"I'm alive". He exhaled the words slowly after breathing in the briny air. Jason Stark meandered his way out of the mangrove forest in his 18 foot Carolina Skiff. As he reached the mouth of the back bay and it opened slightly like a lover kissing the gulf, he pondered over his surroundings thinking, "this is the part of the story where the writer would describe the natural beauty of the area, its history, and followed shortly thereafter with a short biography on the main character." However, Jason reveled in the simplicity that this was a place where brackish met salt, where reality turned into a dream, and where the briny sea air did not lightly kiss your cheek, it passionately caressed your soul.
Jason Stark had fished these waters since he was "thigh high to a house cat" as his mother used to describe units of measurement when he was a child. He knew the topographical nodules that poked and prodded from the sea floor. He knew the current, the way it swayed and swooned with elegance and ferocity that is only known by the sea. He knew the best hiding place when an approaching front screeched at him from his port bow. Or, more realistically, when he decided to take an out of season snook home for dinner. He knew that 3 miles offshore there was a spot where you could catch what the locals call "reef donkeys" by the hundreds, where bonita and other pelagics went to hide from ravenous snow birds (tourists to the locals). Most of all he knew where he was free. Not many people can claim to know of such a place. Not without the assistance of spiritual lubricant that burns on the way down or smoke that engulfs the senses. But Jason Stark knew, sober as a judge. "A place in the sea far away but ever nearer to me" as a thoughtful poet might describe it. Jason was no poet but something about the pinks, oranges, and purples of the dawn sky made him all mushy inside. He was full of pride, knowing that he was really working for a living and full of work ethic that is instilled only in those who select the sea as their home office. His solace and philosophical disposition was short lived as he idled next to his first row of crab traps. "Time to make the doughnuts" he said aloud with no one but a somewhat pissy cormorant to hear him.
Jason knew the line of work he had chosen would likely send him to an early hunchback position by the time he was in his early fifties. It didn't matter right now though because right now, he was "25 and alive" he chuckled at the thought, he thought for a moment that "25 and alive" sounded more like a marketing slogan for an escort service. And so there it began, he pulled over the straps of his oil skins and took the monotonous stance of a batter that was told to take a walk, and began the process he had begun almost an entire life ago. The first pot line came up full of soggy salad that smelled of natural decomposing plant matter, or a wet fart, depending on how you described to your lady or your buddy. The white and orange cork bobbed at the surface like a bloated marshmallow as he gaffed the line to put it into the pot puller. The soggy salad was now at it feet as the puller gently stripped it away from the main line. That smell, the stinking ass rotten salad smell, it was the only thing he disliked about this particular line of work. A smell he would become ever so familiar with as the day wore on into night. The smell that would burn his nostrils and forever cement itself into his senses, a smell that he would long for as minutes turned to weeks and his days turned to night.
"How you gon get any puss smelling like one?" Rusty Blackwell said as Jason unloaded his catch. "Been a long time since I thought I'd smell a puss like that, you smelling ripe boy." Jason gave his obligatory chuckle as he had always done when Rusty made off color comments that could make a grown man writhe in social discomfort. Jason checked to see if anyone else had heard Rusty's "ol puss jokes", it was safe. Jason replied "Yeah smellin is all about you'd do isn't it? "Shit I'd do more than that given she was proper enough boy." Rusty replied. "What you gonna do Rusty?, no teeth, pecker don't work, and you look like a gremlin shit out a bald gorilla." Rusty cooed and cawed like he always did and replied "shit, I'd gum er, gum er real goot." Jason couldn't help but laugh at Rusty's ever present willingness to degrade himself. "Goin down to the harbor tonight Rusty?", "might be some old trashcan waiting to get gummed tonight". Rusty replied "shit boy don't I always, beer don't drink itself son." I figure the good lord put me on this earth to regulate the amount of beer going to and fro and I don't wanna be blasphemous by not holdn my commandments in check." Jason chuckled, "fair enough", "I'll see you down there you ol bastard." "Aight then, don't be knocking over any trashcans till I get there". Ever since word got round that Rusty had made it with Margie Dawson about 5 years ago, Jason had coined the term "trashcan". A trashcan represented a hole where you put everything you didn't want, things that were decaying, old and of no use, kind of like the seed ol Rusty dumped in Margie that fateful night 5 years ago. Jason chuckled to himself again as he thought of rusty, humpty dumptying away on ol trashcan and thought fondly of how he could gather enough ammo in thirty seconds to give Rusty shit for 30 years.
