Free Orbital Decay by Allen Steele Page B

hundred goddamn miles away, so he knew for bloody sure that it was Laura lying on the deck of that sailboat, Laura smiling softly as she improved her tan, Laura who was…
    It had not been Laura. There had been no girl lying on the deck of the sailboat.
    Hooker clenched his hands on the armrests of his couch. His eyes squeezed shut tight, his head lolled back against the couch. Unbidden, uninvited, the memories came.
    By some miracle—probably its location in the northern part of the state, where it still got cold in the winter—Cedar Key had managed to escape the devastating effects of the boom which had hit Florida during the twentieth century. It had never become a major tourist attraction, even as a coastal town.
    A couple of hotels had been built near the beach, it was true, and the long boardwalk near the municipal marina included the usual seashell shops and overpriced restaurants found at any surfside location. But the weather in northern Florida could be as cold and damp during the winter months as it was in New Jersey or Missouri, so the snowbirds from Trenton and Jefferson City tended to stay away from lonely little Cedar Key, heading instead for the plastic sprawl of Panama City Beach or the urban familiarity of Ft. Lauderdale. This left Cedar Key as one of the few places on the Florida coast, even in the early twenty-first century, which still retained a vestige of its charming old-time squalor.
    So it was to a still undeveloped, underpopulated Cedar Key that Claude Hooker made port that cool January evening. He brought the Jumbo Shrimp II into the marina shortly after eight o’clock, avoiding the anchored sailboats and other shrimp boats lined up at the jetties. A steady breeze from the southwest blew through an open window on the bridge, ruffling his thinning hair. Over the low rumble of the boat’s diesel engines he could hear the faraway rumble, from miles away over the Gulf, of the approaching thunderstorm that had chased him and the other fishermen home early from the night’s work.
    Within an hour Hooker had tied up the Shrimp and battened down the trawler for the coming storm. There was no catch in the live hold below the aft deck, so he left the nets in the hold and spread a canvas tarp over the hatch to prevent the hold from flooding. Checking the lines to make sure they would keep the boat at the dock, but weren’t so tight that they would snap in a heavy wake, he noticed soft orange lights glowing in the cabins of some of the other shrimp boats tied up nearby. Other captains staying with their boats overnight, he decided, hoping the storm would break and pass by later in the night so they could head out and try to get at least a few hours fishing in by morning.
    Lightning flashed on the horizon, briefly outlining the thunderhead’s forbidding mass in the night sky. Satisfied the Shrimp was secure, he jumped onto the dock and walked toward the gravel parking lot nearby. He felt a little guilty for not hanging by, as the other shrimpers on the boats were doing. The hell with it, he thought. If he missed a night’s work, it wasn’t fatal. There was money in the bank. For once, the bills were all paid at least long enough to keep his creditors off his back, and it had been weeks since he had given himself a night off. Perhaps the storm was a blessing in disguise. Hooker smiled. Maybe it was God’s way of telling him to go get drunk in town tonight.
    He was still smiling as he fitted the key into the door lock of his old Camaro. Yeah, maybe it was a good night to head over to Mikey’s Place. Hanging out in the bar sipping cold ones and playing pool was preferable to going home and watching TV all night. Maybe he could even find a young lady, so when he did go home it wouldn’t have to be alone. For all the good that it had done, things had been a little lonely since Laura had moved out.
    Hooker’s mouth twitched as he settled into the driver’s seat and fitted the key into the ignition switch.