“You have to kiss it.”
Her eyes jerk up to meet mine. “Why?”
“It’s tradition. You kiss the first fish.” I shrug my shoulders. I push the net toward her. “You have to take it off the hook.”
She gingerly reaches into the net and scoops out the little bream. He is much too small to eat, but those little fish are fun to catch. She gingerly removes the hook, wincing all the while. Then she kisses it square on the mouth. She wipes her mouth with the back of her free hand.
“Do we eat it now?”
I shake my head. “I think we should put him back and let him do some growing.”
“Oh.” She doesn’t look unhappy about it. She tosses him back into the water. “My hands are fishy.” She sniffs her fingers and her face scrunches up. “Was my mom good at fishing?” she asks.
“I wouldn’t say she was great at it, but she had a lot of fun doing it. She could sit for hours and never get bored, even though my dad and I were both very quiet when we fished.”
“My mom knew how to have fun,” she says almost in a whisper.
“Yeah, she did.” I reach over and palm the top of her head. It feels natural, and she doesn’t shrink away from me. “You need a fishing hat,” I say when I see that the sun is in her eyes. “I have one in the cabin you can use next time we go fishing.”
“Can we do this again tomorrow?”
“We can do this whenever you want.”
She reels her line in by herself, retrieves a worm, and tosses it back out. “Okay,” she says. “This is fun.”
She looks up at me and grins. And I can’t help but think how lucky Aaron is to have such wonderful children in his life. If Bess and I had ever had kids, we might not be in the state we’re in now. Maybe she wouldn’t hate me quite so much. Maybe she’d be willing to tolerate me, just a little bit longer.
Maybe I’d have lived up to the promises I made the day we got married.
9
Bess
Aaron looks a bit green by the time we get back to Lake Fisher. He slept the whole way back, and he groans when he gets out of the car.
“You okay?” I ask.
“Yep,” he says with a grunt as he walks toward the front door of his cabin. “Thanks for going with me,” he calls out over his shoulder, without really looking back at me.
I have no idea what he would have done if I hadn’t gone. There’s no way he could have driven himself home.
“I’ll see you on Wednesday!” he yells as he opens the door to his cabin.
“Wait,” I call out. I jog toward him and toward the front door.
“Can’t,” he says. “I have to throw up now.” He walks in and slams the door in my face. I stand there on the porch for a minute, not sure what to do. But the only thing on my mind is the fact that he has three children to take care of, but he feels terrible.
I open the door and walk in behind him. I can hear him heaving in the bathroom, so I give him some privacy. I look around his tiny cottage. It’s laid out exactly like mine, but his mom didn’t have all the family photos and knick-knacks that my mom always left lying around. His mom said that things like that were just more to have to dust.
Finally, he comes out and sinks down on the sofa that’s as old as I am. “Feel better?” I ask him.
“Much.” He leans his head back and closes his eyes.
“Where are the kids?” I go to his kitchen and start looking through his cabinets. He needs some soup or some toast, but I don’t find anything but kid snacks and juice pouches. I grab a juice pouch, punch the straw into it, and take it to him.
“They’re with Eli,” he says. He doesn’t look at me when he says it. He just keeps his eyes closed, but he takes a few tentative sips from the juice pouch.
I lay a hand on my chest. “They’re with my Eli?”