Page 32 of Justice for Radar

“What?” I asked, unsure about the look on his face. Like he was surprised or seeing me for the first time or something.

“Nothing,” he said. “What?”

I shook my head and blushed faintly, wondering if I had imagined things.

“Sorry,” I murmured, and he chuckled, getting up from his seat.

“Nothing to be sorry for,” he said and smiled up at me and once again it almostsurprisedme that I was taller. Like… what? His presence was just so… justso, you know? He seemed larger than life if that made sense. It made him seem taller than he was. I don’t think I’d ever encountered anyone like him in that regard, actually.

“Come on,” he said, putting a hand to my back gently. “Let’s go for a ride and see what we can see.”

“Okay,” I agreed softly.

We rode slowly through the center of town, winding our way inland toward the freeway. I held on, the pace quite a bit more thrilling – read terrifying – than the slow roll to and from the marina earlier in the week.

“Hold on, sweetheart!” he hollered back at me, patting my hands around his waist and then we were on the freeway, and I was holding on for what felt like dear life as the pavement rushed beneath us and all notion of safety or that this was a good idea evaporated with the rush of the wind!

I gritted my teeth and swallowed hard, but soon the rhythm of the bike beneath us and Radar’s deft handling of the beastly machine soothed me enough that the riot of color and sound that was the inner coastal freeway took over my senses.

I couldn’t tell you directionally, if we headed north or south – and I didn’t think to check the freeway signs for the direction. Instead, I enjoyed the hot rush of air, and the sun soaking through the back of my jacket. The fear turned to thrill and my death grip on Radar eased as he piloted us through traffic with precision and skill.

We took an exit, and there wasn’t much to look at, at first. We wound through what felt like country roads Florida style and I half worried we would see an alligator or something. Like, Billy had taken me to a gator farm tourist attraction thing, but I was wholly unprepared to see or find one of those gargantuan relics out in the wild.

We turned down a long, white, crushed shell drive and I held my breath, missing the sign we passed that was larger than life about where it was that we were going. It was getting to be mid-afternoon, heading on toward evening in the next few hours. Eventually, he stopped in a small parking area to the side of a great big old antebellum home. He had to tap my leg to remind me I had to get down, so captivated was I at the beauty of the old place. He shut off the bike and stood up and I looked over.

“Where are we?”

“Sugarland Distillery,” he said. “They have great food, a beautiful tasting room, and tours. I thought it would be a nice and low-key afternoon. Get a late lunch, early dinner and take the walking tour; try a few things and head back home. Maybe stop at the beach for a sunset stroll. What do you say?”

“I say it sounds wonderful and relaxing,” I said. He smiled.

“Good deal.”

He came over to me and winged out his arm. I smiled and slipped my hand through it, and he tucked my arm close, into the side of his body. It felt good. Nice, and normal.

We strolled up the wide front steps of the old home, the wraparound porch festooned with white rocking chairs and small round tables set low between them.

Overhead on the porch, were old, old-fashioned belt driven ceiling fans that circled lazily, and I could just picture it – Sitting on the veranda with a mint julep under the lazy circle of those fans overlooking the sugarcane fields the sky turning golden and pink with the setting sun over them.

It looked good on the surface, peaceful, nice even… but I couldn’t help but feel like the whole ‘experience’ was nothing but a polished turd when I looked out over the modern fields surrounding the house with their irrigators and far out there the roof of a John Deere barely visible over the cane.

I had to bet the whole house was built by slaves.

I wiped my suddenly sweating palm on my denim clad leg as Radar opened the front doors for me to step through.

Inside, the house had been thoroughly remodeled. The entryway open and wide, an archway leading to a vast dining room full of tables facing out the tall windows on that side of the house, and on the left? The way was opened up to a tasting room, giftshop, and bar.

A hostess dressed all in black stepped around the podium at the restaurant portion of the house and she asked, “Party of two?”

“Yeah, thanks,” Radar said, and she nodded politely and we followed her to a secluded table for two at one of the back windows by the kitchen.

“This place is kind of spectacular, but with how old it is, I imagine it has a sordid past,” I said.

Radar gave a charmed smile. “You’d be right. It’s one of the oldest and most haunted buildings in Florida if you believe in that sort of thing and it has one of the bloodiest histories of any plantation in the state.

“Yeah?” I asked, opening the menu and trying to keep my eyes off of the prices which were steep, but not as bad as I expected.

“Yeah, this place burned like a motherfucker in the 1860s. Slaves rose up and revolted, hung the entire family from the hanging tree on the tour we’ll take.”

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