A Fish Named Rimmer

My 6th grade homeroom teacher had a fish tank. It was full of little fish; there were probably eight or ten fish in there. Homerooms were organized in alphabetical order. Most of my best friends ended up in homeroom since I have an unusually large number of friends with last names beginning with either R or S.

So anyway, there weren’t desks for homeroom, there were circular tables with four or five chairs per table. I sat at a table with Dan, Rioux, and Scottywood right next to the fish tank. So one day, Scottywood came up with idea of naming a fish after himself. He picked the biggest one in the tank. It was orange and it had a brown spot on it on both sides. He was proud of his little fish. Not to be outdone, the rest of us decided to name fish after ourselves too. Dan picked a jet-black fish with a big, stringy fin and named him Dan. Rioux picked a silver fish with two long black stripes like a zebra and named it Curly. Steve had a fish too. I was the last one to pick a fish so I got one that looked a lot like Curly but with only one stripe, naming him Shrimp.

The next day, we found the fish named Rimmer sulking under a shell by himself. While everyone else was swimming around like usual, Rimmer was just kind of sitting under the shell. He was barely moving, if at all. When Ms. Szymanski fed the fish, he was the only one who didn’t swim to the top immediately and start eating.

It soon became obvious that there was something wrong with the fish named Rimmer. The very day after he had been christened, he had ceased to be himself. Just three days later, Rimmer was nowhere to be found in the little tank.

“Where did the orange fish go?” Scottywood asked Ms. Szymanski.

“He got sick and died,” she said.

Initially, we were stunned. But the more we thought about it, the more sense it made. This fish, having been named Rimmer just the previous day, had completely lost the will to live. Staring up at his namesake, he decided that the sweet release of death was preferable to living in the skinny yet shameful shadow of the future NGW World Champion. It is obvious that he learned of his new name, considered the situation overnight, and had effectively shut down his immune system, letting himself be overtaken by the icy hand of the Grim Reaper. For the fish named Rimmer, the nothingness of nonexistence was preferable to a long, cruel life as a Rimmer.

Unfortunately, the fish named Rimmer did not know (or did not care) about the plague he would caused. Within a week, an unnamed fish died. Steve’s fish was next. Another unnamed fish died. Dan had babies. Though Ms. Szymanski separated the babies from the rest of the tank, the virus killed them all off quickly. Dan met the same fate shortly after giving birth.

The devastating virus spared only two. Shrimp and Curly. Two proud fish holding on to life with pride. They strutted around the tank over the unflushed corpses of their brethren confidently, invincible in the face of the suicidal fish’s artificial pestilence.

But all was not well. After only having to share the tank with one other fish for a number of weeks, Curly got restless and territorial. One morning, we found him chasing Shrimp in circles around the tank. He was relentless in his pursuit, even as food showered down around them. Of course we were glad to see that both were healthy, but why did Curly seem to be chasing Shrimp? What had Shrimp done? What set Curly off? When would Curly stop?

The next morning, there was no chase. The tank was silent. Curly hovered around by himself. Shrimp lay on the bottom, a bite mark in his side.

What drove Curly to cannibalism? Did Rimmer’s suicide disease drive him to insanity? Was he just a territorial aggressive jerk who wasn’t content to control only half the tank? No one will ever know. But there is one thing I do know. There’s nothing sadder than a fish named Rimmer.