The Boys with Fishing Rods

They appear along the breakwater, arriving one by one as though answering an invitation no one else has received. Fishing rods balanced over their shoulders, bait buckets swinging gently against their legs, they walk with the slow certainty of people whose day has already found its purpose.

They spread themselves along the rocks without discussion. One chooses the end of the wall where the water darkens into deeper blue. Another settles beside a rusted ladder that disappears into the sea. Their positions seem less like decisions than habits formed over countless summers.

Then they wait.

Lines disappear into the water. Rod tips tremble occasionally in the breeze. Sometimes a fish arrives. More often it does not. The hours pass anyway.

They lean against the breakwater with the confidence of people who have nowhere else to be.

Around them, summer performs its daily routine. Families unfold umbrellas on the beach. Ferries cross the bay. Café tables fill and empty. The promenade grows louder as the midday rush approaches. Yet the boys remain where they are, suspended outside the urgency of everyone else's plans, measuring time not by clocks but by tides and possibility.