When Bass Dance in Moonlight

3:47AM. The dashboard clock's glow illuminated my thermos of coffee as gravel popped under tires. I coasted into the boat ramp with headlights off - not that it mattered tonight. Full moon hung over Lake Fork like a spotlight, turning wavelets into liquid mercury.

'Should've brought the spinnerbait,' I muttered, thumbing through my tackle box. My fishing partner Jim snorted: 'You say that every night.' We launched the jon boat into water so still, our wake looked criminal.

First two hours yielded nothing but bluegill kisses. Moonlight, usually a bass magnet, felt overbearing tonight. I switched to a black buzzbait, its propeller throwing lunar sparks. Then it happened - a swirl near submerged timber that didn't ripple outward. My fluorocarbon line twitched before I even felt the strike.

The fight defied physics. Something primal surged through the rod, bending it into a U shape that mirrored the moon. Drag screamed like a banshee. When we finally netted her, the bass' golden eye reflected the whole damned cosmos.

We released her as dawn bled purple at the edges. Jim broke the silence: 'Think she'll remember us?' The wake from her tail slap answered - a moonlit smack across the water's cheek.