pond surface detail

Luther Eldredge and Joshua Baker loved to ponder.
And they were no strangers to rye whiskey.
Once a month, always choosing the three or four hours when the tide was high (when the oysters were well submerged) and when they were not busy scratching out on the flats, the two would take a fifth of Old Overholt and walk off into he woods to go "ponderin'." Once they were safely away from the sound of anything civilized, Luther would sit on a bed of dried locust leaves and lean against the rippled bark. Joshua would do the same on the opposite side of the grand tree. They would pull the cork on the Old Overholt and place it the space between them. And they would ponder. They would sit silently for a while, until the potion warmed their imaginations.
"Ever think about why we dream Joshua?" Luther asked, taking a big draw of the whiskey.
Joshua knit his brows and fixed his watery eyes on a passing cloud.
"I think maybe God is talking to us Luther," he said, reaching around for the Old Overholt.
"Mercy Joshua," Luther said, "Then the man sure has a frightening way of speaking. Last night I opened an oyster and my Grandmother Hopkins was inside."
Joshua snorted and the whiskey burned the inside of his nose.
And so it went for some four hours.
And so it went for some twenty-seven years.
Mortality. Stars. Soul. Love. Friendship. Truth.
When the bottle was drained and buried ceremoniously under the fragrant forest floor, Joshua and Luther walked back into town, often arm in arm.