“Well,” said his father, “I’m goin’ down to the lake and fish for a while.” “Tommy, do you wanna go down an’ fish with y’daddy?” asked his mother. Thomas Brooks grunted and shook his head. “No, I’m gonna stay here and watch the game,” he said.
It was a beautiful early autumn Sunday afternoon in Georgia. Thomas and his parents were at Aunt Sabra and Uncle Leonard’s house in Carl. The Falcons were playing the Rams in Atlanta and the game was not blacked out on TV that far out in the country. Aunt Sabra and Uncle Leonard were Thomas’s father’s aunt and uncle. Uncle Leonard had suffered a stroke a number of years back and could hardly walk. He could not speak or move his right arm or leg. He wore a brace on his right hand. Uncle Leonard loved football and would sit in his big La-Z-Boy recliner and watch the Falcons and Georgia Bulldogs football games on television. When something good happened, he would smile and sigh, “Ahhhhh.” When something bad happened he would sneer in disgust and grunt, “Shttttt.” That happened a lot during the Falcons’ games. Thomas Brooks knew exactly what “Shttttt” meant.
His father got up from the sofa, lit a Lucky Strike, clicked his Zippo shut, put it back in his pocket, walked out the back door and closed it behind him. The two of them had a very complex relationship. On one hand, Thomas worshipped the ground his father walked on. On the other hand he resented the hell out of him. As a child, Thomas had followed his father blindly, hanging on his every word. When he grew into adolescence and began forming ideas and opinions of his own was when the friction began. Thomas was allowed to have ideas and opinions, as long as they were ideas and opinions shared by his father. Whenever Thomas said, did or believed something he did not agree with, his father could be petulant, overbearing and cruel. When Thomas was a boy he and his father went fishing together all the time. But now they spent less and less time together. Thomas was fifteen years old and was only interested in cars, social life, football and girls, not necessarily in that order. He certainly wasn’t interested in going down to the lake and fishing with his father.
The Falcons scored first and missed the extra point. The Rams marched down the field and scored on a quarterback sneak. “Shttttt,” sneered Uncle Leonard. “Did y’all pick up the mail yesterday, Aunt Sabra?” asked Thomas.
“No, sweetie, we didn’t.”
“I’ll go check it.”
“Okay, sweetie, thankya.”
Thomas walked out the back door, opened the double doors to the covered patio and climbed in the golf cart. He backed it out of the patio, crossed the yard and headed down the long dirt driveway toward the mailbox. Uncle Leonard bought the golf cart after his stroke so that he could get around the farm. It was a three-wheel Cushman with no top and was steered with a single handlebar. The property was about a hundred acres with two big pastures on either side of the driveway. A bright red cardinal, sitting on one of the fence posts, flew away as Thomas approached in the golf cart. He reached the end of the driveway and pulled up to the mailbox. It was on the left hand side and had been mounted sideways so that Uncle Leonard could open it from the cart. Thomas retrieved the mail from the cart and placed it on the shelf below the handlebar. He looked both ways to make sure no cars were coming down Midway Road. He turned the cart around and headed back toward the house.
Aunt Sabra and Uncle Leonard’s house was a small, single-level cottage sitting at the back left of the property. Across the driveway from the house was a two-car garage with an efficiency apartment upstairs, which they rented out. The man who lived there had a blue ’55 Chevy. It was originally white, until he painted it outside the garage using cans of blue spray paint. Behind the house, about halfway down the hill to the lake was Uncle Leonard’s long, cinder block storage barn. He kept his tractor and equipment there when he was able to work the land. It was all still in there, but long since used. At the bottom of the hill below the barn was Uncle Leonard’s lake. It was a five-acre lake Uncle Leonard had dug and dammed himself. The dam ran along the back of the property. There were some big fish in the lake. Thomas’s Pepa, who was Uncle Leonard’s brother, had caught one, mounted it and hung it in his garage in East Atlanta.
Thomas parked the golf cart, closed the doors to the covered patio, went inside and put the mail in the basket on the sideboard in the kitchen. “Thankya, sweetie,” said Aunt Sabra. “Yes ma’am,” said Thomas. He sat down and asked Uncle Leonard, “How are they doing?” “Shttttt,” sneered Uncle Leonard. The Rams were leading 14-6. They drove down and kicked a field goal right before halftime. It was 17-6 and Uncle Leonard was not happy. Thomas’s mother and Aunt Sabra were discussing Uncle Ernest’s ailments, his bowel movements in particular, which Thomas had absolutely no interest in hearing about. He stood up and said, “I think I’ll walk down to the lake.” He went out the back door, got his fishing rod out of the trunk of his parents’ ’65 Fairlane and headed down the hill toward the lake.
“How are they biting?” Thomas asked his father.
“Okay. Caught a few bream.”
“Any bass?”
“Not yet.”
“Let’s put two lines in the water and see what happens.”
