I was lucky I found it before Quentin, who would have hidden it, stomped on it, or thrown it over the fence so the neighbor’s dogs could tear it up. Thankfully, he was at little league practice with my parents, so I took the package to my room where I could open it without any trouble.
Who would even bother to send me a gift? Usually, all I ever got was a pair of socks or a book on my birthday or Christmas. Quentin got neat stuff all the time, of course. Video games and action figures and Legos and anything else he wanted. His room—the one that used to be mine before he was born—was filled with toys. The perks of being “the real son” as he liked to remind me every chance he got.
I sat on my bed and held the package in my lap. Running my fingers over my name, I smudged the ink then tore the paper away. Inside was a battered box with a colorful illustration depicting an underwater scene with lots of bubbles and a castle in the background. In front of the castle stood a group of strange looking creatures with green, scaly bodies and feet and hands webbed like a frog’s, but with pleasantly human faces. They even had hair. I could tell they were a family. A happy one. The father was the tallest and stood proudly with his wife, who had an old-fashioned beehive hairstyle. Two smaller versions of the mother and father creatures smiled and played below them. The children. One wore a baseball cap.
“Sea Monkeys!” the swooping, faded letters on the box proclaimed. “Watch a world of underwater fun and magic come to life before your eyes!”
Sea monkeys. I’d heard of them. Some kind of old toy for kids. I’d seen them advertised in the yellowed pages of some old comics I’d found in one of the cardboard boxes Mom and Dad crammed into my room for storage. They were sold alongside x-ray glasses and sneezing powder that cost a quarter back when that was a lot of money for kids. The box looked almost as old as those comics, maybe older. Wondering if whatever was inside was even good anymore, I stared at the beaming family pictured on the box. Their smiles were inviting. Like they were welcoming me to join them in all the fun they were having together.
I was about to open the box when I heard the front door crash open. Quentin stormed into the house yelling something about a foul ball and Mom and Dad laughed in response. I shoved the box under my bed as my brother’s footsteps echoed up the stairs.
“Here I come, fartknocker!”
I checked to make sure my secret gift was well hidden and braced myself for an onslaught of noogies, wet willies, and all the other tortures he planned for me.
~~~
Despite what Quentin tells me almost every day, I wasn’t actually left on the doorstep of our house. I was adopted from an orphanage. That’s about all they will ever say about the topic. They get upset if I ask too many questions. All I know is they brought me home when I was a baby and I was their only child until Quentin, their “miracle surprise,” was born a year later. I was only two, but I remember watching them move my things to the cramped room at the end of the hall. Even then, I could feel them pulling away from me, their love cooling like the heat of a warm fire slowly dying.
I don’t really blame them. Quentin might be younger than me, but he’s bigger, stronger, and better looking. More normal looking, anyway. I’m too small, too skinny, too pale, and have what my father calls a “face with character.” What he means is I’m ugly. My eyes are too big and set too far apart, my lips are long and fat and I don’t have much of a chin, either. At thirteen, I’m the smallest kid in my class. My mom says I’m just a “late bloomer” and I’ll “grow into my looks,” but I don’t believe her. I don’t think she believes it herself, either. She’s too busy fussing over Quentin to really care.
I waited until the weekend. As soon as Quentin left to go ride his bike with some of his friends from school, I dug the sea monkeys out from under my bed. I smiled and said hello to the family on the box before opening it and pulling out what was inside. There was a small, oval-shaped tank of clear plastic attached to a bright orange base. A plastic castle—also orange—sat inside the tank. I turned the box upside down and gently shook it. Two paper packets marked “eggs” and “food” plopped onto the bed.
I followed the directions on the back of the box. They were simple. I filled the tank with water from the faucet in the bathroom, then dumped in the packet of eggs. I set the tank on the nightstand next to my bed and stared into the murky water, unsure what would happen next. After a few minutes of nothing, I felt a sinking disappointment in my gut. The eggs were too old. Like everything else I tried, it was a total failure. Still, some part of me held out hope, so I decided to give it some time before I tossed the whole thing out. I slid the tank under my bed, moving carefully so as not to spill it.
