MUSKY-toe Bait

I strolled out onto a neglected board\]walk, among reeds in a park at the edge of a marsh. It was a bit before 8 a/m in the morning; I was the first of a handful soon to arrive, and restlessly paced the planks. The shallow water was a mixture of orange & green hues, as early sunlight glittered around me, cruising on a slight breeze. I was decked out in slick, dark brown fishing pants with a short-sleeve camo shirt. My reflection wavered at me from the surface; I shoved both hands within my pockets as I soaked in my portrait.

The agile boy’s name was Pyramis. Technically, you have to call yourself a man now I guess. Maybe when I crossed age 20's threshold I’d get used to it. Straw-blonde stubble coated my mouth, lending square features to my chin where genetics had retracted into a beauty stigma. Straight, flimsy hair flapped & tugged around my pinkish neck in the wind, licking at my adam’s apple. Beneath the steeples of my bushy brows, my turquoise eyes felt fragile from lack of sleep. It was the end of the spring Semester.

About then, I heard a car roaming up along the gravel lot. I gazed over, aiming my smooth pointy nose, parting my prominent bottom lip. It was a dark blue Audi bug. Of course Sigmund was here even before the squad’s leader - he never had any excuses. Thank the Divine too, because I didn’t want get stranded with the pompous Jerk who had hired him to help the Outfit today. I could see Siggy’s crossbow in the passenger seat. It was mainly green, with a few murky yellow stripes. His casual invitation was the only reason I had decided to come trekking ~ we having entrenched bonds from tiny childhood. I waved, beginning to head over. A hand-me-down tranquilizer harnessed to my belt, swayed against my hip as I approached.

I got about halfway to the car, & caramel-glossed Siggy [of flamboyant dark hair and eyes] was piling out in a wet-suit minus the flippers, when a bicycle whistled around the corner of trees sporting a string bean rider -- lank green hair whipping behind him. Great. Dudley seemed way too energetic for the morning time. Nobody around here hardly ever invited him to join anything, because he was unapologetically rambunctious. The badger always had a horde of Tall-tales to spin. Well, if worse came to worse, I’d have to put a dart in him to slow that tongue.

The 16-year-old leapt off his still-soaring bike, to which the handle-bars tilted & the wheels snapped right into the Audi’s bumper. I rolled my eyes and Siggy shuffled around checking the scene; “Hey Stupid, you break it you buy it!”

Dudley's buttery eyes trailed toward me as he spoke: "Not like I'd be aimin' fer ya... bike's a stingy rolling stone." By the time the tension boiled down, my defenses spiked higher as the remaining 4 gradually filtered out of the wood-works for this Rendezvous... (minus a Large resource who’d been expected)

***

The Annual 'End-of-school' excursion was about 15 minutes out into the swamp now, yet Dudley’s mouth kept weaving away at a million miles a minute, like a mosquito hell-bent on aggravating some poor soul with its cyclical, buzzing routine.

“Them insecticide guys go ‘round droppin’ Xtreme scorch upon the earth. Arr earth!" He spread his hands to hatch the headline beneath his widow's Peak. “They done them critters in ’long the way! I tell you what they can do, they can go stick their…” Yeeahh, I looked away, as Duds started waving some imaginary, cumbersome hose in place of his own & pretended to swath the countryside in toxic chemicals.

He was proving exactly as infamy entailed him—a Circus performer we couldn’t afford on this High Stake mission. On a normal occasion it could get on one’s nerves, forget how the effects were amplified in this environment.

“Could you knock it off, dude?” I hissed.

“Ahhh yeaah,” He growled. “Ima DEF-net’ly gon’ knock my rocks on thar Fact’ries.”

The lackey wasn’t afraid to Krishna-cross lines over the latest hot-button issue. He was like a wild mustang (short of valiant) that bucked most would-be riders clean off. Therefore he was better known as Buck. I had hoped to high heaven that the jaws of this Oxygen Hog might cramp or something, so I wouldn’t have to reprimand him.

