“Gotta go deal with what?” Brad had blinked, his eyes bleary, when Cameron asked to borrow his ride. He’d crashed on Brad and Elizabeth’s couch after playing last night’s epic Moth Sausage experimental-metal show at Dell’s Saloon.
“A clematis,” Cameron had said. From his aunt Jeanne’s panicked phone call, it seemed her douchebag landlord was up her ass about her vines again. Last time, it had ended with the landlord threatening to evict her over that vine.
“What the hell is a clematis?” A half grin spread over Brad’s face. “Sounds kinda dirty.”
“It’s a plant, you idiot.” Cameron hadn’t bothered to add that it was a flowering and vining perennial, a member of the buttercup family. Native to China and Japan, brought to Western Europe in the Victorian era, and prized for its ability to climb trellises.
Why does he remember shit like this? If only he could cleanse his brain of the useless knowledge clogging it up. Gaining speed after turning onto the highway that runs out to Aunt Jeanne’s trailer park, Cameron rolls down all the windows and lights a cigarette, which he never does anymore, only when he feels like garbage; and this morning he feels like hot, steaming garbage. Smoke trails out the window and vanishes over the flat, dusty farmlands of the Merced Valley.
DAISIES BOB IN the breeze of Aunt Jeanne’s garden. She’s also got some huge bush full of white flowers, a twinkle-light veil-like thing, and this water fountain that he knows runs on six DD batteries because she asks him to help her change them, it seems like, every time he comes over.
And frogs. There are frogs everywhere. Little cement frog statues with moss growing in the cracks, frog flowerpots, a stars-and-stripes wind sock waving from a rusty metal hook featuring three grinning frogs decked out in patriotic red, white, and blue.
Seasonal frogs.
If the Welina Mobile Park had a prize for best yard, Aunt Jeanne would definitely be gunning for it. And winning. But the odd thing about her immaculate yard is its utter contrast with the disaster Cameron knows lies inside the trailer.
The porch steps creak under his work boots. A piece of paper juts out from the handle of the screen door. He lifts the edge to peek: a flier for the Welina Mobile Park Bingo Championship. He crumples it and stuffs it in his pocket. There’s no way Aunt Jeanne goes to those ridiculous things. This whole place is so awful. Even the name. Welina. It means “welcome” in Hawaiian. Sure as shit, this is not Hawaii.
He’s about to jab the doorbell, which is frog-shaped, of course, when shouting spills out from behind the trailer.
“If that old troll Sissy Baker would mind her business, no one would have these absurd ideas, now, would they?” Aunt Jeanne’s voice drips with menace, and Cameron can picture her standing there in her favorite gray sweatshirt, hands on her barrel-like hips, scowling. He can’t help but smile as he strides around the side of the trailer.
“Jeanne, please, try to understand.” The landlord’s voice is low, patronizing. Jimmy Delmonico. A first-class douchebag for sure. “The other residents are upset at the prospect of snakes. Surely you get that?”
“Ain’t no snakes in there! And who’re you to tell me what to do with my bush?”
“There are rules, Jeanne.”
Cameron trots into the backyard. Delmonico is glaring at Aunt Jeanne, who is indeed wearing that gray sweatshirt. Red-faced, she holds up a clutch of the dense, waxy vines that cover the trellis attached to the back of her trailer. Her cane, with its faded green tennis ball jammed on the tip, rests against the siding.
“Cammy!”
Aunt Jeanne is the only person on the planet who’s allowed to call him that.
He jogs over, then smiles as she wraps him in a quick hug. She smells like stale coffee, as usual. Then he turns to Delmonico, stone-faced, and says, “What’s the issue here?”
Aunt Jeanne snatches her cane and points it accusingly at the landlord. “Cammy, tell him there’s no snakes in my clematis! He’s trying to make me rip it down. All because Sissy Baker said she saw something. Everyone knows that old bat can’t hardly see.”
“You heard her. No snakes in there,” Cameron says firmly, tilting his head at the mass of vines, which have grown thick and lush since his last visit. How long has it been? A month?
Delmonico pinches the bridge of his nose. “Nice to see you again, too, Cameron.”
“Pleasure’s all mine.”
“Look, this is straight out of the Welina Mobile Park bylaws,” Delmonico says with a sigh. “When a resident makes a complaint, I’m required to undertake an investigation. And Mrs. Baker said she saw a snake. Said she saw, right in that there plant, yellow eyes blinking at her.”
Cameron scoffs. “She’s obviously lying.”
“Obviously,” Aunt Jeanne echoes, but she casts him a puzzled look from the corner of her eye.
“Oh, really?” Delmonico folds his arms. “Mrs. Baker has been a member of this community for years.”
“Sissy Baker’s packed full of more shit than a turd burger.”
“Cammy!” Aunt Jeanne swats his arm, reproaching his language. Which is rich, from the woman who taught him “A is for Asshole” while he was learning the alphabet.
“Excuse me?” Delmonico dips his glasses.
“Snakes can’t blink.” Cameron rolls his eyes. “They can’t. They don’t have eyelids. Look it up.”
The landlord opens his mouth, then snaps it shut.
“Case closed. No snakes.” Cameron folds his arms, which are at least twice the diameter of Delmonico’s. Bicep day’s been lit at the gym lately.
Delmonico does actually look like he’d prefer to leave. Studying his shoes, he grumbles, “If that’s even true, the snake-eyelid thing . . . there are ordinances. Blame the county for that, if you want, but when someone reports that one of my properties has a pest infestation—”
“I told you, no snakes!” Aunt Jeanne throws her hands up. Her cane lands on the grass. “You heard my nephew. No eyelids! You know what it is? Sissy Baker’s jealous of my garden.”
“Now, Jeanne.” Delmonico holds up a hand. “Everyone knows you have a lovely garden.”
“Sissy Baker’s a liar, and blind to boot!”
“Be that as it may, there are safety codes. If something creates a hazardous situation—”
Cameron takes a step toward him. “I don’t think anyone wants a hazardous situation.” It’s a bluff, mostly. Cameron hates fighting. But shrimp-on-a-stick here doesn’t need to know that.
Looking almost comically startled, Delmonico pats his pocket, then makes a show of pulling out his phone. “Hey, sorry. Need to take this.”
Cameron snickers. The old fake phone call. This guy sucks.
“Just trim it back a little, okay, Jeanne?” he yells over his shoulder as he crunches down the gravel walkway toward the road.
IT TAKES CAMERON the better part of an hour to prune the clematis, fielding Aunt Jeanne’s picky instructions while balanced on a stepladder. A little more there. No, not so much! Trim down the left. I meant right. No, I meant left. Down below, Aunt Jeanne collects the snipped-off stems and purple flowers in a yard waste bag.
“Is that thing about the snakes true, Cammy?”
“Sure it is.” He climbs down the ladder.
Aunt Jeanne frowns. “So, for real, no snakes in my clematis, right?”
Cameron glances at her sidelong as he strips off his gloves. “Have you seen a snake in your clematis?”
“Uh . . . no?”
“Well, there’s your answer.”
Aunt Jeanne grins, opening her back door, shoving aside a stack of newspapers with the tip of her cane. “Stay and visit, hon. D’you want coffee? Tea? Whiskey?”
“Whiskey? Seriously?” It’s not even ten in the morning. Cameron’s stomach lurches at the thought of booze. He ducks under the door frame and blinks, adjusting to the low light inside, letting out a breath of relief at the state of the place. It’s bad, of course. But no worse than last time. For a while, the junk seemed to be breeding with itself like a bunch of horny rabbits.
“Plain coffee, then,” she says with a wink. “You’re getting old, Cammy. No fun these days!”