Old Palmetto Drive, page 6
“What should I do?” I scream.
“Grab it before it goes over the edge,” Travis shouts.
I jump for the pole which starts to get dragged over the side of the boat. My foot catches on the seat and I tumble forward, my hand grasping the slim pole. The boat rocks from the sudden movement and I flap my other arm to try and catch myself, but there’s nothing to hold onto. I’m airborne before I know what’s happening and going over the edge. All I can do is imagine being eaten alive by swamp alligators.
“RIAN!” Sam and Travis yell at the same time.
They grab ahold of my body and tug and we all topple backward onto the floor of the boat in an awkward pile of teenage flesh. There’s arms and legs turned this way and that. But somehow, my fist is still clasped tightly around my prize.
“I didn’t drop it, I still have the fishing pole,” I exclaim and hold the pole in the air like a wand. I grasp the pole with both hands now, and the clear fishing line is jerking and tugging like a live wire in the wind. Whatever is on the other end of it is mad. I try to get up, but I can’t.
“Hold on tight, cous, you gotta reel it in,” Sam shouts from the bottom of the pile.
“How?” I whine.
“Turn the handle,” Travis says and tries to put his hand up to help.
“Watch it, that’s not the handle,” I shriek and laugh. I grab the little black plastic knob on the reel, and turn. It makes a clicking sound as the line winds up. I’m trying my hardest to reel it in fast, but we are still piled in the bottom of the boat which makes it extremely difficult. I’m about to give up when I feel a change. The pressure isn’t so much on the line, but like the fish is getting close to the surface of the water. I pull the pole back with one quick jerk.
“NO!” Sam and Travis shout. They scramble and try to get out of the way, but none of us can move, there is literally nowhere to go. A huge, green fish comes flying right at us on the end of my line.
I scream and then we are all laughing hysterically and squirming and pushing and shoving to get up and out of the way of the slimy fish that has landed in my lap. I’m crying, I'm laughing so hard. Somehow the boys manage to get untangled and jump up. Travis extends a hand to help me. Sam has plucked up the fish and my pole.
“That was like something from a movie,” I say. I push my hair out of my eyes and wipe my face with my arm. I am so sticky and wet.
Travis takes one hard look at me with those crystal blue eyes. “We better get you back to clean up before supper or Aunt Tori might have a conniption fit if she sees you! Quit rubbing your face, Rian. You’ve got swamp mud every which way to Sunday,” he says and points to the seat next to him. So I sit.
“That was a whole lot of southern packed into one statement,” I tease.
Travis nods. “Yes ma’am!” And with that, he turns on the motor and we roar through the swampy waterways and I can’t say I’m happy about the state of my clothes, or apparently my face, but I am happy about the time I spent with Sam and Travis. I guess I kind of like them. I mean, they are sort of fun and make me laugh.
Maybe, just maybe, being here won’t be so bad afterall.
11
Ghosts in the Dark
“Hey, Rian,” Sam hisses. He’s outside of my bedroom door.
“What,” I say. He doesn’t respond. “Sam, what is it? I’m awake, you can come in.” The door opens slowly. Sam looks like he’s just seen a ghost. I check my phone. It’s almost 2 a.m. I’m only awake because I was sketching and group texting with Ava, Gina, and Maggie. They were telling me all the gossip from back home.
“I can’t sleep.” He comes in and sits on the foot of my bed.
“And you think I can help you with that?” I ask.
“No, but I thought maybe you’d want to go and hang out in the blind with me and watch for critters,” he suggests. I narrow my eyes on him. He’s wearing camouflage.
“Why would you ever think I’d want to do that?”
“Well, you come from a city that never sleeps. So you might like to see how alive the Everglades are at night. Lots of things don’t sleep round here. But, maybe I thought wrong.” He gets up and heads for the door.
“Wait, can I ask you something?” I set my sketchbook and pencils to the side and sit up, pulling my knees to my chest, and resting my chin.
He turns around and nods.
“Why’d it look like you saw a ghost when you walked in here?”
