The Fish Room

I snuck down there evenings he worked at the sawmill, to the lath and concrete room where he gutted perch, tossing tails to the cat. A galaxy of scales glistened on the tabletop, and specks of blood. But the floor was smooth, well-suited for skating to Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’.”

I was the girl in the song, and the room—its rows of rods and reels, waders, nets and oars—transformed as I dreamt of getting out, no longer destined to pass every weekend on some Idaho lake, dropping fish into a bucket for my father to clean. Going nowhere.

Jennifer Anderson is an English instructor at Lewis-Clark State College. Her essays have been published in The Missouri Review, the Colorado Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review, and The Cimarron Review, among other places.

 

Photo Credit: Mrs. Gemstone

2 Responses to “The Fish Room”

  1. Christine says:

    I was the girl too.

  2. Nice. Dreaming in the (boys)dad’s room. 🙂

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