Steve`s Country
For a smile as wide as a country sunrise
Saturday Stories! #25-10 Our Camping Fun Continues.
Welcome back to our camping fun story, continued from last week, which was continued from the previous week. This ended up being a bit longer than I had thought. If you missed last week, you can read it HERE. We had gone into our tent for the night, a bit earlier than we had planned, but there were swarms of thousands of mosquitoes outside.
That is no exaggeration either. Now, when Dad was making our supper, and he didn’t want me or my brother to help for some reason, I had walked around our little island to see what was there. I found trees and plants and lots of thick moss, but absolutely no animal life whatever. I had thought that was rather strange since the island wasn’t that small.
There should have been something, such as birds, on that island, but there was nothing. Once all those mosquitoes showed up, I understood why there were no animals on that island. They would never survive with all those mosquitoes! Once we were safely in the tent, we could hear that steady hum of those mosquitoes outside.
This tent we were sleeping in was not huge. It was meant for 3 people to sleep, nothing else. I think when they said this was a 3 person tent, they were thinking of kids. We were all adults on this trip. I was the smallest of the three. Dad and my brother, being older, picked the outside edge of the tent for sleeping. That left me squished in the middle.
However, it had one good point, the ground was nice and smooth under me. My brother had a root under him and Dad had a rock under him. No matter how hard they tried, that rock and root was against their back. I settled in for a comfortable night’s sleep. Now, my Dad had told my brother to set the tent up on the hill. My brother interpreted that to mean “on the side of the hill”.
Dad meant “on top” of the hill. So, we all kept sliding down toward the door of the tent. It was a fairly steep hillside. Poor Dad, he was the heaviest and had the worst time keeping himself from sliding down. And he kept reminding my brother of this fact about every 5 minutes. Now, when we were young kids, our parents would always remind us to use the bathroom before doing certain things, like driving somewhere, or, like going inside a tent.
Dad kept sighing for a while and finally admitted he didn’t heed that principle and had to go outside. That meant opening the tent door. Dad went outside so fast he nearly took the tent with him! Doug and I were swatting mosquitoes continuously until Dad returned. He came back in with hundreds more mosquitoes. So, he decided to spray again. AAAAAAAA!!!! said Doug and I.
We hid inside our sleeping bags while Dad sprayed. Amazing we survived that. About 10 minutes later, Doug had to go out. Dad groaned. Doug went out but he couldn’t get the zipper on the tent door to close, so I got up and worked on that and finally got it down just as Doug wanted back inside. Dad sighed loudly. I had a hard time unzipping that zipper, but it finally worked and my brother came inside.
We all settled down. “Good thing it isn’t raining,” I said, “mosquitoes humming is bad enough, but listening to rain on the tent roof would be worse. Drop, drop, drop, running down the roof and dripping off the edge.” “AAAAAAA!!! Bonehead!” said Dad. Seems all the talk about rain got Dad and he had to go back outside again. At least the zipper on the door worked properly this time.
But those mosquitoes! There were a lot more coming in this time. Then I noticed that Dad left the door open. He said there was no time to close it. Anyway, I zipped it up again, just as Dad returned. Then the zipper got stuck about half way. “AAAAAAAA!!!” yelled Dad and Doug, “These mosquitoes will kill us!” While Dad was fighting with the zipper I crawled out.
“May as well take my turn now,” I said. Dad just groaned and said Bonehead again. Dad was still fighting with that zipper when I crawled back inside. Dad then tried to do the same, but he was considerably bigger than me and he sort of got stuck on the zipper. Doug and I were laughing so hard, even with all the mosquitoes.
Dad grabbed that spray and sprayed the tent again, then he yelled for the flashlight, which was a nice large one. “Shine it here,” he said, so I did. “AAAA!!!” he yelled, “not in my eyes! Bonehead!” Finally he got unhooked and we all settled down to sleep, after Dad sprayed the tent again. “We’re all gonna die!” exclaimed Doug. Finally we fell asleep.
In the morning as the sun shone on the tent, there was not one square inch (or cm either) that wasn’t covered with mosquitoes! Dad said we all move fast, take down the tent, toss everything into the boat and we get out of here. It was amazing how fast we did move too. Off we went back to where we parked the truck. Hauled the boat and all of our stuff up that rough hill and to the truck.
Surprisingly nothing odd happened. Then we went to our favorite restaurant for breakfast. What an ordeal. It was an almost fishless fishing trip. I did catch one fish. That was it. I tried to get them interested in another trip that summer, but both refused. Sigh. No sense of adventure. Well, I hope you enjoyed our little experience. Have a great weekend everyone and God bless!
Steve and Muffin.
©2025 Steve McLeod.
The Investigators, Inc. The Panama Case. Chapter 11.
We were flying over the ocean, heading home, but we still had about 4 hours to go. Kat had told Bridgette to cut the flow of blood from Sky to me for a while and see what happens. She did this for a while but things seemed to get worse and my body started to jump around slightly. So Kat told her to let more blood flow to me, which she did.
