Fiction | Short Story

Spring Migration

Lori was in real, actual danger, but it was easy to convince herself she was not.

Lori could see the early warblers if she hoofed it and went to Palm Point—a hot spot other birders talked about, so close to her new house—but the goal was never to hurry while birding. She liked to stand in the scrubby forest that lay between her house and the shore of the lake and let the birds come to her, staring up into the canopy until her neck got tired. It was mid-February and Lori was very aware of the birding calendar. The spring birds were coming, and she couldn’t wait. Lori walked deeper into the trees.

Her destination was the shore, Palm Point or not. She could hear the water through the pines, mangroves, and oaks. A gentle lap, because there weren’t any boats out. It was a big lake. The other shore was a dark line of trees along the horizon, between the smooth water and the miles of sky. It was a little before six thirty in the morning and she’d been out for half an hour, trying not to trip over roots in the waning dark. Once her eyes adjusted, it was fine. She was getting to know these woods very well. She considered all of it her backyard.

Lori knew she was done looking when she found the house at the lake. She wanted it like nothing she’d wanted before—not a new car that smelled new, not the freedom to buy clothes without looking at the price tag, not any other trapping of wealth or class. She wanted this home to be hers.

It was three bedrooms on three acres at Newnans Lake, a twenty-five-minute drive out of town. But Lori didn’t care. It was wood sided, patinaed into a soft gray, and the roof was metal, silver. She imagined curling up in a chair on the screened-in porch, listening to the rain beat down on that roof. A Florida symphony. There was a breezeway to two carports, which she didn’t need and wouldn’t use but liked having anyway.

It was like a pewter box, waiting to be opened.

She walked in with the real estate agent and it was cool inside. The AC was on, of course, but there was a natural coolness in the house that puddled around your ankles. Lori looked down. The floors were slate. It felt too fancy, so adult.

The ceilings were high with exposed beams. Open-concept floor plan. The kitchen wasn’t exactly updated, but the appliances were, and Lori didn’t know what the big deal was about stone countertops anyway. She could change that later. She was surrounded by windows and she imagined the cross breeze they’d capture. It was only winter for a few weeks in Gainesville, anyway.

One room downstairs was wood paneled—cypress, the real estate agent said—and had built-in bookshelves and a desk. Lori fell distinctly in love with this room. It would be her office, not that she really needed one at home anymore, but just in case. Maybe a library. It would not be a guest room.

Upstairs were two more bedrooms, with cedar-lined closets, hardwood floors, and windows that looked out over the lake. She could still barely see the other shore, even from the second floor, the lake was so huge.

“In the mornings,” said the real estate agent, “the rowers are out there. It’s very inspiring.” It was probably pretty noisy, thought Lori, but she was an early riser anyway. And who didn’t like the novelty of crew teams in Florida, that haughty New England pastime in the hot, humid South?

Lori sent a big email to her mother, Rickie, and her sister, Jordan, when she bought the house, like a baby announcement for it. She invited them to come “anytime” but knew they wouldn’t until Lori made a specific request, like Christmas at my house! And maybe she would do that this year. She had until September at least to decide. She wanted to enjoy her house by herself for a while, walk around naked if she wanted to, decide exactly where to put things to suit her needs.

There was also the tiny issue of the money. Lori had a good job at a bank, in marketing “banking products,” and that made everyone in her family think she was good with money. And she was. She saved up for years for this house, putting away every bonus her job gave, and there were a lot of bonuses. (It was actually a kind of bullshit way to pay people smaller salaries, but it worked out for her.) She saved a lot, but not quite enough for the lake house. Rickie had gotten some money when she left her last job, a small (bullshit) severance. Then Rickie gave it to Lori and asked her to put it “in a 401(k),” so proud she was doing the right thing (for once), so proud she knew what a 401(k) was. She didn’t question if Lori could do this, because didn’t she work at a bank?

Except you can’t just open a 401(k), and you can’t just open a retirement account for another person, really. Lori found this all out by googling. She was going to buy CDs or something, another thing she googled, but she just . . . never got around to it. The money sat in a separate savings account. It earned a few dollars a year. Rickie never asked about it, and Lori never offered.

She’d pay back her mother, she said. She got bonuses all the time. This was just a loan. Lori transferred the money into her own account and bought the lake house. She would definitely, definitely pay her back.

