Happiness in Numbers

by Nicole Field

  As he did so, he saw a small piece of twine tied neatly around his little finger. Surprised, he ran a finger over it, and as his fingertip touched it, he felt a pulse of love and familiarity, Hiraeth and Lucas together, wrapped so tightly that he couldn't tell where one ended and the other began. His lifeline.

  Keith drew a breath, just enjoying that feeling for a moment.

  Then he pulled off his socks, squeezed water out of them, and glumly stuck them in his pocket. He didn't want to leave any part of himself in someone else's mindscape if he could help it, though having wet socks in his wet jeans' pocket wasn't the most fun experience he'd had recently. Still better than on his feet.

  "Well," he mumbled to himself. "Time to explore?"

  He rose again, brushing as much sand as possible off his hands without disturbing the twine further, and looked around.

  In one direction, the ocean seemed to stretch forever, an infinite blue expanse. The beach he was on seemed to do the same, pale stretches of sand broken occasionally by glimpses of rock and shell. The beach was surrounded by sheer, white cliffs, except for one small crack that narrowed down nearby; in it, he could see a structure, some sort of wooden hut or cabin.

  This much seemed straightforward enough. He flexed his fingers a few times, nervous, then headed up the beach toward the cabin, almost waddling from the way the wet denim clung to his legs.

  A dramatic entrance was definitely out of the picture.

  The wood stairs into the cabin were sanded down, smooth-edged but not lacquered. The cabin, too, had clearly been made to survive, wood slates carefully slotted into each other, the roof made of more of the same. An iron stovepipe emerged from the roof, and the door was made, incongruously, of metal.

  Keith eyed that a little dubiously—it reminded him of a video game dungeon door, or, if he were being more realistic, a fire door. It seemed heavy, foreboding, and certainly didn't fit with the rustic wooden atmosphere of the rest of it.

  Still—in a metaphorical landscape, the choice between sneaking in and knocking could bring completely different results, and he didn't want to read as an intruder here. He tried to swallow his anxiety, stepping up and knocking at the door.

  "Oh! Come in, come in." The voice was muffled, but he heard the door unlatch a moment later. Keith steeled himself, not sure what he'd see on the other side. He'd met people in mindscapes before, but they were largely metaphorical manifestations—parts of the person's personality, or their feelings about the people who were important to them.

  Given that they were dealing with a guy who'd just been cursed, meeting someone might not be the best thing.

  Still, nothing was going to be gained by staying out on the porch all day. He took hold of the handle slowly and turned it, opening the door.

  The person inside was an old man, with kelp in place of hair, scales in place of fingernails. He was wrapped in a shawl made of seaweed. He smiled at Keith with a sort of easy-going steadiness, gesturing him in. "Look at you. You're entirely soaked! Come, take a seat by the fire."

  "Uh, thanks." Keith had definitely never seen this guy before in his life. He took a quick glance around the room, ostensibly to locate the aforementioned fire, and what he saw was not terribly helpful. It was, as on the outside, a small, cheery, seaside one-room cabin, though it had a somewhat claustrophobic feeling; there were no windows.

  A cot, sized to be roomy for one or cozy for two, protruded into the room. A rocking chair sat by the fire with a blanket draped over it, and some sort of fish stew was cooking on the old-fashioned wood-burning stove. There was a table, with various poles and lures set out, crab cages and nets stored underneath, which Keith eyed a little uneasily. The old man was clearly some kind of fisherman, and given the context…

  In his limited experience, mindscapes tended to direct him to the things that were most important to the person right then. Keeping a careful eye on the table of fishing equipment, especially the gutting knife there, Keith moved over to the rocking chair and sat in it.

  "Here, let me get you some stew."

  Keith felt a deep revulsion at the idea of eating fish inside a fish's mindscape. Sure, fish ate other fish, but he wasn't about to be careless enough with metaphors to do the same.

  "Oh, no, I just ate," he said. The cookie sat heavily on his stomach. "Thank you, the fire's enough for me."

  "If you prefer," the Kelp Fisherman said. He took a seat on the edge of his bed, watching Keith thoughtfully. "What brings you here?"