That night I had a dream about the sea monkey family. I joined them beneath the crashing waves. I laughed and played games with the little children. The mother and father hugged me and kissed my cheeks. They told me they loved me. They said I was their son and I belonged with them. When I awoke in the dark, I was embarrassed to find my face wet with tears.
~~~
I was still thinking about the dream the next morning when I checked under my bed, expecting to be disappointed. But something had happened overnight. The water had cleared up, and even in the shadows under the bed, I could tell that something or some things were moving around in the tank. I pulled it out and set it on my bedside table to take a closer look.
There were so many of them! The tiny creatures looked more like bugs than fish. Their teeny, segmented bodies darted through the water propelled by multiple legs with fins on the ends. They were jelly-like, nearly see-through with a light green hue. I watched them form squirming clumps and break apart as they swam around the plastic castle.
I loved my new friends. I wanted to name them but there were too many to count. Instead, I dropped a pinch of the food in the tank and watched and laughed as they zipped around to catch the floating flakes.
“Whatcha got there, dickweed?”
Quentin’s voice sent a jolt of fear from the tips of my toes to the top of my head. How could I have been so careless? My little brother had a knack for showing up at the best possible moment to ruin whatever fun I was having. I saw his warped reflection in the tank. He was standing in the doorway wearing the baggy Ravens jersey he always slept in. His arms were crossed over his chest.
“N-nothing.” I whirled around, trying to hide the tank behind me. “None of your business. You’re supposed to stay out of my room. Mom and Dad said.”
“Meeyum and Deeeyad said,” Quentin screeched in a bad imitation of my voice. His eyes sparkled the way they always did when he could tell I was scared. “They’re not your real mom and dad anyway, so who cares?”
Before I could move, Quentin launched himself from the doorway. He rammed straight into me and put me in a headlock, squeezing hard. His arm felt like a hard metal band across my forehead. I struggled even though I knew it wouldn’t help. All I was doing was tiring myself out. Even if I could escape his grip, fighting back would only get me grounded. So much as a scratch or bruise on the precious Quentin meant days or weeks of no TV, no reading, and any other punishment my parents could think of. I was supposed to be the older brother, they said. The more mature one. I think they just loved Quentin more than me.
“Let’s see what you were hiding from me,” Quentin said. “What’s that? A fish tank?”
I beat and slapped Quentin’s arms, but it didn’t do any good. I was starting to feel woozy, and worried I was about to pass out.
“What the hell are these?” Quentin asked. “Weird little things. Just like you!”
Some part of me hoped that would be all, but I knew Quentin better than that. Even if he thought my new pets were lame, there was no way he’d walk away from a perfect opportunity to spoil something I enjoyed.
“Hey big bro,” he piped up. “How about a yummy snack?”
Quentin wrestled me to the floor. I fought and kicked, but he was on top of me, sitting on my chest and pinning my arms with his knees. It was hard to breathe and my cries for him to stop came out as wheezing whispers.
Quentin grabbed the tank with one hand and held it over my head. He was grinning and his small, white teeth and dimpled cheeks made him look like an evil little doll. He reached out with his other hand and grabbed my nose, squeezing my nostrils shut.
“Open wide!”
I tried to keep my mouth shut as long as possible, but Quentin won in the end. He always did. My lungs were burning and I was seeing black spots when I finally lost control, opening my mouth to suck in a giant gasp of fresh air. Quentin brought the tank up to my lips and tilted it forward with perfect timing. My mouth filled with salty liquid. I gagged, trying to spit the disgusting mixture back out.
“Swallow it! Swallow it! Take your medicine like a good little freak!”
The water was thicker than normal, almost velvety. There was too much to spit out, and I was forced to take large, painful swallows. I could feel the creatures wriggling on my tongue and against the sides of my throat. It was their tiny legs scrambling against my insides, and the thought made me want to scream and hurl my guts out.
“Drink up.” Quentin cackled as he emptied the rest of the tank and threw it across the room. He rolled off me and I sat up, wet and choking with snot dripping out of my nose in thick ropes. I wanted to throw up. My stomach was doing somersaults, but nothing came up.
