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For probably the hundredth time that day, Frank tries to tug the strand of hair behind his ear. Pretty pointless, as all the ninety-nine times before; the hair just isn’t long enough yet to stay put. Long enough however to hang into his eyes and bother him.
Frank huffs out a sigh.
He can’t wait to be home. At home he wears a bandana, but he would rather be caught dead than be seen wearing it at work. So he just keeps the image of the slightly messy IT guy going. At least those strands aren’t greasy or unkempt, just at a length that is impossible to manage.
Once home, the first thing Frank does is look into the mirror. At least another six months before he can even attempt a ponytail, and even then the front strands would not be tameable yet. Maybe he should just move on, accept he was a member of proper society now, and get a proper, office-style haircut.
His mirror image is giving him a sour frown.
Yeah no, fuck corporate style. He may have a corporate job, but he won’t try to turn himself into something or someone he isn’t, and doesn’t want to be.
The frown turns into a wry, lopsided smirk. Not so long ago he would have flipped anyone off with both hands who had told him he’d be working for a multi-billion company one day.
The thought comes suddenly and certainly unwelcome, and the smirk vanishes. Frank turns away and leaves the bathroom, but the memory stays. The memory of Jonas and their boasting about being free.
Come to think of it, Jonas had also gushed about Frank’s hair non-stop, especially during sex. Maybe he should get a haircut just to spite that memory.
Still a no. Frank shakes his head with a mirthless chuckle. Sometimes it’s really hard to get that asshole out of his head. But oh, the dreams and plans they had… get enough money to buy a house somewhere off the beaten path, have parties and booze until the end of all days.
Kids’ dreams. Frank scoffs. None of those dreams were even remotely realistic, and none of them were worth dreaming anyway. But what had he known, back then? Other than having space to keep several pet snakes and get stoned and drunk between heists, as well as having a ridiculous amount of sex, he had no dreams to speak of.
Frank has a look around as he closes the fridge door, and slowly opens the can. There’s a large, empty wall next to the bedroom door. Right now, there’s a table and two chairs standing there, and Frank turns around. They could be moved to the other wall, if he moves the sofa there, and…
Moments later Frank is pushing furniture around, the can of beer forgotten on the windowsill next to his desk. And after half an hour, the room is rearranged to his satisfaction. There’s less space of course but it still all makes sense, but now there’s an empty wall between bedroom door and the kitchen.
Frank picks up his beer and takes another sip. Some dreams are maybe not worth giving up on. He’d always been jealous of Spider and his pet, although that stupid tarantula had never ceased to freak him out a little. And it wasn’t that Jonas would have been against a snake, they just had absolutely no more space in that tiny sinkhole of an apartment.
Now however? Frank falls into his desk chair. About time to make that one dream come true that he had always felt is worth dreaming.
Since Frank wouldn’t be Frank if he did anything by halves, he spends days doing research first, then several more days looking for the right equipment. How handy, that he earns so much more than he needs, because he has a substantial amount put aside that he now spends without a second thought. Only the very best, highest quality.
Two weeks later he is the owner of a large, high-end terrarium that is as long and about half as high as the wall. Plants, water, rocks, a large log, and a heat lamp, everything for the perfect environment for a snake to live and thrive.
And only now he starts looking for the actual inhabitant. Some more days of research of how to ethically source a snake follow, and then he finds himself in front of a snake farm two hours south-west of Detroit. He even rented a car, bought a carrier, everything to get his new, future friend home safely.
It’s slightly overwhelming, though. So many species, one prettier than the other. He had a few in mind before coming here, but now he just stands there, and after a moment he starts walking around after putting the carrier down next to the desk with the till.
“Can I help you?”
A woman in her early twenties, wearing a shirt with the name and logo of the snake farm, smiles at him, a bright and happy smile.
“I… guess?” Frank looks around. “I realised I won’t be able to make up my mind anytime soon.”
“Is it a question of space, of feeding requirements?” She steps closer, and points at a few glass tanks. “We will make sure you won’t go home empty-handed, and of course, without regrets!”
