13. 'In the Water': Just in case

(Continued from Chronicle 12. ‘In the Water’: An Unexpected Trip)

The road was practically all ours. We must have been doing about 60 miles per hour, while through the right-hand window I kept watching, with more shadows than shapes, whatever that forest would let me glimpse. The moon shone high above, and from the very edge where the asphalt ended, the green of the vegetation sprang back to life, reconquering yard after yard of ground until it ran into the first lines of trees flanking our way on both sides. Beyond the trees, darkness, giving off a kind of respect and attraction as powerful as it was enchanting. I felt we were crossing a sacred, protected, magical place. –Nocturnal nature as seen from a car window…-, a Rodríguez de la Fuente might narrate, with his spellbinding prosody and descriptive flair, forever inviting us to develop that empathy toward nature he so often preached.

I felt we were crossing a sacred, protected, magical place. –Nocturnal nature as seen from a car window…-, a Rodríguez de la Fuente might narrate, with his spellbinding prosody and descriptive flair,

It must have been around 2 in the morning, and there I was in the back of that Toyota, rocked by the swaying of the asphalt waves and half hypnotized by the music that Alyssa and Hunter kept playing on the way to Lake Cumberland. I was lost in thought, taking stock of everything I had lived through in those last twelve hours, when I truly realized that far too many things had happened in far too little time.

Not even half a day had gone by since I had left school, head hanging low at the thought that it would be a weekend like any other, and now not even I could have imagined where I was. I already had more than enough material to tell it all someday in some good chronicles. And that without counting everything still to come: plenty of surprises and the occasional scare. Suddenly, I realized I was doing too much remembering without enjoying the nighttime of the trip. So I activated the new superpower of the thought stop (see the roster of superpowers a teacher comes to develop, Kentukiana 6: ‘Do I go back or do I stay?’), to place myself back in the present of that very instant and enjoy it as it well deserved. I focused on the road, on what the two of them were chatting about, and settled into calm.

I activated the new superpower of the thought stop (see the roster of superpowers a teacher comes to develop, Kentukiana 6: ‘Do I go back or do I stay?’), to place myself back in the present of that very instant and enjoy it as it well deserved.

I managed to turn that into an exercise for learning to savor presence in a conscious and intense way. Of course, I wouldn't always remember to put it into practice, since human beings get distracted by the slightest thing, but it was already a training habit. And so, I can say I found myself inside a car bound for who knows where with two girls I barely knew, as attractive as they were mysterious, as seductive as they were elusive, and as original as they were multifaceted, as I would get to see for myself later on.

as attractive as they were mysterious, as seductive as they were elusive

and as original as they were multifaceted,

In this fashion, I began to take note of where I was and how on earth I had ended up there. The two girls kept a certain enigmatic aura about them that only heightened my curiosity. At the same time, a great uncertainty kept coming over me, questioning what the lake would be like, where I would sleep if I slept at all, what I would eat if I ate at all, and above all, would I make it back home in one piece?

what the lake would be like, where I would sleep if I slept at all, what I would eat if I ate at all, and above all, would I make it back home in one piece?

My most primal fear was not quite understanding the conversations and everything that might come up within the new gang. Sure, I had only been in Kentucky for a month, but I already wanted to know it all. Then again, a language immersion like that one, with travel, lodging, and lake included, I wouldn't have found at even the best of agencies. For that very reason, I couldn't have been more grateful. I let myself be carried along by the unfolding of each moment, without much expectation, flowing and always working consciously, for I didn't want to miss one bit of that marvelous outing.

a language immersion like that one, with travel, lodging, and lake included, I wouldn't have found at even the best of agencies.

I was still enjoying the music when I began to feel a ferocious hunger. However, I couldn't even ‘take the edge off‘, unless we stopped at a gas station and I bought half a shelf's worth of nuts, since fast food just isn't my thing. I tried to resettle myself in the big seat to see if the stabbing pain of my stomach running on empty would let up a little. –If only I could savor at least some chips, some peanuts, some roasted cashews-, I kept telling myself, trying to shoo the gluttony away. What's more, the weight of my eyelids, together with the head-nodding I was already doing, warned me that Morpheus himself had just taken the seat beside me.

