Story by Steve Vire,
Local photographer Sam Wilson

Chapter Eight, Alligator Alley:  

It had seemed like we waited for hours for this ride, but my watch don’t lie, it was only 30 minutes. Big Chad said that the Florida sun was beating down hot enough to make the old well diggers ass hot. Now, this ride was already starting off a little weird. As if we hadn’t had any weird rides yet. We hustled to catch up to this beat up old red rusty GMC pickup, about a ’65 model, I guess. Big Chad was limping from the blisters on his feet but kept on hustling anyway. There was a young guy in the back sitting in the bed of the pickup with a duffle bag, he just waved at us and said “Hey”, as we were walking up on the passengers side to talk to the driver. He was a middle-aged dude about 45 or so, had on one of those cheap white t-shirt ribbed vest tank tops, wet with a sweat stain on the chest, a half-smoked cigarette hanging out of the side of his mouth with over an inch of ashes still hanging on, and a 3-day beard. Shattered glass particles were in the seat and on the floor of the cab, and there was about a four-foot 2 x 4 laying in the floor, which, along with everything else, made us think twice about taking this ride. Had he stole this truck, bashed the windows in or what? Why was the guy riding in the back instead of up front, was he scared of this dude? A million things were going thru our minds when all of a sudden the guy spoke up.  

“Where ya goin’?” he asked, not bothering to remove the cigarette while talking. The ashes held on.  

“Fort Myers,” I said. “You goin’ that far?”  

“Yep, I am trying to get to Alligator Alley, then go across to Miami.” he replied. “I’m broke and need some gas money, you got any you can pitch in? I got robbed last night while I was asleep in my truck in Alabama. If you don’t have none, I’ll give you a ride anyway. That guy in the back there is from New York, he pitched in some to help. Said he wanted to ride back there to get some fresh air.”  

“Sure we can chip in a little, we ain’t got much though.” we lied because we sure didn’t want to get robbed for gas money. Gas cost about .36 cents a gallon for regular, so Big Chad fished out a dollar, and I pitched in a dollar fifty, so together we gave the dude $2.50 for gas, or roughly 8 gallons or so worth. That was more than enough to pay our way to Fort Myers.  

“Thanks, you guys, that will get me all the way to the alley, and part way across.,” he said. My names Chuck, by the way.”  

He stuck his hand out. We shook hands and introduced ourselves, he nodded and then finally held the cigarette out the window and knocked off the ashes. This guy was slurring his words pretty bad and really acted like he was drunk or stoned or something.  He had a recent wound on his head with a bloody handkerchief on the seat next to him, looked like he had been dabbing at his forehead for awhile. We threw our bags in the back with the New York dude, and after sweeping some of the glass out of the seat with our hands, careful not to cut ourselves, we climbed into the cab of the pickup. Chuck took off, shifting gears perfectly, checking the rear view, not driving like he was drunk at all. That was a relief, anyway. This old truck had “3 on the tree” so it wasn’t uncomfortable at all for someone to sit in the middle on the old bench seat. At least there was no gearshift poking you in the legs and all.  

“What happened for you to get robbed?” we asked, curious about his bad luck, and also seeking some verification for our own comfort levels to be boosted somewhat.  

“Well, I was asleep in my truck at a rest area around Dothan, Alabama, and I guess about  2:30AM I heard a helluva crash and woke up, but by the time I got awake enough to  figure out what was going on, these 2 rednecks had pulled me out of the truck by the legs  and started beating the shit out of me, saying “Give us the money or we’ll kill you,  motherfucker!”  

“So I gave them my wallet and they stopped beating me long enough to see what was in it. I only had about $40 but it was the last $40 I had to my name.  

They said. “Now give us the keys to the truck, we’re taking it and leaving your ass here.”  

I reached in my pocket like I was getting the keys out. They didn’t realize the key was still in the truck, I always left it in the ignition when I was sleeping, in case I had to wake up and make a quick getaway. I kept all my other keys on a ring in my pocket so I pulled them out and pitched them way over to the side in the grass.”  

“You sum’bitch you could’ve just handed them to us,” they said, and acted like they were going to hit me again, but instead they went over to look in the grass where I threw the keys. 

