a muntjac
On the backside of them when we turn around it’s rocks and glass, walls. I call them walls in my head but there is no ceiling so I’m not sure. I don’t know if walls need ceilings to be themselves. I don’t want to ask. But inside of them, these walls or what they are, there is a thing, an animal that looks like a deer but small, a shrunken deer. I want to call it the shrunken head deer or the pirate deer or something like that but my dad he says NO, he says THAT IS A MUNT, MUNTJ, but his voice goes out a little because he doesn’t know how to say it. A MUNTJAC my mom says to him and then to me: A MUNTJAC and it is like a case solved. OKAY I say, and I watch that thing I still call a pirate deer or a shrunken deer as it stands watching the water in the little pond it has.
When everyone was crying and drinking and they kept talking like I wasn’t there that was called a wake. WHAT IS IT I said to my mom before we went and she said back to me A WAKE HONEY, IT’S CALLED A WAKE, and I said OKAY. I was okay with it being a called a wake, I just didn’t want to wear the tie. It was black and skinny and it made my neck scratchy. And when I pulled at it in the car, on the way to this thing they called a wake, my dad said to me QUIT PULLING AT YOUR GODDAM COLLAR and so I did. Sometimes I listen when I’m not putting my hands on my ears, my fingers flat, afraid to listen for what they say, for what is said.
And at a red light when our car stopped I waited until the blinker was the only thing I could hear with its noise, its clicking sound, and then I said I THOUGHT A WAKE WAS YOU TOLD ME THE STUFF AT THE BACK OF THE BOAT, WHEN WE GO FAST. I THOUGHT THAT WAS A WAKE. My dad slammed his hand open on the steering wheel and said GODDAMN IT and my mom just watched him. She looked through him like she sometimes does, like she is trying to watch him, my dad, but there is something always behind him, in him. They never answered my question about what a wake was but I’m pretty sure that a wake is that too, those waves we get sometimes behind the boat.
It would have to be a tiny boat to make a wake in the pirate deer’s pond. In the water of this shrunken deer. A muntjac. I won’t call it that in my head though because I don’t always want to do what they say. He slammed his fingers, my dad, in the steering and I guess it was because of his brother and this wake that he said GODDAMN IT. I don’t always want to do what they say.
The shrunken pirate deer has nice eyes I think, pretty eyes. I might call it pretty-eyed deer instead. I can call it whatever I want, I don’t have to listen. I won’t sometimes. I can call things whatever I want. This pond is too big for a wake anyway, there is no tiny boat.
the tiger
There is a path with a hill, where we go up, and the top of this path is benches that we never sit on. We never sit on these benches because this is by the start and we are never tired yet. We have snacks and things packed too, everything is packed, so we don’t need to stop here, at the top of this hill, this path and its benches.
And at the top of this path and this hill is where the tiger is. The tiger is orange with black stripes and there is this thing in front of it, this thing my mom says is called a moat. She said like castles, LIKE CASTLES she said, they had moats too. TO KEEP BAD PEOPLE OUT she says when I ask her why. WHY? I ask again. I DON’T KNOW HONEY, THEY JUST DID.
But today the tiger isn’t out. I know because I go to the bars, they have this black short fence with these thick bars and I put my feet up on the concrete, up on this step that is there, and I look out and into where the tiger should be. It is gone. It isn’t there. There are bushes and some trees, rocks and more concrete, like this concrete step I’m on, and no tiger. I think maybe it is behind the rocks or in some of the shadows but I look and it isn’t. The tiger isn’t there.
WHERE IS THE TIGER? I ask and my dad looks at my mom and she looks back and no one says anything. There are a lot of times when no one answers, when I ask my mom something or my dad or both and no one says anything. They look at each other or at the floor or at me and no one talks. I don’t like that, when no one talks, when they look at each other or the floor or me and don’t say anything. I want answers, talking. I want them to talk.
IS IT INSIDE? I say because I know sometimes when it is too cold outside a guy who works here, at the zoo, he takes the tiger into this other inside place where there is a ball full of scratches and where they feed the meat. But my dad just says NO, THE TIGER IS NOT INSIDE. THEN WHERE IS IT? I ask because that makes me think if it is not out here and not inside then it might be in our house or our car or under my bed.
