The hot weather had him out of sorts, he had left his cardigan at home and wore his short with the top button undone and the sleeves rolled up as a concession to the sweltering heat from summer. This was not his favorite season, making his lip sweaty under his moustache and making him irritable and short with his patients.
He had cuffed his trousers and let his bare toes touch the sand as he trudged over the hot sand to the pier. Willy waved enthusiastically as he drew near. The old mariner had mentioned to him a few times when they had been drinking at the saloon together that he should come by and see his shop and Willy offered to teach him how to fish. Harvey had finally decided to take him up on it this sunny afternoon after the clinic had shut.
So here he sat, next to a stinky bucket of bait, as Willy explained lures and rod types. Eventually Harvey dropped the line on his borrowed training rod into the water waiting for any telltale bubbles. Willy continued to mutter gruffly to him about the fish he had caught over the years before the conversations slowed and the two men sat in companiable silence, listening to the scream of seagulls and the lap of the waves on the piles.
"I see how you can live alone out here Willy, a man could get used to the peace out here." Willy nodded his head at Harvey's compliment.
"Aye, its not a bad life. But when ones love is the sea, you see your share of storms too" The old man stared out at the azure blue sea and sky, "But yer a young man still, you don't want a lonely life like mine." Harvey frowned as Willy made an exert jerk of his wrist, flicking a sardine out of the water and expertly pulled it off the hook onto the bucket next to him.
"I'm not that young Willy, and life isn't too lonely when I have the town to look after. Eventually most people around here come through my door" Harvey shrugged it off but Willy fixed him with a penetrating glare.
"Yer an odd fish yeurself." The old man grumbled, and they went back to companiable silence as the air began to cool into a sunset that stained the sky orange and danced reflections off the gentle waves. His eyes were drawn out to see and he missed the tugs on his rod as he watched the view. He also missed the sight of Willy shaking his head at Harvey, as the mariner pulled up on his own rod to flick up a beautiful red mullet into his waiting bucket. His eyes looked around the beach and he noticed a figure with a flower in her hair standing on the pier to the east of them.
Silhouetted against the sunset he saw the farmer fishing, her arms tensing and relaxing as she strained at her rod to hold whatever catch thrashed around the waters of the abandoned pier. Willy gasped and clapped a hand to his chest in admiration.
"If my old pappy was around to see this, she's got an octopus. It warms the cockles of my heart to see it." His tone was almost reverent as they watched her struggle with hauling this thing out of the water.
Harvey and Willy watched from outside the fish shop on the wharf over to the abandoned pier where finally she hauled up a slimy and writhing octopus. Its orange tentacles wrapped about the pole and line of the fishing rod and the farmer pulled out a small dagger to pry it off into her waiting bucket. As she wrestled with it, its curled arms gave up treasure it had been hiding and Harvey watched her pull out and handful of stone, and three large round red stones she looked at closer before throwing into her satchel.
Looking up, the farmer caught sigh of them. She raised and arm in hello as she quickly snacked on a peach, throwing the pit to the sea followed by her fishing line into the water again.
"Now that's a woman," Willy muttered, clearly impressed, the wrinkles by his eyes holding twinkling eyes. Harvey started to realize the sun had almost set and Willy was picking up the supplies and tidying up shop. Harvey said goodbye and made a quick exit down the beach before it got too dark to see. He looked out to the pier by the rockpools as he left, it was almost too dark to see but oddly the farmer had a soft glow around her, almost a bioluminescence that was reflected back in the sea below her as she swiftly pulled up another catch.
He shivered a little without his cardigan as the summer air quickly cooled into night and the dark set on quick as he reached the bridge back to town. Being out after dark wasn't something he tried to do much here, they were close to the forest and he had heard wild animals rummaging and knocking over trash bins in the night before. In the areas without street lights he marveled at how dark the night air was and he felt nervous as he crossed the square to the clinic and home to his apartment above.