Chapter 36

“Slow down, Nick! For Christ’s sake, slow the shit down!” Judy barked at me, lowering her passenger side window, and cocking her head out in a canine-like manner.

Perhaps she had instantly forgotten about the question she had asked me only seconds ago because we came upon that certain section—a quarter of a mile from her Tudor—of her property. Her attention was drawn to the swampy land, dense oaks, and skunk cabbage as if it were calling for her. Still behaving like a dog, sniffing the air through her open window, she consumed that rotten and gangrene-like stink, studying the area—not for its attractive green-mixed-with-brown beauty, not because it looked slumberous and paintable, not because it was a lush maze of Mother Nature’s striking work of art—with her intense gaze, silent and alert.