The Drowned Life by Jeffrey Ford

the previous night while I’d been at the celebration. I thought of the last time we were together.
    She was sitting naked against the wall of the abandoned barn by the edge of the swamp. Her blond hair and face were aglow, illuminated by a beam of light that shone through a hole in the roof.She had the longest legs and her skin was pale and smooth. Taking a drag from her cigarette, she had said, “Ernest, we gotta get out of this town.” She’d laid out for me her plan of escape, her desire to go to some city where civilization was in full swing. I just nodded, reluctant to be too enthusiastic. She was adventurous and I was a homebody, but I did care deeply for her. She tossed her cigarette, put out her arms, and opened her legs, and then Witzer said, “Keep your eyes peeled now, boy,” and Darlene’s image melted away.
    We were moving slowly along a dirt road, both of us looking up at the lower branches of the trees. The old man saw the first one. I didn’t see her till he applied the brakes. He took a little notebook and stub of a pencil out of his shirt pocket. “Samantha Bocean,” he whispered and put a check next to her name. We got out of the cab, and I helped him unlatch the prods and lay them on the ground beside the truck. Samantha was resting across three branches of a magnolia tree, not too far from the ground. One arm and her long gray hair hung down, and she was turned so I could see her sleeping face.
    â€œGet the ten,” said Witzer, as he walked over to stand directly beneath her.
    I did as I was told and then joined him.
    â€œWhat d’ya say?” he asked. “Looks like this one’s gonna be a peach.”
    â€œWell, I’m thinking if I get it on her left thigh and push her forward fast enough she’ll flip as she falls and land perfectly.”
    Witzer said nothing but left me standing there and got back in the truck. He started it up and pulled it forward so that the bed was precisely where we hoped she would land. He put it in park but left the engine running, then got out and came and stood beside me. “Take a few deep breaths,” he said. “Then let her fly.”
    I thought I’d be more nervous, but the training the old man had given me took hold and I knew exactly what to do. I aimed theprod and rested it gently on top of Samantha’s leg. Just as he’d told me, a real body was going to offer a little more resistance than one of the dummies, and I was ready for that. I took three big breaths and then shoved. She rolled slightly, and then tumbled forward, ass over head, landing with a thump on the mattresses, facing the morning sky. Witzer wheezed to beat the band, and said, “That’s a solid ten.” I was ecstatic.
    The old man broke a twig next to Samantha’s left ear and instantly her eyelids fluttered. A few seconds later she opened her eyes and smiled.
    â€œHow was your visit?” asked Witzer.
    â€œI’ll never get tired of that,” she said. “It was wonderful.”
    We chatted with her for a few minutes, filling her in on how the party had gone after she’d left the Blind Ghost. She didn’t divulge to us what passed-on relative she’d met with, and we didn’t ask. As my mentor had told me when I started, “There’s a kind of etiquette to this. When in doubt, silence is your best friend.”
    Samantha started walking back toward town, and we loaded the prods onto the truck again. In no time, we were on our way, searching for the next sleeper. Luck was with us, for we found four in a row, fairly close by one another: Stan Joss, Moses T. Remarque, Berta Hull, and Becca Staney. All of them had chosen easy-to-get-to perches in the lower branches of ancient oaks, and we dropped them—one, two, three, four—easy as could be. I never had to reach for anything longer than the ten, and the old man proved a genius at placing the truck just so. When each