Aurora Wolf

The Other Fish in the Sea

By Tabatha Schroeder

Art by Jack S. Rogers

Calvin once complained that there were not enough women in the world.  Now he wished he’d kept his big mouth shut.  Once the universe heard you complain about something it always seemed to step in to try and fix the problem.  That might sound like a good thing but in this instance the universe used his best friend Mark to do its bidding.  Mark had the wonderful gift of misinterpreting everything.

“See.  Girls,” said Mark waving his hand at the bounty before them.

“Come on Mark, speed dating?  This is so not what I had in mind.”

Standing at 5’4”, Calvin was one of the shortest guys there.  Especially when compared to his friend Mark who towered over him at 6’2”.  It was never a good sensation to feel smaller, and weaker, than your competition. In his current setting it made Calvin feel even more embarrassed and lacking.  They were standing in a line waiting for their numbers and then a wonderful thought occurred to Calvin.

I can just leave.

He looked across the room, taking in the different women already seated at the tables, each equipped with a comment pad.  The host, a slight woman with sharp features, had already explained the rules.  Every dater got a number on their shirt and a comment pad to write down what they thought of each other.  Then the men were sent to a table and after two minutes passed they were instructed to move.  And on and on the torment would continue.  This way instead of simply getting turned down by a handful of women at the local bar over the course of an evening, Calvin got the honor of being turned down by a room full of women in only an hour.

He looked over the women once more, finding their eyes full of disappointment when they met his.

Oh yeah, definitely time to leave.

He pivoted around to bolt, when Mark caught his arm tightly.

“Come on man, don’t be a wuss,” he said tugging him along as they moved up in line.  “They’re just girls.”

“Yeah, and they’re out for blood.  My blood.”

“Look, its not my fault Sarah dumped you two weeks before your brother’s wedding.  You, yourself, said you called every available woman you knew and they all turned you down cold.  We tried the clubs last night and what did you say?”

He left the question hanging in the air. Calvin sighed, conceding that the fight was over and he had lost.

“That there wasn’t enough women in the world for you to find another one willing to date you in this lifetime much less in two weeks.”

Check and mate.  Calvin cursed those words but they came out of his mouth last night. Now he was paying for it. The universe doesn’t like to disappoint.

“That’s right and where do I bring you?” asked Mark nodding, as he answered his own question. “I bring you to a whole room full of single, desperate women.  So we’re bound to find at least one that will go to the wedding with you.  The odds are in your favor.”

“If you say so.”

“Do you want to go to your little brother’s wedding by yourself?”

“And risk throwing off the precious setting chart? No I better show up with a date or my mom will hang me.”

Mark snorted.

They finally reached the registration table.  Calvin didn’t bother to look at the number assigned to him.  What was the point?  He let himself be steered into a chair in front of a woman, who was a beautiful, blue-eyed blond and had a look of superiority in her eyes. 

And here we go.

Every two minutes Calvin was forced to stand, exchange a polite good-bye, and then the torment started all over again. By the last table he had received a couple of pity numbers from people who had grudgingly written them down saying they would go with him as “just friends” if he couldn’t find anyone else to take. Yeah, that would be great. Calvin shuddered at the thought of showing up to the wedding with a girl, who told everyone that they were only friends. He could just see his mother talking to someone like that. It would reinforce her complaint that he was always merely a friend and not boyfriend material. He shuddered again, thinking about her accusing him of ruining the wedding, a fact that she implied when he first told her about Sarah breaking up with him. 

Finally he moved numbly to the last table. Calvin was lost in his own head when he sat down, not bothering to look at his next tormentor. 

“Name?”

Huh?

The voice that awoke him from his thoughts reminded him of rainwater trickling down.  It had a cool liquid feel that made an excited shudder caress his body, leaving goose bumps in its wake.

Calvin looked up, meeting blue-green eyes, the color of the ocean only possible in a travel agent’s brochure.  Her hair was long and deep brown, almost black, falling down her shoulders in tangled waves.  She wore a dark blue buttoned-down blouse left open at the neckline, revealing cream-colored skin.

Calvin stared.

“I’m Nixie and you’re…”

“Ca…Calvin.  My name is Calvin Bidwell.”

“Pleased to meet you.”

