The letter came. I was on academic probation. I knew I wasn't doing well in organic chemistry, but my grades were abysmal--a B, two C's, and two D's. I'd managed to get below a 2.0 grade average, hence the letter which informed me that another similar performance could place me on academic suspension. I had really made no friends at the university. I went to my classes and came home. The campus was a sterile, uninviting place to me. Soon, I would be released from my doctor's care. It was time to begin thinking about a new school.
I stopped by to see Tommy one day at the little government housing apartment. It was new and had not yet become run down, so it wasn't as depressing as it would be. His daughter, little Aniston, was as cute as a baby could be and she always smiled when she saw me. And his wife, Suzi, had fallen into a comfortable routine with some of the other mother's in the complex. From the outside, their lives did not look that bad. They had subsidized housing and food stamps. They were getting by.
When I knocked on the door, Tommy opened it a crack and said, "Come here, I want to show you something." I could see he was trying to hold something back with his foot. "Come in quick, and don't let the cat out."
They have a new cat, I thought. But when I slipped by Tommy who was still holding the door, I saw a giant black thing like a baby panther looking me in the eyes. Involuntarily, I jumped.
"What the hell is that?"
"It's an ocelot. Sit down."
I walked over to the couch and sat, but the big cat followed me. It just stood in front of me, looking.
"What the hell are you doing with this? It's scaring me."
Tommy laughed. "He won't hurt you. I found him. I was driving down Mercy Drive the other day and something jumped out of the weeds on the side of the road. I thought I'd hit it and stopped the car to see. When I opened the door, this thing just climbed in. Scared the hell out of me, too. I didn't get in the car for awhile."
As he talked, the ocelot came closer and I could hear it purring, but it was not comforting to me. The low hum inside its chest sounded ominous as it breathed in and out. It bumped my leg with its head like it wanted to be touched, and I could feel the power in it.
"Why do you have this in the house? Aren't you afraid it will eat the baby?"
He shook his head and lit a Marlboro. "No, it is friendly. I looked in the paper and found an ad a fellow had placed who lost his ocelot. I called him. I hope he gives me a reward."
Now the cat had his paws in my lap and was pulling itself up to my face. I could feel the weight of the cat and the shock of adrenaline that I had involuntarily released. I was certain the cat would smell it and go mad, but it just looked at me with those yellow, expressionless eyes and continued with its purring.
"Tommy, get the cat off me. It's scaring me."
He laughed at that and came over, but the cat didn't want to move.
"OK, OK, leave it alone," I said. Goddamnit, I didn't know what to do. Tommy walked across the room and went to a cabinet in the kitchen. As soon as the ocelot heard the door open, it turned and dashed in to see Tommy who was opening a bag of cat treats. I didn't like that thing at all.
"Tommy, I've got to tell you, I think its weird to have that in the house. It's too damned big! Some night you'll be sleeping and it will be pacing around and just decide to eat one of you. I'm not kidding. It's not natural."
"We sleep with the doors shut," he said. Besides, I'm taking him back on Saturday."
The next time I went over, the cat was gone.
"Was the fellow glad to get his cat back?" I asked Tommy.
"Yea, I guess. I put the cat in the car and drove it over there and it ran right into the house. The son of a bitch didn't give me any money for bringing it back, though."
"What!?"
"No, but he gave me one of his frogs. He had a bunch of exotic animals in his house, and he gave me this Amazonian thing." He motioned to a ten gallon aquarium with about an inch of water in it. I walked over and looked inside. There was a giant green frog with a triangle head and arms that looked broken, bent unnaturally in front of its head.
"What are you going to do with that?" I asked.
"I don't know."
"What does it eat?"
"He gave me these little pellets to put in there, but so far it hasn't eaten anything." With that, he put his finger into the water in front of the giant frog to nudge it, I guess, but quick as a blink, the frogs legs grabbed Tommy's finger and pulled it toward it's large, open mouth. Tommy screamed and jumped, pulling his finger out of the aquarium and high over his head dancing around with a hop and a step, twirling in place. Of course, I had screamed and jumped, too. There we were, the two of us, eyes popped, mouths open, staring at each other and the frog trying to comprehend what had happened.
"You alright?" I asked Tommy. He looked at his finger.
"Yea," he said. Fuck that goddamned thing. I'm going to flush it down the toilet, the little bastard."
He was mad and scared, but he didn't move. He wasn't ready to get near the frog again yet.
Then I started to laugh which made him mad which made me laugh harder until he, too started in. Then we laughed until we cried.
Life was like that then. It was the sort of luck we knew. We had been distracted from the troubles for awhile. It was what we had.
It's true...no doubt...those wet-your-pants, over-the-top, laughing distractions are super!
ReplyDeleteSomething dangerous here. You know I remember growing up and hearing and believing all the dangerous people moved to Florida to do things just like this -- keep wild animals as pets, do lots of drugs, hide from the law that was looking for them.
ReplyDeleteIt was like Florida was the wild wild west -- only with swamps. :)
Then came Disney World...
It is all true. It was wet-your pants dangerous full of miscreants and worse. Read Peter Matthiessen's "Killing Mr. Watson." Those are the people who came to Florida. Lots of extra and missing genes. Wild, Wet, West.
ReplyDeleteAnd the John Laroche character in Adaptations...dangerous but loveable! :)
ReplyDelete