Home Is Where You Hang Your Hat
The house is the same, or at least that is what Ollie says. I don't think it looks the same, but then again I haven't approached it from the water before. We beach the plane as best we can and slog out of the lake and up to the deck.
The only sounds we hear are from the jungle around us. No voices or noises of any kind coming from the house. Ollie calls Consuela's name several times as we stand at the sliding door by the kitchen. Nothing.
Lou cups his hands to the glass to look inside, "You don't suppose anything has happened to them."
"At this point I wouldn't doubt that Groucho Marx is living here." I am still stunned at the absence of El Corazon. Where are all my concert t-shirts, my tools, my meager possession, our money... shit man, we had a fortune.
Ollie tries the sliding door and it doesn't budge.
"That's odd... I didn't think this place had locking doors." I try it myself... locked tighter than Red's Buttons.
"NO MUEVA NI YO LE DISPARARE."
The voice is deep and menacing. Both Ollie and Lou understand what is said, I just hold my hands up because that tone of voice works in any language.
What happens next is quite astonishing. Ollie turns because he recognizes the voice, the man with the shotgun looks like he is in shock and then breaks down crying and runs to hug him. Ollie recoils as though the man were going to throw up on him or something but cannot move because the guy is on him like Oprah on a baked ham.
After a long exchange between them, much of which even Lou has a hard time translating, they finally take a breath and Ollie relays to Lou what has happened.
"This IS the fucking twilight zone."
"Good, great... good explanation."
"This guy is Ollie's cousin. He thought Ollie was dead, killed a couple of months ago. They buried him, he says." Lou looks a the guy once more for good measure. The guy just blinks teary eyes at him and listens to him talk like a dog would listen to you reading War and Peace.
"That was all he said?"
"No, Nancy, that wasn't all. He said they buried Ollie, and that Nester has been away for many months. Consuela is gone too. Her mother needed to go to a hospital for treatment for some fucking thing."
Ollie has the man unlock the house and we go in for water and to use the facilities. Lou asks him why there are locks on the doors and the guy gives him the Labrador look again and offers no explanation.
On my way back from the bathroom and a healthy shit I see something that makes stop.
"HEY... Lou, take a look." I pic the picture up off the table where it sits in an old wooden frame.
"Oh shit." Lou takes it from my hands and shows it to the man.
"¿Quién es el hombre en la imagen?"
"Eso es Nestor y el hombre que vuela el avión grande."
Lou looks at me, "He says it is Nestor and the man that flies the big plane."
"We know that much, Lou."
"Right."
After a bit of an exchange Lou finds out that Jerry keeps his plane about three hours ride from here on horseback, about 15 miles north along the river that feeds the waterfall. In all the time we have been living and flying here I don't think we have over-flown that area and I damn sure know we never have driven there. The jungle gets pretty thick to the north.
Our new friend is Nejo, and he is one hell of a cook. Just local town fare, probably goat meat, veggies, and a brown sauce dropped into corn tortillas. We devour it. Ollie eats enough for a high school football team. He is really out of sorts with what has happened, his death and all. While we are making plans to go up river, he decides to stay and see his aunt and family. His parents are long since gone, but his aunt has been the one to raise him. He can't leave here with her thinking that he is dead. I don't bother bringing up the fact that this whole time continuem thing might have had them burying Ollie and now he is back from the dead.
After we eat we weigh the possibility of flying Naomi out of the lake and up to recon this landing strip. If it is big enough to take Abby, then we should have no problem spotting it. We have enough fuel to make it to one of several landing spots if need be.
We leave a nervous Ollie after some heartfelt bear hugs and head out to the plane. Ollie's share of the gold stays with him. With us we bring two large plastic jugs of water and some dried fruit from the house... just in case we don't find what we are looking for.
It is late in the afternoon before we are locked and loaded, both engines running and the jitters about getting out of the tree lined hole we are in.
"Run it up to full throttle before you go, Jake. That will give us a little sling-shot effect."
"I'll give you a sling-shot effect... we are on the water, Lou, there is no sling-shot effect."
"Oh... right."
"But you do give me an idea."
What we do is get her as far across the water as we can and push drag her back on the beach to where the floats are dragged up a bit. Now we can throttle up and be in the power curve before we start to move.
It works well enough. We get to full thrust for a moment or two before the floats break free and start our run.
