Being Lucky can be the death of you

When we finally got inside the shack they called a terminal, there was a little guy with a big attitude yelling, visitors to the left, locals to the right. Five white visitors went left to customs, now, why would anyone smuggle anything into Jamaica, except maybe Reebok sneakers?

Once through customs the five of us went to pick up our luggage.

“No luggage!” the two girls in our band of orphans were screaming to the counter person.

‘’What the hell do you mean the luggage will arrive tomorrow, What about tonight?” the girls screamed.

Artie said, “Perfect, just perfect, I should have listened to you and aborted this cluster fuck when we had the chance.”

We stood in a circle talking amongst ourselves and found that all of us were heading for the same destination. Well, the other guy said,

“There’s not a thing we can do about this tonight so let’s get on with it.”

We walked across the building and through a set of dirty glass double doors into the hot evening; there were tons of people who had come to pick up their charges.

Transportation was included in this all inclusive adventure so we all started looking for something that looked like it fit the role. People started to scatter once they weeded out their relatives and got on the road. That left the five of us, and a bunch of very sinister looking characters that you would hope not to bump into in an alley in Miami. The five of us just sat on the curb with a furlong look on our faces.

As we sat there this old guy came shuffling across the parking lot, stopped and asked if any of us wanted to buy some blow. “Blow?” the girl asked.

“Yah, mon, you know ganja, weed, Marianna, stuff, shit, you know.”

“Oh, Oh!” she said. The subject never came up but now that it had it would give us all a much needed boost and a brighter outlook on life.

“How much Artie asked?”

“Sixty dollars an ounce,” the guy with one tooth said.

“You have papers?” Artie asked.

“Extra five,” the old guy said.

“Take it,” the other guy said, “that’s a great price.”

Artie handed the over the sixty five dollars and the guy pulled a bag out of this pants and rolling papers from his shirt pocket.

“How are the cops, they ok with this?” Artie asked.

“No problem, mon,” the guy said with a big one toothy grin.

“Good question,” I said. The last thing I need is to spend the next three years in the local Bastille, and with no one even knows we’re in Jamaica. Artie rolled a few joints fired one up and passed it around so every could take a puff. After it was passed around for the third time there were smiles all around.

We were five minutes into this laugh fest when an old windowed Dodge van pulled up with one guy in it.

“No one here but the five of you, is there a problem?” he asked.

“Yah there’s a problem,” one of the girls blurted out with a laugh.

“Well you seem to be taking it very well,” the driver said.

“We missed our transportation out to Hedonism, we’re stuck here until tomorrow and we’re not even sure of that.” Artie said.

“No problem Mon, I can take you there tonight, ten dollars each.”

“OK, things are looking up,” one of the girls said, “you’re on, let’s go.”

We all piled into the old van (with no AC) but none of the windows latched and flapped as he drove, this acted a little like a fan.

The driver swung the van around the parking lot and headed out of the lot through a winding maze of Jersey barricades and headed north. “How long of a ride is it?” the other guy asked.

“Oh about an hour and a half hard drive.” “Is that blow you have there?” the driver asked.

“Yah, pass this up to him,” Artie said handing me an already rolled joint.

We all lit up so all of us would be on the same page. Hard drive my ass, the drop on the right with the ocean below with no guard rail, and a steep bank on the left made it impossible to fit two cars side by side. The girls were talking about toothbrushes, tooth paste, a tee shirt to get out of their travel clothes, and other girl stuff. They started to pressure the driver to find a drug store. It was a good idea because the guys were looking for a case of cold beer. Even though the cliff on the left had flattened out to a thick stand of trees and shrubs the chance of finding a anything out here was remote, let alone finding a local Walgreens on the next corner, there wasn’t even a next corner.

The driver turned his head around to look at us and said, “I know dis local place that will fix you up with everything you need.” he said.

About a mile or two down the road on the left there was an opening in the brush, if you didn’t know it was there you could miss it. The driver swung the van into the opening; it barely fit.

Another quarter mile through the brush that was slapping at both sides of the van we drove into an opening.