It was a kindness, her mother said, a kindness. He was getting too big for his bowl and they had to move house. He needed a bigger tank and they couldn’t have it at the apartment.

She used to put him on the windowsill in the house, so he could look out into front yard and see the trees and the people going by. She liked him to see the sun. He wasn’t an affectionate pet, never happy to see her but...

His footsteps resounded off the marble steps as he climbed from Professor McCurdy’s main office up to the lab. Everything seemed eerily quiet in the building, the lights were dimmed to save electricity and even the janitorial staff had gone home. He gripped his dissertation proposal, bloodied by the Professor’s red pen and sighed.

This year had to go right, it had to come together. Everything was...