THE TIGER ATE SOMEONE, SO THEY HAD TO KILL IT my dad says, THE TIGER. JESUS my mom says and gives my dad a look like she gives him sometimes when she is mad or upset. She is mad or upset, my mom, I can tell. And I don’t say anything else because I can’t tell if my dad is serious or not, if he is lying or not, because sometimes I can’t tell. And my mom’s look makes him say to me or her, I can’t tell which, WELL. THAT WAS IT. RIGHT? No one says anything else. I keep looking into the spot, the spot where the tiger should be, hoping my dad is right, that it did, the tiger, eat someone and have to be killed, because that would be better than if it were in my house or our van or at home and under my bed waiting for me.
My dad sometimes lies. He calls it kidding but my mom says it’s lies. LIES she says. I hope he is not, this time, lying. I don’t want to go home, to my bed. Things are there maybe, a tiger. He lies sometimes, my dad, but today I hope he isn’t.
the seal
OUT TO HERE. TO HERE. GINGER, HERE. GOOD GIRL GINGER. GOOD GIRL. COME ON. UP. UP, UP. GOOD GIRL. GOOD GIRL GINGER. GOOD GINGER.
And my mom punches him in the arm, right below the shoulder, my dad. He laughs through his goatee, his beard, and I know they want it to be playful. They want a lot of things. Today they want it to be playful, this.
She makes a kissing sound, the trainer, this woman with brown shorts and a brown shirt, a name badge that I think probably says SANDY or TRUDY or CINDY or something with a Y. I don’t know why I think it must be something with a Y. I just want her name to be something like that, something with a Y. This SANDY or TRUDY or CINDY bending over making kissing sounds with her mouth, with her lips, the buttons coming close to undone around her chest, on her chest, where my dad is looking, was.
I look where my dad looks. When he watches the sun going down through one of the windows in his bedroom and I come to the door and watch from behind him, I look where he looks, at the sun going down. And when I fell off my bike that first time when I was still learning and hadn’t figured out how yet and my knee was blood running down it he watched the blood and I did too, looked where he was looking, watched the blood. My dad, looking at the buttoned brown shirt of TRUDY or CINDY or SANDY and her making those kissing noises to the seal in the water.
GINGER, NO. NO GINGER. NO. COME AROUND. AROUND, GINGER, COME AROUND. AROUND. UP. AND UP GINGER. UP. GINGER, AROUND. AROUND GINGER. UP. UP, UP. GOOD GINGER. GOOD. GOOD JOB GINGER.
His eyes move to the spot where the buttons strain the most, especially when she bends down for another fish in the bucket, another fish for the seal, the one doing the tricks and going up and down rocks, in and out of the water. I can see down it too, where my dad is looking, was, down that brown shirt with the buttons. CINDY or SANDY or TRUDY. She doesn’t see me looking, my mom, just punches down below his shoulder, my dad’s laughing mouth and his goatee, his beard.
GOOD GIRL GINGER. GOOD GIRL.
Like when he looked down into the toilet because there was something in there, him thinking it was someone’s something, someone’s business, but me knowing really it was a g.i. joe I stuck in there, pretending to make him dive and he got sucked down, accidentally. I look where he looks. I squinted my eyes like he did, down at the toilet, the clog, making faces with my mouth, trying to look like him, concentrating. And sometimes over his shoulder when he is staring into the record player that is in our garage, not playing the old records that my mom says are trash, THOSE TRASH RECORDS she says, but just looking down on its unmoving arm and the circles on circles of it, the grooves. TRASH RECORDS my mom says, LET IT GO. JUST LET IT GO.
I look where he looks.
GOOD GIRL GINGER, GOOD GIRL. THANKS FOLKS FOR COMING OUT TODAY, FOR JOINING GINGER AND ME HERE, LETTING US SHOW YOU ALL HER TRICKS. WAVE GOODBYE GINGER, WAVE. GINGER WAVE. GINGER. WAVE GOODBYE. THAT’S RIGHT GINGER. GOOD GIRL. GOOD GINGER, GOOD GIRL.
