by Michael Keahon
Michael Keahon (he/him) is a poetry editor for Venture. He is an English major and a senior at Rider. He recently enjoyed being a guest on Episode 2 of the radio show Rider’s Writers Round. He’s been having a great time experimenting with different styles of writing and encountering work by fellow budding writers. He loves going on long walks with his dog, Chloe, and discovering new music to jam to. He accepts any and all music recommendations!
Six year-old Max leaned on his elbow and gazed out the window of a truck driving alone on a forest road. Tree trunks whizzed by in pulsing blurs, which made his head sleepy. He peeked through the canopies to the looming waves of sea-blue mountains, rolling over a boundless carpet of green. Max’s father, Tom, looked ahead and grinned wide from behind the wheel.
“I guarantee it! You’re gonna enjoy this place. It’s really something.” “Okay. How much longer?”
“Nearly there. Ten minutes or so.”
Max sighed and refocused on the trees. This wasn’t the first time he and his father drove like this together. To Max’s initial excitement, and eventual boredom, his father liked to take him on fishing trips. But, this trip would be special. His Dad said so. Yet the thought of fishing made Max more sleepy and he looked out the window. He imagined basketball players passing and weaving between the trees, until the rumbling truck lulled him to sleep.
Dirt and pebbles crunched under the wheels and hunting equipment rattled in the bed behind them. The path dipped down and over a hill. The truck made a CLANG and startled animals that dashed into bushes. The jolt shook Max awake, but he soon heard the sound of rushing water from somewhere in the dense wood. Tom slowed the truck and raised his head to listen.
The forest was thinning. Sunlight filled in the open space and Max felt like he could breathe deeply again. He thought the land looked like a big bowl of popcorn as huge rocks erupted and clumped on the earth. The truck lurched again, clinging to the path further down and around the larger boulders. The whisper of water grew louder, climbing to a roar.
They finally emerged into a clearing and Max saw where the roar came from. He threw open the door and ran to get a closer look. A large river had cut through the mountain stone, breaking and spilling into steep falls. The water foamed white, rabid, and spit clouds of mist hanging in the air. Sunrays painted rainbows above the rocks. Tom called out to Max.
“Don’t go any closer! Ground’s slippery and the current’s rough.”
Max halted and peered over the side to watch the river. The water flowed endlessly and it entranced him. He’d seen nothing like it before. His family went to the beach last summer, but that was a different kind of water, and a different kind of endless. Max’s ocean was flat, calm, wrinkling in long waves that rolled gently and fizzled into the sand at his ankles. This violent water was out of place in the quiet mountain, or perhaps instead, it was a pulsing heart. Max imagined someone upstream turning a knob to cut the current, letting it eventually slow to a trickle…and then…stop.
He then remembered his mother’s watering hose and how she’d let him give drinks to her marigolds and roses. His parents had both come on the trip, but she said that she was feeling a bit car sick and decided to hang back at camp. She told Max that she’d tend to the fire, fix up their gear, and that she couldn’t wait to hear about his father’s old “favorite place” when they get back.
Dark slender things peaked out from the foam of waves, but Max couldn’t tell what they were. He squinted and saw heads of fish. Big ones, it looked like. They swam against the current that fiercely fought them back. Tom pointed to a group of them and Max watched, squealing in excitement.
“Look! They’re jumping right out the water!”
“Yeah. Big leapers ‘round here. They gotta be if they wanna get past the falls.”
Max looked from the tiny fish heads up to the ferocious waterfall above them. They looked like, to Max’s amusement, himself attempting to perform a layup at his brother’s highschool court. That net was so far away.
“Well, what’s up there?”
“They have to get upriver to calmer waters. To lay their eggs and make more fish. All the fish we can see, they were all born there.”
“Oh! Fish eggs,” said Max. He wrinkled his nose. “They’re making babies. Gross.” The fish sprung in the air, flipping their tails wildly before falling back to the waves. “It’s way too high for them.”
“They’ll get there,” said Tom. “Just wait a while. You’ll see.” He started toward the truck. “Come help me unload stuff in the meantime.”
Max stared a moment longer before skipping over to help his father. Tom walked to the back of the truck and opened the bed. He hauled out a folding chair, threw it under his arm, and handed a smaller one to his son.
“No rods?” said Max.
“We don’t need ‘em today,” Tom said with a smile.
Max shrugged. He heaved his chair and followed his father. They set the chairs down facing the river, safely on the bank. Tom walked back and grabbed a hefty cooler, settling it down next to his seat. He sat next to Max, opened the cooler, and grabbed one of the few beers from the ice. They sat quietly and watched the fish jump.
Tom took a sip of his drink and leaned forward in his chair. He watched Max stare at the rushing water, the leaping life.
“Beautiful. Isn’t it, Max? My father took me here when I was a boy, you know.”
“Really?”
Max couldn’t picture his father as a kid, but he remembered being shown an old album with faded photos of a boy with a wide grin. The smiling boy had a missing front tooth and wore a sun hat with a long brim that was much too big on him. He stood holding a large fish in front of the rapid white falls.
“Yeah. I was eight,” said Tom. “This was his favorite place. Then it became my favorite place.”
“Can it be my favorite place, too?” said Max.
“Of course. That’s why I brought you here. So you can see it.” “Then it’s mine, too!” Max slapped his knee.
“I wish you could have seen how it was when I was young, though.” “Why?”
