Aquarium

~ ~ ~

The old man remained submerged with the fish, hidden away, and my mother finally appeared. I ran to her through the rain and wind and swung that heavy door and was safe.

Hey sweet pea. You’re turning into a track star.

I didn’t say anything in response. I didn’t know where to start.

What’s wrong?

I was looking down at my jeans, wet below the rim of my coat.

Caitlin, you have to tell me now.

Shalini invited me for a sleepover tomorrow. Can I go?

My mother laughed. Is that it? I thought something was wrong. Of course you can go.

She pulled away from the curb then and we drove through the flood, sprays of water rising on both sides, each car with fins like the dealfish, transparent, revealed in headlights. Day but dark, the seas drained, and all of us splashing along the bottom looking for another sea. Others passed, racing ahead, all drawn the same way. The most frantic flight.

I have her parents’ phone number on the class list, my mother said. We’ll call when we get home. And is it okay if Steve comes over for dinner?

Steve was already at our apartment when we arrived. We could hear his harmonica as we rose up the stairs, low sad song, Summertime. My mother stopped on the stairs and closed her eyes and we just listened for a while in the cold. A song that kept falling. When he was finished, he said I know you’re there.

My mother smiled and we rose the rest the way. He was sitting against our door, legs stretched out and boots crossed, flowers on his lap and two bags of groceries beside him.

I thought I’d fix dinner, he said. Mexican night. Halibut fajitas, guacamole, margaritas. Un poco de salsa.

He rose and my mother gave him a squeeze and a kiss. Then we went in and they ignored me. While he worked in the kitchen, my mother pressed up against the back of him like a shell. I sat on the couch and did my homework, reading about kids who were building a tree fort together in some sunnier place.

Don’t forget to call, I said.

My mother and Steve both looked up from some dream, startled to hear another voice.

Sorry, sweet pea, my mother said. I forgot. She detached from Steve and went to the wall for the phone. She looked up the number and dialed and I listened. They were inviting me early, just after lunch, to spend the whole day and then the night. I was so happy I started hopping up and down.

Look at you, Steve said. A Mexican jumping bean.

My mother hung up and said, Okay, after lunch tomorrow. Shalini’s excited too. Don’t hop, though. We’ll get in trouble with the neighbors.

She went back to Steve, but I didn’t care. I would have Shalini all to myself for almost a full day. I couldn’t focus on the reading. I just sat on the couch and felt happy.

My mother and Steve were drinking margaritas in our big plastic water glasses, pink and blue, my mother getting louder from the drink, laughing and punching Steve and climbing all over him.

When dinner was ready, she sat close to him at our small round breakfast table and I was on the other side of the circle. A large plate of fajitas between us, thin strips of halibut and bell peppers, mushrooms and onions. Corn tortillas warmed up. A bowl of guacamole, jar of salsa. I took a big scoop of guacamole and a tortilla and started eating. I was starving.

Steve was doing his bouncing chuckle, and my mother was grabbing at his chest and stomach and arms, those biceps. But at one point he noticed me.

Hey, you’re not having any fajitas, he said.

I don’t eat fish, I said.

He looked so sad suddenly. It was immediate.

I’m sorry, he said. I should have known. And I told you this was my favorite fish, didn’t I. The halibut. Those eyes.

It’s okay, my mother said. She doesn’t mind if we eat fish. It’s a great dinner, and you’ll be rewarded.

I’m sorry, Caitlin, he said.

It’s okay.

My mother kissed him then and took him away again. They never resurfaced. Somehow we ate the rest of the dinner and he did dishes and we had ice cream for dessert and they went to bed and all of it happened without my becoming visible. I was in my room reading and fell asleep without knowing.

When I look back, I’m happy for my mother, and I think it’s good she knew how to make me disappear. I think it was necessary, and I don’t think I even felt bad at the time. Maybe a little lonely, but that was all. We were still in the same house together, and safe.

Shalini was waiting for me at her front door. Her mother behind her with painted eyes and a red dot on her forehead.

I shrieked, and Shalini shrieked, and we ran toward each other and collided and swung around in a circle, jumping up and down. Our mothers were laughing.

Shalini had a beautiful red and gold dress and hoops of gold on her arms, bare in the cold.

Come in, her mother was saying. Shalini, bring your friend inside.

Inside their house was like a palace. Not much bigger than our apartment, but no wall was bare. Thin veils hung like curtains, golden elephants on red carpets, candles and bright pillows and carved dark wood.

We took off our shoes and my mother drifted away and I hardly noticed. Smell of spices thick in the air, all that I smelled each day on Shalini at school but stronger now. Looking back, I’d guess it was clove and cardamom, turmeric and raisins, maybe even something sweeter, cinnamon or something else, but at the time, it was only a kind of magic, overwhelming. I had entered a new land entirely. This is what I’ve always loved about a city, all the worlds hidden away inside, largest of aquariums.

Shalini’s father wore a business shirt and slacks, even on a Saturday. He shook my hand, and I think he had greeted my mother before she left, and then he disappeared too. He smelled like sweet smoke.

Shalini led me to her room down a narrow hallway. Stuffed animals and pillows covering her entire bed and much of the floor, a goddess with golden arms on her wall. At least twenty arms like Shalini’s, each holding a red flower against black velvet, as if a person might take any form, as varied as fish and as brightly colored.

I wish you had that many arms, I told Shalini.

How would I ever put on a shirt?

I laughed and pulled her onto the bed. A soft comforter and all the pillows, much softer than my bed. I had my nose in her hair, smelling her, and I put my hands inside her shirt, feeling her skin. Here are two extra arms, I said. I could feel goose bumps all along my arms and down my back. Her stomach smooth and warm, heart and breath fast. We can be like fish, I said. Let’s get under the covers.

So we threw the pillows and stuffed animals off the bed, got under the comforter, and I pulled it over our heads. We’re a thousand feet down, I said. There’s no light. And no sound.

Shalini giggled.

Shh, I said. We can’t hear anything.

Shalini put her mouth on my ear and breathed, slow weight of the ocean and my spine curling like a shrimp. She held my head in both hands and kept her mouth to my ear and I was arched against her, pressing hard, caught in place, almost paralyzed.

You’re my fish, she whispered. I’ve caught you.

She put her leg over me, and now I was being pressed down, held down against the bottom of the ocean, and this was exactly what I wanted. She pulled off my shirt and lifted her dress until we were skin against skin and I could breathe her in and she climbed onto my back and bit my neck and I moaned and this was my first pleasure, my first memory of pleasure.

We were twelve, and we of course knew nothing, but this was the day of my second birth. Shalini pulled off all my clothes and wore only her bracelets and we moved in darkness guided by feel, without idea, the purest desire, and I wish I could return to that first moment, our own Eden, innocence and desire the same.