by Phil Truman
“Snappin’ turtle?” Threebuck asked. There was unease in his voice. Red Randy nodded without looking at Threebuck. He studied the men in line. He didn’t much care about catching any catfish, but talking to some of these local yahoos did interest him.
Randy dismounted and said, “Let’s get in line.”
The last guy in line, a wiry fellow, turned and watched the two approach. With a sober face, he scanned the tats on Randy’s arms, neck and chest exposed outside the black tank top. He looked over Threebuck’s scraggly face, hanging hair-braid, and the Confederate flag bandana covering the top of his head. He smiled tightly when they stopped behind him. “Howdy,” he said. “You boys from out of town?”
“Yeh,” Randy said looking down at him.
The skinny guy nodded, and looked out past Randy toward the parking area. “Them’s some nice bikes you got there,” he said. When they’d rolled up, their bikes grumbling and popping, everyone in line and at the tables had turned to look at them.
Randy nodded. Two signs taped to the front of the tables in the shelter read: “Pre-Entries here,” and “Sign up here.”
“Don’t look like you’ll be able to carry much catfish home on ’em, though,” the skinny guy observed.
Randy looked down at him again, and noted the twisted little smile on the guy’s weathered old face. “Don’t reckon we’ll be keeping what we catch,” he said. “Probably’ll give them to some sawed-off skinny little farmer. Alls we’re interested in is the prize money.”
“Prize money?” The guy said. “Hell, I doubt there’ll be prize money. Bobby John over there,” he pointed to one of the people sitting behind one of the picnic tables. “...has probably done spent all that at the casino. We’ll be lucky to get some five dollar Bass Pro or Walmart gift cards.” He laughed at his own joke. When all he got from the two were disapproving looks, he stuck out his hand and said, “Name’s Oxley. People call me White.”
Red Randy looked at Oxley and his outstretched hand for a few seconds, then took it in his own and crushed it. “I’m Randy,” he said. “People call me Red Randy.”
Oxley tried to yank his hand free. “Ow. Well, damn, man,” he yelped. Several guys in front of them turned to see what was going on. When Randy let him go, White rubbed the knuckles of his right hand with his left. He looked at Randy with aggravation. “I reckon with a grip like that you won’t have no problem with the smaller catfish. And with your size you should be able to handle all but the hunnert pounders and bigger.”
White flexed his hand some more and looked at Threebuck. “I ain’t so sure about your little buddy here, though. Course, it ain’t all size that counts. Even if you’re a big bastard, like yourself, you got to know what you’re doing... and it helps if you can swim.” White waited. He looked back and forth at them both, and then asked, “You boys do know how to swim, don’t you?”
The last question bothered Threebuck, because he, in fact, did not know how to swim. At about age six or seven, some older boys from his neighborhood in Kansas City threw him into the Missouri River, and he all but drowned before catching a snag and pulling himself ashore nearly a quarter mile downstream from his point of entry. Since that time he’d stayed well away from any body of water bigger than a bathtub, and even then he preferred a shower. He didn’t much like being this near to a lake, but he planned to stay way back up on the shore. He would let Red Randy do the noodlin’, whatever that entailed. Threebuck didn’t much see how you could catch a fish with your bare hands, even if you got in the water with them.
“I think we’ll do alright,” Red Randy said. “Threebuck here swims like a duck.”
The distant thunder sounded again. The air stood still and warm. Sticky.
* * *
“I’m sorry I hurt your hand, old timer,” Randy said to Oxley. “Sometimes I don’t know my own strength.” He’d decided maybe he needed to kiss up to this rube. Charm and sociability weren’t Randy’s strong suits, but he thought, if this old guy was a long time resident of these parts, could be he had some useful information. After they left the registration table, he caught up with Oxley who’d headed off toward the lakeshore.
White had quit rubbing his right hand out of pride, but it still throbbed. “No big deal. I’ve had worse,” he lied.
“You got a good hole?” Randy asked.
“I might,” White said.
