“Sounds great,” I said, confidently.
I stepped timidly onto the ice, bracing myself for my imminent death by hypothermia. Nothing. Not even a crack. I took another step, this time testing it gently with my full body weight. The ice groaned a bit, which stopped my heart, but the ground remained unmoved. I took another step, and another, slowly testing each area.
Chase had moved a few feet away, doing the same, testing each step carefully before putting his full weight on the ice. Encouraged, as I hadn’t made a complete fool of myself yet, I pressed on. After another minute or two, Chase announced this would be a good spot. He set his chairs and pole down on the ground. I added mine to his and stood there awkwardly, praying he wouldn’t ask me to do anything.
Chase pulled a cordless drill from his backpack, knelt down to the ice, and drilled a small hole. I watched with moderate interest. He was occupied and not looking at me, and I couldn’t help but admire his confidence and, well, his hands. The way he gripped the drill with so much confidence. There was just something about a man who knows his way around a power tool. They were the kind of hands that could flip bacon, hunt a deer and fix the carburetor; all before lunch. Being in the great outdoors in the secluded setting, and suddenly, I was looking at Chase in a whole new light.
“Blister?”
AndI was back.
“What?” Dang it. He was laughing at me again. How long had he been calling me? How long had I beenoglinghim?
“You all right?”
“Yeah.”
“Then hand me the ice chisel in the backpack, will you? Actually, there should be two.”
I prayed with a strength of a thousand suns, that I would know an ice chisel when I saw one.
Thankfully, there was just one option. Two, actually. I handed both to him. He only took one.
“The other one’s for you. It’s the most tedious part, so I know a real fisherman wouldn’t trust just one person to do it. You know, to make sure it all goes right.”
“Thanks.” I avoided looking at his eyes because I strongly suspected he was laughing at me. I tried to hold the pole like I knew what I was doing, as I knelt down beside him. He took his pole and centered it above the hole and began moving it up and down, whittling away the ice, to create a bigger entrance. I mimicked his efforts and was relieved to find that it was not hard at all. Soon, we had a wide hole and we stopped. He stood and opened the camp chair, placing it next to me, but a foot or so away from the hole.
“You take this one. Sit here and cast your line and I’ll go this way, twenty yards or so, and make another hole.”
I made a big show of adjusting my chair and seat and getting comfortable, until he was busy drilling a new hole. Then I held up my pole and stared at it.
I turned the handle thing on the right and the string dropped down a few inches. My eyes lit up. I had just cracked the code. I was so worried about trying to throw my line all graceful in front of the Mountain Man over there, that I hadn’t realized I wouldn’t have to throw it. I could just drop it in the hole, nice and easy.
I was feeling quite smug, which in hindsight, should have been a warning signal. My line was in the water, probably at least a couple feet, when a small, Styrofoam container landed onto my lap.
I looked to Chase, questioningly.
“Surely an avid fisherman like yourself wouldn’t forget to bait your hook.”
I stared in secret horror at the innocent looking container. I swallowed. “Of course not, I was just—testing the pole.”
Testing the pole? Was that a fisherman’s term? What was this game we were playing? We both knew I was far from being a fisherman, but I couldn’t back down. Not to him. There was too much childhood angst for me to give him the satisfaction. It was that arrogant look he gave me all the time. Like he knew I was lying. Which, technically I was, but why did he always have to assume things about me?
I opened the lid quickly and efficiently. “I love baiting my hook.”
Oh my gosh. STOP IT.
In the container, amid the top of the dark dirt, lay at least four, tangled worms. Who knew how many more were buried deep, waiting to pounce? Did worms pounce?
In case you didn’t already figure, I was definitely more of an indoor girl.
He wasn’t even trying to hold back his grin now. He was playing dirty. Trying to make a fool out of me. I gritted my teeth. Two could play that game.
I picked up a worm. It squirmed and bended in my hand.
Oh, yuck. Yuck, yuck, yuck.
“So, how often do you go fishing?” I was quite impressed with how normal my voice sounded, because my insides were fighting utter despair. I brought the tiny snake-like creature to my eye-level. One step away from blowing my breakfast all over this redneck fishing hole. Do people really need fish so badly they would subject themselves to this? I wasn’t even going to eat it. I’d be happy with rancid oatmeal for the rest of the week, and maybe just acouplepieces of bacon. I glanced at Chase out of the corner of my eye and was dismayed that my attempt to draw him into conversation while I murdered a—well… either a bug, insect, or some sort of reptile—proved futile. Either way, instead of going back to his business and talking like anormal, nice human, he just stood there watching me, arms folded, and completely entertained.