When the Fog Lifted

3:17 AM. The digital clock's glow painted cracks on my motel ceiling. I lay perfectly still, listening to the chorus of bullfrogs through thin walls. My lucky jighead clicked rhythmically in the tackle box as I carried it to the truck – that sound always reminds me of a chess timer counting down.

Pend Oreille's shoreline emerged as a charcoal sketch. Mist clung to the water like cobwebs, dampening the clatter of my gear. Three casts with a swim jig produced nothing but perfect spiral wakes. 'Should've brought the damn night crawlers,' I muttered, watching a walleye fisherman across the bay haul in his third catch.

By sunrise, frustration tasted like stale coffee. Then I saw them – concentric ripples pulsing near submerged timber. My hands fumbled tying a new leader, fluorocarbon line coiling around my ankles like an angry serpent. The jerkbait hit the water just as fog tendrils dissolved into gold.

Strike. The rod bent double, drag screaming like a teakettle. 'Not today, princess,' I growled through clenched teeth, feeling the headshake through my spine. When the smallmouth finally surfaced, its bronze flank mirrored the rising sun.

At the docks, an old timer nodded at my catch. 'Fog fish sink ships,' he said cryptically. I left wondering if he meant the weather or the fish that got away – the one that straightened my hook moments before dawn.