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The psychic fish hates you. It doesn’t tell you in words. It doesn’t implant the thought. It just looks at you, eyes wide in its Tupperware home.
Mayonnaise. You grab the jar and close the door.
The psychic fish hates mayonnaise. It’s a stupid thing to remember. Did it tell you, or did you pick it up yourself? Is it just another scrap of memory you cling to, trying to hold on to what you have? Not that you ever really had the psychic fish. That wasn’t its way. From the day you brought it home from the fair, fat and golden-scaled, it was its own fish. The carnival worker said it would grow with love. Is that why it became too big for its bowl? Too big for your heart?
Your heart, laid bare to its fins, to its bulbous eyes, so quick to dismiss, its fins never deeming you worthy.
The psychic fish hates touching. It prefers to keep to itself. It has its own music, books, friends, thoughts, and you’re not a part of those. You never were. When you couldn’t take it, the silence, the loneliness, you bought it a friend. Another fish for it to play with.
You open the refrigerator, and the psychic fish watches you. Its friend is gone, flushed away. It blames you. It hated its friend, but still it blames you.
The psychic fish hates friends. It hates birthdays and parties and proposals and tears. You give it everything, and it hates everything.
You stare into its fish eyes, a gold blur in your vision. You close your eyes, tight, tears streaming down your cheeks.
The psychic fish hates you.
It hates the minnow net, the walk to the bathroom, the smell of toilet bowl cleaner, the instant relief of letting go, of finally saying goodbye, and I’m done with you.
The psychic fish hates the sewer.
You walk to your room, and listen to sad songs, and slowly, you forget.
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Originally Published in Grievous Angel.