That Was A Good One

The late morning heat was already making itself known as David pulled off the blacktop onto the gravel road. Low-hanging limbs weighed down with the bright green leaves beat against the sides of the truck as David slowly navigated the ruts and swales.

“Make sure you keep your arm in the window through here,” David said across the bench seat to Jimmy. “I don’t want you getting whacked by one of those pine boughs.”

Jimmy didn’t acknowledge, and continued gazing out the passenger-side window. David’s arm was draped across the back of the seat, and he patted Jimmy’s shoulder gently before returning his attention to the tracks that meandered through the woods in front of him.

Eventually the trees broke, and the truck was spit onto a patch of grass that extended out across an earthen dam. The dam held back three acres of water that flowed in from Ennis Creek, a shiny metal coin in a sea of green foliage that surrounded it. David had fished here since he was a boy. As he pulled to a stop beneath a large willow, he took solace in how little had changed.

David turned the truck off and stepped out onto ground still damp with morning dew. Looking around, he saw the poplar log that rested in the water’s edge on the far bank that always hosted a line of slick-backed turtles, gathered like a gaggle of old men on a courthouse square.

He walked around to the passenger side and opened Jimmy’s door. After unlatching the seatbelt, he helped Jimmy out of the truck and reached in to the middle of the seat where two brown paper bags were stowed.

“Hey, why don’t you take these and go wait at the picnic table for me,” David said as he put the two bags in Jimmy’s hands and pointed to the weathered picnic table that sat in the middle of the dam. “I’ll grab the gear and meet you over there.”

Jimmy slowly started toward the table, and David made sure to keep an eye on him as he walked, anxiously watching for any trips or stumbles as he gathered rods, tackle box, cooler, and two rusty lawn chairs from the truck bed. When he reached the table, he found Jimmy fumbling with the scotch-taped opening of one of the paper bags.

“You ready for lunch already?” he asked with a grin, helping Jimmy break the seal on the bag that sat in front of him. David reached in and held up the contents one item at a time, revealing each like a grand prize to Jimmy’s curious eyes.

“Let’s see, we’ve got a turkey sandwich, some potato chips, an apple, and one of those chocolate pudding cups that you love so much,” Jimmy’s face shined and a chuckle escaped his mouth as he watched the food emerge.

“And last but not least,” David popped open the red Igloo cooler at his feet with dramatic flair, “Your favorite! An ice cold Coke to wash it all down.”

He opened the can, putting it down on the table and then freeing the sandwich from the plastic wrapper. Jimmy picked up the can, and holding it with both hands brought it to his lips. As he sipped, a tiny dribble escaped the side of his mouth. But David had expected this, and was waiting with napkin in hand.

“Easy there, big man! Let’s get you cleaned up.” David dabbed at the sticky brown liquid that ran down Jimmy’s chin and onto the front of his faded blue t-shirt.

They ate their lunches in silence. David helped Jimmy as needed while watching for fish to rise on the water, the way that the breeze moved through the reeds where the creek entered the pond, and how the shadows of the clouds moved like haints across the surface of the pond. Once they were done with their food, he gathered the trash and pulled a small plastic container the color of a robin’s egg from the cooler. He was always amused at how little some things change, like how the nightcrawlers in his hand were packaged and sold at County Line Grocery in the same way as they had been when he was a child. He remembered watching his father break the seal with the blade of an ivory handled Case pocket knife–the same one he now held. David swallowed hard as he folded the knife, rubbed the smooth ivory with his thumb, and slid the knife into the back pocket of his jeans. He coughed as a way to break the images in his mind, and looked at Jimmy, “You ready, bud?”

David picked up the older of the two rods, amber with a plastic pistol grip that was cracked down the middle. The reel, a Zebco 33 from the 70’s, had a button that stuck sometimes. But he knew that this one was Jimmy’s favorite, so he positioned the bobber up the line, and carefully ran the hook through the wiggling body of one of the worms from the baby blue container. David’s face contorted into an amusing mask, the same face that he had made since he was a boy when doing this work; furrowed brow, tip of the tongue just outside the corner of his mouth. His father had always told him that he looked like he was working on a puzzle with no solution.

Baited and ready to go, David took the rod and a lawn chair in one hand and led Jimmy down to the bank with the other. He picked a spot that had always been his favorite when he was a child, under the shade of an massive birch, and planted the chair a few feet from where the water merged seamlessly with the shore. Once Jimmy was seated David kneeled down and held out the rod for Jimmy to hold.

“You want me to cast it or do you want to give it a try?” David asked. Jimmy just smiled, looking down where he dug the toe of his velcro sneaker into the mud. David gave a half-grin and patted him on the knee, “Alright, I’ll see what I can do with it.”

He lobbed the line into the air, the bobber and worm splashing down twenty yards across the water. He cranked the reel a couple times to take the slack out of the line, and felt that familiar sensation of satisfaction that comes with a good cast, as well as the anticipation that comes with the sight of a bobber sitting still in the water. Handing the rod to Jimmy, he affectionately gave his shoulder a little squeeze before walking back to the picnic table for his own rod and chair. Returning to the bank, he watched as Jimmy lifted his gaze up toward the tree line on the far side of the pond, and shielding his eyes from the sun with his empty hand, he studied two crows fuss at a hawk that had come too close for their liking. He watched intently, and David was not surprised that the airborne tussle across the water had taken Jimmy’s attention. Birds had always held a special place in Jimmy’s mind.

