The Waterproof Bible by Andrew Kaufman Read Free Book Online Page B

earlier, from her father, Pabbi, who lived on the fourteenth floor of an apartment building in an area of town Aby rarely frequented. Late one evening, completely unannounced, Aby had swum to his door and knocked. She felt nervous in the hallway. She knocked again. The door was opened, suddenly and with such force that Aby had to hold onto the door jamb to avoid being pulled inside.
    Pabbi wasn’t well dressed. He’d gained weight since she’d last seen him. Several seconds passed during which neither father nor daughter said a word.
    “I need your help,” Aby said.
    “Okay.”
    “I’m going to get her.”
    Pabbi needed no further explanation to understand who “her” was. “Ah, Aby,” he said. “That’s … that’s big.”
    “I know.”
    “Are you still Aquatic?”
    “I am.”
    “Devoutly?”
    “Yes.”
    “So you’re planning on Returning her?”
    “I am.”
    “Oh, Aby,” he said.
    Pabbi did not move from the door jamb. He looked at the line where the red carpet from his apartment met the grey carpet in the hallway. A window was open in his living room, and the current pushed through the doorway, causing their bodies to sway in unison. The gills in his neck flapped open and he pushed a stream of water through them. Letting go of the door jamb, Pabbi backed into his apartment. “You’d better come in,” he said.
    With a quick pull of her arms, Aby swam inside. Pabbi began making a pot of stryim. Neither spoke until it had finished brewing. The kitchen table was cleared of dishes, and Pabbi and Aby bobbed around it.
    “Why don’t you come around more?” Pabbi asked.
    “I try.”
    “Not very hard.”
    “Will you help me?”
    “It’s best if you just leave her alone.”
    “I can’t.”
    “Tell me this—are you going because you want to save her? Or to find out why she left us?”
    “Can’t it be both?”
    “For you, maybe.”
    “So you’ll help me?”
    “Have you ever breathed air, Aby?”
    “No.”
    “Walked on legs?”
    “No.”
    “Tried to pass?”
    “No.”
    “It’s too much for you.”
    “Not if you help me.”
    “Even if I help you.”
    “I’ll do it even if you don’t help me,” Aby said. She looked up.
    “That’s probably true.”
    “Then you’ll help me?”
    Pabbi pushed a long stream of water from his gills. “As much as I can,” he said.
    Leaving her at the table, Pabbi swam to his bookshelf. He pulled down a volume unlike any Aby had seen before. He set it on the kitchen table. Waiting until she was looking over his shoulder, he opened it. The book looked like an atlas, but it didn’t illustrate the currents of the ocean. Aby realized that it was a map of land. Flipping through the pages, Pabbi came to an illustration of a large country, coloured pink. He put his thumb on Halifax. He dragged it across the shape, stopping at Morris, Manitoba. Even on the page, the distance seemed enormous.
    “It will take you days,” Pabbi said.
    “Okay.”
    “Maybe a week.”
    “Okay.”
    “And that’s only if you manage to steal a car.”
    “What’s a car?” Aby asked.
    Pabbi flipped open his gills and pushed a stream of water through them.
    It is important to understand that, for devout Aquatics, simply being unwatered is a sin. At the core of the religion is a belief in the
Finnyfir
, or Great Flood. In this way, Aquaticism is not unlike Judaism or Christianity, but with one central difference: where those religions believe God flooded the world in order to start again, Aquatics believe God simply liked water better.
    Aquatic scripture teaches that God found the land imperfect. He thought the mountains were messy, the deserts too dry and the fjords a little showy. He didn’t like the way the creatures He’d put on land did nothing but fight amongst themselves. The only thing God liked about His creation was the water. He loved the lakes, rivers and oceans. He loved the way water moved. He loved the colours it came in and the sounds it made. God liked the