Free My Juliet by John Ed Bradley

turns into the parking lot at a waterfront restaurant/lounge called Captain Bruce’s.
    â€œDaddy, we were here last week,” Sonny says, glad to hear his father speak again at last. “You don’t remember we came fishing here last week?”
    Mr. LaMott seems to be trying to remember if he remembers.
    â€œIt’s okay if you don’t,” Sonny says. He steps out onto the lot covered with crushed oyster shells. “The only bites we got were from mosquitoes, anyway.”
    The building is uneven sheets of tin and plywood inexpertly applied to a skeleton of two-by-fours. It rests on cement standards maybe fifty feet from some of the best fishing in the southern United States. A sign on the door advertises a 1-800 number for alcoholics and inside fishermen crowd the bar running from the front to the rear of the room. Everybody seems to be drinking the same brand of beer and picking from identical platters of boiled shrimp and new potatoes. Up high near the ceiling a muted TV set shows a home shopping channel and the deal of the day: a ladies’ curling iron slashed to more than half the manufacturer’s suggested retail price. “I need me one of them,” Sonny hears one of the drunks mutter from the middle of the bar.
    â€œYou ain’t got no hair to curl,” shouts another.
    â€œYeah, but at least I can get it up,” says the first man, confounding Sonny but drawing a great riot of laughter from everyone else.
    Captain Bruce drifts over and Sonny gives him a five-dollar bill, the fee for fishing rights off the pier behind the building. The captain wears Wrangler jeans a size too small and his shirtsleeves cover tattoos of fight roosters raining feathers. Today the captain has little to say except for how the Saints did themselves no favors in yesterday’s draft of college football talent. “Eleven picks and every one a colored,” he says. “You’d think they could find one white boy that can play.”
    â€œMark my words, they inheriting themselves some serious behavioral problems,” says the man who wanted the curling iron.
    Sonny puts another bill on the bar and asks for beer and ice and bait shrimp. No surprise, Captain Bruce gives him a six-pack of the same cheap stuff everyone else is drinking, Old Milwaukee in the can.
    â€œYour daddy don’t even know who you are, does he, LaMott?” the captain says as Sonny is heading back outside.
    â€œYou’re wrong there, Captain,” Sonny says after deciding the man means no harm.
    â€œHe’s senile and retarded, both. Got it coming and going.”
    â€œHe suffers from Alzheimer’s. It’s a disease that mainly afflicts senior citizens.”
    Captain Bruce seems to be sizing Sonny up. “Yeah, well, that’s what you say. But he’s too young for no Alzheimer’s.”
    â€œHe’s sixty-four.”
    â€œI’m sixty-two and how come I don’t have it?”
    â€œI guess the good Lord has given you a pass on that one, Captain.”
    The captain shakes his head. “That man, your daddy? I want you to leave him at home next time, LaMott. He’s got no bidness coming out here. My insurance finds out I got somebody like that fishing off my pier they raise my premium overnight.”
    Sonny stares for a long time. “Thank you for the beer, Captain.”
    Sonny loads the ice and beer into his Igloo, his father watching through the back window. Then he lugs the cooler and the rest of the gear to the end of the pier. Lastly he helps Mr. LaMott from the truck, offering encouragement as his father tests his footing and gets his bearings. “Okay, Daddy. Take it slow now. Take it slow. I’m here.”
    When they reach the pier, Sonny ties a length of rope around the old man’s waist then loops the other end around his own. The distance between them runs about ten feet, but if Mr. LaMott suddenly were to decide to go for a swim Sonny