52

There are certain memories that do not live within the fish that is his hand. He will have to go elsewhere to find those memories. The house in Maryland, for example, had a front yard, but he cannot see it now. He does not yet see his mother, either, but he knows that she was there. But not by looking at the fish. He knows his mother was there, but he knows because of a non-memory. A memory outside of a memory. A memory he knows he is not having, and he knows of it by its absence in the place of his own memory outside of the fish where he has seen her. Damn it all. Perhaps the girl will show him this memory if he can find her. But she is not in the fish, either. And this he knows as surely as he knows that he is hungry, once again. He will eat after he meets with The Committee. The handfish is starting to move, and as it does, as it points the way to the meeting place, it no longer yields him memories. It will, again, however. And this is something else that he knows.