Dick wanted to brighten everyone’s mood, so he made breakfast. He made eggs in a basket again, which was a first for Michael and Tom. After that Gabe went to the garage and got some of the fishing gear and took it down to the boat on the docks.
“Michael, did you want to go fishing with us?” he asked.
“Nope, it’s boring.” Michael said as he never took his eyes off his portable game player. “Maybe next time, like a decade from now.”
Dick couldn’t help but laugh. Every one of his boys sounded like that when they reached that age.
“I’ll go.” Dick said with mild enthusiasm.
Tom happily volunteered to go fishing as well, knowing that the talk while waiting for a bite was going to be awesome to partake and listen in on. “I’ll grab something to eat for lunch.” He said before running off to the kitchen to get something.
“You’ll be all right here?” Gabe asked as he looked over at Jenny.
“I’ll be fine, thanks.” Jenny said. She never liked to fish so she was happy that Gabe had someone else to drag out to the middle of the lake this time out. After the talk she had with Dick, she really wanted some time to herself and to just collect her thoughts over a few cups of coffee.
Dick made sure he was properly dressed for the boat, wearing blue jeans and a black t-shirt this time. He was trying to not look overdressed for something as simple as fishing. They all put on their life jackets and hopped into Gabe’s boat which was thankfully a little bigger than Dick had predicted. It was enough to fit ten people if you really wanted to squeeze them in there but more than comfortable for three people and some fishing gear. It took the only a few minutes to get far enough into the Lake for Gabe’s liking. He never liked to venture too far just in case they had to paddle back to the shore themselves. After taking a few moments to situate themselves, they cast their lines into the water and began to wait.
After a few minutes of uncomfortable silence, Gabe was the first to speak. “I’m sorry Dick.”
“What for?” Dick asked.
“For starting your talk with Jenny before you might have been ready for it.” Gabe said as he was referring to what happened earlier that morning.
“Oh, that.” Dick said as he fiddled with his line to attach the bait. “I’ve been getting ready for that talk for a very long time, it was going to happen eventually so that was as good a time as any. Unfortunately, what you witnessed was only the tip of a very big iceberg. All we did was talk about Alex.”
“So, that’s a good thing… right?” Tom asked.
“We haven’t covered the subject about her mother.” Dick answered. “And what happened to her that day pales in comparison to what happened to her brother.”
“How so?” Gabe asked.
“First of all, Jenny was never there when her brother died.” Dick explained to them, “She was too busy doing important projects for school, and Alex didn’t give a shit about learning. That’s why he went off to party without her.”
“So, what was so different about her mother?” Tom asked.
“Alex’s death hit Debbie really hard.” Dick continued, “It literally broke her heart. That was her boy that we buried, and it was more than she could take.”
“How bad did it get?” Gabe asked.
“She kicked me out of the mansion a few weeks after it happened.” Dick answered, “Even though we were legally separated, I tried to visit Jenny as often as I could, but she wouldn’t let me near the place.”
“That’s pretty harsh.” Gabe said. He understood the game that some people play with each other when they get divorced. Most of the time they don’t mean it but it’s hard to be civil when you’re dealing with a broken heart. Hurt people make rash decisions that often lead to incidents. He understood exactly what Dick was talking about.
“Then what happened?” Tom asked.
“In the middle of the night, she took a few bottles of pills and went to sleep, for good.” Dick said as he pulled his line back in the water. “She never woke up from that sleep and was found dead the next morning.”
“Yikes.” Tom replied.
“Where was Jenny while this was going on?” Gabe asked.
“She was sleeping.” Dick answered. “It was a school night, and she didn’t realize what had happened until she discovered the body the very next morning.”
“Oh shit,” Gabe said, as he didn’t know this part.
“Exactly,” Dick concurred, “Jenny was in the state of shock. She just laid there beside her mother and held her cold hand until someone else came along, which was the maid a few hours later. At first the maid completely freaked out because they thought they were both dead. When she realized it was only Debbie who had passed on, she immediately called the police and for an ambulance. While I appreciated her efforts, it was already too late by then. Jenny talked to the medics who arrived first, then to the to the police who secured the scene, and even a few shrinks sent over by child services. I was on the road, all the way over on the other side of the planet when this happened. I didn’t hear about it until like ten hours after the fact. By then, the press already had the story and were running with it.”
Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.
“I heard stories that you were on stage when you found out.” Tom added, “That you didn’t even stop playing. You guys didn’t leave until after the show.”
“That’s true,” Dick replied, “The plane that took us home was still going to depart at the same time no matter how much earlier we showed up… so that never made a difference. We talked about it during the intermission, and decided not to stop the show. I have no doubt they would have stopped if I asked them to, but we were like several time zones away. Cancelling the show only would have made things worse and maybe started a riot. The last thing I wanted was someone else to get hurt or even killed that day. There had been enough death that day already, so we went back on stage.
“That was the right call, Dick.” Tom said, “It was noble to protect the fans, even from themselves. You stopped a bad day from getting even worse.”
“That was my thinking as well,” Dick agreed, “I didn’t want a terrible day to snowball into more tragedy, and even more loss of life.”
“You were damned if you did,” Gabe added, “Damned if you didn’t. I wouldn’t want anyone to have to be put in that position.”
“I hear you, man.” Dick continued. “Anyways; I called Jenny from a phone one of the roadies gave me and talked to her for about fifteen minutes. I told her that I was grabbing the first flight home and would return as soon as possible. That she was more important than finishing the tour, and I was true to my word. I came home that night, but things were never the same.”
