A common saying in the Keys is that if you don’t like the weather, just wait a few minutes and it’ll change. True to the archipelago’s typical form, the rain stopped and the sun came back out just as we finished tying off, the downpour having lasted just ten minutes.
We locked up the Baia, then paid for a day slip at the Herbert Hoover Marina. Our destination, Teddy’s Marina, was just down the waterfront. The place was located deeper into the channel, beside a nearly empty pothole-covered parking lot with a few vehicles that looked like they hadn’t moved in years.
Steam rose off the planks and the concrete path as we approached Teddy’s. The guy back at Alabama Jack’s had been right. The place was a dump. Old docks with missing planks, junk and garbage scattered everywhere. And there appeared to be nearly as many boats sunk beside the docks as there were moored. The few owners brave or stupid enough to tie their boats off had derelict crafts in serious need of repair. One, a monohull sailboat, didn’t even have a mast. Or a helm. And its deck was covered in a tattered blue tarp.
Marina seemed like far too glamorous a word. Junkyard was more accurate.
Avoiding the occasional protruding rusty nail in the wooden path, and weaving between piles of smelly fishing nets and broken crab pots, we made our way toward what looked like the entrance. The worn wooden door fit snug in the jamb, so I had to persuade it a little with my shoulder. It squeaked on its hinges as I swung it open.
The place looked just as bad on the inside, and it was hot. All of the marina’s “amenities” were located in one big room and were on full display as we entered. There were coin-operated washers and dryers in one corner, torn-up couches and chairs in another, and a small bar with a few scattered tables to our left. A radio in the corner played a staticky rendition of “Redneck Yacht Club.”
An appropriate soundtrack.
The four curious pairs of eyes scattered across the dingy room were locked on Ange and me as we strode across the dirty floor, then plopped down at the end of the bar. None of them belonged to either of the two guys we’d seen back at Jones Lagoon. But one of the pairs of eyes belonged to a guy who looked to be in his early twenties. He wore dirty shorts and a black T-shirt. His dark curly hair was a mess, and he looked like he hadn’t shaved in a month.
He’d been sitting and looking at his phone when we’d entered, but he stood and moved toward our position the moment Ange and I sat down.
“Can I help you two with something?” He eyed us both, and the way he looked at Ange nearly made me throw him across the room.
“You the bartender?” Ange asked.
The young guy grinned, showing off his yellow teeth.
“I’m everything around here,” he said.
He grabbed two beers from beneath the counter, popped them open, and handed one to Ange. He drank the other, ignoring me.
I laughed inside but did my best to keep a straight face with the little punk.
“So, you’re Teddy?” I said.
He glared at me. “Old Teddy’s on vacation. I’m Casper and I’m in charge while he’s away.”
“Vacation, huh?”
“Yeah.”
Ange took a sip of the beer, then spat it back into the bottle. She glanced at me, then whispered that it was terrible.
The young guy eyed us both suspiciously.
“So, you’re the one to talk to about a slip, then,” I said. “Do you have an office we could talk in?”
I relished the idea of him leading us into an adjoining room, then bashing him against the wall and asking him where we could find two bald guys in tank tops who’d recently showed up to his marina.
He paused a beat. “We’re all filled up. You’ll have to find a slip someplace else.”
“You don’t look full,” I said.
The man cracked a mirror-shattering smile. “Is there anything else I can help you with?”
I shook my head. “Stale beer. No AC. Terrible service. Can’t think of anything else.”
For a second, I thought the guy was going to try and punch me. His right hand squeezed into a fist and everything. Then the side door slammed open, and a familiar face stepped into the room. It was the scrawny bald guy from back in Jones Lagoon. He was wearing sunglasses indoors and had a cellphone in his right hand.
“Phone call,” he said, eyeing my new friend.
The man snarled. I raised the warm bottle of beer off the counter and grinned at him as he turned and stormed off. The two exited through the side door, banging it shut behind them. Something told me that it wasn’t Teddy on the phone.
I whispered to Ange that it was time to go.
“Where’s the bathroom?” I asked a husky woman who was walking past us.
She cackled. “You don’t want to know,” she said in a deep Southern drawl.
Ange and I slipped out the way we’d come in. All eyes were still boring into us as we strode out into the humid early-afternoon air. With the breeze, it still felt better than in the office. We moved side by side toward the water, then I froze and peeked to the left.
“I know
