Chapter 14: Up Around the Bend

  Scene 1: The Town Leans In

  It happened slow, the way all honest things do. Not with sirens or speeches or ticker-tape parades—Baywater wasn’t that kind of town, and the Mudpuppy Patrol weren’t lookin’ for their names in no lights. But if you listened close, you could hear it: a shift in the way folks talked when the wind bent just so through the cypress.

  They didn’t say magic. Not out loud.

  But they did start sayin’ truth.

  The first sign was a small one—Reggie’s bait shop corkboard, usually cluttered with fishin’ tournament flyers and yard sale notices, now had that Baywater Times article pinned dead center. Someone had underlined Lester Duval’s name in red ink. No one claimed who. But it stayed there, untouched, like scripture in a tackle box.

  Then came the stories.

  Miss Della down at the diner remembered bringin’ coffee to the dredge men back in ’68. Said Lester tipped in dimes and always asked if she had any sunflower seeds for his lunchbox. Mr. Wallace at the barbershop said he once fished beside Lester and never forgot how the man hummed under his breath when he cast his line.

  “Same hum I heard the swamp singin’ the other night,” he muttered, clippin’ hair and starin’ out the window.

  And then, as if the swamp itself had passed judgment, the real change came.

  Big white signs staked into the mud:

  BAYWATER PARISH PROTECTED WETLANDS – PINE HOLLOW PRESERVE

  No backhoes. No bulldozers. No deals done behind closed doors.

  The developers—those with shiny boots and smooth grins—backed off quiet-like, mutterin’ about permits and "local sentiment" and “unexpected complications.” One even claimed the soil wasn’t stable, but everyone knew that was code for the town found its spine.

  Josie saw the sign while ridin’ past on her bike, her hair caught in the wind like a flag. She didn’t stop, just coasted on past with a smile tucked in her cheek and the sun in her eyes. The plaque by the dredge came next—a polished board planted by the path, hand-carved, and simple:

  Site of Pine Hollow Dredge

  Lester Duval—Scientist, Watchman, Witness.

  Lost, but not forgotten. Truth, once buried, has roots.

  The Mudpuppy Patrol saw it together a few days later, standing in a crooked line like fenceposts in the heat. No words passed between them. None needed. They just looked at it, eyes wide and hearts full, and let the silence speak.

  Later that week, little signs of change bloomed like wildflowers.

  Cricket found her granddaddy—usually asleep by 3—wide awake and whistlin’ CCR as he read the paper front to back. “Ain’t no shame in stirrin’ the mud if it brings up the clean,” he said without lookin’ up.

  Bo’s uncle—whose courthouse job had once made Bo nervous—pulled him aside in the backyard and said, “Sometimes you don’t get to pick your legacy, son. Sometimes it picks you. You done good.”

  Lila Rae’s mama placed her daughter’s scrapbook in the town library’s front display case, open to the page titled The Summer We Told the Truth. When folks passed by, they paused—not just for the pictures, but for the handwriting. Real words from real kids, raw and brave and true.

  Kenji’s folks didn’t say much, but that Sunday, they left a bowl of pho on the table untouched. “For Lester,” his mother whispered, eyes misty, as cicadas droned soft outside the screen door.

  Tadpole carved a tiny spiral into the back fencepost of his daddy’s shop. Said nothin’ to nobody. But it stayed.

  And the swamp? The swamp just kept hummin’.

  Not loud. Not showy. But steady.

  Like it knew what had been risked.

  And what had been saved.

  Scene 2: The Swamp Stays Still

  The swamp never said thank you.

  It didn’t need to.

  It just was, same as always—buzzin’ and croakin’, steamin’ under a bellyful of August sun, shiftin’ slow like it had all the time in the world. But if you paid real close attention, you could tell—it stood a little taller.

  The signs went up two weeks later. Big ones, hammered into the earth at the edge of the marsh trail and nailed to trees out by the old levee road. Clean white paint, stenciled letters:

  BAYWATER PARISH PROTECTED WETLANDS

  PINE HOLLOW PRESERVE

  No Development. No Removal. No Exceptions.

  Lila Rae was the first to find one—snappin’ a photo with her Kodak and grinnin’ so wide her freckles nearly danced. She pinned the picture next to Lester’s spiral on the clubhouse wall and wrote under it in red marker: We kept it breathing.

  Kenji ran the hum machine one last time out by the dredge, just to test. No shimmer. No pulse. Just quiet, honest wind.

  “Like it’s restin’ now,” he said.

  Josie nodded. “Like it knows it’s safe.”

  Cricket brought her granddaddy out to see it. He didn’t say much—just took off his cap and stood there starin’ at the trees like he hadn’t seen ‘em in fifty years.

  “You kids did this?” he asked.

  Cricket smirked. “Us and a ghost named Lester.”

