My Father Like a River by Ron Rash Page B

believed a trophy smallmouth or brown would signal a change of luck in
his life.
    As with most fishing trips we took, he had little
opportunity to find out. Every time he moved up or downstream, my brother and I
brought him back with a bird’s nest in our reel, a hook hung on a rock or
drowned log. My father was usually a patient man in such situations, but on this
afternoon his face darkened each time he laid down his rod and traversed the
rocky bank to untangle a line or wade into the water to free a hook. The casts
he did make brought no strikes, not even a swirl or follow. The day was warm for
November, but we were deep in the gorge. By three o’clock the sun was falling
behind mountains, the air chilly.
    My brother complained he was cold and wanted to go
home, and though I said nothing I was ready as well. The fishing had been slow,
three small rainbows in four hours. We were bored, the bait unchecked on the
stream’s bottom. My father ignored my brother and waded out onto a sandbar fifty
feet downstream. He fished with a concentration I had never seen before, making
long, looping casts toward the far bank, changing the speed of the retrieve,
even adding a sinker to the line in hopes the different depth might bring forth
the miracle a big fish always is.
    â€œI’m going to the car,” my brother whined. He
picked his rod up off the rocks and reeled for a few moments before the line
tightened and the rod bowed. “I’m hung up, Dad,” he yelled.
    â€œUnsnag it yourself, dammit,” my father yelled
back.
    My brother hesitated, waited for my father to say
or do something else, because we’d been told to never enter the water without
him close by. But the river had our father’s full attention. My brother placed
his hand on the taut line, followed it into the swift current. He was up to his
knees when he lost his footing and floundered into deeper water.
    When I yelled, my father looked around to see his
youngest son appearing and disappearing in a current that shoved him toward and
then past the sandbar. I stumbled into the shallows, shouting at my father to do
something. I was close enough to see his eyes, and, in that moment, I believed
he was about to let my brother drown. Then he entered the river, tripping and
bloodying his knee in the rocky shallows before flailing into the deeper
current, tumbled and spun downstream himself as he closed the gap between my
brother and himself. He caught my brother, then lost him as a drop-off pulled
the riverbed out from under their feet.
    Twenty yards farther downstream he collared my
brother again. They had been pushed closer to shore, the water shallow now. My
father lifted my brother to his feet, held him there as they both gasped and
sputtered for breath. I watched my father’s hand as it slowly reached back and
touched an empty pocket. I was with them now, and I held on to my brother’s arm
as well, as the three of us stumbled toward shore.
    We looked like shipwreck survivors, each of us
dripping and shivering. My father carried my brother to the car, stripped off
his clothes and then mine, and wrapped us in the quilt. He placed us in the
front seat, cranked up the engine, and turned the heater on high. “When you and
your brother get warm, cut off the engine,” he told me.
    He walked the shoreline for an hour, his eyes searching
the shallows, occasionally wading into the river to get a better look. The day’s
last light had faded completely when he gave up. My brother had fallen asleep,
his head on my shoulder. We drove back in silence. We pulled into the driveway,
my brother between us, still asleep. My hand was on the door handle, but then I
felt my father’s hand on my shoulder. The porch light came on and I could see
his face. He nodded at my brother.
    â€œHe’s okay,” my father said, his voice husky.
“That’s what matters.”
    We lived close to the bone that winter, and the
money the