Behind the Acrylic

6am

I hear the heavy door opening from above. Feeding time! My gills flutter with excitement. I slowly sway and make my way to the food swimming down at me and my roommates.

Tubs, the fat nurse shark is the first to snatch his share. The smaller fish are lucky enough be full with a morsel of food. I wait for the shrimp and sometimes tiny fish that they add to our diets. We aren’t meant to be here behind this thick plastic, but yet here we all are.

There’s Tubs, the nurse shark. She’s a bully and not very kind to anyone. There’s the school of Clownsfish, they live in the anemoni way below the tank. They are very quiet and keep to themselves. There are the Oscars, they are a grumpy bunch of fish with their black and orange scales and a permanent frown on their faces. Then there is me and my group, we are Sting Rays. We live as much as we can here, in this large tube pressed against a spiral staircase. We swim around and around all day, with people sitting around us in fancy tables enjoying our friends on their plates.

10am

It’s been a while since breakfast and now we just continue to swim around and around. I join my friend Frankie, one of the other sting rays, on laps around the fake coral.

He doesn’t seem like himself. He’s been a little blue around the gills. That’s what this place does to us. I haven’t gotten there, yet. But many have come and gone with the blue gills. It’s what we call getting sick from being trapped in a plastic tube.

“Hey Frankie, how’s it going?” I ask him with genuine concern. He looks at me with sad eyes. Says nothing but gives a little shrug with his fins.

“I feel sick. Like this feeling inside of me that’s just eating away. I miss my family.” He responds with a quiver in his soft voice.

He, like most of us, were taken from the ocean. Just plucked out while we were living our lives. We see the ocean, our home, if we swim all the way to the top of the tube and look out the back window of this restaurant. It’s so close, our home, our families. But so far from us at the same time.

“I’m sorry Frankie. I know it’s hard. I miss my family too. But you have to keep your fins up. Try to make friends here, the Oscars are pretty funny.” I say to him to try to cheer him up.

He swims away without saying anything. I swim quietly behind him thinking and wishing we could do something to go back home. But we can’t. We are stuck here, no family, no infinite ocean. Just a large tube with fake coral and sad fish.

11am

I’ve been here for almost 7 years. I’ve seen many fish come and go but Tubs, the Clownfish, and myself are the first ones to be placed in here. I don’t know why the blue gills hasn’t affected me yet. Perhaps is the random joy I get from making fun of the humans sitting around us eating and eating. Or maybe it’s because we have a food schedule and I don’t have to worry about it. Not sure, but I hope to not get the blue gills anytime soon.

It’s 11 now which means the restaurant is open. It’s rather large. White top tables surrond our tube, white chairs and small lamps at the center of each one.

12pm

The first humans have been seated. A family with 3 kids. Frankie hates children. He says they make him sick with their sticky fingers smudging the plastic. I don’t mind them though. When they place their faces on the plastic, I swim up to them real close and blow bubbles. They love it. Their little laughs echo into the tube and sounds like the laughs of dolphins from home. They remind me of home.

Just then one of the kids comes up to the side and starts following Jake, one of the Oscars. I swim up to her and her big blue eyes catch mine. She points and yells something over her shoulder. I blow bubbles at her and she giggles. Beautiful sing song giggles.

6pm

Dinner rush. The humans continue to shuffle in and out and the ones in black that bring our friends on plates, seem tired and ready to leave.

I think the only thing that really bothers me is that these humans eat fish and other friends from our ocean. They watch us here but eat our friends out there.

The night continues as I take another lap around the fake coral, I see Frankie. He is still and upside down. I swim up to him and he’s gone.

10pm

The humans are gone. Frankie is gone. When I found him belly up it took a while for the humans to notice. It happened very quickly, like it always does. The door at top they drop our food in, is the same one they scoop us out of.

It happens so often that it sadly doesn’t affect us anymore. We always think that anything is better than being stuck in here. Swimming around and around.

6am

I hear the heavy door opening from above. Feeding time! My gills flutter with excitement. I slowly sway and make my way to the food swimming down at me and my roommates…