“When they did that, I ran and jumped in the truck, started her up and took off like a bat out of hell. This old truck won’t start everytime, but hell I thought I had no choice, they might’ve killed me there at the rest area. This time she fired right up. They started yelling at me to stop, but hell no I kept going I had her floored. They jumped in their car, and took off after me, I really don’t know why they did, and I don’t know why they didn’t catch up to me cause this thing will only do about 85, I guess they just said fuck it, let him go, or either they were almost out of gas and had to stop. Probably bought some gas and beer with my last goddamn $40. I ain’t seen ’em since and I don’t want to ever see ’em again. See that 2 x 4 in the floor? They left that behind, that’s what they used to bust in the passenger’s side window and I guess they used a rock to bust the driver’s side at the same time. I don’t know what they were hitting me in the head with, but whatever it was it hurt like hell.”  

“Damn, that sounds like a nightmare,” I said.  

“I wished it was, cause I was sleeping so good, I thought I might have been dreaming until they hit me up the side of the head,” he said. “I damn sure woke up then!”  

The sun was going down and it was starting to look like we might not make it to Ft.  Myers before dark. It didn’t matter, this ride with Chuck was taking us all the way, so we just kicked back and relaxed a little. Checking my watch it is 6:10PM and we are in Sarasota. Big Chad checked the map and said we have about 75 miles to go to Fort Myers. About halfway there as dusk was falling it started to rain, even though the sun was still out a little bit. There was a little rainbow off to the side, really a pretty sight to see.  

“There’s our damn pot-o-gold, right over there” I told Big Chad.  

“Yeah, right.” he said. “There might be a port-a-pot over there, but that’s about it.”  

Chuck chimed in, “If we did get a pot-o-gold, some son of a bitch would come rob us and take it away from us anyway. Hey, maybe we ought to pull over and let that poor motherfucker in the back get up here with us so he won’t have to be in the rain. We can’t roll the windows up anyway, but it’s got to be better than sittin’ in the rain back there.”  

He pulled over and the poor guy thought he was being kicked out until Chuck told him he only stopped to let him up front out of the rain. Then we were all four sitting in the truck, holding a bag in our lap to keep it out of the rain, except Chuck.  

“Where’s your stuff?” asked Big Chad, we hadn’t even noticed whether Chuck had a bag or not.  

“Bastards took that too, had my bag in the floorboard with my clothes in it and another pair of shoes, and some personal items and what not.” he said. “Since they took that, now all I got left in this world is this old truck and the clothes on my back. The way I look at it, they can rob me now if they want to, cause you can’t get nothin’ from nothin’. I don’t want to lose my old truck though. I need her to get me to my sister’s in Miami.”  

It was almost totally dark now, I figured Kenton had pretty much given up on us making it all the way to Ft. Myers. We saw a sign that said North Fort Myers 5 miles so we told Chuck to let us out there at the ramp, we could walk down to a gas station and call Kenton. Chuck pulled over as close to the off ramp as he could.  

“Be careful you guys, and thanks for the gas money. That’s really gonna help a lot.” he said, yet another cigarette with ashes hanging out of the side of his mouth.  

“No, man, you really helped us out, we thought we weren’t going to make it to Fort Myers, but you saved our asses,” I said. “You be careful, and don’t go to sleep in any rest areas for awhile.”  

“I won’t,” he laughed, “But if I have to, I’ve got this 2 x 4 somebody left for me, I’ll just beat the hell out of ’em with that.”  

We couldn’t help but feel sorry for Chuck. In the beginning we thought we couldn’t trust him, but over time and now here at the end of this ride, we realized we were wrong even to think there would be any problems. But you never know. Chuck could have took that 2 x 4 and rolled us just the same as he was rolled, but he didn’t. Something came over me right about then. I guess I may have thought about old Jack the construction worker who wanted to do good deeds for others when he could. I didn’t know if Big Chad would feel the same as I did, but I just pulled out my wallet and took out a $5 bill.  

“Take this,” I said to Chuck, “Maybe it will help you get a shirt, some food, a pack of cigarettes, or whatever.” Without saying a word Big Chad reached in his pocket, pulled out a five and did the same. Chuck tried to refuse, but we kept insisting, so finally he took the money and thanked us over and over again. Then he turned away and as he was wiping his eyes he said, “Damn cigarette smoke gets to me all the time”.  

