“Saltwater Tears - The Bemoaning of the Manfish”
A letter from a bottle, found on the shore of an ocean.
Fishman is dead. My celebrated enemy and biological rival.
Nothing has spurned me more throughout this life than the unfriendly reminder of the Fishman’s existence, seemingly in spite of my own. I have many grievances against the grand designer. Out of all the mysteries that he leaves, I must know why I - the Manfish! - must suffer disproportionately.
The Fishman’s features are of genetic and artistic expertise. Every curve , a meticulously toned muscle looking purposeful in its existence. His dark skin glittered when he was above the water as it did in the sea. Light danced through the melanin and exited through glistening amber eyes in a bountiful shimmer. What a blessing to not be marred by the sun from the hours spent in its gaze - unlike these pasty swaths of flesh attached to I, the Manfish!
I have spent many days laying on the beach for a nice coat of sun but alas this fish body has a punishing scent when the meat begins to cook. Beach goers form surprisingly large mobs in short time to chase the Manfish and slander with insulting names. Woe again belongs to I, the “Smells-like-assfish”!
In the water, the Fishman was as graceful as he was athletic with his tremendously strong, human arms paired perfectly with his undeniably dynamic tail. The flesh and scale torpedo that he was , dazzled from the moment he came into this world. Oh to be allowed a vessel as physically magnificent as the Fishman!
But again, I am the Manfish, with arms too frail to swim in a straight line and a torso that hangs in the currents like sails on a dumpster, a mockery amongst all things that traverse the sea. My tail sticks out from my human ass cheeks like a submerged shark. If only I had the consolation price of a human penis but once again, fish. Smooth as an action figure.
I wish I could work hard and overcome the genetic dispositions that leave me in a rotten last place amongst the aquatic creatures but as if I could make it through a moment of the rigorously detailed and painstaking exercise and diet regime of the Fishman! My human ass stings with soreness even throughout my day of sitting in shame! I would eat nutritious fruits and vegetables but I cannot simply walk into the supermarket like the Fishman. It would turn into an impromptu battering with I, the Manfish as their smelly pinata, with no candy to leak out, just blood and probably a little pee. So, I eat my snacks from the gas station where all the other degenerate outcasts of mankind go and get punishing diarrhea not even an hour later. .
Ah but after all, the Fishman ultimately did succumb to earthly pleasures that would bring his untimely downfall. With all these gifts he has biologically, he was bound to do battle in love. How lonely it must be when you must share your love with hundreds of humans and fish alike. Never finding the one, he had to share his surprisingly whopping fish member all throughout the sea and earth. He may have been fish from the waist down but God drew the piscine line right below that whaleish dong. Unfortunately for him, despite his efforts to save the rest of the world from the effects of an ocean filled with rubber and plastic, something to wrap up was all that could’ve saved him after all. His conquests in lovemaking led him to contract a new and ferocious hybrid disease, combining to make an antibiotic resistance combination strain of both human and fish-syphilis.
Statues and memorials were built throughout the world when his passing was announced. He had formed many unbreakable bonds with people and countries due to his vigilante activities. From a simple saving of swimmers close to drowning to brokering peace between warring countries. They marveled at his miracle existence unlike any other half-man cryptid. Most of us could be, at best, freakshow famous thousandaires. Not many of us half-ies loved Fishman out of our cursed jealousy but damn did the idea of him give future generations of human-beast hybrids something to dream about. If only the same were true for I, the Manfish, the crap-chimera without even an invite to the cryptid barbeques.
I did try to contribute to the world that hates me so, making my way to the illustrious League of Fish headquarters, halfway to the bottom of the ocean. I had an envelope of collected proof of what the humans had been doing to our ocean for the past century. Many of the ocean creatures could not see past the water to see who was causing their tribulations, the heating of the oceans, the littering of beaches and the dumping of waste that brought the frightening threat of a marine holocaust to reality for us all in the ocean.
We planned a plot together, as one united marine front, snowballing from causing minor inconveniences to humans like tipping canoes to monumental, one-sided catastrophes to wrecking large cruise ships and not just the ones with swinging seniors. The plan would begin the next day so I traveled back to the shore for one last night of rest before revolution. Before sleep, Manfish celebrated with his usual 6 pack of bottom-shelf brewskis but a friend of the fish world had his eyes on my lonely celebration.
The eyes of that blubbery seal, oh how they saw and betrayed the Manfish.
I, the Manfish, made one careless mistake of not cutting the plastic holding together the six pack before tossing it into a beachside trash-bin. I had cut so many of them before but no, no one saw when the Manfish was a good citizen, only the one time when he was blinded by the prospect of being the savior of entire ecosystems.
And so, the meeting of the revolution turned into a tossing of the Manfish to the bottom-feeders down below. Manfish now writes to you from fish jail, because not even death chooses him.