The Boy Who Swam With Piranhas

  Annie clapped her hands. “This is our nephew, Stan,” she said to her husband, “and he is rather more important than our fish.”

  “I’ve got fish of my own now, Auntie Annie,” said Stan. He showed her his goldfish and told the story of how he got them.

  “Oh, they’re gorgeous!” said Annie. “They’re the most beautiful fish in the whole wide world.”

  Stan put the bucket by the pallets, and as they ate, they kept looking down at the goldfish and praising them. All except Ernie, of course, who couldn’t eat at all. The memory of the investigator’s visit rushed and rolled and rocked through his brain.

  “Calm down, Ernie,” Annie kept saying. “Calm down and eat some cake.”

  But he couldn’t calm down. The cake was like dust in his mouth. How could he tell his family about Clarence P. Clapp? How could he face up to the catastrophe? He clenched his fists tight. He needed a plot, a plan. The goldfish flickered and flashed below him. He dipped his hand into the bucket and felt their tiny tails and fins against his fingers.

  “We need a new line,” he declared.

  “A what?” said Annie.

  “We got to move on from pilchards and cod.”

  “Move on to what?” said Annie. “And why?”

  “Cos we’re under attack!” said Ernie.

  Annie shook her head. “What on earth are you on about, love?”

  Suddenly there was a hammering at the front door, then silence.

  “What’s that?” said Annie. She got up and headed to the door.

  “Don’t go!” yelled Ernie. “Don’t let them in!”

  “Don’t let who in?” said Annie.

  “Them!” said Ernie.

  “Who?” said Annie. She opened the door.

  There was nobody there, just a white van driving quickly away. Then she saw it, a notice nailed to the door.

  DAFT

  DEPARTMINT for the ABOLISHUN of Fishy Things

  FIRST, LAST & FINAL WORNIN

  It is hearby declaired this 31nd day of Joon that a madman nown as Mr Silent has been discovered to be up to FISHY STUFF in his dwellin at 69 Fish Key Lane, and therefour that the madman and his family, if eny, is hearby served with a FIRST, LAST & FINAL WORNIN. Orl fishy stuff must stop imediately! Uthawise orl fishy parafinaylia (i.e. mashines and enjins and cabels and pipes and all the utha stuff I seen) will be forcibly removed. PLUS the sed famly will be evicted – i.e. hoyed owt into the street!

  Syned

  CLARENCE P. CLAPP ESQ.

  (envistigator first grade, seven stars, two pips)

  PS This is NOT a joak!

  PPS BEWAIR! The envistigator will return WITHOUT ANY WORNIN!

  YOU HAS BIN WORND!

  Got a Fishy Naybor? Call 0191 8765432

  We will sort them owt!

  Visit our websight: www.DAFT.gov.

  When he saw the notice, Ernie jumped onto a gutting machine. He waved his fists in the air. “No surrender!” he yelled. “We’ll fight them in the bedrooms and we’ll fight them in the kitchen and we’ll fight them in the hall. We’ll build barricades and booby traps. No surrender! No surrender! God and justice are on our side!”

  “No, they’re not,” said Annie. “There’s nothing but daftness on our side. Look what we’ve done to our lovely home!”

  “But look what it’s brought us,” boomed Ernie. “Look at this thriving business. We’ve got cash in our pockets and food on our table!”

  “Table?” yelled Annie. “We haven’t even got a table!”

  Quietly Stan backed into his cupboard with a piece of birthday cake. He crumbled fragments of the cake and fed it to his fish. Their little mouths opened and closed, just like they were singing happy birthday to him, and Stan softly sang along.

  He held his hand in the water and tickled and stroked the goldfish. They rose to the surface and peered out at him with tiny dark eyes.

  “You’re my best friends,” he whispered.

  Outside, Ernie thundered about the sales of sardines, the mark-up on mackerel, the profits on pilchards.

  Stan shook his head. “Those fish don’t matter,” he whispered. “Goldfish are the fish that matter. Goldfish are gorgeous. Goldfish are great.”

  The thirteen fish wriggled and waved in the water, just like they understood. Stan giggled and smiled at them. He was sure that if they could, they’d smile back.

  All went deadly quiet outside.

  No machines, no chanting or singing, no arguing.

