The Plastic Fragments of a Broken Sea Turtle Heart

Submitted into Contest #179 in response to: Your character always makes the same promise; to change. Will they finally make it happen this time?... view prompt

41 comments

Contemporary

This story contains sensitive content

cw: references to near-death experiences 


1. Sea turtles, like most reptiles, have three-chambered hearts.


There's no sound more unsettling than your own heart beating inside your head. It reminds Cheryl of her mortality—every time she lays her head down on her pillow the wrong way, and her pulse pounds against her skull like the Jehovah’s Witnesses knocking on her door every Sunday to remind her that she won't live forever.


Neither will turtles, but she’s never heard a Jehovah’s Witness talk about turtles. Turtle mortality was never a topic Cheryl consciously considered either, until she found one washed up on the foaming Hollywood shoreline one night, its slimy, lethargic body glistening under a half-moon.


She'd read once somewhere that some turtles live one-hundred-and-fifty years, but in the grand scheme of things, one-hundred-and-fifty years was only a fraction of forever.


***

2. Turtles show affection by following you around with their eyes or head.


Cheryl waits with the turtle until help arrives. She does not know who will show up or when they will show up—or even what people who rescue sea turtles look like.


The turtle, who she's named Richard in the thirty-five minutes they've been alone together on the sand, follows her every movement with his small black eyes. It's the only part of his body still moving, watching her intently as she twists off the lid of her half-empty Sprite bottle and tells him it's going to be okay.


***

3. It's estimated that over half of all sea turtles have tried it or will try it at some point in their lives. 


Doug, the turtle paramedic who shows up, looks like anyone else—a dad, a brother, someone behind you in line at 7-11, only a someone who knows an absurd amount about green sea turtles.


He calls himself a Rehabilitation Specialist, not a turtle paramedic, and, with gloved hands, puts Richard in a large cardboard box that, in another life, transported bananas.


"Is he going to be okay?" Cheryl asks before Doug takes Richard away.


"I don't know. He probably ate plastic. Most sea turtles try it at one point or another." 


The way Doug phrases it makes it sound as if Richard snorted cocaine, as if all adolescent green sea turtles his age will try it, as Doug put it, at one point or another.


Cheryl imagines what might be inside Richard's stomach at this very moment. Perhaps a plastic Barbie purse or one of those spiky blue plastic rings around the necks of SunnyD bottles. Or in a tragic coincidence, the same pink cap of a dollar-store pregnancy test she threw away five years ago in college. 


"Can't he just puke it out?" asks Cheryl


Doug laughs and looks down at her now-empty bottle of Sprite. "Turtles can't puke."


***

4. Plastic makes sea turtles float. 


At one point during the rescue (which turns out to be nothing more than Doug putting Richard in a banana box), Doug tells Cheryl that Richard can probably float in water.


"It's called Floating Syndrome," he explains. "The plastic in their stomachs makes them buoyant."


As Cheryl sits alone in the wet sand, and Doug disappears with Richard in what now seems like a banana-box coffin, she imagines Richard's tired, confused body floating in the middle of the Pacific Ocean like a yellow rubber duck.


***

5. Sea turtles don't have teeth. 


When Cheryl brushes her aching molars that night, she's disturbed by the amount of plastic in her bathroom alone. Half-filled tubs of peppermint lotion. Tubes of gel that promised to erase fine lines, wrinkles, and perhaps also the remaining 85,000 green sea turtles still floating around in the ocean. 


As she rinses her mouth, Cheryl imagines one of Richard's offspring wearing the cap of her toothpaste like a tiny Colgate crown. The image makes her nauseated enough to never want to touch plastic again.


Over the next month, Cheryl promises to change in honor of Richard. She reasons that if turtles can live without plastic, so can humans. 


For the rest of May, Cheryl cuts apart the six-pack rings that hold together her cans of Diet Pepsi. She buys a bamboo brush on Amazon. She starts to treat her single-use plastic less like a one-night stand and more like a forever husband. 


However, by the end of May, plastic seeps back through the cracks of her daily routine. The stupid pasty balls of eco-friendly deodorant make her armpits sting, and the organic, gritty shampoo bars that smell like grass make her hair so frizzy she can no longer ease her mind with the fact that a head of frizzy hair is much better than a blanket of sick, floating turtles covering the ocean. 


