Bonsai Hunting

Where did she learn to cook like this? The girl was amazing. She must have been reading my thoughts because she grinned at me across the table as I finished the breakfast.

I thanked her profusely as we cleaned up from breakfast and packed the coolers up. Aya left a Tupperware dish in the sink to thaw out. Another surprise for me.

As we packed the boat up we could tell that it would be another warm beautiful day. There wasn't a cloud in the sky. We had decided that we would return to the same mother lode patch as the day before and explore the rest of the ridge. Aya's hair fluttered in the wind as we headed down the lake. I could barely keep focused on watching where we were going, as her cute bum sat provocatively on the aluminium seat in front of me.

I landed the boat in the exact spot. We carried the bonsai gear with us, together with the cooler of beer, as we made our way up the path. Sure enough we found a number of other prospective trees to collect further along the ridge. Aya selected another cedar, thuja, after checking that the trunk could be moved. It was perhaps a tad too tall at nearly three and a half feet, but had a graceful twist to its thick trunk. The foliage was compact, tight to the trunk. The tree had plenty of potential. As she photographed the tree, I could see the enthusiasm in her eyes. This was after all, why we came here.

We got to work extracting the tree. After a few minutes the sun had sufficiently swung around to beat down on us, that we stripped down to just our t-shirts. Aya wasn't wearing a bra. What a doll she was.

Although the trunk would wiggle, the rest of the roots were firmly attached. It wasn't going to be easy.

"Don't you feel a little guilty pulling up a tree that's happy living its natural environment?"

"I have thought of that Aya. Here's how I rationalize what we're doing."

She looked up to me from the other side of the root ball.

"This little tree has been sitting atop this ridge for decades, maybe two or three hundred years. It's fully mature, but stunted." I pointed to the fully grown cedars behind Aya and continued, "those trees over there a least have the benefit of perhaps being considered as a home for a bird's nest, or a log to become a piece of furniture, or maybe just firewood to warm someone's house. Do you think that this little tree has had more than a second glance by a human being in its entire life before you came upon it? Maybe a hunter will pass along this ridge every couple of years. Maybe a prospector every few decades. But they're not looking for little trees. You were. You did. You found it. It's been waiting all its life."

She was blinking at me trying to take it all in.

"And now Aya this tree's luck has changed. We are going to pull this tree from here. We are going to get it back to your house. You are going to clean it up, care for it, trim it to enhance its natural beauty, water it and feed it regularly, not letting it suffer. And then hundreds if not thousands of people will see your tree for years and years to come. When they see it, they will gasp at its natural beauty. This little tree will pull at their emotions. This is one lucky tree Aya. You found it. It found you."

Aya was beaming. She understood.

We continued to work on the tree. Aya had a renewed enthusiasm. After a few hours and a few beer breaks, the tree finally let go. We tumbled back into the lush lichen carpet and basked in the warmth of the sun. That was hard work. Aya excused herself to find a place to pee. "No peeking," she said as she rounded a large lump of granite heading to the mature stand of cedars behind her. I just lay in the lichen taking up the warmth, the fresh smells and the sounds of birds chirping around me.

Aya was certainly taking her time. I decided to get started on packing the root ball up in heavy plastic sheeting. I cut the sheet to size and slipped it under the root ball. I couldn't find the bundle of twine. It should have been in the backpack. Maybe it accidently dropped out of the backpack and was sitting in the bottom of the boat? Last time I saw the bundle was the night before on the dock. Perhaps it was accidently knocked off the dock and floated away unseen? Without the bundle being tied up it would be a challenge for Aya and I to carry the root ball and tree back to the boat. Where the hell was Aya?

"Ro-ab?" She wasn't too far, but I couldn't quite tell where.

"Aya?"

"I found something."

"What?"

"A different type of tree." I stood up and brushed soil from myself.

"What kind of tree?"

"Cedar of Lebanon I think."

What the hell was she on about? I started towards the boulder. "Come have a look."

Aya stood in the sunshine naked. She had cedar branchlets draped around her waist like a boreal hula mini-skirt. A necklace of cedar hung as a bodice from her, partially hiding her breasts. She had cedar cuttings tucked into her hair. She held her arms out. A massive smile was on her face; her brown eyes glistened in the sun.

I was speechless.

"There's plenty of shade under my branches," she said unable to contain her grin.