  Annie came to Stan’s cupboard door. “Your uncle’s thinking,” she whispered.

  “Thinking about what?” Stan whispered back.

  “Just thinking,” said Annie.

  They listened to the silence together for a moment.

  “Maybe thinking’ll bring him back to his senses,” said Annie.

  “Let’s hope so,” said Stan.

  And he sighed and smiled and Annie stroked his hair and the goldfish swam in a little shoal around his hand.

  Well. How can we watch what happens next? How can we read of such dastardly deeds and sinfulness and tragedy?

  What could be so awful? You may well ask.

  Oh, innocent reader, just do your job and read. Just listen. Just watch. Or close the book and go away. Turn to happier tales. Leave these soon-to-be-doom-laden pages behind. Go quickly.

  Otherwise read on.

  It’s deep into the night. All seems calm in 69 Fish Quay Lane. Stan’s in his cupboard, fast asleep. He dreams of ducks and fish in a bucket and of a girl’s eye peeping through a peephole in the dust. Annie snoozes too. Her dreams are of how things used to be. She holds the hands of her husband and her nephew and they walk and laugh beside the glittering river. There are great half-built ships standing there. There are men at work. There are fish and chip suppers on the quay. There are no fish-canning machines. Ernie’s voice is raised in gentle laughter.

  Ernie doesn’t sleep. He doesn’t laugh. He perches on a filleting machine. He thinks and thinks, and as he thinks a vision comes to him – a glorious, wonderful and awful vision. He knows that he should reject it, that he should ignore it, that he should fight it off.

  And he does try, indeed he does.

  He mutters to himself. “No.” He clenches his fists. “No!”

  All around, his machines are slumbering. There are gentle crackles of electricity, gurgles of water, hisses of steam. Ernie knows that the machines are his, that they are waiting, that they will do his will. He knows that they could make his vision real.

  But he continues to fight it.

  “No. Aargh! I cannot! No!”

  The night thickens and deepens, and the vision comes again, and again, and again; and Ernie mutters, “No. No. No!”

  And then it’s almost dawn. The stillest hour, the deadest hour. The darkest portion of the night.

  “No,” he whispers once again, but even as he whispers it he’s stepping down from the filleting machine; he’s tiptoeing past his sleeping wife; he’s tiptoeing towards his sleeping nephew’s door. He has a frying pan in his hand. And the machines are sighing, half in horror, half in joy, at what their master is about to do.

  “Be brave,” he whispers to himself as he creeps slowly towards the cupboard door. “Yes, it’s dreadful but it’s for the best. Yes, it’s cruel but it’ll make us rich. It’ll make us famous. Then nobody’ll be able to shut us down. Nobody’ll ever be able to take nothing from us ever again. Do it, Ernie. Do it. Do it for the future; do it for the family; do it for poor, poor little Stan…”

  He opens the door. A shaft of moonlight shines in upon the sleeping boy and falls across the bucket. There they are, the beautiful tender golden ones. By now, Ernie is deep inside his own vision. There’s no resistance left. He grins as he reaches down into the water, as he catches the fish one by one, as he puts them one by one into the pan.

  He catches twelve. They lie gasping and writhing and squirming in the pan. The thirteenth dodges and dives in the water, flicking free of Ernie’s
fingers again and again. He clicks his tongue and grunts.

  “Keep still, you pesky—”

  The boy stirs in his sleep. Ernie crouches still as a statue, hardly breathes. The twelve fish suck at the air in frantic agony and silence. The boy sleeps on. Ernie slithers backwards, crawls out through the door.

  “Come with me, my lovely ones,” he whispers. He hurries to his machines. “This won’t hurt a bit,” he says.

  He presses buttons, flicks levers, switches switches. He grins. He clenches his fists. He leaps with joy as the machines come back to vivid life, and begin to do his work.

  It’s daylight when Stan wakes. There’s no alarm, no hooter, no wakey-wakey. He rubs his eyes. “Am I late?” he says.

  Then he looks down into his deserted bucket. The single fish rises from its depths. And as its mouth goes O and O and O and O, Stan hears its voice somewhere in his brain.

  My companions, weeps the fish.

  “Your companions!” answers Stan. “Where are they?”

  The fish swims sideways, turns away its face. They are taken!

