No Takers
DANIEL
The fish comes up fighting.
A silver flash twists beneath the brown-green water of the Missouri, hard enough to pull my kayak a good foot sideways.
“Oh, that’s a big one,” I say, glancing at the camera clipped to the mount in front of me. The little recording light blinks back, catching every ridiculous expression on my face.
If I land this, it is absolutely going in today’s thumbnail.
The line jerks again. I lean left, keep the rod high, and nearly knock my paddle loose with my knee. Then the fish breaks the surface.
I scoop it on the second try, almost overbalance, swear under my breath, and somehow get it into the kayak without sending myself after it.
A smallmouth bass. Biggest one today.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” I say, holding it up carefully for the lens, “this is what happens when you listen to your followers. Two hundred comments telling me I was using the wrong lure, the wrong cast, the wrong time of day, and possibly the wrong personality, and apparently…”
I grin.
“You were right.”
The fish kicks hard.
“All right, mate. Calm down. You’re famous now.”
I turn it toward the camera, admiring the dark bars along its side. After three weeks on the river, living out of dry bags and eating pasta with melted cheese like it is a culinary achievement, this feels like a Michelin-starred dinner.
The sun catches the water behind me. I glance over my shoulder and realise it’s lower than I thought, already sliding toward the trees, turning the clouds peach and gold.
I should be looking for somewhere to stop. Instead, I’m grinning at a fish.
“Honestly,” I tell the camera, “with the success I’ve had today, I’ve got more than enough for dinner. Could even share.”
I look around at the empty river, the thick trees, the wide quiet sky.
“But, tragically, there are no takers. So I suppose Daniel gets fish for breakfast as well.”
I laugh as I say it. It sounds good on camera. Light. Easy. The lonely traveller, joking into the wilderness.
Most of the time, that's exactly what I am.
Five years now. One trip blending into the next. Crossing borders by bike, climbing peaks on foot, sleeping in my tent, in airport lounges, in hammocks, on buses, and occasionally in the spare room of someone who watches my videos and insists I’m “basically family.”
No rent. No office. No girlfriend asking when I’m coming home.
No home, really.
And I like it that way.
A girlfriend would be complicated. What am I supposed to do, ask someone to wait while I disappear for four months to paddle the Missouri? Invite her into the glamorous reality of damp socks, mosquito bites, dead batteries, and me talking to myself for a living?
Nah. No sane woman would sign up for that. Not for long.
Besides, I like the risk. I like choosing the next bend, the next border, the next stupid idea before I have time to talk myself out of it. That kind of life is easier when no one is waiting for you.
Still, sometimes, after I turn the camera off, the silence arrives too quickly. Sometimes the comments don’t feel like voices, and the follower count doesn’t feel like company.
The fish kicks again, saving me from that thought.
“Right,” I say, blinking myself back into the performance. “Thumbnail time.”
I dispatch it quickly and cleanly, then take a few shots with the main camera: fish out front, river behind me, sun cutting gold across the water. I check the screen.
Decent. But decent doesn’t get clicks.
My shirt is already damp, stuck to me with sweat and river spray. I glance at the camera, then down at myself, already knowing what the comments will say.
The follower count has been crawling toward three hundred thousand for days. Two hundred and ninety-eight thousand and change this morning, last time I had signal. Maybe I hit it next week. Maybe sooner, if this video lands.
And the shirtless thumbnails always land.
I sigh, as if this is a noble sacrifice for the art of documentary filmmaking, and pull the shirt over my head.
Cool air hits my skin. I’m brown from the sun now, shoulders tight from paddling, arms scratched, abs showing if I breathe in and choose the right angle. Tired, yes. Dirty, definitely. But the camera will like it. It usually does.
I hold the fish up again, turn toward the light, try a grin, then a serious look, then laugh at myself because there is nothing more ridiculous than sitting alone in a kayak in the middle of Montana, half-naked, taking selfies with a dead bass.
“Influencer life,” I mutter.
Click. Click. Click.
One shot is perfect: sun behind my shoulder, fish forward, river glowing, my hair an absolute mess in a way that looks intentional if you don’t know better.
That’ll do.
Then the wind shifts. A cool breath slides over the water and raises goosebumps along my arms. The light is thinning fast. The river no longer looks golden; it looks deep, dark, and very uninterested in whether I find somewhere decent to sleep.
I pack the fish away, shove my shirt back on, and scan both banks. Trees. Mud. Reeds. More trees. No friendly little patch of flat ground waiting with my name on it.
Brilliant.
I clip the camera back to its mount and pick up the paddle.
“All right,” I tell the lens, forcing a grin. “New mission. Find camp before I become mosquito dinner.”
I dig the blade into the water and start moving.
For the next ten minutes, the river gives me nothing—the banks stay steep and muddy, and every promising gap turns into knee-deep weeds, tangled roots, or a slope too sharp to drag the kayak up without hating my entire life.
The sun slips lower. My shoulders begin to burn again. I stop talking to the camera. That is always how I know I am getting tired.
I round another slow bend, already annoyed with it before I even see what is on the other side. At first, it is only a shape ahead of me, small and dark against the copper water.
Another kayak.
I slow my paddle.
For a moment I think it must be a fisherman, or someone local crossing from one bank to the other. But the figure keeps moving downstream, close to the edge, scanning the trees just like I have been, looking for a place to stop.
I drift, watching from a distance.
It is a woman. Alone.
No second kayak. No canoe partner. No voices carrying across the water. Just her, her paddle, and a loaded boat sitting low enough to say she is not out here for an hour after work.
I frown.
What the hell is she doing out here by herself?
