With my best friend and soul mate, Jed, out of town for a couple of weeks, I’ve really been trying to knuckle down and get things done around here, and keep my promise to him that I wouldn’t get myself into any trouble. But a girl can only clean out dust bunnies, tend to houseplants, and reorganize so many closets before feeling a bit stir crazy.
I gave my friend Mary Berger a call to see what she was up to and find out if she felt like getting together. As luck would have it, she was up to her eyeballs getting ready for an upcoming book fest at our local community college and trying to finish firing her latest batch of "Lil Ole' Gals" pottery figures. After hearing how bored I was, she suggested I enlist Clare to take a hike. “I hear the trails around Cherokee are looking mighty good now,” she said. “Besides, how much trouble can you get into out in the middle of nowhere?” Little did she know how those words would come back to bite her in the butt.
It took some doing to talk Clare into the whole hiking idea. If we were going to head to Cherokee, she would far rather play the slots. But after pleading with her, she finally took pity on me and agreed to come along, especially after she heard about a particular walking trail that had a great waterfall.
Looking back on it, I have to say the trip started out innocently enough. With the car windows rolled down, Clare and I belted out songs from a Garth Brooks CD to pass the time (BTW: Clare can’t carry a tune to save her life.) We found the parking area for the waterfall trail and, typical for us, ran our mouths off while making our way along the path.
Then, out of nowhere, we heard two men’s voices. And while it was hard to make out what they were saying because of the roar of the waterfall, I’m here to tell you it was clear they were not happy. Clare and I were behind some bushes, but had a pretty good line of sight on what was going on. The one guy was short and stocky, the other was larger, heavier, and wore a baseball cap, so I couldn’t get a good look at this face, but I couldn’t help noticing the tattoo of a monkey face on his arm. These two guys started pushing and shoving each other, and the next thing we knew, Mr. Monkey Tattoo pushed the other guy over the edge and then ran off!
Clare and I tried our best to scan the base of the waterfall to see if there was any sign of the guy pushed over the edge, but didn’t see a trace of him. The first words out of Clare’s mouth were, “Jed ain’t gonna’ like hearing about this.” My first thought was, “Dang it, Mary, you said I couldn’t get into trouble out here! This is all your fault for suggesting a hike in the first place.”
You know, just reliving this as I type gives me the willies. I need to go make a cup of peppermint tea and calm down before I share the rest.
Get a hold of my initial adventure, The Trouble with Mattie, at these fine retailers.
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