The small, noisy truck jolted to a stop at the bank of our lake. We watched in fascination as a young stranger exits and begins unloading equipment, quickly, stopping for a moment to gaze at the sunset than had begun to amass at the horizon. As we crept closer to get a better look, Regina suddenly twitched and looked toward home, “That’s me. It’s dinner time.” I strained my ears to pick-up the slight, indecipherable bellow originating from her brother. The grown-ups always bestowed the task of rounding up the kids to whichever sibling that was within reach. Numerous kids walked the streets of the neighborhood, or stood on their stoops, calling the names of their brothers and sisters at dusk. With a quick “see ya,” Regina scurried off, leaving me alone with the dimming day, a stranger and my innate early evening burst of energy. My soft “good-bye” trailed after, but never reached, her.
Not ready to return to my empty quiet house, I returned my attention to the man and his mission, unloading his trappings next to the lake. So dark, his beautiful, luminous skin gave off an almost a blue glow in the reflection of the setting sun. The silent dark silhouette began tossing his nets into the water with precision; splash, splash, splash. I had never seen anyone fish in our little neighborhood lake save the neighborhood boys that threw hand-made spears and other sharp objects into the muddy shallows, always missing their prey but never loosing hope. I wondered if the stranger knew about the alligator. I wondered if he would catch the alligator in his net. I was too timid to warn him about it.
The golden of early evening turned to the blue-gray of dusk. The Fishing Machine began making his second round around the lake, pulling the nets from the water, tossing the fish to the earth like little beanbags; thud, thud, thud. Flawlessly advancing with the cold tempo of time. Tension began to swell within me, building with the unyielding rhythmic beat of his steps, the yank, pull, toss. There was no pause, catching of the breath, interruption, random swerving, miracle, sleeper wave, last minute stay of execution.
Little shadow lumps on the ground, the occasional flop and flip into the air. I hid behind a tree, close enough to one unlucky victim that I could see its mouth gasping, drowning in air. One eye stuck open in the dirt, the other stared hopelessly into the sky. It asked me for help. Not just from its impending death, but from the ominous mechanical rhythm of its executioner. Without a second thought I darted out and in the blink of an eye, snatched the fish as the fisherman tossed a net yet again. I slipped it into my skirt, which was waiting like a hammock, and slinked like water toward home in the near dark. My slink became a jog, my jog a run and my run a sprint. Bare foot sprinter.
No one was home yet, expect perhaps my sister, but we never noticed eachother. I clenched a large handful of skirt with one hand and started the bath with the other. Half a tub of water and half a bottle of declorinator later The Fish was saved with a kerplunk. He looked relieved to be back in his element. Lucky for us we had bought the wrong kind of fish food for our goldfish recently and I already had some large pellets for him to eat, which he began gobbling straight away. No shock, no fear. MA and her man were surprised to see the fish in the tub when they came home later that evening. The next afternoon MA’s man loaded the fish into a bucket and transported it to where he said he had seen more fish like it and no one would fish. They made me clean the fish poop that was stuck to the bottom of the bathtub. We went out for fish and chips that night.
