The Merry Spinster: Tales of Everyday Horror(45)

“That is your right,” the flounder said, and the fisherman slid the hook out from its mouth and let it sink back into the water, trailing blood behind it.

*

The fisherman went home to his friend, who was lying in bed with the lights turned off. His friend said, “What did you catch today?”

“Nothing,” the fisherman said. “Well, I caught a flounder, but it told me that it was not a flounder at all, but the son of someone very powerful and important, so I put him back.”

“Did he promise you anything?” his friend asked.

“He said he would give me something no one else could grant,” the fisherman said, “but I couldn’t think of anything I wanted at present, so I didn’t ask.”

His friend said nothing, and the fisherman knew that he had said the wrong thing.

“My friend,” the fisherman said, “are you feeling quite well?”

His friend said: “This is why people don’t like helping you.”

“People don’t like helping me?” the fisherman said.

“They do not,” his friend said. “This is why you are lucky to have me.”

“I didn’t know that,” the fisherman said.

“You are lucky,” his friend said again, “that I am here to tell you these things. You should have asked for a better house; I am ashamed to let people see how we live here together.”

“You are?” the fisherman said.

“I have always been ashamed of it,” said his friend.

“I am sorry,” the fisherman said.

“Do not be sorry,” his friend said. “Go and do something about it.”

“Now?” the fisherman said. “It is dark out.”

“In the morning, then,” his friend said, turning over to face the wall. “We might as well go to sleep now, since you have brought home nothing for us to eat.” So they went to sleep, and in the morning the fisherman went back out to the sea, and baited his hook, and waited for the flounder to come back.

The flounder swam up to his boat and poked its head out of the water. “What did your friend say, then?”

“Oh,” said the fisherman, a little embarrassed. “My friend thinks that we should have a better house to live in. My friend is ashamed of how we live together now.”

“How much better?” said the flounder.

“How much better what?”

“How much better would you like your house to be?”

“I don’t know,” the fisherman said. “I didn’t think to ask. Maybe my friend would like another room, to put guests in. And a window in the kitchen over the sink, and wood floors. And a bigger bed.”

“Oil-modified urethane finish,” asked the flounder, “or water-based polyurethane finish?”

“What?”

“For the floor,” the flounder said.

“Oh,” the fisherman said. “Well, I guess the oil-based finish would be better, because sometimes I track in water, when I come home from the sea and bring my catch in with me.”

“It is done,” said the flounder. “Go home.”

“I can’t go home yet,” the fisherman said. “I haven’t caught anything yet.” But the flounder was already gone, so the fisherman stayed and fished a while longer, and then he went home. When he got there, there was a neat little garden out in front of the house full of red chickens scratching for grubs among the cabbages, and he opened the front door to find a sitting room with two fat armchairs in it. There was a window over the sink in the kitchen, and new copper pots hanging just above the stove. There was a new wireless in the dining room (they now had a dining room), and two very big beds in the master bedroom. His friend was in one of them. The wood floors had an oil-modified urethane finish.

“Oh,” the fisherman said. “This is a much better house.”

His friend said, “Then why do you look so cross?”

“I’m sorry,” the fisherman said. “I don’t mean to look cross. I like it very much, and I hope you will not be ashamed to have our friends visit any longer.”

“Perhaps you do not look cross,” his friend said. “Perhaps you are just sick. You do look sick.”

“Perhaps I am sick,” the fisherman said. “It has been a long day, and I have been out in the sun for longer than I should.”

His friend said, “Why don’t you get into my bed and rest? I don’t mind if you use it.”

“How lucky I am to have you for a friend,” the fisherman said. His friend climbed out of bed, and the fisherman climbed in, and his friend went to the kitchen and brought him back a cup of hot tea.

The fisherman said, “Thank you, but I don’t want any tea,” and his friend sighed a long, low sigh.

“This is why people don’t like helping you. Do you want people to like helping you?”

And the fisherman, who forgot he had not asked for his friend to help him, said, “Of course I do.”

“Then drink your tea, please,” his friend said. “Why do you make me regret doing nice things for you?”

That night the fisherman did not sleep very well at all. He had burned his tongue, and his new bed was too big.

“Do you think you will be happy to live here?” he asked his friend in the morning. “And not ashamed? I think we can live here very well,” he added.