As I stepped forward I could feel my cock stiffening. I dropped to my knees in front of her. The lichen was soft and thick.

Still grinning wildly she asked, "Have you come to worship at the feet of mother nature?"

"Y...yes," I stammered.

She adjusted her stance slightly to part her legs and lifted the branchlets at the front of her skirt revealing her trimmed little patch. "Come sing songs of praise," she enthused.

I inched forward and placed my hands on her bum catching cedar leaves in my hands together with her cheeks. The combined aroma of her glistening wet pussy and the fresh cut cedar made my head spin as my tongue reached out to her pussy. Aya dropped her hands onto my head and pressed me forward. Her hips rolled back exposing more of her pussy.

I praised. Oh how I praised. And she gleefully accepted my adoration. I celebrated her virtues up and down, side to side, in and out, with soft kisses and gentle nips and sucks.

I could feel the goddesses' gaze upon me as I had to move my left hand from her bum to adjust my straining cock in my pants. A sigh of relief and a renewed twist to her hips greeted me as my left hand returned to its rightful place on her bum, to caress and squeeze.

Again I was caught in a bio-feedback loop. The more of her sap that I tasted, the more I needed. She was starting to tremble, every limb. Quaking like aspen. I was the beaver gnawing at my choice meal. I looked up to watch as her belly heaved in and out, hard nipples poked through their leafy confines. Her body shimmered from perspiration in the sunlight. She was the shining tree that towered above me. Her long black hair decorated with leaves hung from her crown, open sky above.

I continued to tongue her in worship while I gently squeezed her bum cheeks. I slipped her clit into my mouth and gave it a light suckle. Her knees shook. I plunged my tongue into her as deep as it could reach, my nose pressed up against her hardened nib. Her knees shook again. Aya held onto my head. I held onto her bum. Again I sucked her clit into my mouth and held it.

"Rrrraauugghhhh," she nearly fell over shaking, "aaaauuuughhh," I could feel her spasm against my mouth and in my hands, 'aahhgggrr," she gasped for air, "aaaggh," fingernails dug into my scalp, "haaugh," abdomen flexed in, "aaagh," hot breath on my scalp, "aaugh." She pushed my head away and collapsed to her knees in the lichen, still holding my head.

Her face was red, panting for air, her nose was running. Her shoulders and chest heaved up and down. The heat from her body combined with the cedar almost made my eyes water. She looked into my eyes for a moment then pushed her wet lips onto mine almost knocking me back. She broke the kiss then flopped onto her back in the lichen. Her pussy was splayed open, glistening pink in the sunshine. She was still breathing hard.

Oh how I wanted to fuck her right there and then.

Her hand reached out to mine and she pulled me on top of her. I gave her a wet kiss, opened her mouth with my tongue and pressing it in. She put her palms on my cheeks and pushed me away.

"Thank...(kiss)...you...(kiss)...Rob...(kiss)...thank...(kiss)...you...(kiss)."

"Thank you," I said looking down at her big brown eyes.

She reached down and grabbed my straining crotch. I rolled away. "Not here, not now," I said as I sat up, then lent over to kiss her again. "Later." She had a look of bewilderment on her face as I stood up.

"Don't you want me to..."

"Yeah I do," I cut her off. "But later." I knew I was being a little incomprehensible to her. She lay in the lichen with her pussy splayed open taking in the rays as I gathered her clothes, shoes, the missing bundle of twine and a pair of snips.

"Bye" I said and ran off.

"Come back here with my clothes! Robert Winstanley come back here!"

It only took her three or four minutes to tip toe through the lichen and broken twigs on her bare feet to get back to where we had dug up the bonsai. "Gimme those," she said as she picked up her shirt, flashing me a mock menacing grimace. I couldn't help but laugh.

After bundling everything up and collecting a garbage bag of lichen, we checked out the rest of the ridge to see if there was anything significant to collect. There wasn't. It was about one thirty by the time we had everything back in the boat.

"Want to try pike fishing?" I asked as we munched on a sandwich.

"Sure."

Off we went to a reed bed I'd spotted the day before.

"I'll just watch you," she said as we glided with the engine cut towards the reeds.

"Don't move or make the boat creak," I whispered to her.

"Why are we whispering, the fish are underwater?"

