Goldfish

Gary got buried yesterday.

I had The Only Thing on repeat while processing his departure which, at first glance, was certainly expected – he was pushing triple goldfish digits – and, on second surmise, most comfortably distant. After all, it was a seventh semester college trek, a three year spanned pilgrimage, and a terrible long minute since I last saw him. I was tending to my window cactus garden before I got the phone in.

And it was exactly the way my mother was so cavalier about it. It was exactly that. “Oh, by the way, Garebear went ahead” as was the customary way of phrasing it from my hometown. Maybe I wished we dispensed Garebear a little more dignity, a smidgen more grace – anything more would’ve prevented a hand tremor slip into cacti thorns. I’m sure of it.

Maybe that blood could serve as mild tribute at least. Maybe it could articulate something I couldn’t before hanging up.

Gary was a gift shuffled about a third grade birthday, courtesy of a cross-the-street neighbor. Some Chuck’e’cheese typical ritual and, on reflection, the last one. After that I’d protest that I was a grownup and needed the grownup venues. I got them, hiding the fact I missed the cheer before.

Anyways, I always had the suspicion he was a re-gifting, a pawning off from some bad decision two weeks prior sort of thing. But I didn’t care. As soon as I saw his googly eyes surveying me I bursted into a birthday demanded suggestion he ought to take center stage of our living room, upon entrance. And it was granted.

So it became habitual, with every bus stop walk through the door. I’d greet Gary and Gary, if he could, would surely greet me. He was the only one home most of the time. And not only a greeter, but a counsel too. While my parents were on business trips I’d sit against the aquarium talking through anything.

I’d tell him about what happened that day, what others did, things I learned – especially history, which I knew Gary loved too by the way his tail moved. Eventually I’d move to the coffee table to scribble about homework, repeating its questions and explaining my answers. Some days when I did well on a test I’d press it against the glass so Gary could see. The same with drawings. And when I got my first GameBoy to DS playing variations of Kirby I’d move a chair to sit so Gary could watch while I gave commentary. Right after feeding him.

Some days were spent processing school betrayals, or bystanding some bullying and guilt-ridden minutes. It must’ve been a little unfair to Gary to endure such somber topics. Somber topics that came more frequently with each year passing. But after I’d talked it all out we’d share a renewal of silence, and in that silence I’d imagine Gary regaling his traveling days – the days before he decided to stand guard at our doorway.

Part way through 11th grade so everyone began to scramble for the Right Path, some Harvard aspirations. And my parents floated about as faint memory with each excusable trip, business or otherwise. Growing used to the chilled dark and empty house, and all toys packed, and all games tucked away, I felt the rug tugging underneath me.

As though I needed to say goodbye to the general ways and water of things around me. Mutedly left while I stumbled onward, and with a molten staggered breath I’d wonder if I’d be dissolved soon. In this eclipse everything merged into a deeper dim – everything, except the faint blue glow from the living room.

While the world eroded around me Gary gifted a stability. Acting as a transport, or a submarine I’d imagine our living room together. A hearth beyond the vortex. Some nights I’d decide to sleep on the barely used leather couch while the gravel vacuum puttered into the night.

With Gary’s support I ventured forth, through exams and uncomfortable college essays suggesting that, if I pretended to be something more vulnerable, then they’d somehow be emotionally tugged enough to slot my application as accepted. Whatever it was, I’d write about Gary, and it seemed to work under the pretense that Gary wasn’t a goldfish.

In my essays Gary was a strength unmatched and a patience unwavered. With an alternate world it was Gary that kicked the sand into those that taunted me. It was Gary that encouraged me to try out drawing, or helped me with homework, big decisions. I never saw it as a lie, because beyond his form everything was the same in this world. He was there while everything else disappeared before my eyes.

On the day I packed up for college, the home and the streets around it were unrecognizable. Some paintings about the stairwell seemed spawned in, or the glass cup had a ridge to it undeniably new. Staring out toward the main road I couldn’t remember any of the neighbors nor the kids playing street hockey two blocks down, though mostly staring at their phones. It was a different world.

