makes regular stuff like meat loaf and lasagna. It’s like truth serum on me. And that eyebrow. “They had a sleepover,” I said.
She screeched like a cat. “Really?”
Oops. “Yeah, Mom. You know, grown-ups have sleepovers too, like kids.”
“Oh really.” The eyebrow sunk, her whole body sunk, and she picked up the newspaper and hid behind it while I finished eating. Then she got on the phone while I cleared the dishes. “Don’t listen,” she told me. Okay ... I will Her friends told her to pay The Dark Sorceress and have her change the custody, and to call the school to get that little b-word fired (they actually said the b-word), and to sleep with Dad’s best friend, Ron, everyone knows he’s hot for her–lah de lah lah de lah de lah ” Bilbo the dog started howling along with me.
“Kenny, please. I’m trying to talk ” Jesus, lady, what did I do? “Lah de lah lah de lah de lah ” Right into my room I went merrily merrily merrily merrily.
Miss Landis had her school face on. I walked past her desk and smiled, but she pretended not to see me. I recognized her great smell. Pachooey. Dad told me man-to-man he liked hippie chicks. It was cool that I recognized her smell from Dad’s bathroom. It was like I had a top secret now, like Miss Landis somehow belonged to me. On Mondays she always asked us about movies (she was a great teacher). “Did anyone see any good movies this weekend?” Our hands all shot up. She called on Dick. Taneesha. Consuela. Tucker. Mary. Todd. Jennifer. Mark. Barbara. Ed. Valentina. Hello Hel-lo-o I’m waiting Man, my arm was getting tired. I raised it to the ceiling like I had to go pee, and she still couldn’t see me. What was I, invisible now? Hell-oo-oo Hel-lo Finally she called me. About frickin’ time. I was gonna tell her about this war flick Casablanca Dad rented, but I decided to talk about The Parent Trap instead.
“The Parent Trap, Kenny?” She looked nervous. She knew.
“Yeah, yeah, it’s this great flick about these twins whose parents get divorced. The parents really love each other still, but they’re too messed up to know it anymore. So each parent gets one of the twins, and they grow up apart. Then the parents meet up again a lot of years later, and the twins get together and make the parents see how dumb they were to break up in the first place. But first some messed-up lady tries to ruin everything by marrying the dad, even though no one wants her around.” Ooo, she ran out. What happened was, she said “I see” and bit her lip, and then she ran out.
Saturday morning it was back to Dad’s. I hated going over there. Not being with Dad, just the two minutes lugging my stuff through the boring lobby and having to look at myself and my stupid plastic bags in the tacky mirrors in the elevator, then walking down the hall with its moldy carpet. I wished I had a little brother so I wouldn’t have to be the only one lugging my bags up to Dad’s apartment, with little kids in the hall looking at me like “Who are you?” even though I lived there 29% of the time. Dad’s door was unlocked, like always. Mom’s door had two locks and a chain, and she used them all since Dad left. Frankly they were incompatible, which is why I didn’t have a little brother. Yeah, they were compatible enough to have me. Big whoop. I entered the place with my phaser drawn.
“Hi dude.” Dad had shaving cream on his face and a towel around him. His smile drooped a little. “You can put your gun down. She’s not here.” He wasn’t as dumb as he joked about being.
“Oh really? That’s too bad.” Dad looked at me like he didn’t believe me for a second, then went in the bathroom to finish shaving. He’d made bagels, and they were on the little metal table we’d found on the sidewalk last week. I slopped some cream cheese on one. “What do you wanna do today, Dad?”
“Oh, I thought we’d do something a little bit different.” But first we played baseball on
X-Box, like always, then went downstairs to wash the truck. Dad put the tailgate down and I climbed into the bed. He handed me the hose. The high-powered nozzle was on it. I blasted the leaves and grass out the back of the truck. It was cool. Dad put the Giants game on the radio and we listened to it while we soaped the outside of the truck. Dad flicked soapy water at me and I got him back big time. Then we rinsed the truck with the hose and dried it with towels. We listened to three innings and hardly spoke except for “hand me a towel” or “fill the bucket.” Dad liked silence, but Mom didn’t (she was “The Chatterbox” and he was “The Mute”). Dad looked at the truck and gave it thumbs up. “I thought we’d go to the zoo,” he said. “Your mom’s gonna be there.”
“She will?”
“Mm hmm. We thought, hey, just because we’re not married anymore, that doesn’t mean we can’t spend time together with our favorite guy, right?”
Right. I guess. Yeah ... right
Mom met us inside, where the peacocks walk around. She was wearing the
pantsuit she wore when she sold insurance. Hello, Susan. Hello Rob. Did you have trouble parking? Why? You’re the one who’s late. “Ha ha Funny ” I said. I just meant it’s crowded. I found a good space, no worries. Good. Did he eat? Of course he ate; he ate like a champ. “Come on, guys The animals are waiting.” I walked in between them. “Hey, look,” I said, “there’s a jaguar Hey, look, you guys, that bird sleeps standing up ” Dad’s jaw was tight, like the time his customer complained that Dad’s sprinkler threw the water too far out onto the sidewalk (a half an inch or something psycho like that). Mom was a little more interested in the animals than Dad was. “Look, Kenny, I never knew giraffes had such long tongues.” “Yep,” Dad nodded. “They do.” He was into it now. “Look, Kenny–penguins. I’m glad I don’t have to dress like that for work.” “Ha ha. That’s funny, Dad ” Mom’s lips had a sour lemon pucker, but I made a face and made her laugh. We went on. Dad on my right, Mom on my left. “Gorillas are smart, aren’t they son? Hey, look at that chimp. Hey, look at those gorillas. Hey, look at that lemur.” The talk started slowing like my r.c. robot when the battery was dying. “Hey lookit that possum. Anteater. That hippo. Those zebras. Hey look at that rhino. That seal. Polar bear. Those otters. Those penguins. Those penguins? Christ Almighty, we’ve been here already So what? So we’ve gone in a circle You should’ve gotten a map like I asked. We don’t need a map. We don’t? No. We’re lost, aren’t we? We’re not lost, it’s the freakin’ zoo, not the Amazon. There’s no need for sarcasm.” I wanted cotton candy. I didn’t know which one to ask, `cause I didn’t want either to feel less important than the other. So I looked at Dad and said, can I have cotton candy, then looked at Mom right away. She said, “I don’t care, fine, if your dad doesn’t mind.” “I don’t mind, I’m just broke.” “Sure you are.” She snorted and gave me a fiver.
I wanted to run to the concession stand like the other kids were. But for some crazy reason, my legs got wobbly and I just couldn’t run. All I could do was keep walking along with Mom and Dad as slowly as we would with Grandma and her walker. Earlier in the day we visited the petting zoo. I know that sounds lame, but we used to go there when I was small, and I just wanted to do it again for old time’s sake. “Just let him go if he wants to,” Dad said. I was petting the calf, and the zookeeper was talking about the awful thing they do to make veal. What they do is, they keep the calves in these tiny pens so their muscles won’t grow, and they get so weak they can hardly walk. It felt that way.
~ end ~
Thank you for reading “The Petting Zoo.” If you enjoyed this story, please do share it. “Like” it, too, if you can spare a moment, and please consider reviewing the tale. For more of my short fiction, and other literary goodies, please visit Jon Sindell Fiction. You may also want to check out The Mighty Roman, “a fast, funny, thought–provoking novel about baseball and the modern American man.” Finally, please feel free to connect with me on Facebook, on Goodreads, or via email to
[email protected], as I love connecting with readers. Bye now.
Thank you for reading books on BookFrom.Net Share this book with friends