  “Taken? What do you mean, taken? Taken by who?”

  But there is no answer. The fish swims down to the bottom of the bucket in grief and silence.

  There is a cry from outside.

  A cry of dreadful joy, of triumph.

  “Yes! YES! YES! YES!”

  “Oh, no!” cries Annie.

  “YES!” cries Ernie.

  Stan stands up, opens his door.

  His uncle turns to him. “Here it is!” he cries. “Our new line!”

  And he holds up the little tin with the great golden writing on it: Potts’s Gorgeous Glittering Goldfish.

  What would you do? Jump for joy that your uncle was so clever? Go for him with your feet and fists? Say “I forgive you, Uncle Ernie. I know that your actions, though sadly misguided, arise from the best of intentions”? Would you beat the earth in anguish? Would you scream in pain? Would you howl with rage? Would you stamp and hiss and snarl and spit?

  Stan? He did none of these things. The horror of the tin transfixed him. He couldn’t move; he couldn’t speak. Ernie cradled the tin in his hands and murmured about a golden future. Stan’s eyes glazed over as his uncle talked of shop shelves stacked with gourmet goldfish tinned by Ernest Potts. He talked of diners nibbling Potts’s Gorgeous Glittering Goldfish at The Ritz.

  Annie went over to her nephew. She tried to hold him to her breast but he couldn’t move. He was a statue. His heart beat to the rhythm of the tragic words of the thirteenth fish: My companions! My companions! O my lost companions!

  Then Stan blinked, coughed, reached down and lifted his bucket.

  “I think I’ll go for a walk, Auntie Annie,” he said.

  “A walk?”

  “Yes, a walk.”

  Ernie smiled. “Good idea, lad!” he said. “Stretch your legs. Clear your head. Get a breath of fresh air.” He winked at Annie. “See?” he said. “He’ll get over it, won’t you, lad?”

  Ernie stepped aside as Stan brushed past him. He reached out to tousle Stan’s hair. Stan turned his face to him.

  “I’d rather you didn’t do that,” he said quietly. He opened the front door.

  “Stan?” called Annie. “Stan?”

  “I’ll be fine,” said Stan.

  “See?” said Ernie. “Give the lad some time on his own. That’s what he needs.” Then he had an idea. “Hey, Stan! You could go back to the fair. Get some more of those little beauties for me. Two tons or so should do it! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Tinned goldfish! They’ll knock sardines off the shelves! They’ll topple tuna! They’ll annihilate the anchovies! Tinned blooming goldfish! I’m a total wonder! I’m a fishy genius! Fame and fortune’s just around the corner… Ha-ha! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!”

  Stan turned, took one last look at his uncle and aunt, and walked away.

  Annie stood at the door and called Stan’s name as he walked off down the road. Should she pursue her dejected nephew? Or should she turn back and try to calm her husband? She teetered on the doorstep. Other eyes watched Stan, those of Clarence P. Clapp Esq. The DAFT van was half-hidden in an alleyway at the end of the street. Clarence P. pressed a beady eye to his telescope. He pointed it at Stan, then pointed it at the open door of 69 Fish Quay Lane.

  “Disgracious,” he muttered. “Absolutely appallin’.” He leaned back. “It is indeed just as I thunk, lads.”

  For this time, Clarence P. was not alone. He had the DAFT Squad with him, squeezed into the van, four burly blokes dressed in black with shaved skulls and thick necks and massive hands. Their names were Doug and Alf and Fred and Ted.

  “Take a look, lads,” said Clarence, and the DAFT Squad jostled to get at the telescope. “What d’you thunk of that, then?” he asked them.

  Doug said it was disgustin’.

  Alf said it was appallin’,

  Fred said it was flippin’ terrible, boss.

  Ted shook his head. He took a deep breath. “Boss,” he said, “I sees now that you is right in all you has telled us. The world these days is goin’ to Rackanruwin. It will be a honour to teach them people a lesson and hoy them into the street and smash their faces in.”

  “Well said, Ted,” said Clarence P. “His Grand Fishiness of Fishy Things would be proud of you. Now, lads, get warmed up.”

  And the blokes started to touch their toes and swing their arms and jog on the spot, and the van shook and jerked and squeaked. Distracted by the strange commotion, Stan paused as he passed by. Clarence P. focused the telescope right on his face.

