Angelfish

“Five hundred seventy-eight thousand, one hundred and eighty four.”

“That’s a big number. Does the Federal Reserve know they’ve been hit?”

“That, my dear, is how many hours I’ve spent loving you,”

Soft blue light refracted from the big tank and spilled onto Marlo’s aging olive skin. It bounced onto the walls and peaked around the corners of the busy Aquarium. Vibrant and busy life was not just found within the perimeters of the tanks; the once abandoned space was now teeming with human life forms preparing to entering the next chapter.

He thought Marlo the most beautiful then, at that moment. Though not for the reasons one may expect. Not because her dark curls were still full of miraculous energy or because her full lips had been expertly painted brown or even because she could still fit that sapphire dress he’d bought for her so long ago. He thought her most beautiful because there, in that light, her vibrant soul outshined the sun. She’d dedicated her life to rebuilding that community. She petitioned and campaigned and protested and pleaded, and was even jailed a few times, and the fruits of her labor would finally be culminated and displayed there at the grand opening of their aquarium. He was more excited than she was, but that was to be expected. They were that kind of couple. Inseparable and attached at the hip; she was his rib, he was her everything.



“You have not!” She protested, laughing, “That’s too many hours,”

“That’s exactly 66 years and a day,” he said smiling.

“You have not loved me since I was born! You didn’t even know me until I was 13!” She giggled.

She never laughed with anyone the way she laughed with Johnny. In truth, she held a stone face with most people. Marlo was kind, but tough. You had to be to see the things she’d seen—live the life she’d lived— and still continue to believe in the possibility of a better world. But Johnny, he melted her. All it took was a smile dripping in his Southern boy charm and she was a school girl again: blushing and playing in her hair like she was a child.

But she was not always like this— for him or anyone else. She could remember a time where his boyish charms were nothing but red flags and warning signs. Even still, it was at that very aquarium, in fact, 53 years ago, that they met and he fell in love with her. And though she may never admit it, she fell in love with him too, quickly and most assuredly.

The year was 1969. A 13 year old Marlo had raced her sister from school to the aquarium’s parking lot where most of the school aged children tended to meet in their spare time and on weekends. Marlo and Grace were no exception, but they couldn’t have been more different in their intentions for going. Grace was three years older than Marlo, and really only went to meet up with the boys she got in trouble for talking to during class. But Marlo herself enjoyed trading bows with the girls from the other schools that she rarely got to see.

“No, Clarice! My daddy got me this one from Ethiopia, you cannot have it!” Brenda said snatching back her bow.

“Yo daddy ain’t neva been to no Ethiopia!” Clarice snapped back.

“Yuh huh! And he’s gonna take me there next summer!” Brenda insisted.

“Liar!” Clarice shot.

 The two girls bickered and name called, like they usually did, with Marlo silently in the middle, thinking of ways to change the subject.

“My momma made this one,” she said, pointing to the big pink and white bow she wore. Both girls stopped arguing to look at it.

“It is pretty,” Brenda said grinning.

“I know!” Clarice said, her jaw agape, “Its got glitter on the ribbon part!”

“Yall wanna hold it?” Marlo asked, unhooking it from her hair.

“Yeah!” Both Clarice and Brenda said in unison.

But no sooner had Marlo untangled it from her thick, brown curls, than did a gust of wind snatch it from her hands and send it floating though the air.

“Catch it!” Clarice yelled pointing at the bow as it danced through waves of wind.

The girls stood on their tippy toes and hopped and leapt and bumped in to one another chasing Marlo’s bow, only for it to finally rest in the palm of a 15 year old boy who was paying no mind to a girl his brothers were circling around.

“Marlo, watchu doin’?” Grace said annoyed. Grace was mean and snappy anytime she was around a boy she liked.

“Her bow flew off!” Clarice said out of breath. Marlo and Brenda stopped at either side of her, huffing just the same, their hands resting on their knees as they tried to catch their breath.

“This bow?” The boy said opening his palm. His amber eyes had been locked onto Marlo from the second she arrived in their circle.

“Yeah that’s the one,” Marlo said quickly taking it from him, “Thanks.”

“This is my little sister, Marlo, “Grace introduced, “and her friends… I guess,”

Marlo. He could taste the syllables of her name on his tongue. It felt like smooth ice in a glass of lemonade, hitting the top of his lip on a 102 degree day in the Southern summer sun. It was cool and refreshing and sweet and strong. He found himself looking at her like this for years, unable to take his gaze off the girl with the lemonade name. Even when he moved to live with his grandmother in Kansas, he found himself uninterested in other girls, unable to get that one special one out of his head.

“Would you hurry up? We not even supposed to be in here!” Marlo would whisper to Brenda 3 years later. They’d found themselves inside the abandoned aquarium on a dare they probably shouldn’t have taken. But when Clarice and her boyfriend called them chicken, they found their reputations risked and their options limited.

