TOURIST SEASON by Carl Hiaasen

Lou Kimmelman would say this three or four times a week, and Ida hated it. Sometimes she’d wonder bitterly if she hated Lou, too. She’d squeeze out on the balcony, which was actually more of a glorified ledge, and gaze at the parking lot and, beyond that, the emptiness of the Everglades. In these moments Ida would imagine how great it would be to have a town house on a bluff in La Jolla, where you could sip coffee and watch all those brown young men on their candy-colored surfboards. That was Ida Kimmelman’s idea of retirement.

Instead she was stuck in Florida.

After Lou died, Ida had gathered all the bankbooks and E. F. Hutton statements and got the calculator to add up their worldly possessions—only to discover that Lou Kimmelman, damn his arithmetic, had been absolutely correct. Southern California was no more affordable than Gstaad.

So Ida laid her dream to rest with Lou, and vowed to make the best of it. Never would she admit to her Otter Creek neighbors that her unhappiness was anything but a widow’s grief, or that sometimes, especially during Florida’s steambath of a summer, she longed to be back up North, in the city, where one could actually walk to the grocery without an oxygen tank.

December, with its cooler nights, wasn’t so unbearable. The snowbirds were trickling south and the condominium was a much livelier place than in August, when nothing moved but the mercury. Now Otter Creek Village slowly was awakening, soon to be clogged with other couples who’d discovered Florida as long-ago tourists or honeymooners and returned to claim it in their old age.

The center of social life was the swimming pool. Not much swimming took place, but there was a lot of serious floating, wading, and talking—by far the most competitive of all condominium sports.

When Ida went down to the pool, which wasn’t often, she’d usually end up dominating some debate about the perilous traffic, the impossible interest rates, or the criminally high hospital bills. Each outrage was a harbinger of financial ruination, which was the favorite topic poolside at Otter Creek. Lately, since she’d discovered Lou’s Social Security checks were still coming, Ida’s stock speech on the economy had lost some of its fire and she’d avoided the daily discussions. Ida loved to express her opinions, but she loved her spa, too.

On the morning of December 8, Ida Kimmelman followed her morning routine: hot bagels, two cups of coffee, six ounces of prune juice, David Hartman, and the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel, which had terrific grocery coupons. By ten Ida was usually made-up and ready to walk Skeeter, but on this day she was running late because she had to go to Eckerd Drugs to buy a card for her nephew Joel the law student.

Ida returned to the apartment at ten-thirty to find a nasty little present from Skeeter on the shag in the bedroom. This was another reason she missed Lou, because Lou would always clean up after the dog; he never clobbered Skeeter or threatened to put him to sleep the way Ida did.

She was so mad about the mess in the bedroom that she hooked Skeeter to his leash and dragged him, yelping, down four flights of stairs. She led the dog out to the canal behind Otter Creek Village, near the Everglades dike, and unfastened the leash to let him run.

Ida noticed there was nobody out by the pool. She thought: These people! A touch of cold weather and they run indoors. The breeze felt good, too, although it puffed her new hairdo.

After fifteen minutes Ida Kimmelman got goose bumps and wished she’d brought a light sweater. She clapped her hands and shouted for Skeeter in a baritone that seemed to carry all the way to Orlando.

But Skeeter didn’t come.

Ida picked up her pace along the canal, careful not to get too close. She called for Skeeter again, expecting any moment to see his beautifully barbered, AKC-registered poodle face hopping through the high grass along the banks of the canal.

But there was no sign of the little dog.

Ida trudged on, hollering, calling, cooing, thinking: He’s just mad about what happened upstairs. He’ll be back.

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