Indoor Pool

The enclosed pool area is delineated from the hotel lobby by a set of four French doors.  Cherry wood framed panes of glass stretch for twenty feet, giving anyone interested a view of the interior space.  The heavy doors and thick glass keep a tight seal on the warm, contained moist air and the heavy chlorinated smell that is all pervasive, air that seems more tangible and easier to grab. 
The indoor pool is enclosed on all sides.  Above it is a solid ceiling thirty feet high painted in pastel tones.  The ceiling gives way to large squares of glass that taper at a 15 degree angle towards the ground, creating the greenhouse heat and light that pervades the room.
Immediately inside the French doors is a cement walkway that is three feet wide.  It leads up to the cement lip of the pool and continues around the hard right angles on all four sides. The cement is wet and cool, an intense contrast from the humidity in the air.  Along the walkway, spaced at uneven intervals, are plastic white lawn chairs, some with gray scratches on the legs and back.  One of the chairs has a pile of three folded blue and white striped beach towels on the seat, another has a used looking towel draped over its back.
The pool is long, designed for laps and swimming caps. On one end, in the corner, are three steps.  On the other end are two metal bars and embedded steps in the underwater wall.  There are three lights on in the pool, they illuminate the painted blue sides and bottom, creating the illusion of yellowish-green water.  Steam rises from the surface, dancing, twirling gently as it disperses into the thick air of the enclosed space.
Behind the pool are two Jacuzzi. Empty, they gurgle wildly from the mighty force of their underwater jets.  Heat leaps from the roaring water, twisting violently into the cooler air it meets above the surface. White and ice-blue colored water bubbles over the smooth cement sides of the hot tubs, spreading out onto the already wet cement floor beyond its walls.
Between the two Jacuzzi is a narrow walkway that slopes upward at a 10 degree angle.  Fifteen feet long, it leads to a long narrow room with glass walls on all sides. There is a row of running machines, stair climbers, weight benches, and free weights.  Each piece of equipment is lined up, facing the side-street. A lone woman in tight lycra pants and a long red baggy t-shirt is on the stairmaster, moving at a steady rhythm as she reads a magazine spread open before her. 
Parallel to the narrower ends of the pool are two tall walls that face each other like mirrors.  At their base is a ledge of tropical plants with wide bright shiny green leaves and pungent soil.  Behind the plants, stretching five feet up is a checkerboard pattern of pink and blue tiles.  They reflect the diffused afternoon light coming through the glass ceiling.  Where the tiles end, a mural begins.  It is a beach scene painted in pastel colors.  There is a bright sun, an ocean in the distance, and three bright pink flamingoes in the foreground.  The image is mirrored on both walls.
Posted on several walls beside the pool are signs saying, “NO Diving” and “USE at your own risk.”

Pool

The sky was perfectly blue and warm, its color matching the bright rectangular pool below a cloudless sky.

The pool was alive with bright blue waters, rippling and bouncing off blue painted cement that had begun to fade and looked like the skin of an old person, splotched and uneven in color. There were speckles of pale blue, spots of cream and white, though the overall image was that of bright blue.

On the cement ground beside the pool sat a deep mesh net on the end of a long metal pole. The net was lined with a few inches of soggy leaves and small dead bugs that had been filtered out of the pool. It sat now silently in a stain of water, a shallow puddle that marked its journey.

The long rectangular pool lapped just a few feet to the right of the white painted house. Closest to one length of the waters were the French doors and side windows of a teenage boy’s room. The shades were drawn oven the door, as were the tiny shades specially made for the two five inch windows on each side of the double doors.

The other long length of the pool was edged with a four-foot high stucco wall. Behind the wall was a wide sloping landscaped hillside covered in lavender and large bushes that were every color of green and yellow. Bees moved purposefully between lavender flowers, staying close to their nectar and never veering away from the boundary of plants to human domain. At the top of the hill were large pine and birch trees and barely visible beyond them was the geometric roof of the neighboring house.

There was a girl floating in the pool. Her lower half was covered in a small orange, yellow and green narrow Brazilian bikini bottom. Her pale white breasts were covered in a shiny black bra. She was in the pool, in the center of a hot pink inner tube made of clear plastic that was opaque enough to look through and see the light filled waters below.

The only other thing in the water with her was the fleshy plastic mouth of a pool pump that sucked on the cement edges of the submerged floor. It was attached to a long white plastic hose that was connected like an umbilical cord to one vertical wall of the pool.

She held onto the float with her arms while her feet propelled her across the length of the pool. She was breathing heavily while she moved her legs in an amphibian way, drawing her touching soles together and towards her crotch, then pushing them apart and out, and then, completing the circle, drawing them in once again.

Amidst her laps, she would look occasionally to the French doors covered in shades. There was just a foot of non-covered window at the very bottom of the door and she would look towards it, searching for eyes.

The water was a perfect balance of warmth and refreshing coolness. It lapped across the edges of the pool and spilled over onto the cement floor of the walkways surrounding it. Long streaks of it continued past the black metal gate several feet from the end of the pool. The gate stretched from the pale stucco wall edging the lavender and ended beside the wall of the house, very close to the kitchen door that led to the patio.