  Trying to give off the impression he was comfortable—something he'd never been good at—Keith rocked the chair lightly and heard a metal clink under its runners. He froze, then rocked again faster, more deliberately, hoping the Kelp Fisherman hadn't noticed. "I'm looking for someone," he hedged.

  "Oh, then you must be looking for me," the Kelp Fisherman said, smiling. His teeth seemed to be made of driftwood, growing from his gums as bone should. "I'm the only person here. I'm very grateful, young man. I get very lonely, and it's very hard out here."

  "I guess I must be," Keith said. He swallowed. "Has nobody ever come here?"

  "Just one," the Kelp Fisherman said. "I pulled him from the sea, and saved his life."

  "Saved his life?"

  "Well," the Kelp Fisherman said. "In a situation like that, he might have died."

  Of drowning, Keith wondered, or of what happened when a fish was pulled from the sea? "And what happened to him?"

  The Kelp Fisherman's smile dropped. He looked sad to the point of grief and, after a moment, he wiped an eye. "He left. We took care of each other for so long. I fed him, and taught him many things I'd learned, and he kept me company and took care of me. He had the ability to grant wishes, you know?"

  Keith's fingers were numb, cold. He knew how significant this story had to be, in a place like this. "Wishes?"

  "Yes. If you wanted something, he'd use all his power to help. But one day, he told me he'd run out of wishes to give me." The old man was crying; he wiped at his cheeks again, dabbing them with a corner of his shawl. "He told me he needed to recharge it by granting wishes to other people now, and even to himself. So he left me."

  "Ah," Keith said weakly. "And what did you do?"

  "I couldn't stop him," the Kelp Fisherman said. "But eventually, I grew lonely. I looked for him…"

  "You found him?" Keith already knew the answer. After all, something had cursed Fish recently. Pertu and Avi had 'taken care of' the curser—killed, Hiraeth had confirmed, and they hadn't denied it. But here, in Fish's heart, he was still alive; at least, his curse was, and the memories of him that had welled up with it.

  Keith was sure it hadn't happened exactly how the Kelp Fisherman had described it. After all, this was metaphor, not memory. But the feelings involved… those, he was sure, were real.

  The Kelp Fisherman smiled, the expression bitter. "Never mind him," he said. "Here you are, now, accepting my hospitality. Do you have a way to pay for it?"

  Keith stared at him, uneasy. He curled his hand into a fist just to feel the twine, to remind himself that he had an out if things got too bad. "Yes," he said. He tried to focus on next steps; he had to get the Kelp Fisherman out for at least a few moments, so he could check out whatever it was under this chair. "I… I brought my phone with me, but I don't feel it in my pocket. It must have fallen out in the water or on the beach. You can contact hundreds, thousands of people with it. It can answer all your questions—"

  "I know what a phone is," the old man said patiently.

  "—Right," Keith said. "Well. It's got all my connections in it. And I need it. I'm pretty sure I know some people who can grant wishes, so maybe they can help us both."

  Smiling beatifically, the Kelp Fisherman rose. "You're a dear," he said. "I'm so glad I can depend on the kindness of strangers. I'll just go have a looksee, shall I? You stay here and stay warm."

  "I will," Keith said. He'd left his phone charging at Hiraeth's; it hadn't been on him when he came, so it shouldn't have be
en visualized into this mindscape the way his clothes had. It shouldn't really be out there, at risk of discovery. He hoped it wasn't, and that his lie remained a lie. "Thanks."

  He waited until he heard the Kelp Fisherman's footsteps retreat down the outside steps, then got up, hurriedly pushing the chair back, hauling up the rough straw rug underneath it.

  Sure enough, there was a trap door under there. "Christ," he muttered to himself, crouching and grabbing the iron ring. It was rusty and resisted his pull, but he strained until it lifted.

  Once he'd raised it past vertical, though, it crashed out of his hands, slamming into the floor of the hut. He froze, briefly sure that the Kelp Fisherman must have heard it—but if so, it was even more important that he hurry.

  Keith grabbed the edge of the trap door and began to lower himself. His feet kicked into empty air in the darkness below and, suddenly afraid of how far the drop might be, he tried to pull himself up.

