The Lute Player's Wife

“Georgia, they're ready for you!” The stage assistant peeked her head into my dressing room where my makeup artist Cierra was putting the finishing touches on my eye shadow. I smiled weakly still feeling nervous but I slid my body from the salon chair and followed the stage assistant to the production area. Cameras were everywhere and a big bright stage setting with two blue sofa chairs and a blue ottoman in the middle. I sat in my seat and rubbed the top of my necklace. A silver cross necklace with silver jewels running down the middle. A Christmas gift from my late husband. Reid Pho.

Reid died a year ago and I guess I survived what we went through because someone had to finish the work we started. Someone had to be left to tell Reid’s story because he didn’t last long enough on this earth to tell it. Janine Porter, star reporter of SNC ‘s, Around the World news segment came into the stage area and hugged me. She sat down in her seat next to me. “Are you ready for this Georgia?” She asked me. Her pink dress suit looked stunning rivaling my own tan sweater and black slacks. I crossed my left leg over my right and sat up straight and smiled. The countdown started and the camera started rolling. The studio audience followed the cue cards and clapped.

“Good evening America and welcome to Around the World. I'm Janine Porter, America’s favorite reporter!

I am here today with my guest, Georgia Pho, and today we are discussing her new book, The Lute Players’ Wife, a fiction novel based on true events from her own past.”

“The book is about a newlywed couple who get caught in the middle of an illegal exotic animal trade. Spoiler alert, the main characters’ husband dies! “

Georgia, you and your husband spent several months living in Belize, he was a wedding musician who then became a wildlife photographer sensation overnight until he was murdered one cold, rainy night on the island. Can you tell me a little about that?

My palms are sweaty, I enjoyed watching Janine when she was grilling other people and I was on the other side of the television screen but now, I was in the hot seat and it felt like the entire world had stopped to watch me and listen. There seemed to be a hush in the room as I cleared my throat and spoke remembering everything.

“ Yes, it's true Reid was a lute player who performed with a band at weddings, it’s actually how we met. A mutual friend of ours was getting married and they introduced us. What attracted me the most about Reid was his tenacity. He was tenacious in his pursuit of me, he asked me to dance several times that night at the wedding and when he decided to go to photography school, he worked full-time jobs, at odd hours and was determined to make a name for himself. After he graduated. Reid got a part-time job at a zoo and he was supposed to be taking photos of the visitors to sell as souvenirs but instead he was capturing close ups of the animals and selling them to people. One day an editor for Nature’s Range magazine was visiting the zoo with his family and was impressed with a particular photo Reid had of a gorilla. He invited Reid to interview at the magazine and he was hired! Reid’s success led to our amazing wedding and eventually a few days after we got married, he got the call to come to Belize and I have to be honest, I wasn’t happy about it.”

Janine dramatically rested her arms on the soft armrest and nestled the edge of her jaw in her hands, “Why weren’t you happy Georgia? That seems like a good opportunity for Reid, lucrative even!”

“Reid’s job did allow us to live somewhat comfortably. I was grateful that I didn’t have to work and it allowed me time to focus on freelance journaling and I even had a blog for college students majoring in journalism that was doing well. I was even talking to a University in New Hampshire about being a remote professor, teaching their online Journalism courses.” “ Reid had been traveling most of the year prior to us marrying. I felt as though I planned the wedding myself. We hadn’t gone on a honeymoon and now he was packing up again to go to Belize.” He understood my sadness and invited me to come with him. I considered refusing the offer and just maintaining things at home. I’d hoped we could pick up where we left off when he returned but my mother talked me out of it. She said that I was a wife now, and my place was wherever my husband was. She said, “ The first three years of marriage are the crucial years and the rest is easy.” She even referenced Ruth in the Bible and how she followed Esther to her hometown after the death of her husband. “Where you go, I go.” That’s what she said to me and that's what I said to Reid. I’ve always trusted my mother’s judgement and her wisdom has always been most helpful to me growing up and she still is a strong source of support for me.

