Secret Life

This first part of my new story is almost a true story!

Chapter 1

“No, not that one, that one.

No! Not that one! That one, that one! Not that one, the one behind that one, the one with the orange fin.”

“What are you talking about they all have orange fins.”

“But this one is oranger, ooh there it is!

Oh it got away.”

Larisa Ollerman, that's me, waved the net around half halfheartedly and the three hundred or so goldfish in the tank swam out of the way. All except six slow ones that I presented to my teenage girl customer.

“No, those aren't him.”

“It's a him now?”

“Yeah.”

“How can you tell?”

“I just can, I only want him.”

“Well trust me girl, the harder you chase him the faster he's going to run.”

“Huh?”

“Never mind,” I sighed. I'd been working at the Plantasia Pet Ranch for three months now and had yet to make a customer laugh despite my best efforts. I had been working with this particular customer for going on thirty minutes now and had so far managed to restrain myself from beating the girl's head into the fish tank. So far.

“I'm just saying,” I continued as I waved the net around.

“There he is!”

“That there are plenty of other fish in the sea, ones that would love to go home to a girl like you,” again my net inadvertently caught three unwanted fish, “why this one?”

“I just like him,” the girl shrugged.

I shook my head. This was the same reasoning my friend Shannon had used to explain why she was still with Josh Radcliffe though the boy resembled something they would sell at the Pet Ranch and was about half as intelligent. Of course Shannon hadn't made me catch Josh for her with a 9 inch net, out of a sea of gaping, bug eyed bozos, a fact I hadn't appreciated fully until now.

“Attention Pet Ranch shoppers, the time is now 8:50 and Pet Ranch will be closing in ten minutes. Please select all your final purchases and bring them to the front. For your shopping pleasure we will open again tomorrow bright eyed and bushy tailed at nine am. I won't be here, but uh you might be, thank you, thank you very much.”

I groaned. Not only that I had been chasing a stupid thirteen cent fish around a tank for the past half hour but because I could tell from that rambling chain of idioticness that Larry was closing.

“Hurry,” the girl whined.

“Oh you can't rush true love,” I sniped, which was a lot more polite than the reply I was thinking in my head which was something along the lines of; you're going to have this fish for four days before he dies and you flush him down the toilet, it doesn't matter what he looks like! It didn't help that the particular fish the girl wanted I couldn't tell apart from the other 299 fish in the cramped tank.

I glanced to the clock anxiously. It was 8:51. The girl had come in at 8:20 with a group of friends who had all got bored and left about twenty minutes ago, while I was cleaning one of the fish tanks.

“I always want what I can't have,” the girl said sagely as if that explained her behavior.

“Oh sure, you can have him,” I said, “and for the low price of 13 cents!”

The girl shifted uncomfortably. Oh please, I thought, there is no way you just now realize how ridiculous you sound. I knew customers like her- if they didn't know they weren't ever going to figure it out!

Only after I had netted out 275 of the goldfish into a smaller bucket did the girl finally shriek- “ohmygod that's him!”

I had just been about to dump the fish into the rest but I caught herself just in time and dumped it into the plastic bag that had been sitting open next to me for the last thirty four minutes.

“Well,” I said peering at it, “I sure hope it's a he, for your sake, unless you know, swing that way.” Please don't swing that way, I thought as soon as I had said it. The fish didn't look any better to me from this angle. He/ she? how could you tell really? was orange and covered with small scales, had two bubbly looking eyes sticking out from it's small head and was making gaping motions with it's mouth while it stared at her dumbly through the plastic bag. Actually, now that I thought about it- it did suit the girl perfectly.

“I hope you'll be very happy together,” I said as I handed over the bag. “For the thirty seconds that thing is going to live,” I muttered under my breath. Luckily the loudspeaker drowned me out.

“Attention Pet Ranch shoppers, the time is now 9 pm and the Pet Ranch is closed, please leave now.”