Warm Whiskey in a Cold Ditch: #22

Along with the train and its captive souls, Steven and I continued to sit. I leaned my forehead into the window glass and wished I had my brother's patience, his ability to accept circumstances. He seldom seemed flustered, something he said had helped him in a corporate world where so little of the workday made sense.

But I could not be like him, and only at fishing was I superior. Our father taught us early how to slide worms and grubs onto barbed hooks, how to bobber-fish ponds and small lakes. We also learned how to remove those hooks from the palms of our own hands or our thumbs though Steven never did quite understand how to push down on the hook just enough to get the barbed tip to slide out of the skin without tearing the small wound.

One summer our father and Uncle Frank to me, Steven, and Cousin Mark to Ontario, Canada, to "fish for something other than blue gill and sunfish." Mark, who never quite accepted my brother and me, refused to sit in the back seat with us and instead settled himself between my father and uncle in the front. Steven and I were less offended than we were sad that Mark was the only one among us who did not have a brother.

Our fathers were up early--too early for us--and ready to go each morning. From our rented aluminum boat, we would drop minnows deep into the lake as we fished for walleye before lunchtime, then stop on an island where my father uncle cooked whatever fish we caught. In the afternoon we got back onto the water and switched to lures. Casting was often problematic with five people in the boat, but when we returned to our cabin each evening we had stringers full of northern pike and, on one day, a couple of muskie. I was proud that as we cast with our open-face reels, Steven was always more prone to getting snags in his fishing line, usually whenever a fish hit is lure--the fish would be gone as soon as the line went slack. I got to where I could cast the lure in a perfect arc and then drop my thumb onto the line at just the right moment so that the lure stopped within feet of floating logs or a stand of reeds. After two days, the boat was less crowded because Cousin Mark decided to stay in the cabin so he could read one of the many books he had packed. Later when we asked our father about this, he said that Mark was the type of person who would rather read about life than live it.

"How did you like the fishing trip?" Dr. Fay asked me one snowy afternoon not long after I started seeing her.

"It was fun," I told her. "I'd like to do it again."

"What did you enjoy about it?"

I shrugged. "Everything. Being away with my dad and my brother. Being outside."

"I talked to your dad about the trip. He wasn't sure if you liked it."

"Why would he say that?"

"He said that you never talk about it."

"I talk about it with Steven."

Again, I didn't know what she--or my father--expected of me. I stared out the window behind Dr. Fay's desk and watched the snow grow heavier. The sledding would be good, I thought.

Snow was falling outside the train window, too, though I could barely see the flakes. Steven shifted in his seat, and the way he sighed I could tell that he, too, was finally starting to get edgy. The train had not moved for hours by that point. "Give me the notebook," he said.

"You going to read, or write?"

"Read," he said as he turned a couple of pages. "There's not much room left in here."

"Nope."

"You decide what you're going to right?"

"Who said I was going to write anything."

"Margie told you to. She gave you a pen."

"She should write something," I said. "Or Mark. He's the writer. Give the notebook to him."

"Not a chance," Steven said. "Mark's not getting his paws on this thing." He then slammed the notebook shut so loudly and suddenly that the people in the seats in front of us jumped. "I think we should mutiny," he said as he dropped the notebook on my lap and stood up.

"Where are you going?"

He looked one way up the aisle, then the other. "I need some answers. I'll be back when I find out what's going on."

Both of my knees were vibrating up and down, and I tried to calm them. I watched my brother walk away.