“You know she only wanted us in here so they could kiss right?” Brenda said rolling her eyes.

“Yeah, I know,” Marlo laughed, “But to be honest, I wanted to see what was inside here,”

Brenda sighed as she looked around the damaged space surrounding them. The walls were covered in mold and graffiti and torn wallpaper. All but one of the tanks had been emptied or smashed to bits by the bored gang kids and dead and dried fish entangled with glass littered the floor. It was dark, save for the light from Brenda’s flashlight, and smelled liked stale bread.

A part of Marlo lamented the sight that surrounded her. The windows had been boarded up, so that only sneaky bits of light could shine through, but she’d remembered a time when she practically lived at the Aquarium with her mother. While Grace and her father preferred sports games, the two of them would spend hours making up names for the fish and giving them backstories. The same fish that had been suffocated in oxygen and left to die on the cold, hard aquarium floor.

“It could be worse,” Brenda shrugged nervously, “My brother’s gang used to hang out here. He’d kill me if he caught me playing around the old aquarium.”

As if on cue, a noise rattled in the distance. Both girls let out a squeak and held on to each other as Brenda dropped her flash light.

“What was that?” Brenda whispered shakily.

“An animal… probably,” Marlo whispered back, equally as scared.

“Maybe it’s my brother and his friends?” Brenda suggested, far preferring that to some ferocious animal she’d imagined. “Tripp! Is that you?” She called out. Her question was met with more rattling which prompted a scream from her as she held on tighter to Marlo. Marlo, tired of cowering, shook Brenda off of her and picked up the flashlight.

“Whoever… or whatever… you are, make yourself known! We don’t got time for games!” She shouted in the strongest voice she could muster.

The noise rattled a bit more before two boys jumped out yelling, “Boo!”

Both girls were a bit startled, but Marlo grit her teeth to avoid showing it.

“Hey girls!” One boy said smugly, approaching the girls. The other followed closely and quietly, his hand firmly gripping his backpack strap.

“Darren you scared us!” Brenda said bashfully.

“Not me!” Marlo said folding her arms.

“Yeah! You were a little scared!” Brenda said as Darren put his arm around her, “Who’s your friend?” She asked.

“You remember Johnny!” Darren said, slapping Johnny on the back, “He moved a few years ago. He’s back now though. Aint that right J-Man?”

Johnny ignored Darren, his gaze once again finding Marlo. He needed no introduction: he would know her anywhere. Even in the dark, he was entranced by her silhouette. He found himself wanting to say something, anything, to her, but his words escaped him. He was dumb and weak at the knees around her, that lemonade girl.

“You just here for the summer or somethin'?” She asked him noticing his stare.

“N-no” he stammered out, distracted by her melodic voice. He cleared his throat and tried again, “Me and D are getting a place,”

Marlo nodded. She thought Johnny was cute. He had a nice smile and he was tall, which was a bonus. But cute or not, this boy was hanging out with Darren, which was never a good sign, and she thought herself wise to keep away from both of them.

“Come on Bren, let’s get back to Clarice and Charlie,” Marlo said grabbing Brenda’s hand.

“Don’t spoil the fun Marlo, we just got here!” Darren protested, grabbing Brenda’s other hand.

“We gotta get home, Darren! Let her go!” Marlo said pulling harder.

“Don’t I get a say?” Brenda yelled trying to break free from both of them.

Marlo was not one for arguments she didn’t foresee herself winning. With an annoyed and abrupt “fine!” Marlo released Brenda as Darren pulled her again, sending Brenda's flashlight flying into the last remaining fish tank. It smacked the glass with a 'THUD' that echoed through the empty halls, followed by a cadence of cracking sounds that seemed to go on forever and then suddenly ended.

“At least it didn’t break,” Johnny whispered. But in that exact moment the tank, clearly listening to him and determined to prove him a liar, burst open from the cracked space, sending year-old dirty water washing through the building.

“Eww!” Brenda yelled, “It got in my hair!”

“Bet that flashlight is a goner,” Darren laughed, prompting Marlo to roll her eyes.

She looked around the room: Only three of them, including herself, were accounted for.

“Johnny you okay?” She called out. Panic washed over her as her inquiry was met with silence,

“Johnny?” She said again, more hurriedly. Brenda and Darren joined in the search until Marlo found him squat down near where the tank once stood.

“Hey, dude, you aint hear us calling you?” Marlo whispered frustrated.

“Shh,” he said gently, his hands and a water bottle methodically working. She crouched beside him, soaking her dress in the process. Through the flickering rays of the dying flashlight she could see his fingertips wrapped around two small blue and green fish as he tried to work them into the mouth of his water bottle. He’d managed to get the blue one in, but the green one was refusing to go, preferring to stay circling about in her shallow pool.