“It seems to me you’re talking about issues not currently at hand,” I injected. “How about tuning in with your antennae more and broadcasting less?” I was trying desperately now to divert a monologue revolving around mail being delivered to wrong addresses.

“But ya jus’ riley gotta unnerstan’ how much it annoys me, Pyram,” he droned on.

Oye, the irony of the ire - why did i think he'd be able to transist that antennae metaphor..?

“Cain’t ’member when to put the stupid flag up or not so when I wanna send out a letter, halfen the time it don’t leave the box.” (Dudley lived on the very outskirts of the small town.)

“Maybe that’s what E-mail is for,” I said more snidely than intended. But he continued.

“Oh yeah, an’ last munth I carried Basil out wi’mee to the mailbox and acciden’ly left the poor feller there. Got to wundrin’ ‘bout him when I missed strokin’ the fuzzy hairs on that bugger.”

Basil. His tarantula.

“So couple hours later, hear this awful loud holler and jump right on outside to see what all the fuss’s about. Got there jus’n time to see the mailman peelin’ off down muh lane in a swirl o’ dirt!” Buck flew into a fit of shrill laughter, “Basil…. sher is… is a… fierce little guy!” he exploded into another round of giggles much deeper and more signature than the first. That’s when you could tell he had really set the proverbial oven to a temperature that was Bakin’ his own heart.

Excellent. Get loud, attract the Nasties we want to avoid, start me thinking about giant spiders, and reduce my awareness to the swamp surroundings all in one move.

I shifted my attention back out into the swamp. There were mounds that had been few from the start, rising like islands, but as we moved deeper there were less and less to be had. Tall, gaunt trees rose up in all directions like groggy skeletons. Half were dead or dying, but those alive poofed like green umbrellas. They spread their canopies like hands that ended in unfurled fingers, overlapping one another in concerted effort to dispel the light, that it might not strain their eyes and cheat them of slumber.

And their success was evident; trunks bleached as bone. However, some light made it down in slits; every thirty steps or so there would be a bundle of light, but overall it was gnarled with shadows. Had it been night everything might be blanketed under a compact fog. This morning, the mist was thin, but relentlessly cloistering.

Whew. No cold black eyes or scaly bumps sticking out above the water—none I could see anyway. Never resting my eyes from the terrain, I gave Buck the best pacifier I could think of -- situational logic. “Alligators are stealthy, dumbass,” I ripped him. “If you don’t hear them before they decide you’ll fit nicely on the dinner table, the rest of us might end up competing for your life in a murderous game of tug-of-war, with you dangling from between its jaws, a wailing, bloody, misshapen object. So unless you’re dying to star as the part of rag doll, I’d suggest you Lissssinnnn...” As I drew out the last word I latched onto my ears and waggled them out and away from my face.

Typically, I was a reserved person, but I wasn’t able to rein in my retorts after about a quarter hour of staving them off.

"If you’re gonna be a noxious fume, Home's back that way!" I indicated, Roaring right up by his drooping nose, close enough to rain meteors of spittle along the surface of his pale skin and casually hidden cheek bones. Oops. Mistake. Nothing short of over-animated for Buck.

One corner of his mouth was already peeling back knavishly. “Ah Pyram, that’s a swell scent you harbor. Ever hear about my rich Scent? I once tangled with the nastiest, baddest crocA-gator ‘round these here parts in a Wrestlin’ match. Had the bastard SWIMMING FOR A NEW COAST Affer wun round!!! Matter O‘factlike ain’t any one of ’em ever shows their snout within a Mile radius of me now.”

By now he was curling into a rueful grin. It was iffy whether he really knew what a radius was. However, seemed he had used it properly in this tall tale. Now we weren’t wrestling alligators or doing anything directly violent out here in their waters. But our mission was totally one of those Don’t-try-this-at-home-Kids! style of shenanigan. When boredom talks, stupidity answers. (not a problem unique to Grapplunge, Florida). If that morning someone had told me this day would mark the first in an existence where I would never again be able to afford true relaxation, I would have winced. Yet I wouldn’t seek to recover my life the way it was prior to the excursion, for anything.

