FICTION BY ALISON ARMSTRONG

Alison Armstrong is the author of three literary horror novels (Revenance, Toxicosis, and Dark Visitations), a novella (Vigil and Other Writings), in addition to a collection of writings addressing women and horror archetypes (Consorting with the Shadow: Phantasms and the Dark Side of Female Consciousness). Her work focuses on inner terror, stealthily lurking, solipsistic dread and nightmare flash epiphanies.

Having obtained a Master of Arts in English, she has taught composition and literature at Washtenaw Community College in Ann Arbor, MI and Kingsborough Community College in Brooklyn. In addition to her novels and novella (available on Amazon and other online retailers), she has worked as a co-editor of Nature Triumphs: A Charity Anthology of Dark Speculative Literature and has had writings published in that anthology as well as several other horror anthologies and The Sirens Call ezine.

VISITING FISH
by Alison Armstrong

Bulging eyes, like silver disks, capture the last moments of the setting sun. Red and yellow rays penetrate his scales, reflecting the dying beauty of the day. Mouth clutching the wriggling bait, he feels the tearing hook pierce his gills and wrench him, flailing, from his saltwater home.

The eyes of the fish, now lifeless, stare at the eleven diners sitting together at a long table by the kitchen window, sipping wine and shoveling fork-pinioned morsels of salad into their mouths while they wait for the event that brought them all here to begin. At one end of the table, a young man in a neatly pressed gray suit stands, adjusting his microphone. At the other end of the table, in the corner nearest the full-length open-view kitchen window, Margaret sits. Unlike everyone else at her table, she is alone, without a spouse or companion to accompany her.

As the other diners chatter amongst themselves, Margaret remains silent. Their voices drone on like the buzzing of flies or the cawing of hungry, fish-seeking seagulls. The sounds are garbled, indistinct.

Ever since the death of her husband, Dan, last year, Margaret had experienced similar moments like this when sounds and words seemed incoherent, isolated from meaning. Isolated like herself, lost in an ocean where nothing made sense anymore.

Bored by the monotonous murmur of voices, Margaret turns her attention to the kitchen window beside her. She watches a chef tossing live shrimp into a pot of boiling water, then wiping his hands on a fish gore-spattered apron. As another chef grabs a lemon from a bed of ice, she notices a large fish lying on the ice, its mouth gaping open in an epiphany of mortal surprise, its eyes shimmering like mirrors reflecting the moment of death.

Margaret had sometimes seen whole fish displayed at her local grocery stores, presumably to emphasize the freshness of the fish or because the fish was often grilled whole, but whenever she ate fish, it was in filet form or chopped up as in tuna salad. She didn’t want to see the undisguised carcass of the fish or any other animal whose flesh she was consuming. She didn’t want to be reminded of death, especially now that her husband had died and she herself was growing inevitably closer to the grave.

Every day, it seemed, death gradually insinuated itself into her body and soul. It settled into her bones, pressing against them like a selfish lover impatient to possess her reluctant flesh. Every breath she took brought it closer to consummation. It was a parasite living within her, pulsing in her blood, sapping her strength, whispering insanities to confuse and disorient her mind, forcing her to see the secrets she wished to evade.

Death watches her now through the eyes of the fish. She tries to look away but is hypnotically drawn into its rictus-contorted realm. Staring into those eyes, she sees again the eyes of her husband glistening with tears, his mouth open in inexpressible terror, any final words forever unspoken.

“Testing, testing, testing,” a loud voice suddenly calls out, rousing Margaret from her doom-laded reverie.

“Good evening,” the young man, introducing himself as Beryl, addresses his audience.

He waits for the hubbub of conversation to dissipate, then continues.

“You’ve come here for one reason or another,” he says. “For the free dinner, for a night out with others, or even for the information I’m about to give. Either way, I hope you enjoy your dinner and in the process perhaps attain some peace of mind as we gather here tonight.”

As he babbles on, Margaret picks at her salad, trying to avoid looking at the fish with its death-smitten eyes and fright-frozen mouth, so like her husband’s the evening of his fatal heart attack last year. One moment he had seemed fine; the next he had collapsed onto the floor, his eyes and mouth gaping in horror.

