Chapter 2
MAREN
“That doesn’t sound good, boss.”
I look over to where Leo Sánchez stands in front of the freezer.
He’s the longest-serving employee of Magnolia Bait and Marine Supply, the company my grandfather established fifty-two years ago.
It sells exactly what it says on the outside: boat chandlery, fishing supplies, and airboat tours.
But I’ve added things over the years. Fishing gear rentals for tourists, accompaniments to their catches, like fresh lemons, honey from a nearby homestead, and earthy potatoes.
A section where I sell local artisan things like clay fish dishes for keys and handmade soaps.
A small cafe area, run by Elspeth, a friend of Mom’s, that serves coffee and fresh juices, pastries, and sandwiches.
“I’m scared to check what’s wrong,” I admit, looking up from my laptop. “Sounds like the compressor, which means a lot of money.”
Leo removes his ball cap and wipes the back of his hand over his forehead. “You want me to take a look? See if I can fix it?”
I doubt he’ll be able to with his gnarled knuckles and arthritic fingers, but I also know that because of his commitment to my grandfather and this place, he needs to try. “That would be great. Thank you.”
He pulls the freezer door open. “I’ll move everything out, first, in case it’s losing temperature.”
“Should be straightforward. The shrimp order came in short. And I haven’t been able to look at it because Rocky’s sick today, and I’ve had to rejig all the airboat charters around.”
It’s been that kind of day: Shorted deliveries. Scheduling chaos. Frustrated airboat customers who had the audacity to complain that they thought June would be milder weather and that the airboats are noisy.
I was understanding until they suggested I should give them a refund. I pointed them toward the disclaimer that I am not responsible for the weather and reminded them that they were offered little foam earplugs that they refused.
The song I’ve been listening to on the radio ends. “And if you’re just joining us this morning, the National Hurricane Center has officially upgraded the system moving through the Gulf to a Category Two hurricane with a warning that it could become a Category Three.”
“Shit,” I mutter. As any Floridian worth their salt will tell you, Category One hurricanes aren’t even worth prepping for.
The severe end of Category Two needs some.
But Category Three is where we take it seriously.
Probably makes no sense to those who don’t live in a frequent hurricane trajectory.
That’ll mean cancellations for the airboat tours and a dip in bait purchases, and it also means a shit ton of work bringing all the airboats inside, securing the boathouse, and bringing all the furniture on the dock into the store.
The announcer continues: “While storms in June are not unheard of, they’re relatively rare.
According to NOAA records, only a handful of storms have made landfall in the Gulf during the first half of June in the last fifty years, and this will be the first since 1906 to make landfall in the Everglades this early in the season.
Forecasters say warm Gulf temperatures are to blame and that residents along low-lying coastal areas should renew and activate storm plans for the full wrath of this storm hitting Thursday evening.
Residents should expect rain, wind, and flooding to build over the next forty-eight hours. So be safe out there, everyone.”
I look out the rear doors to the sky. It still looks blue, but the humidity is rising. A sure sign a storm is coming.
A message pops up on my phone.
Rocky: It’s bronchitis. Got antibiotics. Won’t be in tomorrow, boss.
“Shit,” I mutter as I type a suitably sympathetic reply suggesting he get some sleep and get well soon.
I open the schedule, and sure enough, Rocky has four trips out tomorrow. Guess I’m gonna be playing tour guide unless I can convince Brandon, one of our other airboat captains, to come in on his day off. Jessie and Callum are both already scheduled.
Wait, what am I thinking? Hurricane. I do a quick count. Forty-eight hours until it’s supposed to land. It depends when the winds ramp up and the first band of rain starts.
By the end of the day, Leo has conceded defeat on the compressor, and I’ve called the customers who had airboats booked for tomorrow.
Most have bailed, but there are two in the morning willing to play it by ear.
Then, I cancel for the two days after that.
Elspeth has closed down the cafe, and I’m expecting Moira, a local cleaner, to come and clean the store any minute.
“Stay home tomorrow,” I tell Leo.
He shakes his head. “No, I’ll come help finish prepping for the hurricane.”
“I got it. And I think Maria would rather have you help prepare at home.”
