Our toilet grew shadows that morning, breathing ammonia. The steward fed it bleach until it learned to swallow properly.
At 2:30 a.m. the sea counts minutes. He splits from our bed like cell division, returns with salt in his pores. We share a queen size ocean, legs evolving into separate species until I graft mine into his currents.
Formal night: the Russian photographer’s accent had fins. “You’re tall,” she said, her words swimming through air thick as water.
She spawned a stool from the carpet.
“He sits. You grow around him.”
“I don’t want to sit,” I said, my voice scales.
“Not you. He’ll be the bait. You’ll be the hook. Wind yourself through his tide.”
“My hands are becoming fish.”
Before the cruise, I painted their fins,
but they kept shrinking, bleeding, trying
to return to the sea.
At dinner, I ordered a fish named after another
fish named after another fish.
“Is barramundi like basa?” I asked.
“No,” said the waiter, swimming through words.
I ate what wasn’t moving:
asparagus veins, potato eyes,
bread soaking in white sauce like
coral dissolving.
Tall Glass of Water consumed my fish. They swam
through his bloodstream all night.
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Tamara MC, Ph.D., is a neurodivergent writer whose work has appeared in over 80 outlets including The New York Times, Huffington Post, and Newsweek. A polyglot, she has studied 7+ languages and traveled to 77 countries. As a 2024 Arizona Commission on the Arts grantee and recipient of residencies at Bread Loaf, Ragdale, and the Virginia Center for Creative Arts, her writing explores identity, belonging, and cultural intersections. Her forthcoming book from University of New Mexico Press examines poetry as a tool for language learning. In her glittering universe, princesses, sparkles, and all things pink reign supreme.