🎣ONE

Jacob tapped his fingers along to Under Pressure as he took the drive to his father’s childhood home. He glanced at the box on the front seat, then faced the road. “Last road trip, huh Dad?”

Of course the box with the urn inside didn’t answer back.

He left early, wanting to beat the traffic. It wasn’t a bad drive from Cherry Hill, New Jersey to the small Rhode Island town, a little under four hours. He considered stopping in Orange, New Jersey, to see his mother Nina, or stopping at his sister Haley’s house in the same township. Jacob decided to do neither, but to keep going that Saturday morning.

When Jacob reached Rockville, the town was bustling. He passed by McKinley’s Inn and made a note to stop there to say hello. Roy McKinley and his father were best friends growing up. It was nice that he and his wife Annette showed up at the funeral with flowers and a card.

Jacob passed the front entrance for Wincheck Park and Pond. He always wondered why they called it that, a pond. It was not a pond at all, but a lake of 146 acres with three townships circling it in Hopkinton Country: Rockville, Ashaway and Hope Valley. It was big and beautiful, great for all kinds of water activities from swimming to kayaking.

And of course, fishing.

At some point there was no more road, just gravel and dust down a private lane where the homes were close enough to see your neighbor but spread out to give some privacy. Each house faced that corner of the lake, and since the water was deeper on this end than near the park, each home had their own private dock for boating. Only one dock was empty. His father’s.

Jacob parked his green Pontiac Bonneville in the driveway and looked up at the four bedroom, one bathroom, Craftsman Bungalow where his father was born. A porch wrapped halfway around the house because his grandfather closed the back end of the porch to make it a sunroom and sitting area. It was yellow at one point, Grandma Rose’s favorite color. Now it was a fading green. He remembered spending many summers there with his siblings, his father smoking a cigarette or a cigar in one hand with a newspaper in the other; his grandma in the kitchen or the sunroom. He wondered if the kitchen was still yellow.

Jacob grabbed his suitcase out of the trunk and walked up the porch steps. He opened the door with his father’s key. The house smelled like stale cigars. That made sense to him; his father had not been there since last summer. The thought made his heart ache.

He dropped his bag and opened up all the windows in the house, from upstairs to downstairs, letting in a nice breeze. Then he went back to the car and pulled out the box. He brought the box inside the house and opened it on the coffee table. The black and gold urn was sitting in a bed of styrofoam. Jacob pulled it out gently and placed it on the mantel.

“Welcome home, Dad,” he said softly. Then he got to work.

He went through the vinyl records in the living room and he put in The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. David Bowie’s voice began, and he smiled. He always had a crush on the larger than life singer. Jacob found some old cleaning products and used what he could to dust, mop and sweep the living room, dining room and the yellow kitchen. By the time he made it upstairs the sun was setting, so he only managed to clean out the master bedroom. He found some old sheets and replaced the ones in the bedroom that had been there for some time.

He dragged his suitcase and briefcase into the room and started putting clothes in the drawers. He would be there for a couple of weeks and had no desire to live out of his bag. Once done, he lined up his books on the nightstand: Firestarter by Steven King, The Bourne Identity by Robert Ludlum and The Covenant by James Michener. Each book had its own bookmark.

Jacob opened up his briefcase. The curriculum for his upcoming seventh grade class was still only half done. He was thankful for Dr. Kipton’s understanding that he had to take care of things first, but he knew it had to be completed within the next few days or they would give his classroom away. Jacob loved teaching more than anything else. It would break his heart to not be able to do so. Even if he wasn’t teaching his first love, Science, educating young minds was his calling.

But he had other things to worry about. He sighed and opened up The Covenant. He pulled out the yellow lined paper at the front of the book, and looked at the list his father left him in his shaky handwriting:

-Take me home.

-Spread my ashes between my three happiest places: Wincheck Pond. Baisley’s Apple Farm. Pick the last one.

-Sell my father’s house. Give the job to Frank Mullens with 30% off the top. Tell him I’m sorry.

-Split the profits between you, Gunther and Haley.

-Tell Haley to be as smart as her mother and stash it for a rainy day.

-Make Gunther take the money. Tell him I’m sorry.

-Give Ian McKinley a two dollar bill.

-Go to Mass at St. Cecilia’s for four weeks in a row.

-Go fishing.

-Only get gear from Lionel’s Bait and Fishing Shop. George will take care of you.

-Catch, and don’t release.

-Tell your mother I’m sorry.

Twelve items, his last wishes.

Jacob took out his red pen and put a check mark next to the first one. He was trying to decide if he should do them in order, but realized some things were going to come before others. For example, he had already spoken to Frank Mullens, who agreed to be his realtor. According to Mr. Mullens, there was already interest in the lake house. It was prime real estate, right on the quiet side of the lake, away from the park that could be noisy sometimes. And it had its own dock for a boat, something his grandparents never owned, but his father had this rickety wooden boat that he would go fishing in.

And going to Mass would be in between everything else. He hadn’t been to Mass in years but for his father, he would do as he asked. Tomorrow was his first day back to church and he had no idea what to expect.

His siblings would be tough. But he would figure it out when the time came.

Spreading the ashes should be easy enough. He’d split it into three bowls. The first task he’d tomorrow. The second he would have to find a way in. The Baisley orchard was private property. He couldn’t just walk in and ask to drop a dead man’s ashes on the land.

And the third place… Why did his father want him to choose the last place?

He balked at the idea of going fishing. It was his least favorite activity. But he was surprised at the statement: Catch and don’t release. His father released his fish back into the water, only rarely taking them home to grill when it was a special occasion. Maybe if he actually did catch a fish, his father wanted him to have the full experience, taking it home, grilling and eating it.

Jacob took a shower, changed his clothes, and looked into the mirror. He knew he looked more like his father than Gunther did. Jacob had his father’s strong face, brown eyes, thick eyebrows, wide lips and brown hair that got wavy the longer it was. Jacob’s shag haircut was long enough to fall over his face but not quite long enough to put in a ponytail. He liked it that way.

Jacob could see his father in him, and it made him happy and sad at the same time. He turned off the light in the bathroom and got into bed. It was so quiet there, a real change living in the city. He let the soft sounds of the lake through the open window, lapping against the rocks, lure him to sleep.

Catch and Don't Release