Read Online Up Through the Water by Darcey Steinke - Free Book Online Page B

fin, she saw the image of John Berry over the water. She knew he was there to let her know he thought Birdflower was an insubstantial kind of man and that it was weak for her to start up with him. His face was stern like the pirates from whom he'd descended. Emily would forget the islanders were kin to Blackbeard, but then on Friday nights they'd come out to Paolo's, and when a fast song clicked and fell in the jukebox, they'd do a crazy shuffle step—jeans rolled to their knees, smelling like fish and sun—they swung their long-haired girlfriends.
    The fish buckled above water. Her hair blew back hard, and she had to bring her head forward to steady herself. If he'd been able to, she knew John Berry would have accused her of letting him think nothing was wrong, of making him look like a lovesick fool. She wanted to tell him that in her own way she had felt for him. There were things, triggers, his boyish hand movements, curls like the fine fur of pheasants on the back of his neck, and sometimes with him there had been an abandon.
    The sword's top fin skimmed the water. “Talk to me,” Birdflower said.
    Emily felt hungry and a little dizzy, and again when she looked out over the water, she saw John Berry and her hands tightened on Birdflower's shoulders. It seemed to her it was him, snagged and straining on the end of the line. “Think of it like a man,” she said into his ear.
    Michael gave her a puzzled look. “What are you doing?”
    “Let her go,” Birdflower said.
    The swordfish was twenty yards away, the line tight as a guitar string. Emily watched it buck at the surface. “He's calling you names,” Emily whispered.
    Birdflower grimaced and held on. She tightened her grip on his arm and felt tension through his skin. There was a sudden tug. Birdflower lost his grip and the line reeled out.
    “A breakaway,” David said. “Pull back.”
    Birdflower did, but the line slackened and blew.
    Everyone was quiet and the water too seemed calm. The sudden stillness felt eerie to Emily and she walked over to the edge to look for a flicker or a slash of fin. If he caught the fish, she knew they'd string it up and take pictures, like those at the restaurant behind the cash register, photos of grinning men with beers held high to the camera. There were hundreds of these, some overlapping so only the fish showed, the pictures forming a school of minnows swimming off the restaurant wall.
    The line went taut again and Birdflower pulled his body back, then caught the slack and wound in. This went on till Emily heard the fish bump the side of the boat. The net clapped water, and as they raised it, Emily saw the fish wrapped in rope. On deck, it hissed and flipped. Birdflower beamed over the sword. She reached to the back fin, chrome-green and familiar, ridges fanning out like a wet feather.
    The swordfish steaks cooked in the black skillet, turning from a transparent pink marble to firm white. They swam in butter, mushrooms, and scallion bits. “Cajun style,” Birdflower said, standing over the stove. He took a sip from his wine, then set it down. “It's exciting. Life on the end of your line.”
    “My heart went thump, thump, thump,” Emily said.
    She watched from her chair at a yellow table in his one-room cottage, an unmade bed in the far corner. On the wall, photos of suns over water. And leaning against the far wall, his guitar, a ukulele, and a big Western twelve-string.
    “How old's your boy?” Birdflower asked, the fish crackling behind him.
    “Sixteen.”
    Birdflower shook his head. “You with a kid that old?”
    “I don't see what's so strange about it. Some women have babies at twelve,” Emily said.
    “White trash women.” Birdflower grinned.
    “It's more than some have to show for themselves,” Emily said.
    “I just don't think of you as a mother.”
    She pointed to the photos. “Which ones are which?”
    “The blood-orange suns, the ones like coals, are the sunsets. The other ones are