Outskirts Press, INC.

The Buoy knows!

A musical jazz riff triggers Jack Springer to venture out to sea in a heavy fog. He encounters a buoy with an ominous presence. The sight of it is unnerving yet comfortingly familiar. Moments later Jack is pushed into reliving a series of nightmarishly close encounters with death. It begins innocently enough with his adolescent preoccupation with girls and cars. And thus begins the quest to find his dream-girl. Jack recounts an adventuresome life, heralding how Stupidity, Bravery, Bravado and Dumb Luck over comes the forces of his Karma occasionally venturing in the wrong direction. Based on a true story.

Reflection 
A bird chirped followed by the soft scratching sound of squirrels climbing on the red cedar tree came through the opened window.  Usually a light sleeper and early-riser, but this morning his sleep had been deep.  Instead of grasping at the dream images and trying to get back to them after turning over, a musical phrase was softly playing in his head …“Baa dip datt doodily doo” 
A very slight puff of moist Atlantic air came through the window and he opened his right eye to peer through it.  The nightstand clock read 5:32 am, earlier than his usual rising time.  He glanced back again to the open window and saw the fog.  Peering across the front yard of rolling grass and Red Cedar trees, the fog clung to the surface of the pond water like a puffy cotton blanket.
 
It wasn’t the normal pattern to get fog in mid-July on Long Islands’ Cold Spring Pond in Southampton.  But this fog, he thought, was interesting.
 
Rolling onto his back, the big dog at the foot of the bed moaned but gave way to the turning of his feet and legs.  Eyes closed again, those stray notes played softly ...  a jazz phrase from last night? … an accidental collision of intervals and timing? … probably not, but it beckoned to Jack just the same. 
 
As if it were a visible wisp of smoke that waved and danced through the air in a rhythmic sultry way, wet with sex ... “Baa dip datt doodily doo”
… he could almost see it … a little trill of something with an unexpected pause that popped in a delightful lick.
 “Damn!” he breathed, “That is neat.”
 
Lifting the sheet, he swung his feet to the floor and sat a moment.  To his right, at the foot of the bed lay the slumbering Rottweiler.  A pat on the head resulted in a guttural “Mummph”
acknowledgement.
 “Good boy, Argus. Protect the mommy-unit for me,”
He whispered, stroking the big blocky head.  “Mummph”
the dog answered still nestled in sleep and wanting to stay undisturbed, but now had an eye half-open.