“I’m gonna enjoy my last few hours of freedom before I’m locked in with her.” Leo grins at me, and I know he’s joking. This man loves his wife with his whole chest. “Plus, I know you like to push how long you can stay open for.”
I can’t help but laugh at that. He’s right. It’s not that I’m foolish when it comes to hurricanes, but I’ve been through enough to know how much time I have to prepare.
My father, Sheriff Harrison Caldwell, keeps telling me I should fire Leo, but how can I? The man used to slip me Mazapán de la Rosa in its pretty packaging with the rose on top when I was six years old.
It’s still hot and humid, the kind of weather that makes your shirt stick to your skin, when I step outside the bait shop that evening.
As much as I wish I could just take the hand-built wooden steps up the exterior of the building to my apartment above the store, I know there’s an empty fridge waiting for me if I don’t go grab groceries, and that’s no kind of hurricane prep.
The sky is muted, clouds are moving quickly, and a breeze is picking up. By morning, we’ll get rain.
The best parking spots at the bait shop are saved for customers, so I always park in the one farthest away from the entrance.
As I open the truck, I look back at the original old building that squats on the edge of the water.
It’s two stories tall but narrow, clad in weathered pine boards that have faded to a soft gray-brown that only moisture and sunlight can create.
Each plank is individualized with raised and grainy eyes or knots in the wood.
The cafe sits overlooking a porch that wraps around the front of the building in a shallow overhang.
There are six chairs out there, and it’s the perfect spot for sitting to watch the sun go down.
I’ll often bring a glass of wine down from my apartment above the shop and sit and sip in the quiet of the evening.
The flag with the store logo snaps in the wind, and I know the place doesn’t seem like much, but it’s mine and has been my refuge for most of my life.
From the water, the building looks cinematic, like an old piece of history just waiting to be discovered.
The building next to it is much more modern. Airboats line up on the dock that juts out in front of it. The majority of it is a shuttered boathouse for the airboats, with some extra storeroom. But it also has a small hurricane-proof apartment built into the concrete structure for emergencies.
The dock stretches out behind it, the bleached wood giving way to reeds and slow-moving dark water.
It’s the old versus the new.
I remember the day I first thought of this as home, when my grandmother and grandfather, my mother’s parents, took me in at age eleven.
My mom had run off with another man, according to my dad, and my grandparents refused to leave me to suffer my father’s cruelty.
Then there was the legal tussle my father initiated to get me back, not because he wanted me back, but because it embarrassed him and called his parenting into question for me to not live with him.
I cried for a week when the judge declared a daughter’s place was with her father, a fine upstanding citizen.
The judge didn’t listen when I told him how my father utterly diminished everything I am.
How he told me my eyes were too close together to see anything clearly.
And how my nose turned up like a pig snout.
He complained that I embarrassed him with my grades, and then, when I improved them, he told me I was trying to prove I was better than him.
But the very worst violations were when he would rip up my paintings.
I wanted to study art more than anything else—the history of the medium, how to paint with oils, with watercolors.
I wanted to travel and see the masterpieces: The Mona Lisa, which everyone says is smaller than they expect.
The Night Watchmen, which is bigger. The Sunflowers. Munch’s Scream series.
I’ve seen the world through art without leaving the US.
Art has been my friend when the rest of the world wouldn’t be. When I was forced to return to my father, my friends dropped away. My home was uncomfortable, my father overbearing and cruel. He wouldn’t let me socialize after school, and none of my friends wanted to hang out at a cop’s house.
Not that I had many friends.
And once my father killed Drew Stone, a popular member of the Iron Outlaws motorcycle club, my life got even harder. Kids at school connected to the club would vandalize my locker, knock my books out of my hands, trip me, and corner me whenever they could.
They were bigger, bolder, and stronger than I was. I wilted beneath the scrutiny, my confidence ebbing away until I was an angry shell. Filled with bitterness for a mom who’d left me, a legal system that had betrayed me, and a father who didn’t want me.
After that, the few people I had managed to cling to drifted away, and I was left alone.
The day I turned eighteen, I packed my bags and ran away to this building. My grandfather had fallen ill, and it was too much for my grandmother to manage on her own.