by JB Lynn
“Oh,” the mobster mocked. “Paranoia doesn’t suit you.”
I actually think it does. Paranoia keeps me alive.
Chapter Eleven
DeeDee was not happy when I told her that she could not come along to talk to the gorillas.
“Help would I but,” she protested on a whine.
“I know,” I soothed, petting her head. “But I’d never be able to sneak you into the zoo.”
“Which is why I will be your perfect partner-in-crime.” God, pacing the length of his terrarium, flicked his tail excitedly.
“What about your sensitive skin?” Piss meowed cattily.
“Your name suits your disposition,” the lizard countered imperiously.
“Not her name. Not her name. Not her name,” Benny squeaked.
I walked over to the box where the mouse was and looked inside. “Would you like to come along, Benny?”
“No! No! No!” God bellowed.
Piss blinked at him before drawling, “Kind of sound like him, the way you’re repeating yourself.”
“Shut up.”
She flexed her claws before purring, “Come with us, Benny. It’ll be fun.”
“Who said you’re coming along?” God asked.
“I can sneak into the zoo just fine. There’s no reason for me not to go.” The cat licked her paw to demonstrate how bored she was by the lizard’s challenge.
The Doberman let out a heavy sigh and hung her head. “DeeDee doesn’t go only.”
“Fine,” I muttered. “You can come along to guard the car.”
“Guard the—?” God began. He thought better of finishing the sentence when he saw the dirty look I gave him.
DeeDee lifted her head and panted hopefully, “Go?”
“You can go,” I assured her.
“Go!” she yipped excitedly, zooming around in a circle.
“You’d better let her out before you put her in the car,” God warned.
And that was how we all ended up sitting in my car in the parking lot of the zoo.
“Okay,” I said before opening my door. “DeeDee stays with the car and—”
“Guarding!” she barked.
“Quietly,” Piss urged. “Guard quietly.”
“And Piss will scout ahead,” I continued, hoping that bringing the menagerie hadn’t been a bad idea. “And God and Benny will stick with me. Ready, everyone?”
“Ready,” DeeDee woofed silently.
“By Grabthar’s hammer!” God yelled from his perch atop my shoulder.
“Let’s show ’em how it’s done, sugar,” Piss purred.
I looked at Benny, who was tucked into the breast pocket of my jacket, curled into a tight, quivering ball. “Ready, Benny?”
“No, no, no,” he squeaked so softly I could barely hear him.
“Meek mouse,” God mocked.
“Superior ass,” Piss hissed.
I pushed open the door. “Let’s go.”
The cat bounded out and raced toward the zoo’s gated entrance.
I rubbed the spot between the dog’s eyes. “Guard quietly.”
“Luck good.” She kissed my palm for emphasis.
Climbing out of the car, I quietly shut the door and locked it. I took a moment to let my eyes adjust to the darkness. A thick fog made everything fuzzy and damp.
“And we’re off,” God whispered melodramatically.
Poor Benny whimpered.
Sticking to the shadows, I crept across the parking lot. As I approached the front gate, Piss ran up to me. “This way.” She took off like a shot.
I did my best to follow her, but soon lost sight of the cat. “Hey, slow down,” I called. “I can’t see as well as you in the dark.”
“She only has one good eye,” God drawled. “How well could she possibly see?”
“Mean, mean, mean,” Benny protested softly.
“The truth hurts,” God countered.
“Shut up,” I murmured, squinting against the darkness.
Piss appeared at my feet again. “What’s taking so long?”
“It’s dark and I’m trying not to fall and break my neck.”
“You should have brought a flashlight,” the lizard offered.
“Gee, thanks,” I muttered. “Too bad you didn’t think of that while we were still at home and could have gotten one.”
“Who said I didn’t?” he replied haughtily. “It’s not my fault you don’t think ahead.”
I seriously considered brushing him off my shoulder and letting him fall to the ground.
Ignoring the reptile, the cat said, “We’re almost there. Stay close.”
I followed her around a corner to a narrow alleyway filled with five dumpsters overflowing with trash.
“Repulsive odor,” God complained.
For once, I agreed with him.
“Smells like an all-you-can-eat buffet to me,” Piss said lightly.
The lizard made a terrible retching noise in my ear, triggering my sympathetic-vomiting urge. I covered my mouth with my hand and turned away from the garbage, trying to suck in some less rancid air.
“You can climb on top and leverage yourself over the fence here,” Piss called from a distance.
Grudgingly, keeping my hand over my mouth, I turned to find her perched on the middle dumpster.
I had to admit her plan made sense. If I could stand on top of the dumpster, the leap to a low part of the fence was quite accessible.
“No,” God protested the moment I moved toward the cat.
“It’s the best way,” Piss argued.
“It’s revolting,” the lizard objected.
“It’s a necessary evil,” I told him, steadfastly forcing myself to move toward the trash receptacle.
“It’s not worth it!” God yelled desperately. “Do you have any idea of the filth you’ll be exposing me to? The feculent muck and grime? The deadly germs and bacteria?”
“Hey, drama queen,” Piss yowled with irritation, “why don’t you just crawl through a hole in the fence?”