“Hey, you just take care, man,” I said, and we shook hands again. We both wished the New Yorker good luck and waved at them as they drove away into the night toward Alligator Alley and Miami.  

“Well, there goes $10,” I said, “but it feels good.”  

“Right, it does”, said Big Chad. “Reminds me of what my mama always told me and that is to do the right thing. You gotta make sure you don’t miss out on any blessings the good Lord might think about sending your way.”  

“Ain’t that the truth,” I said. “We just might need a few before we get back home.” 

It had finally stopped raining. Steam was coming off the pavement as we took off walking to the first gas station we saw, and it had a pay phone outside on the wall. I dropped in a dime and called Kenton’s number. He answered.  

“Hey Kenton, we made it,” I said with relief.  

“Yeah, cool, where are you?” he asked.  

“Looks like we are at a Phillips 66 station at the exit for North Fort Myers,” I said. “I can’t see the street names.”  

“It don’t matter, I know where you are,” he said, “I’ll be there in about 10 minutes.”  

He pulled up in a blue Ford station wagon, and we tossed our bags in the back and climbed in after many handshakes, hugs, and pats on the back. I hadn’t seen my cousin in over a year since his family had moved from Kentucky to Fort Myers. Now he had this mullet haircut and a beard, with a long ponytail. I guess he was about 18 years old now, fresh out of high school.  

“Damn, I can’t believe you guys made it. I had my doubts,” Kenton said pulling out on the street.  

“We did too, especially around Tampa we didn’t think we were going to get a ride that lasted more than 10 or 15 minutes,” said Big Chad. “We’ll have to tell you about some of these rides we got.”  

“All in good time,” said Kenton, as he whipped a joint out of his shirt pocket. “Right now, you motherfuckers better be ready to PARTY!”  

I looked over at Big Chad. At exactly the same time we both said “Fuck it, fuck it all, Big Chad!” and laughed our asses off.  

Chapter Nine, Party Time:  

We got to Kenton’s house and literally fell out on the living room floor. We were so tired, wet, and hungry partying was not high on the priority list at the time. The priorities were more like, shower, dry clothes, food. Kenton’s parents weren’t home from work yet, they had stopped by somewhere to eat on the way. We just lay in the floor and regrouped a little, then took a shower and cleaned up. Man, that shower felt good. During the summer in Florida, even the cold water is almost hot. We were used to that cold Kentucky well water running at about 55 degrees, not the 80 degree “cold” water coming out of the faucets here in Florida. But it was refreshing anyway after the ordeal we had been thru there’s a lot to be said for soap and water. After we changed clothes in Kenton’s bedroom, we came out and his parents had gotten home from work etc. and his dad was reading the paper.  

He put the paper down and said, “Well, have you boys had a good trip so far?”  I said, “Well I guess so, it certainly hasn’t been dull and boring.”  

“No, I guess not.” he said. “I don’t know how comfortable I would feel hitchhiking this day and time, you know it used to be a major mode of transportation especially back in the wartime, anybody with a uniform was automatically given a ride. I remember my mom and dad talking about picking up servicemen all the time that were either leaving for the war or coming back from the war. When I was in the army and coming home, you didn’t have to worry about getting there, people would just pull over and give us a ride when they saw that uniform. But times sure are different now. Everybody’s against that Vietnam war and I bet with a uniform on you would just about guarantee you would NOT get picked up the way everybody’s thinking these days. That’s a shame. Plus you got all these crazies out there running around. You didn’t run into any of them did you?”  

I didn’t really want to answer that question, because I knew if I told the truth, they would probably call my parents in Ky. and they would get all freaked out and try to get us on a bus or something and try to make us come home. We damn sure didn’t want that to have to deal with.  

“No, no it’s really been pretty uneventful, everybody we’ve caught a ride with has been really nice. Kinda tough getting thru Tampa though, seemed like we never could get a ride to take us more than 10 or 15 miles. But we made it OK,” I said.  

