Further north, past the East Coast of Florida, Georgia and the Carolina's, beyond the shores of Virginia, Delaware and New Jersey, on the Southeast corner of the State of New York, are the populous Manhattan Island, Staten Island, and Long Island. Present day inhabitants dream of basking in the tropical breezes of The Florida Keys while they swelter in the dog days of the New York summer. They long to escape from the scorching days of July and August that lack even a whisper of a breeze, humid days when the scrapers of the sky allow the blistering rays of the sun to beat against its sides and reflect to the street below. Sixty miles from the New York City line, on the South Shore of Long Island, boats and ferries crisscross the waters of the Great South Bay to the wisp of sand of Fire Island. They race to communities called Oak Beach, Cherry Grove, The Pines, and Ocean Bay Park to engage wild dancing and savage abandonment in places named Flynn's, The Monster, The Ice Palace, and The Casino.
To those revelers, the hot sticky days of summer are fleeting days of ecstasy. They are long, sweaty, summer days that too soon fade and vanish in September, Labor Day to be precise. Then, the boats are lifted from the water. The merrymakers retreat to their single-family homes or small apartments and set thermostats for the onslaught of winter.
With winter comes boredom and depression. Many escape the constant drab sky and endless days of frigid Long Island by fleeing to Florida and the Florida Keys. However, the vacations are always too short, leaving many to fill their monotonous days and nights with dreams of the tropics.
John Whately was one of the wistful dreamers. In his little apartment on the South Shore of Long Island, he would mull away the gray and cold with dreams filled with visions of the blue green sea, the lustrous Hibiscus and iridescent Bougainvillea. He'd visualize tan bodies lining golden beaches and the sun's reflections off the evening
clouds in the last dramatic blaze of day. He hungered for the permanent escape to the colors of warmth but, because Florida's job opportunities were scarce, he endured, and waited. When the opportunity came, he and his wife left New York and moved to Fort Lauderdale.
Two things occurred shortly after his arrival. His wife left with another man and he developed skin cancer. A divorce ended one; early detection and surgery expunged the other.
After the auspicious beginning, he purchased a town home in one of the many minuscule Florida communities that surround tiny man made lakes and settled in.
He appeared younger than his fifty-four years with a rugged square jaw face and wavy, sand colored hair that had just had begun to develop specks of gray. Careful to avoid the customary middle age spread, he took pride in his appearance and the fact his weight had not fluctuated in over twenty years. Muscular, a little less than five feet nine inches tall, he was an energetic man blessed with a quick wit and a devil-may-care look in sky blue eyes.
Following the failure of his marriage, he decided he had advanced as far in the business world as he desired. He did not like conflict and did his best to avoid decisions and responsibilities. His position, as liaison between the customer and the aerospace company that employed him, was ideal and he soon became ensconced in a comfortable, yet superficial, lifestyle.
A year after John relocated to Florida, his friend Joey D., and Joey's wife, Penny, also fled the cold winters of Long Island.
Younger and taller than John, Joey was in his middle forties and over six-feet tall. He was, like John, somewhat irresponsible. Unlike John, Joey had an aversion for exercising and his ample middle attested to the fact he enjoyed imbibing. A professional Sea Captain, his olive complexion had permanently darkened from days in the sun that etched deep flaring ridges at the corners of his eyes. Cuspidate dark furrows, narrowed into blackness, and lined his brow. Below his predominant bulbous nose was an even more predominant handlebar moustache. Unkempt and ragged, a mixture of black with speckles of gray, and moisture, the moustache bestowed a look of a seafarer from another era. His gravelly voice and the short peaked Captain's hat he always wore to protect his balding scalp, only added to the persona. Never loud, Joey's calm, easy going exterior masked an underlining restlessness and insecurity. Lessons learned as a child in the streets of New York had a hardening, self-protecting effect. He became a New York Motorcycle Patrol Officer and later, a New York City Fireman. In his early thirties, he was injured on the job and retired from the fire department with a full disability pension.
His constant inner struggle found an outlet in a love for the sea. He became a licensed Captain and spent the spring and fall seasons ferrying luxury yachts between New York and Florida. During the summer, he captained ferryboats between the South shore of Long Island and communities on Fire Island. In winter, he escaped the cold by obtaining positions on yachts that toured the coast of Florida and islands in the Caribbean.
It was as a paid Captain aboard one such yacht that he met Penny. The younger Penny was the ship's cook. A shapely, good looking, brown-eyed woman nearing forty, quiet and unassuming, Penny adored Joey and gladly reshaped her life for one in his shadow.
Their idyllic existence ended when the yacht owner, not sharing Joey's love of the sea, became the subject of Joey's ridicule. Soon Joey found himself unemployed. Penny followed him from the stateroom aboard the luxury yacht to a tiny bedroom in Joey's father's home on Long Island. After purchasing a forty-four foot party fishing boat, Joey conducted charted fishing trips for Long Island executives. He quickly tired of trying to appease drunken managers and sold the business for a small profit.
The idiom 'two women cannot share the same kitchen' also became reality. With the profit of the boat sale, Joey's disability income, the remainder of their combined savings, and another mortgage, they purchased a home on Long Island's south shore and waited the coming of winter.
When it came, the memories of the tropics were haunting.
With renewed fervor, they increased their saving until, through scrimping and working part time jobs, they escaped the harsh realities of winter and purchased a house in the center of the Florida Keys. They chose Lower Matecumbe the Southern most key in the chain of small islands called Islamorada.
The wood shingled house was suspended above the ground by nine, eight foot high, concrete block, and pillars. It was a two bedroom single family home with a walk-around wooden deck that afforded a sensational view of Florida Bay. John became a frequent weekend visitor. He spent many late afternoons drinking beer with his friends while reminiscing ab