  Bo made a point of wanderin’ past the new real estate office that had once boasted “Luxury Lakeside Living.” The windows were dark now. The big banner out front? Gone. Rolled up and tossed into the wind.

  He tipped his imaginary hat as he passed. “Guess y’all picked the wrong swamp.”

  Even the grown-ups started changin’ the way they talked. Folks at the café started callin’ it “the preserve” instead of “that ol’ mosquito bog.” The preacher added a line to his sermon about “watchin’ over creation with clear eyes and honest hands.” And Miss Della, bless her, painted a whole set of pinecone ornaments shaped like frogs and named ‘em after each member of the Mudpuppy Patrol.

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  Josie caught sight of one hangin’ in the post office window.

  The tag read: For the ones who kept the water still.

  No brass plaques. No medals.

  Just the swamp—whole, quiet, and right where it was meant to be.

  Scene 3: A Smile and a Picture

  Josie came in from the back porch with her boots slung over one shoulder and her shins covered in burrs. The day had been long in that good kind of way—the kind that left you dusty, sun-warmed, and full of the kind of tired that felt earned.

  She was halfway to the kitchen when she spotted her daddy sittin’ at the dining room table, elbows on the wood, old shoebox open in front of him. He looked up at her like he’d been waitin’ for just that moment.

  “Hey, Red,” he said, smilin’ in that rare, lopsided way he had when he wasn’t thinkin’ too hard. “Got somethin’ you oughta see.”

  Josie dropped her boots and padded over barefoot, curiosity pricklin’ like sticker grass. Her daddy pulled a photograph out from the middle of the box, held it by the corners like it might crack if breathed on too hard.

  He passed it to her.

  Black-and-white. Faded at the edges. A man in coveralls stood beside a hulk of rusted machinery—what looked like part of the old dredge rig. The man had kind eyes, heavy shoulders, and a half-grin tucked just under a mustache.

  But it wasn’t the man alone that caught her breath.

  Next to him was a kid.

  A redheaded kid.

  Josie looked up, heart thumpin’.

  Her daddy scratched his neck. “That’s me. ‘Bout six years old, I reckon. Mama used to drop me off at the station when she worked nights. Lester kept an eye on me. Taught me how to skip rocks. Gave me sunflower seeds and told me the swamp had its own way of speakin’, if I listened close.”

  Josie stared at the photo like it had just spoken back.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked, quiet.

  He looked down. “I forgot.”

  He paused, then added, “No... I let myself forget. ‘Cause rememberin’ hurt.”

  Josie nodded. She understood that.

  He pointed to the man in the picture. “Lester was always thinkin’. Always writin’ stuff down. Said the earth talked in hums and patterns. Said he wanted to make sure no one ever shut it up.”

  Josie ran her finger along the edge of the photo.

  “He did,” she said.

  Her daddy nodded. “You made sure he did.”

  He stood and placed a hand on her shoulder—firm, gentle. Then, with that rare smile still tugging at the corner of his mouth, he added:

  “I’m proud of you, Josie.”

  She blinked.

  He’d never said that out loud before.

  She tucked the photo into her back pocket like it belonged there, like it always had.

  And in that moment—standing barefoot in her own kitchen, smelling like swampwater and summer—Josie Lawson felt older than her years, lighter than her bones, and more seen than she ever had before.

  Scene 4: Mudpuppy Patrol HQ

  The clubhouse never did look like much—not to anyone but the six of them.

  Half duck blind, half driftwood hideout, with walls patched in old plywood and the roof held together by wishful thinkin’ and bent nails. But to the Mudpuppy Patrol, it was a palace built from sweat, secrets, and late-evenin’ laughter.

  So when Josie announced, “It’s time we made it official,” no one argued.

  Cricket arrived first with a bucket of green paint and a brush that looked like it had survived a hurricane or two. “Best I could find in the shed,” she said, smirkin’. “Might be frog green. Might be pond scum.”

  Lila Rae followed with a mason jar of red clay from her mama’s garden. “For accents,” she declared. “Authentic swamp tones.”

  Bo showed up last, carryin’ a beat-up crate full of old spray cans and lookin’ mighty proud of himself. “Guess who raided the high school art room trash?”

  Kenji had already drawn up a logo—a muddy bootprint inside a circle with a compass needle runnin’ through it. He’d practiced it over and over ‘til it looked carved in stone.

  And Tadpole? He didn’t bring paint.

  He brought focus.

  He stood at the edge of the clearing, watchin’ like a foreman, noddin’ here, gruntin’ there, makin’ sure every board got its color and every corner its purpose.

  They worked all afternoon, smearin’ and splashin’, laughin’ too hard at Bo’s “accidental” streaks across Kenji’s back. The green went on thick, like a second skin. The roof got a fresh patch of canvas. Even the trapdoor got stenciled:

  AUTHORIZED MUDPUPPIES ONLY.