I just glared at her as I picked up my spinning reel. I had a seven inch floating Rapala. Gold pattern. It was going to be a little tricky fishing with the massive tree in the middle of the boat. Aya sat at the other end of the boat facing me. She held her hands out to the side giving me a -- what the hell look. I sat and watched Aya for a moment as she sat and watched me. I stood up quietly and turned around.

I took one long cast behind the boat a good fifteen feet off the reeds, right off a bit of a point and clicked the line into gear. Nothing. I reeled it in. Nothing. I waited a few moments then cast the other way along the reeds, also fifteen feet off the reeds. Nothing. I reeled it in. Nothing. After another moment I cast back to where the first cast landed and clicked it into gear. Nothing. As soon as I started reeling it in...Bang. Splash. I pulled the rod back sharply and set the hook. He had some weight. He started ripping line off the drag, I tightened it just a bit. He stopped ripping line as he made out into deeper water, pulling the boat along.

Aya's eyes were like saucers.

As I reeled him in I could tell he was a good fish, not a monster, but there was definitely some weight and muscle there. You can feel a big pike shaking his head right through the line. I eased back on the drag a little and reeled him towards the boat. He didn't want to come. Eventually I got him about twenty feet off the boat. Mr. Pike had second thoughts about that and made a dash for the deep water again. He was pulling the whole boat with him.

I hadn't really thought this through properly. That massive tree that Aya collected took up the majority of the free space. There was also a garbage bag full of lichen, the bonsai collecting backpack, a tackle box, two mini-coolers and a pack with spare clothes and things. Plus of course gas tank, two life jacket cushions, paddle, the other fishing rod, rope and anchor. There was barely room for Aya's and my legs. With a little pike I could wrestle it off the hook without getting it into the boat. Altogether a different story with a large pike.

Slowly I reeled him in. As long as he stayed out of the reeds I had a good chance of landing him. In the reeds, he'll wrap the line around the vegetation and the line will snap.

With one hand I passed the tackle box to Aya.

"In the tackle box, I need you to get me out a pair of long nose pliers. There are a pair of gloves with rubber nibbies on them, get them out too. Also there's a little leather pouch with a handle sticking out. It's the net."

"This is a net?" she asked holding it up.

"Keep it away from your face, but pull it out of the pouch." The spring loaded rim untwisted in a flurry.

"Wow."

'Fuck' I thought to myself. I could see the net had a hole in it. It's a trout net. It's about half the size of what I needed, and now I find it has a hole in it.

The fish was about ten or fifteen feet from the boat when I caught my first glimpse of him in the depths. Even though it was spring and they tend to be still skinny at that time of year, he had some girth to him. Suddenly he made a dash under the boat and towards the reeds. Luckily I had time to swing the rod tip out and over the motor and miraculously didn't catch the propeller. I stopped him by tightening the drag, but now he was dragging the boat back towards the reeds. A little offshore breeze wasn't helping.

It was a make it or break it moment. For every inch that the boat drifted towards the reeds I had to bring the fish in by at least the same amount. There was no way that Aya understood the dynamic of what was going on.

"Pass me the gloves Aya," she did, "and put the net right there," I motioned with my head as I managed to get one glove, then the other on.

I was winning, but my seven foot rod was bent back almost a hundred and eighty degrees. He was shaking his head. My arms were starting to hurt.

"When I get this fish in the boat Aya, stay away from his head. You don't want to get anywhere near his teeth or that lure."

He was five feet away and the boat was maybe eight feet from the reeds. I was only going to get one chance. I knelt down and reeled him in until the half of the rod was underwater. I held the rod in my right hand, braced against my forearm and picked up the net with my left. I pulled up, the rod bent right over near to the point of snapping. The fish came up as I dipped under him with the net.

I caught him.

Aya squealed as I pulled him out of the water. He was at least thirty inches long. His tail has slipped through the hole in the net but he was caught up by his dorsal fin. Out of the three set of treble hooks he was only hooked by the end one. His mouth was bleeding. His angry gills were flaring. He was shaking and twisting vigorously as I pulled him over the side and onto the lichen filled garbage bag. Immediately the line got caught up in the bonsai tree as he flopped about, bleeding. Aya raised her legs up and swung them out of the way screaming. The whole tree was shaking in the caught up line. The boat landed in the reeds.

Still holding the fishing rod in my right hand I grabbed a hold of the fish with my left hand. He was still wrapped in the net. The net got caught in the hooks. It all became a tangled, gnashing, bloody chaos with menacing teeth and intimidating needle sharp treble hooks flailing about. Twigs, cedar leaves and grey lichen rained down from the tree above onto the whole mess.

