the shape of water?

He left me.  After all this time.  He just up and... left.

We had our usual time together earlier that morning. He was happy to see me as always.  Nothing seemed any different.  But then a few hours later, gone.

It's weird.  In  many ways, I disliked him, I resented him.  But these past several months, I guess since he was all alone and completely dependent on me, we bonded.  That no name fish.  I found his body sucked up against the filter intake.

See him?  Dangling there and looking rather pornographic?

Readers who have followed along know the story of the fish tank apocalypse, the "Apocalarium" as it came to be known.  In summary, I had a thriving freshwater community aquarium.  It included a few different species of fish, a happy little snail, and several thriving live plants.  Until that fateful day...

I brought home friendly (NOT) fish that typically do well in such an aquarium as mine.  Over the course of about a week, one by one, all of the other fish died.

But hey, at least the plants continued to look good... Well, until we went away for a couple of days and the monster fish totally ignored the food cube I left and devoured all my plants instead.

Not wanting to risk harm to any other creatures, I let the fish tank become a cold, desolate, bubbly thing.  That environment only seemed to help those monsters thrive all the more as they lived longer than any fish on record (might be an exaggeration, but not by much!).  I don't even remember how long we had them, but they were eventually eligible to be considered "ancient".

But even they couldn't last forever, and at last, there was just the one remaining in cold isolation.  But damn if that last guy didn't plan to live forever!

I dunno, I think at some point, I gave up on the idea of getting the tank back.  It seemed like we would forever have this relationship - him in the lifeless tank, me caring for and feeding the monster.

But alas, now he's gone.  And I remember those who went before.  His victims:  Fin, Gil, Rubberlips, Donatello, Gary...

Rest in Peace, no-name monster fish.

I never hated you.