Kenton’s Mom asked how my folks were doing back home, since my mother’s sister was Kenton’s grandmother, they asked questions about his grandmother and grandfather as well. I related what I knew, which was not much, cause being away at college I didn’t keep up with the family gossip, which was fine with me.  

“What are the plans for you all tonight?” asked Kenton’s dad, still flipping thru the paper.    

“We’re going to grab a burger or something and go hang out with some friends,” said Kenton. “Don’t wait up for us, cause we may not come home at all, or if so, it will be extremely late.”  

“No problem,’ his dad said. “Just go in the den when you get here so you don’t wake anybody up. We have to leave for a breakfast meeting early tomorrow morning at the Chamber of Commerce, so we won’t be here anyway.”  

Kenton said, “We may crash here for a little while in the morning and then they want to go to the beach and hang for a little while tomorrow and then they have to leave early the next morning, so we’ll be back here tomorrow night, then I’ll get up and take them out to the interstate.” 

“OK, well that will work, and if we don’t see you boys, I hope you all have fun and come back and see us if you’re ever down this way again,” said Kenton’s dad, knowing full well that would never happen. “Say hi to your Mom and Dad when you get back home.”  

“There’s some sandwich meat and bread here if you want something to eat, just help yourself,” said Kenton’s mom. “Cokes, cookies and lemonade in the fridge if you want.”  

“OK, thanks so much, we will,” I said. “It’s so nice of you all to put up with us for a couple of days. We really appreciate it.” Big Chad echoed my sentiments.  

They went out to the den to watch TV and left us in the kitchen making sandwiches.  Kenton got on the phone and called some friends to stir up a party at somebody’s house or apartment somewhere. Big Chad and me just chomped down on a couple of fat sandwiches and wolfed down an entire bag of chips, while we waited for Kenton to get off the phone. Hey, I said we were hungry and I was serious. We chugged some sodas to get a little caffeine and sugar in the system.  

“OK, I’ve got us a little party lined up, we can stop by the liquor store on the way and load up. I’ve got a bag of weed and there’s no telling what the others may have, but I promised you all a party, and by God we’re going to make one!” said Kenton.  

“Cool, man. We are at your mercy. You lead the way.” said Big Chad. We finished off the sandwiches and cleaned up the kitchen a little bit before heading out the door.  

“Don’t you need to tell your folks we’re leaving?” I asked, since that was a requirement at my house, and probably at Big Chad’s as well.  

“Hell no, they don’t give a damn anyway, they’ll figure it out,” said Kenton with the door slamming behind him. “Come on, motherfuckers!” he said, looking back thru the screen door at us. We piled in the old Ford station wagon and headed out. Kenton wasted no time reaching in his shirt pocket and firing one up and we passed it around on the way to the liquor store. It was some really good shit too. We pulled up into the liquor store parking lot in a fog.  

“Man, that shit packs some punch now, don’t it?” said Big Chad, kinda coughing and choking, his eyes watering. “Gimme another hit off that.”  

“Yeah, you might say that” said Kenton, “it’s called sensimilla, and has no seeds. They say once you smoke sens, nothing you do will make sense. Ha, ha, hang tight, I’ll be back, what do you all want to drink? I’m in for $10 but you’ll have to chip in for whatever you want to be drinkin’ tonight.”  

“Case of beer!” I said.  

“Southern Comfort,” said Big Chad. “And some good whiskey, any kind.” 

I said, “Motherfucker, good whiskey is good whiskey, not just any kind of whiskey.  There is shitty whiskey, too ya know.”  

“Oh, fuck you,” said Big Chad. “Wild Turkey, then.”  

“It’d be the best you ever had,” I said.  

“Think so?” asked Big Chad. “I’ll never go back to dogs.”  

“Yeah, yeah, fuck you too,” I said, Kenton laughing his ass off listening to us.  “You fuckers already ain’t got no sense,” he said. “Gimme some money.”  

We both gave him $10 so he went in while we sat and waited in the car. Kenton came back with a case of Budweiser, a fifth of Jack Daniels, a pint of Southern Comfort and a pint of Wild Turkey 101.  

“Think this’ll hold you till we get a rope?” he asked.  

“Yeah, I think so man. If we drink all this we may be down for a while,” I said.  

