Free Eeeee Eee Eeee by Tao Lin Page A

said.
    The dolphin gave Ellen a muffin on a plate.
    “A little,” Ellen said.
    The dolphin watched Ellen eat the muffin.
    “Thank you,” Ellen said.
    “Do you want cake?” the dolphin said.
    “I don’t know,” Ellen said.
    The air conditioner went off.
    The room was very quiet.
    The Christmas lights blinked.
    The refrigerator was very quiet.
    “Do you want to come over again?” the dolphin said.
    “Okay.”
    The dolphin held Ellen’s hand and they went to Ellen’s room.
    “I had a lot of fun,” the dolphin said.
    Ellen hugged the dolphin.
    The dolphin cried.
    The dolphin very quietly went, “Eeeee eee eeee.”
    “You are nice,” Ellen said.
    “Did you like the muffin?” the dolphin said.
    “Yes,” Ellen said.
    The dolphin looked at Ellen.
    Ellen sat on her bed and looked at her hands.
    Ellen looked at her sandals.
    The dolphin looked at Ellen’s sandals.
    “Do you want to do something else?” the dolphin said.
    “Okay.”
    The dolphin held Ellen’s hand.
    They went through the trapdoor and the corridor down a ladder into an elevator.
    The elevator had mirrors.
    Ellen looked at herself and the dolphin.
    The dolphin was smoother.
    The dolphin put a blindfold on Ellen.
    They walked across a rope bridge and Ellen heard hamster noises.
    The dolphin took the blindfold off Ellen.
    They crawled through a tunnel.
    There was a playground.
    Ellen walked into the playground and felt very quiet.
    She felt very calm.
    The dolphin went down the slide.
    Ellen climbed onto the slide and went down the slide.
    The dolphin went, “EEEEE EEE EEEE.”
    Ellen went to the swings.
    The dolphin and Ellen did the swings.
    “EEEEE EEE EEEE,” went the dolphin.
    Ellen looked at the dolphin’s face.
    The dolphin’s face looked handsome.
    Ellen looked at the dolphin going, “EEEEE EEE EEEE.”

 
    Dolphins felt top-heavy, that year, most of the time, and wanted to lie down. When their heads weren’t on top they still felt top-heavy, but metaphysically. In public places they felt sad. They went into restrooms, hugged themselves, and quietly went, “Eeeee eee eeee.” Weekends they went to playgrounds alone. They sat in the top of slides—the enclosed part, where it glowed a little because of the colored plastic—and felt very alert and awakebut also very sad and immature. Sometimes they fell asleep and a boy’s mother would prod the dolphin with a broom and the dolphin would go down the slide while still asleep. At the bottom they would feel ashamed and go home and lie in bed. They felt so sad that they believed a little that it was their year to be sad, which made them feel better in a devastated, hollowed-out way. Life was too sad and it was beautiful to really feel it for once; to be allowed to feel it, for one year. When dolphins had these thoughts, usually on weekends at night, it was like dreaming, like a pink flower in a soft breeze on a field was lightly dreaming them. The sadness was like a pink forest that got less dense as you went in and then changed into a field, which the dolphins walked into alone. Sometimes the sadness was like a knife against the face. It made the dolphins cry and not want to move. But sometimes a young dolphin would feel very lonely and ugly and it was beautiful how alone it felt, and it would become restless with how perfect and elegantits sadness was and go away for a long time and then return and sit in its room and feel very alone and beautiful.
    Sometimes when dolphins went to playgrounds alone they did the monkeybars and went to the swings and on the swings thought, “I hate this stupid world.”
    They thought, “I hate it.”
    They cried a little with the wind against their face.
    They felt so bad that they went away.
    And found Elijah Wood and told Elijah Wood to go with them and Elijah Wood went—because he thought it was a movie. Elijah Wood and other celebrities like Salman Rushdie rode dolphins in rivers. Salman Rushdie felt proud and famous. And the dolphins swam to