Un-Screening - Post 2

The sky and sea seemed to meet.  For Hank, it’s as though they were one element again.  The boat was calling to him.  The fish were calling to him.  He went inside and picked up the phone.  It was time to get all the guys together.  It was time to go fishing.  Nobody admitted how much trouble it was to set the date.  One couldn’t find a pen to write it down.  Another was in the car at the time the text came through.  Everyone had problems like these.

Once he’d grabbed four neighbors, Hank was able to get the boat tipped over, as green, brackish water came gushing out onto the dirt.  He sat, and tried to resist eating the entire bag of Kettle chips.  Stray cats walked by.  Storm clouds lingered to the north, and he tried to delete old pictures off his phone.  He saw a picture of his dad.  He swiped faster than he had been.

Despite the fact that each man had their heart set on fishing, each man also discovered how much he had regretted agreeing to go.  There were moments that day that they hated themselves for going.  It’s bad manners to get into their lives too much.  But each of them found themselves sitting at a table, sighing, holding their head in their hands.  The only thing that kept them going was that spark of anticipation that they might get a little nibble on the line, and the other men would roar, “Cheers!

Hank had sat the night before looking out at the deep, dark sea.  What was it like to be dead?  To be part of that incredible stillness?  He missed his dad’s strength, and appetite for life.  His dad could whistle through his teeth like nobody’s business.  Hank almost thought he could hear it on the sea breeze.  He almost felt like he’d been punched in the gut.

He prayed a most helpless prayer.  Like he imagined some wounded dog might do, he howled on the inside, with low moans emitting.  The room felt really cramped.  He pictured all the people he loved, waiting to talk to him.  He got up to wash his hands and face.  He stared at a bowl of split pea soup, drowned in goldfish crackers, but he didn’t eat.  He made a vow not to eat until he was eating a fish he himself would catch.  Not in the habit of doing things like this, he struggled.  He lay in bed with his stomach growling.  He dreamt of mugs of beer. 

He sat on the beach the next day with only four other people around.  He went out into the surf with the water up to his neck, lapping at his chin.  He floated, light as can be, the sky like a great bowl above him pouring blue goodness into his eyes.  The salty smell of the sea filled him with such hunger.  Later, he would sit, waiting at the dock with his father’s empty boat.

After many fish had been caught, Hank sat among his friends, showing them the picture of his father when he’d been caught in the rain, his face all squinched up.  The grill hadn’t been lit yet.  Nor had they docked the boat.  But they could smell it already.  And they could already taste it too.