White Boys in Florida

Alysia Li Ying Sawchyn

We have spent over two thousand years perfecting insulation from the elements, running water, central air, fiberoptic cables, and still this motherfucker keeps suggesting we sleep outdoors. On hopeful days, the well water tastes like cut grass, tiny white orchids bloom in the Spanish moss draped over pine trees’ branches, and baking geckos practice aerobics on the lanai; every other day, the water smells like hardboiled eggs, wasps are nesting on the front porch, and my flesh welts where creatures have made a meal of me. After seven years, I have finally learned the sound an alligator makes: an assertive frog, a faraway smoker’s cough, a dog barking into a seven-foot traffic cone—not a growl but a grunt. I’d heard it everywhere without knowing the source. Apex predators have little need for evolution, and thus the means of surviving them has also remained the same. The creature’s strength is only in its downbite; once within snapping reach, you’ll need to get even closer, wrap your arms around its snout, and hold on tight. I am still waiting for instruction on how and when to let go.