We married in September and left for Belize after Christmas in December and he did request a few weeks off to actually spend time with me. We visited the Mayan Ruins, swam on the beaches and for the first three weeks, it felt like a honeymoon. His contract was only supposed to be for six months but by July of 2018, we were leaving our hotel and renting a small cabin in a small city outside Belize called Chiqui that was closer to the road that leads to the Macaw River.

Janine nodded and handed me a tissue as tears streamed down my cheeks. I could picture the waterfalls and the lush trees in the forest and the Belizean people. It was a beautiful country at one point. She was sympathetic but dove right into my aching soul with her next question. “Why did they ask Reid to come to Belize?”

I dabbed the corners of my eyes with a tissue and sipped some water from the mug next to me on the small coffee table and continued. “The magazine was doing a segment about endangered species. The Scarlet Macaw birds were becoming extinct in the country as their numbers dwindled from the thousands to only about two-hundred. A biomonitoring team concerned about the wellbeing of the animals due to a dam being built that was cutting off the animals from necessary resources like hunting, feeding and even mating grounds. Scarlet Macaws have been being stolen from their nests and sold illegally over the US and beyond for the past eight years in the country and the biomonitoring team decided to camp near the nests every mating season to deter poachers. My husband was originally there to take pictures while the article was being developed. Shortly after we moved to the cabin, he told me that we’d be staying longer because he joined the biomonitoring team and would be taking shifts camping around the trees protecting the birds’ nest.

“How did that news make you feel? "Janine asked.

“I felt awful! He made a decision without talking to me and I always accepted that he would always love animals more than I did! I mean, I don’t hate animals or anything, I just believe that they have their place and we have ours and that there are boundaries! I tried to be supportive despite being hurt but slowly his new role started to deteriorate him.” He was sleeping less, and gone from home for weeks at a time, the team would be out scouting new nests and every new thing he learned it seemed it was all he could talk about. It was as if he was becoming obsessed.

I got so lonely that I took a job at an American woman’s stall at the market in Chiqui. She sold silk scarves and other linens. It gave me something to do during the day to keep me from worrying. I made friends with the small network of wives who also had husbands working on the Macaw monitoring team but they spoke Belizean mostly and I didn’t feel like I belonged. They were sweet women but, I was depressed and homesick. My marriage was in shambles, we argued all the time when Reid was home. He got angry whenever I suggested that he take some, “time off.” My mother told me that this was a test of my marriage and that I must pass it. She suggested I meet Reid where he was and spend some time at work with him. It soothed the fire temporarily. I tried to blend in, and appreciate nature but roughing it, cooking and sleeping outside was hard for me but it gave me the opportunity to be close to my husband and seeing the birds so up close as we did was a beautiful bonding moment. I’m not an animal lover but one thing I learned about Scarlet Macaws is that when they mate, they usually mate for life and fly in pairs. I believed that Reid and I could have a love like that and we agreed to get matching Scarlet Macaw tattoos on our shoulders to symbolize the experience and to be a reminder to us during rocky points in our marriage. I cried all the time. Spending time with Reid in the forest only made me more anxious to get back home and start our lives, we had planned on starting a family you know?

“I see. You felt like Reid was putting you in second place, after all the support you’d given, it seemed like your feelings didn’t matter”. Janine said thoughtfully.

“I nodded as I wiped away more tears. “I ate salads foraged from the plants for him, I washed his clothes in the cold river and almost got bitten by a snake, I was fighting for my marriage and I felt that I wasn;t getting the same actions in return. The straw that finally broke the camel's back was on our anniversary. He promised he’d be home in time for us to go out to dinner and spend the entire weekend with me. He never showed up. I was hurt, angry and terrified all at once! “

“Is that what led you to sell the map of the bird nests?”

“ I never really entered his office, he always kept the door closed and often fell asleep at his desk while editing photos or writing in his journals. I burst into that room on our anniversary night and I just copied it. I don't know how many copies I made, probably about ten. I knocked over the chair, flung papers around the room and tore pages from his journals. I found a Macaw feather in one of them and I took it.

