Plantasia - The Coconut Chronicles: Two Guys, One Caribbean Dream House - page 264

Throwing on T-shirts and shorts we dashed to the balcony where we were greeted by
the sight of an enormous white mega-truck cozying its dented nose up to our prized mango
tree. Tiny puffs of smoke seeped from under the truck's hood and curled upwards into the
tree's lush foliage.
Beside the truck teetered a portly middle-aged man in a faded red t-shirt and volumin-
ous cut-off shorts that reached down almost to the tops of his bright blue socks.
Spitting out yet another choice profanity, he removed his baseball cap and flung it to
the ground.
A damp silence followed.
“ ¿Hola? ” I hazarded. The man looked up at me in bemused wonder.
“Your tree, it hit my car.”
“Uh huh,” I murmured, awestruck by the speed and efficiency with which he had re-
moved himself from the blame equation in this little mishap.
Clearly I could learn a thing or two from this guy.
“I'm sorry,” I said, apologizing for our tree.
Michael gave me a Look.
“No problem,” Francisco replied with a shrug, tossing his fender into the back of the
truck.
Five minutes later we were face to face.
Unfortunately.
I've driven past distilleries that smelled less like alcohol than our new gardener. His
breath was sour almost to the point of sweetness; his body smelled like small animals had
burrowed into his armpits and expired.
“ ¡Mucho gusto! ” he beamed, grabbing our hands in his big sticky paw. “Your garden, I
will make it like a paradise.”
This sounded promising. I nodded enthusiastically. Maybe he didn't smell so unpleas-
ant after all.
“Come,” he urged, swinging open the monolithic door of his truck. “I show you my
work.”
The truck's cab was crammed so full of empty beer cans and tequila bottles we could
barely excavate a place to sit. It was also occupied by two fairly large dogs who didn't seem
completely thrilled to share their space.
Noticing my concerned expression, Francisco declared the dogs “crazy friendly” which
would have been a lot more convincing if one of them hadn't growled ominously every
time my leg got within an inch of his drooling snout.
Whistling merrily, Francisco gunned the truck into life and before you could say “gag
reflex” we were on our way, bouncing along to God knew where.
Our destination, it turned out, was a bright blue house whose garden Francisco had ap-
parently designed.