The Blood of Water

The heavy cedar door with the rounded top sagged a little in its frame. Long years of facing tough, salty winter winds coming off the bay had pitted its surface. Paint that had once been bright turquoise had faded to a dull sky blue color. After forty years of abuse the little workshop where Bernie Levine Taylor had spent so much time tying flies and building fly rods for friends and customers was looking pretty decrepit.

Bernie had never liked his first name, or his second for that matter. When people around town started calling him B.L.T. in high school he happily adopted it. Some people joked that it stood for Bad Luck Taylor. There had been some mishaps over the course of his seventy-five years, a busted knee five winters ago on the rocks of Past Point, the tip of his right pinky finger gone down the throat of a huge sharp toothed dogfish off Whidbey Island, numerous busted fly rods, and lost flies, but he figured he’d made it this far, so he must be doing something right.

The light was getting bad as the evening storm moved in. He could just barely see the white caps form on the waves as they coiled up the channel. A sudden gust of soggy wind pelted the window with thick raindrops, obscuring his view of the channel. He turned back to the tying bench, wondering if his old shop would survive the winter this year. The sand dunes that once created a protective barrier around his shop were nearly gone now, eroded away by the relentless tides.

B.L.T. turned back to his tying bench. The metal legs of his old stool creaked as he swiveled away from the window. A half finished fly, dressed brightly in hot pink, orange, and red feathers and fur for the returning run of pink salmon, sat quietly in the jaws of the chrome-plated tying vise. He tied in some hot pink marabou, and then some silver tinsel for the body, but had to stop as the arthritis clamped up the fingers on his right hand. He flexed his hand several times, trying to loosen up the fingers, and then he massaged each joint, to work out the knots, but this didn’t ease the pain any. He dipped his hand in large Tupperware bowl full of warm salt water that he kept on his bench for just such an occasion.

The pain wasn’t the problem; he had pretty much adapted ways to deal with his daily parade of aches and pains. It was having his work interrupted by them that really boiled his ass. For nearly sixteen years he’d held the record for the largest pink salmon ever caught in the state, and he’d caught it on a fly he’d tied in his very own shop the night before. Then three years ago some yahoo from the god damn desert in Eastern Washington had visited the bay on a drunken weekend lark and landed the new record size pink salmon, outweighing B.L.T.’s salmon by just six and a half ounces. That was the same year his wife had died. He’d lost a lot that year.

He’d been fishing the point that day when the son of a bitch had weaved his way unsteadily down the rocky bank to the beach. He’d waded right out into B.L.T.’s casting lane and began swinging his heavy baitcasting rod. It looked to B.L.T. like he was swinging a tree trunk with fishing line tied to it. He’d watched him make three identical casts to the same spot with the five inch red flat fish, before the dual trevel hooks finally dug into the flesh of what should have been B.L.T.’s new record pink salmon. B.L.T. watched him land the big fish, sickened when he yanked the fish out of the surf by the tail, and swung it in a 180-degree arc, full force against a rock to kill it.

Then he’d followed the bastard up the bank and north along the railroad tracks back to the marina. He watched the weigh-in, unbelieving. He saw the dense salmon dip the scale 6 ounces past the old record, his record. He couldn’t believe after all the time and energy he’d spent learning the tides throughout the year, and tying different fly patterns to imitate the perfect bait fish that some outsider from the desert could wade into his spot and steal his record just like that. After the weigh-in was over he threw up in the narrow, dirty alleyway between the marina and the boathouse. An hour later he was in his shop tying flies for the next day, determined to get his record back. Then the little black phone in his shop had rung. Maggie had insisted he install it for emergencies. He thought it was there just to nag him, but Maggie had called him that day, the day she had had her stroke.

That had been three years ago. His bitterness always left him slowly when he remembered that day. The walls of his little shop held many trophy fish, trout, bass, all five species of Pacific salmon, an eighteen-pound steelhead, and the former record pink salmon. The dead marble eyes of that one always bothered him. The washed out blue iris turned down slightly towards his tying bench, making him feel like the fish was condemning him.

“Oh shut up,” he said quietly.

The ringing of the telephone startled him back to the present. He let it ring until the answering machine came on. He heard his son’s voice.

“Daddy, we are all wondering where you are. If you’re in the shop please pick up. Daddy?”

The wooden planks outside the shop that served as steps creaked with the weight of a body ascending them. B.L.T. knew what was coming. His son was in town visiting, trying to convince him to attend the wedding, his son’s third. Back before his wife had died, B.L.T. could have pulled off his disappearing act, and snuck out the back door of the house to his shop, but now with Margie having gone B.L.T. had to fumble through the domestic issues the best he could. Hiding or pretending he was asleep was not an option, his son would continue to knock, or panic and call an ambulance, thinking B.L.T. had had a heart attack and died. B.L.T. liked to think of it as DEFCON three to one. If the phone call and knocking didn’t arouse a response then they went to DEFCON one and the ambulance showed up looking for B.L.T.’s dead body.