Randy walked beside White. Threebuck stayed three paces back. “Boy told me,” Randy said. “...there’s a damn fine catfish hole under a sycamore tree around here. Said it was a bent sycamore.”
“What do you mean, ‘bent’?” White asked.
“Well, I ain’t sure. He just said ‘a bent sycamore.’ I thought you might know what he meant.”
White rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “This here’s a pretty fair sized lake. Lot’s of sycamore trees around it. But I don’t recall any particular one that was bent in any certain way around this part. You might try looking over at Black Creek.”
“Naw, the boy told me it was around Eagle Branch,” Randy said.
“Hmm. Well, I don’t know. Ain’t something I’m familiar with.”
They had arrived at the lakeshore within a small cove. Some old tree trunk and brush lay out in the water about ten feet from shore. An outcropping of sandstone ran along the edge in layers, part of it overhanging the water.
“This here’s always been one of my favorite spots,” White said. “That brush and old log in the water, and this here rock overhang makes a dandy catfish hole. Old flatheads seem to like it here.
“Why don’t you boys throw in with me?” White liked Randy’s size. “I bet between the three of us, we can grab us some dandy catfish.”
“Sounds good,” Red Randy said. Threebuck remained silent, and stayed back, up near the trees away from the shore. Randy, as he sat on the ground to take off his boots, looked at him. “Well, come on, Three. You ain’t going to chicken out on me are you?”
Threebuck, leaning up against a tree, answered, “I think I’ll just watch.” The clouds flew by darker, and the rumble of thunder came closer and longer. A startling wind cooled the still air and began to chop the lake water.
White started wading out into the lake, feeling with his foot along the shelf of rock against the shore. “Hell, boy, this ain’t no watchin’ sport; this is a doin’ sport,” he said to Threebuck. “You need to get in here and grab a fish, if you’re a man.”
White bent at the knees and sunk chest deep into the lake water. He moved along the overhang feeling along its submerged edge. The sky blanched blue-white for an instant, and five seconds later the air cracked like a cannon shot. The increasing wind whipped frothy caps against the side of White’s face.
Threebuck looked at the sky, and move behind a tree, hugging it.
“Come on, dumbass. You’re being a wuss,” Randy said back to his partner as he stepped into the water. “You ain’t going to let a little wind and rain scare ya, are you?”
Threebuck stood upright from behind the tree, and scowled. He didn’t like anyone questioning his manhood. He thought he might have to pound that skinny farmer.
“More like I ain’t stupid as some,” Threebuck hollered into the gathering din. “Seems to me, standing waist-deep in water during a lightning storm ain’t the smartest thing to do.”
As if to punctuate his point, the sky flashed again sending a jagged bolt ground-ward some distance away. Red Randy jumped a bit, looking toward the lightning. Then he threw his head back and laughed just as the thunder arrived.
“Found one,” White said in almost a whisper. “Not a real big ’un, but he’ll do.” He sunk a little deeper into the water. The movement of his shoulders said he was slowly moving his arms, but the brown water concealed all but the top of his shoulders upward. He stared at the rock facing in concentration, a grin on his face.
“Ah-oooo!” White yelled. “The sumbitch has got me!”
The water around White became a churning froth as man and catfish
thrashed and fought against one another. White stood upright and pulled the fish out of the water; his right hand up to his wrist gulped inside the flathead’s wide mouth. The creature whipped its tail in a futile attempt to escape White’s grip, although it was difficult to tell who gripped whom. White moved toward the shore and grabbed the rope stringer he’d laid there. He worked the fish’s mouth loose from his hand and held it up. The approaching storm rumbled again. Gripping the bottom jaw with his left thumb and forefinger, he ran the stringer down though the fish’s mouth and out through its gill slit with his right hand, then pulled that end up and through the loop at the other end.
Holding up the lassoed catfish by the rope end and examining his catch, White said, “Maybe a twenty-five pounder.” Then he secured the stringer around a sapling near the shore and dropped the fish into the water.