"Holy shit, that worked." Lou checks out flap setting and then holds on tight. We get out of the water two thirds the way down the lake and I try to climb as quickly as possible without stalling.
"Come on, baby, up... UP." I have enough speed and I pull back and clear the trees.
"Three birds." Lou says, barely audible.
"What?"
"There were three birds in that nest."
"I knew it... you finally have permanent brain damage from all of those Walkers."
"Hey, that was fucking close and you know it."
"Yeah, I know it."
I think we burned more fuel on the way from Puerto Barrios than we first thought. I flick the fuel gauge and don't see any change. I think I can make an alternate landing about five miles south of where El Corazon should be if we don't spend too much time looking for this new location.
Below us we leave the waterfall to the south and follow the river. The cloud cover we flew through to get down here is closer to the ground up here and it forces us to fly extremely low.
"This isn't going to work if we can't get up a little higher. The damn airfield could be a half a mile off and we would fly right by it." Just as I finish talking a tree top scrapes at the bottom of the fuselage.
"Jesus Christ, Jake, pull her up or we won't have to worry about finding an airfield to land on."
I gain altitude and we are immediately in the clouds.
"Damn it." I pull and out of the clouds and leave them below us. We make it into clear sky at no more than 300 feet. We are now ten miles north and below us the clouds are thinning.
"Hey, I think our luck is changing." Lou looks out over the landscape below. Through the veil of thinning clouds we can see the unnatural scar of a man-made clearing.
"No shit." I bank and drop a little altitude as we make a wide circle and do a fly-by.
"Two hangers... hey, I see the Power Wagon."
That is enough to convince me that this is the place. I go down range and then make a turn back toward the runway.
"I didn't see Abigail." Lou tells me, but I already know.
"He'll should be home tonight. This is the beginning of a new month and he does the runs from the river farms, but those are all day runs."
We drop the gear and flaps, then throttle back and get on glide slope. Landing is sweet relief. Even though this should be "home", I feel like a stranger in a strange land. In less than a minute we taxi into the compound and spin her around toward the entrance before we shut down.
As soon as we step out of Naomi we hear the moment of silence abate and the sounds of the jungle fill the void. Before us are two large hangers, a ranch-style house, and a few other outbuildings. While we look at the house we see a young woman waving at us from a large picture window. She isn't waving at strangers. But we are.
The only sounds we hear are from the jungle around us. No voices or noises of any kind coming from the house. Ollie calls Consuela's name several times as we stand at the sliding door by the kitchen. Nothing.
Lou cups his hands to the glass to look inside, "You don't suppose anything has happened to them."
"At this point I wouldn't doubt that Groucho Marx is living here." I am still stunned at the absence of El Corazon. Where are all my concert t-shirts, my tools, my meager possession, our money... shit man, we had a fortune.
Ollie tries the sliding door and it doesn't budge.
"That's odd... I didn't think this place had locking doors." I try it myself... locked tighter than Red's Buttons.
"NO MUEVA NI YO LE DISPARARE."
The voice is deep and menacing. Both Ollie and Lou understand what is said, I just hold my hands up because that tone of voice works in any language.
What happens next is quite astonishing. Ollie turns because he recognizes the voice, the man with the shotgun looks like he is in shock and then breaks down crying and runs to hug him. Ollie recoils as though the man were going to throw up on him or something but cannot move because the guy is on him like Oprah on a baked ham.
After a long exchange between them, much of which even Lou has a hard time translating, they finally take a breath and Ollie relays to Lou what has happened.
"This IS the fucking twilight zone."
"Good, great... good explanation."
"This guy is Ollie's cousin. He thought Ollie was dead, killed a couple of months ago. They buried him, he says." Lou looks a the guy once more for good measure. The guy just blinks teary eyes at him and listens to him talk like a dog would listen to you reading War and Peace.
"That was all he said?"
"No, Nancy, that wasn't all. He said they buried Ollie, and that Nester has been away for many months. Consuela is gone too. Her mother needed to go to a hospital for treatment for some fucking thing."
Ollie has the man unlock the house and we go in for water and to use the facilities. Lou asks him why there are locks on the doors and the guy gives him the Labrador look again and offers no explanation.
On my way back from the bathroom and a healthy shit I see something that makes stop.
"HEY... Lou, take a look." I pic the picture up off the table where it sits in an old wooden frame.
"Oh shit." Lou takes it from my hands and shows it to the man.
