Fishing the Sloe-Black River Read Online Free PDF Page A

their catch and Paulie’s fingers will be frantic in his hair. Where’s O’Meara this morning? they’ll say to him. Has he found himself a gerbil? The other fishgutters will be cursing over slabs of fillets. Their plastic gloves will be covered in blood. Strings of fishgut will have fallen on their boots. That bastard’s always late anyway.
    I should pull on my old jeans and whistle for a taxi, or hop on the trolley, or ride the bicycle through the hills, down to the warehouse, but the light this morning is curiously heavy, indolent, slow, and I feel like staying.
    Enrique is coughing in the bedroom behind me, spitting into the pillow. It sounds like the rasp of the seals along the coastline cliffs farther up the California shore. His skin is sallow and tight around his jaw. The way he thrashes around in the bed reminds me of a baby corncrake I once took home after an oil slick in my hometown near Bantry Bay, continually battering its blackened wings against the cage to get out.
    He should wake soon, and perhaps today he’ll feel well enough to sit up, read a novel or a magazine. I bend down and pick up the large pieces of shattered glass from the floor. There’s a long scar on the wall where I threw the jamjar. That was smart, O’Meara, wasn’t it? I find two quarters and a few dimes scattered among the glass. There’s an Irish five-penny piece on the floor too, an anachronism, a memory.
    I flick a tiny shard of glass off my finger, and Enrique tosses again in bed. He is continually thinning, like the eggshell of a falcon, and soon the sheets will hardly ripple. I move to the bathroom and take a quick piss in the sink. Enrique has always said that it’s a much better height and there’s no risk of splashing the seat. Not too hygienic, but curiously pleasurable. My eyes are bloodshot in the mirror, and I notice the jowly look in my face. When I wash I can still smell yesterday’s fish on my hands. We are down to the last bar of soap, and the water that comes through the tap has a red iron color to it. Back in the bedroom I pull on my jeans, a heavy-checked lumber shirt, and my black-peaked hat. I search in the pockets of my jeans and find three more dollars, then check my watch. Another hour late won’t really matter. My coat hangs on the bedpost. I lean over him again and tell him that I will be back in a few moments. He doesn’t stir. Ah, isn’t that just lovely, O’Meara? Out ya go and get breakfast for Enrique.
    *   *   *
    The wind at my back hurries me along, down the street, past a row of saplings, over a child’s hopscotch chalkmarks, to the deli, where Betty is working the counter. It’s an old neighborhood store, the black-and-white floor tiles curled up around the edges. Betty is a large, dark-haired woman—capable, Enrique jokes, of owning her own zip code. She often wears tank tops, and the large flaps of flab that hang down from her underarms would be obscene on anybody else, but they seem to suit her. There’s a barker on the other side of town, near City Lights Bookstore, who shouts about “Sweaty Betty” ’s shows, but I’ve never had the guts to go in and see if it’s her up there, jiggling onstage in the neon lights. Betty negotiates the aisles of the deli crabways, her rear end sometimes knocking over the display stands of potato chips. When she slices the ham the slabs are as thick as her fingers. There is a bell on the inside of the door, and when I come in she looks up from the cash register, closing the newspaper at the same time.
    â€œThe Wild Colonial Boy,” she says. “What’s the rush?”
    â€œLate for work. Just gonna grab a few things.”
    â€œStill working down at the abattoir?”
    â€œThe warehouse. Gutting fish.”
    â€œSame difference.” Her laugh resounds around the shop. The tassels on the bosom of her white blouse bounce. Her teeth