The Second Fly Caster: Fatherhood, Recovery and an Unforgettable Tournament

by Randy Kadish

let you down.”

  “Maybe you’ll become the first caster in state history to break a hundred feet.”

  “If God’s willing.”

  The mayor smiled. “I don’t think God takes sides in a fly casting tournament.” He rubbed my head for good luck, he said. I didn’t like being treated like a rabbit’s foot.

  I handed my father his fly rod. He turned away from me, walked down a line of people and shook more hands. Suddenly, I felt lost and alone and as if I didn’t know where to go, but then I reminded myself to walk to the bleachers. I did and looked for my mother. I didn’t see her and wondered, This year, will she come?

  I sat down by myself and scanned the bleachers for the stranger with the long, gray beard and hair. I didn’t see him. Maybe Shane Riley chickened out.

  I turned to the lake. A long, narrow fire burned on top of the water. The fire didn’t spread or weaken. It kept its shape as if it were a tree or an image in a photograph, but then I remembered that the fire wasn’t really a fire, but reflected sunlight that now hurt my eyes. I squinted, and for some reason I wondered if Moses really had talked to a burning bush. To me, it just didn’t seem possible.

  I looked away from the sunlight. Stretching across the lake like the yard lines of a football field were six lines of ropes, the distance markers. The closest line, I knew, was fifty feet, the farthest was a hundred. I closed my eyes and whispered so no one could hear me, “God, even though I don’t always believe in you, please, please help my father break a hundred feet, but don’t, don’t let Shane Riley beat him. Because if Shane does, what will I say to my friends after I’ve boasted so much? Besides, if my father doesn’t win, maybe he’ll start drinking and again yell at my mother and smash things, the way he did when I started school.”

  My father sat down with the other casters on the pew borrowed from the church.

  I studied the faces of the three casters I didn’t know and wondered which face belonged to Shane Riley. I guessed the face of the young man with curly red hair and a square jaw. He was lean and looked athletic. Though he didn’t look at all evil, I hated him, but I didn’t care if my hate meant that I too could turn bad.

  I looked at the officials’ table. On top of it was a small, golden statue of a fly caster. Though I knew the trophy was only gold-plated, to me it was worth a million dollars.

  My friends, Mike and Bob, climbed down from the top row and sat next to me.

  Joe Dingly, the tournament director, picked up his battery-powered megaphone and said, “Ladies and Gentlemen, let’s begin the distance competition. I’ll call the casters alphabetically. Tom Brolan will go first.”

  I again looked for my mother. I didn’t see her, and became angry and then wondered if there was still something dark between my parents.

  Tom Brolan’s best cast was eighty-seven feet. None of the next five casters beat him. Finally, it was my father’s turn. He stood up and looked at me. He smiled.

  I yelled, “Show them, Dad!”

  My father marched to the end of the short dock, pulled line off his reel. Shaping the line into large circles, he piled the circles on the dock. He cast the line back and forth, letting more and more line slide through his thumb and forefinger and making his casts longer and longer. (Fly casters call this shooting line.) My father stopped casting and let about fifty feet of line fall on the water. He bent his knees, crossed his heart and got into his casting stance. He cast his fly rod up and back and, with his line hand, pulled down on the line. (Fly casters call this hauling.) The line lifted up off the water like a jet taking off and formed a long, tight rolling loop that flew back and up like a missile. The top of the rolling loop got shorter and shorter. Just before the loop unrolled, my father rotated his shoulders and hips and cast his fly rod forward, slowly at first, then faster and faster, until he stopped it abruptly. The line formed another rolling loop. The front of this loop, however, tightened and formed a sideways V. My father shot about seven feet of line and then again cast back. He cast forward. When his casting arm was straight and all the way out, he stopped the rod abruptly and let go of the line. The front loop streaked over the eighty-foot marker.

  I was proud.

  The fly turned over perfectly and landed gently on the water.

  “Ninety-seven feet!” Bill Smyth, the official sitting in a rowboat, yelled. It was my father’s all-time best tournament cast.

  The spectators stood up and cheered. I was sure that I had the best father ever.

  Now if only he could break a hundred feet!

