A Ferry Tale - The Coconut Chronicles: Two Guys, One Caribbean Dream House - page 3

“It's our neighbor,” I said, cutting my eyes towards the back of the house.
His expression conveyed an epic lack of concern. His trigger finger visibly twitched. I
could almost see a cartoon bubble over his head: So many weeds, so little time .
“Which one?”
It was my turn to roll my eyes.
“The guy next door,” I almost hissed. “The one whose name we don't know, although
we should by now.”
We had heard him called Humberto, Tito and Chago on various occasions, and now we
weren't sure which was his real name and were too embarrassed to ask.
“Uh huh.”
“I think he wants a ride to the ferry.”
This brought the trigger finger to a full stop.
“Now?”
“He's at the gate.”
He hesitated, clearly torn between the clarion call of solidarity with his partner in a
Time of Need and the unbridled delights of decimating unwanted vegetation. With a slight
grimace he propped the weed whacker against the terrace balustrade.
“I'll be there in two minutes.”
But by the time I got back to the gate Humberto/Tito/Chago was gone. Before long,
however, I heard singing from inside his house.
“ ¡Hola! ” I called.
There was no answer, but the man's dog, stationed as usual on top of his ramshackle
doghouse, whipped himself up into a frenzy of barking in response. I waited as patiently as
I could. Soon Michael came around the side of the house jangling the car keys.
“Where is he?”
Unfortunately the sound of Michael's voice threw the dog into further paroxysms of
hysteria. It was like a scene from White Fang , minus the snow.
“I'm not sure,” I shouted. “I think he went back inside his house.”
“Hmm. Does he want a ride or not?”
Michael could be so linear in his thinking sometimes. Surely he'd been around Vieques
long enough to know that logic simply didn't apply here.
“He said he did.”
A mutinous expression stole over Michael's face.
“Obviously he changed his mind.”
He glanced back towards the garden. The whacker beckoned. I was losing him fast. As
if on cue, our neighbor's door popped open and out he shot, bearing not one but three beers
this time. A brewski for each of us, including whoever was planning to drive. This was
nothing new—we'd seen young boys swigging beers as they clopped along bareback on
wild horses, cops chugging Medallas in their patrol cars. It was definitely a beery island.