Tainted Love

Chapter

The Market of Secrets

The morning sun stretched across the market like liquid gold, turning the air into a mixture of salt, chatter, and smoke. The sound of bargaining voices blended with the rhythm of waves crashing not too far away. The scent of fresh fish, seaweed, and wood smoke wrapped around everything — the smell of survival, of another long day beginning.

Daniel and his father, David, stood side by side at their small stall, their hands slick with water and salt as they sold fish faster than they could stack them.

David’s laughter boomed above the noise. “Eh, Daniel! See how they’re rushing today! The sea has truly favored us!”

Daniel, barely in his teens, grinned widely. His palms were small, but quick …wrapping fish, weighing scales, collecting coins. The customers came from every corner, their voices overlapping in a rhythm that made the whole place feel alive.

They had caught plenty the day before a miracle of tides and patience. And now, the blessing was paying off. Women with scarves tied high around their heads crowded around their stall, pointing, arguing, paying, leaving with baskets full.

Left. Right. Center.

Fish flew off the table faster than David’s eyes could follow.

And for once, luck smiled on them.

By midday, the crowd began to thin, and the heat softened into a lazy hum. They had been standing since dawn, their feet aching but their hearts light. David sank onto a wooden crate, wiping sweat from his brow, while Daniel stretched his back and smiled proudly at their empty baskets.

It was a good day. A rare, beautiful day.

And then, chaos broke through the calm.

A woman’s voice split the air …sharp, angry, trembling.

“You want to kill me and my family?! You wicked people!”

Heads turned.

David’s brows furrowed as he stood up. From between the stalls, a woman stormed toward them, her wrapper dragging against the ground, her scarf half slipping from her head. Her voice rose higher and higher, cutting through the last remnants of laughter in the market.

In her hand was a fish …their fish ..unwrapped, slick, and dripping.

“You want to kill us?” she screamed again, waving the fish wildly. “What is this inside, eh?! You want to poison me and my children?!”

David blinked in confusion. “Madam, calm down first…”

“Calm down for what?!” she barked. “You people think we are fools? You want to kill my family? Look at this!”

She thrust the fish forward. Inside its belly, sticking out between layers of soft flesh, was something small and black …a hard, shiny object that did not belong.

The crowd drew closer.

David reached for the fish. His hands were steady …the hands of a man who had seen the sea’s oddities many times. He examined the object carefully, frowned, and looked up.

“Madam,” he said gently, “I’m sorry for this. But we don’t control what the fish eats in the ocean. Sometimes they swallow strange things …plastics, stones, even bottle caps. This one probably swallowed it before we caught it.”

But the woman’s anger did not cool. Her voice climbed higher. “You think I don’t know poison when I see it? You want to kill us with this thing?”

David sighed. Her scarf had slipped off entirely now, her worn-out blouse clinging to her back. Anger had drawn deep lines into her face, and her eyes darted between father and son like blades.

He reached into his crate and pulled out another fish. “Please, take this one instead. No payment. Just go home and cook for your family.”

The woman snatched it without another word and stomped away. Her feet kicked up dust as she disappeared into the noise of the market, still muttering under her breath.

David exhaled and turned to his son. “Throw that one away,” he said, handing over the fish. “The sea is strange sometimes. It gives and it takes.”

But Daniel didn’t move right away.

The black object inside the fish …it glinted faintly under the sun. Something about it looked deliberate. Precise. Not like a random thing swallowed by mistake.

Curiosity flickered across his young face.

He took the fish away from the stall, pretending to follow his father’s instruction, but when he reached behind the wooden crates, he did something else entirely. He pulled the small black object out from the belly. It was smooth, rectangular, with tiny metal lines on one edge.

And then he remembered.

The teacher’s voice in class weeks ago.

“Some of the rich people use small cards …memory cards. They store music, pictures, secrets. Even films.”

He had imagined it then …something like a magical stone that could hold voices and faces. Now it was in his palm, sticky with fish blood, smelling of salt and something unreal.

A thrill ran through him. He smiled, wide and bright.

He, Daniel …a boy who sold fish …was holding something only the rich could have.

He slipped it into his pocket.

⸻

The evening came fast, like it always did near the coast.

The sun burned down into the horizon, and the sky turned crimson, spilling color over rooftops and waves. Daniel and David packed up their crates, their earnings wrapped safely in cloth. They trudged home through the narrow path between houses, past the laughter of neighbors and the smell of cooking stew.

