Pond People

It was quiet for days.

And days…

The mirlings were free to swim whenever they wanted without keeping watch for humans.

The automated feeder dispensed more flake than the fish needed. The overfed fish produced more waste, and uneaten flake fell into the gravel to rot.

Eddy, Flash and Grandad spent ages discussing the fate of the watery murk that Mother syphoned out of the gravel.

So did Molly, Flo and Grandad. Flash learned this from Sylva, who had a knack of joining conversations when you thought she wasn’t in range.

Sylva also reported that Molly was becoming reconciled to life in the tank, since these ‘what if…’ sessions were usually brought back to reality by Grandad’s infuriating common-sense. ‘They in’t going to pour that muck in the pond, though, are they.’

And yet… this was the only way anyone had escaped the tank since their arrival. They could surely think of a way to escape the bucket before being emptied down the drain.

Whenever Sylva tuned in on an escape committee, she would repeat, ‘We have to stay together,’ but her mantra had lost its urgency. After hearing their unlikely suggestions, she no longer seemed afraid that anyone would be foolhardy enough to risk any of them.

A sheet of clear plastic rested on a rim at the top of the tank. Two holes had been cut in this thin plastic, for the pump’s wiring to pass through and the flake to drop from the new feeder.

Flash could reach this clear sheet by climbing up the pump’s tube and pulling himself onto the plastic. When the others were asleep, he brought himself up here to practice holding his breath for long periods.

Above this plastic, a lid of thicker black plastic rested, like a rectangular hat, on the top of the tank. This had holes at each end to accommodate whatever wiring was needed to operate lights, pumps and other equipment. Their tank had only the pump and the fish-feeder, so there was plenty of space for a mirling to squeeze through to the outside world.

Might an exceptionally fit mirling with a rope be able to reach the floor?

Once he reached the shelf at the bottom of the tank, how could he untie his rope from the top of the tank? He would need a second rope.

Where could he secure his rope from the shelf for the drop to the floor?

How long must he hold his breath to reach the shelf, attach the rope, slide to the floor, and run to Mojo’s bowl?

How much more rope would he need?

By the third day, the water began to taste… sharp. It caught in Flash’s throat. He tried not to take in too much at once, so it could pass through his gills without stinging.

When the feeder stopped working, fish looked for other food, nibbling at the leaves that Flash wanted to take for Flo and stripping plants that helped oxygenate the water. They rooted for rotting food in the gravel and sent muck drifting back up into the tank.

The polluted water was unpleasant to breathe and held less oxygen, so Flash had to take more of the foul stuff through his gills to get enough. He gave up practising holding his breath.

The pond fish grew sluggish. The black one stayed close to Molly; he wondered if she was feeding it. Grandad’s bronze took on a grey hue.

Amber’s recent rosy glow from her swimming sessions faded to a watery mustard colour. Her new-found energy was quickly drained. Flash heard panic in Walter’s protests.

‘I told you, you’re not strong enough to go off swimming with Eddy.’

‘The exercise is good for us,’ Eddy insisted, ‘and Flash carries her when she’s tired.’

‘Don’t worry, Walt,’ added Flash. ‘We’ll look after her.’

Sylva bristled. ‘His name’s Walter.’

‘I quite like Walt,’ came the quiet protest.

Amber reassured her brother. ‘I’ll be all right, Walt.’

By day five, they were all drooping. Walter turned to Flo for help, and she installed Amber beside Grandad, who entertained her with his tales of the river while Flo fussed over them both.

Walt stayed close to his sister’s side and Sylva had to be there too, so the sickbeds became a gathering point. Amber and Eddy played fivestones, and she laughed at Eddy’s awful jokes, even though she had to stop to catch her breath.

The day after that, none of them were laughing.

Flash foraged for what food he could find, and Molly prepared it in silence as Flo tried not to make it obvious that she, too, was drooping.

There must be something he could do.

If only he could get his brain working properly to think what it was.

Little was moving in the tank when the family arrived home. Fish hung listlessly in the water or rested on the gravel. Flash crawled into cover as the children bounded into the kitchen. He had stopped looking out for humans.

Andre paused by the tank. ‘What’s that smell?’

‘Yeuch!’

‘It’s the fish tank.’

Father lifted the tank’s lid.

‘It’s the fish food. It’s got damp and gummed up the holes so the flake can’t drop.’

‘Well, get rid of it,’ said Mother. ‘And if the tank still smells you’ll need to clean the gravel. And the filter.’

Mother had become as knowledgeable as Father since taking over its maintenance.

‘It must be condensation,’ said Father. ‘Perhaps we should have left the lid open.’

‘A partial water change would help,’ Mother added with satisfaction in her voice. ‘I’ll be unpacking the suitcases.’

Flash watched from a scraggy patch of weed as Father vacuumed the gravel. The fish had eaten much of the weed, and its stripped stalks offered little cover, but he kept very still. Father was too preoccupied to notice him. Mother hummed to herself on the other side of the kitchen as she fed armfuls of clothes into the washing machine.

Flash noticed more from his stationary post than he did when swimming around the tank. He noticed plants drooping on the windowsill, and Mojo sneaking off with a sock from the washing pile. He noticed the drawers under the shelf whose round handles would support a cord if he could clamber down to knot its end.

Father poured in fresh water from the pond to replace the water vacuumed out with the sludge, and Flash felt a wave of nostalgia as he breathed in the smells of the pond.

Goldie rose from the gravel and flexed her tail, followed by the fantails and Flipper.

Eddy swam up to join Flash, his homesickness seeping into the water around him.

‘You don’t want to go down there,’ he warned. ‘Molly started turning the gravel under the plants so the muck would get vacuumed away with the rest. Now Sylva’s moaning at Wally for not getting theirs cleared before Father finished vaccuming.’

‘How did Molly get the muck out for collecting? Wasn’t she afraid of being seen?’

‘Father had to go off a few times to empty the bucket. He’s replaced a lot of water.’

In silence, they enjoyed the lingering traces of the pond.

Eddy asked, ‘Why do you dislike Molly so much?’ and his answer came without thinking.

‘Because she’s always right.’

Eddy paused to consider. ‘She doesn’t really believe that, Flash. Flo says Molly only ever wanted a quiet life in the pond. Unnoticed. She wants to keep us safe.’

‘So does Grandad, but he doesn’t tell everyone what they should be doing. She’s like a mosquito buzzing in the background.’

The annoying thing was, Molly was right – about staying out of sight, about keeping their gravel clean, about everything.

Even more annoying was that people listened to her.

He had worked hard to recruit his team and lead them to victory. OK, some useless shooters had gone over to Molly. He’d told himself those weren’t worth worrying about. Why, then, did it matter?

She had made no effort to impose leadership but, somehow, Eddy’s success was supposed to be due to her too.

He groaned. ’What’s the point of all these safety instructions anyway when there’s so much that we can’t influence. What can we do if one of Beth’s friends pours in too much flake, or the pump stops working, or the glass breaks…?’

Flash took a breath and waited for the oxygenated water to cool his frustration.

‘There’s precisely nothing we can do to help ourselves. We can’t turn on the pump or vacuum the muck away. And we can’t get everyone out of here.’