Alaskan Catch

by Sue Pethick

  “Right. And she offered to take me out to Totem Park on Saturday. Members of their tribe are carving totems and she says I can watch them as long as I don’t act like a atk’átsk’u.” She grinned. “That’s child in Tlingit.”

  “I’m impressed.”

  “Don’t be. She says my pronunciation is horrible.”

  The waiter came by and asked if they’d like to see a dessert menu.

  “Oh, no thanks,” she said. “I don’t think I could eat another bite.”

  As the man walked off to get their check, Emily looked at Sam.

  “Thank you again for bringing me here. I really appreciate it.”

  “Anytime,” he said. “It beat the heck out of another heat-and-eat dinner from the microwave.”

  “Maybe so,” she said, “but it was awfully short notice. At least let me pay for dinner.”

  “No way. If it wasn’t for you, I’d be out looking for Bear right now.”

  “Well, if it happens again, you might try McDonald’s. You should have seen him eying those kids’ Happy Meals.”

  The check came and Sam paid. He hated to see the evening end. He couldn’t remember when he’d enjoyed talking to someone as much.

  “This has been a lot of fun,” he said. “I’m glad you called.”

  “Me, too. And not just because I needed to get out of the house, either.”

  They looked at each other.

  “You ready to go home?”

  Emily looked down and shook her head.

  “Me neither. Why don’t we go for a walk?”

  “Now? It’s almost nine o’clock.”

  Sam glanced out the window.

  “Still light out. Why not?”

  “I’d feel like a kid staying up past her bedtime.”

  “So . . . ?”

  Emily hesitated a moment.

  “Sure,” she said. “A walk sounds good.”

  Out in the harbor, the sun was crawling slowly across the horizon, its golden light spreading outward across the inky water and illuminating the bottoms of the violet clouds. Overhead, gray-winged gulls wheeled hopefully, still on the lookout for an easy meal. As Emily took it all in, Sam could tell she was moved. He’d always felt proud of Ketchikan and the life he’d made for himself there, but it was fun to experience it through the eyes of someone seeing it for the first time.

  “It’s beautiful,” she said.

  He nodded. “It is, isn’t it?”

  “Where should we go?”

  “Have you been to Creek Street?”

  “That’s the one built over the water, isn’t it?”

  “It is, and it’s not too far from here. Can you walk in those shoes?”

  “Oh, yeah. I didn’t bring any fancy shoes with me.”

  “All right, then.”

  Neither of them said a word as they headed down Water Street, just one of several couples out enjoying a few extra hours of daylight. A light breeze was coming off the water. Sam saw Emily zip up her jacket and wondered if he should offer his arm, then thought better of it. Whatever there was between them felt fragile; he didn’t want to ruin it by doing something that might be misconstrued.

  Emily glanced over at him.

  “Can I ask you something without seeming rude?”

  “Sure.”

  “What do people do in Ketchikan? I mean, I know that fishing is big and the Coast Guard is here and probably other maritime industries, but, I mean, if you don’t have any connection to those, what is there?”

  The question surprised him.

  “Well, we have everything most other cities have: schools, a local government, post office, grocery stores . . .”

  “Yes, but what do you do, you know, when it’s dark all the time? For fun, I mean?”

  “You mean besides watch TV and make babies?”

  Emily blushed. “That’s not what I meant.”

  “No, but that’s what a lot of people think.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”

  “It’s okay. If I were in your shoes, I’d probably wonder the same thing. As it happens, Ketchikan is probably one of the best places for the arts that I know of. When the fishing season is over, we pour that same energy into art and music and theater.”

  He pointed to the spot a quarter mile ahead where Creek Street started.

  “I’ve got a couple of friends who sell their artwork in there. You can see for yourself.”

  “I’d like that,” she said. “And I’m sorry if I hurt your feelings.”

  They reverted to silence then, their footsteps matching right-left-right, and when Emily shivered and crossed her arms, Sam silently offered his elbow—an offer of peace as well as warmth. When she slipped her arm through his and hugged it to her, he smiled. Maybe this was what Kimberley had meant when she said what she did about Emily. If so, he thought, she was mistaken. Emily might be a bit too candid, but there was nothing about her that seemed the least bit spoiled.

  “So,” he said. “What is it about your mother that you’ve been obsessing about?”

  She waved a hand in front of her face.

  “You don’t want to hear about that.”

  “Why not? I’ve been told I’m a pretty good listener.”

  “You are,” she said. “You helped me a lot with that problem at the cannery. I just don’t want to bore you with all of my mother’s melodrama.”

  He jostled her with his elbow.

  “Try me.”

  Emily narrowed her eyes.

  “What are you, a glutton for punishment?”

  “Absolutely. Plus, I’m curious. I’ve never heard of anyone who could literally drive a person insane.”

  “Oh, so I’m crazy now?”

  “Hey, you said it, I didn’t.”

  She sighed and looked away.

  “No, that’s okay. I don’t want to get all worked up again.”

  “Eh, fair enough. The offer’s still good, though, if you change your mind.”

  Emily squeezed his arm. “What about you?”

  “Me?”

  “Yeah, what’s your family like? Do they drive you crazy, too?”

