Let's Pretend This Never Happened (43 page)

Then Laura came to pick me up so we could go to the discount outlet together, and as Victor gave me a kiss good-bye he lovingly whispered,
“You are not allowed to bring any more goddamn towels in this house or I will strangle you.”
And that was exactly what I was still echoing through my head an hour later, when Laura and I stopped our shopping carts and stared up in confused, silent awe at a display of
enormous
metal chickens made from rusted oil drums.

LAURA
: I think you
need
one of those.

ME
: You’re joking, but they’re kind of horrifically awesome.

LAURA
:
I’m not joking.
We need to buy you one.

ME
: The five-foot-tall one was three hundred dollars, marked down to a hundred. That’s like two hundred dollars’ worth of chicken
for free
.

LAURA
: You’d be crazy
not
to buy that. I mean, look at it. IT’S FULL OF WHIMSY.

ME
: Victor’d be pissed.

LAURA
: Yup.

ME
: But on the plus side? It’s not towels.

LAURA
: Yup.

ME
: We will name him Henry. Or Charlie. Or O’Shaughnessy.

Insert inappropriate cock joke here.

LAURA
: Or Beyoncé.

ME
:
Or Beyoncé.
Yes. And when our friends are sad we can leave him at their front door to cheer them up.

LAURA
:
Exactly.
It’ll be like,
“You thought yesterday was bad? Well, now you have an enormous metal chicken to deal with. Perspective. Now you have it.”

Then we flagged down a salesman, and we were all, “What can you tell us about these chickens?” as if we were in an art gallery, and not in a store that specializes in last year’s bath mats. He didn’t know
anything about them, but he said that they’d sold only one and it was to a really drunk lady, and then Laura and I were all, “
SOLD.
All this chicken belongs to us now.”

So he loaded it onto a trolley, but Beyoncé was surprisingly unstable, and the giant five-foot metal chicken crashed over onto the floor. And Laura and I were all, “CHICKEN DOWN! CLEANUP IN AISLE THREE,” but he didn’t laugh. Then the manager came to see what was causing all the commotion, and that’s when he found the very conservative salesman unhappily struggling to right an enthusiastically pointy chicken that was almost as tall as he was. The salesman was having a hard time, and he told everyone to stand back “because this chicken
will cut you
,” and at first I thought he meant it as a threat, like “That chicken has a shiv,” but turns out he just meant that all the chickens’ ends were sharp and rusty. It was awesome, and Laura and I agreed that even if we got tetanus, this chicken had already paid for itself even before we got it in her truck.

Then we got to my house and quietly snuck the chicken up to my front door, rang the doorbell, and hid around the corner.

“Knock-knock, motherfucker.”

Victor opened the door and looked at the chicken in stunned silence for about three seconds. Then he sighed, closed the door,
and walked away
.

LAURA
: What the fuck?
That’s it? That’s the only reaction we get?

ME
: That’s it. He’s a hard man to rattle.

Victor was surprisingly pissed that I’d “wasted money” on an enormous chicken, because apparently he couldn’t appreciate the hysterical value of a five-foot chicken ringing the doorbell. Then I said, “Well, at least it’s not
towels
,” and apparently that was the wrong thing to say, because that was when Victor screamed and stormed off, but I knew he was locked in his office, because I could hear him punching things in there. Then I yelled through his door, “
It’s an anniversary gift for you, asshole.
Two whole weeks early. FIFTEEN YEARS IS BIG METAL CHICKENS.”

Then he yelled that he wanted it gone, but I couldn’t move it myself, so instead I said okay and went to watch TV. Then when the UPS guy came I hid, but he was all, “Dude. Nice chicken,” and Victor yelled, “IT IS
NOT
A NICE CHICKEN.” Which was probably very confusing to the UPS guy,
who was just trying to be polite, Victor
. Victor seemed more disgruntled than usual, so I finally dragged the chicken into the backyard and wedged it into a clump of trees so that it could scare the snakes away. Then I came in and Victor angrily pulled me into his office so that I could see that I’d stationed Beyoncé directly in front of his only window. And I was all, “
Exactly.
YOU’RE WELCOME.” I told him that he could move Beyoncé if he wanted to, but he totally hasn’t. Probably because of all of the giant rocks I piled on Beyoncé’s feet to dissuade burglars. Or possibly because Beyoncé is growing on him. Still, I can’t help thinking that we
wouldn’t even be
having
this argument if Beyoncé was towels. Honestly, this whole chicken is really a lesson in picking your battles more carefully. Plus, he’s awesome and I can’t stop giggling every time I look at him. Beyoncé, that is.

Best. Fifteenth anniversary.
Ever.