The next quarter, though, Lori’s job changed their bonus structure and, poof, the bonuses were gone and she was stuck with that small salary. It was going to take her a few years until she could pay it back. She would just have to make sure her mom didn’t need it in the meantime.

The air was warmer in the forest now, the sun higher in the sky. Lori stopped. Something had started singing, and loudly. The birds were waking up, not just today, this day, but from winter. They were starting to sing their spring songs. Lori was wearing a sweatshirt and a baseball hat, but the latter was only a nod toward warmth. In twenty minutes, she’d need it to shield her eyes from the sun as it crested the tree line on the other shore. It would be warm and orange for five minutes, and then it would fully rise and bleed into the sky, yellow and hot. Sunglasses were not great for birding. You had to keep taking them on and off to look through your binoculars.

There it was again, on her right, toward the water. She looked up, not for the specific bird, but for movement. You didn’t always look for where the bird was, but for where it might go, because it was probably going somewhere. Lori saw something largish and dark fly from one oak to another, closer to the water.

It sounded like a creak and squawk. A cartoon bird opening an old screen door. A big sound, but not necessarily from a big bird. Lori wasn’t scared of birds, mostly because they were almost always tiny and very far away.

Hawks and eagles were scary, of course, and she once accidentally walked directly under a red-tailed hawk. She could have jumped up and touched it. Someone had left the scaffolding of some kind of foldout awning, the kind you put over a table at a picnic, the nylon cover long blown away. Lori walked under and felt a presence. There wasn’t any movement, but she’d been birding long enough to develop a feeling for some things.

She slowly turned and looked up and there it was, soft and terrifying. It started to move its shoulders and head side to side, and Lori didn’t know if that was some kind of territorial posture or the warning in advance of attack, but she knew it wasn’t good, that being so close to a predator with knives on its feet was not good, so she backed away slowly—but didn’t turn around because she didn’t want to turn her back to it—and avoided looking it in the eye. Were hawks like bears like that? Were bears like that? Lori’s heart pounded for a quarter mile as she walked away.

There wasn’t any movement, but she’d been birding long enough to develop a feeling for some things.

She imagined it swooping low and grabbing her hair, digging its talons into her scalp. But also, how soft its belly looked. She wanted to ruffle its feathers, feel the smoothness of its head, have it rest on her arm. But she wasn’t stupid. Lori knew she couldn’t do that for real. But she was glad she didn’t bird with a camera. She would have been tempted to capture such a close-up shot.

The real thing to be scared of on Newnans Lake was alligators. Someone told her, maybe it was the mechanic who last changed her oil, but someone told her that Newnans Lake had the highest population of alligators of any body of water per something—hectare, acre?—in Florida. Everyone thought it would be Okeechobee, but that was actually too big. It diluted the sample, so to speak. Newnans Lake was big and there was plenty of wildlife (there were always stories going around of a Florida panther stalking the shore, but Lori didn’t think they were true), but it was statistically the right size to win the prize of Most Alligators. It made for a good story for non-Floridians. All Floridians had alligators in their pools at one time or another, so it wasn’t a thing.

The trick with alligators is to not hit them with sticks, the . . . mechanic? had said. Lori liked to pass this wisdom off as hers—at the bar, after a conference, or at lunch with out-of-town colleagues. She loved to tell this story; she thought it made her seem tough and worldly, which she was not.

One day after she’d recently moved to the lake, she went over to the college crew team’s boathouse—no one was there because they practiced so early in the day—because she wanted to see what the lake looked like from the end of the two-hundred-foot dock. The water was high, only several inches below the dock’s surface, and the sun was hot. It was basically noon. She walked confidently out of the shade of the tall oaks and their picturesque Spanish moss to the end of the dock, an I’m-the-king-of-the-world moment, in a North Florida way, because she couldn’t see the land behind her and there was nothing but open water in front of her. There were no boats, just some ducks or gulls in the distance, bobbing on the lightly lapping lake.

Not wanting to get in trouble for trespassing (but of course no one was around), she turned and walked back the down the dock, knowing what she wanted to know about it, and there it was, just off the port side, a huge fucking alligator in the shade of the trees. She could see its bumpy head, its yellow eyes just above the water, but no teeth. They were hidden under the water, along with the rest of it. Its head was the size of her lawn mower. The rest of it had to be eight or ten feet, easy.

