River The Pirate of Negril

He stood about 6'1and thin. He had sun bleached blond locks with a dark tan. People thought he was Jamaican, because of the way he move around the locals. He spoke the native patois. The island was his oyster. Pirates are real trust me....
I remember my first encounter with him. It was New years eve 1999. The millennium was upon us. Everybody was freaking out about Y2k in the states. So I thought I would head down to the island with my fiance' for festivities. So we got to Negril, we stayed at the resort Point Village.
This was my first time to Jamaica. All I knew about it was Bob Marley, reggae and weed. So when we got there we walked down to the bar to wait for our room to be ready. There was this guy there with a rum bottle in hand with about 9 beautiful women around him. He acted as if he owned the place. Not arrogant, but very sure of himself. He had those women eating out of his hand. My fiance' was in aww. She asked the bartender who he was. He got a smile on his face and said "That's The River".
We just watched him and listened to him woo these women. He had a American/Jamaican accent. I must say his eyes were the color of the sky. His smile was devious and his laugh was more so. He stood up and told the ladies he needed to head downtown to see Mrs.Brown.
As he walked by us my girl said hi to him. I was like wtf. He in return said Wha Gwaan(what's going on?). I introduced my girl and I to him. He asked if we liked brownies, of course we had no idea he meant ganja cakes. You see Mrs. Brown is well known world wide for her baked ganja goods later we found out. He asked if we wanted to go with him to get some sweets. We told him we were waiting on our room to get ready. he said it will be there when we get back. This whole time my girl was staring at him, practically drooling, he paid it no mind at all
We got to this little shack. When we got out of the cab, people yelled his name. Little kids ran up to him just to say hi. I never seen this type of reaction to one person. We walked in to the shack and this lil old lady was behind the counter, she got up and said " River my bad boi" . He leaned down and gave her a hug he said hi mama Brown. He told her he needed 3 cakes and a jug of tea. Tea and brownies what the hell I thought. She handed him the goods and told us that we were in very good company.
We got back in the cab. He said eat up. So here we are munchin down these brownies dying of thirst so he handed us some tea. No none of these things tasted very good at all. very bitter and bland. He asked us if we wanted to catch the sunset at Rick's Cafe' before I could say no my girl says real quick YES! I was getting a little pissed at her but oh well.
We got to Rick's 2 policeman were standing outside the gates. "We don't want any problems Mr. River", they said. He said back to the one "did your sister make it home on time last night". I bout shit. I saw the officer was not happy at all. Riv just laughed and said come new friends let's watch the ball of fire land in the sea.
I was starting to feel a little strange things were not looking right. I told him how I was feeling he said it was probably the mushroom tea starting to work. Oh Shit!! , oh yeah the brownies were ganja brownies. I wanted to kill him. He looked at me and said" I know what your thinking, if ya feel rude enough here I am". I told him I was just surprised. he said cool.
We watched the sun go down. It was amazing, colors flying everywhere with reggae jammin in the background. I was fucked. I could not stop grinning nor could I stand. He called a girl over and introduced me to her. I was trying to tell this girl that I was engaged, but the words would not come out. I looked over at my girl she was gone and so was he. I was thinking the worse.
I heard a familiar voice through the speakers. It was him on stage singing "by the rivers of Babylon" and my girl came back and said she had a hard time finding the bathroom. The audience was captivated. I must say so were we. It was SKA version of the song and he rocked it. Jumping around like a mad man and in control of all the on lookers......Then the song faded in to Trench town rock. He was amazing, he had the lil girls worked up in a frenzy. At one point one jumped on stage and got a hold of him and layed a big ass french kiss on him..The band just kept playing through the 5 min. make out session on stage.
We never did make it back to the hotel that night we went with him and 2 of his ladies to sleep at the light house. What a night , my first night in Jamaica was the best night I ever had all my life...............