Dudley stopped slogging through the grungy waters, scanning the expanse of marshland for dramatic effect. Oh the suspense. What could he be rearing to add now?

I nearly halted alongside him, positively *thrilled as I watched the other 4 members of our party wading several yards ahead, making it known who the stragglers were. (or perhaps I owed my dawdling to the aura of a certain butthead in the thick of the Pack). We could afford to trek on foot, because gators gravitate towards sunlight during the morning when they're stiff. Nevertheless, the water was getting deeper; I sensed it stretching up from mid-shin to grab across our knees.

Sounds of our fellows’ sloshing pierced the ghostly calm and sent ripples through stagnant pools that may well have not stirred for years. The action parted the frosting of moss, wayward drifting upon the water’s surface. We took the back way in, near the vacant liquor store so no bayou patrollers would spot us. This thin strip of wasteland was private property (but I was tight with the owner).

Even so, it was unusual not to hear chatter among the wildlife. Wow, not even a frog fart: eerie… With no wind to speak of, standing there beside green boy I felt even more helpless against his untamed imagination.

Buck poised, contemplating the scene as if he truly remembered the glorious battle that struck fear into the hearts of every alligator far and wide, setting their scales to rattle with dread. He bellowed, "QUAaAKE!" he Hollered, "In awe of my might! IZZ there one who belly-Hee*eaves to possess more Pow'A than rests hitherton with Moi, smitin' impregnable brotherhoods HENCE??” (oh, right beautiful under-Staining of the ancient vocab there).“If it BE a savvy adversary crawls among ye, bring him FORTH that he should claim his rightful place -- lest I be declared superior over thou and all thy kindred.”

Ah, how contemporary a challenge—their forefathers will set up the catapults and arrive with a Spouting of Trumpets. No reptiles stepped forth to thumb their nose at his kingly proposal. My determination to deflate him had died a horrible death, and I decided to stop feeding the hedonist.

Any restraint involving volume and absurdity had been set aside during this particular performance, so the Caterwauling finally bled enough indignation from our group’s other Members. Even as the other 4 twisted their bodies to scold him for the reckless banter, he turned towards me, face aglow, saying, “See? Nuthin to worry about ’cept fer the animals al'ruddy prezent,” his palm gestured at the party ahead.

They all lambasted him in a barely coherent fluster of remarks. This might have destabilized the heart of your everyday type, but not this ribald rascal. Duds went so far as to crank swift fists against his eye-sockets to signify they were crybabies, & shrugged back into a pair of bowed shoulders attached to a gaunt 6′3" neck.

“I Told y'all we shouldn’t have brought him along!” I overheard Dallas harshly remind us all. The rest just nodded, mumbled, and also told me to quit riling him up. I rolled my eyes their way and pointed at myself incredulously: “Hey, y'all have it easy: he finds my mannerisms particularly humorous."

Then all but sprinting against the water’s resistance simply to accrue a decent jog, my torso took on a heavy spray-line. Bubbles frothed around me from below as my feet churned slick mud and soggy branches. For me, about 76 kilograms but a few inches short of 6 feet tall, it was certainly a sweat to avoid stumbling. I forced several strides (plus a jumpscare of ropy tree branch colliding into my shoulder -- ) and managed to account for the ground Dud had delayed me.

The mission to fetch exotic party fuel (tradition of the school’s popular Crowd) had grown increasingly "off-the-map" in recent years, & was headed this time by their Ringleader, Dallas. As known to some of us, Dal Capone. A recent relationship with a ditsy little girl named Penny had bolstered his ranks through an unprecedented roof of prestige. Already possessing charismatic qualities of smooth-tailored & upbeat outlook, he could well function without a sweetheart in the picture: all social symbols belying his true nature.

Brashness twinkled in his neatly spiked black hair, which grew perpetually infused with product.

I wish the Ivy League wannabe, merely was a pretty boy puffing up his own Hot’air balloon - no, he was a Thug.