All other sound seemed to stop and Calvin had to grip the table in front of him to make sure it wouldn’t dissolve into oblivion.

“So what are you looking for?”

“Huh?”

She giggled.

“Why are you here?  You know speed dating?  What are you looking for?”

Her words were like a demand, pulling out his thoughts before he could control them.  In a rush he found himself babbling about how Sarah had left him for some guy in her office, after they had been together for three months, his longest relationship.   Now she wouldn’t even give him a pity date to his brother’s wedding.  The worst was she knew it was coming up and had already accepted the invitation. His family seemed to care more about him messing up the seating chart if he came alone than what he was going through.  It was bad enough he didn’t get to be the best man or that his younger brother was getting married before him.

He spent the entire two minutes talking and then when the bell buzzed signaling the date over, he froze.  Oh crap!  What did I tell her? His mind was blank, when he tried to conjure up the last couple of minutes.  Then she spoke, making him lose all thought again.

“So what you want is to forget about this Sarah person and to no longer feel inadequate around your brother?” she asked.  Her words tugged at him painfully.

He nodded in a jerky movement, as if his body was no longer under his control.

“I think we can help each other.”  She rested her hand on his.  “When is the wedding?”

“5 p.m. next Saturday.”

“Perfect.  I have this family thing I have to go to that Sunday.  You go with me, and I’ll go with you.”

He nodded, feeling numb. 

She smiled and wrote something on a piece of paper; then she folded it up and stuck it into the pocket of his shirt.  Mark came over and they watched her walk away.

“She’s something, isn’t she?  Did she blow you off too?”  He asked.

Calvin slowly shook his head.  Then he reached into his pocket to fish out the tiny piece of paper, handing it over to his friend as he stood up.

“Wow, there is no way,” said Mark, looking at the piece of paper.

“She’s going to the wedding with me,” stammered Calvin.

They were walking now but Calvin felt like his body was on autopilot.  Outside was cold, threatening to drench the city in rain once again.  This fact was completely lost on him.

#

Calvin moved through a haze, during the days following his encounter with Nixie.  It took all of his control to wait three days before calling her and finalizing their plans.  Mark had insisted he wait, so as not to break the sacred “three day rule”, which even after he explained it, made no sense to Calvin.

When his waiting period was up, Calvin called only to reach her machine and of course when she called back he was at work. She promised to meet him at the wedding.  Hearing her voice, even on the recording, brought the goose bumps back, invading his body and chilling his skin. He was distant at work, but since he normally tried to stay invisible there, few people noticed. 

When he stood in front of the church moments before the service was scheduled to start, he had a terrible thought.

What if she wasn’t coming? Maybe it was just a joke. Or she might have forgotten. Or had the wrong church.  I should have insisted on picking her up and…

“Hello, Calvin.”

Her voice made his thoughts skid to a halt, leaving a bruised feeling inside his brain. 

“Hi,” he coughed, finding it difficult to work his mouth.

“Nervous?”

He nodded.

“Don’t be.  I’ll take care of everything.”

With that, she took his arm and led him inside. She was right; to his amazement she guided him around like a puppet, playing the happy girlfriend. As the evening wore on he even found the right words popping out of his mouth, with no recollection on how they got in his head in the first place. He felt a tiny bite of fear, when his mother approached them. 

“She is simply adorable,” said his mother, when she pulled him aside before the dinner.

“Maybe you were right to break it off with Sarah so you could date around a bit.”

He only nodded, finding the restraint to not correct her that it was Sarah who left him, which would have normally slipped out. Then the reception was over, leaving them standing on the church steps long after everyone left.

“Thanks…” he said, trying to take her hand.

“I’ll see you tomorrow.”

With that she handed him a slip of paper and left. His heart dropped, fearing he had blown his chance with her completely and he attempted to come up with something to say.

“I had a good time!” he said, his voice breaking.

Oh crap.

She turned around and flashed him a smile. All his doubts stopped and he stood there stunned until he could no longer see her. He clung to the tiny piece of paper like it was an ancient relic written in a language he didn’t understand. When he was back in his small efficiency apartment, he was relieved to find directions and he clung to it all the more.