  Josie painted the logo on the outside wall with her own hands—steady, determined—while the others cheered her on.

  Then she dipped her brush in the red clay and wrote beneath it, crooked but proud:

  Mudpuppy Patrol HQ

  Est. This Summer. Forever Ours.

  When it was done, they all stood back, smudged and sunburnt, arms folded across their chests like kings and queens overlookin’ a kingdom.

  “It’s perfect,” Cricket said.

  “No,” Josie corrected, hands on her hips. “It’s earned.”

  Tadpole took his knife and etched a date into the doorframe. Today’s. Just a quiet little mark to say: we were here.

  And maybe—we still are.

  The sun slipped down behind the trees, and the sky turned syrupy gold. They sat on the front step, paint on their jeans and pride in their bones, not sayin’ much, just watchin’ the fireflies rise again.

  The swamp breathed easy around them.

  And for the first time, so did they.

  Scene 5: One Last Spin

  The sun had dipped low, burnin’ the sky to ash and orange, and the swamp lit up with fireflies like the stars had dropped in early to watch. The air smelled of paint, citronella, and childhood, and the clubhouse glowed from within like a lantern someone forgot to blow out.

  Kenji set the old tape recorder down in the middle of the floor, wiped the last smudge of green off his glasses, and held up the final cassette like it was a holy relic.

  “Think she’s still got one more in her?”

  Josie nodded. “She better.”

  They all gathered close. Cross-legged or leanin’ against the walls, bare feet sticky from the heat, faces lit by the soft flicker of the lantern and the honest buzz of crickets just outside.

  Kenji clicked the tape into place. The gears whirred. The speaker crackled.

  And then—

  That guitar.

  Sharp, bright, and wild as a fire through dry brush. It didn’t creep in—it kicked the door open.

  “There's a place up ahead and I'm goin’, just as fast as my feet can fly...”

  Josie laughed, head back, red curls stickin’ to her neck. Cricket whooped and clapped along, off-beat and grinnin’. Bo started tappin’ on the floor with a paintbrush like he’d invented the drums.

  Kenji sang quietly under his breath. Lila Rae closed her eyes and leaned against Tadpole’s shoulder, hummin’ like she’d known this song her whole life.

  Tadpole didn’t sing.

  But he smiled.

  That song wasn’t just music anymore. It was theirs.

  “Come on the risin' wind, we're goin’ up around the bend...”

  The little tape deck warbled on the high notes, like it knew this might be its last hurrah. But the soul of it—raw, rollickin’, alive—that part came through loud and clear.

  And when the final chord rang out, there was a moment of stillness so pure it felt like the swamp itself had paused to listen.

  The tape clicked off.

  No one spoke right away.

  Josie stood, walked to the window, and looked out toward the trees—toward the trail they’d followed, the shimmer they’d chased, the truth they’d unearthed.

  She turned to the others, eyes bright and voice quiet.

  “We ain’t done,” she said. “We’re just started.”

  Scene 6: Just Started

  The others had gone quiet, their voices driftin’ off like fireflies into the night, leavin’ only the creak of the wood and the lull of the bayou. One by one, the crew had wandered off to their own corners of the clubhouse—Bo snoozin’ in the hammock, Cricket curled up on the window ledge with her slingshot tucked under her arm, Lila Rae still scribblin’ in her notebook by lantern light. Tadpole sat on the floor near the door, whittlin’ in silence. Kenji fussed with the tape player, tryin’ to rewind it just right like the CCR magic might live in the spools themselves.

  Josie stepped outside and let the screen door thump shut behind her.

  The porch groaned beneath her as she sat, cross-legged, elbows on her knees. The swamp spread out before her like a story no one had finished tellin’. Moonlight glazed the water in slivers. Bullfrogs tuned up somewhere down the bank, and the trees rustled just enough to remind her they were still listenin’.

  She pulled the photo from her pocket—the one of Lester and her daddy as a boy—and held it up to the moonlight.

  There was a time when this story belonged to grown-ups. Scientists. Politicians. People in suits with big words and small hearts.

  Not anymore.

  This summer hadn’t been about games or ghost stories. It had been about truth. About listenin’ when no one else would. About diggin’ when the ground said “leave it be.”

  About learnin’ how deep roots go when you care enough to follow ‘em.

  She traced the edge of the photo with her thumb and smiled.

  The breeze shifted, warm and easy, brushin’ past her like a whisper in a language only the swamp remembered.

  Behind her, the CCR tape clicked softly in the clubhouse—rewound and waitin’.

  Josie looked out toward the trees, eyes fixed on the path that vanished into moon-shadow and memory.

  “We ain’t done,” she said, voice steady and sure as a tide.

  She tucked the photo into her pocket.

  “Just started.”

  And she leaned back on her hands, starin’ up at the sky, where the clouds drifted like lazy ghosts and the wind hummed a tune only summer could sing.