“Threebuck!” Randy yelled. “If you don’t get out here, I’m gonna come up there and throw your ass in.”
Threebuck, shamed into action, sat down near the others’ stashes of pocket items, socks, and boots, and started removing his own. Rather than removing stuff from his jeans pockets, he decided to just take them off.
Randy looked at him and asked, “What are you doing?”
Pulling his leg out of his jeans, he folded them and put them on top of his boots. He then started walking toward the water wearing only his white briefs and his Confederate flag do-rag.
“Don’t want to get all my clothes wet,” he said as he stuck one foot tentatively into the water.
“Aw right, well let’s go look for another,” White said to the others. The wind picked up a bit, and big drops of rain started to ripple the water erratically with small craters. White waded toward the submerged tree trunk with its twisted limbs protruding out of the water in every direction. He motioned for the others to follow, and said, “Come on, now.” Randy sloshed toward him, but Threebuck held back when he saw White already up to his neck in the brown water. Then something harder than the fat raindrops smacked into is body; and almost immediately one stung the top of his head. He saw other round white missiles the size of a pea enter the water around him.
“Looks kind of deep there,” Threebuck said.
“Well, yeah, it’s deep, but it ain’t over your head. These big babies don’t exactly live on dry land,” White said.
“Come here, son,” he said to Threebuck. “I’ll show you how it’s done.”
Threebuck looked at Red Randy and shook his head, but got no sympathy. Deciding the deeper water would be better than the pelting of hail, Threebuck waded out to the others, who had become two bobbing heads in the water.
“See, your bull flathead will be on the nest protecting his old lady’s eggs,” White started to explain while moving around under water. Raindrops and small hail plopped into the water around them at an increasing rate. “The female catfish likes to find a place down in some dark hole to lay her eggs. An old log like this, with lots of brush is perfect.”
“Oh, wait a minute,” he said. “I think I found something. Let me make sure it ain’t some old snapping turtle.”
After he felt around a little more, White said, “Naw, it’s a catfish awright. Dang big one, too.”
“C’mere, son,” he said again to Threebuck. Threebuck treaded along side White. “Now reach down here and feel him. Careful, though. Don’t poke him. Just run your fingers along his side. He won’t do nothing unless he feels threatened.”
Threebuck reached down into the murky water, stretching to keep his head above the surface; small whitecaps lapped against his chin and cheeks. He touched the soft side of the catfish and ran his fingers along it. It felt slick and slimy.
“Yeah, I feel him,” he said to White.
“You want to grab him?” White asked.
Threebuck wasn’t about to say no, even though the thought of grabbing that big denizen terrified him. “Sure, why not,” he said with bravado.
The sky flashed and crashed in an almost simultaneous detonation. Threebuck and Randy cringed and ducked. White only looked up at the storm.
Turning his attention back to Threebuck, White said, “Awright, here’s what you want to do. You move your right hand a couple inches out in front of his mouth, and start wiggling your fingers. Move your fingers in toward his mouth, still wiggling, maybe even touch his lips.”
Threebuck started doing as instructed. It began raining harder.
“If that old catfish has been sitting on them eggs for a while,” White shouted above the hiss of rain. “...he’s probably pretty hungry. And when he sees them fingers of yours wiggling in front of his nose, he’s going to think they might be something good to eat, and he’s going to grab them.”
Threebuck looked at White with concern, and slowed down his finger wiggling under water. White saw the concern, and went on with his lecture.
“When he does that, it’s going to startle you some. I been noodlin’ for fifty-some years, and I ain’t never got used to that moment when a big old catfish grabs onto to me. But don’t let that panic you, son, because it’s at that point you got him.
Rainwater ran off Threebuck’s head and face in rivulets. The concern expressed there didn’t slacken.
“Now I gotta tell you,” White continued. “That a catfish has got teeth. They ain’t big teeth, like a gar or pike or nothing, but just the same, it ain’t real pleasant when he chomps down on you. They’re little sharp things more like a saw blade or real heavy sandpaper. But that don’t mean they can’t rip you up some when they start twisting.”
