The Goldfish Named Fred

Several years ago when Brianna was about nine we had a small aquarium with a lone goldfish named Fred. Ok, truth be told, the fish never had an official name, but for the sake of this story his name was Fred. Brianna never really paid much attention to Fred. I wasn't even sure that she realized we had an aquarium. I'd hoped that would be something that would interest her, but she never really got into it. So, Fred spent his time in the dining room, doing what goldfish do. Best I can tell, that is nothing. However, overall, he was a darn good fish. 
Now this was the Fall of the year. Brianna had to be at school by 7:30 so I could be in class by 8. I was taking three classes every morning and then working until it was time for her to get out of school. Our morning schedule was tight to say the least. On that morning, I also had a huge presentation due for my Statistics class. Usually, we both got a shower and got dressed at the same time, and while I finished my hair and makeup, Brianna watched TV. She always sat in the recliner and was a pretty aggressive rocker. She sort of bounced on the end of the chair and it made a loud squeaky sound as she kept rhythm to whatever she was watching. When it got quiet, I looked in to see what she was taking apart doing. She was sitting back down in the recliner, and all seemed well. It was not uncommon for her to get up and get a toy or stuffed animal to rock in the chair with her. It was when I went back to putting on my makeup that it occurred to me that I thought I saw water dripping off the elbow of her shirt. There was never standing water of any sort since she loved to splash and would soak herself and immediate surroundings. I glanced back in the living room where she was bouncing like a wild woman gently on the end of her chair. She had her fists up toward her chest, which was typical for her, but on closer look, I saw a tiny orange tail. An ORANGE TAIL!! "Brianna!!" She bolted out of the living room, through the dining room, and almost made it out of the kitchen before I caught her, the fish still in her fist. We dropped him back in the aquarium and waited. He actually seemed ok. A bit shaken up, but not too bad. I changed her shirt and we went on about our day. Unfortunately, it had been too much for Fred and he died a couple of days later. That was the last of the goldfish. I knew that once she had rocked one goldfish, she would want to rock them all.