Frank has another look around.
“Or if commitment is the problem, there are species that aren’t very long-lived.”
“That’s definitely not a problem,” Frank replies. “Maybe I’ll just have a bit more of a look around.”
She smiles and nods, but then gets called by a co-worker. She spins around and vanishes though an open doorway, and Frank is left to walk and browse. So many beautiful animals, how is he supposed to make up his mind?
He then passes the doorway the girl has vanished into, and dares to take a peek inside. Apparently her co-worker needed assistance handling a clutch of eggs.
The girl sees him and smiles. “I’ll be with you in a second!”
“No worries, I’m just being nosy,” Frank replies, and is about to step away again when she laughs.
“Well, who doesn’t want to have a look at the backstage area. Come on in! Just don’t touch any of the eggs.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Frank says, and, careful where he steps, walks into the large room filled with shelves. Apparently this is where they keep the eggs and the hatchlings, and Frank passes a large table with a high border. A few hatchlings are slithering around there, on sand and fine gravel warmed by a heat lamp. Frank, being the man he is, has spent so much time reading about snakes these last weeks, that he can’t help his inner nerd.
And within minutes he’s engages in a lively discussion with the young woman and her co-worker, about the merits of the various species as pets, and how easy they are to keep.
Frank has another look at the hatchlings, and he just wants to take all of them home. Then his eyes fall onto one of them who is curled up in a corner. He is smaller than the others.
“What’s wrong with that one?”
“Oh.” Her smiles dims. “He’s just… well, you could call him the runt of the litter. He didn’t develop well in the egg, and we were waiting if he catches up. He hasn’t, though, and he isn’t well. We’re actually putting him to sleep later today.”
Frank looks at the small handful of life, off to a bad start right off the bat. Small, sickly, the runt of the litter. Unwanted, and unloved. He reaches out, and the small, sickly snake uncurls and hisses at him. Actually tries to bite him. “Still has spirit, though.”
His heart does something very strange in his chest. For some reason he feels some sort of kinship with this snake, smaller, weaker, always the outsider, never good enough. Hissing and being prickly as the only defence he has.
“I’ll take him.”
She chuckles. “I assure you, you don’t want him. I doubt he’s going to live another week. He’s a waste of your time and your money.”
Taking a deep breath, Frank looks at her. “My money isn’t your concern though, is it?”
Now it’s her turn to frown. “I just don’t get why you would buy an animal that is not okay. It’s not fair to let him live like that.”
“Well, maybe it’s not fair to dispose of him before you gave him a chance.”
She throws up her hands. “You’re gonna sign a waiver though, I don’t want you come running back here in a week complaining the snake is dead.”
“Don’t worry, I won’t. I just…” Frank shrugs. “Call me a sentimental idiot if you want.”
“You’re the customer. You could make a reservation for any of the others, though, and come back if things… don’t work out.”
“Thanks for the offer, and I will be back if this doesn’t work out.” The snake tries to bite him again as he picks it up, but curls up in his palm anyway. It keeps giving him the stinky eye, and Frank just looks at the small handful of life. He is so fucked.
“I’ll be the best dad ever,” he whispers to the snake in his hand. “I promise.”
The snake is unimpressed by his bonding attempts and tries to bite him again. Frank doesn’t have it in his heart to be angry.
He leaves the farm with a sickly snake he is assured won’t last the month, and a box with crickets as well as breeding instructions.
“Welcome home,” he says as he puts the carrier down onto the table. “We’re going to make this work, right?”
The snake hisses at him.
A part of Frank wishes he had listened to the girl. Another part, the part whose heart was aching for the little fella, is not regretting his choice. But the snake is not only not well, he’s getting worse. Frank takes a few days off, and every two hours, day or night, he checks on the snake, and eventually starts feeding it fish food dissolved in water with a syringe.
He knows he is fighting a loosing battle, but he’ll be damned if he gives up now.
But then the little snakes lives another night and another day after all. And another, and another. And suddenly it’s been two weeks, and for the first time, he eats one of the crickets that make such a fucking racket all the time.
