The Midnight Country

Chapter 7

I guess I wasn’t surprised to find Dillon already there, sitting on the rock usually reserved for my brother (back when he still fished with us; back before he got his license and began driving the GTO—before he met Wendy with her jeans so tight she’d been known to pass out), his pole propped on a stick and the bill of his cap touching his nose, as though he were sleeping.

“You’re awfully early,” he said, having heard my approach, but didn’t look up. “How’d you get out?”

I sat down the tackle box and popped it open, chose a lure. “Brought up Mom.”

“Oh, man.” He lifted the bill of his cap and looked at me. “I bet she started quoting chapter and verse ...” He laughed without much humor. “Matthew, probably. ‘Blessed are those who—’”

“Mourn. For they will be comforted.” I shook my head. “Nah. Psalms.” I cast my line which plopped into the water next to his. “I don’t even know why she bothers. They all say the same thing.”

We fished, he sitting in Shad’s old spot while I sat in his, both of us using our coats for cushions— which was funny, considering it was mid-November. Nor was that the only thing, because there were mosquitoes buzzing about also—mosquitoes, right there on the doorstep of winter, something neither of us could believe or explain. But then there had been a lot of unexplained things that year; like how a United Airlines 747 could vanish without a trace on its way to Honolulu from LAX or how my brother could grow so tall in the space of several months or how Grandma Grace could refuse even to consider that our parents might still be alive. At least that’s what we were talking about when my orange and white bobber dipped once, decisively, then twice, and I jerked my rod (to sink the hook) before quickly beginning to reel whatever it was—a salmon, I hoped—in.

As it turned out, it was just your garden-variety Rainbow trout, albeit a decent-sized one—about 17 inches—which filled the bottom of the bucket nicely even as it thrashed and flopped about; so much so that we were both looking for our bonkers when the foot-long dragonfly whirred past us—its cellophane wings vibrating, its redden eyes glinting—very nearly scaring us both out of our Converse shoes.

“What the—” shouted Dillon.

“Holy mother,” I blurted. It was on the tip of my lips to ask, ‘What the hell was that?’ when a second dragonfly (as big as, if not bigger than, the first) landed on my shoulder—its wings oscillating, blowing my hair, its compound eye only inches from my own.

“Aaah!” I screamed, dropping my pole, slapping my body, dancing like a man on fire, as Dillon sprinted for the trees and the dragonflies buzzed away—back to wherever they came from—until I tripped over a root and fell flat on my face ... a position in which I stayed, too frightened to move, too frightened to breathe, until I was sure there were no more of the things flying around.

Needless to say, by the time I climbed to my feet, Dillon was long gone, having ran straight home to momma without so much as a look back. I wasn’t particularly surprised: had I been in his shoes, I would have done the same thing. I don’t know about girls, but in Boy-land, in the 1970s, before sensitivity training, it was every kid for himself. All I know is that I couldn’t explain what I had just seen—no more than I could explain Shad’s sudden growth spurt or Grandma’s aversion to any mention of our parents or why Wendy wore such tight pants and so much blue eyeshadow—and quickly gathered my things (or, more properly, my brother’s things), reaching, at last, for the bucket—over which I paused, my hand still trembling.

It’s funny, because to this day I don’t know why I did that—paused to examine the Rainbow trout—when the truth was I had every reason to flee just like Dillon. Maybe it was because the fear and breathlessness of our brush with the dragonflies was still so fresh; and that, because I had become aware of my own breathing, I became aware of the trout’s, or rather, its lack thereof. All I know is that I became fixated on its dying and gasping for air in a way I’d never done before, looking into its great, golden eye as though it were a dog, or a cat—even a person—seeing myself there, seeing the whole world, or at least the sky above Comet’s Tail, California—population 9,893, at least back in 1978.

Nor could I bring myself to bonk it, even though the tool was right there in my trembling hand. Partly this was because a Bible passage had come to mind—living with Grandma, they could never be far—Proverbs 12:10, “A righteous man regards the life of his animal, but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel.” And I guess I just wasn’t feeling cruel that day, because instead of bonking it I snatched up the bucket’s handle and moved toward the water, where I crouched, tipping it toward the surface—when something massive snorted nearby and a huge shadow fell over me. Something I at first took to be a bear, my heart pounding, my blood racing, but quickly realized, upon seeing its reflection in the river, was no such thing.

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