One of the science labs my county runs requires live goldfish. My school normally buys a small assortment and passes the tank from room to room until every class has run it. Once the experiment is done, we're left with a bunch of goldfish that no one really wants. The tank becomes an aquatic hot-potato as everyone tries not to be the last one stuck with it. Eventually, the goldfish usually find a permanent home. Some tanks decorating rooms can fit a couple, and we try to parcel them off to any students willing to adopt them.
That's the setup.
On Tuesday, my science co-teacher walked up to me while the kids were working. On Friday, she'd sent a goldfish home with an extremely excited student. The kid normally has some anxiety and stress issues, but the little fish in a bag gave her a case of happy-itus. Her parents bought a tank, set it up, and then all had a welcoming something or other for their new pet.
The goldfish died that weekend.
Maybe the family didn't let the water sit first. Maybe the goldfish was at a ripe old age. Who knows? The student was traumatized. There was much crying, and the parents wrote an email to my co-teacher explaining the whole situation and how upset their daughter was. They admitted that they were pretty upset about the whole incident and wanted to read up more on fish care so that it would never happen again. "They probably had a funeral too, knowing this family!" my co-teacher told me. At the end of the email, they asked my co-teacher to not ask about the fish, because the whole situation was so upsetting. They didn't want their daughter to break down or cry at school.
Of course, my co-teacher did not check her work email over the weekend. What was the first thing that she asked Tuesday morning?
"Hey! How's the fish?! Oh, I'm sorry....do you want another one?"
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