Quentin brushed himself off and slapped the back of my head on his way out of my room, calling out down the hall to my parents as loudly as he could.
“So gross! Mom! Dad! Guess what David just drank?”
~~~
It hurt.
The pain woke me up in the middle of the night. A sharp stabbing in my stomach so bad I had to clap my hand over my mouth to keep from screaming and waking everyone up. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised. What had started as a minor stomachache after Quentin forced me to drink the sea monkey water had gotten worse. I had hoped it would just go away and kept it to myself for most of the week. But last night, I promised myself that if it wasn’t better by morning I’d tell my parents. They’d at least take me to a doctor. Probably.
My stomach rumbled and spasmed. The pain shot downward. Lower and lower. I was going to lose control. I was going to shit the bed. My parents would kill me and Quentin would never let me live it down. I clenched and threw off the covers, preparing to make a mad dash to the bathroom. To my horror, I saw my stomach bulging from underneath my T-shirt, smooth and round as a bowling ball. I told myself it was probably just bad gas, but the sloshing sound I heard as I stumbled out of bed and ran for the bathroom made it hard to believe that lie.
The bathroom was all the way at the other end of the hall. I had to pass the doors to both my parents’ and Quentin’s bedrooms to reach it, doing my best to stay as quiet as possible. It wasn’t easy—every step sent another wave of cramps through me. The longer I took, the closer I came to losing what little control I had and crapping out whatever awful mixture my body was cooking up right there on the hallway carpet. I didn’t need the real Quentin there to know what he’d say.
Look at whittle baaaaby Davie. He shit his wittile pants! Better put him in diapers!
The bathroom was just a few feet away, but it seemed like miles. I closed the distance waddling like a penguin and had just enough time to shut the door and pull down my pants. A photo finish, as Quentin liked to say.
I pushed and felt a wave of relief as a hot gush of god-knew-what splattered against the inside of the toilet bowl. Another cramp hit, and I groaned. A terrible smell filled the bathroom, like a mix of old fish and rotten eggs. I gagged but stayed on the toilet, waiting for it to be over. For a moment, I was afraid it wouldn’t stop. That whatever was inside me would keep spraying out forever. I had a vision of the toilet overflowing and pressed the silver handle again and again, praying the next flush would be the last.
Sweating, I watched my stomach deflate with each successful push. I started to worry that I might die. The thought of Quentin or my parents finding my dead body slumped on the toilet, pants around my ankles and spattered with shit made me want to crawl out of my skin with embarrassment.
Makeitstopmakeitstopohgodohshitpleasemakeitstop!
The last spasm rocketed through me, making me bite my tongue and curl my toes. Then it was over. I sucked in deep breaths of the horrible air. My whole body shook and my arms and legs felt watery and weak. The pain was finally gone, and for the first time in days, I felt close to normal.
I reached for the handle, prepared to give the toilet one last flush. That’s when I heard the noise coming from inside the bowl—a bunch of little splashes, like fat drops of rain landing in a puddle. Whatever they were, it sounded like there were a lot of them. I thought about the tiny creatures swimming around in the tank. They’d been too small to be making the wet, slapping noises beneath me.
Unless they grew bigger.
I shuddered. Part of me wanted to get off the toilet and look in the bowl. How many of those things were swimming around in the mess I’d just made? Dozens? Hundreds? How did they survive inside me? What did they look like?
Did I even want to know?
I pressed down on the handle before I could think about it anymore. There was a comforting woosh of fresh water and the sounds were gone. When I peeked into the bowl, there was nothing but clean, clear water.
~~~
I was still thinking about the sea monkeys and “the bathroom incident” a few days later. Shortly before bed, I stood at the bathroom sink brushing my teeth and wondering if I’d ever dream of the happy family under the waves again. I wondered what it would be like to sit down to dinner in their underwater castle or go on a family picnic in a field of swaying seaweed. The ocean was supposed to be cold, I knew, but the thought of returning to their world made me feel warm and giddy. I couldn’t wait to fall asleep.