Then I drove from Chiqui to the border of Guatemala. I ended up in the city called Austitino. I covered my hair and neck with a scarf and put on sunglasses. I surveyed the markets asking shop owners where I could purchase a Macaw Bird. Within ten minutes I was directed to a small house off the pier near the boating docks. The man who owned the shop had all sorts of birds lined in cages but he was out of Macaws. He mentioned his last shipment left months ago and that his men were having difficulty getting more.

“It looks like the Macaws hired themselves some security, my men can’t get near a nest without a gun being pressed into their backs!” The man had said. I was even more furious. Reid knew I didn’t like him playing with guns. I showed him the map I’d copied. I told him, one of the soldiers had left it at my scarf shop and convinced him it was real by presenting the feather I stole from Reid’s journal. It wasn’t an easy decision but I gave him my contact info and we planned a good day for them to raid the nests. He believed he was selling me a male Macaw baby bird for $10,000 and one female bird for $15,000. US cash. He promised me no one would get hurt. I gazed at the cages of Toucans, lovebirds, canaries and other species and even spotted a few Iguanas and Lizards. It dawned on me that I was doing the right thing. No matter how long my husband and his group protected those nests, the poaching wasn’t going to stop. Their network was bigger than twenty forest rangers. If they couldn’t get Macaws in Belize they would go somewhere else.

The night they raided the forest Reid was supposed to be home. I’d shredded the other copies and cleaned his office but when he came home, it was only to shower and change clothes. Another camper fell ill and Reid was asked to take his spot. I begged my husband not to go, I threatened to go to the airport and go home. It’d been a thought that crossed my mind often.

He left anyway. Choosing those Macaws over me. Over our marriage. The rain poured endlessly that night. From the skies and from my eyes. I hesitated many times. I don’t know what made me prepare a backpack and go trekking through the darkness. The Macaw River is about two and half hours away from Chiqui. It was too dangerous to drive all the way there and I didn’t want to draw attention to myself. As I neared the edge of Chiqui. I covered my jeep with fallen leaves and headed to the campsite. I was too late, gun fire was ringing and I could hear the screaming of the birds. The poachers had killed four men and were wounded in the middle of the clearing. I laid in the wet grass and hid behind a tree. They drove off in a large truck and I heard birds squawking from the back of it. I crawled in the grass searching the wounded and dead faces for Reid. I found him pressed up against a tree bleeding from his stomach. I sobbed and confessed to everything. I held him and apologized. I lit an emergency flare and hoped for a miracle. I begged him to stay with me.

I remember him gripping my hand before he died and saying, “Georgia, I love you and I forgive you.” I have those words tattooed on the back of my shoulder with two small Scarlet Macaws flying toward each other in pairs. It reminded me that all I had to do was love and forgive my husband as he did me, and maybe, just maybe, he’d still be here with me. I thought if the Macaws disappeared, he would come back to me and we could go back home and start over. I lost him forever but Reid and the other biomonitoring teams caught the Belizean government's attention and a military team has been stationed at the border of Guatemala and Belize checking cargo and now the remaining bio monitors have chipped their baby chicks and are able to track and retrieve their stolen birds. It's a step in the right direction, steps I like to think my husband started. Reid is gone from this world physically but he’s with me spiritually. I’m remarried now but not a day goes by that he doesn’t cross my mind. We’re paired for life, forever and always like the Scarlet Macaw. I hope this book helps struggling couples and inspires the government to do more to stop poaching.

Janine has more questions for me but I don’t care to answer them, I rise from my chair and head backstage and to my dressing room where I grab my purse and pass the surge of media, protestors who are against me, supporters who understand me, I climb into my truck and my driver speeds me towards the airport. I’m sitting but my mind is flying, flying in my truth, as I am the only one who must live with it. I reach up and finger the cross necklace once more. I love you, and I forgive you Reid, I whisper.