Peter Markus - Bob, or Man on Boat

I don’t know what Bob will do with this fish once he gets it.

I don’t think he’ll eat it.

You can eat any old fish.

But this fish.

This fish will be a keeper.

Some fishermen and some fisherwomen, when they get a fish that is too big to eat, these people will sometimes get these fish mounted and will hang these fish up on a wall on the inside of their house.

Bob hasn’t got any walls to hang his fish on.

When Bob gets his fish, I think I know what Bob is going to do with it.

I can picture Bob now, lifting up this fish.

I can picture Bob looking this fish up and down its beautiful fish body, this fish with a song inside it shining out.

I can picture Bob taking this fish and leaning with this fish over the side of his boat.

To let this fish go.

To give this fish back to the river.

So that Bob can be the Bob that he is.

So that Bob can continue to fish.

Go fish.

But we won’t know until Bob gets this fish.

Until then, we can only imagine.

Even I can only guess.

Guess what?

There goes Bob now.

There goes Bob going after that fish.

I’m going with him.

I’m going to go after him.

That man.

That fish.

Bob.

What better gift can a son give to his father than the thing that he is looking most for?

Bob, I imagine myself saying.

Father, I might even say.

I’ve got something I want you to have.

Bob, I have something I want to give you.

Like this, this is how I imagine this, I hand over to Bob his fish.

This fish, when I give it to Bob, it is still alive in my Bob hands.

In Bob’s hands, this fish, it is something more than just alive.

This fish, it is living.

It is like trying to hold in your hands the flowing that is the river.

This fish, it is too big for it to fit inside a bucket.

So Bob and I, we carry it together.

Down to the river.

Here, at the river’s edge, father and son, we let this fish go.

We stand and we watch this fish swim away.

We do not say anything to each other about this fish.

Then, after a while, we get into Bob’s boat.

For the first time ever in the life of Bob’s boat, there is in Bob’s boat more than just Bob.

It is Bob and his son Bob.

I start the motor.

Bob steers.

Like this, Bob and I, we begin again.

We go out onto the river, for the first time in our lives, father and son, fishing for our fish.

I want that fish.

I want to get that fish.

I want to be able to say to Bob, This fish is your fish.

So I get into my boat.

I get into the dead man’s boat.

I’ve got my bait, whatever it takes.

Minnows, worms, leeches, slugs.

There are things made out of metal — lures, spoons, spinners — that are made to look like fish.

Little fish for the big fish to eat.

I’ve even got mud to bait my fishing hooks with so that my hooks look just like Bob’s.

Maybe I can fool the fish in the river into believing that I am Bob.

Like Bob, to be like Bob, I talk to the fish.

But unlike Bob, when I open up my mouth to talk to the fish, it is more like I am talking to the river.

I don’t mind this.

The river is a good ear to talk to.

When I talk to the river, the river listens.

The river never talks back.

This is my wife talking.

It’s after midnight, she says.

She tells me, You said you’d be home before dark.

You said, she says, that you’d be home in time to tuck Bobby into bed.

You know what your son said to me tonight?

I shake my head.

He said that you said that you’d promised him tonight to tell him a bedtime story.

My wife says, You know what else he said?

I don’t say anything.

He said, Why does Daddy spend more time with the river than he does with us?

Doesn’t Daddy love us anymore?

Doesn’t Daddy love us as much as he loves the river?

This is what your son said to me tonight, she says.

What did you tell him? I say to this.

I told him that of course your daddy loves you more than he loves the river.

I told him that in your daddy’s eyes, if you were a fish you’d be the biggest fish in the river.

What’d he say to that? I say this to my wife.

My wife says, You want to know what your son said?

She says, You sure you want me to tell you what your son said about all of this?

I nod with my head.

He said, your son, is what my wife says, that he hates the river.

He said, your son, that he wished the river would go away.

I don’t say anything to this.

I can’t say anything to this.

I must say something to this.

That night, I go into my son’s room.

Only his head is sticking up and out from the covers.

He looks more like a turtle than he does a fish.

His eyes, my son’s, do not open up even when I whisper his name.

Bobby, I say.

I sit down on the edge of his bed.

I put my hand on his head.

His head, he turns it away.

Is this my son flinching from the touch of his father?

Sonny boy, I whisper.

I put my hand on his chest.

It’s me, Daddy.

I’m home, I tell him.

His eyes only halfway open.

I can see that he can see me even though he isn’t even close to being awake.

I came home, I tell him, to tell you a bedtime story.

Are you too tired to hear a story?

He shakes his head.

Good, I say.

Once upon a time, I whisper.

In a kingdom far away.

There was a man who lived in a boat on a river.

And in this river, I say, there lived a fish.

I stop the story there.

I don’t say anything else.

I don’t know what else to say.

After a little while, my son’s eyes flitter open.

A fish’s eyes, I should tell you, never close.

Daddy, he says.

Did you bring home any fish?

A couple.

Can I see the fish? he asks me.

He always asks me this.

My son, he likes to look at the fish.

He likes to touch the fish.

This is my son.

In the morning, I tell him.

It’s late.

I tell him, Close your eyes.

He listens to what I have told him to do.

My son, he is not a fish.

Use your imagination, I say, to imagine seeing the fish.

Then I tell him, Tell me what you see?

What does the fish look like? I ask him.

Is it big?

I can tell that he is looking hard, I can see that he is trying hard, to picture this fish in his head.

He looks like he’s having a little bit of a hard time finding a fish in his head to see.

His eyes, I can see, he is squeezing them as tight as he can get them to close up tight.

It’s okay if you can’t see them, I say.

I tell him, You’re probably too tired.

In the morning you can see the fish, I say.

Go to sleep.

But then he tells me this:

I can see the fish.

I see the fish, he says.

I see you, too, Daddy, he tells me.

You see me? I say.

What about the fish?