Gone Fishing

Chapter 2

                The next day dawned pale and rainy. The street outside was slick with the previous nights rain. Wren stared out of the rain painted window dismally. In Canada, there would be snow on the ground and she would be laying in her feather bed in the loft of log cabin, enjoying the warm of a cheery fire, built in the stone fireplace by her father. Her father would be out fishing by the lake for their breakfast. Then he would come in and she would get out of bed and fry the fish he had caught.

                She wiped a silver tear from her cheek, and walked over to her dresser where a box of tissues sat. She blew her nose gently and then looked at the framed picture of her father sitting on her bedside table. His smile, as it always had when he was alive, seemed to say, ‘I will always be there for you no matter what’. More tears started running down her cheeks.

                “Stop this,” she whispered to herself. “It’s no use. Your tears won’t bring him back.” Realizing that it was almost eight-thirty, she got dressed and washed her face. She walked down the stairs, trying to wipe away her sadness, just as she had wiped away her tears.

                Her mother was waiting for her downstairs. “Oh good!” she exclaimed. “I was just about to come up to wake you.” Her cheeriness halted when she saw the lingering sadness on Wren’s face. She hesitated.

                “You were thinking about him again weren’t you?”

                Wren nodded unhappily. She wiped another escaped tear from her eye.

                “You know, he wouldn’t have wanted you to be sad. He would want you to be happy.” Her mother walked around the counter and put her arms around Wren. She had a nice smell, sort of like fresh baked bread and cinnamon rolls

                “I know that,” she whispered tearfully into her mother’s hug. “It’s just so hard. Everywhere I go, there are reminders of him. Every time I open a book, I can hear him reading aloud to me. Every time I walk into a grocery store, I can see him pretending to put a can of Brussels sprouts into the cart, just to make me angry.”

                She sniffed, and lifted her eyes to her mother’s face. The dark brown eyes welled with tears. “I am so sorry, darling.”

                “I am not sorry that I have those memories to keep in my heart forever. I just wish they didn’t make me so sad.” Wren pulled away from her mother. “It is days like this that are the hardest.”

                “The way you describe him, I feel like I missed some part of him, the likeable part. I wish I could have known him as you did.” Wren’s mother wiped a tear from her eye. Then she straightened up. “It has only been a few months since… since he died. The sorrow will wear off eventually.”

                “I know, but I remember him so vividly. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forget him.”

                “Then don’t. Just remember the happy times you had together. And from the way you make it sound, there are many.”

                Wren smiled a teary smile at the memories running through her mind; how their canoe had tipped over during a fishing trip, the first time she had had to melt snow to make soup, gutting a moose.

                “You are right, Mom. That does make me feel better. Thank you.” Her mother put on a bright smile and began to get eggs out of the refrigerator, and bacon out of the freezer.

                “We haven’t had a nice Saturday breakfast together for a while. Let’s make some blueberry muffins, too.” Wren smiled at her mother’s idea. “That sounds great mom,” she said.

 

                An hour later Wren ran upstairs to her room, and grabbed her brown book bag. She quickly stuffed in her journal and the diary she had gotten from the bookstore the day before.

                She walked out the front door, yelling to her mother, “I’m going out, mom; I’ll be back in a couple of hours.”

                She didn’t wait for her mother’s reply; instead she slammed the door, and ran around the side of the house to the garage. Grabbing her fishing rod and tackle box, she left the musky smelling garage and walked back out onto the street. It was still raining a little bit, but not enough to bother Wren.

                She walked down the street, and one word came to her mind, grey. The street was not colorful. The only spot of color was her own crimson red door, which had been her mother’s idea. When summer came, they were going to paint the shutters the same blood red. Other than their door, there was no other color at all on the street. The Jansen’s house was brown, the Watchokivisk’s was a dark grey, the Winsson’s house a faded white, and so on.

                At the end of the street, there was a T in the road. Past the T there was a little patch of woods, about the size of Wren’s school. Within the woods ran a clear little stream, bubbling up from the ground that was plentiful with trout and panfish.

                Wren entered the woods and found the worn old log that she always used when she went fishing. She sewed a worm on her hook and casted into the middle of the clear pond that was formed by the underground spring. She set the fishing rod down, determined to keep an eye on it, and picked up her journal and the diary.

                She opened her journal and read the first two entries of the diary. She pulled out a pen and opened the diary and began to read the third entry.

 

January 19^th, 1919

Dear Diary,

                I know I haven’t written in a while, but a lot of things have been going on lately. With my training and all the studies I have to do, I just have no time to write anymore. Yesterday, a person almost discovered the entrance to the Court of Protectors. Because I am one of the newest and most normal looking of all the Apprentices, they sent me out to divert him. He was very nice, but he needed to leave. It took me a while to get rid of him. But when I got back in, Mrsi told me I did a very good job.

                So far, I have not been able to do any protecting of the egg, but they said maybe by the end of the month, I will be able to take the shift with Mrsi. I am very excited about �"

                Wren looked up. She had heard something. She looked down and gave a quiet little squeal. Her fishing rod was shaking and jiggling and suddenly bounced into the water. She had been so wrapped up in the diary, she hadn’t even noticed that she had a fish on the other end of her line. Giving no thought to the diary or the temperature of the water, she jumped in after the fishing rod.

                The water wasn’t deep, it only came about to Wren’s waist, but it was cold. She grabbed onto the fishing pole just before it disappeared under the water. She began reeling in and realized that it was a very large fish on her hook. She backed up out of the water and slowly reeled in the line, still wanting to save her fish.

                It was a big trout, brown and speckled, and it was the biggest fish Wren had ever caught in the spring.

                She pulled the hook out of his mouth and slipped him into the plastic bag she had brought along for such an occasion.

                She really had no choice but to head for home. Her clothes, hair and body were soaked and water logged. Now that she was back out of the water, she could laugh about it. She gave an involuntary shiver.

                Gathering up all her things, she suddenly remembered the diary. She looked around to see if she had dropped it on the ground. She searched everywhere, and could not find a trace of it. With exasperation, she decided that it must have fallen in the water and floated downstream. Slowly she put on her backpack and glanced around, still hoping to catch a glimpse of the brown cover of the diary. Still not seeing it she walked back out of the gloomy woods and walked dejectedly back home.

                When she walked in the door, her hair dripping and her shoes squelching out water every step she took, her mother looked at her with an odd look, like she was trying her best not to laugh.

                “Should I ask what happened?” she questioned with a small smile.

                “Nope,” Wren replied simply and turned to walk up the stairs. Just in time she remembered the fish she had in her backpack. She reached in and pulled it out. It gave one last feeble little flop, and then it died.

                “Here,” she said as she handed the fish to her mother, “put this in the freezer.” Her mother took it gingerly by the tail and nodded, swallowing hard.

                “You know you are going to be the one who has to fry that thing, right?” her mother asked anxiously.

                “Yup.” Wren walked squishely up the stairs. She changed into her pajamas, even though it was still the middle of the day. She sat on her bed dejectedly. How could she have been so stupid as to lose the diary? She tried to remember exactly what had happened and at what point she had lost it, but she could not. It was as if the cold water had washed everything from her brain.

                She swung her feet up on her bed and slid under the thick blankets.

Reviews

[Tony Dincau]

Hi Whispering Pines, I enjoyed this chapter, partly because you're writing is crisp yet still descriptive, and partly because I like fishing, outdoors, and the deep tie to family that you have woven here. Thanks much!