Beyond the metal gate was the formal patio area with a floor of red bricks that had been heated by the sun. As water from the pool spilled over the edges and past the metal gate, it met the hot red bricks and some of it turned immediately into steam.

The formal patio was cluttered with various pieces of outdoor furniture. A wrought iron circular table and six matching chairs sat close to the metal fence, as did a small circular fire pit and two chairs made out of metal and gray plastic fabric.

Across the fifteen feet of red bricks, on the edge, by the grass, were two chairs and matching ottomans that were made of espresso colored rattan and padded with thick beige pillows. Perpendicular to them, against the white wall of the house, was a long sofa made of the same style and covered with the same beige pillows.

The girl drifted in the pool. There was only the sound of the lapping water. She made lazy laps and protected her sensitive lips from the sun whenever she turned towards it.

The Pool

The room is long and nearly white, made from smooth marble that has been cleaned so often it now shines. The stone is complex, not one uniform shade, but with a tendency towards white with flecks of black and gray thrown in. Tiny cracks that look like capillaries and lighting run through the marble, journeying through stillness and stone. There is a dark rectangular doorway on each end of the room, without a door, it promises only blackness. The walls of the marble chamber are completely straight, designed and constructed with perfection. The floor is made from the same pale stone, exuding the same strength and silence as the towering walls. There is a stillness about the room, a hollowed space buried deep, far from noise and movement, quick lights and endless jabber. It is still and solid, lit only by a few large candles flickering from the iron candelabra high overhead.
Mirroring the rectangular shape of the room is a pool. It sits full of cool water in the center of the space, its shape beginning just ten feet from each of the four walls. Within the waters are large slate stepping stones, not quite resting on the bottom of the pool, but hovering halfway below the water’s edge. Thick green plants have grown up from the lowest point, their shiny green stems and thick leaves glisten in the mixture of water and candlelight, competing for space with the steppingstones and reaching forward, towards the surface.
A pale-skinned girl in a small red bikini walks gently from stone to stone. She steps slowly, her toes moving through easy walls of water, her toes finding the hardness of the waiting slate steppingstone as she moves. Her pointed nipples are covered with tiny triangles of bright red fabric, as is the crack of her round white ass. A thin film of water glistens on her like tiny jewels and she moves slowly, feeling each ripple of water move across her bare thighs, stepping carefully from stone to stone in the quiet pool. The gentle lapping of water is the only sound in the room and she looks down, her eyes moving past her pointed breasts and round stomach and towards her shape-shifting legs rippling below the water’s edge, her lower-half brushing past the thick-leafed greenery crawling slowly, endlessly towards the light.

Pool

The sky is huge, an enormous canvas of blue that seems both far away and close enough to grab the couple of white puffy clouds that decorate its blueness. For miles and miles, there are rolling hillsides covered in yellow and brown grass. Twisted oak trees and small mounds of low growing green shrubs populate the hillsides. The landscape is empty, no powerlines, no cows, no houses, just the soft contours of earth and green speckles of umbrage. Tucked in the contours of the hills, on a naturally level space, is a kidney shaped pool. Carved into the lawn of cultivated green grass, the pool is outlined with walls of cement and filled with crystal clear blue water. The water sparkles with diamonds of light as sun meets with wind-induced ripples. It is completely clean, except for the fact that all the leaves of the nearby maple, the tree that hangs over the pool like a green umbrella, have been swept into the pool. All the dead leaves are in a single line in the center, they vibrate slightly with a touch of wind, but they stay clumped together in linear formation. On the lawn, there are a dozen people spread out in groups of two and three. They lounge and sun on top of colorful beach towels, their skin is golden in the light. The women wear designer white bikinis and large-lensed sunglasses. The men, with firm chests and hard stomachs, recline on their sides, turning themselves to the women they address. Twenty steps from the pool is a ramshackle house. The roof, made of wooden shingles that have turned black, is slightly concave, heavy with an accumulation of old rain water and rotten leaves. A wooden porch by the old front door has long ago been lost to termites, only a thick banister covered in small holes remains. There is a black hole in one of the walls to the right of the decimated porch, the hole is just large enough for a human head to peer through. Inside and directly behind the hole, is an old bathroom. The white tiles that cover the floor and the walls are dusty and covered in a fine black soot. There is a hose attached to the wall and a couple old metal knobs that used to serve as a shower. Beyond the bathroom, not separated by any wall, is an old kitchen. It too, is very dusty. The cabinets are off white, nearly brown. The fixtures on the drawers and the sink are covered in orange rust. There are white and blue tiles that decorate the countertop. Cobwebs hang in every corner. Pale light filters in through dirty windows which face the north, the sun beats through the weathered grime and settles into the room.

