Lineage(69)

“This is my BOOM stick!” He’d then laughed until tears leaked from his eyes.

Each day that dawned on the lake held the warmth and promise of a summer that refused to end. After waking, Lance sat at his post in the alcove each morning until lunch drove him to the kitchen to appease his hunger. The afternoons were normally spent writing until John’s truck made its appearance in the front yard. The two men would gab, normally over beer that Lance now kept cold for just this occasion, and then John would announce that he should get to work. Gradually, the yard became not just tidy but well-groomed, and Lance began to see how truly gifted John was with his shears and mower. The evenings, Lance spent alone. He would sometimes walk the shore to the far points of the bay that had spawned not only the town’s name but, in all reality, the town itself. John had filled him in on the local history one particularly hot afternoon after finishing his second beer of the day.

“Whole town was built on shipping, did you know that?” Lance shook his head, smiling at how John’s eyes lit up when telling a story. “That bay right out there was a major shipping port a hundred years ago. You wouldn’t think so, but the water gets real deep, real quick out there. Don’t go wadin’ in ’less you want to take a swim.”

“What about the rocks in front? How did the ships navigate between them?”

“Well, son, the ships you’re thinking of weren’t nearly the ships that are today. They could fit in smaller places than most. Although, they didn’t need to since those rocks you see out there were actually part of the port itself. They helped make up a gangway that stretched out over two hundred yards from shore.” John must have seen the questions arising in Lance’s face because he added, “Oh, the pilings are all gone now, rotted off and either floated away or sunk like anything else in that lake. No, they shut this port down and moved the harbor a few miles south of town. That’s only just a small recreational port now; the real shipping dock is in Duluth, of course.”

Lance imagined a bustling scene of activity and ships entering his small bay years ago in a time that felt like a myth. The only traces of what had once been were now between pages of a local history book and in the handed-down words of the oldest residents.



When his phone rang beside him one Thursday afternoon, it startled him from thoughts of sunken goods covered in wet moss and pilings that a man couldn’t reach both arms around in the cold waters below the window. Andy’s frowning face stared back at him from the screen, and with a flick of his thumb, Lance answered the call and tilted back in his chair.

“To what do I owe this momentous occasion?”

“Really? That’s how you answer?” The irritation was palpable even through the speaker of the phone. “You haven’t called me in over a week.”

“Hey, the phone works both ways, buddy, I’m just saying. Plus, it’s been closer to two weeks.”

“Ass. I haven’t called because you sounded angry in your last text.”

“You texted me at four in the morning!”

“I was just leaving a party—horrible ordeal, by the way. I haven’t had such shitty food since St. Cathy’s. And the condo it was being held in was atrocious. I can’t fathom why these celebrities insist on going to an obscure location and having a f*cking cocktail party in a second cousin’s living room.”

Lance listened to his friend rant as he gazed out at the lake, which held streaks of the setting sun among its rippling blue waves. “I’m sorry you had a terrible time at a get-together with the who’s who of Hollywood while I’m up here alone in the wilderness.”

“You’re the one who was ostentatious and bought a house without consulting anyone else first. I’m not going to feel sorry for you.”

“I don’t expect you to. Besides, the place is really growing on me. I’m getting settled in here. I’ve even met some people.”

“I don’t believe it for a second. You don’t meet people, they run into you and realize they’ve read your books and want to be friends.”

“Not up here. There are some people that have read my stuff, but mostly I’m an unknown.”

“Yeah, an unknown from out of town that shows up and buys an enormous house in the middle of the community.”

“It’s not enormous. And how would you know, you haven’t even been here,” Lance said, leaning forward in his chair with a bemused smile.