What Jason hadn't realized was the stillness of the night as he offloaded his stone crab claws. It was too still. Not stillness like a big cat stalking its prey or the stillness of a high schooler sneaking in after curfew. It was much worse. It was a stillness that could only be described as complete. Jason shrugged off the feeling and went back to offloading those crab claws that morphed into dollar bills before his very eyes. He was not the only person to see things morph into others that night. Across the small channel of the marina sat two beady eyes, sunken deep in their sockets, savoring the scene as it played out before him. The boat man began to see things morphing into others too. A healthy young man morphing into a heap of dead flesh, a canvas of tight skin withering to prune, and the twinkle of life fluttering like a match to the wind. The boat man observed, profiled, and locked away what he'd seen. He now had enough fire in his belly to start planning the execution of what he deemed as "honest work".
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In Osprey, a spittle of a town, just south of Sarasota, FL, Frank Bingham (Franklin Dennis Bingham) to his mother, and Don Mcreedy (Donald Wesley Mcreedy) to his mother, sat and looked at each other over a humorously large pile of what looked like court documents to the average passerby. In the little hole in the wall joint where they shared ownership for the past year or so, called Pelican Bay Café. Frank broke the heavy silence and stated curtly "I'm getting really tired of this shit Don." Don look at him almost empathetically, "That's the job Frank, and it's a bitch I'll tell you that". "Throwing darts at a bucket of yogurt. That's what it's been like, I feel it too." Frank and Don were both pressing into their 40's but held the physique of athletes. They were from the same area, Frank from Maryland and Don from DC. It, quite honestly, was about all they had in common at first. This comradery of birthplace had been a natural adhesive between the two of them but as they pondered the task before them, they wondered if the adhesive still had enough "stick" to hold them together. Frank, a retired army "specialist" (he never would say exactly what he specialized in), had a tangible, silent resolve that let most people know beforehand that he was "not the right one" if they got a little hot to trot. At just a hair under 6 foot and about 210 of corded muscle, if the initial perception from a shit starter didn't work, his stature sealed the deal. Don, also a retired military man, sniper to be exact, was a bit taller, a bit lankier, and a hell of a lot goofier, was about 6'2 185, but the same corded muscle exposed itself through his white tee shirt just a little closer to the bone. Neither man wanted to be here, they had the scent of their prey and they wanted to hunt. They wanted to track, pursue, subdue, and extract the filth that they had been following for what seemed like an eternity. Their trail had run cold over a year ago in Mississippi. They had been reassigned to Florida, and other than the weather, there wasn't much to write home about. They enjoyed their new lives as restaurant owners. Of course they weren't really restaurant owners but they prepared for each assignment the same way, similar to how a movie star might prepare for a role. They immersed themselves into the lives that they had been told they had to lead. The objective, always the same, infiltrate, interrogate, extract. They didn't know if other teams were in Florida, to their knowledge, they were the only ones. There were others stationed around Louisianna and off the gulf coast of Texas, but no others in the sunshine state. One thing was for certain about Frank and Don. They were not typical fare. They looked different, acted different, and just were........different. The look of them almost immediately confirmed this to anyone that pondered their reason for being. They didn't look like locals, they didn't look like snow birds, they looked just as their mutual job titles had defined them "consultants". "
"What a pussy word" Frank would always say. "It makes us sound like we are fucking accountants". Don would always play off Frank obvious distaste. "Just add whatever you want to the front of it man". "Titty consultants, vaginal consultants, gimme a beer consultants, whatever you want Frank, just try to have some fun with it". "Bullshit" Frank groaned. This was the way it typically went, the odd couple. Don trying to cheer up a grumpy Frank. Frank pissing on Don's attempts and Don shutting the hell up. It was a unique relationship. Neither of them had the gall to call it a friendship but after spending years together, they couldn't help but enjoy each other's company. Frank and Don had met several years ago now, at the same office for the same job. Frank didn't care too much for Don at first, he felt as though Don looked a little bit like a Calvin Klein pussy. Don on the other hand was taken immediately with Frank and thought he looked like the best friend he never had. That day would forever be a life line between both of them. A bond forged in "privileged information".
