The Goldfish at the End of the Line

The suspension cable hummed above Arthur's head, a vibration he felt in his teeth as he stood on the catwalk. Three hundred feet of empty air separated him from the bay, and he was seriously considering the space between.

He'd been a bull in a china shop for thirty-five years—aggressive, decisive, wrong more often than he admitted. The private equity firm had rewarded him for it. His ex-wife had not. The kids called twice a year, birthdays and Christmas, conversations that felt like reading terms of service aloud.

A goldfish bobbed in a plastic bag on the catwalk beside him.

He'd bought it an hour ago from a pet store in the financial district. A feeder fish. Seven cents. The clerk had looked at his three-piece Italian suit and asked if he was starting an aquarium.

"No," Arthur had said. "I'm starting over."

The irony wasn't lost on him now. A man worth forty million dollars, standing on a bridge with a seven-cent fish he couldn't keep.

He'd named him Ferdinand. Because he was a bull who wanted to sit under the cork tree and smell the flowers. Instead, Arthur had charged through china shops, through boardrooms, through his marriage, leaving nothing but broken porcelain in his wake.

Ferdinand flicked his tail in the plastic bag.

The cable sang in the wind. A freight horn sounded from somewhere far below.

Arthur remembered his daughter's eighth birthday. She'd wanted a goldfish. He'd bought her a pony instead. Because he could. Because he was Arthur fucking Mercer, and Arthur Mercer's daughter didn't get a ten-dollar fish from a carnival booth when she could have a three-thousand-dollar animal that required boarding and vet bills and someone to care for it when she was at her mother's.

She'd cried. Not because she wanted the fish. Because she knew he'd never once asked what she wanted.

He looked at Ferdinand now, suspended in a bag of dirty water, and felt something crack open in his chest. Not a breakthrough. A breakdown. The distinction had never seemed smaller.

"Well," Arthur said. "Let's see what under the cork tree looks like."

He didn't jump. He called her instead.

"Dad?"

"I have this fish," Arthur said. "And I don't know what I'm doing. And I was wondering—would you want to help me figure it out?"

The cable continued its hum above them both. Ferdinand swam in small, patient circles. For the first time in thirty years, Arthur did too.