Half of Paradise

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After the spring rains when the first hot days of summer begin, the inland waters of the Gulf of Mexico turn smoky-green from the floating seaweed, fading to dark blue beyond the sandbars where the great white pelicans dive for fish. On an island off the Louisiana coast there is an open-air pavilion among a group of cypress trees, and in those first wisteria-scented days of May one can sit in a wicker chair, drinking chilled wine, and listen to the salt breeze rustling through the overhanging moss, or just sit and watch the whitecaps break against the beach and disappear in an iridescent spray of foam.

Avery Broussard walked up the beach with his duffle bag over his shoulder and entered the pavilion. It was midafternoon and no one was at the bar. Two fishermen sat at one of the marble-topped tables. He drank a draught beer from a thick glass mug filmed with ice on the outside, and watched the fishermen hand-wrestle. One of them was a little drunk, and he laughed loudly and used a profane expression in French when the other man forced his hand down. Avery drank down the cold beer and ordered another. He counted the money in his wallet. He had fifteen dollars, enough to buy a bottle and get him home. He had quit his job on the oil exploration crew that morning, and he wanted to catch the afternoon launch to the mainland in order to be at the house by nightfall. It was three o’clock now and the launch left at four. He sipped the beer and looked out over the beach at the few palm trees and the sun bright on the water and the sandbars white in the distance.

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