He had left Margaret and their adult daughter Sally with no warning, no life insurance, and just enough savings to pay for his funeral arrangements. After years of working long hours for low pay, he and Margaret had made barely enough money from their jobs and then from their Social Security to take care of necessary expenses. Although Sally helped out her parents whenever she could, almost all of her earnings went to covering her own rent and other necessities.

Her mind is so focused on the fish and memories of her husband that she hardly tastes her salad or listens to what the man at the microphone is saying. Every once in a while a word or phrase breaks through—“final arrangements…funeral planning…expenses…” only to be drowned out by a flood of thoughts and images submerging her awareness. 

She flashes back to her first date with Dan—their shy glances and faltering conversation, her flush of excitement as he softly gazed into her eyes. Scenes from their life together whirl by, moments she wishes she could capture, hold forever in the present: her wedding bouquet, dark purple lilacs and pale yellow daffodils, clutched in her hands, just before the moment it is thrown into the air, its destination unknown. But like all the moments in her life, they evade her grasp, fleeing like reckless children into a dangerous, dooming future. She and Dan had kept their only child, Sally, safe so far, but now, as a young adult living on her own, Sally no longer wanted or needed parental protection. 

The older memories are too soon supplanted by more recent ones lacking the brilliant colors and intense, ecstatic, vividness of the earlier moments. They lag by in muted tones of brown and grey as Margaret recalls her forty years of married life with Dan, days filled with her dreary, monotonous job as a sales clerk, working long hours spent standing on her feet, a grimace of feigned pleasantry plastered on her face. Since Dan also worked long hours at his job, their evenings together were mainly spent at home watching TV in their drab gold and olive-toned living room.

Although the love they shared survived the tedium, Margaret felt weary, drained, and apprehensive about the future. Dan kept promising her that one day they would take the vacation they always dreamed of—a visit to Paris or some beautiful, exotic resort; however, Margaret was much less hopeful. She pretended to believe his promises, but she knew they were futile fantasies he couldn’t bring himself to relinquish. They were the hook-laden lures, enticing yet ensnaring, that helped Dan endure his boring, physically exhausting, low-paying work as a warehouse stock clerk. Returning home, his body aching, Dan turned to them for solace and escape.

When his aging body could no longer sustain this grueling pace, Dan was forced to retire. Realizing that he and Margaret would probably be unable to handle the rigors of an overseas trip, he set his mind to fantasies involving vacations and special events closer to home. Although his fantasies had changed slightly, he clung to them nevertheless. They were all he had to make sense of his life now. As long as he clutched onto them, he had hope of a long-delayed reward for all the time and effort he had sacrificed for his thankless employer. To give up on them would be admitting his struggle had no meaning, that all which lay ahead of him was disappointment and death.

His last promise, the night before he died, was to take her to dinner at Pierre’s Bistro, the Michelin-starred restaurant that had opened recently a few miles away. But that promise, like his others, was never fulfilled. All the best years of their lives had been spent together scrimping and saving and hoping, only to end in this dismal, dispiriting outcome.

“Is that all there is?” she often asked herself, recalling the old Peggy Lee song she and Dan had danced to sometimes at the Christmas parties Dan’s company used to have. Was that all there was to show for all those years of boring, unfulfilling work?

Even those rare moments of joyful dancing, like almost everything else in her life, had ended when she and Dan grew increasingly less agile and less vigorous. She and Dan had kept working until they were too exhausted to do the things they enjoyed. They had kept grasping at the promised bait, a future of a happy, relaxing, fulfilling future but had never obtained it. Now that Dan was gone all she had left were the memories of their fickle hopes.

In the year since he had died, Margaret had begun noticing a creepy feeling of disconnection and disorientation. Although she saw Sally at least once a week, the days in between her daughter’s visits seemed to blur together, one moment merging into another, dream metamorphosing into wakefulness, present into past.

Now, at the restaurant Dan had wanted to take her to, Margaret misses him even more than usual. Why couldn’t the free dinner offer have come when they both could have enjoyed sampling this tiny tidbit of luxury and maybe, as a result, received some information that could have alleviated their financial woes?

Although surrounded by other people, Margaret feels alone, the only one without a guest. Sally, of course, had to work late this night, so now Margaret is by herself, face to face with an ominously staring dead fish and only a wall of glass between them.

