I have now slogged through the Handbook for the New Aquarist, and my parents are keeping their promise. It’s Saturday, and Dad is taking me to buy an aquarium.

Tanks for You is in a strip of shops on a busy street that’s walking distance from our house. Today Dad and I are taking the car, but I’ve walked over and hung out here lots of times. Besides the fish store, there’s a drugstore, small grocery, dry cleaner, ice cream shop, Chinese restaurant, barber, and a sandwich place.

“Hey!” Dominique says when I walk in. “How’s it going? I’ve been expecting you.” He smiles. His teeth are very, very white against his dark skin.

“Hi,” I say.

“Have you used that cheat I gave you to go to the hidden level in DeepSea Danger Hunt yet?”

“Yeah,” I say, “a couple days ago. It looks cool!” I don’t tell him how disappointed I was not to be able to explore the deep, dark hole in the sea.

He nods. “I hear the new game will be out in about a month.”

I nod back. “Cool,” I say again. I feel a little uncomfortable bantering back and forth with Dad around. I mean, I’m just a kid and Dominique’s pretty much already a man, but Dominique and I talk a lot. I think Dad might think our conversations are pretty weird and that Dominique’s weird for sort of being my friend.

But Dominique doesn’t seem in the least uncomfortable. He turns to Dad and says, “I’m Dominique Martin. Gabe and I have been talking for weeks about his new aquarium. We also seem to like some of the same computer games.”

“Dominique, I’m Peter Livingston,” Dad says. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“So, Gabe, are you ready to choose your equipment?” Dominique asks, his white teeth flashing.

“Uh—well—sort of.”

“Okay. Let’s get started setting you up.”

I take the list I’ve made out of my jeans pocket. “Well, a twenty-five-gallon tank,” I say. “Acrylic, not glass. A rectangle.”

“I don’t have to tell you that with acrylic you have to be extra careful not to scratch it, because it shows scratches more than glass,” he says.

“Yeah,” I answer, “but acrylic tanks look better than glass.”

Now Dominique turns to Dad. “Acrylic provides better clarity,” he says. “It’s also a little more expensive, but not much. He’s right to want it.” Dad nods his approval, and Dominique disappears into the stockroom to get my acrylic aquarium. When he reappears with the tank in his arms, Dad asks him where he’s from.

“Guadeloupe, in the Caribbean. But I’ve lived here since I was ten years old. Still, we speak a lot of French and Creole at home. So you can hear a little accent in my voice.”

“Just a little,” Dad says. “And I’d be happy to have an accent if it meant I could speak three languages.”

With all the conversations I’ve had with Dominique, I had not entirely figured out that he speaks with a slight accent. It seemed to me that Dominique just had kind of a musical way of talking.

“Actually, I speak four languages,” Dominique says. The smile again when Dad makes an exaggerated surprised face. “Spanish, too. I took it in middle and high school.”

Dad nods his appreciation.

“And Dominique takes classes at the community college and is waiting to get a scholarship to the university,” I say. “To study biology. And then to go to medical school.”

“Well,” Dominique says, “I’ve been admitted to the university. But the only way I can afford to attend is if I get more financial aid than what the school has offered me. So I’ve applied for this scholarship from a private organization that helps science students. I’m told my chances are good. But I don’t know whether the scholarship will come through or not.”

“When will you find out?” Dad asks.

“Not until July,” Dominique says. He shakes his head. “And it’s only May.”

“I wish you the best of luck,” Dad says.

Dominique gets back to the business at hand. Examining the acrylic tank he brought out from the stock room, he says, “Okay, one brand-new acrylic tank, unscratched as far as I can see. Want to double-check?”

I look it over. Clear as can be. I nod.

“Do you need a stand?”

I shake my head. “No, there’s this ledge where it’ll fit just right. It’s near an outlet so I can plug in the stuff that needs to be plugged in.”

“It’s not a window seat, is it? You don’t want to put an aquarium near a window. The sun will cause algae to grow, and the water can get too hot or too cold.”

“Nope, not a window seat. It’s a big ledge in the computer room. We used to pile up books and papers and manuals from computer games there. This morning I cleared out the junk that was there.”

I tell Dominique all this, and he approves. “So the next items need to be a cover and a light. And a heater and thermometer.”

I turn to Dad. “If I only kept cold-water fish, like goldfish, I wouldn’t need a heater. But the neatest fish are tropical fish, and they like warm water.”