Everything calmed down again and after another hour Kat said to cut the flow of blood again. When she did it this time everything seemed to remain stable. The rest of the team cheered when they heard the news. There was even cheering back home as well. But, we still don’t know what will happen to me having so much of Sky’s blood in me now.
Will it hurt me after a while? But, at least for now everything is fine. However, I am still not conscious and that is worrying Samantha a little. Kat told her not to worry about anything yet. There is still 2 hours to go before we land, then a drive of about one and a half hours. I will be staying in our new medical clinic for a few days so Samantha can keep an eye on me and watch for any side effects.
Several members of our team will be staying there actually. Sienna has asked if she can stay with us for a while so that Galyna and Victoria can give her counseling. This whole ordeal has been very hard on her and she needs some time off before heading back to work. Aside from getting good counseling, she will have some time with our girls which I know will help her as well.
Part of the counseling that Galyna and Victoria use is spending time outdoors, but in safety, plus spending time with the cats. That is something that Misty, our third counselor, incorporated into counseling sessions and now all three use the cats. Muffin says that Sienna needs her own cat and she may be right. Sienna does love cats so maybe we can find her a special cat of her own.
I am still not conscious, though Kat is not concerned about that. Samantha, however, is a bit more worried about that “little problem”, as Kat likes to call it. With just over an hour till we land, I opened my eyes and looked around a bit. “Hi Steve,” said Sky so gently, “please don’t move your right arm, we are still connected together.” I looked down at our arms and saw the tubes connecting us together.
I frowned a bit, but never said a word. Sky noticed my frown. “Do you remember what happened Steve?” she asked. I shook my head, slowly, signifying a negative response. “This is so I could give you some of my blood,” she continued, “you had lost a great deal of blood and I was the only one with the right blood type for you.”
She had such a beautiful smile and spoke so gently, it made me feel good. “Are we married?” I managed to say finally. “No Steve,” she replied, “you are married to Jennifer, remember? We will soon be home and you will see her.” She was still smiling. She then called Kat who came in right away. “Well, nice to see your eyes open again Steve,” she said.
“Jennifer?” I asked. “His memory is a bit off,” said Sky. “Kiss me Steve,” she said, “then tell me who I am.” We kissed. I smiled. “You are Kat,” I said with a large grin. “There, he’s back to normal again,” said Kat. “That’s no fair,” said Sky, “you always get to give Steve a kiss to bring him back to life again.” “I just helped his memory,” said Kat, “you brought him back to life by exchanging your blood with him.
Sort of a special covenant between the two of you. That’s better than a kiss. Now, Steve, how do you feel otherwise?” “Well, I must admit that I feel a bit strange actually,” I said, “like something is different, not something bad, just different.” “Well, that is to be expected,” said Kat, “you have some different blood in you now and we’re not really quite sure what that will mean.
But I doubt there will be any major problems. Anything major, in a negative way, would show up immediately. But you might feel a bit odd at times, that will be normal for a while. Just make sure you let one of us know right away of anything out of the ordinary.” “I will do that Kat,” I said. Well, we are back home again, and have been for 5 days already.
Samantha said I was perfectly healthy again, so I am no more in the medical clinic, but back in the chateau, and that sure feels good. There was a number of us in the library and Jennifer had been sitting on my lap but went to the kitchen to get us some coffee and donuts. As soon as she left, Sienna came into the library and sat on my lap. “Who said you could sit on my lap?” I asked her.
“I saw a couple of the girls sitting on your lap today,” she said, “so if they can, then I can too.” Jennifer returned at that moment and stood shaking her head. “I go to the kitchen for a few minutes and when I come back you have another woman on your lap,” she said, “and kissing you too!” There were several gasps around the room.
“Oops,” said Sienna, “I thought you would be away longer.” “That’s okay,” said Jennifer, “you can stay there, it’s more comfortable sitting beside Steve anyway.” “Good, besides, I have to leave tomorrow anyway,” said Sienna, “have to get back to work.”
“You are not going anywhere yet,” I said, “you can leave when I give you permission to leave.” I smiled at her. “I have a large company to run,” she said, “and who says I need your permission?” “Your company will survive without you for another week or two,” I said, “and, in answer to your question, I do.” A slight discussion took place.
“Okay, but I get to sit on your lap and get a kiss every day that I’m here,” she said. “Deal,” said Jennifer, “now you two stop arguing and eat your donuts.” Actually, I think Sienna enjoys being here, she just doesn’t want to admit it. Aari and Dawn are still in the clinic, the others are healed now. Lance was the only one on our team to be killed. His body was shipped home to his family in the US.
All expenses, including burial were paid by Sienna. Lance’s two brothers and a friend have asked to join our team and they will soon be arriving to begin taking our tests. Kat has been working on my arm and I do have use of it again, though not perfectly yet. I am feeling fine, but still strange at times. Will anything really change? Have to wait and see, I guess.
The End. A new story will be coming along soon.
©2025 Steve McLeod.
