Cary was staying with his grandfather for the summer and his grandfather lived in an old wooden house in Lafourche Parish. The TV reception wasn't that hot and his grandfather didn't have a satellite so, most nights, after dinner, entertainment was a story from Grandfather.
And he had plenty of them. Funny stories, silly stories, even a few scary ones. Well not too scary. But variations on things that go bump in the night. Not like the ones that guy Eddie down the street told.
His grandfather didn't much care for Eddie. Said he was a "burn out" and a "bum." Probably because Eddie spent the day baked. But that was part of the reason Cary liked Eddie, that and his willingness to slide over the j and share the stash.
It never seemed to dry up. When you think it might, Eddie's older sister Sarah would pull up outside in her Honda, having driven in from Texas, with more pot.
Eddie and Sarah fought a lot but also had this weird vibe like they'd slept together once or thought about. And Sarah really creeped Cary out. She was always griping about something or kissing Gus, her large dog she traveled with.
"A dog's mouth is cleaner than any humans!" she would insist.
Maybe so, but you wouldn't catch Cary soul kissing with a dog.
After Sarah would leave, Eddie would insist Sarah wasn't always so weird. But she was married to this attorney named Kevin and she'd gone a little nuts, insisting for over a year that they not have sex and then insisting that he'd cheated on her and broken their vows because no man could go a year without sex. Sounded to Cary that she was nuts when that year started, not after it came to a close.
Eddie had an ex-spouse too: Shelley.
He said he was a go-getter to get Shelley.
He'd talk about that a lot when he was stoned. He'd talk a lot about anything. And Cary would get so wrapped up in the tales, he'd sometimes forget the time. Grandfather said dinner was at seven each night and you had to be home by then.
Eddie was a developer. He purchased land and cleared it and turned it into a housing division. He liked to talk about that a lot. It's why he had the big, double-wide trailer that he lived in, with his office and a spare bedroom, and a bathroom on one end, a big living room and kitchen and dining area in the middle, and the big master bedroom and second bathroom. He would buy up a piece of land, move the trailer there and buy up surrounding lots and then start clearing.
Cary's grandfather had lived here his whole life and didn't like the idea of (a) things being torn down or (b) moving elsewhere. So he and Eddie didn't get a long much even when you put the whole pot thing to the side. They were neighbors so Grandfather would be neighborly but he didn't care for all the time Cary spent over at Eddie's.
Sometimes Cary would try to lie but you can almost manage that straight, when you're rushing home baked, it can be a little harder. One day Eddie brought out this bong and they'd swapped hits until 8:00. When Cary saw the time, he'd darted out of the trailer and ran all the way back to his grandfather's house.
"You're an hour late. I told you dinner is at seven. You're an hour late."
Cary knew it was serious. It was the old man's only rule for the summer. But he was buzzed and had a case of the giggles that he was trying to suppress.
"You think this is funny? You think this is funny?"
Biting his lower lip and trying to put a serious expression on his face, Cary shook his head "no."
"We have rules for a reason. We have rules for safety."
Again, this was the old man's only rule. Rules?
It was too funny.
Don't laugh, he kept telling himself, don't laugh.
The moment and grandfather's anger faded and Cary made sure to get home by seven from then on.
They were eating gumbo a week or so later and Cary pointed out that Eddie said there were giant shrimp in the area now since the BP spill.
"That was oil," his grandfather said. "Not steroids. See what that weed's going to do to you, huh?"
Cary just laughed.
Eddie was a short guy, maybe five foot, six inches, maybe not that tall. He said people had teased him all his life about his height and his "chicken legs," but he'd shown them. He'd gotten the cheerleader.
That was Shelley.
Shelly and Eddie went to high school together. He was a freshman. She was a friend of his sister's and she was a cheerleader. She was pretty and popular and he was Sarah's kid brother, the lowly freshman.
But he'd gotten the cheerleader.
Not when she was in high school. She'd already graduated. And he would graduate as well. It would be nearly five years later. They'd bumped into each other at a party, she was drunk, he had some baby bhang, they went back to her place, sparked it up and got busy.
"Three months later, she calls me to say she's pregnant."
He took a deep drag on a joint, smiled and said, "So I got the cheerleader."
After she gave birth and got tired of living with her mother. Shelley didn't even put Eddie down on the birth certificate as the father. But she did move in with the baby four months later and they got married shortly after.
It was a dream that broke apart like a tropical storm.
But for awhile, Eddie had everything he wanted.
"Nothing lasts forever," Eddie muttered rolling yet another joint.
Looking over at the clock, Cary saw it was fifteen minutes after nine. His grandfather was going to kill him.
He dashed out of the trailer, skidding across the deck and took off in the dark for his grandfather's house. On the asphalt road, he turned to hear what was making the noise and ended up tripping on his own feet and falling. He put his arms out to break the fall and skinned his palms and banged up his knees.
Still on his hands and knees, he heard that noise again.
Looking slowly to the left, he saw nothing. Looking over to the right, still nothing.
Looking over his shoulder . . .
A giant crustacean. Its gills alone had to be three feet long. And it was oozing some sort of brown slime behind it. And advancing at a rapid pace due to its five pairs of pereiopods.
But the slime wasn't just going behind it, it was advancing in front of it, coming at Cary.
He managed to stand just as the slime hit him. So his arms could move. But his feet were stuck to the slime. He couldn't move them.
And the giant shrimp was advancing.
Think, think, he told himself.
Of course. His shoes were stuck, not his legs. That slime was sticky. Reaching down, he began unlacing his Converse sneakers. No problem with the right one but he'd double laced the left one. Looking over his shoulder, he knew he'd never make it.
That's when he saw his grandfather running from up ahead carrying his Winchester Model 70.
"Grandpa! It's a giant shrimp!"
"Prawn! It's a prawn!" his grandfather said stopping to take aim and let a series of bullets fly over Cary's head and into the prawn.
The head split open as the bullets hit, sending more slime flying everywhere.
Some of it hit Cary in the face since he failed to turn his head or cover his face. As he wiped it off, pulled it off, the small was enough to make him retch.
Still hurling, he noticed Eddie, puffing on a joint, walking up through the ooze. Eddie stood behind the crustacean which, though dead, still remained upright up to the thorax. Eddie shoved it to the left, tipping it to the ground causing even more slime to spill out.
Pointing in disbelief, Cary wondered how Eddie was able to walk through the slime.
"Galoshes," Eddie explained. "So your grandpa killed another giant shrimp? What is that, Jim, forty this month?"
"Prawns, Eddie, they're prawns. Damn BP."