Alligators are quick, especially in the water. Lori had to pass it to leave the dock, had to walk maybe four or five feet directly in front of it to get to safety. She was in real, actual danger, but it was easy to convince herself she was not. She passed it on the way in unscathed, after all, right? It hadn’t attacked her while she was mooning over the lake, had it?

Lori walked calmly down the dock, as close to the far edge as she could, no quick movements, just steady and calm and not looking at the alligator except out of the corner of her eye. When she hit dry land, she walked faster and faster to the middle of the dirt road that led into the boathouse and back out to the main street, instead of closer to shore like she normally did, in case she could see an egret or ibis or anhinga.

That mechanic had told her something else important about alligators. That they don’t actually want to eat you, humans, especially ones larger than a toddler. (It was a real thing to not let kids play too close to the water when there might be alligators.) They definitely wanted to eat your dog, or maybe a chicken or a raccoon. But adult humans were loud and boney and hard to wrestle, and being cold-blooded and very large, energy was sometimes at a premium.

“Don’t poke them with a stick,” he said, “and don’t get near their babies in spring, and they won’t bother you.”

Lori could tell he liked to be the one who told this to people, the Alligator Ambassador, and she appreciated it. She’d lived in Florida most of her life, but no one had ever told her that.

She heard the creaky squawk of that bird again and she looked up and there it was. There they were, a flock of red-winged blackbirds, shiny black with red and yellow markings on their shoulders. Epaulettes. They were loud, bold birds, and Lori felt friendly toward them, liked to see them early in the season (and then grew bored of them, of course, as the summer approached and passed, because they were always there). Birding was definitely about the excitement of the new.

The sun was up and it was time to go back home and get ready for work. She didn’t have to look at the time to know—the sun told her. She was taking her phone out of her pocket just to check (because what if she was wrong), and it rang in her hand. Who was calling at seven in the morning?

It was her mom, the screen said.

“Hey, Mom,” Lori answered. “Is everything okay?”

“Good morning, honey,” said Rickie. “Just getting an early start to the day and thought I’d give you a call. I knew you’d be up, what with the birds and all.”

She was in real, actual danger, but it was easy to convince herself she was not.

“Yeah, I’m out in the woods right now.”

“Great service out there!”

“Yeah.” There actually was. Lori looked up, as if she could see the cell phone tower, as if it were right in front of her, but of course it wasn’t.

Rickie called, but not often. She and Lori had a long chat maybe once a month or two, and they texted in between, GIFs and memes and sometimes little bits of info.

Lori waited a second, waited for her mom to say what she needed to say, and she sensed it wasn’t going to be good.

“So, Lori, a while back I got some letters in the mail, and I thought they were spam, or junk, or something, so I didn’t do anything about it, but it turns out they weren’t.”

“What was it?”

“Well, it was from the mortgage company. I couldn’t remember the name and I thought it was close but not the same and I thought, This is how they get you. You know how they’re always trying to take advantage of old people in Florida.”

“That’s true,” said Lori. She was back in the high grass, away from the oaks and mangroves. She’d be in her own yard soon. It was getting late, and she needed to shower before work.

“So, it turns out that I haven’t been paying my mortgage.”

Rickie said it like she just plum forgot, that she meant to, but who could find the time in our hurly-burly world. Passive voice. Lori could feel the heat rising up her neck. This was the kind of thing her mother did. This was the irresponsibility that Lori loathed and that directed her to do the exact opposite of what Rickie would do in almost all situations.

“Are you okay? Do you need money?” Lori waited for her to ask about the money, her money. The money she had paid her own mortgage company.

“Well, it might be too late for that.”

“This is Florida. They basically can’t take your house.”

“I talked to the bank, and we all agreed it would just be easier if I gave them back the house.”

“It’s not Tupperware, Mom. It’s your house.”

“I know, but I think it’s just easier this way.”

Lori had so many questions. How long had her mom not been paying her mortgage and why? Did she lose her job? Did she quit? How much did she owe? Did she really talk to the bank, or did she just want to slip out in the night and let them sort it out, never talking to another human adult about this except Lori? Rickie wasn’t dumb. She had to know about credit scores.

“Mom, where are you going to go?”

“Well, you’ve got that spare room, don’t you?”

