Dan L. Walker
Text © 2016 by Dan L. Walker
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission of the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Walker, Dan, 1947- author.
Title: Secondhand summer / by Dan L Walker.
Description: Portland, Oregon : Alaska Northwest Books, [2016] | Summary: Sam, a twelve-year-old boy who loved the homestead fishing life he left behind when his father died, moves to the big city of Anchorage where new friends lead him on forays into crime, and leave him feeling wilder and wiser.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015049230 (print) | LCCN 2016014940 (ebook) | ISBN 9781943328420 (pbk.) | ISBN 9781943328437 (e-book) | ISBN 9781943328796 (hardbound)
Subjects: | CYAC: Coming of age--Fiction. | Grief--Fiction. | Alaska--Fiction.
Classification: LCC PZ7.1.W348 Se 2016 (print) | LCC PZ7.1.W348 (ebook) |
DDC
[Fic]--dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015049230
Edited by Michelle McCann
Designed by Vicki Knapton
Cover illustrations by Karen DeWitz
Published by Alaska Northwest Books®
An imprint of
P.O. Box 56118
Portland, Oregon 97238-6118
503-254-5591
To my father, Chet Walker, whose legendguided me long after he left this earth.
Contents
AcknowLedgmENTS
This book is a product of many people who invested in the writer and his work. Secondhand Summer was fueled by the tireless support of Madelyn, my wife, and carried forward by the forever-patient editor, Michelle McCann. Mary Armstrong and Nancy Fisher gave me the reader’s perspective, and Kathy Tillman Corp provided unwavering inspiration, insight, and encouragement. Twenty-two years spent with adolescent students reminded me daily what those middle school years were like. Of course, I nod to my mother who always knew I had it in me.
Chapter 1
The last day I saw my father alive he was in a wooden dory coming through the swells to the beach. Sometimes the loaded dory dropped out of sight as it pushed through the waves, so my father appeared to walk across the water toward us. Over the nets stacked in the bow, I could see his hat pushed back to show his smile. There would be few fish in the boat, maybe a dozen late run cohos, the last lean pickings of a used up season. The rest of the load was nets, buoys, and anchors coming in for the last time that year.
Joe and I waited on the beach, thinking it was just the end of a fishing season. We had no way of knowing that it was the end of everything we knew.
Joe sat in the jeep with his arms hung on the wheel, just like he was finishing his time on the beach, his time at home. He was eighteen and restless to move on.
“I wish he’d let me go out,” I said. “For the last run anyway.”
“You’ll get your chance next year, Humpy. Then you’ll be sorry. You’ll have your fill real fast.”
“Nah, it’ll probably be just you and Dad again with me on the beach picking the low tide sets. Even on the nice days Mom will say no.” She had been raised on the beach sites and watched two brothers drown when a dory flipped in the surf and trapped them beneath it.
“Don’t count on it.”
“Whaddaya mean?”
“What the hell do you think I mean?” Joe leaned out of the jeep at me. “I’m hittin’ the road.”
“Anchorage?” Some road, I thought.
“Damn straight.”
The sun and tide were falling and an evening breeze had kicked up some chop around the one red keg buoy still anchored between the boat and the beach. The boat hovered while Dad lifted the buoy clear of the water and hauled the line in hand over hand. His shoulders and stance were broad as he braced against the roll of the swells and