“I can see that this is not your ordinary goldfish bowl,” Dad says. “By all means, let’s make it comfortable for your new pets.”

We add an air pump to keep oxygen circulating in the tank and a filter to help keep the water clean. Then comes colored gravel for the bottom. I choose a combination of neon yellow and orangish-pink.

“Now plants,” Dominique says. “Live plants are great, and we have them here—ferns, water sprites, water wisteria. They can help keep the tank clean by reducing the build-up of algae. But I don’t recommend them for a beginner, and even lots of experienced aquarists don’t use live plants.”

“Why not?” Dad asks.

“They’re hard to grow and keep alive. They can be particular about their water conditions and sunlight. When they start dying, they can make a real mess in the water. I’d stay away from them.”

So I choose a few artificial plants. Then I look at some of the other tank decorations, like large colored stones, little ceramic shipwrecks, and statuettes of deep-sea divers wearing diving suits and helmets.

“Look at this guy,” Dominique says when he sees me looking at them. He picked up one of the divers.

“Victor!” I exclaim.

“Sure looks like him, doesn’t it?” Dominique says. “But it’s just a coincidence. The company that makes this diver has been making him since way before there were computer games.”

“Well, maybe one of the programmers at DeepDown Software had one of these guys and modeled Victor after him.”

“Could be,” Dominique says. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

“Can I get this diver, Dad?” I ask. “It’s not expensive.”

Dad checks the price and okays the purchase.

Dominique goes behind the counter to ring everything up. “Okay, we’ll add this bottle of water neutralizer, and you’ll be all set.”

Dad and I look at each other. “Haven’t we forgotten something?” I ask.

Dominique looks at all the stuff. “Not unless you want to get a net today,” he says. “But that can wait until next time.”

I look at him to see if he’s joking. But there’s no flash of teeth.

“The fish!” I exclaim.

“The fish,” Dominique repeats. “Not today. Hey, man, I thought you did your research.” Now the teeth flash, but I can tell he’s not kidding. “You have to get your aquarium going first, get it all nice and clean and the water all settled and the temperature stabilized. You make a nice home. Then you add the fish.”

I don’t remember reading that in that bogus Handbook for the New Aquarist.

“Aw, come on!” I say. “This is like bait-and-switch!”

Big grins now from both Dominique and Dad. It takes me a minute to realize that I made a pun—and I didn’t mean to. What I meant was that I thought I was getting everything I needed for an aquarium today, and then at the last minute I’m told I can’t have the best part.

“I mean,” I say as they stand there grinning, “what a rip-off!”

“Come on, Gabe,” Dominique says. “I would be ripping you off if I sold you your fish. They’d probably die in a brand-new aquarium.”

“You can be patient,” Dad says.

I have no choice. Dominique adds up all the equipment and slips a pamphlet on setting up an aquarium in the tank. Great. Another boring thing to read.

“Thanks, Dad,” I say. I know my voice doesn’t sound all that grateful, but I really do mean it. We’re standing on the sidewalk outside the store.

“You’re welcome, Gabe,” he says. “Dominique seems to know what he’s talking about. I know it’s hard to wait, but in a couple of days you’ll have your fish.”

We load the stuff in the car and then set off on foot to do errands at the drugstore and dry cleaner. Soon it’s lunchtime, and we stop in at the sandwich shop to eat.

I like going out to lunch with my Dad. We don’t talk all that much, but we have a good time. And we always get a double order of fried onion rings. Mom usually grabs at Dad’s stomach if he orders onion rings when she’s around, and, as he says, it’s hard to enjoy something fully when you’ve been reminded that it’s going to show up right there.

“Let’s go home, and you can get to work,” Dad says when we step back out on the sidewalk. The car is right in front of the aquarium store. Inside, I can see Mr. Newman, the owner. Dominique just went on his lunch break. We saw him going into the sandwich shop as we came out.

Dad and I stop at the same time. I think we must be having the same thoughts.

“Uh—Can we go in here again?” I ask.

“Well, just for a second,” he says. “Yeah,” I say.

Mr. Newman is always friendly and agreeable. He agrees, for example, that some fish are hardier than others and that three hardy black mollies and three hardy flame tetras would be a safe way to start off my aquarium. They would look excellent together, too. I should just be careful about getting the temperature right around seventy-five degrees before adding the fish. But that’s what I bought a thermometer for, isn’t it?