Aquarium Escapes

I was first in line for a Sea Life centre's morning opening. I wanted to do some research for my novel, which features an aquarium. Whilst waiting for the counter to open, some people turned up behind me and arranged themselves in such a way that I thought they were trying to push in. Luckily, when the ticket attendant arrived, she served me first, and I paid £20 for an adult ticket. 

I proceeded down the corridor and into the first room, where low tanks of cuttlefish, smiling eels, and wolffish were situated. I was perturbed to see the creatures clustered around the top of the tank, on top of one another, with their heads sticking out over the top. I entered deeper into the room and on the floor, behind the door, some of the fish had spilled onto the floor. When they saw me approach, there was a flurry and flopping of fins and tentacles as they scarpered back into the tank. I saw the coiled arms of cuttlefish squirming against the tiles. I ran back the way I had come, horrified.

Two old ladies went ahead of me into the same room. I peeked in after them and saw that many of the larger eels and wolffish had also plopped out of their tanks and onto the floor. The old women shrieked as the fish flapped around their feet. A smaller eel, seeing the open door, made a wriggly beeline for it, and for me.

I ran off in another direction, down a main corridor that led deeper into the aquarium. The eel was following, I could hear its wet body slapping the floor as it slithered after me. With no time to look back, I ran as fast as I could, the awful sounds always close behind. When I came to a room with a white countertop on which souvenirs were sold, I leapt up on top of it, much to the surprise of some other guests.

An employee saw the eel, and went to pick it up. "What are you doing here?" he sighed, as though it were a regular occurrence. He picked it up in his bare hand and threw it into a bucket of water. My whole body twitched and prickled in fear, lest one of the squirmy beasts should unexpectedly make contact with me. My wife poked me awake and I jumped out of my skin.