The Catfish Off Grandpa’s Old Dock

“Four pounds, two ounces,” he said into the bullhorn, and a whole cheer went up off that bank.

Mack put the fish in the big tank of lake water they had set up to keep the derby fish alive. Mason stood with his face right at the glass watching it swim.

I looked up the bank. Brittany had not moved. She was still standing on the grass with that coffee in her hand, but her arms were not crossed anymore. They were just hanging at her sides.

The derby ran until eleven. Nobody in the eight-to-ten group came close to that fish.

The biggest one after it was a bass a little over two pounds, caught by a girl with braids who came over and shook Mason’s hand like a little businesswoman.

At eleven, Mack climbed up onto the tailgate of the county truck by the ramp and called everybody in.

The whole crowd came up off the bank, parents and grandparents and kids with wet shoes, and stood around in the sun.

He went through the little ones first, the four-to-sevens. A boy of five won it with a bluegill as big as his face, and his whole family hollered like he had won the lottery.

Then Mack looked at his clipboard. “Eight to ten,” he said. “Biggest fish of the derby, four pounds, two ounces, a channel catfish. Mason Mueller.”

The whole crowd clapped. Mason looked up at Kevin like he was not sure he was allowed to go. Kevin gave him a little push in the back, and Mason walked up to the tailgate.

Mack reached into the tank with a net and handed that big channel cat back to him, and Mason held it up the way Delbert had shown him, behind the fins and under the belly. It was as long as his arm.

Somebody’s grandma had a camera. Everybody had a phone. They all took his picture, this sunburned boy in a yellow life vest holding up a fish as long as his arm in front of the whole county.

Then Mack handed him the trophy, a little gold fisherman on a wood base, and the new rod and reel in its box.

Mason did not know what to do with it all, so he handed the fish back to Mack and the trophy to Kevin and held the rod box.

And then he looked out over the crowd, and he found me, and he held up Lou’s old rod instead.

Just held it up over his head. I did not know he had picked it up off the bank, but there it was.

I could not see after that for a minute. I had to take my glasses off.

The woman next to me, a stranger, put her hand on my arm and did not say anything, and I was grateful to her.

When I got my glasses back on, I looked for Brittany.

She was at the back of the crowd, right where she had stood all morning. Twenty feet back from the water. Her coffee was gone. I do not know where she put it.

She was looking at her son, holding up his grandpa’s old rod over his head in front of all those people.

And she was crying. Not loud. Just standing there with tears coming down and not wiping them.

Then she uncrossed her arms, and she started walking toward me through the crowd.

I did not move. I stood right where I was beside my folding chair, with my sun visor in my hand.