Normally his son, and whatever family he happened to belong to at the time spent their time in California, only coming up north to visit during Christmas, but his son’s new fiancé wanted to get married in her hometown of Vancouver, and they figured that it was close enough for B.L.T. to attend the wedding.

He heard the musical rapping knock of his son that let the world know that no matter how screwed up his life was he’d always have that used car salesmen’s optimistic sunny disposition.

“Come on in if you can figure out how to turn the knob.”

“Hi Daddy, we all missed you. I thought maybe I could coax you back in the house to spend some time with your family.”

B.L.T. winced at his son’s voice, and his insistence on calling him daddy. Lewis was nearly fifty years old, and he still called him Daddy.

“Not my family, except you. The rest of them I don’t even know.”

“Come on Daddy, you know Elise, and little Frankie, they’re your grandchildren.”

“Chester’s the only grandchild I got that’s worth anything, and he only comes around in the summer when you’re all down south. I liked his mother, too. The first wife should be the only wife.”

B.L.T. watched Lewis begin biting his nails, like he always did when he was frustrated. He studied Lewis’s face, seeing his own hawkish nose, and wide square jaw imprinted on this younger, half finished version of himself without the personality to carry it. B.L.T. had decided the 60’s had made Lewis weak,

“A generation of cowards,” he always said. He could never find any of Maggie in him either, not even in Lewis’s eyes. If Lewis had been a girl and had Maggie’s softness then he could accept it, but Lewis had never been anything but a scared little boy to him.

“Since you mentioned Chester, I may as well tell you that he won’t be visiting you this summer.”

“What do mean? Is he sick or something?”

“No. His mother and I have decided maybe you’re not a good influence for Chester. She thinks-”

“Not a good influence. Not a good influence. What are you saying Lewis? I taught the boy to fly fish, and more about being a man than you ever did. I taught him-”

“Yeah, and you also taught him to drink beer last summer. He showed up to school drunk on the first day, and he’s taken up smoking. You really taught him to be a man all right, Daddy. Were you planning on teaching him bigotry and how to beat women like your hero Hemingway next summer? Anyway, I wasn’t planning on telling you until after the wedding. That’s the real reason I came out here. To ask you again if you’d go to the wedding.”

B.L.T. sat with his back turned to his son, staring out the window at the channel. He couldn’t say anything. He had no defense this time or sharp rebuttal. Chester was in trouble and he was the cause. Chester had always been a little high-spirited, too quick to cast B.L.T. thought, but level-headed most of the time.

“Well, if you’re not going to answer me, I guess there’s nothing more to say. I got you a train ticket up to Vancouver for tomorrow afternoon. Jean and I will lay your suit out for you before we leave tonight. The address of the church is on the invitation. Hope I see you there.”

“Can’t make it. The pink salmon are running.”

Lewis stopped and turned slightly.

“Oh yes, how could I forget. You’ve got a damn record to break. Have a good time by yourself tomorrow.”

He heard the door slam shut as Lewis left. The wind picked up and began to howl a little as it rode along the deep grooves between the roof tiles. He couldn’t think. Too many aggressive emotions swirled around the tight little room and in his head. Pink salmon only ran every other year. He’d missed the run in ’99 because his right knee gave out. His son couldn’t understand this, not being a fly fisherman. Chester was the only one in the family that really took to it. B.L.T. wanted to spend time on the water with him, to stay up all night tying flies, and drinking beer, but not too much, the boy was in enough trouble already from the sound of it. Fishing for Pinks had more to do with family than another one of Lewis’s weddings did anyway, as far as B.L.T. was concerned.

He quickly finished tying the big hot pink fly, and then curled up on the small sofa in his shop, pulling the dusty brown sleeping bag over his body. He decided to sleep in the shop just in case his son and his new family hadn’t left yet. He didn’t want to battle with Lewis again tonight. Things would clear up in his head in the morning on the water like they always did. He’d figure out what to do about Chester, and the rest of the mess, in the morning.

The shoreline of Past Point appeared in his head. He tried to picture what the beach would look like tomorrow if the storm continued through the night. He could picture the piles of washed up eelgrass, and the dried out driftwood mixed in with the garbage that wouldn’t decompose in the harsh saltwater. He tried to see it as he hoped it would be, clean and calm, with Chester and Maggie, but he couldn’t hold it, and drifted off.

He slept lightly that night, waking periodically more from the sounds in his dreams then the noises in the night. Vague, undefined memories of a dream about a screaming contest with a black hooded man on a stormy deserted island stayed in his head each time he woke up. He tried to reassure himself that it was just a dream and fell back asleep.

