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Survivors
Alix Womack
It was dead, only its white underside visible in the far corner of the tank where it was floating belly up behind the filter. Its tail oscillated in the current created by the filter’s regular circulation system and Isai hesitated. He could feel its presence – the presence of death that swarmed out into the room, seeping up into the shadowy lampshades whose bulbs had long ago been salvaged for freebasing. After a few minutes of debate, he yanked the filter cord out of the wall and scurried out of the fish room and into the kitchen. He could see the outline of the tank from the corner of his eye as he frantically searched for the mirror among the remnants of his former life: food wrappers mingled with the newspapers that littered the floor, making Isai wonder when he had last actually thought to eat.
If there had been a door between the two rooms he would have closed it.
Turning his back to the dark shapes shifting through the fish room, he emptied a bump onto the mirror, cutting it into three lines and immediately inhaling two of them. He faltered over the last one for a second before hastily breathing it in as well. As he felt the paranoia subside and the normalcy of the coke-high set in he let out a deep sigh and jumped up to take on the day.
A week passed, and then two. The shark-fish consumed the living room to the point that Isai had stopped going into it all together. He had transferred all of his drug paraphernalia to the bedroom a couple of days earlier, eliminating the need to enter the kitchen, which was isolated on the far end of the apartment past the fish room.
It was Sunday, and he was going to catch the 16 downtown as he did every Sunday. As he passed the fish room he hesitated and glanced into the darkness. The fish was still there. He hadn’t seen it for fourteen days, but he knew it was lurking in the darkness, lying in wait in the smoky crevices of the barren room. A smell he equated with death crept out into the sunlit anteroom, grasping out in greedy tendrils, threatening to pull him down into the murk. He felt grotesquely captivated, scanning the dark shape in the far corner for any sign of the fish. Had he dislodged? Were his decaying odds and ends suspended throughout the unfiltered liquid, clinging to the coral skeletons that lined the back wall of the tank? He forced himself forward, breaking his trance successfully only once he realized that if he didn’t leave immediately he would miss the bus.
He
boarded at the corner of South M and
Suddenly everything changed.
Who was this who had boarded? He had never seen her before. He couldn’t even explain what had drawn his attention to her. She had soft brown hair, like a fawn, and was smiling in the general direction of the bus driver, timid eyes darting everywhere but his face as she slowly poured her change into the machine. She accepted her transfer and stumbled back into the row of seats across from his as the bus jolted into motion.
She looked young. Nineteen maybe, and pulled a book out of the small cloth tote she carried over her shoulder. She twirled her hair casually around her index finger as she read. She pursed and pouted her lips, absorbed in the tiny world that lay in her palms. He was captivated.
The insomnia was unbearable. Isai’s eyes darted to the floor where the lighter and the light bulb sat waiting. Sleep. SLEEP. He clenched his eyes shut, exhaustion pulsing over him in waves. Everything was muted except the deafening sound of his teeth scraping against one another. He didn’t want to get high, he wanted to rest, but that didn’t seem like it was going to be an option. After another minute or two he reeled out of bed, kicking the pile of clothes on the floor in frustration. Holding the lighter under the light bulb, he wondered where the beautiful girl from the bus was. As he took his first hit, he imagined her sleeping soundly in her bed, warm and safe and comfortable. He gave her a family and a happy storybook life as he let the counterfeit endorphins take hold. A minute or two later the initial high had worn off and Isai wandered out of the room in search of something to occupy himself for the long night hours to come.
The week went by slowly, and the shark fish became so overwhelming that Isai took the sheet off of his bed (its only covering) and tacked it up over the doorway. He walked past it on Sunday, barely even hesitating, and pushed determinedly through the oppressive atmosphere to the front door and out into the crisp morning.
He was ecstatic to be on the bus as he hadn’t been in years. His leg tapped uncontrollably as her stop neared, as he envisioned her sweet face. He repressed the feeling of microscopic spiders scurrying up his forearms as he watched her board. She really was the most beautiful creature he had ever seen. She smiled at Military Man and his wife as she made her way again to the seats across from Isai’s. His face felt wet as he watched her pull the book out of her bag. He could taste copper and touched his lip, finding it slick with blood. Panic surged up from his stomach into his throat. She was going to know he snorted coke – the moment she saw the blood she would know he was nothing better than a junkie. He searched frantically through his pockets for something to stop the nosebleed and looked up suddenly, startled to see her so close. She had a mole on her left cheek, just below her eye.
His eyes narrowed. “What?”
“Here.” She smiled, arm extended, her gaze faltering only slightly.
He accepted the small offering, a tissue, and wiped his face clean. “Thank you.”
She slipped back into her seat.
He hesitated and then, “What is your name?”
“Amber.” Startled, she looked into his eyes for a moment before glancing up at the ads that lined the ceiling of the bus. She was squeezing her right hand with her left, running her left thumb over her right index knuckle rhythmically.
Isai realized he was grinding his teeth again, and clamped his jaw shut, staring out the window.
Amber…
He felt as if every particle of his matter had become independent. He was floating, spreading into every room of the house, lighter, happier than a cloud. The real withdrawals hadn’t hit him yet, and the adrenaline he currently felt was propelling him through the house with a new sense of purpose. He walked immediately into the newly lit living room, straight towards the fish tank. The light bulb he had just replaced flickered briefly, but Isai was too euphoric to notice. He was cleaning up his act and cleaning up his life, starting with this fish.
He peered into the tank, the water opaque and brown. A thick film of black and red fungus had spread across the glass and the water was covered in a substantial layer of a green algae-like substance. He could just make out the shark-fish, its body still whole, all of its parts intact, floating upside down behind the dormant filter. The moment the stifling air of death was out of his house he was sure he would have the willpower to get clean – he would have the will power to do anything. He dove his hand down into the tank, grabbing it with his fist. It felt slimy and whole, its cold skin still firmly wrapped around its tight bone structure. The second it was in his grasp something changed. The air in the room changed – Isai’s conviction faltered. In that moment the shark-fish slipped out through Isai’s fingers, snapped around with one flick of its tail and latched onto his hand, hard. Isai yanked his hand up out of the tank in distress and confusion. The shark circled through the blood pool a couple of times before reclaiming his place behind the filter.
Isai stared vacantly at his hand as blood streamed down his palm and spattered softly on the orange shag carpeting. The light flickered once, twice, and then went out, leaving him in an endless sea of darkness.