"The Catch"

"You've got to be kidding! You can't expect me to carry all that stuff over all those hills." Brad was hopping mad, acting out again for all his twelve years were worth.

I didn't say anything, just kept walking with the canoe on my head, shoulders leaning into my backpack. If he wanted to fish with me, he would have to carry his share, because I wasn't about to make two trips this morning. At twelve, it's about time to help a fella gain some self-reliance, read that self-respect.

The rattle and clatter behind me told me Brad had decided to see things my way, maybe not all my way, but enough to let me relax about his angry attitude a little. We wound our way through the buck brush and past tall oaks and elms to the bank of the Straight River. We drove about a mile and a half from my farmstead to the trail, hiked another mile from the truck to my secret fishing spot, and we made it just as the sun chimed 6:00 A.M.

I laid the canoe gently by the water's edge as the rest of our gear hit the ground with a crash. I told Bradley "Thank God for stainless steel thermos jugs, huh?" I got a haughty sneer in reply, but I love him anyway.Bradley and I sat in the short spring grass, on the bank savoring the morning sun and a cup of java, black, or in the boy's case, a can of Dad's root beer.

Our first fishing expedition of the spring portended big success for my son, who possessed visions of dragging home a stringer of sunfish, sighting the Loch Ness monster, something great. He had been getting increasingly hard to handle in the two years since his mother died, and I needed some quiet time with him to get to be his buddy again. Like before the accident."Well son," I stood and tossed off my grounds, "let's make a noise like bait." Brad chugged his soda and crushed the can under his heel, belching enormously.

I slid the canoe into the water as he tossed in our rods, tackle box and lunches. We got in and glided quietly out into the slowly moving water- resting from its spring frenzy.

We paddled here and there, Brad in front talking animatedly, me in the stern, occasionally warning him not to scare the fish. We were looking for the hot spot, where the sunnies were, where they would be hungry.Later, rather than sooner, we found it, and as I had promised, our lines "whipped the water to a froth," pulling in small to medium sunfish. The water was so clear that you could just hang your hook in, and when a sunny looked interested, if he was too small, just pull the hook away and tease a bigger sunfish with it.

Brad was having a ball, but it was starting to dawn on him that someone was going to have to clean all these fish and that they would want help with that- I could see his mind working at excuses, just in case he needed them- homework, to bed early for school, whatever.The fishing was getting slower, it was about noon, when they sleep, read, or do what they do after a good meal. I motioned to Brad to reel-em-in, we'd go to shore for lunch and a nap.I paddled in, it was easier than to argue with Brad that he had to help. Coasting along the shore a few feet out, a swatch of red and white cloth caught Brad's sharp eyes.

Obligingly, his dutiful father nosed the canoe into the weeds so his curiosity could be satisfied.We pulled up close and Bradley lifted the cloth with his paddle. We stared. Staring back was the desiccated, partially eaten face of a young woman. We listened. Open jaws silently protested their fate. What you would call a dead quiet. The only sound I could hear, a wild pounding, was the blood in my ears. Something had been at work on the eyes. Now my son knows what crows do in the winter.Brad dropped his paddle. "Oh no, Dad, oh God, oh yuck!" He rolled away against the far side of the canoe, nearly tipping us. The ripples from the canoe made the face bob gently in the water, up, down, up, down. An arm floated languidly to the surface, palm down. She had all the time in the world. We had none.