"Here take the rod!" I held it out to Aya.

"No way!"

"Please just take the rod," I glared at her. I must have not looked too happy with her response.

Reluctantly she took it. I let go of the rod and subdued the slippery fish with both hands and one knee.

"Pass me the pliers Aya!"

She was cowering at the other end of the boat still holding the rod. Reluctantly she passed me the pliers. I managed to pull the hooks out of his mouth. His teeth were massive razors. I freed the hooks from the net.

"Ok Aya, unhook the line from the tree and reel the whole thing tight." That she managed to do as I pressed down on the fish and net resting in the lichen bag, although she just managed to hook the end of the rod with the lure in the reeds. That I could solve in a minute. I really hadn't thought all this through too well.

I knew the links on my gill chain were too small. "Aya can you get a plastic garbage bag from the bonsai kit?" She did as I held the fish in place. I opened the bag and slipped the fish head first into the bag, he slipped from the net with a little assistance. I tied a knot at the top of the bag, then sat back up onto my aluminium seat.

Aya stared at me.

"Can you pass me a beer?" She passed me a beer and kept the last one for herself.

Pppfft. Pppfft. Swig. Swig.

"Is fishing always like that?"

"No. It's rarely like that." I was breathing hard. The bag was still flopping.

"What are you going to do with the fish?"

"We're gonna eat it."

"Really?"

"Damn right." I took another swig.

We sat for a moment enjoying our beer while stuck in the reeds, watching the bag flexing at our feet.

"Did you want to have a go at fishing Aya?"

"No way."

Aya managed to free the lure from the reeds and I fired up the engine. I backed the little boat out of the reeds then came about. Back to the lodge we went through a little chop. I noticed whispy little clouds way up high. I knew that meant rain within forty eight hours. As we approached the camp we could see that other guests had arrived.

When we reached the dock I asked Aya if she wanted to help me clean the fish. She didn't. We rebundled the tree with wet lichen and stowed it alongside the others, then cleaned up the dock and packed away the gear.

With a clean plate in hand together with my filet knife and the bag 'o pike I headed off to the fish house as Aya prepared to take a shower. The scale in the fish house had the pike at just over seven and a half pounds. There are two ways to clean a pike, the meticulous way which maximized the amount of meat but leaves a lot of small bones, or there is the way I was taught by a northerner lady a number of years ago. One clean filet from each side and a vee shaped one from the top. Except for the dorsal fin which has to be cut out, all the meat is boneless. I did the northern cut, yielding about two pounds of flesh. Henri thanked me for the generous left over pike trimmings. Bear bait, even though the spring hunt had been cancelled.

Pike fillets were packed into the fridge with some Saran Wrap on the plate. Pike and eggs for breakfast I thought.

Aya was dressed in her black sweat pants again with a light blue collared blouse and pink slippers. She was blow drying her hair as I stepped into the shower to clean the dirt and fish off myself. Luckily she left me some hot water.

I found Aya sitting on the floor slouched up against a kitchen cabinet. She was sobbing. Dry spaghetti noodles were splayed out on the floor all around her. She held some in her hands.

"Aya. It's okay. It's just noodles." I started scooping up noodles from the floor and placing them on the counter above. "We can wash them if we have to."

"I'm sorry Rob...it's..."

"Stop being silly Aya." I cut her off. She continued to sob as I gathered noodles. I pulled her up and led her to the couch.

"I think it's pretty well martini time Aya, d'you want one?" Instead of answering she simply started to sob again.

"What's wrong Aya, you can't be crying about spilt noodles." She didn't answer, just looked away. Is it me? What the fuck did I do? Or didn't do?

I made up two Oliver Twists. Large ones. In fact I finished the bottle of gin. She sat on the couch as I shook them, then poured them out. As I brought the two glasses to the coffee table I said, "Whatever it is, I'm sorry Aya." She stood up and practically ran off to her room slamming the door behind her.

What the fuck?

Is she upset with me or upset with herself? She didn't do anything wrong, she's absolutely magnificent. Fun and sexy as hell too. It had to be me. Was she upset that I caught and killed a fish? Maybe because I said 'later' after I ate her out earlier? Or maybe she really did want to fish and I took off before she had a chance to cast?