Lessons in Timing by Sylvia Barry

Author:Sylvia Barry [Barry, Sylvia]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Riptide Publishing
Published: 2024-04-21T18:30:00+00:00

July 27th - Nineteen days until the convention

When I woke the next afternoon, Lucas still hadn’t emerged, and Gaston and LeFou were both floating at the top of their tank, already starting to smell like the underside of a pier.

I came upon them while brushing my teeth, and the brush hit the carpet with a hollow thud, spattering my legs with paste.

I’m not proud of this, but I reached into the rancid tank and tried to animate them, as if part of me thought they were just asleep. It was possible that I might have been speaking to them as well, whimpering and begging them like a child to Wake up, please. When there was no response, I retrieved my phone with slimy fingers and desperately googled: reviving dead fish.

Retrospectively, it seemed like there shouldn’t have been as many hits as there were.

There wasn’t, however, anything useful.

I ended up standing over the tank and, aye, weeping—softly and with what was hopefully a certain amount of manly dignity.

I had been talking with—at these fish for weeks now, and I felt we’d had . . . How could they just . . .?

A second realization dawned on me. I’d thought the disappearance of the second batch of muffins had been a positive sign.

How badly was Lucas doing? What had happened?

He still hadn’t responded to any of my texts. My eyes wandered toward the hallway, to the door of his bedroom. I could, I could always just, but that—

That didn’t . . . No.

Just no.

Even in these, the gravest of circumstances, I couldn’t handle the idea of knocking on his bedroom door. Not hungover, with a tear-stained face, dead fish in my hands.

Instead, I retreated into the numbness of my own mind. I wrapped Gaston and LeFou in a plastic bag and set them gingerly in a corner of the freezer. Then I took on the impossible task of notifying Lucas. I couldn’t bear the thought of giving him the news over text, so I grabbed a page from the pad on the counter.

The fish are dead, I wrote. Then: They’re in the freezer.

Oh fuck. They were dead before I put them in the freezer.

This was a disaster. I crossed everything out, crumpled the note, and began again on a new page.

It’s not my fault.

No, my condolences, bloody hell, something’s happened. How was this getting worse?

In a desperate attempt to be done with this task, I scribbled something nonsensical onto a fresh note and slapped it on the side of the empty tank.

I focused on getting dressed and presentable in time for Finch to collect me. Then ignored his concerned inquiries about my welfare and his comments on the fact that I was, once again, visibly hungover.

“Are you sure you don’t want to go to the doctor? The campus clinic does walk-ins, and you’re looking really pale—”

“Titch.” I groaned helplessly. “Just drive.”

Finch was unrelenting in his attempts to get me talking right up until the moment he realized that if he followed me to the classroom, he’d likely have to face Skyler again.

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