Johnny Gator (6 page)

“Okay,
so tell me and get it over with,” she said.
 
She didn’t mean the words to sound harsh but they came out a little
sharp anyway.
 
“The suspense is killing
me.”

“Oh,
mon
cher
,
” Johnny
said.
 
He sighed, his breath heavy and
harsh. “If you want, then I will.”

“I
do.”

“I
don’t think you will believe me.”

“I’ll
promise to try.”

“All
right, then.” He put down his mug and laced his hands together. “I graduated
from school and did a few years in the Army.
 
I did a little time over in the Persian Gulf.
 
When I got out I didn’t want to be around
nobody much, so instead of going home to Acadia Parish I came here.
 
I knew a few Cajuns around but I figured I
could keep to myself as much as I wanted, so I did.
 
I spent a lot of time out on the lake and
after a while, I felt like me again, you know?”

Nola
swallowed hard. “I do.” His words described how she’d felt after getting to
know him.

“I
started painting and some people liked my pictures.
 
Then I got interested in being a
traiteur
.
 
Healing runs in my
Mamere’s
family and I had the knack.
 
‘Fore long,
a few people started coming around to my door, asking me to help, and I
did.
 
I heard about
Delphina
long before I met her.
 
I thought I could
learn things from her, ways to help people, so I called on her even though I
knew she also practiced voodoo.”

She
felt like she had to say something. “Where did she live?”

“Way
out on one of the most remote arms of the lake,
cher
,
” he told her. “It was hard to find but I
did
,.
and
when I dragged my boat out of the water, she
met me with a shotgun and told me to get gone or she’d shoot me.
 
I stood my ground, me, and she didn’t.
 
When she found out what I wanted, she acted
pleased, said she’d help me.
 
So I
started going over there on Saturdays and she taught me.
 
I learned a lot, at first, herbs and old
grass cures and such.”

Johnny
paused and stared down at the table.
 
When he remained silent for more than a minute, Nola prodded him to
finish. “And what happened then?”

“She
got it into her fool head she wanted me,” he said. “By then,
Delphina
had to be somewhere the backside of eighty years
old and me just thirty.
 
She could’ve
been my grandmother and I sure didn’t feel an attraction but I guess she did.”

It
took a lot to bring French to Nola’s lips but that was enough.
“
Mon
dieu
!”

He
gave her a faint smile. “I told her I wasn’t interested but she didn’t want to
take no for an answer.
 
I quit coming
around and she came to me.”

Nola
glanced around and squelched an urgent need to scrub with lye soap. “Here?”

“
Oui
,
where else?
And I told her to go away, don’t come back.”

“Of
course, what else would you do? What could she have possibly thought you would
do?”

“
Delphina
thought I’d climb into her bed, boo.
 
She’d put some herbs into my tea that
should’ve made her irresistible but the combination made me sick.
 
It didn’t work and I puked it up, but she
wasn’t aware.
 
So when I spurned her it
made her mad, and that’s not something you want a voodoo woman or a
mambo
to be,
cher
.”

Prickles
danced up and down Nola’s spine, cold and hurtful. “I don’t suppose you
would.
 
Johnny, tell me what this has to
do with all the strange things I don’t understand. I believe you so far.”

“I’m
gettin
’ to that.
 
Now see, I didn’t see her no more after that for a long time.
 
But I ran short on cash and so I did a little
gator hunting.
 
They pay good money for
alligators, for the meat, the hide, the whole animal.
 
I was small scale, just killed a couple but
it gave me the money I needed. She found out.”

“I
don’t understand what that had to do with her.”

He
laughed but without mirth. “The gators are like her pets, like kittens and
puppies to a normal woman.
 
She feeds
them, she loves them, and she lets them in the house sometimes.”

“Ooh.
That’s just weird.”

“It
is, but she’s got no family—nobody—so she’s made them like her kin.
 
Delphina
heard
about how I was
makin
’ some money and she sent for
me.
 
Damn fool I am, I went.”

“Why?”

He
leveled his head and met her gaze without blinking. “The old man who brought
her message said she was real sick, maybe dying, asking for my help.
 
How could I deny a crazy, lonely old woman
that? So I went.”

Whatever he says now, it will be
the part he thought I wouldn’t believe. It’s going to be insane, - fucked-up,
and weird.
 
Nola steeled herself to hear the truth.
 
Her nerves turned into barbed wire and
wrapped around her lungs, her stomach, and her throat.
 
She couldn’t breathe and it was difficult to
force out the words, but she did. “Tell me what happened.”

Johnny
reached out and took her hands in his, warm and strong. “It was night,” he
said. “The moon was big and full.
 
It
shone silver over the cypress trees and the black waters of the lake.
 
A wind moved the Spanish moss until it looked
like ghosts or demons out of hell.
 
Everything went silent and although I’m never scared, I was terrified
that night.
 
I got to her place and the
windows were dark.
 
I’d thought I’d find
her in bed but she stood on the shore surrounded by a half-dozen
alligators.
 
Her hair was down and loose,
flowing all over as she chanted in some weird mix of French, Latin, and what I
think might have been Spanish.
 
She had a
cup held between her hands and after I pulled the boat up she beckoned to me.

