flopping

Weren’t the fish miraculous, he was asking, and had we ever seen such a show? He’d ferried us to Loggerhead Key for a day of snorkeling (the kind of trip he said normally ran four hundred dollars, although he’d invited us for free), and now in the dinghy back to his sailboat he was very satisfied with what we had seen. He liked nothing better than to float free and easy in the ocean. He’d told us the fish would be just off the beach, and there they were, tucked in among the coral.

On the way back as his sailboat furrowed the waves he let out a line and in minutes hooked what he called a yellow croaker. It was more than a foot long, stout, and had been dragged through the water by the hook in the corner of one eye. Under the shining silver scales its body was firm and solid in his hands. Hooks don’t bother them, he explained as he gripped near the gaping gills and used wire cutters to pry off the barb, then yanked the shaft through the eye socket. He lobbed the fish twenty feet off the stern where it thudded into the pile of snorkel gear in the trailing dinghy.

The windless sky beat down hot. Over the chugging motor he explained that he kept only fish he meant to cook, and that the croaker was a good size and would make a good dinner. He’d once thought about opening a seafood restaurant, but instead he’d started a pizza and sub chain. The fish flopping among the masks and fins was unable to knock itself over the rubber side of the dinghy, and he was explaining to us how he and his wife created free advertising by saying loudly at movie theaters, “Let’s go to Mama Lucia’s – I hear they have great pizza!”

It took two hours to get back. We did not notice when the fish had stopped struggling, but at one point it began flopping again in a sudden hot fit, and we all watched in surprise for the few moments it lasted.

At Fort Jackson he anchored down and then retrieved the fish. It was dead. It would not, he said, be nearly as good as the grilled chicken breasts he had for that night, so he slit the gut and tossed it into the water. Now we would see a show – he liked watching gulls fight like mad over a dead fish.

The gulls did swing by for a look, but they were not interested. Several hours later when he brought us back ashore in the dinghy the dead fish was still floating there.

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copyright © 2004, michael w. hobson