“You gotta scoop her,” Marlo coached, showing him how to do it, “She don’t know you and she’d scared. You gotta be gentle with her. Show her you just wanna get her back to her guy, not take her away from him.” She finished by gently pouring the fish and the water in her palm into the water bottle.

Johnny looked at her, amazed, as the two fish encircled each other, happy to be back with one another. Marlo looked up from her pruney hands and met his gaze, holding it silently for the first time. Maybe this boy wouldn’t be so bad.

“I’ve got something to confess,” a present day, more mature Marlo said to Johnny, still holding that same adoring gaze, “I’m scared,” she whispered into her slightly trembling hands. She leaned on the glass in front of the base of the seal habitat. Above it, a trainer would be preparing Willie the seal to meet hundreds of business men, women and elementary school children. He would be giving her a hard time, refusing to come from his cave, nervous about seeing hundreds of faces... like Marlo.

“What if… what if they see me. Differently than you see me. Or ask me a question I can’t answer? I don’t perform well under pressure”

Johnny chewed on the question for a brief moment, looking up towards a black rubber fin that had floated down into the water. Like instinct, Willie had dived down to retrieve it for the trainer and brought it back up for her. It was likely that she didn’t even have to ask him—he’d want to. While he was fearful of the new faces, he trusted the one that had been there with him from the beginning.

“Don’t look at it as performing,” Johnny finally said, “Don’t even look at them. Look at me. You can always look at me,”

She gave him a warm and trusted smile that only lasted for a second before a wave of sadness crashed into her. She turned towards the glass and looked to a small clownfish that had seemingly taken interest in her. She put her pinky on the glass, pretending to pet the fish before turning back to Johnny.

“Why’d you leave?” She asked holding back tears.

“You can’t exactly deny Uncle Sam, Marlo,” Johnny whispered sweetly whilst approaching her, a gentle chuckle forming in his throat.

But in that space, under a water filled glass bridge, he remembered her most painful memory with her. One that began in 1974 and had continued through to that day.

The pair that had been inseparable for two years sat on separate ends on what would have been the darkroom starfish habitat of the abandoned aquarium. They’d sat in silence for what seemed like hours before Marlo’s poetic voice cascaded towards him.

“We could run away you know?” She suggested, “They say the war is almost over anyway. We’d change our names; hide until they weren’t lookin’ for you anymore.”

Johnny cracked a smile. His first in hours.

“Your daddy would miss you, darlin’” he said slowly walking towards her, moving stray pieces of broken ceiling out of his way as he went.

“And I would miss you!” Marlo said fighting tears.

He enveloped her in his warm embrace, her small frame sinking into his brooding chest. He held her tight, secretly fearing he’d never be able to do so again.

“What if I gave you something I’ve never given anybody else? Just to hold on to until we see each other again? Then you can give it back if you want,” Johnny said smiling.

“What?” She asked looking up at him, her eyes ladened with salt water.

“My last name,” he said staring into her eyes, beaming.

"Mrs. Hall?” A reporter said, interrupting their memory, “We’re ready for you,”

Marlo looked into her husband’s eyes. She still had no answers, but maybe she didn’t need them. She had him and their legacy and it was enough.

“Four hundred sixteen thousand, three hundred and six hours,” she began, her eyes resting on Johnny. “That is how long I’ve spent pouring all of me into rebuilding this place. My husband and I started when I was just a girl and when he died…” she paused, choking on her own words. She stared at the blank space she imagined he'd be standing in.

Look to him, she thought, smiling, as a lone blue fish swam across the tank in her peripheral.

“When he died in 1975,” she continued, “this place felt like the only way to keep his memory alive. We had no children. This was our child. When I could not spend time with him, I spent time here, nurturing it; loving it. Taking what some had written off as dead and, with your help, pouring life back into it. I stand here, proud. Proud of the hard work performed by our many dedicated volunteers. Proud of what this aquarium means for the coming generations. Proud of the home we’ve created, not just for the aquatic life that surrounds us, but for our community as well. This was the place I made friends, fell in love, got my heart broken and was rebuilt. It was home to me and now, I give it to you. It is my greatest honor to present the Johnny L. Hall Memorial Aquarium!”

She finished, beaming at the crowd before her. And when the lights had shut off and the people had gone home, she was still beaming, still proud to have furthered his legacy and made a difference.

“You stole my line,” Johnny laughed, standing next to her as she watched the jellyfish float to the top of the last lit tank.

“And your last name,” she smirked, “Still want it back?”

“No,” he laughed, “I think naming the spot after me was a fair trade,”

She sighed, smiling contently as two green and blue fish slowly swam before her, seemingly linking fins.

“I miss you,” she sighed tilting her head up, the light from the tank illuminating her sapphire dress as she stood in the aquarium alone.

“Five hundred seventy-eight thousand, two hundred and eight,” the empty halls sang as she headed to her car and the final light shut off.

“That, my dear, is how many hours I’ve spent loving you,”