I'm usually pretty good at spotting snakes because I look for them even in winter, but we missed the first one because we were inspecting the old refrigerator we used to gauge the water height. Jaime grabbed me suddenly sinking his fingers between my ribs and under my armpit. There was a long, black snake just under his feet. We screamed and ran.
That was at the very beginning of our hike. The next two hours were filled with talking about snakes, looking for snakes and worrying about snakes. We didn't see any more on the trail.
But we still decided the water was a safer activity after lunch. By then, Harper had made it clear that she expected us all three of us to be on the same floating device. Just like she expects the three of us to sleep in the same spot on the bed and sit on the same seat in the living room or car.
Barack and Margart Cho had a great canoe they said we could use, but it was heavy. Jaime grabbed one side but needed my help to flip it. I grabbed the nose and heaved it towards myself. An enormous snake came flying towards my face with it. I screamed, I ran, we got in the paddle boat instead.
The next hour was filled with talking about snakes, looking for snakes and worrying about snakes while we powered the boat with our feet. And we did see another.
I'm a suburban person who grew up a country person who's always wanted to believe herself a city person, so I know how snakes swim.
Jaime didn't.
The realization that the animals slither on top of the water just like they do on land made him ill. "It's just disappointing. It's so disappointing." He repeated to himself unprompted over and over again.
We took our last evening walk along the gravel road instead of the woods to avoid snakes but turned around before the first neighbor's house to avoid neighbors. We ran into Barack and Margaret Cho. Margaret told us we could check out a little later because they didn't have new guests coming the next day. We thanked her and said we'd probably take her up on that kind offer so Jaime and Harper could paddle board one more time.
We also asked to buy a dozen eggs, and she said she'd bring some by.
Harper immediately knew something was wrong when we got back to the cabin. I figured it out shortly after. Jaime would have never put it together.
An animal, we're not sure what kind, had come through the sliding screen door and eaten all the food left on the counter and table top knocking over whatever it couldn't eat. Jaime and Harper searched the house for the animal while I cleaned up frantically before Margaret came by with the eggs.
She popped in as I was swiffering and told us we hadn't paid the pet deposit. I was more than happy to shove some money in her hands and get her the fuck out before she discovered what had happened. I was the last one out the door, so I was clearly the one who hadn't closed it.
Jaime knew it despite my gaslight attempts to convince him he was at fault. Harper knew it, too. And I'd be damned if Margaret Cho was going to judge me as the future that liberals want.
I didn't sleep well that night because I was convinced the animal was still in the house. The paranoia was a nice change from White supremacist paranoia and the crazy doppelganger paranoia that kept me up before.
The first thing Jaime said in the morning was, "Let's go home." I told him I thought he wanted to get back on the water one more time, and he said, "No, we're going home."
I love him so much.
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