Thomas flipped the carriage on his Mitchell open-faced spinning reel, let the line go slack and put his rod together. He reached into his father’s tackle box, picked out a number four Mepps spinning lure and tied it onto the end of his line. He tripped the carriage, tightened the line and cast. Reeling and popping the line, he thought about the first time he had gone fishing. It was with his father and Pepa at Uncle Ernest’s lake. They had brought home quite a haul and his father always said that that day had spoiled Thomas because he thought fishing was always going to be that way. He had found out over time that day was very much the exception rather than the rule.
Just then he felt the familiar bump, bump on the end of the line and set the hook. He began to reel and could tell by the action he had a bass. Thomas reeled the fish in, took it off the hook and hung it from the hand-held scale in the tackle box. The fish weighed a little over a pound. “Throwin’ ‘em back today?” he asked.
“Unless you feel like scalin’ and cleanin’ ‘em.”
Thomas tossed the bass back in the lake. They fished in silence for a while longer, until his father asked, “Well, how were they doing?” “Shttttt,” replied Thomas. His father laughed.
“Rams were leading 17-6 at the half.”
“Two field goals?”
“A touchdown. They scored first and missed the extra point. Haven’t done anything since.”
“Shttttt.”
Thomas caught another small bass and his father a couple of more bream. He felt bad for his father. “I’m going to go fish on the dam for a while,” he said. He figured he would let his father have the spot on the bank. The water was shallower and more fish would come in there to feed as the afternoon went by. His father didn’t say anything and began casting toward a big limb that had fallen from a tree by the bank.
He was working his line from the middle of the deep back to the dam when suddenly his father yelled, “Oh, I got bit! Big time bit!” His rod was bent almost double and the end was waving back and forth like an amp meter. Thomas began running along the dam, reeling his line in at the same time. He threw his rod down when he got to the bank and yelled, “Keep the line firm, Daddy, and walk back this way! Don’t let him get tangled up in that limb!”
“I know, that’s what I’m worried about!” His father backed up the bank as far away from the limb as he could. The line went out toward the dam and back toward them. His father ran to the edge of the water, reeling the slack as he went. The tip of the rod bent almost to the top of the water and the thought ran through Thomas’s head that the rod might snap in half. Then the line started out toward the middle of the lake, singing as it ran off of the reel. “He’s cleared the limb and going deep! Pull and reel, Daddy, pull and reel!” Thomas yelled. His father pulled up on the rod with a heave and began reeling furiously. The tip of the rod snapped straight and the fish broke water. It hung in the air and twisted in what seemed like slow motion. Thomas’s heart stopped and he almost sat down on the bank. It was the biggest bass he had ever seen in his life. Shining green, gray and white, the big fish shook a spray of water and hit the surface of the lake. The tip of the rod began dancing again. “Keep reeling, Daddy!” yelled Thomas. “Don’t lose him!” “Oh, I’ve got him,” laughed his father. “I’ve got this monster!”
“I’ll get the net!”
Thomas ran to the tackle box and snatched up the aluminum-handled net. His father kept reeling and the line was now close to the shore. “I’ve got the net, Daddy,” said Thomas. “Get him to where I can scoop him!” The bass was at the shore now and they could see his huge head and long black body. His father let the rod drop a little in his left hand and reached down to grab the bass by his cavernous mouth. As he reached down, there was just enough slack in the line for the big fish to give one last shake. He made a violent spasm, the lure broke free from his mouth, splashed back into the water and was gone.
Thomas and his father looked at each other, stunned. “Damn!” yelled Thomas. “Just damn!” His father sat down hard on the bank and stared speechless at the water. Neither of them said anything for a few seconds, when suddenly Thomas grabbed his father’s rod. “He’s probably back over by that limb, Daddy!” He began to cast past the limb and bring the spinning lure back over the top of it, reel, reel, bump, reel, reel, bump, just like he had been taught. His father eventually reached in his shirt pocket, pulled out his pack of Luckies, put one in his mouth and lit it. He clicked his Zippo shut, took a long drag and exhaled a cloud of blue smoke. “He’s gone, Tommy,” he said. “He won’t bite again, not today. He didn’t get that big by being stupid.” Thomas knew he was right but continued to cast, reel, reel, bump. He finally pulled the line in, hooked the lure to an eyelet and sat down next to his father. They both stared at the water until Thomas said, “That was a hell of a fish, Daddy. Seven pounds, I’d say.” “Yeah, I know,” said his father. After a minute or so he said, “I’m never gonna catch another fish that big, Tommy.”
“Sure you will. You might catch that one. It’s not a big lake. He’s not going anywhere.”
“Like I said, he didn’t get that big by being stupid.”
“Yeah, but you’re smarter than he is. You’re a man and he’s a fish.”
“Yeah, a big fish,” his father grinned. A hell of a fish. In a small pond.”
“That’s right.”
“I screwed up. I should have waited for you to get the net under him before I reached down to grab him.
“I don’t think the net was big enough to hold him. You want to cast a little more?”
“Nah, let’s go in. I’m done.”
“Okay. Maybe Momma and Aunt Sabra are done talking about Uncle Ernest’s bowel movements by now.”
“Oh, Lord, I hope so.”
They gathered up their gear and started up the hill. Halfway up, Thomas put his arm around his father’s shoulder. Together they trudged toward the house to watch the Falcons lose another one.