“Henry called it,” Jay said. “Got a big brown here.” He was recording everything while narrating with educational, amusing declarations as he mocked Henry for his efforts while trying to net the twisting fish before it broke away.
Matthew cursed, and Jay howled with laughter as Henry fought to net the trout—a dozen pounder if an ounce.
“Watch closely, fellow anglers,” Jay’s radio-personality voice continued. “And see the amazing Henry net without netting. Looks like he’s tangling that fish. There you go—tangling. A brand-new technique and you saw it first on Angling Amateurs.”
He kept up the steady chatter while zooming in to watch Matthew work the brown free. Charles stepped in with the pliers and the gloves to assist.
Then came the display footage. They all knew the drill by now and Matthew stood in the official pose and held up the brown, who gasped obligingly for future viewers.
“A keeper,” Jay said.
Matthew agreed. “A worthy adversary.”
Since they were only allowed five catches a day by law, anything less worthy got tossed back to survive another day.
“Tangling.” Jay laughed after he stopped recording. “Tangling. Do you get it? Angling means fishing with a line and tangling means Henry got the whole thing tangled up in the net. Damn, I’m good. Any more questions about early retirement?”
Jay was talking to hear himself because no one else cared. Charles broke into the beer cooler to start the celebration.
“All hail Captain Jay.” Jay caught the icy beer Charles tossed his way and raised it high. “Another reminder of why I continue to sacrifice the comforts of a good woman and a home filled with little mouths to feed.”
“Sacrifice?” Charles winced. “That picket-fence lifestyle will drain you worse than the loans, dude.”
“And your ass would be eating beanie wienie from a can if not for my wife, I should remind you.” Henry pointed out before drawing deeply from the bottle of Bass Ale.
“Don’t waste your breath.” Matthew leaned against the bench seat and slanted an approving glance Henry’s way. “Playboy Charles here has commitment issues. He won’t hear a word you say. Trust me on this.”
“Like I even have time for a life anymore.” Not everyone was cut out to be a married man, and Charles had already learned the hard way that he wasn’t one of them. He wasn’t about to make apologies. Especially not to Matthew, who’d fared no better in the marriage arena with an ugly divorce behind him.
“Where you been, chief?” Charles said. “Just so happens I’ve finished my eighth month at New Hope, and if you haven’t heard, we’re launched and hosting families already.”
Matthew tipped the neck of the beer bottle in acknowledgement. “I’ve heard.”
“Impressed yet?”
“That you’re still at St. Joseph’s all these years later.”
Charles laughed. “And you doubt my ability to commit.”
Any less commitment and he would have run out the back door when he’d spotted Karan at New Hope. Now there was a real sacrifice—being forced to put up with his ex-wife for the term of her community service.
But St. Joseph’s chief of staff didn’t need any reminders about Charles’s commitments gone bad. Neither did Charles for that matter, because he resented that Karan was inside his head again, turning up like a bad penny as his grandmother always said—whatever the hell that meant—and disrupting his peaceful weekend.
Setting aside the bottle with a clatter, he reached for his fishing rod. He wanted his fifteen seconds of fame on YouTube. He wanted to commune with nature the way the Native Americans had when they’d used these streams and rivers to travel. This was his time to take a break from reality, to step away from the constant demands of the O.R., from New Hope, from the pressure of Matthew dangling the appointment in front of his nose like a worm on a hook.
He cast the line and projected the same focus he used in surgery onto the sound of the stream, on the wildlife in the trees and the shore, on the absence of demands on his time. Today was his. To relax.
And he did. Charles cleared his head into restful emptiness. The beer cooled his throat. He shed another layer of clothing as the sun rose, glinting off the gunwale as the boat rode with the current.
Then a phone vibrated.
All gazes swiveled toward the gear, toward the insistent tremor of sound that intruded on the quiet.
“Henry, you have any babies coming?” Matthew asked.
Henry shook his head. “Lawrence is on call. I’m not expecting anything he can’t handle.”
“It’s mine.” Charles reached for his BlackBerry and glanced at the display. New Hope’s main switchboard. With a sinking feeling, he depressed the talk button, knowing he wouldn’t be getting this call unless there was trouble. “Steinberg.”
“It’s Deputy Doug, Dr. Steinberg. Sorry to bother you, but we need a director.”
Charles could practically feel the gazes on him. He covered the receiver and whispered, “New Hope.”
Matthew nodded. Jay cast his fly. Henry went back to making knots.
Charles asked, “What’s up?”
“Smoke detection system went off. Security company called the fire department.”
“Is there a fire?”
More curious gazes. Jay mumbled something under his breath that sounded like: “To hell with real.”
“No, no fire.”
Charles exhaled a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. “Then what triggered the system?”
Deputy Doug hesitated long enough that Charles knew he wasn’t going to like the answer. “Burned popcorn.”
“Come again?”
“Burned popcorn. One of the volunteers didn’t know microwaves have popcorn buttons. She set the timer and got distracted. Place smells godawful.”
The adrenaline began to ebb like the boat’s wake behind them. “Any damage?”
That would be about the last thing New Hope needed.
“Microwave took a hit, and the place is going to smell for a while unless you’ve got money in the budget to call one of those disaster recovery services to air out the drapes and carpets. But maybe we can keep the windows open long enough.”
Which was good considering they’d almost broken the bank getting the place up and running, and he hadn’t budgeted much for maintenance repairs on a newly renovated house.
Instead, Charles had sunk the bulk of their assets into handling the monthly expenses until they reached out to the community to secure more funding. It had been a sound plan, but obviously he should have budgeted for stupidity.
“Who puts a bag of popcorn in the microwave and walks off?” he asked. But the instant the words were out of his mouth, Charles knew.
“The new volunteer with the Jag.” Deputy Doug didn’t sound amused. “One of the kids wanted a snack.”
Charles stared at the river ahead, an entirely different world, one where ex-wives weren’t lurking beneath trees that dipped leafy boughs into the water. “What do you need from me?”
“The fire chief is conducting an inspection now, but we’ve got everyone outside. The fire escape procedures all worked like a charm, too, so you know. Got everyone out safely and quickly, but the fire chief won’t let everyone inside until a director signs off on the incident