I felt like a puddle of chicken soup.
Damon must have noticed me sweating and turning pale. He saw Brown Eyes looking at me as well. “What the hell’s the matter with you,” he whispered. I was frozen and couldn’t speak. My mouth felt like a dry sock was stuffed in it. “That chick with the big boobs is looking at you.”
“I know, she busted me checking her out,” I finally said.
“Yeah, now she’s checking you out,” Pretty Boy laughed.
“She caught me off guard,” I said as I took in a breath and composed myself. My mouth was still dry and pasty. “Christ dude, I need a beer.”
“Don’t worry bro, there’s a ton of beer on this boat,” Pretty boy said. “And soon we will be cracking them open.”
Our cabin was located in the wretched bowels of the floating beast among twisting corridors so narrow that you had to side step when passing another person. This was where the majority of the crew members, mostly Phillipinos, South Americans and Dutch were housed. Dishwashers, laundry workers, maintenance, garbage collectors and so on, lived like sardines in tiny cabins the size of a small bathroom with a shower-toilet combination, a set of bunk beds and a small useless desk. I was sitting on the top bunk shaking my head in disapproval. If either me or Damon wanted to change our clothes, one of us would have to either wait on the bunk or stand out in the hall.
“This is no good,” I said. “We’re down in the deepest pit of the ship like sewer rats.”
“Yeah you’re right, ” Pretty Boy said, looking around the small shit hole of a cabin. “I don’t know how Dave and I stayed in here for the first cruise. We are the scuba instructors damn it. We need a bigger cabin like the ones the performers have. They are huge compared to this.”
“Who the hell do we need to talk to?”
“We can talk to Jean the activities director and she can talk to the House Master,” Pretty Boy said as he rubbed his stubble chin.
“Let’s go now. We can’t stay here,” I said while jumping off the upper bunk. “Christ, you can smell someone taking a big dump four cabins down. This is unhealthy.”
After talking with Jean, explaining that we need more room due to the amount of files, text books, training aids (Which