Aquarium by David Vann Page B

thousand feet down, I said. There’s no light. And no sound.
    Shalini giggled.
    Shh, I said. We can’t hear anything.
    Shalini put her mouth on my ear and breathed, slow weight of the ocean and my spine curling like a shrimp. She held my head in both hands and kept her mouth to my ear and I was arched against her, pressing hard, caught in place, almost paralyzed.
    You’re my fish, she whispered. I’ve caught you.
    She put her leg over me, and now I was being pressed down, held down against the bottom of the ocean, and this was exactly what I wanted. She pulled off my shirt and lifted her dress until we were skin against skin and I could breathe her in and she climbed onto my back and bit my neck and I moaned and this was my first pleasure, my first memory of pleasure.
    We were twelve, and we of course knew nothing, but this was the day of my second birth. Shalini pulled off all my clothes and wore only her bracelets and we moved in darkness guided by feel, without idea, the purest desire, and I wish I could return to that first moment, our own Eden, innocence and desire the same.

B y the time my mother picked me up the next morning, I was jangly from lack of sleep, buzzing inside. My spine alive as a sea horse fin, fluttering.
    You look like a zombie, my mother said. A happy zombie. What did you do?
    We swam, I said. Floated.
    I didn’t know they had a pool. It must be inside and heated? But their house is small.
    Yes, I lied.
    The drive was very strange, being in a car, seeing the world outside pass by. All of it had changed. Bright and clear and small, even though there was no sun. The air without distance, the Space Needle as close as any house beside us. The way a fish can hang in stillness if the tank water is clear and calm enough. Suspended, held by nothing at all. Time no longer linked to object, the world muffled and without echo, without pressure, without movement.
    I went to bed as soon as we arrived, slept through the afternoon until my mother woke me for dinner.
    I don’t know about sleepovers, my mother said. You do need to sleep. They’re not called wakeovers. Shalini’s parents did nothing to make you sleep?
    I felt so heavy I couldn’t answer. Lying in some deep-sea trench, all the weight above, unable to keep my eyes open.
    I hope you can sleep tonight. We have to get you up and moving for a few hours at least.
    My mother pulled me out of bed, made me walk and drink and eat and talk, all of which I observed from far away. All I could think of was Shalini. And then I remembered the old man.
    Someone wants to meet you tomorrow, I said. At the aquarium. An old man.
    An old man? Someone who works there?
    No.
    Well who then?
    I was still submerged. I regretted trying to talk about this with her. Just someone.
    Do you know him?
    Yes.
    How?
    We talk about the fish. He’s kind of like the three-spot frogfish. His hair and his old hands.
    How long has this been going on?
    I don’t know.
    You’ve been talking with some old man and you didn’t tell me?
    I closed my eyes and drifted back down, the pull irresistible.
    Caitlin. My mother grabbed my chin and made me look up at her. I was sitting at the table and she was standing. What is his name?
    I don’t know.
    Has he made any plans with you?
    What?
    Has he offered to take you anywhere?
    I couldn’t think. No, I said, and then I remembered. Just the Sea of Cortez, in Mexico, to see manta rays. They do backflips.
    Caitlin! my mother yelled. That voice jolted me awake. Fear in both of us. You are not leaving school tomorrow, she said. You are going to stay right there. And I’ll come as soon as I can, then we’ll drive to the aquarium, and we’ll arrive with the police.
    No, I said. He’s my friend.
    Has he touched you?
    What?
    Has he touched you?
    No. I mean I just sat with him and he hugged me. He was helping me.
    Has he ever touched your chest?
    No. I mean yeah, but just because I was panicking and my heart was going fast.
    Caitlin! My mother slapped