  His cold fingers slipped, and he dropped—no more than five feet. It was still a rough landing, and he swore softly as he fell onto his butt. Not enough padding there to make it feel anything but awful.

  "Who's there?" a voice called, a soft, warm tenor. "Hemingway, is that you?"

  Of course the Kelp Fisherman was a fucking Hemingway. "No, it's me. Keith," he called back.

  "Keith?" The voice sounded confused but affable, like a puppy who hadn't seen where the treat went but knew it was still there somewhere. "The human boy who my boyfriend's being a jerk to?"

  Relief washed over him. If he remembered seeing that, this must be Fish's core self, the part that could be unlocked to, hopefully, break the curse and let him fill his own vessel out properly again. "That's the one," Keith said wryly. "It's dark, can you help me find you?"

  "Um, I can keep talking, sure!" The voice was off to his right, and he faced that way, moving forward. "I'm kind of tied up right now and it pretty much sucks. I'm not super happy that they killed Hemingway but I guess they thought there was no other choice. I'm doubly unhappy that it didn't fix the problem. But I mean they're so worried. I wish I could fix this problem. Mostly for my own sake but, you know, also theirs—Oh, hello!"

  Keith's hand had found a figure hanging from a fishhook set in the ceiling. He froze in horror, afraid of hurting Fish more with his touch, but he supposed it might be the curse itself, holding Fish trapped. Feeling reluctantly around the area, he let out a breath of relief, his knees actually going weak—thankfully, the hook wasn't through Fish's skin, but through the rope dangling him from the ceiling. Under the rope, he was wrapped up in a strange, dry, scaly material—covered entirely, like a captive in a burlap sack. A full blanket of dried-out fish skin.

  The curse. It had to be.

  Slowly, Keith shifted the rope, beginning to wiggle it against the barb of the hook. "I'll get you out of here."

  "I know you want to try. Thank you," Fish said. "Hey, it's not your duty though, okay? If it doesn't work, if things go bad, get yourself out safe. I don't want to be trapped inside my own vessel, and I hate that it's not allowed to be mine anymore! But sometimes, people go through that, you know?"

  "You've got a right to live your own life as you," Keith said firmly, thinking back to the things the old man had said.

  "I mean, yeah, I've been trying. But if this is what he needed—"

  Keith was managing to get a bit of fray on the rope now. He sought desperately for something to say that would encourage Fish to help free himself. He wasn't sure that just untying him would do it. "Sometimes… sometimes people are lonely, yeah. And sometimes you can do things for them. But you can't do the things other people want forever. You have to decide—"

  He thought about Shaunee, who shouldn't know about ghosts. About his own family, who he was keeping at arm's length. About two people trusting him with the person they loved, and two more waiting for him to accept their help to get out if he needed to.

  Suddenly furious, Keith rubbed the rope against the hook's barb harder; let the curse break on its own false premise. "You have to decide what to do for others. The people who want to decide that for you aren't people you can help at all."

  Behind him, there was a crash, something huge landing in the room.

  "There was no phone," Hemingway bellowed, his voice deep. He seemed massive now, filling the space behind Keith.

  Keith kept sawing at the rope, faster, breathing hard with fear.

  "You lied! You took advantage of my trust! And now you're trying to take my boy!"

  The rope gave, snapping hard enough that Keith was flung away by the force. Fish came tumbling down, rolling in the air as the rope unwound from around him.

  "Don't leave me again!" Hemingway wailed at Fish. The gutting knife he was carrying was huge now, dragging on the floor. Hemingway's arms were too long, bent all wrong.

  Fish began to rise from the ground, shedding dry fish skin and scales everywhere as the wrappings he'd been tied up in came apart. "There isn't an again," he said. "You're dead. I never came back to you. Keith?"

  Keith jerked his head up. "Yeah?" he squeaked.

  Torn-off scales were catching the dim light from the trap door above, surrounding Fish in a haze of glitter. Fish turned his face slightly and Keith saw a bright, dangerous smile there, full of hundreds of sharp needle teeth.

  "Go home," Fish said. "I just need to take a moment to kill this guilt of mine. Okay?"

  Keith nearly protested. He'd come here to help, he should see it to the end—

  But this was personal. It wasn't his business. And Fish had told him to go.