On the backside of them when we turn around it’s rocks and glass, walls. I call them walls in my head but there is no ceiling so I’m not sure. I don’t know if walls need ceilings to be themselves. I don’t want to ask. But inside of them, these walls or what they are, there is a thing, an animal that looks like a deer but small, a shrunken deer. I want to call it the shrunken head deer or the pirate deer or something like that but my dad he says NO, he says THAT IS A MUNT, MUNTJ, but his voice goes out a little because he doesn’t know how to say it. A MUNTJAC my mom says to him and then to me: A MUNTJAC and it is like a case solved. OKAY I say, and I watch that thing I still call a pirate deer or a shrunken deer as it stands watching the water in the little pond it has.
When everyone was crying and drinking and they kept talking like I wasn’t there that was called a wake. WHAT IS IT I said to my mom before we went and she said back to me A WAKE HONEY, IT’S CALLED A WAKE, and I said OKAY. I was okay with it being a called a wake, I just didn’t want to wear the tie. It was black and skinny and it made my neck scratchy. And when I pulled at it in the car, on the way to this thing they called a wake, my dad said to me QUIT PULLING AT YOUR GODDAM COLLAR and so I did. Sometimes I listen when I’m not putting my hands on my ears, my fingers flat, afraid to listen for what they say, for what is said.
And at a red light when our car stopped I waited until the blinker was the only thing I could hear with its noise, its clicking sound, and then I said I THOUGHT A WAKE WAS YOU TOLD ME THE STUFF AT THE BACK OF THE BOAT, WHEN WE GO FAST. I THOUGHT THAT WAS A WAKE. My dad slammed his hand open on the steering wheel and said GODDAMN IT and my mom just watched him. She looked through him like she sometimes does, like she is trying to watch him, my dad, but there is something always behind him, in him. They never answered my question about what a wake was but I’m pretty sure that a wake is that too, those waves we get sometimes behind the boat.
It would have to be a tiny boat to make a wake in the pirate deer’s pond. In the water of this shrunken deer. A muntjac. I won’t call it that in my head though because I don’t always want to do what they say. He slammed his fingers, my dad, in the steering and I guess it was because of his brother and this wake that he said GODDAMN IT. I don’t always want to do what they say.
The shrunken pirate deer has nice eyes I think, pretty eyes. I might call it pretty-eyed deer instead. I can call it whatever I want, I don’t have to listen. I won’t sometimes. I can call things whatever I want. This pond is too big for a wake anyway, there is no tiny boat.
the tiger
There is a path with a hill, where we go up, and the top of this path is benches that we never sit on. We never sit on these benches because this is by the start and we are never tired yet. We have snacks and things packed too, everything is packed, so we don’t need to stop here, at the top of this hill, this path and its benches.
And at the top of this path and this hill is where the tiger is. The tiger is orange with black stripes and there is this thing in front of it, this thing my mom says is called a moat. She said like castles, LIKE CASTLES she said, they had moats too. TO KEEP BAD PEOPLE OUT she says when I ask her why. WHY? I ask again. I DON’T KNOW HONEY, THEY JUST DID.
But today the tiger isn’t out. I know because I go to the bars, they have this black short fence with these thick bars and I put my feet up on the concrete, up on this step that is there, and I look out and into where the tiger should be. It is gone. It isn’t there. There are bushes and some trees, rocks and more concrete, like this concrete step I’m on, and no tiger. I think maybe it is behind the rocks or in some of the shadows but I look and it isn’t. The tiger isn’t there.
WHERE IS THE TIGER? I ask and my dad looks at my mom and she looks back and no one says anything. There are a lot of times when no one answers, when I ask my mom something or my dad or both and no one says anything. They look at each other or at the floor or at me and no one talks. I don’t like that, when no one talks, when they look at each other or the floor or me and don’t say anything. I want answers, talking. I want them to talk.
IS IT INSIDE? I say because I know sometimes when it is too cold outside a guy who works here, at the zoo, he takes the tiger into this other inside place where there is a ball full of scratches and where they feed the meat. But my dad just says NO, THE TIGER IS NOT INSIDE. THEN WHERE IS IT? I ask because that makes me think if it is not out here and not inside then it might be in our house or our car or under my bed.