And it was an afternoon where my parents were home, ready to “see me off” even if they’d soon leave for another flight. I suppose this is the same as a birthday to check off. A birthday departure, and instead of gifts you had giveaways – and despite my protests, my parents suggested it best to leave Gary still by our doorway. They’d have a cleaner come by to feed him they assured me.

Upon first entry into the apartment the thought of Gary faintly glowing in a vacated home stabbed at my conscious perpetually. All those days he provided me company, grace, and in his final years I left him with nothing but a door that, maybe one day, would open to another bus stop walk greeting. But that day never came.

He endured three years of silence while I tended to my cactus garden or “career” aspirations. Guarding a doorway for a family missing, a friend wandering.

I was able to manage the guilt if I forgot for a moment. But how can you forget about something that was most of your life? When I tried to articulate why I wanted to see my goldfish to my roommate, they only pressed more questions, perplexed to why I’d care about a goldfish soon to depart.

I never had the courage to say why. Or how it bothered me they’d suggest Gary would be gone soon. I’d drop the topic and go to my room and clasp a pillow to plug the hole in my chest, to sink in my frustrated and furrowed eyes. And I’d calm myself with the thought that, well, I can get him here next semester, surely. Somehow.

Each year passed and with each year a renewed promise that, one day, Gary will see this new world with me, faintly glowing to guard our apartment door. Toward the end I then rationalized that, well, it’s almost all over, and I’ll get to him soon.

Now I will never see him again. Of course it didn’t matter how my mother delivered the news. And of course no one will know nor understand how I couldn’t stop the tears flowing, collapsed to the floor and trying to steady my convulsings and struggled breath between the wailings, deafened by the walls closing in. A faint blue flickered to dark.

I never accounted for a world without Gary. A broken world that separates you so casually and viscerally from certain continuity. Hollowed out and filled with doorways without greetings, goodbyes without meanings. In my pitiful state I could only fend with invasive thoughts about how I failed at the fundamentals: finding a way to be with those you love and care about.

After laying disheveled to deal with the grief in several 20 minute waves so eventually I found the stillness and quiet in dusk. Staring at the ceiling fan so I remembered the same ceiling fan of our shared sanctuary, which connected to a night I almost forgotten.

A same sort of dusk and with a glow around the walls I had a different set of silent sobbed tears drying. Close to sleepy. It must’ve been two birthdays since, before the middle school brink – most likely due to some isolation kicking in. I murmured to ask Gary how he dealt with loneliness before nodding off and, at the cusp of dream, I swore I heard something.

“In my traveling days I used to feel a little distant even if I had companions about me. Goodbyes were horrible in those days, but what could you do?

“Yet after enough traveling I once met an upstanding bananafish and we shared a twenty month trek more before parting. But the entire time we were together I didn’t have a bother and upon departure there wasn’t a loneliness either.

“It was then I realized that loneliness may not be about the distance. Everywhere I went I thought about those bananafish days and found myself content with my single seagrass suite, coral reef room of one. I’d stare out into the deep water and knew my twenty month friend was out there swimming all the same. Maybe he found a different ocean, something farther beyond this world and body, and still for whatever reason I found myself convinced we never left, as if time no longer had meaning.

“It felt like a dash of insanity, perhaps bordering a continual seance, but despite my inner arguments I concluded that one has connection with everyone you meet, anywhere you go, whatever form. Even if they’re across heavens. They never stop being your friends.

“Such a day will come where we seem to depart, and however guilty you feel I hope you realize the same I did. That though I loved every moment we spent these days together, however distant, I’ll love the next thousand more, because it’s only a matter of time before we meet again. However it goes I’ll keep you hidden company until then. Be sure of it.

“I’ll look forward to seeing you again.”

I awoke in a startle, pushing some 9:30 with the dusk firmly set in, delivered through the cactus window garden glass. Tears flowed once more and adjusting myself up so I’d wipe with my elbows. But there wasn’t as much of a hollow to my chest. I gathered myself and sniffles to whisper, “I’ll look forward to seeing you again too, Gary.”

A faint blue glow flickered from the opposing wall.