Contrary to widespread belief, Shalonda isn't biologically a fish. She gets her fishy looks from the seven years she spent living in the belly of Elliot, a giant deep-water Song Trout. These incredible creatures are named for the haunting angelic tones produced when they try to breathe out of water. Folklore asserts that whenever the fish were caught they were always released because their song was so divine that no God-fearing waterman (or waterlady) ever dared to keep them.
Naturally, with not much else to do in the belly of a fish, Shalonda took to learning the intricacies of the trout's song, which she felt in vibrations, every time the fish was caught.
On the day that Elliot would die (of natural causes at the ripe old age of 110), he beached himself in North Philadelphia (don't ask) and gently vomited her up. Elliot's last, most beautiful song, is the song (in variations, of course) that Shalonda now shares in his honor.