“Why didn’t you think of that?” God bellowed, slapping my cheek with his tiny foot.
“Did you just hit me?” I raged on a whisper.
“Whoops,” he said sheepishly.
“Apologize. Apologize. Apologize,” Benny ordered in a slightly stronger tone.
“The repetition,” God groaned.
“You struck Maggie.” Piss lifted a paw and flexed her claw. “Apologize or I’ll strike you.”
God let out an audible gulp. “Sorry. My emotions got the better of me.”
“I’m going to get the better of you if that ever happens again,” Piss threatened.
“Emotions are running high,” I said, trying to defuse the situation. “None of us are at our best.”
“Don’t let him off the hook so easily, sugar.” Using her one good eye, the cat gave the lizard the evil eye.
I sighed heavily. “We can either stand around arguing all night or do what we came here to do.”
“Argue. Argue. Argue,” Benny urged softly from his hiding space in the pocket.
Striding over to the fence, I lifted a hand to my shoulder. “C’mon. You can go your way and I’ll go mine.”
God hopped on my fingers. “Remember to put me down gently. I have sensitive skin.”
“So you’ve mentioned,” I replied dryly, carefully bending down and lowering my hand to the ground.
“A million times,” Piss added. “You complain about Benny repeating himself, but you’re the one who can’t shut up.”
Ignoring us, the lizard skittered off of me and through the fence.
Straightening, I eyed the dumpster and the fence, wondering if Piss was giving me too much credit for athletic prowess I didn’t possess.
“You’ve got this, sugar,” she assured me.
Deciding I had nothing to lose, I awkwardly clambered onto the dumpster. A thin sheen of dampness caused by the fog made the surface slick. The vile odor of whatever horrid thing w
as rotting inside made me gag. The retching reflex made me lose my balance and for one terrible instant I thought I was going to plummet headfirst into the smelly decay.
Thankfully, I caught myself, regained my balance, and shimmied my way over to the fence. I examined the fence for a long moment, unsure I could make the leap and clear the top as Piss believed I could.
I tensed all my muscles as I prepared for my attempt.
“You can do it!” God bellowed in his best Hungarian accent. “You can do it!”
And so I did.
I leapt.
It’s funny, the things that can go through your head in the millisecond before gravity takes over and you tumble to the ground. In that moment that I was airborne, I relived a memory of the time my mom and I jumped off a dock into a freezing cold lake somewhere in Pennsylvania.
I’d been terrified, but she’d held my hand and had this look of utter confidence, so I’d made the leap of faith. The water was bracingly cold, but invigorating, and I’d had an ear-to-ear grin as we’d swum back to shore. Remembered moments of joy shared with my mom were the best.
It was like the bubbly happiness of the memory buoyed me through the air and then my hands hit the top of the zoo’s fence.
Somehow, I managed to hang on and awkwardly leverage myself up and over the fence. I half-climbed, half-fell down the other side, twisting my ankle as I landed on the hard ground.
“You get a negative two for grace, but a six for sheer determination,” God judged dryly, “for a total score of four. Maggie Lee earns a four on fence clearance.”
Piss hissed her annoyance at the lizard, before saying, “I knew you could do it, sugar. I’ll be right there.” She raced off in the darkness.
“You can pick me up now,” God said.
Ignoring him, I gingerly began to limp into the zoo, leaving him to fend for himself.
Piss zoomed into my path. “This way.”
I followed the cat along a shadowy path.
“Is it far?” God asked pitifully, running to keep up with us. “My long-distance conditioning is not optimal.”
“Are we there yet?” the cat mocked, glancing back at him. “Suck it up, buttercup.”
“You’re a miserable creature,” the lizard shot back.
“Blame it on your company.”
I was pretty sure I heard Benny titter softly in my pocket.
Suddenly, loud whispering filled the air. A chill slid down my spine. Instinctively, I stopped and crouched. I listened intently, but there were too many voices for me to make out the words.
The only thing I could clearly make out was Benny hyperventilating. “Scary. Scary. Scary.”
“What is that?” I asked Piss.
“The reptile house,” the cat replied.
“Eat. Eat. Eat,” Benny lamented pitifully.
“Now is not the time for a midnight snack,” God reprimanded.
“He’s afraid the snakes are going to eat him,” Piss explained. “You, who is always going on about me chowing down on you should understand that.”
“Oh.” God sounded properly chastised.
“I won’t let the snakes eat you,” I promised the mouse. “I’ll keep you safe.”
“Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”
“What’s here that can eat me?” God asked worriedly.
“We’ve got to go past the birds next,” Piss replied. “They’re your natural predators, aren’t they?”
The lizard let out an audible gulp.
“Come here.” I bent down and offered him my hand.
He didn’t need a second invitation to run up my arm and dive into the safety of my bra.
Piss chuckled. “The gorilla habitat isn’t too far way.”
We made our way past the talkative parrots who lectured us about being in the zoo after hours, the camels that looked at us disdainfully before spitting at us, and a lone yak that smelled worse than the garbage dumpster.
Finally, we approached our intended destination.
“Intruder alert! Intruder alert!” a deep female voice yelled.