She had been lured here to this restaurant, enticed by an ad she had received last week, the glossy photos of delicious-looking food and the words “free dinner” tempting her to explore what lay within the brochure. She remembers the texture of that glossy paper—its smooth, plastic-like sheen—and the eye-catching, mouth-watering depictions of thick, juicy steaks, tender, flaky fish fillets, and delicate French pastries.

“Free dinner!” the ad repeated inside the brochure. “You and a guest are cordially invited to a free dinner at Pierre’s Bistro. As you and your guest feast at this beautiful, Michelin-star restaurant, you will receive free, no-obligation-information on pre-planning funeral arrangements. If interested, please RSVP as soon as possible. Seats are limited. We look forward to seeing you.”

So what if she had to listen to a presentation about funeral plans while she was eating? Maybe, she convinced herself, this dinner offer was a sign sent by Dan, a reminder that she needed to start thinking about her own funeral arrangements since she, like Dan, lacked life insurance and Sally made scarcely enough to take care of her own needs.

As Beryl drones on about funeral packages, including memorial services, types of caskets and urns, and additional amenities, such as guest books and slideshows with photos of the deceased’s life and loved ones, Margaret continues picking at her salad. Although the champagne vinaigrette and dried cranberries topping the spring mix are delicious, her thoughts keep drifting to Dan’s hasty cremation and memorial service. Her husband deserved better, but lack of money cheated him of even his final reward.

When the speaker concludes his presentation and the question and answer session begins, their waiter comes around to the table to ask everyone their choice of entrée.

“And what would you like today, Madame?” the waiter, with a French accent, asks Margaret. “Filet mignon au jus with wild rice or our visiting fish of the day―red snapper with lemon beurre blanc, served with fingerling potatoes and haricots verts?”

Visiting fish of the day, she thinks to herself, what a strange phrase to use…as if the fish were an invited guest. A funny image pops into her head—a fish in a dinner jacket, sitting beside her at the table, holding a fork in its finned hands.

Amused by this image, she smiles at the waiter as she considers the two menu options: steak or fish—which should she choose?

She recalls the filet mignon she had ordered for the first time a few years ago during one of the Christmas party events at Dan’s workplace. Served rare, it gushed blood all over her plate, soaking the mashed potatoes and baby carrots in its maroon mortal juices. Repulsed, she had left it uneaten and had the waiter bring her the lemon-basted fish fillet instead.

“I’ll have the fish,” she says, envisioning that beautifully grilled fish filet drenched in a delicious tangy lemon sauce.

While she waits for her entrée to arrive, she sips her complimentary glass of wine, a dark garnet-hued Cabernet. The more she sips, the more she feels as if she were floating amidst the sea of conversations surrounding her. They lull her, like gentle waves, as she drifts with the flow.

“Your visiting fish of the day, Madame,” he says, placing a silver-domed plate beside her; then with a graceful flourish, removes the cloche covering the plate.

Gasping, she stares at her plate. Instead of the beautifully grilled filet she had expected, what lies before her is the piscine messenger of death. Fate or some perverse cosmic joke had brought them together again, grim-faced fish and life-weary widow.

She feels the room start to spin around herself and her unwilling dinner guest. They are the stars of this fateful reunion, her funereal feast.

Hadn’t she known but refused to admit that this is what she had subconsciously hoped for? Hadn’t she realized that the “visiting fish” would be the one in the window? Hadn’t she secretly known that the fish she ordered on the menu might be that same fish?

The room was spinning so fast that she couldn’t make sense of anything anymore. What was fantasy? What was real? What did she truly want now that her husband had died and left her without hope for anything but to join him as soon as possible?

“Come, taste me,” the fish’s gaping mouth seems to beckon. “I am yours now, our fates entwined.”

With trembling hands, she clutches her fork and digs into a piece of the tender, flaky flesh.

She tastes the ocean, ancient, briny, mysterious. She tastes its treacherous hopes, its hook-hidden lures.

Closing her eyes, she imagines the fish in his dinner jacket, sitting across from her, and her husband, smiling, forever by her side.

Her head slumps to the table, her eyes fixed on the death gaze of the fish. Her heart flutters, pulsing like an eager lover’s, and her breath quickens. With one last ragged breath, she sighs, her mouth open like a fish grasping a hook, her body forever still. She finally has her reward. All her dreams have been fulfilled.