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She noticed him sitting on the dock, looking like he’d rather be a million miles away. His head drooped as he dangled his feet over the water. His shoelaces were untied, and as she came closer, she realized it was because he’d outgrown those shoes. The only way they’d fit on his feet was if he left the laces loose.
He had dark skin that glowed like a copper coin in the sunshine. She would have thought maybe he was Indian, from one of the nearby reservations, except that he looked entirely out of place here.
Since that was how she often felt, her heart went out to him.
Alvin Carter had lent her a fishing rod and given her the task of trying to catch a fish for lunch. An idea came to her. Boys liked fishing, didn’t they? She didn’t know much about boys, except that her mother was always warning her about them. But this boy had such a woebegone look about him that she wasn’t scared of him at all.
That changed when she tapped him on the shoulder. He jerked around with a ferocious glare that made her jump back and nearly drop the fishing rod.
“I…I…” she stammered. Now that she saw his face, she couldn’t imagine why she hadn’t been scared of him before. He was terrifying! She gripped her fishing rod tight, thinking that at the very least she could defend herself with it. “Do you like to fish?”
The frown changed to confusion, and then to the sweetest smile she’d ever seen. “I don’t know. I never tried it. Sorry if I scared you. You shouldn’t creep up on a person like that.”
“I wasn’t creeping.” Her fear gave way to offense. “That’s rude to say. You just weren’t paying attention. And I’m barefoot, so you probably didn’t hear me.” She glanced at his feet. He noticed, and bent his long legs so the shoes were hidden under the dock. That did away with the last of her fear.
“I was going to offer you a fishing rod,” she explained.
He eyed it curiously, then held out his hand. “Okay. Do you know how it works?”
She’d never used one either. “Not exactly.”
“Don’t you live here?”
“Not exactly.”
He laughed and she noticed that his eyes had speckles of amber lighting up the warm brown. His hair was cropped so short that she couldn’t tell if it was curly or straight, but it was a dark brown color she envied. She’d always wanted dark hair; her own blond hair stood out too much for her taste, acting almost like a spotlight.
“You don’t live here either,” she pointed out.
“Good thing I don’t. I’d go crazy from boredom.”
“If you’re so bored, why don’t you try to catch a fish?”
She kneeled next to him and they peered at the rod together. He quickly figured out how to release the reel so the fishing line spooled out into the water. Then he reeled it back in. He stood up to cast the line, and whooped when it landed far out in the water with a gentle plop.
She stood up next to him. He was a little taller than her, but not much; she was tall for her age. “I think you’re supposed to reel it in and kind of jerk the line once in a while. I saw people doing that.”
“Here.” He handed the rod to her. “Show me.”
She liked that he wasn’t trying to hog the fishing rod, or act like he knew everything about it. He seemed nice, for a boy. He smelled pretty good too, like very strong laundry detergent and Lifesavers. The orange ones, which were her favorites.
She took a turn with the rod, carefully imitating the movements she’d seen the locals use. There were many types of fish in Lake Bittersweet, and they required different techniques, but only certain kinds swarmed around the dock.
After a few minutes, she felt a tug on the end of her line, and gave a shocked squeak. The tug came again, and she looked over at the boy in a panic. “What do I do now?”
“Uh…keep turning that handle? Yeah, just keep going. Like that.” He cheered her on while she cranked on the reel, until finally the hook on the end of the line swam to the surface, with a small silver fish attached to it.
Wildly, she yanked the pole overhead so the fish landed on the dock, flopping indignantly. It twisted so much that it dislodged the hook from its mouth.
“It’s going to get away!” she cried.
The boy went running after it, and so did she, after she set down the rod. He got his hands around its slippery body, but it spurted right out again. She shrieked again—“it’s getting away”—and then a woman’s shoes stepped into her field of vision. Cork heels, canvas tops, a gold ankle bracelet. One kick from those shoes and the fish skidded across the dock into the lake. It immediately disappeared into the water’s depths.
“Didn’t I tell you not to get in any trouble?” the woman demanded. She clamped a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Now you made me ruin my shoes. We wasted our time coming here. Come on.”
The boy dug in his heels. “I don’t want to go yet. She needs to catch a fish.”
“Blondie needs a fish? Plenty more fish in the lake.” She chuckled at her little joke. “We gotta long drive.”