–If only I could savor at least some chips, some peanuts, some roasted cashews-,

There I was, not even knowing whether to stretch out on the seat or lean against the glass for that urgent little nap, when suddenly I find Hunter's face barely a foot from mine and, extending her right hand, she says: –Do you wanna?–. Between the darkness and the faint glow given off by the car's dashboard, I could make out what looked like the wrapper of an Oreo chocolate cookie or some similar kind. It came in a plastic whose crinkling sound made my mouth water all the more. –A little chocolate cookie at this hour!-, I thought, –forget one cookie, I want the whole package!-. –Yeeaah, Of course, gimme, gimme all that you want–, I said in a more than jovial tone, for that would interrupt my belly's penance. However, upon taking what she handed me I noticed right away that there was hardly any cookie in there, and its weight was so light it seemed like a joke. I did feel something inside, only when I pressed it the cookie deformed and then sprang back to its original shape! -It's a condom! A rubber!- I reacted deep down inside. I felt the sensation of an underwater implosion in the center of my forgotten stomach, and both sleepiness and hunger vanished on the spot. My eyeballs looked like two ping-pong balls in the middle of the dark night. I didn't know what to say, though I didn't need to. Hunter quickly added: –Just in case-. She turned around and went on chatting with Alyssa.

upon taking what she handed me I noticed right away that there was hardly any cookie in there, and its weight was so light it seemed like a joke.

I was left dumbfounded. I didn't know how to take it or where the joke was going, if it even was a joke. I tucked the little gift into my wallet and christened it ‘The lucky balloon‘. It took me back to my high school years, when it was all the rage to carry a condom in your billfold, mostly to show off and play the ‘macho man’. The funny part was watching how, as time went by, that famous trophy slowly turned into an old, flattened, never-used trading card.

I christened it ‘The lucky balloon‘.

The thing is, I don't know if it was the effects of the hunger and the sleepiness coming back over me, together with the beers I had downed during the concert with The Mortals, but my mind began to spin wild theories and get up to its old tricks as soon as I saw Alyssa take a turnoff to the right down a dirt road that burrowed into the jaws of the forest. The asphalt was behind us and now the mystery began. Where were they taking me? How would it all end? I began to think that maybe Hunter's little ‘rubber‘ was nothing but a pretext to keep me quiet once I saw that our course toward the lake had changed. We kept advancing over a rough stretch of potholes and gravel. Between the music and the car's swaying I felt rocked as if by a lullaby. And yet I didn't like that business one bit, and I could already see myself offered up in sacrifice to one of the great spirits of nature: the great black bear of Kentucky. So, drawing on two fine classics of literature, I pictured Alyssa and Hunter as a sort of pair of characters somewhere between La Celestina and the Libro de Buen Amor, now turned into hearty mountain lasses inviting me to get out of the car and step into the unsettling woodland to work their wiles. I could already see myself lashed to a tree like a totem, falling under the spells of their singular coven. Who knows what they would then do with the body of this innocent teacher who, as a lovestruck and venturesome archpriest, would soon be stripped of his clothes, albeit by the sharp claws of a black bear of Kentucky.

as a sort of pair of characters somewhere between La Celestina and the Libro de Buen Amor,

Suddenly, my own snoring woke me up! I opened my eyes and saw that I had fallen asleep, sitting up with my mouth half open. How embarrassing if they had heard me! And how many times they must have heard me! I was glad to see I was still inside the Toyota, coming out of that trance. I checked that we were still on the proper road, and the great stand of trees seemed to have been left behind. What I never got to know was whether we truly had turned down that path to take a shortcut, or whether it was only the stage set of the immense dream that overcame me.

In a little over two hours we reached the Cumberland Plateau, and this time I was quite aware of how the car turned off the road again, only now to arrive at our final destination: the small house of Darren, one of the gang's new friends. There we would spend our first night.

We were deep inside another great forest. Alyssa parked in front of the house and Seth came out to meet us, flashlight in hand. The moment I stepped into the house, I settled onto one of the couches to settle accounts with my long-awaited sleep, for in just a few hours Seth himself would wake me up to carry out a curious job.

in just a few hours Seth himself would wake me up to carry out a curious job.

– To be continued next Sunday, March 24.

Chronicle 14. ‘In the Water’: The Chicken Gets Involved, the Pig Commits