  “Quick, lads,” he said. “This is one of them. Take a butcher’s at the face of evil.”

  The lads looked. They grunted and groaned in disgust.

  Fred retched. “That is the horriblest thing I has ever saw, boss,” he said.

  “Well said, Fred,” said Ted.

  “I’ll take him easy,” said Alf. “Can I kick his teeth out, boss?”

  “No, Alf,” said Clarence P. “He is just a minnow. We has bigger fish to fry. Let him go.”

  And Stan looked down at his bucket and walked on.

  Clarence P. opened his briefcase. He took out a piece of paper headed:

  He rubbed his hands. “Right, lads,” he said. “Heads up, chests out, backs straight. Out we get.”

  And the lads of the DAFT Squad muscled their way out onto the pavement.

  Stan walked on in the morning light. He walked past the Shipwright’s Arms and the Salvation Army hostel and the Oxfam shop. The river glistened below him, and far off was the bright blue sea. As he approached the waste ground, he saw that the fair was being dismantled. The great Ferris wheel lay in sections in the back of a large truck. The horses from the merry-go-round were piled up in a trailer. There was no sign of any hot dog stalls or candyfloss stalls, or Gypsy Rose’s ancient caravan. Stan walked among it all. Men swung sledgehammers and ropes and tarpaulins. There were yells and curses and the drone of engines. “Watch yer head, young ’un!” came one cry. “Keep clear, you daft little brat!”

  Stan ducked and dodged and walked. He didn’t know why he was here, what he hoped to do or find. He was aimless, still stunned. The earth shuddered beneath his feet.

  “Ye come back, then?” came a voice.

  Dostoyevsky, of course, suddenly walking alongside him.

  “Couldn’t stay away, eh?”

  Stan said nothing. Dostoyevsky walked closer. His arm knocked against Stan’s shoulder. He pointed down at the bucket. “Where’s the rest, then, eh?”

  Stan couldn’t answer. Tears came to his eyes. A voice inside him said, Get away from here. Go home. Another said, Keep walking. Walk to the ends of the earth, Stan.

  “Ye come te do some work?” asked Dostoyevsky.

  “Are you leaving?” said Stan.

  “Indeed we are. The stall’s took down, the ducks is packed, the caravan’s hooked up.”

  “Where will you go?”

  “Here and there and near and far. All the way
across the world and mebbe…” He paused and smiled. “Have you come to come away with us, young Stan?”

  “No,” said Stan, but even as he said it he was wondering if he meant yes.

  “I got some nice new fish,” said Dostoyevsky. “Lovely bright and shiny ones.” He leaned close. “Nitasha’d be pleased to see ye. She dun’t say much but I seen it in her eye. My guess is she’s quite taken with you, lad.”

  Stan said nothing. Straight ahead was a Land Rover with a caravan attached to it. Hook-a-duck ducks were piled up at the caravan window. Nitasha peered out through the window of the Land Rover. Stan had a sudden vision of himself sitting behind her, driving away from machines and tins of fish, moving free across the world.

  “Know what I think?” said Dostoyevsky. “I think you’re a lad that’s bin cooped up far too long. I think you’re a lad that’s ready for an adventure. Am I right or am I wrong?”

  Stan shrugged.

  “There’s plenty work for you to do,” said Dostoyevsky. “All them little fish to care for. And all them ducks to keep clean. It’s up to you, but seems to me you’re made for travellin’ with a hook-a-duck stall.”

  Stan sighed. Maybe Dostoyevsky was right. He certainly wasn’t made for working fish-canning machines in Fish Quay Lane. What kind of life was that? And what kind of life was it to live with a bloke like Ernie, who could do the dreadful thing he’d done last night? He took a deep breath.

  “And of course I’ll pay you,” said Dostoyevsky. “Jus’ like I said I would.”

  Stan took another deep breath. Be brave, he told himself.

  “OK,” he said. “I’ll come along.”

  “Good lad!” said Dostoyevsky. He opened the Land Rover door. “Look who’s come back to us, Nitasha!”

  Nitasha turned her eyes to Stan. She peered at him, just like she was peeping through a peephole. There was a fish tank on the back seat, with a shoal of lovely goldfish in it.

  Stan got into the Land Rover.