A Patient Boy, Page 8 of 8

"Daddy. .." So soft.

"Yes, son."

"When they get it off. You going to hit me on the head like your mom did that squirrel?"

I was caught up trying to remember how to breathe when he chuckled. It was faint as a mouse in the wall, but it was a chuckle. Relief poured over me like cool water. I touched his stomach to tell him not to laugh, but he already knew. Still he was grinning big. And I just had to chuckle myself, the relief was so enormous. It made him grin all the bigger.

"Sir, we're going to move the car. You'll have to move."

"You just do it without me," I said, refusing to break the spell. And we went back there to the gray-white span of Ed Sally's bridge, Denny creeping close to the big rock, me holding back with my fingers crossed. And I can tell he sees him there, hanging in the current, twisted mouth open just enough to taste the water floating down.

"You see him?"

He nodded.

"You only get one shot. Flick it out just right so it catches that spot in the riffles and snakes on down to him."

They've been getting into place. Muttering how they're only going to get one try, and it'd be a damn sight better if I'd get up and help them push. But I knew that the three of them would have the momentum. It'd roll off soon enough.

"I don't want to catch him, Dad."

He said it right out, full voice. Stopped the deputy cold.

"He ought to stay there under the bridge," he said, real clear like we were at the dinner table. "If he stays, then we can always know he's there."

"You're right," I said.

They got to "three," and he squeezed my hand, and the Impala rolled slowly over and fell loudly into the brush.

All he said was, "Oh, Daddy...," with this wondering look on his face.

They put the rubber suit back in the truck with the stretcher and their tubes and bottles. And the police radio talking, talking, talking. And Alice, crying. And me remembering the smile on my dad's face the day I caught my first fish, and looking down on my boy who wasn't there anymore.