more like a bird than a boy. He’s looking over the side of the boat and into the water. His hand is extended, almost touching the water.
And this is why I love the painting, why it reminds me of the stories of Loosewood Island that Daddy raised me with: if you gave
The Catch
only a cursory glance you might wonder at the reflection of the boy’s fingertips in the foam of the ocean.
Except it’s not a reflection.
It’s not the boy’s fingertips at all, but some other person’s fingertips—some other creature—reaching from the water to grasp at his hand, to pull him under.
E very time we boarded the
Queen Jane
, Daddy gave us the same lecture: watch our feet with the ropes, watch our fingers in the hydraulics, watch that we sit where we’re out of the way, watch that we help when it is needed, and always, he’d add at the end, giving us a wink, watch to see if there’s anything that Brumfitt might have painted out in the water.
By the time I was twelve I’d started showing breasts, though it was Rena, early at only eleven, a full year younger than me, who’d gotten her period already, and Momma had been making noises about how the
Queen Jane
wasn’t a place for me or my sisters to be spending our weekends, that squatting on the deck to pee and hosing it off wasn’t the best training for the kind of girls she was trying to raise. She’d never been warm to the idea of me, Rena, and Carly fishing, but she was always ready with an extra lunch for Scotty to take along. He belonged out there with his daddy, she’d say, because otherwise how would he learn to be a lobsterman? It might be in the Kings blood, but that didn’t mean Daddy didn’t also need to teach him how to be a man.
Despite Momma’s urgings and Daddy’s steady attention, Scotty was always the last one out the door. On a Saturday morning,when I’d already be in my boots and slicker down at the docks, checking the bait, re-coiling any lines that I didn’t like the look of, he’d still be sitting at the table, as if his sugared cereal could stand to soak up more milk. Rena and Carly were somewhere in between. Sometimes they’d come fishing because I wanted to be there—and Scotty
had
to be there—and because they didn’t want to be left behind. Sometimes they’d stay home to walk the island and bake with Momma or play with friends.
That Saturday, a fall day when the wind was hinting at what was in store for us with the coming of winter, was the last time that the four of us all went with Daddy at the same time, and it was also the first Saturday that Momma said it explicitly: “You girls are staying home.”
Scotty was still upstairs, even though Daddy had woken him first and Momma had gone into his room twice to get him moving, but I was at the table eating oatmeal with syrup. Daddy was pouring coffee into his thermos. Momma packed him his lunch every day, but he liked to doctor up his coffee with enough sugar to offset the salt of the sea, and he always heated the cream before he poured it in, so that the coffee wouldn’t go cold for him if he was still out on the
Queen Jane
in the evening. He rested the lid on top of the thermos, like he did every morning, to keep the steam in while he pulled the sugar from the pantry. He glanced at Momma when she said it, when she said, “You girls are staying home,” but he didn’t say anything.
Rena stuck her head out of the bathroom, where she was braiding her hair, but Momma glared at me and me alone. I hadn’t said anything, hadn’t responded, but she acted like I had. “That’s right, Cordelia. You’re staying home. It might be a weekend, but it’s cold outside and I don’t want you girls coming back home tonight with runny noses and skin that’s chafed from the wind.” She folded her arms under her small breasts and leaned back against the counter. She was wearing a blue dress that matched the sky more than the water, and I wondered how early she must have woken to have