Silver Serendipity

The aquarium was nearly vacant at eleven a.m. on a Wednesday. I bought a ticket from the bored-looking woman sitting in the glass box at the entrance, headset plugged into her phone, as she responded to whoever she was talking to in between telling me my total.

I walked in and followed the familiar path through the smaller darker rooms that opened out to the giant circular room with the huge tube-like tank in the center. Maybe six people stood around, half of them at the little touch pool area off to the left side.

I found the tunnel I always crawled through that opened into a bubble underneath the center tank. Sitting cross-legged in my sheer tights and black skirt, I hunched a bit to fit in the child-height space. I watched a school of white-scaled fish swim past in front of me, the rest of the aquarium blurry through the layers of water and glass.

“I can’t do it, Mom,” I whispered. A shark followed the school past me. “I can’t watch them put you in the ground.” My voice shook and I played with a piece of yarn sticking out of the sleeve of my black sweater. My eyes stung, but the feeling had become near constant the last few days, so I ignored it as my new norm.

I have come here a million times. This was the first time I came without her. This place seemed to be where she found her muse, spending hours sketching on the bench near the tank I was under while I ran around, watching the fish swim and playing in the touch pool. She started going on her own when I got too old to be entertained by the same fish over and over again. I wish I could have come back here with her one last time before everything took a turn for the worse.

Through the glass, I saw a school of kids, dressed in white collared shirts and plaid pants and skirts, emerge from the dark rooms, spreading out around the tank and surrounding the room. The fish darted away as they ran up and thumped their hands against the glass, some even sticking their faces against it. A scratching sound came from my right before a little girl with two black box braids trailing down her back emerged from the crawl space into the bubble I occupied. The space was meant for a couple of kids, but with the two of us, it became a tight squeeze. The girl took no notice of our merged personal space, coming right in and smiling up at me.

“Hello,” she said, eyes lighting up as she looked around in every direction. “There’s so many fish in here.”

I nodded, not wanting to leave, but also not wanting someone else in here with me. I could hardly tell this child to go away though, so I stayed silent, hoping she would lose interest. Eventually, her eyes fell back on me, and her little forehead wrinkled. “Why are you in here all alone?”

I considered how to answer, not wanting to ruin this random kid’s day. “I’m hiding,” I offered.

“Oh!” She perked up. “This isn’t a very good hiding spot. Everyone can see you through the glass.” She tapped the bubble wall beside us, and I chuckled.

“I guess you’re right.” I looked out, seeing the blurry room and the newcomers running around wildly. “But I’m not hiding from anyone. I’m kind of just hiding from the world today.”

The girl looked out at the tank too. “My mom says that hiding from problems just makes them worse.”

My heart clenched and I looked down at her. Tears rimmed my bottom lashes and I sniffed, pulling them back. “My mom used to say that too.”

She smiled. “Mommies are the smartest.”

I smiled. “Yeah, they are.” I wiped my nose on my sleeve, the tears coming back with a vengeance.

“Sasha!” We both looked over toward the crawl space where the shout filtered through.

“I have to go!” The girl scrambled to leave, throwing a wave over her shoulder as she disappeared. I watched her emerge from the other side of the tank. An adult woman stood by the entrance and began to scold her before ushering her over to the side of the room where another group of school kids pressed up against another brightly lit tank.

I sighed, Sasha’s words flitting around in my head as tears fell down my face. After a few minutes of remembering my mom, picturing her there on her bench through the watery barrier, I hung my head. “Okay, Mom,” I said to the still air. “I’ll see you soon.”

I crawled out of the tunnel and stood up, wiping down my skirt and avoiding eye contact. With a slow glance up, I realized no one was looking at me and stood a little taller. Glancing back at my hiding spot, I took my first step forward and then continued across the room toward the exit.

At the door, I looked back one more time, Sasha catching my eye from where she stood, holding the hand of the woman now corralling another group of screaming kids. Sasha grinned widely, flashing all her teeth, and waved. I waved back, my lips pulling up before I walked out of the aquarium, got into my car, and started the drive to my mother’s funeral.