Christmas in October
by Ed Blank
I squinted through the late day sun I saw the flash of an enormous forked tail almost all the way out of the water. It hung there for a few seconds, did a little wiggle and then slid back beneath the glare. It was too far for me to cast and I had the wrong angle with the sun to see the fish through the water. I stared at the water for some sign.
After a few minutes I started walking slowly to my left to get the sun a little more behind my back when the tail appeared again this time almost within range, assuming I don't get too nervous. I decided to be patient and wait for the tail one more time and deliver my fly just almost on his nose. "Wow, that's a big tail. OK, OK, it's only going to be about forty feet "- a piece of cake if my heart wasn't pounding so hard. "There it is" and with one false cast I let it fly putting it within a foot of the fish. "Yes!", luckily the bonefish must have staring at the bottom because he didn't spook. I waited a second and gave a short strip, then another and another, but nothing - maybe he did spook.
The water was about ten inches deep and I could see well to my right but not to side where the fish was. "Come on, where are you?" What seemed like a minute passed (probably more like 10 seconds)he before he tailed again about five feet further to the left and a little closer. This time I didn't think I just threw it. A second after the fly hit the water he tailed again, I stripped once, the line was tight, I gave it a good strip strike and the fish exploded toward the deeper water . "Holy Bonefish!" I stood their in a stupor watching the line slash through the water and listening to my reel scream as the backing was peeling off. There is a line of sharp coral by the edge of the deep water and I realized that I had to keep the line above it. I took off towards the coral, tripping and running toward the edge with my rod flailing as high overhead as I could hold it. In a matter of seconds there was over a hundred yards of backing between me and the fish. I knew I had cleared the coral, now I was just hoping the fish would stop before my backing came to that dreaded last knot. "He is not slowing down!" as I stared at my empty reel
Finally he turned and I began reeling like a madman to take up the slack. I got some of the fly line back on the reel and that seemed to be the signal for another run as blistering as the first. Each run after that went out about half as far as the last run and I began to sense victory. Another few minutes and the bonefish was in my hands, my biggest ever, ten pounds of bright silver that somehow turned a relatively intelligent, grown man into a babbling village idiot . I eased him back into the water and watched him swim a few feet and somehow disappear, a ghost even in my memory.
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