The Sea Beach Line Read Online Free PDF Page B

could swim. A pile of break rocks extended out from the shore, parallel to the pier, and we stopped just across from where they ended.
    â€œHere,” said Al, kneeling down to reach into his backpack. He pulled out two hooped wire baskets and a greasy brown paper bag.
    â€œWhat’s in there?”
    â€œChicken necks.” He showed me the yellow-gray mottled lump before he began fastening it to the bottom of one of the baskets with a piece of twine.
    â€œThose are the real necks of chickens?”
    â€œOf course.”
    â€œWhere did you get them?”
    â€œButcher shop. Where else? It’s good crab bait. Cheap meat. Crabs are bottom feeders. They love this kind of meat.” He scored the necks with his pocketknife, so that the yellow skin separated and the pink flesh was exposed.
    â€œDo people eat them?”
    â€œSure, if they’re hungry. You eat chicken, don’t you?”
    â€œYeah, chicken wings. Not chicken necks. People cook them up like chicken wings?”
    â€œNo, there’s not so much meat for that. It’s more for a stew. Listen, trust me, if you’re hungry enough, you’d be happy to eat chicken-neck stew. Maybe today you’ll find this out, if we don’t catch any crabs.” My face must have betrayed my fear, because Alojzy let out a deep laugh.
    He tied the baskets onto some braided lines, and tied the other ends of the line onto the railing of the pier. The rail was full of grooves worn by similar lines, which made me think that what we were doing wasn’t so strange.
    Alojzy showed me how to toss the trap out over the water like a Frisbee. The baskets opened fully in the air, then fell straight into the water. We gave it a couple minutes to give the crabs time to smell the bait. When we finally pulled the baskets up, I was sure that I felt the weight of crabs in mine, but as soon as the basket rose into the air, I realized it had just been the pressure of the water.
    We threw the baskets back in. In the distance was a big boat, stacked high with different-colored shipping containers. Beyond that, I could make out a distant coastline.
    â€œWhat’s that out there?”
    â€œThere? A boat.”
    â€œNo, not that, the land.” I could make out a mass in the distance. “Is that New Jersey?”
    â€œNo. Staten Island. Still New York City.”
    â€œOh. So can you swim there?”
    â€œMe? Sure I can.”
    We pulled the traps in again, and to my delight a crab was in one of them. I hadn’t actually believed that we would catch anything. It was a terrible thing we caught, with wart-like growths and splotches of mud across its uneven shell.
    â€œLook! Dad! I caught one!” I usually referred to him as “Alojzy,” or “my father,” but when I was speaking to him the word “Dad” came smoothly and affectionately from my lips.
    â€œYeah, so I see. Or maybe it caught you? But it’s just a spider crab. No good for eating.” He took the trap from me and turned it upside down, shaking it until the crab fell back into the ocean. I felt a little cheated of my catch, but at the same time was happy to see the thing gone.
    Next throw, we pulled up a couple spider crabs each. Alojzy dumped them on the pier and kicked them hard, so that they skidded across to the other side. He walked over and kicked them again, booting them far out into the water. I understood why he did it. They were ugly, and deserved to be kicked.
    â€œWe don’t want them on same side as us,” he told me. “They’ll keep coming back now that they know about the bait.”
    We moved farther out on the pier, and our luck changed. My father pulled in two rock crabs. They were about the same size as the smaller of the spider crabs but had smoother backs and looked altogether more sanitary. After that, we started pulling them in left and right.
    â€œThis is the spot,” my father said. We threw back four