“You’re getting a what?!” 

“A 90-gallon saltwater tank” my little sister, Melany, replied with a calm tone as if she was just stating the weather. It was common knowledge to most of the family that Melany always had a love for the water and after my sister, Ily gave her the first fish she seemed to love fish as well. Quarantine seemed to only make her interest in them grow. She had previously only had a small 5-gallon tank with one small beta fish, and while that was rather small I thought a 90-gallon tank was excessive.

“From where?”

“Ily said she was gonna sell her tank and fish and mom said that if I wanted it I could have it.” I then remembered seeing said tank in Ily’s studio. I remember it looked huge to me and so tall that I could barely reach the top. The blue lights shining down on the tank and the different fish swimming around rocks and corals being the clearest details from my foggy memory.

“Mom really said that?” I question in an incredulous tone. My mother was always someone who wasn’t a big fan of having many if any, pets because she knew about all the responsibility and attention they needed.

“I was shocked too but she was serious” Melany stated just shrugging her shoulders.

“Well okay, if you want to deal with the tank that's on you,” I said in a rather cold tone. I was determined not to get sucked into this whole deal with the tank. I wasn’t a big fan of fish and a 90-gallon tank full of sensitive fish and coral sounded like a bad idea just waiting to happen. Add that to the stress of having to adjust to online school and I really wasn’t looking forward to the installment of my sister's tank. Nevertheless, a week later the tank was installed in the living room so it would be the first to greet me when I walked through the front door. In all honesty, it was a beautiful thing to observe. The blue lights not only tinted the room and water but also the corals and fish, making them glow and while there weren’t many fish in the beginning they were all beautiful. One of my favorites was the convict tang, which was roughly the size of my palm, and its body was covered in black and white stripes, except for the fins which were tinted a warm yellow. The convict tang, which was later named Francis the prison convict, would swim to one end of the tank and then zoom back to the other. He would do this a million times until he got tired and decided to hide in one of the little caves made by the rocks glued together.

“Ily says he gets the zoomies'' Melany mentioned as we sat at the end of the couch and just watched Francis. ‘That's an appropriate name for whatever it is he’s doing’ I thought to myself. 

“I need to do a water change soon and clean out some algae from the rocks” she stated a few minutes later. Water changes from what I learned from observing was just taking out some of the water and replacing it with new clean water. It was a process made to keep the tank clean. “I might need your help.”

“Do I have to?” I mumbled.

“Pleeeease Brenda” she begged, turning to look at me.  I turned to Melany and we just stared at each other for what felt like an eternity, until I finally let out a long and tired sigh.

“Fiiine” I finally replied. “But I’m not sticking my hand in for more than a minute”. Melany gave me a look that screamed ‘Are you serious’ but then with a roll of her eyes and a small smile she just agreed to my terms.

A few months had passed and nothing really changed. The world was still in partial lockdown as the numbers of Covid cases fluctuated. The tank remained in our living room. There were many challenges and issues with the tank, such as occasionally stressed corals, a jebao pump not working, or the lights turning off randomly. But the world didn’t burn down and Melany grew and learned from these experiences. The tank wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be.

“I need to do a water change and pick out that algae growing in the rocks,” Melany said in a tired voice. While online classes had gotten a little easier once we got used to our schedule it still was a difficult thing to fully adjust to. I knew she still had some homework to do and even though I had some homework as well I had time to spare.

“Need me to help you with something or do you want me to stay for moral support?” I asked her as she began to pick out the algae from the rocks.

“You can just stay here for moral support if you want,” she said without turning to look at me, her full attention on cleaning her rocks. I took a look at the rest of the rocks she had to clean. ‘That's a lot of algae for one person to clean’ I thought as I went to grab another step stool in order to reach the top of the tank. I took off my hoodie to reveal the graphic short sleeve t-shirt I was wearing and got on the step stool.  I plunged my left hand into the warm water feeling the waves made by all the fancy equipment. I reached for the closest rock and started pulling on the algae. It felt rather soft and came off the rocks with relative ease after a few pulls. Francis and Bob, a coral beauty Melany had bought a month or so after the tank's initial installation, swam around my hand, curious of the new intrusion in their home but too anxious to actually approach. Her clownfish, Julian who usually stayed in the corner next to the heater also approached my hand, his tail fin swinging back and forth at an aggressive pace.

“Oh yeah Julian will sometimes try to smack you with his tail” Melany quipped, her attention split between pulling the algae off her side of the tank and watching Julian move towards my hand and away from it.

“I’ll just scare him away if he gets too close” I responded, “I’m more worried about your sea urchin.”

“Who Dave? Nah man you don’t have to worry about Dave, he hides inside the cave during the day. Sea urchins are actually brainless.”

“Weird” I comment. We spent the rest of the time cleaning the rocks just listening to Melany’s playlist and occasionally singing our hearts out to certain songs.

“You know Brenda, I'm proud of you,” Melany suddenly stated.

“Oh, why's that?” I asked, a puzzled look on my face as the statement came out of thin air. 

“I remember when you never wanted to stick your hand in the tank and now you willingly decided to help me clean my tank. You even feed them now when I can’t.”

“Well yeah. I was always scared of either your fish biting me or that I would hurt your coral. But now I know your fish are also scaredy cats like me so I feel okay sticking my hand in here. Plus I feel bad just leaving you to do this all on your own. You help me all the time. I figured it would be good if I helped.” I responded in a sincere tone. 

As kids, Melany and I were glued to each other, and with only a two-year difference between us, we generally had the same interest. Obviously, as we grew up and with me going to middle school and my first 2 years of high school without Melany, we began to grow distant. However, quarantine had brought us physically closer, as now we were not separated by things like school or social outings, with school now being the dinner table and our laptop screens and social outings were now taboo. As days and months blurred together and no sign of normality any time soon, we began to grow to be more understanding of each other. We tried to keep each other sane and support one another. Melany would be there for me by letting me rant to her about the things I loved and felt passionate about or the things I disliked and wished to change, or just by making me smile when I felt melancholy. Seeing how much effort Melany had put into managing and learning about her tank made me see how special it had become to her. I thought that helping her out with something important to her would be a good opportunity to begin to be supportive and helpful, the way she was always there for me and my troubles. A way to show her that her older sister would always be there for her.