#

The restaurant was a small family owned establishment overlooking the ocean. It had a large deck, which wrapped around the building so patrons could enjoy the view. That was where he found her. She was holding on to the rail; the wind blowing her wavy hair, entangling it, and her face partially upturned to the sky with closed eyes. He stood there, unable to calculate the time he spent looking at her. Then her eyes opened, a smile spreading across her lips.

“I knew you would come,” she whispered, walking over to him. She reached out touching his face softly, like someone praising a dog for coming in a timely manner. “But then again you couldn’t stay away even if you wanted to, could you?”

“I wanted to come,” he said, his voice feeling strange.

She smiled again, sending a feeling of peace to warm his body. Just like the night before any thought of self-doubt seeped away and he returned her smile with poise.

“So who are we meeting? You only said it was a family event,” said Calvin, following her to the front door.

“My foster parents own the restaurant and every year they invite the children they have taken in, for dinner. Right now I have twenty foster siblings and each year the number grows. Seeing me with a boyfriend puts my foster mother at ease, which is where you come in. Ready?”

He nodded.

“I’d love to meet your family.” 

She looked at him admiringly the way an artist views their work, before planting a chaste kiss on his lips.

“That’s why I picked you.  You’re such a sweetie, pity nobody else could see that, but that’ll change.”

Together they walked into the restaurant and were welcomed by a vast group of smiling faces.   An evening never went so smoothly in Calvin’s life.  No longer was he afraid of finding disapproval in anyone’s eyes and found himself full of charm, telling funny little anecdotes he never realized he knew.  He played the part of a happy man with the perfect woman.  Then the evening was over and they stood back on the pier, watching the waves kiss the wood floor beneath them.

“That was perfect,” she said, her voice thick and sweet like honey.  “I know it’s silly, but I wanted to give them one happy memory before leaving for good.”

“Leaving?”

She smiled, her eyes filling with a look of disillusionment and bittersweet longing.

“When I was young I begged my real parents for a chance to live a normal life.  They left me on the beach as a teenager.  It was a fun few years and I’ve always liked coming back for a visit, but lately my foster family has been asking too many questions about my personal life.”

“I don’t understand.”

She smiled, brushing his hair out of his eyes. 

“This is what I do,” she said, waving her hands in a sweeping motion.  “I give deserving men what they want.  What they truly need.”

“Then you’ll stay with me. That’s what I want. I’ve never met anyone like you. You make me a better person.”

“I’m sorry Calvin, but I gave you what you asked for. You wanted to forget the girl who hurt you and you have. You wanted your family to be proud of you and they will be. You’ll notice the changes more as the days go on. The bargain is done.”

Her words stung his ears, leaving them ringing in pain. He reached out to her, but she pulled back, sitting on the rail. 

“It’s how it has to be,” she said softly, her words forcing his hand to freeze only inches from her.

“But I want you to stay.”

“They all do in the end.  But it wasn’t what you asked for; what you truly wanted at the time.”

He opened his mouth to protest but his words died away, realizing the truth in what she said.

“You’ll do fine,” she said, leaning back and then she gave him the same dazzling smile as when she first met him, which made his body feel light.  “There’s plenty of fish in the sea.”

With that she leaned all the way back, disappearing into the cold salty water from which she came.

“Nixie, wait,” he cried, running to the rail and peering into the water. He waited, as if she would pop back out but deep down he knew she wouldn’t. “Why did you choose me?”

The sea gave no answer. 

#

Years later, Calvin stood on the balcony of his beach house.  It had been a long, full summer.  The sun was just now setting, casting a soft glow over the water.  He sighed, about to turn away, when an odd movement caught his eye.  It looked like a dolphin playing in the crashing waves but the color was wrong.  Must be the light.  He squinted, shading his eyes, trying to get a better look.

“Calvin,” called his wife, sticking her head out the open bay doors.  “The sitter just took the kids upstairs.  Have you taken out the wine?”

“Uh huh.”  Still staring hypnotically off in the distance.

“Well aren’t you coming?  The guests will be here soon.”

He nodded, pulling his gaze from the ocean. A smile spread over his face, when he looked into her eyes. He found more love in that one simple look than he had ever hoped for.

“Sorry, dear, I got distracted.”

With one last look at the water, he followed her into the house.

The End