8,000 TIMES A DAY

Laura wouldn’t entertain that thought. She just loved Laurie too much. He was all she had. She loved him each time he got near her. Which happened often: some eight-thousand times a day. Each time was like the first time.

It was a fleeting form of love. She’d love him and then sort of forgot she did, forgot he even existed. But she soon enough loved him again, within seconds, each time they swam back past each other from the other side of the bowl. The moments of forgetfulness were brief enough, almost negligible. Cosy feelings took hold of her whenever she saw Laurie’s glistening orange scales approaching her. It was all she lived for. It was a beautiful life all in all.

But that horrible thought now consumed her. It was a thought she’d never had before. And it was becoming bigger than the love she had for Laurie. It was something more basic, more instinctual. The “hand of God” – Julie’s, really – that appeared over the bowl everyday, generously sprinkling Fish-O-Rama flakes hadn’t materialized for two days now.

Laura was starving. Something deep in her fishbrain told her she must eat Laurie. Laura was the larger fish, and the rule was that the big fish ate the small. It’s just the way it is. The horrendous thought gnawed at her from the inside. Each time she spotted Laurie, every 14.2 seconds, instead of feeling awash in love, anguish now ravaged her. Laurie was starving too; eating him would lift him out of his misery, her innate voice told her. But then she’d be alone. Sad. Forever. It’s a terrible thought.

Julie popped another handful, swallowed all the pills in one gulp. The shrink’s prescription said ‘one-a-day’, but she’d now lost count. The rumor about Zach turned out to be true. And the mysterious gal was no-one but her bestie Marcia. Julie’s devastation was complete. She didn’t care if she overdosed. If she’d die. If not showing up for work at the launderette for two days would get her fired. She didn’t care about anything anymore. She just stayed in bed looking into the void. The TV had been on day and night, but she hardly noticed.

Someone in the crowd threw something at Donald Trump. An immense uproar follows, and a mob of hardliners held the culprit down. Luckily, whatever was thrown at the Presidential Candidate, didn’t quite harm him. The TV played the scene over and over, from every possible angle, in slow motion, in even slower motion. Trump’s facial expression was priceless. Ego melted into shock, a flicker of fear, maybe even embarrassment, then rage. Absolute rage. It was actually very funny.

“Get him outta here!” he commanded the mob. He rubbed his face theatrically like in some great pain, with gestures of a hero surviving extreme adversity. Julie laughed. She didn’t know how she did it. She hadn’t laughed since Kerri whatsapped her those pictures of Marcia on top of Zach. She didn’t think she’d ever laugh again. But Trump somehow cracked her up.

His name was Sergio Rodriguez. An ordinary thirty-something Texan instantly became a household name. He’d wheeled his ageing dad, Marcos, to Trump’s electoral rally.

“But Dad, he doesn’t love us Mexicans!” Sergio protested. His dad insisted on seeing Trump while the campaign trail was nearby.

“Not us! It’s the scum that’s entering the country these days he’s got a problem with!” Dad said, shifting himself in his wheelchair as he smoothened his t-shirt with an American flag and Make America Great Again spanned across it.

“We’re fine, son. We’re Americans too! I’ve been American since that day I saw Neil off. I’m proud of what Donald’s saying about America.”

Marcos remembered the times when America was great. He was there on that greatest day in 1969, a junior-technician at Cape Canaveral. He was one of the last men on earth to see The Three going. Armstrong passed right by him.

“Do it for all of us!” Marcos cheered him. Armstrong just tilted his head a little.

When the astronaut stepped down that ladder, he felt over the moon. Earthrise wasn’t only spectacular, but emotional too. That little blue ball in the sky – that’s where everything happens and ever happened, all of human history. Armstrong recited those great words he was told to say. He also remembered what that technician told him, just before he boarded Apollo-11. It’s one of those awesome moments one thinks of nothing and of everything at the same time.

Magical.

Armstrong tilted his head a little when he made his great small step. Nobody noticed it in those grainy black-and-white TV images, only Marcos did. Armstrong only got to the moon, Marcos was in seventh heaven. For the first time, Marcos felt more American than Kennedy.

Marcos’s dad, Sergio’s grandad, had come to America to make a fortune and then return to his beloved Mexico. When he ended up buying the struggling gas-station he worked for, little did he know that one thing leads to another and he’d eventually own his little big desert-roadside empire. He never returned, but his heart remained in Mexico, didn’t even learn English. He nevertheless afforded Marcos a good American education, earning him his fab job at NASA.

“I don’t like him, I just don’t”, Sergio reiterated, “But I’ll take you, Dad, since you wanna go so much, I’ll get the truck ready.”

At the carpark, an anti-Trump protester handed Sergio a flyer. Sergio just crumpled it up in his fist, not giving it a thought. He needing both hands to wheel his father through the thickening crowd. They managed to get to the very front, right under Trump’s podium, as people graciously made way for the wheelchair to go through.

Marcos listened proudly as Trump made several passing mentions of America’s glory days of old, and even mentioned that triumphant day he remembered so well.

Sergio put up with the whole charade. He was angry at both Trump and Dad. But never mind, this wacko was no way gonna win the election!

It was when Trump said something about a wall to keep “ ’em rats” out, that Sergio’s blood boiled over. A strange energy took hold of him. He hardly realized that his hand had gone up and that he’d tossed whatever it was he had in it – that crumpled anti-Trump flyer – at the Candidate. Later, beaten and bruised in hospital, he found out he was a world celebrity.

Julie laughed on, like the happy girl she once was. The more they showed of Trump’s funny grimace and theatricals, the more she chuckled. She sat up and turned on the light. The sudden glare startled the fish, their fins fluttered, splashing some water.

“My poor Laura and Laurie!” Julie muttered, “You must be hungry!”

She sprinkled a good serving of Fish-O-Rama, which both fish devoured voraciously.

Laura was thankful. For the food, but especially for not having to think anymore of eating Laurie. It was a big deal for her. It took Man going to the moon and back to save Laurie’s life. But it was all worth it. Laura just loved Laurie too much. Eight-thousand times a day.