My family and I always go to Alabama for spring break. My favorite thing to do there is fish for mackerel. One recent summer, my dad, my friend Zack, and I headed down to the Alabama State Fishing Pier. Zack and I ran ahead, racing each other to see who could get his line in the water first.

While we were setting up, I couldn’t help but notice the sunset. It looked like something you would see on a postcard. The pier smelled like fresh fish and sea air. Seagulls and pelicans were fighting over scraps of fish, and old guys were arguing over whose fish was bigger. I leaned on the railing. The breeze was whispering to me like a kid who sits next to you in class.

I could see that the fish were biting; everyone around me was pulling in mackerel. But I wasn’t even getting a nibble. Thirty minutes later, the strangest thing happened. I saw a man struggling to pull something up over the railing, so I ran over to see what it was. He had hooked a pelican. The man was calling for help, so my dad’s friend ran over with a hoop net to get the pelican out of the water. Once we pulled it up onto the pier, the huge bird stopped fighting us, as though it realized we were trying to help. When my dad’s friend got it unhooked, the pelican flew off, looking relieved to be free.

As that was happening, I was finally bringing up a Spanish mackerel. But I was so distracted that when I grabbed the fish, it freaked out and I lost my grip. The three-pronged hook went right through my finger. Quickly, I cut the hook from the lure so the fish couldn’t shake and make it worse. When I realized the hook was sunk in past the barb, I thought, This is going to hurt!

While everyone else was freaking out, I tried to stay calm and figure out how to get the hook out without needing stitches. I told myself, “Just do it,” then pulled the hook straight out of my hand, barb and all. Afterward, my dad said I turned as white as a ghost, but I pushed on and continued fishing despite my bleeding, throbbing finger. I was not going to go home without a big fish.

On the very next cast I hooked a king mackerel. It was starting to take out a lot of line, and I had to run down the pier, almost pushing people out of the way. When it stopped fighting and taking out line, I returned to my spot. The hoop net was too small to get the fish out of the water, so we had to gaff it.

We pulled it up, and it ended up being 40 pounds. It looked like something prehistoric, with very little color and blue stripes. You can only imagine how big the smile was on my face. Then we went home, cleaned the mackerel, and swam in the ocean for the rest of the day.