He smiles before answering. “Because I did see one before I walked in. This place has all kinds of dead folks walking the halls at night.” Then he wiggles his fingers and makes a ghost noise, like oooooohhhh.
“Don’t be stupid, Sam. And give me a second to change. I’ll come with you to see the critters. But, do I have to call them that? Can I say animals?” He looks surprised. But, that’s only because he doesn’t know me very well. One thing these boys will learn is that I’ve got a wild streak in me. Plus, I can’t stand my friends having fun without me. So no, I’m not letting Sam have an adventure in the middle of the night if I’m not there to participate.
“But critter just sounds so, critter-like,” he teases me.
“You have such thick southern accents. I didn’t know they had them in Florida.” I point out while I’m looking for my shoes. What do you wear when you go outside at night in the Everglades anyway? I’m already wearing a baggy shirt, so I quickly pull on a pair of thin, black joggers over my pajama shorts and grab my favorite tie-died Bliss and Mischief sweatshirt.
“There are pockets all over Florida, especially up in the panhandle, with original settler families. We’re the ones who still got thick accents. Least, that’s what Mama said. Plus, Gramps came from Louisiana and my Daddy came from Alabama… so I guess we talk like them too.”
I shrug. I guess that makes sense. I have my Dad’s strong Connecticut accent, at least that’s what Ava always tells me.
“You ready?” he asks impatiently.
“Yeah, what are you waiting for?” I ask.
Sam cocks his head at me and grins before leading the way out of my room. I peek around for any ghosts, but it’s just me and Sam. There are candle-shaped LED lights in the hallway and down the stairs, the kind that flicker and mimic real candle flames. So, it’s not as dark or scary as it could be. The entire house, I’ve decided, is vintage glam and I kind of love the aesthetic. Of course, I’ll never tell Mom. She doesn’t get the satisfaction of knowing I might actually like Cullier Manor House.
Sam doesn’t sneak around. He just walks out the front door like he belongs here and here belongs to him. Which I guess it does. The house is so big no one will even hear or notice us leaving out the front door. For a moment I wonder how often my Mom and Aunt Kris snuck around because clearly it’s pretty easy.
When we get out on the porch the summer night air is just as sticky and damp as it is during the daylight hours. I won’t need my sweatshirt, but I carry it in my arms anyway.
“You remember when we were kids and played together on our one and only family vacation?” Sam asks as we walk along the path toward Travis’s shop. There are solar lights dotted here and there in the gardens to illuminate the path.
“Yeah, I guess. My dad wasn’t very happy on that trip. He sort of ruined it for me.” Dad complained the entire vacation about my drunk Uncle Chuck.
“I thought you were so cool. Even for an eight year old, you were like this posh New Yorker,” Sam tells me.
“I thought you were a big dork,” I tease. “Country kids. With all your ‘yes ma’ams’ and ‘y’alls’” I laugh. “But, look at you now, Sam. All grown up.”
“I still say y'all and yes ma’am.” He laughs too, pointing to a patch of trees off in the distance in a big field to the left of Travis’s shop. “There. That’s where the blind is.”
“What exactly is a blind?” I ask. I try not to feel stupid like my earlier encounter with Justine and the side-by-side, or Mrs. Day and the fish, or come to think of it, all my encounters so far.
Sam is nice though and doesn’t laugh at me. “It’s like a tree house with camouflage on it. It lets us sit up high, hidden from the critters. They just go about their business and we can watch them. I’ve been trying to spot a Florida panther for my entire life. Mr. Jenkins said he’s seen one hunting on his ground a few miles from here. They have huge territories spanning hundreds of miles. There are less than two hundred in the wild.” His voice rings with excitement as he talks about the panther sighting. “I’ve had a hard time sleeping since my parents–” he pauses. “So, I come out here instead of sitting awake in my room all night.”
“The panther, it can’t eat us right?” I’m usually not scared of animals. I love going to the Zoo in Central Park and watching the Tigers. But, they are in cages. A panther roaming free, that makes my heart palpitate.
