When the Fog Lifted

Three cups of coffee still couldn't chase the pre-dawn chill from my bones. The truck's thermometer read 48°F as I pulled into the Grapevine Lake parking lot, my headlights cutting through mist that smelled of damp pine and gasoline. My lucky spinnerbait clinked rhythmically against the tackle box with each step – the same red-and-silver lure that fooled my personal best last spring.

Dawn arrived as a pale smear behind the fog. My first casts disappeared into the milky void with soft plops. 'Should've stayed in bed,' I muttered, watching a spiderweb tremble on my rod tip. Then, halfway through retrieving a Senko worm, the line went heavy with that electric throb only big bass make.

For seven breathless minutes, the fish danced me through submerged timber. My braided line sawed through water until – snap! – the fog parted to reveal my lure dangling from a cypress knee. But where the fish had rolled, concentric rings still widened. I reached for my backup rod, hands steady now, and cast a topwater frog exactly where the ripples began.