Chapter 1
The First Fish to Feel Loss
Fish do not have particularly long memories; the average goldfish has a memory span of about 2 seconds. This short memory often leaves the goldfish very confused, although luckily for its species in general, some fish could keep their memories in order a little longer. Now some people call goldfish companions, or at least let them fall under the jurisdiction of pets, but really they’re just ornaments you feed. You can’t really play with a goldfish and when you share your secrets with it, however hard it tries, it won’t ever be able to remember how you started the sentence.
One place where lonely little girls could buy themselves their very own forgetful fish, was the carnival on Forget-me-not lane, ironic as it sounds. It was a place people often forgot about, until signs once again appeared all around the small village it visited each summer. This odd little place, so forgettable it often forgot itself, was the birthplace of Victoria and a world of its own in more ways than should be possible.
Victoria was not looking for a forgetful fish, although her keen eyes had noticed a few peeking out from the weather-damaged stand, gloomily manned by her 45-year-old next-door neighbour, Mr. Christmas. The children found his name funny because to them, he was basically the village grinch.
Given any choice, Victoria would have avoided the man, but she was fourteen years old, her hand was being tightly held, her mother was having a bad day and struggling would only make her look silly. So when her mother started pulling the unwilling teen towards the stand Victoria followed obediently, completely unaware that she, resident of a village that only about 60 people have heard of, was going to be the first girl to break a goldfish’s heart.
This goldfish had a name, it didn’t know it, but he’d been given one on the day he was born by a random passer-by. It didn’t remember the name, the passerby or even that fish needed to be born. Goldie* was not extraordinary as goldfish went, he was a happy average though he occasionally boasted to himself of shiny scales. He was friendly and could never hold a grudge for long, but that was mainly due to the fact he couldn’t remember a reason to do so for long.

Victoria however was extraordinary, always had been and always would be. She knew it, some people said it, but she was quite sure that nobody had noticed why so far. She liked animals; she saw something in their eyes that made her happy but she was sure that was normal too.

Goldie was not very eye-catching, whatever he may think about his scales, but a sympathetic eye might notice that the plastic bag protecting him was sagging miserably. His dull gaze did not drift very far, but for a second did run along the frail physique of a curiously intelligent looking child.

Her striking blue eyes were locked on his and Goldie felt he had no other choice but to look back. As he looked deeper past her delicate eyelashes, he imagined himself safe in her room, watching over her from a large glass tank with smooth pebbles lying on the bottom. He could hear crackling from a fireplace, smell food floating above and felt happy for the first time in his life. He was the first goldfish in history to feel more than content but sadly, this was not going to end well for him.

Victoria smiled at Goldie as the dream passed between them but a sharp tug from her mother stopped it short. She turned away, slightly disheartened, and spent the day deep in thought, had that goldfish understood her? Would it remember the answer if she asked?

Unfortunately, the truth was that he couldn’t remember and that just made this new unforgiving emotion feel all the worse. Goldie knew something had happened in his life whether it had been ten seconds or ten years ago he didn’t know. If he could have wept he would have, but he couldn’t so he swam around in circles, searching his pathetic plastic shelter for some kind of answer, but none came.

Goldfish don’t generally remember anything long enough to register an emotion, this had its highs and its lows they were never ecstatic or in love but they were never sad or scared. Because of this Goldie had nothing to protect him from this new soul shattering emotion, he was the first to be something but he didn’t care about or even understand the concept, what was so special about being the first fish to feel loss?

Sally, also known as the passer-by, was not a very imaginative person, she was a five year old stereotype who had seen a goldfish. What else was she supposed to call it?

2 Which is something many humans strive to be, just look at the Guinness book of records and you’ll see just how far people will go