Shortly after that, the tank began to murk up. Through the dim months of January and February, the filter clotted, the flow stopped and stringy green silk grew on the lip of the waterfall. The murk thickened. In the center of the darkness, Fish swam random patterns and became a sad, hopeless entity curled into his plight. He was no longer fooled by his short-term memory into thinking he was eternally free. Nor was he bored by the repetitive nature of his laps, going around the stupid ship figurine, sinking down into the gravel, picking—typical bottom-feeder—for scraps. Instead, he was lost in the eternal roar of an isotropic universe, flinging himself wildly within the expanding big bang of tank murk. On occasion, he found his way to the light and rubbed his eye against the glass, peering out in a judgmental way. But no one was there to see him. No one seemed available to witness these outward glances. Until the day when Teddy, now just Ted, noticed and said Mom, Mom, the tank, and she went and cleaned it, but only after she had knocked her knuckle a few times on the glass and seen that he was alive, consumed in the dark but moving and seemingly healthy. Then she felt awe at the fact that life was sustainable even under the most abhorrent conditions. She felt a fleeting—connection between this awe and the possibility that God exists. But then she reminded herself that it was only Fish. Just frickin’ Fish, she thought. Here I am so weepy and sad, trying to make sense of my horrible situation, that something like this will give me hope. Of course, she was probably also thinking back to that afternoon, watching her father sluice Fred down into the warm waters of the shallow pond in Michigan. Her memory of it was profoundly clear. The vision of the fish itself—pristine and bright orange—travelling through the water as it spilled from the bucket was exact and perfect.