Mercedes ran into the bathroom. If she didn’t sit down right now she was going to explode. She tore down her shorts and crashed into the expensive, European porcelain. The stream rushed out of her like a mandatory evacuation. Mercedes relaxed into the peegasm. Every morning she did this to herself. She’d get up, let the dog out, make Maximo’s smoothie, a coffee for herself, but all before going to the bathroom. When she finally did, it was an angry release. Mercedes looked down at her phone, as she listened to the sounds of Niagara Falls pummeling the lake.
She stopped scrolling to read about tiny home furniture. Then she wondered, “Do any of us pee without our phones any more?” But, her thoughts were about as impatient as her bladder. Her mind jumped to Maximo. They had fought last night.
Mercedes felt a pressure from down below. It was a distinctive pushing against her most tender bits. At first, Mercedes thought she was having a spasm, but then she got poked. Yep, poked. Jabbed. Right in the kisser. The poke sent her flying off the bowl like she’d been zapped. She pulled up her shorts and looked back down at the toilet. There, she saw a shape. It was clear, but with a definitive border. “Yep,” she thought. “That looks like a hand.”
“I’ve got to make an appointment with my gyno,” Mercedes said to herself.
She put her thumb on the lever getting ready to flush down whatever she had most likely birthed into the toilet. But, the hand had other plans. It snapped to like it was saluting her and started swimming around the porcelain. Mercedes jumped back and stared with frozen curiosity. Then the hand grew two sizes, grabbed the rim of the bowl and launched itself into the air.
Mercedes squatted, instinctively, as the clear fish-hand tumbled through the air in slow motion. It flew over her head and into the bathtub opposite. She turned around to see the thing land in the basin with a “thwap”. Mercedes leaned into the bathtub like Sheryl Sandberg would’ve wanted. She grabbed her loofah on the stick and poked back at the fish-hand. She prodded and poked, poked and prodded, studying the gelatinous funk. Soon it started to shimmy, then shimmer taking on a flesh color. It grew upwards like a lucite pickle. Alright, it was more like a “clear dildo,” which is what her sister, Marisol, would’ve said. Then it transformed again. It took solid form. Sitting before her was a grown man. He was naked and shivering. He looked bald, but muscular. He was young, but not too young. He was slime covered, but, still, he looked relieved.
Mercedes grabbed a towel from the towel bar and handed it to him. He wrapped it around his shoulders and nodded. He was grateful.
Mercedes decided right then and there to stop taking edibles before bed. She sat back down on the toilet and took him in. “Do you speak English?” she asked.
“Sí,” he nodded. “But, like Celia Cruz once said, my English is not very good looking.”
Mercedes scrunched up her nose, trying to understand what the creature meant.
“My Spanish is much better,” he added.
“¡Ah! Hablaremos en Español, entonces,” Mercedes responded. “Primero, ¿cómo te llamas?” she asked.“We will speak in Spanish, then,” Mercedes responded. “First, what is your name?” she asked.
“Me llamo Nandito,”1 he said.
“Mucho gusto, Nandito,”2 she said in response. “Y Bienvenidos,”3 she added, unsure of what to say.
At that moment, Mercedes realized she had just welcomed a fish-hand turned creature-man into her home. If she had to guess, she would say she was losing her mind. Maybe she had been chosen (“Escojida,”4 like her abuela used to say). “Either way, things would never be the same,” she thought.
Nandito nodded in the affirmative, as she looked at him. She felt calmer for some reason when she looked at him. She couldn’t explain it, but it was like he understood her.
My name is Nandito.
Nice to meet you, Nandito.
And welcome
Chosen