Day Fourteen

The sucking noise came and Alfie was squeezed out of his son’s house and back to his own home where Maurice was waiting for him.

Maurice had managed to just squeeze into Alfie’s kitchen. When Alfie landed, breathless and shaken, he held out his trunk as a token of support.

“Bad trip?” Maurice asked sympathetically.

“Well I guess I’ve struck out as a father.” Alfie slumped into his seat and propped up his chin with his hands.

“Can’t be too bad,” Maurice assured him looking around. “You haven’t done too badly for yourself. I mean I never had my own home or a wife. I had kids though but they weren’t around for long.”

“Kids,” Alfie said sadly, “You only want the best for them and then all you can do is sit back and watch ‘em screw up.” He thought of Beth and poor little Julie. What life would that little mite ever have?  He shuddered thinking about how many more seizures she would have to endure. It wasn’t fair to put her through all that. And Elliot? What the hell was he thinking of, letting those kids carry on like that. And Nathan! He put his face in his hands.

“I was born in the zoo,” Maurice said. “People watched me pee and poo all day long. ‘Oooooo Dadday! Look how much that elephant shits!’ I had sex in the zoo, my kids were born in the zoo and I died in the zoo.”

“You know Maurice, I’ve always wondered what animals thought about being in a zoo.” As a child he would often visit the city zoo because admission was free. There were only farm animals there plus a few peacocks and hens but he had wondered how the more exotic animals coped.

“I know. That’s why I found you.”

“To tell me life in a zoo sucks?”

“It was all I ever knew,” Maurice seemed to shrug. “I got my meals brought to me every day and I never had to work a day in my life. Humans were scared of me so they didn’t bother me too much.”

“But all those people watching you all the time.”

“You guys have CCTV. You get used to it.”

Alfie looked at Maurice carefully. Having never spoken to a six tonne bull elephant before gave him nothing to compare anything to. Maurice must have been a magnificent animal when he was younger. He wasn’t too short of magnificent now that he was dead.

“You never met another elephant that was captured?”

“Nope.”

“You never heard stories about what it might be like in the wild?”

“Nope.”

“You didn’t feel cheated because you weren’t part of a herd?”

“I was a part of a herd. We elephants stuck together. Always.”

“Huh,” said Alfie, perplexed.

“I never got sick or injured or had to worry about some lion chewing my ass.” Maurice seemed to shrug again. “C’Mon Alf, let’s get some air. I’m feeling a little claustrophobic.”

There was a small portal just behind them and Maurice back up through it.

“Care—“ Alfie was too late in warning Maurice that they were on the second floor. He looked down below just in time to see Maurice perform a graceful front roll. “Well I never thought I’d see that,” he muttered to himself as he stepped off.

Man and elephant walked companionably down the road. Alfie had no idea where they were going but he hoped he might see Lucy again. He wanted to talk to her about the children. Maybe they could do something to help matters. Something had to be done.

“Do you miss anything from life?” Maurice asked.

“You mean like living?” asked Alfie.

“Don’t be fresh. I’m just asking.”

Alfie stopped for a moment as if compiling a very long list. He hadn’t been to his nice warm bed since he’d been dead but that hadn’t occurred to him before so he didn’t think that counted. He hadn’t been to the toilet but he had gone so often when he was alive due his faulty prostate that he definitely didn’t miss that. He found his wife and could see the kids. He could watch television and he had more company now that he was dead than he was alive. He missed touching things but he could do that if he earned physical force points. Suddenly, he had something.

“I miss tea!” Alfie said triumphantly. “Milk with one sugar.” He punched the air. “The next time I get some physical force points, I’m going to steal a sip of tea!”

From out of nowhere, Ivan re-joined them.

“Boys, am I glad to see you. We got to get to the hospital quick. I have a great idea!”

Things were as grim for Sarah as they had been before.

“OK Alfie,” Ivan said. “I want you to do your thing.”

“What thing?” Alfie asked with alarm.

“You know, the whole scaring thing. Give her a fatal heart attack!”

“Ivan, I am not going to kill your sister.”

“C’mon, man. Do it for me.”

“Oh yeah. Murder her. I’m not even all that confident we won’t be judged at some point.”

“You’d be doing something merciful.”

“I’d be doing something illegal.”

Ivan looked at Alfie as if he were stupid. Alfie didn’t like that one little bit.

“She’s not even conscious. How are you going to scare someone who is not even conscious?”

It was the strangest voice Alfie had ever heard. It was like someone was talking with their larynx tucked up just behind their wisdom teeth. He looked around the room and his eyes rested on a emperor penguin chillaxing with a copy of an old Sunday Times. Next to the penguin was a flamingo who was just about pink around the edges and next to the flamingo was what he thought to be a puffin.

Alfie looked at Maurice who was smiling broadly. “I thought you could ask them too.”

“Ask them what?”” Alfie had never been so flabbergasted in his entire life. He felt as if his brain had just blown up.

“Ask them if they minded being in a zoo, of course.” Maurice said as if Alfie should have known.

“Oh we were tweeted fine,” said the flamingo, high fiving the puffin.

Alfie rolled his eyes heavenwards. “You know, at one point I was kinda relieved I didn’t go to hell but I can see how my opinion could change really fast.”

“You ever wonder why flamingos stand on one leg?” asked the puffin. “Because they would fall over if it lifted the other one.” A surprisingly loud and ever so obnoxious laugh escaped from the puffin.

The penguin snorked. “You guys are so funny, so funny!”

Alfie looked at Ivan. “This place is a zoo.”

“You know,” Ivan said menacingly, “One of our best friends is a cat.”

“Oh we met her, all right. We met her,” said the penguin.

“It was a right catastrophe!” cackled the puffin.

“Categorically!” screamed the puffin. They were laughing so hard they had to lean against each other to remain upright.

“Purrfect! Purrfect!” shouted the penguin, flapping his arms that weren’t quite wings.

Alfie decided he wanted to change the subject. “Ivan, you were saying something about your sister?”

Ivan seemed to have to force himself to look away from the birds and when he looked at Alfie, it seemed to him Ivan was looking as if he was smelling something really bad. Without answering Alfie, he looked at Maurice.

Maurice did his shrug. “Alfie he said he wondered how animals felt about being in a zoo. He wouldn’t take my word for it so I thought I’d bring in some reinforcements.”

“You could get a rhino or a giraffe or, I don’t know, an animal who doesn’t tell stupid jokes?” asked Ivan.

“What fun would that be?” asked Maurice, genuinely perplexed. “They have to entertain themselves somehow.”