The blood pounded in her ears but quickly subsided, because of course she would let her mother move in and of course she had to, whether she wanted to or not. Lori’s childhood had been fine, if maybe messy, but her mother was not abusive or loud or mean or hurtful. She was . . . childish. She was charming and funny and great at a party. She was not exactly maternal. Lori bet she made a great roommate, to someone else.

“Of course, Mom. You can come stay with me.”

“Just for a little while. Until I’m back on my feet and can get another place.”

“However long you need.” She still hadn’t asked about the money. Was she going to wait until she arrived? Over breakfast or in the car to the grocery store?

“Thank you, honey. I’m sure it’ll only be a few weeks.”

Lori knew it would not be just a few weeks. But she didn’t know if it would be forever.

“When do you need to be out of your place?”

“Well, this weekend would be great. I’m already packing up.”

Of course she was. She was already packing up because she had actually seen this coming, probably didn’t think those letters were spam (spam!) at all, and just wasn’t paying it because she felt like she shouldn’t have to or lost her checkbook or whatever disingenuous reason she had for it, and she’d left everything to the last minute so that if Lori hesitated, she could play the desperation card. She couldn’t move to New York and live in Jordan’s studio apartment in midtown. Rickie lived in Jacksonville, an hour and a half away from Lori and her pristine pewter box.

Rickie lived in Jacksonville, an hour and a half away from Lori and her pristine pewter box.

“Sure thing, Mom. I’ll come get you Saturday morning. Listen, I have to get ready for work, but I’ll call you at lunch and we can talk more details. What you’re bringing and stuff. Do we need to get a truck?”

“Yes, yes, we’ll talk later. Thanks so much, my lovely daughter. You take such good care of your old mom.” And she hung up, a relief, to both of them.

After work, Lori walked into her quiet house and tried not to calculate just how many days left she had to luxuriate in its emptiness. Now she had to get things ready. She took everything out of the closet in the guest room, easily fitting it all in her own walk-in closet. There really was a lot of storage in the house.

She put some things in the locked drawer in the built-in desk in the office—financial papers about the account that held Rickie’s money, yes, but also checkbooks and her little password notebook (which she knew was pointless to keep, more than half of it outdated anyway) and her external hard drive and her passport and other papers. Maybe it was just smart in general to keep that stuff locked up. Lori didn’t exactly think her mom would commit identity theft or something, but she just felt better doing it. She thought about getting a lockbox for her private things, her vibrator and journal and such, but even her mother knew the sanctity of the bedside-table drawer.

Lori walked around the house and tried to see it through her mom’s eyes. It was nice. Maybe a little too nice. Would she get suspicious about how she afforded it? If Lori said, “I saved a lot and got a few good bonuses,” would it be enough? She remembered that Rickie cared less about the details of Lori’s life and more about her own, so she would be proud her daughter had a fancy house and that she got to live in it, living vicariously through her.

My daughter is a big shot at a bank, she could practically hear her mother telling the cashier at Publix. My other daughter is a big shot in New York City, she would say, chest puffed, nails done, her daughters’ successes proof of her impeccable mothering.

Lori moved a few books into her bedroom. Things with mom in the title, novels even, so Rickie wouldn’t infer anything, good or bad. She started cleaning, since it had been a while, and even though Rickie did not keep a spotless house herself, she commented on cleanliness, at restaurants or about other people’s homes, in conversation. (Lori did too. She got it from her mom.)

Lori dusted the baseboards and vacuumed the stairs and scoured both bathrooms top to bottom. It was night now. The lake was a dark void out her windows, no lights except her far-off neighbors. In the kitchen sink, she filled a bucket with hot soapy water and scrubbed the cabinet fronts, wringing globs of greasy, dusty detritus from the sponge. Maybe no one had ever done this. It gave Lori a feeling of sanding something down to its base layer and starting fresh. She would always know the last (or first) time she’d done these things. When her mom moved in, now this marker in time.

When she was done, she showered and fell into bed, exhausted. Would she have to say good night to her mom next week, for weeks and weeks, forever? Would her mother notice on the nights she didn’t? Would she mention it in the morning? Before she fell asleep, Lori felt like she was waiting for something, a knock on the door, a phone call. It had already come, but she still felt on edge.

There was a small bit of excitement, like the weeks before spring migration started, waiting for the first warblers to show. But there were still the hawks. And the alligators. And those things never went away.