Threebuck looked at White with a furrowed brow; White looked back at him as if he’d just told him how to change a tire with the expectation that he should proceed. When Threebuck kept looking at him, White said, “You might ought to duck your head under water to see where your fingers are in relation to his mouth”
Threebuck immediately raised both hands out of the water and started to stand up. “Naw, huh-uh, I ain’t doin’ that,” he said with a vigorous shake of his head, and started backing away.
White looked disappointed. “Well, suit yourself,” he said. “Noodlin’ ain’t for everybody.” Threebuck couldn’t mistake the disparagement in the old man’s voice. The rain continued to splash heavily around them.
“You’re just a damn sissy, like I thought,” Randy said.
Threebuck sighed and squatted back down in the water. “What do I do after he grabs me?” he asked White.
“Well, son,” White answered. “You grab holt of him through his gill slit, and haul him up out of the water. It’s as simple as that.” More lightning and thunder issued from overhead.
Threebuck stretched his neck as much as he could, the surface of the lake water lapping around his chin and mouth. He started to tell the others, “I think I can get to him without ducking my he—” But before he could get the word “head” out, his index and middle fingers banged into the lips of the flathead. The fish snapped onto his forearm, swallowing it almost up to the elbow.
Threebuck panicked and jerked his hand back. “Damn!” he said in a half screech. But the catfish held tight.
“Ya got him?” White asked with excitement. “Pull him up, boy! Pull him on up!”
Threebuck tried to plant his feet on the slick dough of the muddy bottom and stand up, but the fish spun violently and yanked him under. The only sound the others heard from Threebuck was, “Glurrg.” His head came up and he gasped for air, and then just as quickly he disappeared under the frothy mocha surface again. White and Randy stood looking at the spot on the water where they’d last seen Threebuck. Ten seconds later he arose again like a breaching whale, only this time five yards farther out. He thrashed the water with his free arm. Looking back toward his companions, he said only, “Help,” before disappearing under the waves for a third time. White would later remark that he thought the look in Threebuck’s eyes at that point came in somewhere between terror and resignation.
“Don’t let him go, son!” White yelled. “He’s y
ours!”
Randy would later remark that, right after Oxley said that, he wasn’t sure if the old man was talking to Threebuck or the fish.
It was then the skies opened up. Rain fell in wind-whipped sheets, and the commander of the clouds fired his cannonade in several loud and successive volleys, trembling the earth and waters.
Every few seconds Threebuck would break the surface and thrash about, only to disappear again. Each time, he faded a little more into the shroud of rainfall, and farther away from White and Randy. Each time he surfaced he fought toward the shoreline. But just as Threebuck struggled towards shallower waters, the fish fought back for deeper, and it became a stalemate between the two about ten feet from the shore. After the fifth time Threebuck came up for air, he started to replace his plaintive cries for help with subsequently more intense and profane swearing, that is, as much as the remaining air in his lungs would allow.
White and Randy tried to wade and swim to Threebuck, but the catfish held the advantage, being in its own element. The downpour hampered them as much as the lake water. Soon Threebuck and his catch bobbed around a promontory point in the rain-wrapped shoreline and disappeared totally from sight. The two men waded as fast as they could to shore, and then broke into a run to reach the shoreline on the other side of the rocky point. The woods, the deluge, and thick underbrush slowed them down, but when they finally broke through on the other side they couldn’t believe what they saw.
The storm had abated, and fifty yards away, Threebuck lay on his stomach some ten feet from the water’s edge. Behind him, White recognized Soc Ninekiller pulling a johnboat onto the shore. To their amazement they saw the large flathead catfish on its side next to Threebuck. The catfish’s tail waved slowly up and down, and its left gill slit flexed. The fish looked half Threebuck’s size in length and almost the same in girth. The scrawny biker’s right hand and bloody forearm remained buried inside the fish’s mouth, the curl of his fingers wrapped around the outside of the right gill slit.