“Out of the way, dickbreath!”
Quentin barged into the bathroom, shoving me aside with his shoulder. The toothbrush flew out of my mouth, splattering white foam across the mirror then clattering across the tile floor.
“Man, I gotta’ take a mad wiz,” Quentin said. He stood in front of the toilet and untied the drawstring on his sweatpants. Unlike me, he wasn’t shy about bathroom stuff, and I heard the tinkling sound in the bowl almost instantly. He looked at the toothbrush and grinned.
“Maybe it’s time for Mr. Toothbrush to take a swim in the toilet. Nice and pissy, just the way you like it.”
“Come on Quentin. Don’t.”
“Just a little dip. For a little flavor.”
“Please don’t.”
“You’ll love it. Then I’ll tell everyone at school how you brush your teeth with pee like a weirdo. Sound like a plan?”
I opened my mouth to answer, but the words never left my lips. Suddenly, the floor groaned, a booming, creaking rumble that grew louder and louder until the whole bathroom shook.
“What the hell?” Quentin looked around, eyes wide, not noticing he was missing the toilet. Urine dribbled onto his feet and the floor. It was the first time I could remember him actually looking frightened. The rumble came again, now joined by a thick, muddy gurgling. The bathroom filled with a heavy, reeking scent.
“The pipes,” I said. “Quentin, stay away from the—”
The toilet exploded, flinging shards of white porcelain and yellowish water in every direction. Something sharp whizzed by my face. I scrambled to the corner. A thin drizzle of hot blood ran down the side of my cheek and puddled on the tile.
Quentin stood frozen in place. The toilet was gone, replaced by a dark, jagged hole. Brownish water gushed up from its black mouth. Something was rising out of the muck. A long arm covered in glistening, green scales. At its end, the hand—five bony fingers tipped with sharp claws and connected by webbing so thin I could almost see through it.
Quentin looked down. His lower lip trembled as the last pathetic drops of his urine dripped weakly onto the floor. The arm lunged out and grabbed his foot. It was fast, pulling him into the bubbling hole. He didn’t have time to scream. The filthy water splashed, and ribbons of dark red bloomed in the swirling sludge.
I heard muffled yelling behind me. Footsteps raced up the hallway. Mom and Dad. I didn’t wait for them. Something was rising from the hole. Something large and hunched. Its form wavered and wobbled as it got closer to breaking the surface.
I ran to my room and slammed the door shut, hiding under the bed with my eyes closed. That’s when the screaming started.
~~~
I don’t know how long I waited in the darkness beneath my bed. I could still hear them feeding, the cracks of bones and wet chewing noises coming from the other side of my door. It sounded like there were a lot of them. I listened to them moving in the hallway, making heavy scraping sounds as if dragging their feet. They spoke to each other in a language I’d never heard, their words wet-sounding barks and coughs. The smell was unbearable, and I tried to breathe quietly through my mouth.
The knob turned, and the door opened slowly. The thing stood silhouetted in a yellow square of hallway light. It was short with wide shoulders, its body covered in the same slimy green scales as the arm I’d seen in the bathroom, its head huge and round, noseless, with bulging eyes and rubbery fishlike lips that looked very familiar.
It took a single step inside my room, its webbed feet flapping against the bare wood and leaving a trail of damp puddles. It spoke to me, but I didn’t understand. More of the creatures crowded into the hallway behind it, staring at me with those wide, giant eyes.
“Don’t hurt me,” I whimpered.
The thing in my room shook its head. Its expression softened. It held out one of its hands, palm up and open.
The fear left me. In a certain light, its face looked almost human. I thought of the smiling family of sea monkeys and crawled out from under the bed, stood up, and took its hand. Its skin was cold and slick but I didn’t pull away. After a while, I didn’t even mind the smell.
We walked out of the house. My new brothers and sisters followed. My new family. My true family. There were more outside, gathered under the moonlight around an open manhole in the middle of the street. They waved and twisted their blubbery mouths into what I thought were smiles. I smiled back. My eyes filled with tears and for once, they were happy tears.
I was finally going home.