Elijah East and the Sky Fisher

Clues in Lost Memories

I couldn't stop thinking about Jen.

When I got home, I avoided everyone and went straight to my room. I locked the door and flopped on my bed. I just couldn't unsee the pain on Jen's face after I rejected her like that. She was just trying to help, like everyone else was, and I pushed her away, just like I did to Becky and Steph and Dad. Maybe people were right. Maybe there was something wrong with me. As I fell asleep, I couldn't help wondering if I was the problem.

So of course, to make my bad day even worse, I had a dream about Mom.

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Once upon a time, there was a fisherman who wanted to meet a star more than he wanted anything else in the world. So the fisherman asked the village shopkeeper for a fishing boat to take to the sky and a rod to catch a star, but the shopkeeper laughed and waved him away. However, the shopkeeper's wife was a kind woman, who didn't much like living with the grumpy shopkeeper. So she took some tools from her husband's shop and built a boat for the fisherman to take to the sky. Then the wife built a rod for the fisherman to catch a star with.

She made the fisherman pay her, but not with gold. The wife made the fisherman take her with him, up to the stars. The fisherman, knowing how much the wife wished to get away from her husband, agreed.

So the fisherman and the wife who was now a widow set off for the stars. The journey was long, but the two passed the time by telling stories. When they reached the stars, the fisherman cast out his line and waited with the widow. Years passed, but the pair aged only minutes. The fisherman never lost hope, and neither did the widow. And their waiting paid off when the smallest star of all came to them.

The star's name was Juni, and it quickly became friends with the two travelers. Over time, the fisherman and the widow started to change into stars, and began to gain the knowledge of the cosmos. The fisherman learned that the stars were all spirits of women who had passed on and been deemed worthy by some otherworldly Presence. But the stars were fading, and the fisherman could feel the Presence fading too.

And so, while there were still wisps of the Presence lingering in the endless space, the fisherman's star merged with the Presence, and from then on, he was known as the Sky Fisher. He travels across the sky with his faithful companions Juni and the widow, who had become a star named Amri. The Sky Fisher helps wayward stars find their place in the ever changing night sky. And that's were he is now, still helping the stars.

Good night, my little star.

You'll make me proud, Elijah.

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I woke up crying for the second time in the last two days (I was really hoping that this wouldn't become a regular thing). I didn't remember the story from the dream, but somehow I knew that it was real. I could still fix this! I didn't have to be a problem. I wouldn't be a problem. I looked over at my alarm clock and saw that it was five thirty in the morning. A little early, but Jen wakes up before sunup on the weekends so that she can see the colors. I was almost ready to leave when I thought about Jen's face last night after I left.

Would she even want work with me anymore? Would she even want to be my friend? Jen the only person who saw me and didn't think that there was something wrong with me. Now I wasn't sure if that was still true. But I cast aside my anxiety and decided to deal with it once I got to Jen. I grabbed my bike and pedaled off.

When I got to her house, Jen was already in the yard watching the sky blaze with seemingly endless colors. She saw me when I came up her driveway but pretended not to notice me. A took a deep breath, walked up to her, and started apologizing without taking another breath.

"Jen I'm really really sorry for not listening to you I should have been a better friend and I regret not being one it's just super hard for me and that's not your fault you're the only person who sees the good in me and for that I will always be thankful but you're right last night I wasn't okay I was hurt and scared and I took my feelings out on you and I'm so sorry."

Jen said nothing. I breathed in and out a few times, the way Steph taught me to do when I was worked up over something.

"I'm sorry, Jen."

I was about to walk away when Jen turned towards me and wrapped her arms around me.

"I would never not be friends with you, Elijah East. And there's no reason for you to think otherwise." She pulled back and looked directly at me, her bright blue irises full of relief. Did I ever mention that she has beautiful eyes? "You're amazing, Elijah. And nothing will ever change that."

I tried to talk but all I could get out was a nervous squeak. She was still pretty close to me. I cleared my throat and tried again. "Maybe we should try last night's meeting again?"

"Sure!" Jen said brightly.

I followed her up to her room and sat down at her desk. Jen's room wasn't very big. She had a twin bed in one corner and a wooden desk along the wall. There was a bench at the end of her bed and a few bookshelves around, and that was pretty much it. Her room was simple, but I liked it a lot better than mine.

I don't think I've mentioned that my grandparents were rich. I've never even talked to them in my life, but they left Mom all their money and assets when they died. So now that Mom is gone, all the money is Dad's. My room feels like a reminder of how unfair the world is, that Mom could be missing and people still cared about money.

When Jen and I started our detective agency, there was some sort of silent agreement that we would have our meetings in Jen's room. It didn't feel right to talk about finding Mom in a room that was unaware of the fact that she was gone. Everything else had changed, but my room stayed exactly the same.

I realized that Jen was waiting for me to say something, but I wasn't sure if I wanted to tell her about my dream. I couldn't explain why I only remembered the story now, and it kinda freaked me out. Jen must of noticed how uncomfortable I was, because she started talking about everything we had figured out about the Fisher Mystery, which wasn't much.

"So!" She said with forced happiness. "We know that Fisher is some person from an old legend that supposedly no one has heard about in at least a hundred years, which isn't very helpful, but we'll figure that out as we go. The first mention of Fisher-"

"It's not a name. It's a title." I whispered.

"Huh?"

I still didn't really want to, but I recounted the legend that Mom told me in the dream to Jen. Somehow I remembered the entire tale word for word. At first, it felt weird when I was telling Jen about it and didn't even have to try to remember, but I quickly realized that it wasn't just a dream. At some point, I heard this story before. And I felt like Jen had too.

After I was done, Jen sat quietly, lost in thought. The silence was broken when we heard a banging noise on the front door.

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Word count: 1,339