markwildyr.com,
Post #67
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“Hem and Haw” got a decent number of page views last time,
a lot of them from the Ukraine. Hello to all of you over there and welcome.
This week, let’s try another flash fiction.
*****
WADERS
I remember the very instant I
saw Robby as a man. As he struggled to shore, fighting the current of the shallow
river, his long legs encased in rubber waders, it struck me that my young buddy,
my hero worshiper was all grown up. I’d known him since birth and lived in the
house beside his ever since. His father, ten years my senior, had sort of adopted
me after I lost my own to an automobile accident. Weldon Riggs, although
devoted to his wife, was right there whenever my widowed mother needed help. But
as his accounting business grew, he devoted more and more of his waking hours
to it, leaving me to provide companionship to his son… just as he had me.
Seemed fair.
Robby had called me Uncle Mikey
ever since I was fifteen-years-old until he reached the age of twelve when he
dropped the y, and I became Uncle
Mike. I enjoyed his company and adoration as much as his father had doubtless been
pleased by mine. While most of my classmates eventually grew distracted by
sports and girls and life in general, I took pleasure in introducing Robby to
such things. I coached him, mentored him, and loved him as surely as if he were
my own brother.
But things changed during that
fishing trip taken in celebration of his eighteenth birthday. As he slogged up
onto the shore, he met my gaze and held it for a long moment before dropping
his eyes.
“Damned waders feel like they
weigh a ton in the water,” he said, his color a bit higher than usual.
“You let water get over the top
of them, and you’ll know what a ton really feels like.”
He laughed. “Yeah. Guess so. But
they sure keep your feet dry. Not warm, but dry.” He held up a stringer with
three decent-sized trout on it. “You hungry, Uncle Mike?”
The moment passed; the world stabilized
on its axis again. I cleaned, and he filleted. Never had pan-fried trout tasted
so good. We laughed and teased our way through the meal.
A thunder shower drove us inside
the tent, and we lay atop our respective sleeping bags, listening to the rat-a-tat-tat
of raindrops against the canvas. Utter contentment. My mind briefly flitted to
the image of him coming out of the water in those heavy waders this afternoon
before succumbing to sleep as the Lord’s tears drummed against the tent.
I woke to find him propped on
one elbow studying me. “Whoa? What’s up?”
“Did you know your eyelids
flutter when you sleep?”
“Everybody’s does at some point.
Something about the sleep stage you’re in.”
His pleasing visage grew solemn.
His Adam’s apple moved as he swallowed. “What… what happened this afternoon?”
“We ate some bitchin’ trout. Wish we could do it every day.”
“Before that. When I waded up on
the shore.”
I averted my eyes. The storm had
passed, but I knew from the gloom that clouds still shrouded the sun. Thunder rolled
in the distance. The faint odor of wet grass and sodden pines permeated the
tent. In the pregnant silence, I heard water drop from soggy limbs. Some landed
on the canvas protecting us with startlingly loud thuds.
“Don’t tell me it was my
imagination, Uncle Mike. I saw something in your look.”
I closed my eyes and tried to relax
muscles I hadn’t realized were tense. “I… I saw you as a man.”
He lay on his back. His movement
brought my eyes open. Some people’s appearance suffer in profile. Not Robby’s. He
was so handsome, my heart ached. He licked his lips before speaking. “I’ve
always seen you as a man.”
“Of course, you do. I’ve got ten
years on you.”
“That’s not what I mean.” He
turned on his side away from me, exposing his broad, tapered back to my gaze.
I’m sure I hesitated only a moment,
but it seemed like an eon before I turned and spooned against him. When I threw
an arm over him, he grasped my hand and moved it where he wanted.
“Oh… Mike!” he breathed gently.
*****
The imagination runs wild, doesn’t it? But tell me
something. If things progressed the way most of us dream it would, did Mike and
Robby cement a relationship… or ruin one. It can go either way, you know. Lust
sometimes demands what the conscience can’t accept. I know how I think it
worked out, do you?
Amazon permits you to read a short passage of my novels, Cut Hand and Johnny Two-Guns.. I also believe the STARbooks-published River Otter, Echoes of the Flute, and Medicine Hair are still up. I sure would
like to get the final book in the Cut Hand Series, Wastelakapi… Beloved, published, but it’ll take some help from
readers to get Dreamspinner interested.
My contact
information is provided below in case anyone wants to drop me a line:
Website and blog: markwildyr.com
Email: markwildyr@aol.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/mark.wildyr
Twitter: @markwildyr
The
following are buy links for CUT HAND:
And now my mantra: Keep
on reading. Keep on writing. You have something to say, so say it!
Until next time.
Mark
New posts at 6:00
a.m. on the first and third Thursdays of each month.
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