“Course not! I won’t let nothing bad happen to you, cous. I told Aunt Tori that I’d protect you,” he says as we reach the base of the tree.
“Thanks, Sam. So, how do I get up in that thing?” I ask. We are under the tree he’d pointed at. He was right. It’s like a big tree house. But, from where I can see there isn’t any way to get inside of the tree house.
“There’s a secret ladder. Travis hooked it up to voice command. We might be country folks, but we still use technology.” He says with all seriousness. Oh, I can’t wait for this!
He stands right below the tree house and then says into his Apple watch, “Lower the Ladder.” And holy shit, some kind of trap door opens and a ladder comes down.
“Impressive!”
Sam smirks before he starts climbing. “Come on, before we scare the panther.”
We would scare the panther? I highly doubt it. But, I don’t wait for a second invitation. I climb up into the blind right after him. I have no idea what to expect when my head pops up into the small space. It’s dark, but I imagine it’s what a treehouse might be like. A little wooden room with small windows all the way around the edges and two small folding chairs to sit on.
Sam is already sitting on one of the chairs. I clamor in and sit on the other. “Now what?” I whisper.
“Now we wait,” Sam replies. Then he hands me some funny looking sunglasses. I frown at them. But, I put them on anyway and suddenly I can see everything.
“Night vision,” he says proudly. I don’t mind him showing off all his hi-tech gadgets.
“Why is it all green?” I ask as I look around and watch things light up in the glasses.
“I think it has to do with the light luminescence that humans can see, the glasses enhance it. Animals have it naturally and can see in the dark, that’s why they are so active at night. Okay Rian, see that space there, look through it.” He helps me look out a spot in the blind after his quick science lesson. It looks pretty boring to me. Just the big open field with some clumps of grass and few shrubby palms.
We sit there for what seems like forever and it’s so quiet.
I yawn. I’m about to take off my glasses, but there, oh my god. Something is moving.
“Sam, look.” I point into the field. I’m seeing something prowling about in the grass and my blood pressure explodes, filling my ears with a thump. Could it be a panther?
“That’s a skunk,” he says softly.
“A SKUNK?” I shriek whisper.
“Shhhhhh!”
“But, won’t we get sprayed?!”
Sam’s only response is a muffled chuckle.
“I did not come out here to be sprayed by a skunk.” I turn and glare at him. His face is distorted in the lenses of the night vision, and his eyes glow like the moon.
“Rian, we are up in the air. And that cute, little guy is at least twenty yards away, and on the ground.”
Sam tries to reason with me. But, I’m mad. What if that skunk can climb a tree and decides to spray me? My skin and hair will be covered. This outfit would have to go in the trash. I’ll have to cut all my hair off.
Fortunately, the skunk wanders away before I have a complete meltdown. We sit in silence for a while after the skunk sighting. He was right about the Everglades being awake at night. There are owls hooting. Cracks of branches in the woods. Other sounds I can’t identify. The place is alive, that’s for sure. I decide now's as good a time as any to ask Sam something that’s been on my mind.
“Sam, what’s the school like here?”
“It’s fine, I guess. I mean, it’s K-12. There’s about fifty of us. I’m on the football team and baseball too,” he says, still watching through the opening in the blind for the elusive Florida panther.
“Really? There’s only fifty seniors?” I ask. Back home I had at least three-hundred people in my grade.
“No, like, fifty kids in the whole school,” he says.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” I can’t hide it. That’s insane.
“You’ll get to know everyone pretty quick,” he replies. “There’s eighteen girls in the high school. So you can be on any team or join any club you want, not a lot of competition. They are all excited for you to be here.” He pauses and shifts in his seat, then he scratches his cheek, and wipes his hands on his pants– like his palms are sweaty. “I may have told everyone you were coming. I hope you aren’t mad.”
I hold my breath for a minute and think about what I’m going to say. “I’m not mad. But–” I know what I said back home in New York. That every girl would want to be me, or date me, but the more I think about it the more it scares me. “Maybe I’ll just do online school.”