“There were a lot more fish then. The factories they built dump chemicals in the water. It makes the fish sick, so there aren’t as many now.”
“They should shut them down!”
“I think so, too. But there’s still lots of fish left. They’re very tough.”
Tom took more sips of his beer and placed it down. He pointed again. “Look. They’re jumping higher now. Almost reaching the top.”
“Wha– they are!”
Max watched the fish launch themselves into the air, flapping their tails to propel themselves up, up, up. Their fins pumped madly and pushed on the wind. At the peak of their jump they seemed to hang, just a split moment, frozen in the air.
“It’s about time. They’re almost doing it,” said Tom.
“Doing what?” said Max. “You’ll see. Just watch.”
The fish lept far up like scaly, writhing rockets over the water and ghostly rainbows. Max sat quietly while time seemed to move slower, icier than before. The jumps were long and high as more fish took hold of the air, until they were pulled back down. Finally, one large fish, gasping and sparkling under the sun, jumped clear over the top of the falls.
Max drew a gasp. The fish never splashed back down, but it kept on going. And going! The fish soared above the water, thrashing about until it found a current of air to ride. It settled itself safely inside and swam freely far above the river. Max found his breath and jumped up, pointing and tugging at his father’s vest.
“Dad! Dad! Look! The fish is flying! It’s flying!” “Yes it is. And the rest will, too. Watch.”
Just as his father said, Max saw the fish– one, then another, and more– take to the air.
They shot out of the water and did their flailing dance before adjusting to the wind and collecting together into schools. They swam in lines and groups, turning and flowing, and some veered off to swim around before joining the rest.
Max awed as a current brought a group of fish over his head. They fluttered above, casting down shadows and drops of river water over the two onlookers. Max and Tom held their arms over their faces to shield themselves from the fishy rain. Looking up at the scene, Max felt like he was underwater. A diver on land. Breathless.
“Amazing every time,” said Tom. “Like I said, this is my favorite place.” “Me too,” said Max.
The father and son stood silent for several minutes watching the fish swim above their heads with looks of wonder. Max’s eyes were sore after looking for so long, and from looking towards the brilliant sunlight and silhouettes above. After a while, Tom took another sip of his beer and turned to his son.
“We have to go. Your mother is expecting us soon.” “Ok,” said Max, not looking down.
“Let’s wrap this up then. We’ll have to bring some back to her. One second.”
Tom turned around and walked back to the truck. Max didn’t move, or look to see Tom return with a rifle. He began loading the magazine.
“These aren’t regular fish, so I’ll have to get them this way.”
Max turned and saw the gun. His eyes and cheeks whitened. “You’re killing them?!” “Just a couple, for us to eat tonight. Your mother’s going to grill some over the fire.” “No. You can’t!”
“Max, we’ve gone fishing before. It’s the same thing. What’s the problem?” “It’s not the same. You’re killing them! Like the factories!”
“No. Those places poison the fish. We’re only having a few to eat.”
“But they need to get back home! They want to make new babies. They tried so hard.” “I understand that, but we have to eat. Do you want to be hungry later?”
Max didn’t care about hunger. “You can’t kill them, too. There’s not as many now. You said so!”
“Don’t worry ‘bout that. There’ll be plenty flying around when we leave.” Tom gripped his rifle and flicked off the safety. “Now, stand back and cover your ears.”
Max started to protest before Tom raised the gun to a school passing overhead. He tracked their paths smoothly with the barrel, glancing down to the ground to watch their shadows drift over the rocks. Max cupped his ears as Tom fired a number of rounds into the group of fish.
Blood sprayed as the shots bore through the meat. Max watched two of the fish fall to the earth. They landed with a heavy THUD and writhed on the ground, gasping with horrid open mouths. The rest of the group scattered, swimming in sporadic directions until they recaptured the currents of the wind and swam away.
“Aye. Still not too bad a shot after all,” said Tom. He opened the cooler next to his feet and took the other beer from the ice. “Let’s go bring them back to camp. Max, grab that one near you.”
Max was silent. The feeling of flight crashed down like the animal on the ground before him. Even though he covered his ears, the ringing still blotted out the world.
“Ok.”
He walked several steps to where a fish still flopped frantically on the rock. Water and blood pooled on the stone underneath it and the wet scales still glistened like gems in the sun. He watched as the fish’s spasms slowed and weakened. It took empty breaths, silently opening and closing its lips. Nothing to say.
The fish lay on its side and Max saw its large eye, clear and colored like a gleaming marble, open to the sky. It barely moved as he got closer. In the reflection he saw the silhouettes of the other fish soaring above their heads. A mirror– the blue of the sky, the white wisps of clouds, the scaly black rockets– showed in the glassy eye until the fish finally stopped moving altogether.
It was too quick. Just a moment ago he watched the schools ebb with the wind, their collective dances a magnificent journey. He looked up to the other fish still swimming above him. Although he was still there, still watching them, the feeling he had before the shots rang out felt like an old dream. The screech in his ears subsided and he listened to his own shallow breaths.
Max made a decision then. He will return to this place someday, but he will come alone.
The boy hoisted the slimy thing into his arms and gave it to his father, who stuffed it into the cooler and loaded it on the truck. They climbed in and drove off toward the forest road. Max sat, without saying a word, watching the shadows of the fish flying above blend into the darkness of the canopy. He listened to the roar of the water hush into a whisper as they were once again engulfed by the quiet mountain woods.