“Well, that’s not all,” said Kenton as he was backing out of the parking lot. He whipped out another joint from his shirt pocket and fired it up.  

“I need me a shirt with a pocket like that,” I said. “Just joints coming flying out all the time.”  

“No shit.” said Big Chad.  

Kenton just grinned and fired it up and took off down the road toward his friend’s place.  Without a care in the world we drove to the south side of Fort Myers to hook up with Kenton’s buddies at their apartment. When we got there, we went in, and Kenton made the introductions to his friends, Ricky and Kyle. He knew Ricky from some landscaping business he worked for part-time, and Kyle was Ricky’s girlfriend. They seemed like really nice people and immediately started concentrating on the partying. Ricky broke out this big piece of bamboo about 2 1/2 feet long and 2 inches in diameter from under the couch. At the bottom, it had a small piece of bamboo like the end of a cane fishing pole that was about 3 inches long sticking out of it at an angle. This thing was obviously homemade from Florida bamboo. Ricky got a glass of water and some ice out of the refrigerator and poured it in the bamboo. Then he got a little bowl-shaped piece of lead he had fashioned out of a big fishing sinker with a hole in the middle out of the coffee table drawer and stuck it on the end of the small piece of bamboo. He then pulled out a little brown chunk of something kinda looked like dirt, put it in the little lead bowl, lit it up and started toking on the bamboo pipe. 

“Here you go,” he said handing the pipe to anyone who would take it. His girlfriend Kyle beat everybody to it and started hitting it herself. Big Chad and I said nothing, cause we hadn’t been around a device like that, much less smoking dirt.  

“What is that shit?” asked Kenton, as he was hitting it himself and started coughing his head off. “God, you have to take it easy, whatever it is!”  

“Brown Moroccan hash,” said Ricky, laughing at Kenton. “This shit came straight from the Middle East. My cousin was in the Navy over there and he came home about 6 months ago. Wanted to make some money when he got here, so he took a chance and stuck two bricks of this shit inside the speakers of his Bose stereo system and then screwed them back together and the Navy shipped all his stuff over on a ship, while he flew back to the states. He said he was sweating bullets when he went to the dock in Norfolk to pick up his belongings in case they found it, but since you’re sitting here smoking it, I guess you know the answer to that already. He cut me a chunk off of it and gave it to me just for the hell of it.”  

“Wow, that’s taking a chance now,” I said, I had chugged about 3 or 4 beers in the 30 minutes we had been there and done a shot or two of Jack as well. Adding this shit to the mix, I mean it just about flattened me. About that time Ricky says to me, “Your cousin says you play guitar, I’ve got one here, why don’t you play us a tune.”  

Now if anybody reading this is a musician, you’ll know what I’m saying when I tell you that I wasn’t in any shape to even hold a guitar, much less play and sing. But what the hell, I’d never see these people again, so I said OK. This guy Ricky then pulled out a Fender Stratocaster and mid-size Peavey amp, a mike, stand and all and hooked everything up, put the mike stand in the middle of the living room floor, handed me the Strat and said, “Go for it, man”.  

I thought to myself, well I’m basically on another planet here, but so are they, so I started playing “Come Monday” by Jimmy Buffet. I started getting into the zone and remembered all the words exactly right for a change and made it all the way thru the song. Three or four more friends of Kenton’s showed up and everybody was clapping and saying, play another one! So I did some old James Taylor songs, Fire and Rain and Steamroller and luckily, I made it thru them too. This Kyle chick had started watching me and telling me I was really good etc. and this made Ricky kinda pissed off. I made no moves whatsoever toward this girl, I mean Ricky was about 6’2″ and weighed about 280, had on some old blue-jean overalls and no shirt, he had some flaming red hair and beard,  kinda looked like Charlie Daniels on crack and steroids. No, I didn’t want to mess with this guy. Since it was his guitar and stuff, I decided I needed to end my part of the concert anyway. So, I handed it off to him.  

“Here,” I said, “I’m fresh out of tunes. I need to get another beer, a shot of whisky, and see if I can chase down that bong again. You play us one.” 

