When the Reeds Whispered Secrets

The digital clock glowed 4:17 AM as I laced my mud-crusted boots. A bullfrog's croak echoed through the cabin window - the Everglades were already stirring. My thermos hissed when I filled it, the smell of burnt coffee blending with diesel fumes from the truck. I patted my lucky jighead in the tackle box, its red paint chipped from last season's trophy snook.

Moonlight silvered the sawgrass as I poled the skiff toward the hidden slough. The water here moves like liquid shadow, where bass stack up like cordwood after May rains. First cast with a topwater frog sent ripples dancing. Nothing. Second. Third. A gator's tail slapped the surface twenty yards east, making my neck hairs stand.

By sunrise, I'd cycled through six lures. Sweat pooled under my vest when I noticed the reeds shivering upstream - not the usual wind-waves, but sharp, staccato twitches. 'Talk to me,' I whispered, threading a soft plastic craw onto the hook. The cast landed softer than a heron's feather.

The strike nearly yanked the rod from my hands. Line screamed off the reel as something bulldozed through lily pads. 'Not today, princess,' I growled, thumbing the drag. For three breathless minutes, the world shrank to singing braid and aching forearms. When I finally lipped the 8-pounder, its golden flanks glittered with swamp magic.

As I released her, a breeze carried the reeds' hushed applause. Maybe they'd been rooting for us both all along.