David planted his own chair in the mud. Letting out a deep sigh, he lowered himself into the seat and opened the container of worms to fish one out for his own hook. He had just gotten one of the writhing noodles between his thumb and index finger when he saw movement on the water in his peripheral vision. Looking up, he saw Jimmy’s bobber quickly dip twice below the surface, as if someone had yanked the line like a cord attached to a light bulb.

The worms and rod dropped from David’s hands, and jumping to his feet he called out, “You’ve got one, buddy!” But when he looked down, Jimmy was studying the quivering rod with a look of astonishment, like a snake by the tail. David moved behind the chair and leaned down over his shoulders, taking the rod and Jimmy’s hands into his own.

“Here, we’ll do this together,” David said as he positioned Jimmy’s hand on the reel. After a half dozen turns guiding the rotation of the reel, he felt something change in Jimmy’s hand. There was a taking charge, and Jimmy began to reel on his own. A flash of recognition crossed his face, a knowing of what should happen next. Letting go, David stepped back and watched, The movements weren’t smooth. They came in fits, and they were jerky. But they were Jimmy’s alone, and his face was now set in a look of dogged determination.

David let out a hearty laugh and clapped his hands as Jimmy fought against the zig-zagging line, willing it toward the bank. Finally, he couldn’t help but let out a boyish whoop of excitement when a bluegill the size of a pie plate flopped onto the shore at their feet. He knelt down in the mud, and after finally getting the fish still he held it up for Jimmy to see.

“Well what to you think about that?” David said as he let out a low whistle, peering at the olive colored scales and jet black eyes in his hands.

“That was a good one,” Jimmy muttered out of the blue, the first words he had spoken since getting in the truck that morning. David dropped the flailing fish to the ground out of surprise.

“Yeah, it was,” David answered with a slight shaking in his voice. Smiling, he wiped his eyes with the sleeves of his shirt.

**********

David could have sat on the bank forever, but an early summer afternoon thunderstorm had other plans. He and Jimmy loaded up and headed back to town before the weather broke. Heavy gray clouds seemed to stalk the truck along the way, and a handful of drops hit the windshield as they passed the town limits. David turned off the radio for the last several miles, and listened to the sound of the tires as they flitted against the rumble strips along the shoulder. They sounded like a whirring buzzsaw when the tires grazed. He glanced over at Jimmy to see if he noticed the noise, but he was asleep. Chin firmly planted on his chest, which slowly moved up and down with his breath.

They pulled onto the paved drive, perfectly lined with Bradford pears, and David could see Anita shepherding stubborn residents inside that were still occupying the front porch rockers, as if they were staging some sort of sit-in against the rain and thunder moving in from the west. Pulling up to the front door under the semi-circle colonnade, David killed the engine and stepped out into the damp afternoon air.

“Just in time! Looks like the bottom’s getting ready to fall out,” Anita proclaimed loudly as she started down the steps to to greet them.

“Yeah, we hit a few rain drops just outside of town, but we outran it for the most part,” David replied as he quietly opened the passenger door.

A large, kindly red-headed woman in her late 60’s, Anita had been a close friend of David’s family for years, having worked as a nurse with David’s late mother at the hospital in town decades before. His mother had been a bit older and had retired first, but Anita stayed on until just a few years back. But sitting still had never been her strong suit, and David was thankful when Anita said she was coming here part-time for a few days a week.

“How’d y’all do today?” Anita asked as she came alongside David, who gently shook Jimmy’s shoulder to wake him.

“We did good! We only caught a few before the weather drove us off. But he got to see the birds and get some sun on his face, so it was a win either way,”

Anita smiled and nodded her head, giving his back a motherly rub as he unbuckled Jimmy’s seatbelt. He was awake now, and glanced around with a bleary-eyed look of confusion as David helped him out of the truck. Without a word, Jimmy slowly started to shuffle past Anita and up the steps to the porch.

Anita cackled and asked, “Well Jimmy, ain’t you going to say goodbye?”

Jimmy paused two steps from the top, turned around, and blankly measured Anita and David for several seconds. Finally, he asked in a wary voice, “Do I know you?”

Anita turned her head and looked off toward the distance, as if to give some semblance of privacy as David tried his best to hide the pain on his face.

David cleared his throat and walked up the steps. He gently took his father by the shoulders and kissed him on the cheek. “I love you, dad. I’ll see you on Saturday and we’ll go catch us some more.”

He took a deep breath as he walked back down the steps, and as he passed Anita winked and squeezed his shoulder softly. Then she took the old man by the hand and patiently walked with him through the front door, the sign reading “Pleasant Valley Memory Care” neatly positioned above it in scrolled black vinyl letters.

For three years David had made this same trip twice a week, to pick up his father and carry him to the place where they had spent so much time together. H knew that most days his father had no recollection of the pond or what they were doing there. But some days, there was a flicker of light in that long shuttered corner of his father’s mind. Today had been one of those days, and David was thankful for that as he pulled back on to the main road. The evening sun broke through the clouds with rays of silver and gold, and David squinted his eyes against the light as he drove. He thought about the words that his father had said by the water’s edge earlier that day, and quietly offered them from his own lips like some sort of simple prayer.

“That was a good one.”