  “Sometimes. Not so much since I moved out.”

  “What are they like? Do they live around here?”

  “No, my parents live in Juneau, which is where I grew up. My dad’s a retired college professor. Mom’s a nurse.”

  “Any brothers? Sisters?”

  “One brother: Gabe.”

  “Older? Younger?”

  “Older.”

  “What does Gabe do?”

  “He’s a biomechanics engineer.”

  “Sounds impressive.”

  “It is. At the moment, he’s refining an artificial hand he designed as a science project in high school.”

  “Real underachiever, huh?”

  “Yeah. The rest of the family’s so embarrassed.”

  “So, how did you get into fishing?”

  “Same as everyone else: it was a way to make a lot of money during summer break. If I wanted a car, wanted gas for the car, plus registration and insurance, I had to earn it.”

  “You worked in the cannery?”

  “A couple of them, yeah. Started on the slime line, then moved on once I knew how things worked.”

  “They really throw you into the deep end there, don’t they?”

  “Why not? It’s good pay for a kid.”

  “I’m not sure I could do it, honestly,” she said. “The first time I walked in there, seeing all that blood? It turned my stomach.”

  “It turns everyone’s stomach. You just get used to it.”

  “That’s what Tim told me the first day.”

  “And . . . ?”

  “It’s true. I hardly notice it now. Funny, the things you just don’t see after a while.”

  The lights of Creek Street were on, casting a warm glow on the faces of the shoppers peering into the windows. Sam and Emily paused as they approached the boardwalk, taking in the spectacle of an
entire shopping area built over a fast-flowing creek. The two of them leaned over the railing, still arm in arm, and watched the water trip over the rocks below them. It occurred to Sam that if he turned his face, Emily would be close enough to kiss.

  “It’s like something out of a storybook,” she said, peering down into the water. “Whoever thought of making something like this?”

  Sam suppressed a smile.

  “Actually, this used to be the red light district.”

  “So it is like a fairy tale,” she said, her eyes twinkling. “Don’t they all have happy endings?”

  Now it was his turn to blush.

  “Yes, I suppose they do.”

  Emily turned and looked at him.

  “Have you figured out what you’re going to do about Bear yet?”

  “Not really. For now, I guess I’ll just leave him in the house and hope he doesn’t destroy the place by the time I get back. I hate to do it. We work long days in the summer, but I can’t take the chance that he’ll get out again. We were lucky today, but I don’t expect lightning to strike twice.”

  “I’ve been thinking,” Emily said. “Why don’t I take him for walks on my lunch hour? That way, you can leave him in the house, but he won’t be stuck there with nothing to do all day. The two of us can run around or play Frisbee or whatever and when I get off work, I can go by the house and keep an eye on him until you get home.”

  Sam was so shocked, it took a second for him to speak.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Of course,” she said. “I’m normally a pretty active person, and being stuck inside all day is torture. Plus, frankly, it would give me an excuse to get away from the idiots I live with.”

  Sam was flabbergasted. Emily’s offer was more than he ever would, or even could, have asked for.

  “Wow. That would be, I mean, it would make things so much better for both of us.” He laughed and spun her around. “Thank you.”

  There was a moment’s hesitation as their eyes met. Sam felt his heart pounding, unsure what to do. Then Emily smiled softly, leaned forward, and, as her eyelids closed, they kissed.

  CHAPTER 13

  Time seemed to crawl by the next day at the cannery. After a morning spent out on the floor, the interns were herded back into the classroom for lessons on species identification and sampling methodologies—all of which was review for Emily. As Tim Garrett stood at the whiteboard explaining the subtle differences between coho and sockeye salmon, she rested her chin in her hand and thought about Sam.

  Emily bit her lip, remembering the kiss they’d shared the night before. Neither of them had said or done anything to make her think it would happen, but when it did, it just seemed like the most natural thing in the world. The memory of it—the clean, soapy scent of his skin, the light prickle of his hastily shaven face, the warm press of his lips against hers—still thrilled her. As they’d stood there on the boardwalk, the water below them rushing past, it felt as if something inside her had suddenly come alive. It was only later that the reality of what had happened hit her.

  Her first reaction had been an overwhelming sense of guilt. Emily and Carter had gotten very serious over the past few months, and their families certainly expected they would marry at some point. It seemed wrong to be kissing someone else while the two of them were still more or less committed. Emily was sure she’d be upset if she found out that Carter had been kissing someone else.

  Then she’d remembered how irked she was about their mothers’ interference, the feeling that she was just a passenger in a car being driven by someone else, and wondered if kissing Sam had somehow been an act of rebellion, a way to reassert control over her own life.

  Kimberley’s accusation had preyed on her mind, as well. The idea that, since Emily was only there for the summer, any involvement she had with Sam amounted to “toying” with him had bothered her more than it should have. It was true that when she took the job in Ketchikan, Emily had had no intention of staying past the three-month commitment of the internship, but the more time she spent there and the more she learned about it, the more she appreciated the town and its people. Yes, it was different from where she’d grown up, and if she moved there, the cold and the rain would be something she’d have to get used to, but the hectic pace and high cost of living in Southern California had already made staying there an open question.

