I was still in shock as we pulled into my Uncle’s driveway. His house was typical of a small Midwestern town: two-story and white, speckled black where the paint had started to peel, and with a backyard that contained a single oak tree and faded into woods some 20 yards back. His garage was a separate building that stood to the right of his house, and it was from here that he stepped out of an open side door as he heard us pull in. I turned to my mom as he waited for us to exit the car.

“Mom?”

“Yes honey?”

“I don’t want to do this,” I said, clinging onto some far-fetched hope that we could still turn around and go home.

My mom let out an exhausted sigh. “I know this is hard on you guys, but it’s been a long time since you’ve seen your Uncle Mark, and he’s been really looking forward to spending some time with you guys.”

I looked at the car floor, numbing with defeat.

“I know it’s hard to stay positive about it right now,” she continued, “but please try to cheer up as good as you can, if not for yourself at least for your Uncle. Okay?”

“Okay, mom,” I replied, too exhausted to say much else.

She turned to my brother, Dustin. “You too, okay?”

Dustin nodded.

We stepped out of the car and walked up to greet my Uncle. He was middle-aged, with short, unkempt hair that had mostly retained its black hue but also had sporadic, prickly facial hair with hints of gray coming in. He wore a faded gray University of Michigan T-shirt and a pair of worn jeans. We were just below the age where he would’ve considered us too manly to give hugs, so he hugged us, greeted my mom and dad, and then spoke with them for an unbearably long time. He had heard about what had happened and was clearly trying to speak about anything but, and I quickly tuned out of the conversation. It felt stilted and forced, and that had started to bother me.

Eventually, the conversation fell to a halt, and my parents waved their goodbyes and walked back to the car. The hum of the engine faded into the distance, and we were left standing beside our uncle in silence.

“You guys wanna head inside?” he asked.

We both nodded.

He led us to the screen door out back. It squeaked loudly as he pulled it open and banged shut as it swung closed behind us. Inside, the blinds were closed, and the light from a hanging lamp in the dining room was a musty yellow color. A football game played quietly on a TV in the next room. The atmosphere felt suffocating.

“I’ve got lots of snacks,” Uncle Mark said. “There’s chips and Cheetos in the pantry, there’s chocolate milk in the fridge, I got ice cream in the freezer … ” He trailed off for a moment. “Help yourself to whatever you want. Just don’t eat too much, because I was thinking we could have dinner soon.”

“Okay, thanks Uncle Mark.” I said faintly.

He paused. “You know, I found a great fishing spot on the lake the other day. I thought maybe you guys might want to head out there Sunday morning, see what we can catch.”

For the briefest moment, Dustin’s face lit up. “Yeah, that sounds great.”

I said nothing. I hated fishing.

We stood in silence for a moment, until eventually Dustin and Uncle Mark followed the sound of the TV and began talking about the game.

I sighed and brought my bags upstairs to the guest bedroom, where I knew I’d be staying. The room was bathed in darkness, outside of a soft gray light splitting through the blinds and falling on the floor beside the bed. I sat on the bed and found myself reflecting on the day. We had always been planning on going to my Uncle’s that day, but it wasn’t until this morning that my parents decided that it was also the day we would have to put our dog, Java, down as well. She died in my dad’s arms, but I didn’t have the heart to watch. I felt the emotions swelling up to the surface the more that I thought about it, and I quickly shut it out.

I came downstairs an hour later when I couldn’t sleep. It was dark, but the warm light radiating from above the dining room table seeped into the hall, illuminating it with a faint glow. The murmur of the announcers on TV and the soft roar of the crowd trickled through the halls of the house. I stumbled groggily into the TV room, where the flickering blue light washed over the shaggy green couch and faded brown armchair. Uncle Mark sat on the couch, fixated on the game. I sat on the couch beside him and watched in silence for a while. Eventually, he began to talk to me about football, and I talked back. I couldn’t have cared less about the game, but, for some strange reason, it felt good to be in his company.

I woke up the next morning to a hand on my shoulder, gently shaking me awake.

“Hey, Conner,” Dustin whispered.

“Huh?” I responded groggily

“You gotta get up. It’s time to go out fishing.”

“Uh-huh.”

I closed my eyes and began to drift back off, but Dustin shook my shoulder again, harder this time.

“C’mon Conner, it’s time to get up.”

“Okay, okay.”

I slid slowly out of bed. I didn’t remember going back upstairs in the night, but I must have at some point. As I changed into my clothes for the day I peeked through the blinds in my room. The sky was a soft purple, and the faintest hues of orange glowed upon the edge of the horizon. We ate, and then began loading up the pickup truck. We drove much of the way there quietly, watching the sun rise over the treetops. It was cloudy when we arrived, casting a somber gray light upon us, yet I felt strangely invigorated. We transferred everything into my uncle's fishing boat and then stepped in. Fog clung to the water like rising smoke, lazily drifting about in the windless morning. We split through tufts of fog as Uncle Mark took us across the lake, and the motor rumbled softly as we cut across the glassy surface. We finally stopped in a secluded corner of the lake, near shore. We waited there a moment, listening to the waves lap against the side of the boat, gently bobbing us up and down.

“So, Conner, have you been reading anything new?” Uncle Mark asked, breaking the silence.

I was a huge reader at this point in life, so I leapt at the question and talked about the book I was reading, and as I did Dustin teased me, and Uncle Mark showed us how to fish properly and everything was okay because I finally understood. I understood that Uncle Mark wasn’t going to be the perfect solution to our problems because he wasn’t perfect, and he was going to deal with things in his own flawed way, just as Dustin and I dealt with things in ours. But we didn’t need the perfect solution — we needed somebody that cared about us being happy. Uncle Mark did and that was enough.

We didn’t catch a single fish that day.