“She
had a small fire burning and I think she put something on it that would burn and
drug me,
mandragora
maybe, you know—mandrake,
nightshade, it has a lot of names.
 
My
head whirled and everything went a little fuzzy.
 
When I got close, I asked her if she was all
right, that I’d heard she was sick. She laughed, and I knew then I’d made one
helluva mistake but it was too late.

“When
she spoke again, two of the gators started writhing around and I thought she’d
poisoned them, figured that’s what she planned to do to me…but it wasn’t.
 
Those alligators, they turned into two men—big,
strong ones—and naked as a newborn child.
 
They strong armed me and held me in place so she could make me drink
from the cup she held.
 
It tasted
terrible and I knew it was some kind of blood mixed with wine, seasoned with
herbs and who knows what.
 
I tried to
spit it out but it was like I was paralyzed and I couldn’t. She held it to my
lips until I drank it all.

“Then
she chanted some more, waved her hands around, and sprinkled something in the
fire. It smelled like sage.
 
And then it
happened.”

Nola
tried to pull her hands back but he held on tight.
 
Her mind froze as she tried to understand
what he had just told her.
 
Alligators becoming men?
Potions and spells in the night?

“I
think she must have drugged you,” she said. If she could break his grip she
would run for her car, leave this place, and never come back.
 
As much as she hated the idea of going back
to Dallas, she would.
 
This man she
loved, he had to be crazy, and fear snaked through her veins.

“
Oui
,” Johnny
said. His voice was calm and very quiet. “You already think I’m crazy. I see it
in your eyes.
 
But I
ain’t
done yet so hear the rest of it, then judge me.”

She
nodded, unable to speak.

“I
started twitching like crazy and couldn’t control my body anymore.
 
It hurt,
whoo-ee
,
it hurt terrible, and I thought she’d poisoned me for sure. I figure the
stomach cramps would hit me next and then I’d drop dead.
 
I thought she lured me out to be gator bait,
to feed them, but no, it was worse than that, worse than anything I could’ve
dreamed up.
 
My head whirled and spun, my
senses were messed up, but everything was intense and then,
bam
, I was one of them.”

“One what?”

“I’d
become a gator, like the others,” he said. “I felt so strange, bulky, and
clumsy.
 
My belly dragged the ground and
walking on four legs, not two, it was hard.
 
I could see, though, and hear.
 
That old bitch, she laughed and cackled.
 
Hell, I think she even danced.
 
I
went wild and into the water.
 
I swam
with
alligators,
I rolled in the mud, all of it.
 
It’s like a dream now, a nightmare, but it
really happened.
 
I don’t remember all of
it, just bits and pieces.
 
When I woke
up, I was naked and dirty, lying on the shore in front of
Delphina’s
house.
 
She came out, told me she’d
witched me into a half-man, half-gator, and that I’d shape-shift for the rest
of my life.
 
‘Punishment for killing gators,’
she said, and payback for spurning
her affections.”

Nola
stared at him, speechless.
 
He stroked
the back of her hand with gentle fingers. “Do you believe me,
cher
?
I’m
tellin
’
you true.”

She
parted her lips to say no but shut her mouth, uncertain.
 
“I don’t know.”

“Think
about it.”

If
Nola did, she’d lose her mind.
 
“I
can’t.”

“Do
you have questions? I’ll answer anything you want to ask me.”

Where
would she begin? Her mind became paralyzed as she struggled to understand, to
consider the possibility, to wonder
and
 
reject
the impossible.
 
If her brain would work, then she could move
her feet, and if she could she’d make tracks.
 
Nola stared at him.
 
Her mouth
felt as dry as August, her throat choked with invisible rocks.
 
It took a lot of effort to make words come
and when they did, they surprised her as much as Johnny.

“Pour
me another cup of coffee and let me try to sort all this out,” she said in a
hoarse croak. “I’m not saying I believe but I’m trying because I love you.”

Johnny
released her hands and refilled her mug.
 
With a sad look in his eyes and slow steps, he left the cabin.
 
The twang of the screen door as it slammed
shut confirmed his exit, and Nola sat still, thinking.

Talking
about the gator started all this.
A
series of flashbacks rolled across her mind, each one vivid and sharp with
detail.
 
Nola thought of the gator that
had hung around, so tame, and how she felt so drawn to it.
 
She recalled its eyes and gasped, realizing
they were the same color as Johnny
Loutrel’s
.
 
I never
saw the creature when he was here, either, not once.

Nola
remembered the rough feel of the skin on his back and how he’d twitched, his
face contorted in pain.
 
His features had
seemed to transform and his body to change.
 
He looked like he was going to
drop down on all fours, I remember that.
 
His description of the first time he shape-shifted matched what she had
seen.
 
Memories came to mind of their
good times together, the meals shared, and their many conversations. His
presence eased and healed her, and their kiss made her long to believe what had
to be impossible.

 
As she pondered, she sipped the coffee and let
her thoughts run free.
 
Nola allowed her
instinct to guide her, and after a good half hour or so, she knew what she
would do.
 
If he was what he claimed,
he’d have to show her.
 
She walked to the
door and peeked out to find him sitting on the porch, rocking in an easy
rhythm.