Fishing

Allie raced ahead of her dad, wanting to be the first to reach Mrs. Thornton and Jack's door. She loved babysitting Jack, and today they would get to spend nearly the whole day together while their parents went to a concert in Benson Hills.

Jack was sitting on the porch waiting for her, and he ran to greet his favorite person in the world. He rushed into her arms, throwing his whole body into the embrace. "Allie!" he yelled.

"Hi Jack! You ready to have some fun?" Allie asked. She nodded to Mrs. Thornton when she exited her house.

"Can we go fishing?" Jack asked.

Her dad had managed to catch up to her, and Allie looked to the adults before they could get mushy. "Can we? It's a nice day for fishing. Plus, I could cook up whatever we catch for dinner."

The adults shared a wordless conversation, and Allie hoped they would say yes. "Well, if you promise to watch Jack really closely, I guess it's okay," Mrs. Thornton answered.

Allie and Jack both let out a cheer. "Don't worry Mrs. Thornton, I will be super careful. And Jack will too, right?" She gave him a stern look and he nodded solemnly.

"I promise Momma. I promise Allie."

Mrs. Thornton still looked a little unsure, and Allie gave another sincere promise. "We won't stay at the pond if Jack doesn't mind me."

Her teacher seemed to relax a little, and looked over at her dad. "Okay. That sounds like we can trust them. Are you ready?"

The Mountie nodded. "We don't want to be late."

"Bye Mom!" Jack said.

The adults said their goodbyes and climbed into Mr. Coulter's car that they were borrowing for the day, and Allie persuaded Jack to go inside and sit down for a quick lunch before they went fishing. She thought through the supplies she would need to get for their fishing excursion. Her old pole would probably work for Jack.

"How many fish will we catch?" Jack asked.

"I don't know. It will depend."

"What's 'depend'?" Jack asked.

"Oh." Allie had to think for a moment about how to explain it. "Depend means that we don't know for sure, because things out of our control could happen."

"Like what?"

"Like…the fish might not like our bait, or they may not be hungry."

While Allie cleared their lunch dishes, she told Jack to get his hat and shoes.

"Watch me Allie! Mama taught me to tie my shoes all by myself!"

Allie dutifully watched him tie his laces in a lopsided bow. She figured it wasn't her place to criticize his technique, so she exclusively gave him praise. "That's great Jack!"

"Can we go fishing now?" he asked.

"We need to grab fishing poles and gather some bait, then we can go to the pond," Allie said.

Jack's lips pulled into a pout. "Ah man! I want to go fishing now!"

Allie panicked for a moment, hoping he wouldn't start a temper tantrum now. He was such a good boy usually, but when he got upset, he was a nightmare. She figured the bad needed to come out sometime, and boy did it.

She squatted down to his level. "We'll be super quick! How about we… skip to my house to get the fishing poles?"

"No, gallop!" Jack replied.

"Okay, let's gallop!"

She matched Jack's pace as he set out at a sprint.

"I beat you!" he said triumphantly when he reached the porch of her row house.

"You certainly did!" she said, only slightly winded from her jog. She entered the house and grabbed her old pole for Jack, and her latest one for herself.

They were outside and back on the path to the pond within a minute. Once at the pond, Allie explained how to discover worms, and Jack excitedly began overturning rocks and branches to find their bait.

Once they had collected about a dozen, Allie said it was time to begin.

"Yay!" Jack said.

Allie showed him how to hook the worm on her hook, then gave him his own hook. "You try it. Be careful though, you don't want to hook yourself."

Allie watched him carefully as he took the hook in one hand, the worm in the other, and tried to get them together. His little tongue came out as he concentrated deeply at the task. It took a minute, but Jack finally managed to get the worm hooked. Then Allie demonstrated how to cast the line, and Jack caught that skill much faster.

Allie had always enjoyed the quiet contemplation time she got while fishing, but today was nothing like that. Jack talked constantly about Pal, Scout, daycare, their latest picnic, and everything else under the sun. He finally stopped and gave a yelp of surprise when his line went tight.

"Allie! I got one!" Allie dropped her own pole to help him reel it in.

"You've got a fighter! Hang on tight!" Allie said. She had to give a lot of her own strength to the line, and a good sized trout popped out of the water.

"You did it!" Allie praised. She unhooked the fish herself, not wanting to get Jack hooked.

The trout flopped on the ground for a moment, and when it stilled, Allie added it to the two other trout she had caught earlier.

Jack lasted another 15 minutes before he began to complain. "I'm bored, Allie."

"Okay Jack. Are you ready to go home?"

"Yeah."

Allie focused on preparing their supplies, unhooking the lines being her top priority. A splash behind her turned her around quickly, heart racing and panic rising. If Jack had gone into the water, Mrs. Thornton would never forgive her.

When she caught sight of Jack, she let out a deep breath. He was standing firmly on dry land, collecting rocks and throwing them into the pond. She had to also breath out her rush of anger, knowing Jack hadn't done anything wrong, even if it gave her a heart attack.

"You ready to go?" she asked.

"Yeah! You know what Allie? You're my best friend!"

"Awe! You're my friend too."

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