F

There floated a hum, dual tone, all around the house, inside and outside. Peris and Fauna heard it too and interrupted their play. The notes sat right on a sudden wind. Branches rocking and rippling through Peris’ jean overalls and Fauna’ long hair, her flowery summer dress draped over the grass that also swayed. It wasn’t a visible plane as the sky was blue and not a cloud in sight, neither anything that could have been responsible for that sound. It wasn’t the landscape artists, it wasn’t a car or baby’s white noise machine. It was a distant hum, at its source, the horn of God, a ridiculously beautiful and monotonous song. And then slowly it fell, and the sounds of the earth were risen again. Sounds they had ignored but in this moment of curiosity was raised to their full attention. Birds turning the corner, then falling away, the wind again, the leaves, the birds, a word from the house next door, the wind rising, and falling. What was that? asked Peris, shoving his hands deep in the pockets of his overalls. I don’t know Fauna whispered. No it wasn’t no sound like I ever heard before, felt it in my guts. Fauna caressed her stomach and agreed. The house of Fauna’s father was flooded by the Everglades on the third Christmas of her birth. Everyone died except three year old Fauna. She floated on small raft for two hours before being saved by Mr Belview and his sons Roger, Thomas, Thurgood, and Bryson. They all died in the civil war against the Confederates. Mr Belview would be childless if not for the daughter who his wife named Fauna, after her Grandmother. Sondra was born in the Bahamas and followed her family to the southern part of the new world. Only two days in the metropolitan of the city that would be her permanent home, Mr Belview first approached her. He outstretched his hand and gave a small smirk. They married summer of that year, and on Christmas of the next Fauna was born. Wait a second. Fauna couldn’t have been Mr Belview’ daughter, that makes no sense. Let’s just say we don’t know where Fauna is from or how she came to be playing with Peris at a park or on some stretch of land with trees and birds. Do we want to pretend we know where Peris came from? Didn’t think so. After they heard the noise they returned to the giant cheese grater. At the top they were careful not to slip, as going down the wall would slice portion of your skin until you were skinned to the bone. That explains the hospital bed teeter tottering on the top of the grater. It belongs to he He who accidentally slipped. No one has ever seen his body. How do we know he’s there? Peris says he heard laughing one night, Fauna said it was crying. At the crevice of the graters roof, where a giant hand should fill, on the round curve Peris and Fauna clutch each other, balancing their weight over a gruesome death. In the morning the blood shines over the blades the man went down. The rain hasn’t removed much. The water in the tank is red now. Mr Belview wasn’t expecting to find a tiny human being washed away by a flood on the banks of his home as he was fishing with his sons. Neither was he expecting for confederate soldiers to come into his home and shoot his sons. Ms Belview took her life shortly after that. Mr Belview, therefore, couldn’t be sure if one of the two fish in his tank was his biological daughter. But he took care of them like they were. They were fed on time and spoken to with love. Over the years he would increase the size of the tank and fill it with household accessories so that his children, Fauna and Peris, could swim. Sondra named Fauna, Mr Belview named Peris, after himself. In the day Mr Belview would take out his trumpet and play to them. How do you like that Peris Belview! he would yell looking into the fish tank, laughing. And then he would lower his voice when addressing Fauna, and the voice would all but disappear by the end of his question, slipping into tears. Fish can talk. That’s what Fauna and Peris realized when they began asking each other about the noise. Fauna, hearing her brother Peris speak, made her aware how in love she was with him. Peris kept a lot of secrets. He would continue doing most of the talking, because that was how he kept silent, he wanted to be just like Fauna. Peris speculated he was born in the Everglades by frogs and was most likely picked up and kept by one of the sons and lived to old age by some miracle of Fauna’s presence. He never told anyone this, but he was always near her and playing with her because he was convinced that he would die the moment she forgot about him. In the night he would tell her stories and in the day ask questions and begin all over again. He thought she was the most important fish that had ever lived. Fauna wanted to hold Peris in her stomach but the man in the hospital bed would wake up if she addressed her love by name. This was her only secret. In the middle of their play, as he went on and on about nothing, she would let him hear the sound of her guts, and in that silence between his rambling and his first question addressed to her, she would have all that she ever wanted.