Of Different Waters
Chapter One

Besides the whole giving people shocks thing, Ronan was a pretty average guy. He was neither smart nor simple, tall nor short. He was a little on the skinny side, but that wasn’t his fault, dammit! He ate like a pig, and still managed to look like a twig. He had dazzling dark blue eyes that he was rather fond of (they were his favorite feature about himself) and strange, unruly hair that he wished was as normal as the rest of him.

The unruliness of his locks actually didn’t bother him at all. He was a big fan of the “just out of bed” look and he rocked it. But the color of his hair made him stick out. It was blue. Anywhere from electric blue to a navy so dark it looked black could be found on his head. He often got unwanted attention from people because of the color. Bad attention. People generally thought he was a no good punk, because what kind of respectable person had blue hair. And when he tried to explain that the color was natural, well then he was a punk and a liar.

At the present moment, though, he didn’t care what people were saying. Okay, he never really cared what they said to him. He just found it petty and annoying when people talked about him like he wasn’t standing RIGHT THERE IN FRONT OF THEM. But anyway... Ronan was on his way to the pet store. He was thinking about getting a small pet, maybe a ferret or a tree frog or something like that. Ooh, or maybe one of those snakes that could slither its way up through his nose and out his mouth. He had always wanted one of those.

He looked at the ferrets and was heading for the reptile section when some hidden force compelled him to take a gander at the fish section.

He looked at the cheap fish, feeder fish and goldfish. In terms of spending the least amount of money, fish were certainly the way to go, if they were freshwater. But did he really want a pet that involved such little interaction? He looked at the saltwater fish. They were too high maintenance for him. But they were pretty, and made him think of a certain popular Pixar film.

He went back to the freshwater fish. They were easy to care for. Maybe I should get a fish for a pet, he mused as he watched the feeder fish swimming in their tank. What a crappy existence, he thought as he watched them.

Ronan jumped when an anguished cry broke through his thought process. “Holy Moby Dick, Billy’s dead!” He looked around trying to figure out where frantic voice came from.

And came up with nothing. No one, but him, reacted to the voice.

Great, now I’m hearing voices. Ronan raked a hand through his hair and looked back at the feeder fish. There he saw a fish slowly floating to the top of the tank.

Dead.

Another fish swam up to the dead one and poked it with its mouth.

“Billy?”

Ronan watched as the fish swam away quickly.

“Eww. He’s really dead! I just touched a dead fish!”

Ronan’s eyes grew wide. He was starting to think he was crazy. Because he swears the fish were the ones talking.

He shook his head and decided he had just been staring at the little fish too long. So he moved on to some other, hopefully less insanity inducing, fish. And he found himself looking at the goldfish.

There was one in the back of the tank that got his attention right away. It was a goldfish, but it had a pattern similar to a cow.

“Yo, what’re you looking at?” Ronan stared disbelievingly at the fish and pointed a shaky finger at himself in question. “Yeah, you, buddy! I know you can hear me,” the fish growled. Ronan took a step back from the tank in shock.

And accidentally ran into a creepy sales associate that had been standing right behind him like Lurch. He grabbed onto the man to keep from falling over and accidentally gave him a shock.

“Ouch!” the associate screamed very much like a little girl. Ronan found it amusing since the guy was probably six foot five.

“Uh,” Ronan began articulately, “I wanna buy a fish?” He pointed to the tank with the moo cow fish.

Creepy associate immediately went into salesman mode. “Any particular fish you’d like, sir?” he asked with a disgustingly sweet smile on his face.

“Me!” the cow fish practically screeched, doing a back flip.

Ronan pointed to said fish. “That one.”

The salesman got the fish out and put him into a plastic bag for the ride home. Ronan picked out a bowl for the fish, some rocks, and a little plastic shrubbery for decoration. And of course, he got fish food.

Then he checked out.

On his way out the door he looked at the fish swimming in the middle of the plastic bag.

“So what’s your name?” he asked, trying to make small talk. And then he mentally smacked himself for talking to a fish.

“My name’s Fisk. Don’t ask why, all I’ll say is I lost a bet.”

Ronan let out a chuckle.

He got into his car and headed for home. Him and Fisk conversed all the way there.

He decided it had been a good decision to buy the annoyingly spunky fish.