David hummed a tune …an old fisherman’s song ….his voice calm and low. He didn’t notice the way Daniel kept touching his pocket, feeling the sharp corners of the secret he now owned.

When they reached home, David went straight to his room to wash off the salt and exhaustion. But Daniel paused in the small hallway, hearing a soft sound …not the clatter of dishes or the hum of night insects.

It was crying.

He turned.

There, sitting on the floor by the wooden chair, was Pascaline. Her shoulders shook with quiet sobs, her head bent low. The oil lamp beside her flickered gently, casting golden light on her tear-streaked face. Her wrapper was loose, her hair uncombed.

She looked… broken.

Daniel had never seen her like this.

He walked closer, his small feet making almost no sound on the floor. “Mommy?” he called softly.

Pascaline looked up, startled.

Her eyes, red and wet, met his …and for a second, something inside her softened. The word Mommy struck something deep within her chest, a memory she had buried long ago. A memory of a baby’s cry she never got to hold long enough.

“What is it, Daniel?” she said, trying to steady her voice, wiping at her tears quickly.

“Why are you crying, Mommy?”

Her lips trembled. She tried to smile, but it was the kind of smile that only deepened sorrow. “It’s nothing. I’m okay.”

He didn’t believe her. Children always know when someone’s heart is breaking.

Daniel tilted his head, his eyes full of something pure. “I know you are sad. But I hope the Lord helps you.”

Pascaline’s chest tightened. The child’s words were simple, but they felt heavier than anything she’d heard in years.

She reached for his hand …her fingers shaking slightly …and squeezed it. “Thank you,” she whispered. “You’re such a kind boy.”

Daniel smiled, shyly. “I’ll go and bathe and come back, okay?”

She nodded, watching him leave. And when he disappeared behind the curtain, she let out another long, quiet sob …the kind that feels like it comes from the bones.

⸻

Daniel poured cold water over his head. It ran down his body like silver. The day’s heat and smell washed away, but his thoughts stayed busy …circling the thing in his pocket. The black card.

He finished bathing, dried off, and put on a clean shirt. When he reached into his pocket, the card was still there …smooth, mysterious, silent.

He sat on the small bed, holding it in the glow of the lantern.

So this was a memory card.

Could it really keep memories? Songs? Faces?

He turned it over and over between his fingers, feeling its tiny ridges. How could something so small hold so much? What if… what if it belonged to someone important? What if it was part of something bigger?

He couldn’t know. But he felt it …the way one feels a story about to begin.

He wrapped it carefully in a piece of cloth and slipped it under his pillow, close to his head. Maybe, he thought, he would dream about what it contained.

⸻

When he came back to the small sitting room, Pascaline was still there, quiet now, staring at the flickering flame.

Daniel sat beside her. The air between them was warm and still.

“Mommy,” he said softly. “Don’t cry anymore. You’re not alone.”

She turned to him, eyes shining. “You’re too good for this world, Daniel,” she whispered, her voice trembling with the ache of things unsaid.

He smiled and leaned against her arm. “We’re family.”

She nodded slowly, the word family tasting both sweet and painful.

For a moment, silence settled ….heavy but comforting. The only sound was the lamp’s soft hiss.

Pascaline looked down at the boy beside her and thought of the child she once lost …a face she’d never gotten to see properly, a cry she never got to calm. And something in Daniel’s eyes made her feel, impossibly, like the world was trying to give her a piece of that child back.

She stroked his hair gently, her heart too full to speak.

⸻

That night, after everyone had gone to bed, Daniel lay awake. The house was quiet except for the whisper of the wind through the cracked window.

His hand reached under the pillow. The card was still there … his secret. His treasure.

He held it up against the faint light from the moon, watching how it reflected just a bit of silver.

Somewhere outside, a dog barked. A motorbike passed. Then silence again.

Daniel didn’t know that the small thing he found in the belly of a fish would soon change everything …not just for him, but for the woman crying in the next room, for the man sleeping peacefully, believing his world was safe.

He closed his eyes, the card resting against his palm, and whispered a small prayer ….the kind that children say without understanding why they say it.

The sea had given them a good catch.

But sometimes, the sea gave more than it should.

And tonight, beneath the hum of crickets and the sigh of waves, the market boy who found a secret slept, unaware that he had just reeled in a story far bigger than the ocean itself.