When the Raindrops Became My Metronome

The truck tires crunched over gravel still damp with midnight dew. I tightened my grip on the steering wheel, the familiar weight of my grandfather's silver fishing reel bouncing against my thigh in the passenger seat. Lake Cherokee's silhouette emerged through the fog, its surface rippling like liquid obsidian.

By sunrise, my topwater frog lure had already kissed thirty-seven lily pads. 'Dance it like you mean it,' I muttered, remembering old Carl's advice at the bait shop. The lure plopped near submerged timber, its rubber legs twitching... until the wake came. Not the lazy swirl of a turtle, but the predatory 'V' that made my pulse thrum in my ears.

The strike exploded like a depth charge. My line sawed through duckweed as the beast bulldogged toward the hydrilla jungle. 'Not this time,' I growled, thumb burning against the spool. When the smallmouth finally surfaced, its bronze flank glittered with rain that had begun falling unnoticed. I knelt in the shallows, cradling beauty that outshone any scale measurement.

Thunder rumbled as I released the fish. Raindrops dimpled the water where she disappeared, each circle overlapping like nature's slow applause.