“Online school?”
“Yeah, some of the best schools in the world are online,” I explain. “Why don’t you and Travis do online school or have a private tutor? Obviously your parents could afford it.”
“Why would we do that?” He folds his arms across his chest. “We grew up here with all these folks, Rian. This is our home. This is your home now too.”
“Yeah, sure Sam.” Everyone wants me to say this place is my home, but I’ve only been here for forty-eight hours. I’m not ready to admit defeat and call this place anything other than a crappy summer vacation.
I’m just about to tell Sam I’m tired and we should go back to the house when I notice his body tense up. He’s looking out at something in the field. Probably that awful skunk again. I swear if it takes one step closer to me, I’ll freak out. But, Sam is slowly pulling some equipment from the bag by his feet. A camera. He doesn’t say a word, he just pulls off a lens cover and aims out and takes pictures…
“Oh. My. God. That’s a lion,” I hiss.
“No, Rian. That’s a Florida panther.” His voice is so calm it verges on creepy.
I shiver.
I can hardly believe my eyes so I squint and blink fast, but the animal doesn’t disappear. It’s real and I can’t take my eyes off the beautiful creature as it slinks slowly through the field.
“What’s that next to it?” I ask.
“I’m not sure,” he says and reaches for something else. He sets down the camera and puts up a pair of binoculars up to his eyes.
“Let me,” I try to grab them. He just bats my hand away.
“Excuse you!” I say.
“SHHHhhhhhh!”
“Oh, you did not just shush me!” I whisper.
“Rian, Jesus, stop being so needy. Do you have any idea what we are witnessing?” he says. What an asshole! He slapped me away and now he has the nerve to tell me I’m being needy. I’m going to leave so fast he won’t know what hit him.
“It’s got a baby,” he chokes the words out and hands me the binoculars just as I’m about to try and move this stupid ladder back down. I push them back.
“Liar. If they are so rare–”
“Just look!”
I snatch the binoculars and look out at the panther and the thing rustling around with it. Holy shit. Sam was right. That’s a baby panther. And for fucks sake, it really is so cute. It’s like seriously the cutest thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life.
“Simba,” I whisper.
“Rian, you’re witnessing history. Do you have any idea how special this is?”
Of course I don’t. But I do know this is one of those moments that is better when someone is around to witness it.
“Will the kitten survive?” I ask and watch it chewing on a palm leaf. It’s so adorable I can hardly stand it.
“I don’t know. They are ultra endangered.”
“Then we better enjoy this rare moment,” I say, surprising myself. Hmm. See? I can be a good person if I want to be.
“Amen,” Sam adds.
Sam and I sit in silence and watch the panther and her kitten for a long time. Sam quietly takes pictures with his night vision camera. The panther is sleek and smooth through the green lens of my night vision goggles. This experience is surreal and the more I stare at the panther, the more I feel connected to her. She’s licking her kitten and nuzzling it with such care.
I lift my goggles just to see if I can see her without them, and she jerks her head up and looks at the blind. She stares right through the small window and makes direct eye contact with me. My instinct is to turn away and hide myself because I feel raw and bare and wide open to her. Predator and prey; she could run over here and climb up the tree if she wanted to. She could hold me down and dig her sharp teeth into my neck and rip me apart for daring to watch her and her child. She yowls and growls and purrs before finally winking at me, as if to say, welcome home, Rian. Then she nips at her kitten and together they wander off through the field, disappearing into the darkness like a pair of ghosts.
Wait…
Did she wink at me?
I rub my eyes.
“Sam, I think I’m seeing things. The panther, she winked at me,” I yawn and lay my head down on his shoulder.
Sam gently pats my head. “Cous, that was incredible. I’ve spent years trying to catch a glimpse of a Florida panther. And to see one with a kitten–” he sighs. “I’m so glad you were the one here to see it with me.”
I yawn again and nod my head up and down on his shoulder. “Me too.”
