Peter Markus - The Fish and the Not Fish

When Him asked Girl where it was she lived, Girl said in a boat is where she lived. On a boat, Jane said back. Not on , was what Girl said back to this. I said I lived in a boat. A boat where? was what Jane stepped in to say next to all of this. There’s no place in this town for a boat to be a boat on, no pond or lake to float a boat. The boat, Girl said to this, that I live on, Girl said, is just as much dirt as it is boat. It’s a boat up on land, is what this girl said. Hey, do you three want to go see it?

Him and You and Jane all three of them said all three at the same time, Yes, yes, yes we’d like to see it. We like boats, You said, me and him, You said, we do, when in truth not once had these boys set a foot on a boat. Him did not say a word to this, though with a nod of his head he too said: I like boats too.

What Jane said to this was, Fools, there’s no boat in a town where there’s no place for a boat to be a boat on.

Oh yeah, Girl said, then come see and I’ll show you how a boat don’t need a lake or pond for it to be what it is.

Girl took them, Him and You, by the hands and she led them on a path in the woods out on the edge of this town to where her boat was the place where she lived.

This path, through these woods, these two boys, Him and You, with the girl named Jane who kept two steps in back of these three, this path, in this town, not a one of them had set foot on. She called it, this path, this girl who led them on this path through the woods they now walked on, she told them, it was called, the dead man’s trail.

Why’s it called that? was the thing that You asked.

Why do you think? Jane said from the back, so that Girl would not have to, a man died here on this trail.

Wrong, Girl said. It was a boy, is what she said when she said it. It was a boy who drowned in the lake.

What lake? Him said. There’s no lake in this town.

But there was, Girl said back. Where these woods are we see, there was a lake here, Girl told them, where now all we see are trees.

How could what used to be a lake be what it is we see here as woods and trees? is what Jane said she’d like to be told.

It just did is what Girl told her. The lake, it dried up and the dirt and weeds rose up to take its place.

And the fish? Him asked. Where did all the fish go? was what Him said this to all of this. And when he said what he said a bird, it was blue, it flew down, out of the blue of the sky, as if to say, to what Him had just said, My old man, he was a fish.

He was a boy, the truth is, is what Girl then just said, and she did not mean the bird that had dived from the sky. He was just a boy, she went on, but that was all a long time back when he was just a boy who walked out in the lake and he did not come back.

Why don’t they call it, You said he’d like this to know, the dead man’s trail and not the dead boy’s?

What Girl said to this was this: that it’s not called the dead boy’s trail where this boy walked and this is why: that the dead boy’s ghost has all grown up now to be a dead old man with long white hair that sticks out on his old man head and on his face.

That ghost of an old man, Girl then said, he is the one who haunts this here trail that we’re on.

At night, she went on, in a voice like a bell whose sound you can’t help but turn to try to see it, if you stand here real still, you can hear his feet walk on this dirt that used to be, way back when, the mud that was the floor of a lake.

What you just said, Jane said back to this, is what it is how God looks, Jane said. This girl, Jane said, thinks God is a ghost.

God is a ghost, Girl said this to this. He lives in the trees. He’s the sound a tree makes when the wind blows to let us know look up and then like this you will see.

You can’t see the wind, Jane said to all of this.

See, Girl said. Look up.

And when she did, yes, the wind made the trees shake and the leafs that fell to the dirt at their boy and girl feet, these leaves, each one, each leaf took the shape of a fish.

The boat that Girl took them to, the boat that she said was the house that she lived in, it looked like a boat that had sunk. This boat in these woods that looked like it had sunk, it had a hole in its side so big you could walk through it, and so walk through it and in it, this big hole in its side, was what Girl did when she came up to it.

In it, this boat, there was a wood chair to rock back in and some rope that hung from its back and a steel pail for you to spit in but that was it that was in this boat. Jane sat down in the chair and rocked back and forth in it and asked Girl if the pail was for her to piss in. Girl did not say a word to this, but when Him asked what was the rope for Girl turned and she told him it was a rope to hang all of her dreams from.

Last night I had a dream, Him said to this. I dreamed, Him said, that I was a fish.

A fish, Jane said from the chair where she rocked. In a town with no lake or pond for a fish to live in.

What’s that mean? You said. To be a fish in a dream in a town with no lake or pond in it?

What it means, Jane said, is that what you want is to be in a town that is not the place where you live.

It means, Girl said, to all of this, that you dreamed you were a fish. That is it.

If I was a fish, Jane said. I’d not want to be here in a boat. A fish in a boat, Jane made it a point for her to make, is a fish that is soon to be dead.

Is soon to be dead such a bad thing to be?

Him and You and the girl named Jane all looked at Girl who was the one to say this.

It is, Jane said, if you want to grow up to be more than just a boy or a girl.

But what if what you want is to be a boy or a girl who does not grow up to be old?

Jane stood up from where she sat in Girl’s chair. Who would want that? was what she then said to this.

Girl raised up her hand to say that she would want that. And then the hands of Him and You said and did the same.

Jane’s hands stayed where they were, hung down like hooks by the sides of her young girl legs. The light hairs there raised up as if to reach out to be touched, to be felt, to be smoothed back down.

I have to get back home now, Jane now said.

Since when? Him then said.

Since you know when is when, Jane said.

Don’t you mean You Know Who?

No, Jane said. I said you know when, not you know who.

Who, Girl said then, is You Know Who? You is who, You said.

What?

You are who, you do, said Jane. You look like this You Know Who. That is who you do.

Says who?

Says me.

And you are who?

I am Jane is who.

Jane who?

I am Jane who wants to be more than just a girl is who.

Girl looked at this Jane who said that she was a girl who wants to be more than just a girl.

Girl shook her girl head at this girl whose name she said was Jane.

What Jane said to this is what a rock might say when a rock looks up to see a tree.

But how?

And then:

Why you?

And in the sky a bird flew through the too blue blue and it too, like the sky that it was blue like, it cawed: who, who, who.

Do not ask what kind of blue the sky was.

The sky was blue.

The sky was blue.

But still you do ask.

And so I’ll tell you.

The sky was sky blue.

The sky that was blue was a sea.

See the sky.

That’s what the bird says when it caws that sound and that word: who, who, who.

Jane is who.

Him is who.

You is who.

And Girl?

Girl is Girl is who.

And You Know Who?

You Know Who is just a girl who looked just like the girl who is known to us all as Girl.

Where is she now, this You Know Who?

Who knows.

Does You Know Who know where it is that she is or where it is she has been?