“I heard from fans that were there.” Tom added, as he remembered reading stuff and talking to people about it. “They keep telling us that the show in Japan was one of the best Horseman concerts of all time.”
“We played or hearts out,” Dick said, as he recalled that night. “We played until our arms felt like jelly. I was so angry and hurt that night and rather than take it out on the people I who were there to see us, I took it out on my music.”
“That was also the night you guys trashed the stage.” Gabe recalled.
“It was,” Dick confirmed, “That setup was pretty expensive, and we did everything short of torch the thing when the show was over. The band knew what was going on; we knew this was this leg of the tour was being cancelled because I had to head home and take care of business. So, they decided to go out with a bang. We played our hearts out and left everything we had up there on the stage. Then after the second encore, which we never did before, we ended the show by trashing the stage. I was so angry I didn’t realize my hands were bleeding from all the playing I had done that night.”
“Wow.” Gabe said, “That must have been some show.”
“Our agents were furious.” Dick recalled. “They wanted the band to go on without me, but to that band that wasn’t possible. The fans would have felt cheated if Evel Dick wasn’t there picking the strings for the Horseman.”
“That would be like seeing the Stones without Keith Richards.” Tom said.
“Or Guns N’ Roses without Slash.” Gabe added. “To the fans it just wouldn’t be the same.”
“What infuriated the execs and agents the most was that the greatest night of Horseman performances was the one night no cameras were rolling.” Dick chuckled at the irony of it all, “Out of the countless concerts we played, that was one of the few that we never taped, and it was the show everyone calls the best of all time. I for one was happy that there were no cameras rolling. I don’t want to relive that night ever again.”
“I don’t blame you.” Gabe said as he cast out the line again.
After talking about Jenny’s mother, they chit chatted about other things that were not as serious. All this time they hadn’t caught a single fish and Tom was really starting to get impatient.
Dick was starting to get impatient as well. “No offense but this gets really fraking boring. Now I remember why I don’t do this so much and I need to take a friggin’ piss.”
“The lake is your toilet bowl.” Gabe replied. “That’s how all fishermen go when they really need too.
“Oh, I see.” Dick said as he stood up.
Tom offered to let him go to the corner of the boat so they could both turn their back and give the old man a little privacy. Dick appreciated that and waited before dropping his pants and attempted to do his business. It was an epic failure as a strong wind came along and rocked the boat. With his pants still around his knees, Dick fell off the boat and went into the water.
“Man overboard!” Tom called out, even though he and Gabe were the only other two people on the boat.
“Grab an ore.” Gabe ordered.
Tom used the ore to reach out and pull Dick back to the boat. Thankfully Dick was being kept afloat by his life preserver, which he thankfully kept on. Dick had been complaining about it all day but reluctantly kept it on and with his pants around his knees that would have made it near impossible for him to swim back to the boat and he might have drowned. Tom reached into the water and pulled dick back onto the boat carefully. Gabe stay on the other side of the boat to make sure the weight Tom used to get Dick back onboard didn’t overturn the boat and cause them all to fall in.
“Are you all right?” Gabe asked.
“I’ll be fine.” Dick said as he wiped the water from his eyes. He reached down to grab his pants and then he felt something move. “Holy crap! There’s something in my pants!”
Gabe reached into the pants that were still down by his knees and pulled out a fish that had to weigh at least several pounds. When Dick was in the water, the opening of his pants acted like a net and caught the fish as he was being hauled out by Tom.
“Now that’s how you catch a fish!” Gabe said as he held the thing up. It was almost the size of Dick’s calf.
“I can’t believe that just happened!” Tom said, shocked.
“Neither can I, and those were my pants!” Dick agreed. By the time they got back to the cabin, Dick had dried off mostly, but he still immediately went to the bathroom to change into something cleaner and freshen up after his dip into the lake. Jenny walked out from the kitchen to greet them, and her eyes bulged open at the sight of the fish Tom was carrying in, which was their only catch of the day.
“Wow, nice catch Tom!” she called out.
“It’s not mine.” Tom corrected her, “Dick caught this one.”
Jenny looked at Gabe. “Is he serious?”
“He’s not lying.” Gabe answered. “Tom helped him bring it onboard, but that is Dick’s catch. He’s also going to be our dinner tonight. I probably have to make a burger for Michael, but that bugger will be everyone else’s dinner.”
“I’ll take it out back and gut it.” Tom said as he took the fish back out before it had a chance to stink the house up.
“Wow.” Jenny said as she couldn’t help but giggle. “I would have never thought of my Dad as a fisherman, ever.”
“That makes two of us, princess.” Dick said as he came back out with a fresh pair of clothing on. “I can’t wait to have that bastard on my plate with a slice of lemon and veggies on the side.”
“Wine too.” Gabe added.
“Of course! Always white with fish, right?” Dick asked.
“I think so,” Jenny answered with a hint of doubt. She knew there was some wine in the basement so that wouldn’t be a problem.
Dick looked around. “Where is it?”
“Tom is going to take it out back and gut it.” Gabe answered.
“Oh, this I have to see!” Dick said with a smile as he bolted out the door like a kid that wanted to see something super cool going on. Despite the rough start to their day things were looking up as it went on. Now all they had to do was survive dinner and see where it all went from there.