It’s a feeling of triumph Frank has never felt before.
From then on, the little guy gets gradually better.
What doesn’t get better is his mood, however. On one hand, Frank is glad he’s strong enough to be in a foul mood and hissy again. On the other, Frank feels under-appreciated. It’s not that he would expect gratefulness of a reptile, but still. He has sacrificed so much sleep.
With the snake getting stronger Frank dares to go back to work, but only half days. But by now, his buddy doesn’t require a full-time nurse anymore, and Frank picks up his regular life again.
Frank has never looked forward that much to coming home, the snake’s mood notwithstanding. But he resists any bonding attempts, and is in general a prick. That doesn’t make Frank love him any less.
There is still the fear though that he might relapse. That something is wrong with him that isn’t visible yet. That Frank will get up one morning, or come home one afternoon, to find him lifeless in a corner of his tank.
But weeks pass, and turn into months, and the snake still defies all odds.
And Frank still hasn’t been able to think of a name. Just calls him buddy, but what difference does it make? He doesn’t come anyway when you call him, so Frank may as well wait for the right inspiration.
It’s a cold, stormy day in late December, and Frank is wrapped in so many layers on his way home he feels like the marshmallow man. He is so glad when he’s finally home he doesn’t register at first how cold it is. That something is wrong first goes up for him when he sees the clock on the oven blink at 00:00.
“Fuck.” There was a power outage.
A second later, his heart drops into his stomach. He drops his beer, and runs towards the snake tank. The heat lamp is dark, and Frank can only guess that with the power outage, or the power coming back, the lamp kicked it. A cold shudder creeps down his spine.
“Oh no… oh no… please…”
How long had the poor snake been lying here in this freezing cold?
Frank digs him out from under a few leaves, but he’s cold and stiff, and doesn’t move.
“No… please…”
Shaking his head, Frank stares at the snake in his hand. He can’t find a single sign of life, but maybe he’s not dead, not quite. It’s still cold in the apartment though, there’s not a single warm spot to be had here. So Frank does the only thing he can think of: he stuffs the whole snake into his shirt, against his skin. Fighting tears of anger, helplessness, and frustration he stumbles into the bedroom and falls onto the bed, clothes and all, and pulls up the blanket to cover himself completely.
Curled around the snake he lies there, and he knows he’s too late, but he can’t give up. Not yet, not just like that. But nothing happens, and Frank tries to bite back the tears, but eventually gives it up as a bad job.
“It’s not fair…” He wipes a hand across his nose. “Fuck, it’s not fair! It’s not fucking fair! Not now! Not after everything! It’s not fucking fair!”
He still stays under the blanket, with a dead snake stuffed into his shirt, and he just can’t stop crying. He cries, and he wants to kill the people who were responsible for maintenance of the power grid, and then he just wants to go back in time to keep himself from leaving the apartment. No one would have said a word, in this weather.
But he left, and it happened, and now all he can do is calm the fuck down again so he can pick up the pieces and move on.
He doesn’t calm down though. He spent so much time and energy keeping his little buddy alive, and then this…
Something small nudges his chest, and the next sob freezes in Frank’s throat. And then something very small tickles the side of his chin.
“Buddy?” Frank’s voice is clogged and shaky, husky and weak. He uncurls and pulls away the blanket, and yes… there is a small head peeking out of the neckline of his T-shirt.
And Frank, moron that he is, bursts into tears again.
But the snake just settles down, apparently now quite comfy in Frank’s shirt, and keeps flicking his tongue ever so often. Frank cautiously touches the snake’s head, and for the first time, the snake doesn’t hiss at him, or pulls away.
What a magical Disney moment. Under different circumstances, Frank would have thrown up a little bit in his mouth. As it is, he sniffles, tries to ignore the snot on his face – Frank is many things, but he is not a pretty crier – and gently caresses the head of the snake with his finger.
Now he doesn’t know what to do, though. The apartment is slowly warming up, but the heat lamp is busted, and he can’t keep the snake in his shirt until he can get a new lamp.