I slowed my pace, the fog obscuring my view, as Piss ran ahead.
“Defense positions,” an overeager male voice ordered. “We’re under attack.”
I shuffled in front of the habitat and peered at the three gorillas that were watching me distrustfully. I offered them a weak smile. “You’re not under attack.”
“You’re invading our space,” the youngest and largest animal bellowed, baring his teeth and pounding on his chest.
“Primitive primates,” God groused from my bra.
“I startled them,” I argued.
“Back off. Back off,” the female screamed, shaking the bars of the cage.
“Of course.” I took two steps backward. “I didn’t mean to intrude. I’m sorry for alarming you.”
“You—” the young male began.
“Shhh,” an elderly, tremulous female voice interrupted. “Listen more, talk less.”
I switched my attention to the third gorilla. She was smaller and older than the other two, but when she stepped to the edge of the cage, the others respectfully fell back.
“What—?” the male began.
She waved him off, focusing on me. “I think the human understands us.”
“I do,” I confirmed.
“Can’t be,” the younger female argued.
“I assure you, I can,” I said.
The young female jumped back.
“Don’t be alarmed. I just needed to ask you about the man who ended up in there with you. He’s my uncle and I’m trying to figure out what happened to him. Do you understand the meaning of uncle?”
The older female drew herself up to her full height. “We value our family bonds. We did no harm to the human.”
“We should have,” the male complained.
“Forgive him,” the older female said. “He is young and impulsive.”
I nodded my understanding. “Can you tell me what happened?”
“He fell,” the younger female supplied helpfully. “From above.” She pointed up at the observation deck that ringed the habitat, providing a bird’s eye view of the area.
“He was injured,” I began.
“Not by us.” The older female issued the denial hotly. “We cared for him.”
“I know,” I soothed. “I was wondering if you saw who hurt him or who pushed him over the edge.”
“We did not,” the older female replied.
“Because Cleo fell asleep on watch,” the male complained bitterly, giving a dirty look to the younger female.
“She wasn’t on watch,” the older female chastised gently. “Just because you told her to do something doesn’t mean she had to. She chose to sleep. Her time, her body, her choice.”
The male made a growling noise before turning his back on all of us.
“We didn’t see anything,” Cleo confirmed.
“Did you hear any arguing?” I asked hopefully.
“Of course not,” the male grumbled, his back still to me. “Otherwise, we would have looked up and seen something.”
“Unshakeable logic,” God opined from my bra.
“But there was the smell,” the older female offered.
I stepped closer. “What smell?”
“Garlic,” Cleo offered.
“Dill,” the male argued.
“Vinegar,” the older female declared.
“Seriously,” God mocked. “We’re going to solve this by tracking down the smell of garlic, dill or vinegar? You do know that DeeDee’s a Doberman, not a bloodhound.”
I considered smothering him with my breasts.
“The human is okay?” the older female asked.
“He is,” I assured her. “Thank you for taking such good care of him.”
She bowed her head.
“And thank you for the information about the odor. It’s helpful.”
“Liar,” God whispered.
Ignoring him, I told the
gorillas, “I have to leave now.”
“Will you return to speak with us, human?” the older female asked.
“Maggie. My name is Maggie. And yes, I’ll come back to talk with you again if that’s what you want.”
“Very much,” the older gorilla said.
“Then I will see you again soon,” I promised.
“Be careful,” she called as I turned to limp away. “Your uncle got lucky. You may not be.”
Chapter Twelve
“You need a job.”
Those were the first words spoken to me by a human being the next morning.
Since I’d been hypnotized by the sight of my coffee cup spinning slowly within the microwave, I jumped a little. I slid my gaze sideways to find Aunt Susan staring at me, lips pursed, eyes disapproving.
“Good morning,” I replied as the microwave timer beeped.
“You need a job,” she repeated crossly. “You can’t be getting up at the crack of noon like some aimless hobo.”
Taking my steaming cup out of the microwave, I glanced at the clock. “It’s 9:37, not exactly the crack of noon.”
“It’s too late for any self-respecting responsible adult to be starting their day. You’re wasting your life, Margaret.”
Trying to hold my tongue, I blew on my drink. It wasn’t like I could tell her I’d been out late talking to the gorillas in the mist.
Arms crossed over her chest, Susan tapped her foot impatiently.
I struggled to remember that she and I had recently reached a truce of sorts and that she wasn’t always so difficult to deal with. Not wishing to escalate a situation that could easily turn into a full-blown battle, I forced myself to take a calming breath.
“Something bothering you besides my irresponsible hobo-ness?” I asked dryly.
“Don’t be smart, young lady.”
“Problems with Griswald? Loretta? Leslie?” I asked rapid-fire, trying to figure out if her fiancé or sisters were to blame for her current mood.
“You’re deflecting,” she countered.
“Marlene? Darlene?” I pushed on, thinking maybe one of my sisters was the cause of her wrath.
She shook her head.
Remembering she’d been going to visit my mother, I asked cautiously, “Mary?”
Her face crumpled and she sank into the nearest chair.
Anxiety made my stomach clench and I put down my cup. “What happened?”
