Fish Sticks

The spring time birds sitting on elm branches nearby, singing their song as the light of the noonday sun streamed through the trees casting blotchy shadows on the outside play area would have been a worthy distraction for any 9 year old.
“James?  James?  James Fishery!” shouted Ms. Ledderbee, finally snapping the young boy out of his daydreaming.  The other children chortled as James remembered where he was.
“Huh?  Oh.  Here.” James replied, flipping a paper over on his desk.
The teacher finished roll call before beginning the class as the students casted James snide grins and whispered about him amongst themselves.  James had always been quite the imaginative boy, but today especially.  Maybe it was because he hoped his father’s latest invention would be finished by the time he got home.  He listened partially as each student got up when the teacher called on them, not really listening to the words he was hearing as his focus drifted again.  Only once it was his turn did he snap back to the present moment at the mention of his name.
“James, your turn.  What do you want to be when you grow up?”
“Oh uh. . . “ James thought for a moment, and his mind brought up an image of his father, bent over a new invention, working away tirelessly and producing his results the next day with a big smile.  All that excitement, creativity, and joy.  “I want to be an inventor, or a scientist.  A scientist inventor!”  responded the boy excitedly, holding up his drawing.  “I’m going to invent a way to find dentures.”
The teacher tried not to chuckle, but her smile, having been noticed by the other students, gave them the confidence to laugh out loud at their now embarrassed classmate.  The teacher eventually calmed down the class and James sat down with reddening cheeks, wishing he had never gone up.  He tried to avoid talking again all the way until lunch time. 
Several of the more ill mannered students in James' class watched him from a nearby table as he pulled out his lunch box.  They got up and huddled around him as he opened it, staring at the contents.
“What are those?”
“They look like fried hot dogs.”
“Guys this inventor wannabe is eating fish sticks.”
“Hehe, his family must be really poor.”
“Enjoy your poor people's food Fishsticks.  Hahaha.”
“Heh, Fishsticks, that’s a good one.”
“See you later Fishsticks, hope you find your dentures.”
James didn’t respond, feeling if he told them his mother made them from scratch that they would tease him more. 
Even after 9 years, the taunting still rang in his ears, only getting louder in highschool, as his isolation drove him deeper into his own fantasies and creativity.  His mother had noticed her son’s tendency to hide from interaction with others, and tried to do things with him when she could.
One night James and his mom sat watching TV over one of her latest culinary experiments.  James’ attention was fixed to the screen as he watched eagerly to see how the new actor would portray his favorite time traveling alien.  Meanwhile the sound of his father’s work occasionally escaped from the garage door.  His mother watched the show with her son, but occasionally her gaze would shift worryingly to the garage door.
James continued to take in every move and word from the show, as the main character searched for a meal that would please his new taste buds.  The apple was tossed along with the bread, and the beans were definitely bad beans.  As he watched and laughed with his mother, he looked up to the hero from the blue box.  Then his hero found their taste again with fish sticks and pudding.  Something clicked in James’s mind at that moment, as the nickname that had been used to degrade him since age 9 was redefined.  From then on being quirky and the odd one out felt less like a fault, and became more like a super power.

A dull pop from the basement startled Jame’s mother.  A moment later James’s father burst out the garage door among a pall of smoke, coughing and sputtering as he tried to clear the air, but it was too late.  The fire alarms activated as the glow of fire flickered from the bottom of the basement staircase.  His mother gave him a frightened look as his father snatched a fire extinguisher and a gas mask from the counter, before disappearing back down to the basement.  He didn’t bother to try to reassure her as he fought the spreading fire.  Meanwhile James’s mother shook her head with a perturbed sigh as she grabbed a kitchen chair, climbing to silence the ear bleeding screech of the smoke alarm.

Once things had calmed down, his father came back up the basement stairs.  He peeled off the gas mask and put his mouth in the crook of his elbow as he coughed out more of the smoke that was now dissipating.  James’s mother pulled her husband aside, and James listened silently as the whispered argument from the kitchen pulled down the mood of the house.  He could hear his mother frustratedly reproving his father for putting so much time into working for a company who didn’t care about him and not using that time to sleep or hang out with his son.  But then his father’s soft reply reached James’s ears. 
“I have to provide for you and James, but I also have to experiment. It’s who I am. This company allows me to do both.”
Jame’s mother wasn’t content with this answer, but she’d given up trying to convince him long ago. She threw up her hands and headed for the laundry room. “This will be the death of you.”
James watched his father, who waved her off as he made his way back down into the smoke filled basement, coughing occasionally into his sleeve. James’s gaze went to his mother’s expression as she ran her fingers through her hair.  They were both worried her last words would prove to be prophetic.

Later that night, James crept down the stairs, lured by the sounds of his father continuing to work in the garage.  He opened the door and went down the stairs to the lab where his father hunched over a contraption, illuminated only by the light of a single light bulb hanging from the ceiling.  He looked up from his work and smiled knowingly.  “You can’t sleep either eh?”
James shook his head. “What are you making this time?  Something for the company?”
His father placed the contraption on a turntable and spun it. “Nah. Something I’ve been working on personally. It’s a receiver.” He pointed to a complex looking circuit board. “This decodes any transmissions it picks up into whatever format you want. Right now it’s set to radio waves. Here, watch this.” With childlike excitement, James’s father turned on the contraption. It lit up and came to life, only to spark and suddenly burn out.  James quickly grabbed the fire extinguisher and doused the invention.
His father held up his hands. “NO! What are you doing?!” He snatched up the invention as soon as James had successfully put out the flames, checking every inch of the now frozen or burnt electronics. The circuit board was fried. James hung his head as he heard his father’s downcast tone. “That was three years of work. And now…” His father noticed his son and his gaze softened. “Now we can rebuild it. Together.” He put a gentle hand on his son’s shoulder. “I remember all the times you would watch me work when you were little. You would run home from school to see what new invention I’d made. I think a father son project is long overdue. What do you think? Wanna make something with me? For science's sake?”
James nodded, and soon father and son were engaged in the wonder of invention, completely unaware of the clock showing 2am, or their responsibilities for the next day. But when the next day came, so too came tragedy. Because no one could inhale that much smoke in their lifetime and get away unharmed. James and his mother had always suspected his father’s cough was something more.  And that night, when James and his father had fallen asleep from fatigue, his father’s lungs finally surrendered, and he passed on.
Now, as the rain streaked down black umbrellas, and his glasses threatened to fog over, James stood with his mother as they watched the casket lower into the grave. The words of James’s father that night still echoed in his ears, and the lab and contraption still sat untouched since that night four months ago. 

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