THE TIGER ATE SOMEONE, SO THEY HAD TO KILL IT my dad says, THE TIGER. JESUS my mom says and gives my dad a look like she gives him sometimes when she is mad or upset. She is mad or upset, my mom, I can tell. And I don’t say anything else because I can’t tell if my dad is serious or not, if he is lying or not, because sometimes I can’t tell. And my mom’s look makes him say to me or her, I can’t tell which, WELL. THAT WAS IT. RIGHT? No one says anything else. I keep looking into the spot, the spot where the tiger should be, hoping my dad is right, that it did, the tiger, eat someone and have to be killed, because that would be better than if it were in my house or our van or at home and under my bed waiting for me.
My dad sometimes lies. He calls it kidding but my mom says it’s lies. LIES she says. I hope he is not, this time, lying. I don’t want to go home, to my bed. Things are there maybe, a tiger. He lies sometimes, my dad, but today I hope he isn’t.
the seal
OUT TO HERE. TO HERE. GINGER, HERE. GOOD GIRL GINGER. GOOD GIRL. COME ON. UP. UP, UP. GOOD GIRL. GOOD GIRL GINGER. GOOD GINGER.
And my mom punches him in the arm, right below the shoulder, my dad. He laughs through his goatee, his beard, and I know they want it to be playful. They want a lot of things. Today they want it to be playful, this.
She makes a kissing sound, the trainer, this woman with brown shorts and a brown shirt, a name badge that I think probably says SANDY or TRUDY or CINDY or something with a Y. I don’t know why I think it must be something with a Y. I just want her name to be something like that, something with a Y. This SANDY or TRUDY or CINDY bending over making kissing sounds with her mouth, with her lips, the buttons coming close to undone around her chest, on her chest, where my dad is looking, was.
I look where my dad looks. When he watches the sun going down through one of the windows in his bedroom and I come to the door and watch from behind him, I look where he looks, at the sun going down. And when I fell off my bike that first time when I was still learning and hadn’t figured out how yet and my knee was blood running down it he watched the blood and I did too, looked where he was looking, watched the blood. My dad, looking at the buttoned brown shirt of TRUDY or CINDY or SANDY and her making those kissing noises to the seal in the water.
GINGER, NO. NO GINGER. NO. COME AROUND. AROUND, GINGER, COME AROUND. AROUND. UP. AND UP GINGER. UP. GINGER, AROUND. AROUND GINGER. UP. UP, UP. GOOD GINGER. GOOD. GOOD JOB GINGER.
His eyes move to the spot where the buttons strain the most, especially when she bends down for another fish in the bucket, another fish for the seal, the one doing the tricks and going up and down rocks, in and out of the water. I can see down it too, where my dad is looking, was, down that brown shirt with the buttons. CINDY or SANDY or TRUDY. She doesn’t see me looking, my mom, just punches down below his shoulder, my dad’s laughing mouth and his goatee, his beard.
GOOD GIRL GINGER. GOOD GIRL.
Like when he looked down into the toilet because there was something in there, him thinking it was someone’s something, someone’s business, but me knowing really it was a g.i. joe I stuck in there, pretending to make him dive and he got sucked down, accidentally. I look where he looks. I squinted my eyes like he did, down at the toilet, the clog, making faces with my mouth, trying to look like him, concentrating. And sometimes over his shoulder when he is staring into the record player that is in our garage, not playing the old records that my mom says are trash, THOSE TRASH RECORDS she says, but just looking down on its unmoving arm and the circles on circles of it, the grooves. TRASH RECORDS my mom says, LET IT GO. JUST LET IT GO.
I look where he looks.
GOOD GIRL GINGER, GOOD GIRL. THANKS FOLKS FOR COMING OUT TODAY, FOR JOINING GINGER AND ME HERE, LETTING US SHOW YOU ALL HER TRICKS. WAVE GOODBYE GINGER, WAVE. GINGER WAVE. GINGER. WAVE GOODBYE. THAT’S RIGHT GINGER. GOOD GIRL. GOOD GINGER, GOOD GIRL.
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