In the morning he rolled off the little sofa slowly, using his arms to swing his right leg over the side of the soft cushion. His bad knee popped loudly as he extended his leg trying to stretch it. He walked to his house behind the shop and went into the kitchen, nursing his knee a little, as it stubbornly refused to loosen up the stiff cartilage. He didn’t wander too deeply into the house in the morning. Force of habit told him Maggie was still asleep in the bedroom. He sat in the kitchen and watched the sunrise a little more. His eyes weren’t so good anymore, and he wanted to make sure there was enough light out for him to see when he drove to the point. The little pattern of yellow and white daisies seemed to grow on the wall as the sunlight crept through the kitchen. He remembered the spring Maggie had put the wallpaper up in the kitchen. Lewis had been a toddler than, and only wanted to spend time with his mother. The daisies appearing on the wall, and the ones growing in the yard had seemed like magic to Lewis. That was nearly a year before B.L.T. built his workshop.

The sun peaked over the two pine trees in his front yard, splintering the rays of light as they passed through the tight branches. Once he felt he could see well enough to drive, he walked slowly out to his old pickup and started the cranky engine, giving it a chance to run for several minutes to warm up.

The drive down to Past Point was short, taking him down Old Main Street, the original part of town that had been renovated to appear as it did in the 1920’s. B.L.T. could remember the old town from when he was a boy. The smooth, clean brick buildings with pastel red and yellow painted tile roofs were nothing like the wild, frontier shacks that had once made up most of the town. Back then logging and the canneries were the main sources of income. The city council had restored part of the old wooden boardwalk, but anyone in the know could tell a concrete sidewalk laid underneath the wooden shell reinforced the boardwalk. B.L.T. remembered how as a little boy he and his friends loved to play on the rickety boardwalk, trying bounce each other off the boardwalk and into the muddy street. Everything had changed from those days. He almost hated the town now. The small forest that once surrounded Past Point had mostly been leveled in the 60’s to make way for the ferry terminal that had been built. The two-mile deer trail that ran through the woods to the railroad tracks had been churned over, and converted to a soft gravel jogging trail. A small park built right on the waterfront, allowed people easy access to the Point.

He parked his pickup in the lot, secretly glad he didn’t have to put his bum knee through the two-mile hike down to the point anymore. He strung up a fly rod, tied on the big hot pink fly, and walked slowly down to the rocky beach. Watching the incoming tide rise over the chunks of riprap, he scanned the water for rising fish. After following the five-hundred yards down shore to where the flat, rocky beach met the shallow cliffs of sandstone, he saw the dark red dorsals, backs, and tails of a school of Pink salmon. Occasionally one would break the surface and he could see the bright sunlight glittering off its silver body. He sat on a smoothly rounded sandstone boulder and watched the fish rise and thought about Chester. Maybe the beer had been a bad idea. He knew Maggie wouldn’t have allowed it, but since she’d died he’d really wanted to bond with Chester as much as possible, help him to grow up and be a man.

As the tide continued to rise, the fish moved closer to shore, and a large salmon rose in a circular pattern, chasing smaller salmon out of its territory. B.L.T. had been waiting for this. He stood and waded out just past his knees, scanning for the next rise. When the big fish slapped to the surface, he immediately cast to it. He gave a count of five, allowing the fly to sink a little, before he began stripping the line in quickly. The grainy saltwater collecting on the line bit into his fingers as he stripped it back. On the fifth strip his fly stopped dead.

His line violently reversed directions and began heading out to sea. He knew he’d hooked the big buck that had been surfacing. He cupped the outside of the reel with his palm, creating friction to try and slow the fluorescent green line that was peeling faster and faster out into the bay. He saw the big fish clear the water, and splash down, sending a shudder through his rod and arm.

As the salmon ran for the deeper water out in the bay, B.L.T. began stepping backwards towards shore, anticipating the time when he would have to be close to shore to land the fish. He could feel his boots slipping a little on the loose rocks under the waves as he slowly backed up. Dark brown clumps of eelgrass hung off his fly line, accumulating thick strands as the big fish continued to run out into the bay.

As the fish slowed a little, he reeled hard, trying to regain some line. The painful arthritic knots in his fingers came to visit, but he ignored them. He backed up towards the beach a little faster. As he backed up, he felt his right heel and calf strike a rock that was buried in the surf. He tried to lift his knee over the rock and step backwards, but instead his bum knee locked out straight, and he went down hard. The sandstone bank met the back of his head as he fell.

As the colorful sparks cleared from his head, and the cold seawater began seeping into his waders he realized he was lying on his back in about three feet of water. He searched for his fly rod with his right hand, sweeping the bottom for it, but only tore his fingers on the rough barnacles clinging to the rocky bottom. His fingers cramped hard and he had to stop. He could feel a dull throbbing in the back of his head and the left side of his knee was beginning to burn. He wanted to get up, get back on shore and find his fly rod; he still needed to land that fish. He had an idea of how to fix the situation with Chester too, if he could only get his strength back and stand up. If only the tide would slow up long enough for him to collect himself. Maybe he would go up to the wedding. It was still early morning. The train didn’t leave for Vancouver for a few hours yet. He could still make it. Maybe set everything right with Chester and his son.

“Yeah,” he thought, “As soon as the tide lets up a little more I’ll get up, stretch out that bum knee, and catch that train to be with my new family.” He turned his head to the right just enough to see the cloudy underwater breakers rolling steadily towards the beach.