“Oh my gosh,” she gasped, wiping her eyes, “I cannot believe he actually bought that!”
The second blonde leaned back against the cooler, laughing so hard she snorted.
“The magnets part was your idea!” she pointed.
“And it worked!” the third blonde said proudly. “That man looked right at the poles and still walked away!”
For several minutes, they sat there celebrating what they considered the perfect escape from a fishing fine.
Finally, once they calmed down, the first blonde reached into the tackle box beside her.
“Well,” she said, “now that he’s gone…”
She pulled out a massive bag of potato chips.
The second blonde grabbed sandwiches from a cooler.
The third one uncapped a bottle of lemonade.
And then, without even touching the fishing rods again, they simply sat there eating lunch beside the river.
That’s when the second blonde frowned.
“Wait a second.”
The other two looked up.
“What?”
She pointed toward the riverbank.
“Where are the magnets?”
The three of them froze.
Slowly, all three turned toward their fishing lines.
Every line was gone.
The poles were still there…
…but the strings had vanished completely into the water.
The first blonde jumped up. “What happened?!”
The third blonde grabbed her pole and started pulling frantically.
Nothing.
The line wouldn’t budge.
Then suddenly—
SPLASH!
A muddy bicycle wheel burst out of the river attached to one line.
The second pole jerked violently.
Another splash.
This time it was an old shopping cart covered in algae.
The third blonde pulled with all her strength until an enormous rusted safe surfaced halfway out of the water before crashing back in.
All three screamed.
That’s when they heard slow clapping behind them.
They turned around.
The game warden stood there grinning with his arms crossed.
“Funny thing about magnets,” he said calmly. “They attract metal.”
The blondes stared at him in horror.
The warden pointed toward the mountain of junk now dragging their poles toward the river.
“Congratulations, ladies,” he said. “You officially ARE cleaning the river now.”
Then he pulled a folded ticket book from his pocket.
“And since you admitted you weren’t fishing…”
The blondes sighed with relief.
“…I guess I can’t write you a fishing citation.”
All three smiled instantly.
Until he added:
“But I can fine you for illegally dumping half a scrapyard back into state waters.”
The smiles disappeared.
The first blonde blinked. “Wait… what?”
The warden pointed at the floating shopping cart.
“Ma’am, unless that cart belongs to you, somebody put it there.”
The second blonde panicked. “We didn’t dump it!”
“Maybe not,” the warden replied, “but now you’re responsible for removing every single thing your magnets pull out.”
The three blondes looked at the river.
Then at the shopping cart.
Then at the safe still half-submerged underwater.
The third blonde groaned.
“We should’ve just bought fishing licenses.”