Fishbowl. Sarah Mlynowski

don’t have to worry about all this fire mumbo jumbo right at this moment. The girls haven’t even met yet. So relax. Have a cup of coffee. Never mind, there’s no need to stimulate any heart-stopping da-da-da E.R.-beat hyperactivity. Have a cup of herbal tea instead. And pay attention to the first name in each chapter title or you’re not going to have a clue who’s talking. Oh, and forget you ever heard about the “burning down” of any “apartment.”

      So did you hear about the fire at 56B Blake?

      

      (Fire? What fire? Insert your blank stare here.)

      

      Well done!

      1

      ALLIE’S MISTAKE

      ALLIE

      Eeeeeeeeeeeeep.

      Shut. Up.

      Eeeeeeeeeeeeep.

      Shut. Up. Pause.

      Eeeeeeeeeeeeep.

      Shut! Up! I’m trying to mind my own business while I stir my instant coffee (my brewer has gone back to Vancouver with its owner, one of my former roommates. My other college roommate, most furniture, all forms of cutlery and the living-room TV have also deserted me for the rainy city of Vancouver), but this teeth-scratching eeeeeeeeeeeeep keeps interrupting me. It’s like when you bite your lip by accident and it gets all puffy, and because it’s puffy, you keep biting it—you know?

      Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep.

      Please, please, please stop.

      Three minutes and ten seconds later: eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep.

      Time to detonate the smoke detector. I’ve lived in this apartment for over two years and in all that time, not once have the batteries run out. But isn’t that always the case? They had to wait for Rebecca and Melissa to move out before they decided to kick the bucket. My ex-roommates are each at least half a foot taller than my five-foot frame (I prefer to be called petite, not short, and none of that vertically challenged crap, thank you very much) and could have reached it by standing on a stool without the aid of a phone book. Both could have easily, without breaking a glow, popped out the offending batteries, making the eeeeeeeeeeeeep go away. Go figure.

      The beeping offends my ears yet again, and I examine my right thumb for a piece of stray nail to chew on. Gross? Yes. A bad habit I picked up from my mom.

      Maybe this eeeeeeeeeeeeeping is a sign. A sign for me to get dressed, walk to the nearest Starbucks and order a cappuccino before going to work. Maybe while I’m there I will meet someone capable of stopping this eeeeeeeeeeeeeping. Maybe I will make new friends. I need new friends. Now that my former roomies have left town, I have only one friend left in Toronto, Clint, but secretly, I’m a little in love with Clint, so I don’t think he counts. I’ve tried not to be in love with him, because he’s not in love with me. I realized this last year (me loving him and him not loving me). I had a little too much Mike’s Hard Lemonade (Canadian girl beer) and said, “I love you, Clint.” And he got as pale as loose-leaf paper and said, “Thank you.”

      Thank you? What is thank you? Thank you for making me a turkey sandwich, Allie, maybe. Thank you for taping TWIB (that’s This Week in Baseball for all those not in love with Blue Jays–obsessed men) while I was out sleeping with the slut from my economics class. Worst-case scenario, obviously, but still applicable. But thank you for the “I love you”? What does that mean? He started stammering all boylike that he had to go, he had an early class (as if he ever went to class), and I realized what a mistake, what a huge mistake I had just made, and I said, “As a friend, I mean. I love you as a friend. You’re my best friend.”

      So technically I don’t know for sure he doesn’t love me. It’s certainly possible that he believed me about me not loving him that way. And if he doesn’t think I’m in love with him, he probably doesn’t want to risk potential embarrassment and disappointment by admitting his true feelings for me. He’s probably afraid of making the first move, because of his fear of rejection. Not that he’s ever been afraid of being rejected by other girls.

      But I’m different from other girls. I am. Clint says no one appreciates him the way I do.

      So you see, I’m having a bit of a current living-in-Toronto friend drought. Obviously, I’ll have two built-in friends when my two new roomies arrive in a couple weeks, but who should I talk to until then? I wish I had a dog. I’ve always wanted a dog. A dog that will sleep on my pillow. A dog that I can take for walks and feed snacks and teach to roll over and walk on two legs and do other fun tricks, and maybe one day I can present him on David Letterman’s Stupid Pet Tricks. But shouldn’t I ask my new roomies if I want to get a dog? In case they’re allergic? Is it the ethical thing to do? Could I hide the dog? It could sleep in my room. I have the biggest one.

      But if I can call them to ask them this, that means I have someone to talk to. And if I have someone to talk to, then I really don’t need a dog, now do I?

      Eeeeeeeeeeeeep.

      Maybe by the time I get back from coffee and work the eeeeeeeeeeeeeping will have stopped. Sometimes you wish for something and it actually does happen. Really. Like in fourth grade. I went to sleep crying because in the morning I had to take the Monday multiplication test and I was stuck on table nine. For five weeks, Mrs. Tupper (who probably never used Bounce, because her skirt always stuck to the inside of her thighs) had been making me stand up in front of the class and answer, “Allison, what is nine times two?” And when I answered eighteen, she’d ask, “What is nine times five?” She’d ask me six questions in all, assuring me that if I passed the test, I could move on to the tenth table, but if I answered even one wrong, I’d have to repeat table nine again the next Monday.

      Anyway, for five weeks I went to bed crying because even though nine times ten and nine times eleven were no-brainers (“Multiplication isn’t your foe, times it by ten and add an O. Don’t let math give you trouble, times it by eleven and you’re seeing double!”—Mom made those up for me), I would either forget nine times eight (seventy-two!) or nine times nine (eighty-one!), and for some inexplicable reason answered sixty-five to both. Anyway, I had been on the ninth table for five weeks now, and the test was in the morning. I knew that one (maybe two) more days of practice would really be helpful, and then poof, the next morning there was a flood. There’s never been a flood in my part of the city in its entire history. How weird was that? Needless to say, the schools were closed, since no one could get to them unless they had a boat or Jet Ski. Totally bizarre. And when I took the test (on Tuesday) I passed.

      See? It happens.

      Eeeeeeeeeeeeep.

      I brush my teeth, throw on jean shorts, a tank top and sandals. I grab my purse and head out the door.

      

      Mission not accomplished. Work—good. Well, not good as in fulfilling good. How can telemarketing be fulfilling? Although, I raise money for the Ontario University Alumni Fund so it’s actually telefundraising, which isn’t as immoral or annoying as telemarketing. And I did raise over five hundred bucks today, which is pretty good. Anyway. Cappuccino—also good. Meeting taller friends so they can fix the eeeeeeeeeeeep—bad.

      But what’s this? Silence? I look up at the offender on the wall in the living room next to the kitchen’s entranceway. Has the sour-milk-sipping noise come to an end?

      No sound except passing traffic. I leave the windows open because it is a breath-hampering, fluid-draining ninety-seven degrees outside. And I can’t afford an air conditioner. I once had a fan, but like everything else that gave me joy, it is now in Vancouver.

      Quiet. See? I told you it could happen. Sometimes when you wish for something hard enough—

      Eeeeeeeeeeeeep.

      Damn.

      Hmm. There’s a pharmacy next door to Starbucks. Why didn’t I think to buy batteries? Wouldn’t that have made more sense than to assume that the obviously dying batteries would self-heal while I was