All right, I agree. What else would you have of me?”
“That you tell all other people my rules and make them abide by them.”
“All other people? What other people? There is only me and my wife.”
“And if I tell you there will be more?”
“Who? Who else is coming?”
“That I cannot see. But they teem like a red tide.”
“Where are they?”
“Ah. That’s a puzzle, isn’t it? Tell me, how did you begin your life?” the fish asked.
“Well, I—” Chilingana stopped, bewildered. He didn’t know. He had never thought about it before. He had always simply been. His wife and the world had always been. So, too, the storyfish must always have been.
“You know little of the world,” said the fish.
“All right, you’re so clever, you tell me how I was begun.”
The fish’s tail flicked impatiently. “I’ve said already all I’m going to say until you honor my wishes. I do hope you’re a social animal.”
The fish’s snout loomed over him. Its laughter shook the waters, and Chilingana floundered helplessly.
He awoke with a start to find himself slouched beside the creel. His stung hand was red and swollen. The storyfish floated just below the water level, its huge eyes following him. “Why,” he said, “I must have dreamed this.”
“You think so?” said the fish. Although it remained beneath the water, its voice rang clearly in his head. “Honor your promises tonight. Then come and talk to me in the morning before you throw me back into the ocean, and I will tell you the most important thing of all—a thing you will not want to hear. But you must.”
“What’s that?”
The fish said nothing more.
Chilingana got up. He grabbed a clay pot and hurried down the steps to the water. The smell of frying fish made his stomach grumble, but he ran on. At the bottom he filled the pot, then hauled it much more slowly back up.
His wife met him at the top. “So there you are, you foolish man. I looked all over for you, I called to you. Where had you got to?”
“I was right here.”
“No, you weren’t. I came out and found your fillets but not you,” said Lupeka. The discussion would surely have blossomed into an argument, except that she noticed her husband’s swollen hand. “How did this happen?”
He first scuttled over to the creel and emptied the pot into it while he spoke. “There, fish. There’s some more water for you.” Setting down the pot, he said to his wife, “The fish stung me. It’s nothing. Nothing at all.”
“Nonsense, that needs tending to. It’ll have poison in it.”
She led him inside. His wife had cooked the fillets beautifully. He stared at them, his mouth flooding with desire, while she bandaged his hand. Finally she let him sit on the floor and handed him his portion.
He was about to take his first bite when he hesitated. The food dangled from his spoon. Lupeka asked, “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” replied Chilingana. “I just—” He lowered the spoon. “I just want to give thanks to these fish for letting me catch them. For giving their lives to sustain ours.”
“That’s an odd thing to say. And why are you bellowing?”
He said, “No, it isn’t odd at all. From now on we’re going to honor them whenever we eat. We’re going to thank them just like this.” Then he ate the food.
His wife decided that the poison from his hand had affected his brain, and so she refrained from argument.
After dinner Chilingana was exhausted. His wife insisted that he go to bed and rest. He complied. She covered him with her body to keep him warm. Into her ear, as he drifted to sleep, he muttered, “Tomorrow I’ll know everything.”
In the morning he awoke to his wife’s scream. He sat straight up on his mat and looked around the hut. She wasn’t there. He bounded outside, to find her beside the door. She had been carrying a huge fillet, which lay now at her feet. Its skin was blue. It was the storyfish.
“Fish!” cried Chilingana, and he knelt beside it. “Fish, oh no, fish, forgive me. Please forgive me. I would have put you back! Tell me the secret thing. The important thing.”
The headless fillet did not answer.
“Where is his head?” he demanded, finally paying attention to his wife. “What have you done with his head?”
She did not seem to see him. Her gaze lay beyond him on a more fearful thing. In a tiny voice she asked, “Husband, how did you create all