Ricky gave me this shit-eatin’ look, grabbed the guitar from me and started ripping into Bachman-Turner Overdrive’s “Taking Care of Business”. This guy wasn’t bad, but not good either, and he was just beating the ever-loving shit out of that guitar, I couldn’t stop thinking he was wishing that guitar was my head. He banged on the guitar for about 30 minutes before he got tired and then they cranked up the stereo.  

We had been there a couple of hours, and you needed a knife to cut thru the smoke just to see who was across the room. Big Chad and I were hoping some single loose chicks would show up, but everybody who was there had a damn boyfriend with them, or one that was coming later on to join in the party. So we just shot the shit with people and mingled around sharing whatever they were smoking if they offered, and kept on drinking beer etc. Big Chad had started working hard on that bottle of Southern Comfort and like me, wasn’t feeling any pain at all. We walked over and sat down in the floor and leaned up against the wall where we could observe the people there and take in the scene.  

“Well, whaddya think about it, Big Chad?” I asked.  

“Wow,” he replied shaking his head. “I was hoping Kenton would be wanting to party, and man, that’s all we’ve done since we’ve been here.” While he was talking, that chick Kyle was sitting in Ricky’s lap, she had on this little Navy looking chick outfit red, white, and blue pantsuit with these very short shorts that were hiked up so high things were almost hanging out, and she had Ricky in a big, huge lip-lock.  

Chad says, “Look at that, now why in the hell can’t that be me. I would trade places with him in a heartbeat. Goddamn, I swear she looks delicious! You can quote me on this if you want to, but I think I would crawl ten miles thru rain, sleet, and snow just to hear her piss in a tin can over a long-distance telephone.”  

“Yeah, I know what you mean,” I said. “You know man, we probably need to leave here pretty soon, I don’t think I can look at that much longer without doing something stupid and then old Ricky would beat the hell out of all of us.” Kenton came over and sat down with us, he was carrying around the bottle of Jack and it was almost gone.    

“So, what do you think, can we throw a party down here or what?”  

“Yep, no doubt you can.” I said. “You have some cool friends, for sure. And I must say, the scenery is exceptional, I would like to do more than just take a picture, though.”  

Big Chad chimed in, “Right, and I’ll tell you now, if you took a picture of that, I’d have to eat it.” He couldn’t take his eyes off Kyle and those shorts. Hell, none of us could.  

People were coming and going, passing out on the couch, we were just about falling over leaning up against the wall, and Kenton said, “You want to just go back to the house and crash? You guys have to be tired after hitchhiking all day. Besides, we have to go to the beach tomorrow, you gotta be up for that.” 

Big Chad said, “Yeah, let’s go. Ricky’s not going to pass out anytime soon so we might as well.”  

We told everybody we had a good time, shook hands, said our “nice to meet you’s” to everyone and staggered out into the night to get in Kenton’s station wagon and go to his house. I mean nobody was in any shape at all to be driving, but Kenton said he could make it, not to worry. I don’t see how, but he did it. After we got in the car, right before we pulled away, Kenton looked at us and grinned, reached in his shirt pocket and pulled out another joint.  

“Son of a bitch, it’s that magic shirt pocket again!” yelled Big Chad. We all laughed and looked at each other. Kenton wasted no time and fired it up and drove off. After we smoked that joint, Big Chad and I fell out in the car and slept all the way to Kenton’s house. When we got there Kenton woke us up and reminded us not to make any noise because we didn’t want to wake anybody up. We started creeping into the den and I ran into this table, knocking it over and caught this big ass glass lamp right before it hit the floor and broke into a million pieces. Kenton ran over and grabbed it away from me.  

“Damn it,” he said, “Be quiet, we don’t want them in here all over us asking questions!”  “Sorry, sorry,” I said, “You might say I am a little fucked up here.”  

“A little?” said Big Chad, trying his best to keep from laughing out loud.  

“Come on, just lay down in the floor and sleep it off, gotta go to the beach tomorrow,” said Kenton. “Here’s a couple of pillows.”  

We took those pillows and lay down on the carpet. I bet we were out in less than 5 minutes and I’m sure Big Chad was soon dreaming about Kyle and those shorts. I wouldn’t want to swear to it, but I believe I might have been doing some dreaming too.