Whoosh . . . whoosh, the aluminum pole flexes from my hands to the rake head on the bay’s bottom. Its steel teeth pluck clams into the basket a dozen feet below the surface. The pole is an extension of my arms for farming the bay’s bottom. Oyster shells and quarterdecks pile on deck, still needing to be culled, and while the wind is due north over open waters, waves are small and the boat rocks gently. It’s a good day for jerk raking.

My flat-bottom skiff has a fifty-horsepower outboard with a small cabin mounted by the stern. The insides are battleship gray, the outer hull navy blue, and the bottom is covered with “red lead,” copper paint to repel barnacles and seagrass. She’s built for jerk raking, small and quick enough to return upwind for yet another pass over a bed in the middle grounds.

This catch comes in shades of blueish gray, while yesterday’s was chalky white, coming from the sandy flats off Fire Island. Clams are spectators. They don’t say much, but their shells speak volumes about their origins. The chalky-white ones come from sandbars, the blueish-gray ones from a blend called sugar bottom, and the dark-ash ones are plucked from the mud. Working mud is a messy business I like to stay away from. Cleanup’s a bitch, and the clams
seem depressed as if they always knew they were trapped in a dreary place.

“Sit Down, You’re Rockin’ the Boat” plays over and over in my head as I jerk the rake. I don’t have much else to think about but a tune. I wonder, where’s Fred?

Something falls from the sky and hits the deck with a sharp crack. I drop my rake handle and jump to the side. A seagull swoops down and picks up his shattered clam and jumps to the bow.

“Good morning, Fred,” I say.

He ignores me as he pokes his beak through the broken shells like a surgeon and then gulps down the meat.

“I said, good morning, Fred, and I wish you wouldn’t do that.”

He’s so rude, perched quietly on the bow like that without remorse. Seagulls are inconsiderate creatures. It’s their nature.

I don’t like to be ignored, so I turn my back and return to raking.

“Feed me,” he says.

I ignore him, tit for tat.

“Feed me, Seymore…please!” he squawks.

And there we go. My name’s not Seymore, but he said please. I pick a chowder from the pile on deck, break it against a cleat and toss it his way. He stomps it with his webbed foot, gulps it down, and then . . . “Feed me!”

“Dang it, Fred!”

I hoist the rake, dump my catch on deck, and send a few more chowders his way. I needed the break anyway. Finally, he ruffles his feathers, splashes some white poop on my bow, and turns his back on me—so rude.

“One of these days, Fred”—I go back to raking—“pow, right to the moon!”

“It’s not as it appears, you know . . . that moon,” he says.

Now he’s talking—to argue, I’m sure. He only sees what’s wrong and seems to find pleasure in this.

“People write songs about the moon,” he says, “but it has no light of its own. It simply reflects the sun’s light. Without the sun, no one would know it was there. That’s not very romantic when you think about it.”

Seagulls are both gregarious and antisocial. They flock together but bicker over everything—not just food and shelter but mundane minutia, like who perches where on an open dock. But I am not a seagull and prefer to use what I call “reverse seagull psychology.” It works.

“You’re right when I look at it that way, Fred.”

He hops along the side of the boat and stands beside me, his head perched back as if surprised. He’s never come this close.

“You agree?” he says. “Yes, moonlight is really sunlight. You see it too?”

“Oh yes,” I say. “The others are romantic fools, aren’t they?”

“Yes, the fools!”

“He’s wrong, you know.”

This voice was not Fred’s. It had a higher pitch and came from below.

I look down at the pile of shells. An oyster shell flips over, and a blue crab peeks out just enough to expose his face and a claw.

“I’m nocturnal, and the bird is wrong. I prefer to feed and mate under the moonlight, and that’s romantic.”

Fred freezes and cocks his head toward the pile like an Irish setter pointing at game.

“I see you!” Fred says.

“The bird will eat me!”

I scoff at Fred, “And you would, wouldn’t you?”

Seagulls are diurnal and always hungry. So I pick up my bailer, the top half of a plastic Clorox bottle I made to scoop bilge water. Then I gently scoop up the crab and return him to the bay, where he darts down out of sight.

“You eat them too!” Fred says in disgust. Seagulls have such angry eyes.

He flies to the bow and turns his back on me, silent once again. So I go back to raking.

There’s something about Fred. He’s abrasive and rude. He wants shellfish, and I know that’s the only reason he’s been squatting on my boat. He’s not very interesting and has no imagination. Who cares if moonlight is the reflection of sunlight? He just wants to argue, and that’s his nature. But he’s company and I like that part. He takes my mind off me, giving a break from this solitude. And with a little imagination and seagull psychology, I can make the situation tolerable.

“You eat them too!” he squawks again.

“You’re right, Fred. I’m sorry. I hadn’t thought of it that way.”