Indulgent Author's note...
Some people think a lot of themselves. So much so that they introduce their stories like they're Stephen King returning from head injuries. Alas, I've no such excuse for my lax writing lately. I've simply started working full time again and I've felt kind of daunted by Dream Small's success. Pretty sure it's hard to meet expectations after that.
But yet again, a thing I had planned for a Valentine's Day Comp sort of took its own path and scampered off with the faeries. I was exploring the way that new relationships turn your world upside down sometimes and how unsettling and frightening that is when you've left your twenties behind and are well dug into your existence. And well, here we are.
I've been strongly criticised in the past for the vulgarity used in my stories. (Ironic that on an erotic story site, people don't like vulgar language but they're okay with Susan over there pissing on her husband's lover.) Also, for the slang that has people googling like those funny eyed goldfish. Well, here it is all over again.
This is set in Australia. What some read as vulgarity is just conversational speech. We use the words, Cunt and Fuck like American's use salt, the British use tea and the French should use deodorant. They are simply part of a vocabulary that falls from our tongues like drop bears from gum trees. To further confuse you, I'm introducing our mates from across the channel on the little islands of 'UnZud', the 'Kiwis'.
A quick warning also for those of you wishing to achieve dislocated wrist levels of self-pleasure... While there is sex, it's contextual and sparse. There are no throbbing members described in their veiny glory plundering the sodden love flowers of smut talking stepsisters. There are however a couple of people who get to know each other in and out of the bedroom.
This is an original work that may not be reproduced etc, etc. I reserve all the usual rights. If you see this or any other story of mine elsewhere, please let me know. Never pay for my stories. They are all published here free. I might get around to monetising one day but I struggle to take myself seriously.
Read on, cuzzy.
Man, I love fishing.
There's a little wooden jetty at the end of the boardwalk that runs down between my neighbour and I. The boardwalk lets people access the canal-side parkland at the back of my place. At this time of day, it's free of the lycra-clad joggers, the squabbling kids, the tourists and the dog-walkers. It's just me, my fold out chair, my little esky and my fishing gear. Oh, and the mosquitos.
I drown bait and watch the sunset over the dark rippling water and some nights a fish annoys me by requiring my attention. Not too often but often enough that I seldom buy protein at the shops. After ten years fly-in fly-out on the mines, it's nice to enjoy gentleman's work hours.
Work starts from home at eight each morning with video conferencing, goes mobile at midday for interviews or office time and always finishes by three in the afternoon. It gives me time I never had before to enjoy a social life. If I had the remotest notion of how to.
So, I fill my afternoons with gentle exercise; usually a bicycle ride to the shops and back and some days a gentle paddle on my surf ski in the calm canal waters listening to the cling-clang of rigging on masts and the hubbub of suburban living. It's serene.
But it's also empty.
At six I enjoy a light meal of cereals and fruits. I eat backwards for whatever reason, protein and carbs of a morning, traditionally a sandwich at lunch and then breakfast for dinner. There's no-one to criticise me and frankly it's what I feel like. On social nights where I have business meals or functions, I feel so bloated and gross by bedtime. But anyway, after dinner, I put six Boags long necks in a little blue foam cooler with a bit of ice, then I put some beach worms in a plastic bucket with my tiny tackle kit and take my handline down to the jetty.
Each evening, swarms of mosquitos remind me to slather myself in Neem oil and I set up my contraptions and go about my own version of fishing. My mind drifts on the far-off noises of ocean and traffic and I feel very removed from the busy coastal strip a kilometre away. It's like a meditative moment. My worries fall away and I'm washed clean with the lapping of the ripples on the wooden poles below. My mind winks and blinks with the waking mast lights and all that matters is here and now.
That's probably why she scared the absolute shit out of me with her polite, "Excuse me. Hello."
Beer unceremoniously splashes all over my face and shirt courtesy of my spastically jerked arm movements. I kicked my bait bucket into the water and fell sideways off my little stool onto the foam esky, crushing it and setting long necks rolling left and right over the wooden boards. To make things worse, at that precise moment, a tug on the line announced a much larger than normal piscatorial interest in my nightly bait.
"Oh shit. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." My clearly identifiable by vocal tones as female intruder scampered around trying to salvage my possessions while I laughed like a wombat and tried to get my feet under me all the while, trying to keep pressure on my catch.
I watched in distracted amusement as she stretched to rescue my bait bucket and used it to put my corralled long necks in, then started trying to reassemble my destroyed esky.
"Shit, your chilly bin is wrecked."
"Haha, my what?" I ask over my shoulder as I pull what I believe is going to be a good-sized flat head closer.
"Your chilly bin. It's broken. I'm so terribly sorry. I just didn't want to startle you and... Now look. What a mess. It's proper munted."
"S'alright, I just got a bit of a fright love. Cheap as chips anyhow. Can you pass me that net there, yup that's it. Look at this fucking beauty. Shit. Sorry for the French." It is indeed a beauty. I reckon it's about sixty centimetres long or two feet for you old buggers. I haven't caught anything this spectacular since I moved here eight years ago. Not much else matters to me in the moment except my sudden hunter-gatherer glory and self-appreciation.
She's bent over with her head down scrambling to get the beer out of the bucket in anticipation of me wanting to use it for my catch and in a moment that will be forever etched in my memories, she stands and offers me the bucket and the long curly dark hair that had hidden her, is swept from her face by the gentle night breeze.
I've never met a princess. Or a queen. But in the moment, I imagine that this is what they look like.
Her features are strong but equally delicate and fine. She has a proud brow and nose that are balanced by the softest smiling lips and cutest dimples. Her deep brown eyes wrinkle with mischief in the corners and sparkle with reflections from the sunset.
My grace, poise and ability to speak all pack their bags and exit stage left, and in a moment of epic clumsiness, the fish slaps my face, throws the hook and splashes back into the water. To cap things off, a sharp burning pain tells me that in my failed attempt to rescue the moment, the big flathead has spiked me with a gill raker.
"Oh god. You must hate me. I was just tramping down the shops and... My brothers are fishermen. I wanted to see if you had caught anything. I'm so sorry. Are you okay, is it hurt." She grabs my hand and pulls it to her to examine where the blood runs down my index finger.
"Ah. I'm alright." I manage to get out between laughs. "Just a little prick."
"Do you tell all the girls that? You're a bit short to start with, no wonder you're fishing on your own."
That just starts my laughed out loud joy all over again and I have to sit on the wooden jetty and open another beer while she inspects my fatal wound.
/`-------------------------------------------------------<><
"So... Let me get this straight, okay. You actually had a conversation with a real live female? A pretty one?"
