By James Hartman

“This dummy absolutely refuses to blink.”

Going to the zoo wasn’t Becky’s idea, but just two days after he was fired Herbert complained of feeling claustrophobic.  Her husband didn’t research any other jobs and now he is trying to stare down a crocodile.  For the first time since they entered the Reptile House, he looks up at his wife and says,  “Who the hell does it think it is?  I paid to come see it with my own money.”

Everything inside Becky cinches with panic.  Last night Herbert berated the Walgreen’s cashier after he found what he perceived to be a burnt corn kernel in his pint of Moosetracks.  “This is what I get?” he shouted, as he backhanded the credit card machine.  “For eight goddamn dollars?” 

Herbert is not violent.  He does not possess one of those touch-and-go tempers.  He is actually docile.  When Becky came home last week and told him the school board had let her go, due to state-ordered budget cuts, he gave her a sweet kiss and said she’d find another teaching opportunity.  His mild disposition is one of the reasons their marriage has lasted so long, although someone else may define “long” differently.  To Becky, “long” is three years.  It was losing his job that did this.  Five dedicated years to the dealership and the dealership one day handed him an envelope with a letter.  She found her husband slouched on their bed, the envelope and letter dangling from his slack fingers.  “This is what they think of me,” he groaned.  “Can’t even say it to my face.”

His fist of knuckles now slap the glass.  The crocodile, facing Herbert, stares at nothing, or everything.  It has a bulging belly and its narrow jaws, Herbert complains—“What’s the problem, can’t move your mouth either?  How you gonna eat?”—are firmly shut.  But now, now there is the slightest incremental rise.  The upper jaw floats above the bottom jaw, but Becky’s husband does not notice.  Grinning, he admires his fist of knuckles as he hurls them harder against the glass.

“Excuse me, sir.”

The voice next to them belongs to a man maybe five feet, yet gorged with muscle.  He wears a red-collared shirt, or the red-collared shirt tries to wear him.  DETROIT ZOO hangs in the high right corner of it.  His mustache is a thick solid brown, but his complexion is paler than the Aruba rattlesnake’s chalky skin, which it is shedding in the next enclosure over.

“Margaret does not like that,” the man says.  From a blue nylon string around his neck floats a white badge with the name Theodore Jones in red.  Beneath his name, the word VOLUNTEER, and all of a sudden Becky feels her neck tingle.

Herbert studies the man’s white badge, then blinks stunned amusement at the man’s face.  “This crocodile is named Margaret?”

“Siamese crocodile, sir.”  Theodore Jones raises one cupped palm to a yellow square plaque.  “Margaret is one of our SSPs, so you would do well to provide her with extra respect.”

Herbert swings his fist of knuckles against the glass.  “More like it should show me some respect, considering I paid fourteen ridiculous dollars to see its stupid ass.”

An instant smile waves across Becky’s face, and she asks with a spring of curiosity, “What’s SSP?”

Theodore Jones shifts his glare from Becky’s husband and addresses her, his eyes firm and urgent.  “Species Survival Program, ma’am.  Margaret here is a critically endangered species.  The Detroit Zoo is working with other zoos around the world to repopulate them in captivity so we can restore their numbers in the wild to healthy levels.”

Theodore Jones’s arms are sliced by veins that throb across his muscle-gorged skin.  He smiles at her, and Becky tries to ignore her own throbbing veins.  Did they have to keep this building so warm?  Nine degrees outside and she had buried herself in four layers.  “And where do they live?” she asks, her curiosity irrepressible.

“They live in the tropical lowlands of southeast Asia, and perhaps one or two Indonesian islands.”  He frowns at his feet, his jaw muscles pulsating.  “I am sad to have to report that the humans whom amongst they live hunt them for their supposed medicinal benefits.  Lies, ma’am.  Outright lies.”

“See?” Herbert says.  “Now that’s behaving rationally.  If they can cure disease, why the hell not?  Talk about an easy kill!”

Becky looks down, but not at her husband.  The Siamese crocodile’s jaws are definitely, obviously, open, two inches or more, her light emerald eyes striped black and still.

“Excuse me, sir, but that is not a nice thing to say.”

Herbert chuckles.  “Let me guess, Margaret doesn’t like that?”

Theodore Jones stretches his long hand across his flat stomach and glares at Becky’s husband.  “No, sir, Margaret does not like that.”

Herbert punches the glass, grinning, as his eyes flick between Theodore Jones and his wife.  Because of this, he does not notice Margaret’s jaws widening.  He does not notice her light emerald eyes glittering black.  “What was that about species survival whatever?  Are you kidding me?  Our state’s economy is total shit and you’re talking about saving some stupid ass crocodile?  What about saving us?”

“Sir,” Theodore Jones murmurs, like nothing could ever unravel him.  “I have politely requested once already.  Please stop hitting the glass.  Margaret does not—-.”

“—-it doesn’t like that, I know.  I can hear, you dummy.”  Herbert continues to grin as he punches his knuckles faster against the glass.

A sudden, harsh sound snags the air, and Becky sees Margaret’s narrow jaws snap shut, then bounce open against the glass, exposing wide-spaced, knife-like teeth.  Her eyes a glittering black trance.

“Jesus fuck!” her husband squeals, and spills back on his ass.  “What the hell’s wrong with it!?”

Becky and Theodore Jones look at each other.  They share a loose, delighted chuckle.

“Well, sweetheart,” Becky says, and traces down her neck a long, wet line of sweat.  “Maybe she’s ravenous.”

~~~~~

James Hartman’s fiction appears in Blue Fifth Review, Litro, December, Raleigh Review, Hamilton Stone Review, New World Writing Quarterly, and elsewhere.  His fiction has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and The Best Small Fictions, and was a finalist in New Millennium’s 54th Annual Short Story Award.  His scholarly work is featured in The Hemingway Review.  He holds a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from Eastern Kentucky University, and lives in Pennsylvania.