Good. Now throw it away…

He closed his eyes.

A catbird whistled.

Nothing.

BOOM!

Colorful waves of light radiated in spheres around him.  He stood still as he stretched out his invisible reach.  He scanned.  He listened.

His enemy couldn’t hear him.  He opened his eyes.  The scene around him erupted in an immense light. 

What was that?

No one knows what it’s like to be her.

Wanchese Harbor was warm that day.  Located on Roanoke Island in North Carolina, the area is Just about as far north as you can go to feel like you’re still snuggled in the embrace of the South.  It’s simple and nice. 

She arrived to the fish house via boat.  Not just any boat.  A crab boat.

Mom doesn’t understand.  Why can’t she be more like Heather’s mom?  Look at her.  Everyone can probably see her ass.  Well maybe if they were on a boat.

Whatever.

She twirled nervously.

I hope nobody sees me here. 

If you make a loud enough noise someone will hear.

The image had been burning in my mind like if there was a pause button at the movie theater.  It just can’t happen.  The light in the projector is too hot, and the film literally burns.  Like fire.  It burns.  I wanted a picture of a redliner.  I could see it perfectly in my head.

1. If the water is warm enough hundreds of thousands of crabs smother the sea bed and make their way for the Outer Banks of North Carolina.

It’s not like you can just drop a pot with a male crab (Jimmy) in it to attract the females during the heat of the mating season.  There are rules.  There are superstitions.  Like any other task there are subtle cruelties that make it a daunting challenge.  Imagine being able to pluck baskets full of money from the sea.  It is the dream of many.  Like the settlers that rushed to California during the gold rush, intelligent and ambitious men are currently giving their bodies and minds to the call.

More about the rules.  Blue crabs shed their hard shells.  Young crabs before they shed exhibit an identifiable characteristic that tells the soft shell crabber when they are about to shed.  Nature allows us to see when this metamorphous will occur.  It is almost as if we are supposed to be at the top of the food chain.  Located on their back flippers is a stripe of color.  If you look hard enough and know where to direct your attention you will find what all soft crabbers know.

When it is time the stripe will turn from white to red.

They call them Redliners.

SEE THE REDLINER PICTURE I’M TALKING ABOUT HERE:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/southern_transient/3498694655/

The pier was ragged. The planks were old. Walking. I look down. I can see the water surface a good thirty feet below me. Through the years the pier had settled unevenly into the sand below forming what resembled the deck of a sunken pirate ship. I was reminded of the boys from “Stand by Me” walking across the bridge unaware of the smoke breaking from the trees behind them.

“Blalf!” She didn’t look good. Her face was not her normal warm shade.

“What?”

“Blalf!”

“You gonna’ throw up,” I asked her as we continued down the pier one board at a time. “Come on now. It’s pretty solid.”

She darted to her right and grabbed the railing. “Oh dear,” she said dramatically. “I don’t think I can make it.”

“Oh, now. We’ll be fine. They don’t make ‘em like they used to you know.”

“Fwench fwy!  Fwench fwy!  I’m gonna get a fwench fwy.

I absowutewy wove Wendy’s fwench fwies.

Uh oh! Wait.”  Oh no — what the heww?

“Windsheiwd!  It’s a windsheiwd.

Puww up!

Puww Up!”

*** NO SEAGULLS WERE HURT DURING THE FILMING OF THIS PRODUCTION.

It’s those quiet moments during the days that only you could appreciate.  A fisherman taking a break.  He was eating an orange.

“When was the last time you went to the aquarium with your daughter on a Tuesday?”  Are you serious Morgan Freeman?

He walked to the fantail of the Fortune Hunter.  An orange peel hit the water with a slap like  a cold hand on a bare ass.  His jaw squeezed the juice from the orange in his mouth.

A sugar so sweet nothing could beat.

“Crazy ass birds.”