Hairless Rats: Free for Kids Only

This morning Victor and I followed our usual routine. We got up, drove Hailey to kindergarten, and stopped into the local gas station for coffee and local gossip. On the way out we stopped in front of the public bulletin board that serves as our small town’s newspaper. It’s always filled with invitations to neighborhood barbecues, and ads selling broken tractor parts or requesting clean dirt (which seems like an oxymoron), but today we found that the same person who had fascinated us with bizarre ads last year was back. They were the kind of ads that made you question exactly what was going on in his home, and also your own sanity. They were ads like:

“FLYING SQUIRRELS: CHEAP. FREE DELIVERY.”

A month later that ad was replaced by another:

“REGULAR SQUIRRELS—FREE TO GOOD HOME.
NOT FOR EATING.
”

I tipped my hat to his ethical disclaimer, but it was puzzling. Had the flying squirrels been “regular” the whole time? Had it taken the seller a month to realize they didn’t have wings? How many squirrels had been dropped from the roof before he finally gave up and realized they weren’t faking it? Were these regular squirrels free only because they all now suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and vertigo?

I imagined a horde of squirrels, all hunkered close to the ground as they stared in horror at their former friends who easily jumped from branch to branch. “YOU’RE GOING TO GET KILLED!” the squirrel would yell, and his former buddies would shake their tiny heads in pity, wondering what horrors their friend had seen to change him so. In my head, it was as if the squirrels were damaged Vietnam vets, shell-shocked and unable to cope with real life after the terrible things they’d had to witness.

Victor said I was being ridiculous, but I pointed out that it was also pretty ridiculous to give away squirrels that you could just set free, and he admitted he had no real answer to that.

The ads kept coming over the summer, and then very abruptly stopped. Most likely (Victor and I speculated) it was because the (probably very well-intentioned) man was eventually murdered by his own squirrels. But this morning, almost a year from the time since we’d seen his first ad, a new sign was up with the same distinctive handwriting. He was alive and the world was a better place for it:

I censored the phone number to protect them from prank calls. And because I want to keep all the sugar gliders for myself. Sugar gliders who, I half suspect, might actually just be mice with flabby underarms, and who have survived being thrown off the roof.

VICTOR
: Wow. I don’t think I want to know of the situation you have to be in where you need a rat delivered so desperately
that it can’t wait until morning
.

ME
: Ooh, I would.

VICTOR
: Well,
of course you would
.

ME
: Who
wouldn’t
want to know about an emergency rat situation where the emergency is that you NEED a rat. It’s like the exact opposite of every regular emergency rat situation ever. It sounds fascinating. We should call this guy just to see what his deal is. I bet he has great stories. I mean, who gives hairless rats to children? He’s like the bizarro-world Candy Man.

VICTOR
: So call him. Pretend to apply for a free squirrel and see what his story is.

ME
: I wonder what the application process is on that? It would be really depressing to get turned down for free squirrels.

VICTOR
: True.
“I’m sorry. We’re going to have to decline you. Your home isn’t even fit for squirrels.”

ME
: Our home is pretty messy, but I think it’s
at least
fit for squirrels. I’d be like, “But
our
squirrels seem quite happy.” I’d totally appeal that ruling.

VICTOR
: “I’m sorry, but your references didn’t check out.”

ME
: “But our references
were squirrels
.”

VICTOR
: “Right.
And they’re not happy.
Plus, there have been some reports of hate speech.”

ME
:
“What?”

VICTOR
: “Last week you dropped a fork and yelled, ‘Rats.’ Then in January you complained that your computer wasn’t working properly and was acting ‘all squirrelly.’ We have people on the inside, you know.”

ME
: “Hang on.
Are those people the squirrels who live in my attic?
Because they’re all high and they don’t know what they’re saying.
Those squirrels are junkies and they are not to be trusted.
”

VICTOR
: “Ma’am,
that was slander
. You’ll be contacted by the squirrel civil liberties union for a statement. Plus, you need to stop referring to squirrels as
‘those people.’
Please get your shit together.”

ME
:
Wow.
We sound . . .
totally unfit to have squirrels
. Now I don’t even want to call the guy, because I’m all nervous about being judged. I don’t even think I could pass the interview.

VICTOR
: We probably shouldn’t apply for more squirrels if we can’t even manage to keep ours off the horse.

ME
: ?

VICTOR
: It’s another word for heroin.

ME
: Yeah,
I know what “off the horse” means.
I just can’t remember how we got to the point where I’m defending myself against the imaginary accusations of a man who gives hairless rats to neighborhood children, and who apparently trusts the nonexistent squirrel junkies in the attic.