Of course, there isn’t one.
“Mack, open up!” I shout.
“I know you’re in there!”
Nothing.
“You can’t hide from me.”
Menacing but untrue. Also. Still nothing.
“I have a picture of you. And I’ll show it to others if you don’t let me in.”
Yikes. What a thing to say. But I can’t help it. I have to see him again. I have to know what’s going on. The questions I have about him haunt me unrelentingly.
“Wait!” A muffled sound comes from inside. The smooth, deep voice. Then a splashing nose and a splat, splat, splat. “Just wait.”
He must’ve been in the tank. How fucking weird. Then again, who am I to judge? A woman who considered hiring a locksmith to break into his apartment.
My eyebrows lift in anticipation before the door opens an inch, and I see his eerie pale eyes and smooth, scaly face peeking through. A chill runs down my neck. His presence does something to me.
“How do I know you’re alone?” But his voice remains deep and smooth as ever. Still guarded. Still cautious.
“Because I’m a loser without any friends?” I say, lifting a shoulder. Sometimes the truth is the most persuasive answer.
His large eyes move left and right as if he’s considering the veracity of that answer, and then the door opens. He hides behind it as I shuffle inside.
Once I’m in, he immediately locks the door.
He holds out a hand. He’s wet, slick with water, leaving a trail on the floor. “Show me the picture.”
“You can’t delete it, I’ve saved it to the cloud,” I say.
“Yeah, I get how blackmail works. I just want to see it.”
“You can’t see my phone.”
“Send it to me, then.”
“I need your phone number. Do you even have one?”
He briefly shuts his eyes and brings his hand to his forehead. “I’m a fish, not a Luddite. Of course I have a phone.”
The gesture is so human. So is his voice. His posture, the way he moves and speaks.
But his appearance is so . . . not human.
“555-7632.”
I smother the surprise that I’m sure is on my face. I can’t believe he gave up his number. I type it into my phone and send him the pictures.
He furrows his brow. “These are the pictures I sent you. I thought you secretly took one of me or something. You’ve tricked me.”
I shake my head and reach out toward him. He backs away, as if afraid. “Sorry, I’m not trying to touch you . . . I was just trying to show you where to look in the photos.”
“Oh,” he says and scratches at his forehead.
I get a closer look, and he doesn’t have fingernails, but this gesture, in particular, looks very human. I wonder where he learned it.
“May I?” I ask.
He thinks for a moment. “Fine.”
I walk closer to him, filling in the space between us and stepping to his side so we’re not in an intimidating face-to-face stance. I know firsthand just how intimidating that posture can be.
“Here . . .” I say, reaching toward the phone in his hand and making an open-pinch motion on the screen with my index finger and thumb. I zoom in on the area in the corner of the picture, the one he sent of the framed man. “Look closely, look here right in the corner.”
He glances over at me, and now I’m sidled up next to him. I can really see every detail of his form. Each small iridescent scale, like they’re drawn on with ink and oil paint. His ears too, like holes in his head, but they’re tipped with little triangle-like fins. Almost as if to mimic a human.
“You noticed that?” He lowers the phone, again turning his gaze to me. “You saw me?”
I nod. “Yeah, I can be observant sometimes. Not all the time. Just sometimes.”
He shakes his head. “Why did you still talk to me after this?”
I shrug. “How was I supposed to know what I was looking at? I knew you were a catfish, I just didn’t know you were a cat . . . fish. You know what I mean?”
To my absolute surprise, he chuckles at that, lowering his focus to his feet. “And now that you see me for who I really am?”