"¿Quién es el hombre en la imagen?"
"Eso es Nestor y el hombre que vuela el avión grande."
Lou looks at me, "He says it is Nestor and the man that flies the big plane."
"We know that much, Lou."
"Right."
After a bit of an exchange Lou finds out that Jerry keeps his plane about three hours ride from here on horseback, about 15 miles north along the river that feeds the waterfall. In all the time we have been living and flying here I don't think we have over-flown that area and I damn sure know we never have driven there. The jungle gets pretty thick to the north.
Our new friend is Nejo, and he is one hell of a cook. Just local town fare, probably goat meat, veggies, and a brown sauce dropped into corn tortillas. We devour it. Ollie eats enough for a high school football team. He is really out of sorts with what has happened, his death and all. While we are making plans to go up river, he decides to stay and see his aunt and family. His parents are long since gone, but his aunt has been the one to raise him. He can't leave here with her thinking that he is dead. I don't bother bringing up the fact that this whole time continuem thing might have had them burying Ollie and now he is back from the dead.
After we eat we weigh the possibility of flying Naomi out of the lake and up to recon this landing strip. If it is big enough to take Abby, then we should have no problem spotting it. We have enough fuel to make it to one of several landing spots if need be.
We leave a nervous Ollie after some heartfelt bear hugs and head out to the plane. Ollie's share of the gold stays with him. With us we bring two large plastic jugs of water and some dried fruit from the house... just in case we don't find what we are looking for.
It is late in the afternoon before we are locked and loaded, both engines running and the jitters about getting out of the tree lined hole we are in.
"Run it up to full throttle before you go, Jake. That will give us a little sling-shot effect."
"I'll give you a sling-shot effect... we are on the water, Lou, there is no sling-shot effect."
"Oh... right."
"But you do give me an idea."
What we do is get her as far across the water as we can and push drag her back on the beach to where the floats are dragged up a bit. Now we can throttle up and be in the power curve before we start to move.
It works well enough. We get to full thrust for a moment or two before the floats break free and start our run.
"Holy shit, that worked." Lou checks out flap setting and then holds on tight. We get out of the water two thirds the way down the lake and I try to climb as quickly as possible without stalling.
"Come on, baby, up... UP." I have enough speed and I pull back and clear the trees.
"Three birds." Lou says, barely audible.
"What?"
"There were three birds in that nest."
"I knew it... you finally have permanent brain damage from all of those Walkers."
"Hey, that was fucking close and you know it."
"Yeah, I know it."
I think we burned more fuel on the way from Puerto Barrios than we first thought. I flick the fuel gauge and don't see any change. I think I can make an alternate landing about five miles south of where El Corazon should be if we don't spend too much time looking for this new location.
Below us we leave the waterfall to the south and follow the river. The cloud cover we flew through to get down here is closer to the ground up here and it forces us to fly extremely low.
"This isn't going to work if we can't get up a little higher. The damn airfield could be a half a mile off and we would fly right by it." Just as I finish talking a tree top scrapes at the bottom of the fuselage.
"Jesus Christ, Jake, pull her up or we won't have to worry about finding an airfield to land on."
I gain altitude and we are immediately in the clouds.
"Damn it." I pull and out of the clouds and leave them below us. We make it into clear sky at no more than 300 feet. We are now ten miles north and below us the clouds are thinning.
"Hey, I think our luck is changing." Lou looks out over the landscape below. Through the veil of thinning clouds we can see the unnatural scar of a man-made clearing.
"No shit." I bank and drop a little altitude as we make a wide circle and do a fly-by.
"Two hangers... hey, I see the Power Wagon."
That is enough to convince me that this is the place. I go down range and then make a turn back toward the runway.
"I didn't see Abigail." Lou tells me, but I already know.
"He'll should be home tonight. This is the beginning of a new month and he does the runs from the river farms, but those are all day runs."
We drop the gear and flaps, then throttle back and get on glide slope. Landing is sweet relief. Even though this should be "home", I feel like a stranger in a strange land. In less than a minute we taxi into the compound and spin her around toward the entrance before we shut down.
As soon as we step out of Naomi we hear the moment of silence abate and the sounds of the jungle fill the void. Before us are two large hangers, a ranch-style house, and a few other outbuildings. While we look at the house we see a young woman waving at us from a large picture window. She isn't waving at strangers. But we are.
posted by Jake Allen at 8:33 PM
