Caught!

Elmo plodded toward his favorite fishing spot, a medium sized pond he'd spent many quiet hours beside, putting the world to rights in his head. The weight of his fishing gear was welcome after months of inactivity.

Spring was in full swing, dusting off her glad rags and sprinkling sunshine and cheer. Trees that had once groaned under the weight of icicles and snow had emerged triumphantly from the icy blasts of winter, preening in their myriad of green hues.

Insects flitted. Birds trilled.

The path to the pond was muddy. Shower-laden clouds loomed in the distance, offering the menace of another dousing. Elmo wasn’t deterred. Clad in waist high waders over water-repellant trousers, a waxed jacket over a warm fleecy shirt, and long johns beneath that, he was well equipped for the elements. His thatch of rusty colored hair was crammed under a peaked cap that had seen its best days over a decade ago. Made of Harris tweed, it was a good luck charm. Wearing the cap, he was invincible. And that prized carp he’d been after was waiting.

He brushed aside brambles and nettles, edging toward the shore. And stopped in surprise.

Ducks and moorhens should be swimming among the lilies, nursing broods. The surface should be alive with water boatmen and other invertebrates. Instead, in mid-May, it was frozen solid. At least three inches of ice remained across the entire expanse.

He ambled closer, testing the ice with his welly. It creaked under his foot but didn’t crack. Toward the middle several waterfowl gathered, tapping the ice with their beaks. A mallard quacked imperiously. A teal duck flapped its wings noisily. A brace of mute swans flew in, tried to land, and skidded into a messy heap amongst a clump of bullrushes lining the opposite shore.

The mob appeared to be looking at something beneath the ice. Elmo gritted his teeth. This pond had history. He’d been here the last time it had refused to thaw. With three companions. It had not ended well for them. They'd headed out onto the ice to investigate. There had been birds there, too. Hollering and honking.

It occurred to him that he’d seen way too many horror movies, and this pond was just an ordinary pond. His friends had fallen through the ice. It was common enough around these parts. During the spring thaw. It wasn't his fault that he couldn't swim, or hadn't been quick enough to save them. Not his fault at all.

His trepidation increased. This pond had claimed more than one unwary victim going back hundreds of years. Not today. He smiled and rushed back to his car, parked in a layby two hundred metres away.

Retrieving a small rucksack, he half-jogged back to the pond.

“I’m not falling for your tricks,” he called to the flock that had doubled in size. “Old Ma Crowther fell for your tricks. She fell beneath the ice. Buried on a Tuesday, she was, in her Sunday best.” He smiled wryly, opening the bag. “She always said she’d want to be buried in her Sunday best,” he rambled, grabbing a hard-topped case from the rucksack. “But I got no intentions of being buried this year. I got things to do.”

The drone he pulled from the case had been a Christmas present from his Aunt Agatha. She’d told him that he needed to have more fun. All the cool kids had drones these days. He snorted. At thirty-five, he’d stopped pretending to be a kid some time ago, but he appreciated the sentiment from a woman who’d lived through two world wars. Agatha had been cool. Elmo…? Elmo was the kid the cool click had taunted half to death. The kid that had worn hand-me-down shorts during winter and long floppy sweatshirts in the height of summer, because that’s what the youngest kid endured when attached to a brood of ten rambunctious siblings.

Elmo shook off his maudlin musings and fired up the drone, checking battery power and camera before resting it atop the ice, stepping back, then nudging it into the air with a couple of finger flicks on his control pad.

The drone buzzed toward the web-footed throng, not quite drowning out their irritated squawks and quacks as it loomed over its target. Elmo kept one eye on the birds and one on the small screen. He squawked himself as he got a bird’s eye view of what had the flock’s attention.

Three faces peered up at him, eyes wide, mouths agape. Pale as a snowdrop, their eyeballs no longer filled their sockets. Skin and sinew had gone. Only skeletal remains had endured. But he knew them. Brad. Jeff. Colin. His friends. Lost beneath the ice.

He cursed as the drone stuttered then plunged, crashing into a million plastic pieces, and scattering the birds in a flurry of feathers. Elmo wasn’t going to bite. Everyone knew the legend. His friends hadn't heeded his warning. The pond wanted another victim. Then it would thaw, he was sure. Brad, Jeff, and Colin hadn’t been so canny as he. What did it matter if this fishing hole was frozen all year? He’d find a new one.

Pleased with himself, he shoved the controller into his rucksack and gathered his fishing gear, then clambered up the bank. Let someone else be lured to a ghastly death. Squawking and quacking, the flock flew toward him. He cursed them, swatting with his rods and backpack. He caught one duck with his rucksack, tumbling it to the ice, stunning it.

The birds squawked louder, diving on him with a fury he hadn’t seen since he’d thrown Peter Postlethwaite’s cap into a muddy puddle and stomped on it because Peter had called him a sissy.

Peter had flung himself at Elmo, fists flailing, except Peter hadn’t had the same upbringing, fighting for space among a tribe of ten siblings, four dogs, three cats, and a goose that had found its way into their yard five years ago and refused to leave. Best guard they’d ever had. Elmo had won that brawl. He'd win this one, too.

Elmo grunted as a swan’s wing clipped him across the face, forcefully enough that he lost his footing. The bank was slippery. The weeds and mud gave no traction. He fell clumsily, scrambling, then slid down the bank and onto the ice.

The birds took off, silent now. Elmo tracked their path to the shoreline. He was cold. So cold. He tried to rise. The ice was melting around him, then refreezing almost instantly, dragging him to the middle. Screaming, he flailed to break free, kicking hard, his heels beating against the frozen surface. He felt as though fingers clutched at him, dragging him down, denying him freedom.

Water filled his lungs, his head breaching the surface, his shouts muted, his panic ebbing as the cold began to shut down his vital organs. His movements slowed. Thoughts grew sluggish. So cold.

He thought he saw a large carp swim by. He thought perhaps it smirked. Delusional, he was. Dammit! He’d been so excited to go fishing, finally. Now he was caught.

He watched a lazy trail of bubbles drift upward. His breathing stopped.

* * * *

“John! Look! The pond’s thawed finally.”

Chloe skipped down the bank, eyeing a bundle of fishing gear curiously.

“Angler forgot his stuff,” she said as her boyfriend scrambled after her.

John shrugged. “Probably gone for a piss. Let’s head to the far bank, eh? Better fishing there.”

Chloe grinned. “I’ll bag the biggest trout. You wait.”

“You wish!”

Chloe thought she saw a fish breach the surface and frowned. A carp, if she wasn’t mistaken. A big one. Her grin widened. Trout or carp. As long as it was bigger than John’s she didn’t care. Game on.