Endless School

The hallways extend in all directions, connected by stairways and ramps. Each hallway is lined with doors that lead to classrooms. There is a constant noise that swarms through the place, bouncing off the walls, seeping through little holes, taking sharp turns around corners. The walls are of different colors, some white, some blue, some bright red. The stairways are all metallic silver. No area is the same as another. The colors and turns intersect in unpredictable ways and form new structures in every direction. Most of the doors are closed, each with a number and a bulletin board to the right, most of them empty. There is a sense of a crowd but no sign of it, loose words and laughter flash through the noise here and there but nobody can be seen walking through the halls, up the stairways or into the rooms.
The building complex sits on top of a large grassy hill and continues inside of it. The structure extends under the earth and pokes out from gaps here and there, along the slopes of grass and between little patches of tall ancient trees. A wide concrete stairway cuts the hill in two and leads to a center plaza, a round space covered in concrete with a tall single sculpture at its center. The sculpture is a very abstract representation of a man with arms extended upwards. It towers over the plaza impressively, at least 30 feet tall. At its base there is a large bronze metal plaque that says "above" in a vast number of languages and alphabets. From afar the surface of the sculpture seems to be light gray, up close, it has a slightly green color.
The large central stairway leads to a secondary building complex at the bottom. Its first level is lined with glass doors, all of them closed and dark. Its second level is twice the height of the first one and it is made of a single large window that acts as a huge mirror, reflecting the buildings above it. There are further stairways on either side that continue moving downward. Inside the main building there is large lobby, with couches and tables. There are newspapers still open and scribbled post it notes scattered over the tables. Wooden doors to the south lead to a small movie theater. The main screen is blank but the projector is on, spilling pure light onto the white surface. There is a book open on the podium and a stack of papers on a small table to the right.
To the left of the screen, there is a small doorway. It leads to a dark staircase going downward. It ends in an even darker hallway, where the walls are painted black and the only light comes from small lights that are over 50 feet apart from each other. Beside each light is a door, unmarked and locked. The hallways extends back into the depths of the hill. As it reaches deeper, the air becomes more oppressive and the walls are covered in moisture. The sound of the crowd above is deafening, almost making the ceiling shake, and it is contrasted with tiny drops of water that echo with a bright crystalline clarity.
At the very bottom of the hill, the hallway opens up into a circular room. There are three other long hallways extending away from this room. In the very center, there is small pool. Above the pool, the ceiling is open and it extends upwards as a smooth concrete cylinder. In the center of the pool, there is a small concrete pedestal and on top of it, a golden chalice full of blood. On its side there is a large bronze metal plaque that says "below" in a vast number of languages and alphabets. The noise that extends through the whole underground seems to be loudest in this place, resonating through the cement cylinder that extends up towards the plaza and the tall sculpture above.

Two Islands

It is the light of early morning. Free of any trace of dawn, a crystalline brightness is in place. It is as if dawn had never been, and dusk will never be, and the overbearing presence of noonday sun is but a myth. The sky is an unimposing blue reflected perfectly in the water which holds two sandy isles interminably apart from any other land mass and teasingly separate from one another. They are so close that they are almost one, but the sea finds its way between them as the waves lap at their shores. As each group of waves rolls out to make way for the next, a narrow band of wet sand is exposed, the link between the twin islands. It is as if they hold hands under the water, keeping their bond in discretion. The water comes and goes between them. They accept its constant demand for attention, the way it tickles their extremities and holds them apparently apart. The sea water sparkles like liquid silver kissing their shores and flowing into little eddies. Its motion is gentle. Water creeps to shore in elliptical arms of foam and scattered sand and slips away again without commotion. It is quiet, making hardly a sound as it makes its rounds. Like a gentle breath it whispers in and out.
Ivory columns rise from the soft mounds of sand, the remains of a forgotten civilization. They look as smooth and creamy colored as if time and the elements have never touched them. There is no sign of weathering and yet walls are missing, blocks lay scattered in configurations that dance between the realms of chaos and symmetry, and columns lay in peaceful repose.
On the larger isle the ruins are mainly intact. Open aired temples slope slightly, as if one half of their structures are slowly sinking, being swallowed by the fawn colored grains of sand. Their floors are absent under those same hungry kernels. Nowhere is there a symbol, or sign, or statue to betray an origin. They stand plain and silent, void of explanation, free of personality. From the centermost structure every shore of the island is in plain view, no more than 30 feet away in any direction.
The smaller island is even more diminutive, hardly a sliver. It is placid host to a few fallen walls and two natural rock formations which lay sprawled like creatures from the deep come to lounge upon its scant surface. Dark gray and cool to the touch, these boulders have been shaped by the sea. They hold its precious deposits, tiny white shells embedded in their surfaces.
Silver foamed surf laps gingerly at a little pool that has collected near one of these inert bodies. The pool is filled with stones, each perfectly rounded by an eternal affair with sand and water. Some are of an earthy yellow hue, others as clear as glass. Polished by nature’s invisible hand, they are smooth and shiny. By some means, they have come to be stacked in the pool so that they form a lazy pyramid, sparkling under the water’s surface. The eye is drawn to them, the hand will yearn to touch. Their rarity and unassuming beauty lends them a value that far out reaches currency. Nothing is comparable. Like everything else here, there is nothing that they may be measured against, no sign of time or trend to define them.
The two islands cling to one another, without a past or future, holding their ageless ward; the alabaster ruins and its natural treasures, just above water level.