  Keith tugged the twine free from his finger.

  *~*~*

  He woke up in Hiraeth's arms, wrapped around him warmly and, for a moment, that was all that mattered: the security with which Hiraeth was holding him, the sense of Lucas right there.

  And then, suddenly, glass was shattering, the others were screaming and, over it all, there was a loud whoop of delight.

  "Uh," he said into Hiraeth's shoulder.

  Hiraeth's fingers rubbed at the base of his skull. "It's fine, it's fine. Oh, he's sure naked."

  "No, seriously…!" Keith pulled away, glancing over his shoulder.

  The shattering sound had been the fishbowl, and the man to come out of it was, indeed, very naked. He was extremely tall and slender to the point of willowy, with many long, rainbow-colored fins cascading down from his head in the place of hair. His entire body seemed to have a faint rainbow-like sheen to it.

  "Hey!" Fish said in delight, and flung himself bodily onto Avi and Pertu. They scooped him up, enveloping him in a hug, laughing and crying a little, dancing around while Hiraeth casually reached over to the kitchenette and grabbed his dustpan, sweeping up the glass from the broken fishbowl.

  Lucas slid out of Hiraeth while they were all busy. He sunk down next to Keith as they watched the reunion together. "You okay?" he asked, soft.

  "I'm good," Keith said, tilting his head toward him. "Knowing you guys were there to catch me helped a lot with the anxiety."

  That made Lucas grin, his entire expression brightening. "Yeah? I'm glad. It felt like we were doing something, kinda. We could feel you not… here? But we could feel you. And just… all we had to do was keep in mind we could bring you back to us, where you belong. Is that, you know, hokey?"

  Avi was bawling now, clinging onto Fish and crying hard enough that the seizing force of his body was causing flower petals to rain down around the three of them. Keith smiled, watching it. "A little hokey is okay."

  "Good, 'cause it's what I got right now."

  Laughing, Pertu peeled her way out of the hug, brushing petals off her shoulders. "Hiraeth, do you have any spare underwear I can toss the big guy in? We might have to go out to get more clothes but… I mean, you know."

  Hiraeth hmmm'd. "I have some of Keith's—" he began, playfully.

  Keith huffed. "How much of my underwear have you stolen?!"

  "Some of mine will do just fine, though," Hiraeth
said.

  "That's great," she said. She turned, grinning, the tip of her tongue poking out of her teeth, to face Keith. "Thanks."

  "N-no, it's—"

  "But," she added, "do you mind giving the family a couple minutes? Not long, just…" She gestured between herself, the sobbing Avi, Hiraeth and Fish.

  Before all this, he might have felt like they were excluding him; like he was still on the outside somehow.

  But some moments you needed for yourself.

  "You got it," Keith said. He got up, offering a hand to Lucas as if he really could help him to his feet. Lucas rose without it, but stayed close as they headed down the stairs to the closed-up shop room below.

  It was quiet down here, dark and peaceful, and Keith relished it. As wonderful as it was to succeed, to help Fish get back to his usual self, mindwalking was stressful and tense and had so many ways it could go wrong. He hadn't done it often, but every time he did, he needed at least a few moments to decompress.

  He didn't have longer than a few moments, though.

  "Keith—" Lucas warned.

  Keith heard it too: footsteps on the stairs. He raised his head, about to greet Hiraeth—

  Avi sniffled, rubbing his eyes with the heel of a hand. "Hey," he said.

  "Uh, everything okay?" Keith asked, taken aback. "He's fine, right? He didn't go right back to it?"

  "What—no, nothing like that." Avi shoved his hands in his pockets. "I wanted to talk to you."

  Keith tried to steel himself, leaning a little into Lucas's cool presence for courage. "Sure. Of course. What is it?"

  "…Thanks. For getting Magari back."

  "Magari—Fish? I mean, of course. I'm glad I could," Keith said, a bit startled. He picked at the side hem of his thankfully-dry jeans with his fingernails. "None of you deserved that and… I mean. I think F—Magari deserves a chance to… to live his own life. Surrounded by the people he chooses and… and in the form he chooses. Not to be locked inside himself like that, so…"