Nine Suppers in a Bass Boat

The Fourth Night

By the fourth night, it had become something.

Duane Becker and Lyle Ostrander came by. They have fished with Rick since high school, and they had heard about the boat at the co-op, and then they had heard about the supper at the gas station.

They pulled up in Duane’s pickup at a quarter after six, and both of them stood at the end of the driveway with their caps in their hands like they had come to a viewing.

“Evening, Karen,” Duane said.

“Evening, Duane. Lyle. Have you eaten?”

They looked at each other.

“There’s plenty,” I said. “It’s chicken and noodles.”

So I brought out two more plates. Duane climbed in and sat on the front casting deck with his plate on his knees. Lyle sat on the back deck with his feet hanging over the motor.

Four grown people eating chicken and noodles in a bass boat in a driveway in central Iowa. Marlys across the street with her lawn chair and her coffee. The Mason jar candle flickering in the cup holder.

Duane said it was the best boat he had ever eaten in. Lyle asked for seconds. They talked about walleye at Saylorville and whether the crappies would be up in the shallows yet. Rick laughed once, a real laugh, and then looked at me and stopped.

After they left, Rick stayed in the boat. I started to gather the plates and he put his hand on my wrist. Not hard. Just to keep me there.

“Sit down a minute, Karen.”

I sat.

The candle was down to an inch. A truck went by on the highway, and the dog two houses down barked at it.

“I turned fifty-five in March,” Rick said.

“I know. I made the cake.”

“A letter came from the co-op in February. About my pension. What it’ll be when I go.” He was looking at his hands. “I sat in the truck in the parking lot and read it four times.”

“Was it bad?”

“No. It’s fine. It’s fair.” He turned his wedding ring around on his finger. “That’s what got me. It was fine. Thirty years of poles and that’s what I had. A fair letter.”

I did not say anything. I had learned a long time ago that Rick talks when you let the quiet sit.

“Dad never let me have one thing,” he said. “You know that. And I never asked. I never asked you either. And then I’m in the truck with that letter and I thought, I’m going to be dead someday and I never had one thing that was just mine.”

“So you bought a boat.”

“So I bought a boat.” He shook his head slowly. “With your kitchen. I know it. I knew it when I signed the check, and I did it anyway, and I told you the kitchen works fine because I couldn’t think of anything else to say.”

“It doesn’t work fine, Rick.”

“I know it doesn’t.”

He was quiet a long while. Then he said, “I’m sorry, Karen.” It came out rough, like it had been stuck in him sideways.

“I know you are,” I said.

I did not tell him it was all right. It was not all right. But I put my hand over his on the bench seat, on my mother’s tablecloth, and we sat there until the candle went out.

The next night I made supper in the boat again.