But by now he has calmed down, and his brain is working again. He cranks up one of the radiators to full heat, parks the carrier right in front of it, and heads into the kitchen to start the oven. He sets it to 100, and then goes and throws a few towels into it, but doesn’t close the door because cold or no, the last thing he needs is a fire hazard. He uses the warmed towels to pad the plastic carrier, but all of a sudden, the snake isn’t in a hurry to get away from him.
It actually takes Frank a moment to untangle his arm from the snake, or the snake from his arm, but once settled in the towels, the snake calms down again and gets comfortable.
Frank gets up three times that night to warm another towel, to make sure his snake is comfortable. He is, and he doesn’t hiss at Frank anymore either. Frank does wonder if the snake has forgiven him for existing in the same space, of if he is even weaker than before, though he of course hopes it’s the former, because the latter doesn’t bear thinking about.
Then Frank calls in sick the next day, and is on his way to the pet store as soon as they open. He also swings by an electric supply store, and gets a multi-plug with surge protection. The next thing he’s going to do is figure out a way to MacGyver a construction with a battery pack, in case backup is needed when the power takes too much time to come back if this happens again.
When Frank comes home from work the next day, he is greeted by a minor case of furniture malfunction. The wall-mounted shelf next to the computer desk has decided that screw anchors can no longer hold it, and has tried to make a break for it. One of the screws is still in place, but it hangs completely askew and has spilled the load of CDs all over the desk.
Frank heaves a deep and heavy sigh, brews himself a coffee, and surveys the carnage. And here he had watched an hour of YouTube videos about DIY, to get the job done right.
But first, relax. And for the first time, Frank dares to try and pick up the snake, to see if he would finally be allowed to wear him.
He almost bawls from sheer joy when the snake curls around his neck and shoulders and gets comfortable.
“We had a real bonding moment there when you almost died on me, hm?” Frank takes a sip of coffee. “But please don’t do that again. I promise I’ll do my fucking best to keep you safe.”
The snake flicks his tongue, but doesn’t complain when Frank puts him down onto the desk to pick p the electric drill. And while Frank surveys the shelf, trying to assess if he can get it back up like it is, or if he has to drill new holes into the wall, the snake has a look around on the desk, and investigates the collection of CDs. Vintage games that predate Steam, and some even predate consoles. None of them took any damage, thank fuck, but Frank is still miffed that his DIY skills aren’t even enough to keep a small shelf mounted to a wall.
The snake nudges against a few CDs and they slide apart, and then he honest to god chooses one to curl up on.
“If it fits I sits?”
The snake flicks his tongue, and gets comfortable on the CD.
“What are you, a cat?” Frank crosses his arms, shaking his head with a chuckle. So adorable, that the snake is still small enough to almost fit onto a CD.
Frank tears his eyes away from his scaly companion, and sets to fixing the shelf. He takes a bigger screw anchor and a bigger screw, and hopes that this will do. Then he starts putting the CDs back, and takes his chance to dust them off while he’s at it.
“I actually need that back, you know.”
The snake makes no move to leave the CD.
“Like, I’d really like to put that back.”
His reply is a flick of a pink, forked little tongue.
Frank rolls his eyes with a sigh and puts away his tools, but when he comes back, the snake still hasn’t moved.
“Well.” Frank reaches out, but to his surprise, the snake doesn’t complain. “Let’s see what your scaly butt choose as a pillow.”
Frank looks at the CD cover, and at the snake. Then back at the CD.
“Oh, okay. Maybe you want to be a hero? The main protagonist of someone’s story?” He can’t help the smile that grows into a grin. “Maybe that is your name then. J. C.?” He tilts his head and narrows his eyes. “No. Denton. Denton is better. What do you think?” He picks up the snake again. “Denton, the hero wearing shades and kicking ass?”
The snake flicks his tongue and Frank, alone and unobserved by anyone, nuzzles the snake’s nose with his own.
He wants to think that Denton looks very pleased with his choice.