  Despite those conflicting factors, however, Emily was sure that none of them had anything to do with what had happened on Creek Street. What she’d felt for Sam at that moment—what she still felt—wasn’t about interfering mothers or rebellion or even Kimberley. The fact was, from the first time she saw him, Emily had felt an attraction to Sam that she’d never felt for anyone else.

  For starters, he was funnier and less inhibited than Carter was. There was a sexiness about him, too, that took her breath away—something she could not, in all honesty, say about Carter. Even the fact that Sam worked in a fishery was appealing. He understood the kind of issues marine biologists dealt with in a way that Carter had shown neither an interest in nor a desire to learn about. There’d been times, in fact, when he’d seemed annoyed that Emily had any interests at all other than his own.

  Bear, too, was a big reason that Emily had grown so fond of Sam. The big dog had a way about him that had captured her heart from the very first, and rather than being intimidated, Emily found his size endearing. He seemed to know instinctively that his size made him formidable and went out of his way to compensate, showing a gentleness that was both touching and unexpected. She was glad Sam had agreed to let her watch him while he was at work. It gave her something to look forward to in the middle of the day and made a seamless place for her in both their lives. Anyone who owned a dog like that, she thought, was worth getting to know better.

  Not liking dogs was another thing about Carter that being around Bear had pointed out to her. He’d always told her it was because dogs were unpredictable and he needed to protect his hands—which, for the most part, Emily understood. After all, a surgeon’s hands were, as he liked to say, his fortune. Carter was also obsessed with keeping his hands clean, though, something that loomed large when she imagined what it would be like to marry him and have children together.

  Emily’s fondest moments with her own father were of building sandcastles and digging in the garden together. Even if Carter didn’t want a dog, would he be willing to make an exception to his clean hands rule for things like that? What about changing diapers or cleaning up after a sick child? The fact was, he had no problem sticking his hands into a bloody wound. Was keeping his hands clean really that important, or was it just an excuse for him to avoid doing things he thought were beneath him? It was only at this remove that Emily had even asked herself those questions, and the implications bothered her. It didn’t mean she didn’t love Carter or that she didn’t still think she might marry him, but seeing him in contrast to someone like Sam had opened her eyes in a way that nothing else had before. She didn’t know what she was going to do about Carter, or Sam, for that matter, but last night had given her a lot to think about.

  A buzzer signaling the end of class sounded, and Emily hastily gathered her things. She’d offered to make dinner for the two of them that night, and there were a few things she needed to pick up at the store. If she hurried, she could get everything in the oven before Sam got home.

  Emily kept her head down as she headed out the open doors. Getting in late last night had spared her from any further criticism at the hands of Rachel and Kimberley, and Tim had decided not to have them working in pairs again. She’d thought briefly about finding an Airbnb for the rest of the summer to be done with the whole roommate situation, but had decided as a matter of principle not to give them the satisfaction of running her off. She hadn’t done anything wrong. Why should she be the one to leave?

  She was almost to the sidewalk when she heard someone calling her.

  “Hey, Emily! Wait up.”

  It was Uki, hurrying
toward her with her lab coat flapping behind her like a cape.

  “Don’t worry,” she said, pausing to catch her breath. “They’re not coming. How’ve you been? I haven’t seen you at the house in a while.”

  Emily hesitated, wondering what this was about. She doubted Uki had stopped her just to ask about her general health.

  “I’m fine,” she said. “Just, you know, busy.”

  “How’s the arm doing?”

  “Pretty good.” Emily held it out, displaying the still-fading bruises as she flexed her fingers. “Not pretty, but it works okay.”

  Uki looked down, running a hand through her hair.

  “Listen, I’m sorry for the way things have been at the house. I thought it was just some stupid white girl crap at first, but it’s pretty obvious now what’s going on. I talked to Tim about it this morning and he said he’d get it sorted out.” She grinned and threw a thumb over her shoulder, indicating the cannery. “That’s where they are now—getting sorted.”

  Emily shook her head. “You didn’t have to do that.”

  “Hey, man, I didn’t want to deal with it, either. Like being back in high school, you know? No thanks.”

  “Well, I appreciate it,” she said. “But for now, I think I’ll probably just make myself scarce.”

  “Oh. Yeah, sure, that’s cool.”

  Emily turned and saw a man walk out of the quartermaster’s office with a black pennant in his arms. He unfurled it and started hoisting it up a flagpole by the gangway.

  Uki groaned. “Aw, hell. Not again.”

  “Why? What’s wrong?”

  “That.” She pointed at the pennant moving listlessly in the breeze. “It means someone’s died at sea.”

  “Anywhere at sea?”

  “Here in our waters. Someone sailing out of Ketchikan.”

  Emily shivered.

  “They flew it for my cousin last year,” Uki said. “My dad two years before that. He was on a seiner; went over the side and got caught in the net.”

  Emily was only half-listening. She’d known that Sam’s work was hazardous, but it hadn’t occurred to her that he was in any real danger until just then.

  Uki frowned. “You okay?”

  “Yeah. Just c-cold. I should have put on a jacket,” she said. “I’d better go.”