  My father again cast, this time only ninety-five feet. He had one more cast to go. Again I prayed to God, but praying didn’t help. My father’s third and last cast was ninety-six feet. Disappointed, I again was scared that Shane Riley would cast over a hundred feet and win the tournament.

  Three casters were left. Two of them, I knew, were not as good as my father, but the one with red hair—yes, I was right—that was Shane Riley!

  I crossed my fingers but then, not wanting my friends to see that I felt I needed luck, I stuffed my hands into my pockets. Suddenly, I was a little lightheaded. I seemed to be floating like a balloon and watching everything from high above. But things didn’t look any smaller.

  Joe Dingly picked up the megaphone. He cleared his throat. “Shane Riley!” he called.

  The red-haired man didn’t stand.

  “Shane Riley,” Joe Dingly called again.

  No one in the bleachers stood up.

  I saw my mother sitting by herself on the top row of the bleachers. Thankful she was there, I smiled and waved to her.

  She didn’t see me.

  “Shane Riley forfeits his turn,” Joe Dingly said.

  I fell like a stone, it seemed. I crashed back down on the bleachers and turned to my friends and said, “Shane Riley chickened out.”

  Another name was called. The red-haired man stood up and walked onto the dock. Just to be safe, I kept my crossed fingers in my pockets.

  The red-haired man’s first back cast formed a wide loop, and so did his first forward cast. I knew right then that my father was champion again! I uncrossed my fingers.

  When the competition was over I ran to my father. He put his arm around me, and together we turned to the spectators. They rose to their feet and cheered, and I felt they were cheering for me.

  I looked at my mother. She smiled and clapped her hands.

  My father handed me his fly rod and walked to the officials’ table. He picked up the trophy and held it above his head. He smiled like a boy, and I saw the space where he had lost a tooth. I wished I could fill it. My father looked up at the sky and said, “Thanks, God.”

  After the tournament, my father, mother and many of the spectators walked to the picnic area. The bleachers emptied, and again I found myself alone with my father’s fly rod. I walked onto the dock, pulled line off the reel and began casting. Even though my loops were wide, and I barely cast farther than fifty feet, in my mind each cast was over a hundred feet and brought the crowd to its feet.

  “You’re pretty good,” someone said.

  I turned. A tall young man stood behind me. His hair, drenched in sunlight, seemed to be made of gold.

  He smiled. His teeth, I noticed, were perfectly straight. “That looks like a fine, fine fly rod,” he said. “May I try it?”

  I didn’t like the idea of handing my father’s fly rod to a perfect stranger, but I saw trust in his face and heard it in his soft, warm voice. I looked around. Except for the stranger, I didn’t see anyone. I handed him the rod.

  He stripped off more line, then made a perfect roll cast. He started his back cast. He hauled straight down—longer than my father did—and as I watched the line form a tight loop and shoot straight back, I knew the stranger was a very special fly caster.

  As good as my father? I hope not.

  Like my father, he made his second back cast lower than his first. The line almost unrolled. Unlike my father, the stranger pointed the fly rod a bit lower. The y
oung man cast the fly rod forward. He hauled the line well behind his thigh, and then he let go. The front of the fly line took the shape of a sideways V. It arrowed across the lake and then unrolled. The fly landed just past the hundred-foot marker.

  He handed me the rod. “If I were you, I’d take real good care of this rod. It will always be real special and more valuable, year after year.” He smiled, and in his deep-set blue eyes I saw the eyes of the old stranger who had walked in on the Association meeting. The stranger, I now knew, was the young man’s father.

  I said, “You’re Shane Riley.”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “You’re real.”

  He laughed. “Yes, I think so. And you are?”

  “Erik, with a k.”

  “Erik, maybe one day you’ll become a great fly caster, like your father, if you want.”

  “I’m not real good in sports the way my father was. And I’m too small.”

  “Some people, like some flowers, are late bloomers. I was small too. Besides, size has nothing to do with casting.”

  “Then what does?”

  “Erik, I believe there are ways out there. We just have to keep searching for them, and sooner or later we’ll find them.”

  I wasn’t sure what he meant, but I was afraid to ask.

  “Can you teach me?”

  “I’m sure your father can. Maybe I’ll see you—here’s something that will help you cast farther: When you make your back cast try to keep your casting elbow closer to your body, and then, after your last back cast unrolls about