Free Erasing Memory by Scott Thornley Page A

just ate a lion! A
lion!”
Father and son howled with laughter, andthey kept howling as one by one Aidan tossed up the remaining lions, monkeys, giraffes and elephants. In less than five minutes he’d fed half a box of safari wildlife to five gulls and was spent from laughing.
    Though they both had lines overboard, Aidan was more interested in looking over the side, hoping to catch the moment when a fish would grab hold of his orange and yellow rubber wiggly. His life jacket was tethered to the rail surrounding the engine housing, so there was no chance he could fall over.
    “There’s someone looking at me, Dad.” The boy was staring directly down.
    His father turned slightly towards him and said, “Where?”
    “Waving at me—down there, in the water.” Aidan waved his small pink hand, hesitantly at first but then vigorously up and down, the way he did when he was glad to see someone.
    “Maybe it’s a mermaid. Does she have a fishy tail?” Tim kept his attention on the end of his rod, waiting for any movement that would indicate the big moment he was looking forward to—when he and Aidan would land tonight’s dinner and return home triumphantly.
    “No. His hair’s like mine, only longer. Dad, he keeps waving at me.”
    “Maybe you’re seeing your own reflection, like in your mirror at home.”
    “No, Dad. He’s in a boat.”
    There followed a silence that made Tim uneasy. He looked over at his son, who was still waving, slowly now, hesitatingly, downward. Tim put his rod in the white vinyl tube and went to sit on the cushioned bench beside Aidan, who turned to his father and said, “See, Dad? See him there—he’s waving at me.”
    Tim looked down. “Oh fuck! Sorry, son. Oh my fucking Christ—oh sorry, Aidan, sorry Daddy’s swearing. Oh shit, oh shit!”
    Tim covered his mouth, then grabbed at his hair. He quickly undid his son’s tether, took Aidan by the arm and put him in the wheelhouse seat, snapping his shoulder and seat belts on. Aidan had no idea what was going on but was awestruck to see his father so excited by the man in the boat. Tim went back and leaned over the side again. “Oh fuck. Oh shit—sorry, Aidan, Daddy’s bad language.” He retrieved both rods and tucked them into the hull rails.
    He turned the key with the happy-face float fob and the powerful Swedish diesel rumbled to life, sending two small clouds of black smoke out of the stern’s twin exhaust pipes. Running forward, he pulled up the anchor and stowed it haphazardly on the deck. As the boat began to drift, he hauled up the stern anchor, laying it and its line across the blue vinyl bench. In the wheelhouse he threw the transmission into reverse and powered the craft backwards with such force that the water crested over the swimming deck at the stern. He spun the wheel hard to starboard and swung the boat around, shifting back to neutral, then dropped the red ball gearshift down. The bow lifted so dramatically that Aidan wasn’t sure whether to be filled with fear or glee. He chose the latter and started squealing as if this was the best day of his life. The deep V of the hull settled down as the boat gathered speed, scattering the gulls that had been resting on the water as they digested their crackers.
    Turning around for a moment to watch the white wake breaking the stillness of the lake, Tim picked up his radio microphone and called,
“Book’s Boat
to Hangdog Marina.” Clickingoff, he waited, but only static came back.
“Book’s Boat
to Hangdog. Come in, Hangdog.”
    “Hangdog. What’s up, Tim? We’re just getting started here. Over.” It was Kathy Doolittle, who ran the tuck shop.
    “There’s a fucking awful problem out here, Kath. You need to get the marine unit on it right fucking now. Over.” Tim dropped his speed to ten knots, but he couldn’t drop his heart rate. Suddenly he thought,
What the fuck, I can hardly breathe. What if I have a fucking heart attack out here and I’m plowing ahead with