The Pisces(56)

“So are you glad about everything? Like, everything that led you up to this point where you feel okay, maybe even good about being alive? Are you glad for that trajectory of your life?”

“Yeah,” she said. “I feel strangely good about everything. Sure, no regrets. I regret nothing.”

“I regret everything,” I said.

“Lucy.”

“I’m still fooling around with that swimmer,” I said. “More than fooling around, like, I’m completely, totally in love with him. But the thing is that he’s totally in love with me. I mean, it’s the most passionate, real, most spiritual experience I’ve ever had with someone. And yet, I’m not even totally sure if the whole thing even exists.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, we don’t function well in the real world.”

“The real world is rubbish.”

“But we’re mostly relegated to a rock. We’re tied to a rock.”

“Sounds like most marriages. At least ones with children.”

“I just—I’m afraid it might kill me. I can’t tell if it’s a sickness or the best thing that ever happened to me.”

“That’s brilliant!”

“Tell me, was it definitely men who landed you in here?”

She paused.

“Yes, I suppose it was the men,” she said. “But really it was me.”





41.


That afternoon I got my period. When I saw the blood, I wept. I wondered if that was why I had been feeling so anxious and afraid. I had cramps that felt like I was being stabbed in the uterus. Usually I enjoyed getting my period, the release of it—I always had. It made me feel connected to some primal goddess energy. But today I just felt heartsick. I had only five more weeks left with Theo and now the next week would be spent bloody, unsexed. What would we do together? I supposed we could just talk. I could put his cock in my mouth.

He was waiting for me when I got to the rocks. He put his arms on the rock and his shiny body came shooting out of the water. He looked like he wanted to stand to greet me, to come running over. I imagined him standing, how or if that could ever happen. I would have to prop something up for him, almost like a frame or a podium. I wondered how much weight his tail could withstand.

“Guess what?”

“What?” he asked, kissing my cheek.

“I have my period,” I said, dejected.

“I know,” he said.

“What do you mean you know?” I laughed.

“I just know. I know because I just intuited it. I could feel it. I’m in sync with your vagina. We’re always in contact,” he said.

We were both laughing but his eyes seemed serious.

“Also, don’t forget,” he said. “I’m an oceanic creature. I’m always with the moon. I can tell these things.”



“Well, I guess we won’t be able to fool around for a while,” I said.

“Oh, I don’t care. I’d be happy to be covered in your blood.”

“You would?”

“Yeah, I want your blood all over me. I want your blood on my face and in my hair.”

“You’re crazy,” I said.

“No, it’s true.”

And with that he began to kiss me down my body, lying between my legs with his face up my skirt.

I felt scared. Did I smell? Jamie had never gone down on me with my period, and certainly no one before him. I had a tampon in and no blood was on the outside of me, but even still. I was shocked.

But after a minute or so he sighed.

“I can’t eat you the way I want to with this rock under me. And I’m certainly not going to be able to fuck you here. It’s cutting me up,” he said.

I could see that some of the scales near his sash looked irritated and misshapen, like a fish that had been packed at the bottom of a full grocery bag.

“What should we do?” I asked. “Do you want to get back in the water?”

“No,” he said. “I don’t know. I guess you’d better get the wagon.”

“Oh my God, really?” I squealed.

“Yes,” he said. “But keep that creature in there under full lockup. And throw away the key.”

“Of course,” I said. “I’ll be right back!”

I went skipping away. Or maybe I was running. My joy of having him again, being near him, was unabashed. You could not separate me from it. I was the happiness and the happiness was me. The nothingness was nowhere near. It couldn’t touch me. I felt no need to be or do anything other than the way I felt. And if I did, it wouldn’t have been possible anyway.

I tripped on a dune and skinned my knee running across the beach. I cut it on a shard of shell. That made me pause for a moment. Was it a sign that being with Theo was deeply misguided? My knee hurt and there was sand in the cut. But all I wanted was for him to take care of my knee. I wanted to show it to him and be babied.



When I got back to the house I didn’t wash or bandage the cut. I wanted him to see what happened—to know that I hurt myself and needed to be taken care of. Even though he was entering my world, it wasn’t all easy for me. I was making sacrifices and taking risks too. He wasn’t the only one for whom this was difficult. I’ve always felt that injuries are a bit romantic, in the sense that you’re forced to be vulnerable and have someone else take care of you. I wanted to stay vulnerable.