Friendship, Firmness, and Bitten Fingers

“Rich, this will change your life. You have no idea what an adrenaline rush can do for the body,” Derek explained.

Rich was a small black lizard so he knew that changes to his life that are too abrupt or unexpected (like a particularly cold winter or a larger than average boot) could be the end of his life. Why is everyone always looking for something new to do? Why did he agree to meet Derek for lunch? Maybe because Derek offered to pay for cricket sitting in front of him on his plate. He decided to play along; at least for the sake of lunch. 

“Oh really? I’m not sure that I could get into something like that. It sounds dangerous. Don’t you get scared?” Rich asked. He thought he would probably find the answer to this question very annoying. 

“It is dangerous! It’s supposed to be dangerous! Of course I’m scared! Rich, don’t you think it might be worth it to be scared sometimes?” 

No. “Yes,” Rich answered. He wished that Derek would stop staring at him like that. “Okay, run it by me again.” 

Derek settled back into his seat, preening with the excitement of getting to tell his tale again. 

“Alright, listen closely, it takes a sensitive ear and mind to understand the complexities we’re working with here,” Derek started. “I hide in the grass on the side of the sidewalk, waiting for a human to walk past—”

“Any human?” Rich cut in. 

“No, the trick is to avoid any particularly spiky shoes. Understand?” Derek explained further. 

Rich nodded and Derek continued. “So when I find a suitable target, I rush out in front of them and do a kind of squeak.”

“Squeak?”

“Yeah, like a loud squeak. Then, they’ll look down and see me, and at this point I’ve flopped over on my back. Some people think that they stepped on me and some people just want to poke me, but either way the human crouches down to get a closer look at me.”

“Every human?”

“Okay, I’ve got like a 80% rate of crouchers.”

“Even little girls in those pink ballet shoes?” Rich questioned further.

“Especially little girls in those pink ballet shoes. Anyway, they get down to my level and reach out a finger. That’s when I jump up and bite one of their fingers really hard. Then, I run back into the grass, never to be seen again.” 

Rich looked at Derek expectantly, waiting for more, before he realized that he was finished. “Oh, okay,” Rich decided on saying. He wondered if Derek was going to eat his cricket. 

“Okay? Do you get it? I bite them! I disappear, like a biter in the night!” Derek exclaimed. He didn’t seem quite as sure of himself as he did at the beginning of this conversation. He sounded more desperate than anything else. 

“No, yeah, I get it. How often do you do this?” Rich asked, wondering if Derek would even notice if he started edging towards his plate. 

“I’m up to three or four times a week. It really gets the blood pumping, you know? I need something to get me through the rest of our mundane experience.” Apparently Derek found their experience much more mundane than Rich did. 

“What if you get stepped on?” Rich asked. 

“What if I do?” Derek countered. 

Rich didn’t exactly know what to say to that. He wished Derek hadn’t have said it at all. Derek had always been weird and now his weird new hobby was probably going to get him killed. 

“Can I have your cricket?” Rich asked. It would be rude to let it go to waste. 

Derek nodded and pushed the plate towards his friend. 

Rich thought about his existence without Derek. One less small black lizard in their burrow in the ground. Less heat when they crowd together. More food, sure, but Derek didn’t even eat that much anyway. 

“Will you come with me next time?” Derek asked. He sounded shy. 

Rich considered this. Maybe if he went with Derek, he could convince him to stop. Or maybe Rich would even like biting human fingers for some reason. But he didn’t care for excitement. What he’d really like to do is finish the cricket in front of him, and then leave and find a large, warm rock to lay on. 

“No,” Rich decided. He hoped he said it kindly. 

Derek nodded, like he expected this. “Do you think I’m being stupid?” he asked. 

“Yes,” Rich decided. He hoped he said it firmly. 

Derek was never quick to anger and that didn’t change with an uncomfortable conversation and a rejection that he could have seen coming. He got up from the table and laid some payment down. “I’ll see you at home tonight.” 

“I’ll see you at home tonight,” Rich agreed. 

Shortly after, Rich finished and left as well. It was only afternoon, the day was still young. He got down on all fours, letting his feet feel the ground. He imagined the roots and the small lizards of different colors and the other strange things that were moving underneath him. He let his feet carry him to nearly the other side of the field that his lizard burrow had made their home. 

He knew where he was going. 

He spotted it— a large, smooth bolder, not shaded by any trees. It was surrounded by a kind of sandy soil, probably eroded from the rock over time. Rich scampered over and climbed up the side. He found the smoothest, warmest patch of rock, and took his time making himself comfortable. Finally, he settled down. 

He felt his belly warmed by the rock against him and his back warmed by the sun above him. He let his eyes slip shut, and thought about how somewhere else, Derek was probably in the opposite position— back to the ground, belly to the sky and the possibility of a terrible fate, fingertip in his small mouth. Rich wondered if Derek ever drew blood.