To be honest, Cheryl never thought much about turtles before Richard. 


She knew they weren’t doing well, per se. It just wasn’t human nature to think twice about the turtles, unless those turtles were the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.


But unlike the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, these turtles were weak, buoyant, and ate magic marker caps instead of cheese pizza. Cheryl never cared about turtles, until that night Richard looked her dead in the eye, mistook her as his savior, not understanding that she was the one who put him down on the shore to begin with, the one who bloated his stomach with the sharp fragments of objects that made only a marginal difference in her everyday life. 


She promises to change eventually, when the time is right, vowing to, at one point or another, make her carbon footprint as small as Cinderella's glass, plastic-free slipper.


***

6. Sea turtles can't tell the difference between plastic and food.


By the time Cheryl has her first child, she’s mostly forgotten about Richard—about her plastic-free stint and her go-green fever.


Cheryl is too busy to think about sick turtles. She has a child to keep alive—a now three-year-old boy named Xavier who loves to play kitchen, pretending to grill plastic meat patties and drink from plastic grape juice boxes he half-believes are real. 


*** 


7.  Sea turtles can slow their heart rate up to nine minutes between heartbeats.


A lot can happen in nine minutes. 


You can fold your laundry.


You can throw out old Tupperware.


And according to the plastic wrapper on the pre-cut cookie dough, in nine minutes, you can bake a dozen cookies.


When the cookies come out of the oven, it takes another nine minutes for them to cool. Once they do, Xavier grabs them, shoveling them down his throat so fast Cheryl yells at him to slow down.


***


8. Sometimes sea turtles look like they’re crying, even though they are not. 


Cheryl doesn’t think about Richard again until she finds Xavier one day sitting cross-legged on the carpet of his bedroom, making a high-pitched whistle that reminds her of a seabird.


He looks like he wants to cry.


Cheryl once read in a book somewhere that sometimes sea turtles look like they're crying. If you ever see one up close, they shed tiny salt tears, as if they know what's happening to them, as if they know there's a piece of a plastic doll head living inside their stomach.


But it turns out, they're not crying. They're just excreting excess salt that they cannot pee or puke out, through the tear ducts that are too small for the bits and pieces of bottle caps, tampon applicators, and Happy Meal toys to escape from.


She kneels down to his level, but he cannot bring himself to cry. His ribs pull inward, and her hands shake as she dials for help.


The woman on the other end tells her, too calmly, to make a fist, to then lodge that fist under his belly button and cover it with her other hand, to push and push until whatever it is comes out.


It's a Lego. A stupid red Lego, now lying on the carpet covered in mucus. He inhales desperately, like someone’s who’s been underwater for the last ten years.


Word travels fast, and changes from ear to ear. He swallowed a Lego. He broke his leg. He has bronchitis. He has a tumor.


Depending on what they hear, neighbors come bearing presents that weekend—stuffed animals with glittery plastic eyes, plastic get-well balloons, and flowers wrapped in crinkly cellophane.


"It's really not a big deal," Cheryl tells them, but they insist, adding one by one to the plastic nest of presents that, to the untrained eye, might look like food.

January 07, 2023 04:14

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41 comments

Aeris Walker
02:59 Jan 18, 2023

So much to like in this one! It’s well organized, thoughtfully structured, engaging, and contemporary in all the best ways. I really liked how you broke it up with the facts about turtles and made plastic such a major theme—something Cheryl just can’t seem to escape. You also do a good job foreshadowing what will unfold throughout the story, so subtly and creatively, and without giving too much away. Great ending and tons of great lines! “He calls himself a Rehabilitation Specialist, not a turtle paramedic” “She promises to change event...

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Liv Chocolate
04:25 Jan 21, 2023

Thank you so much, Aeris!!! This was a fun one to write. So glad you liked it <3

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Helen A Smith
15:40 Jan 11, 2023

I really liked the way you tackled this eco-friendly story, Liv. The connection between the turtle and Xavier worked well. There’s some great lines about the ‘turtle paramedic.’ Although it was a serious subject, it was a fun read.

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Liv Chocolate
21:33 Jan 15, 2023

Thank you, Helen!!! Definitely not a "fun" topic to write about, as I try to avoid cautionary tales and preaching positivity XD, but I'm so happy you liked it.

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Kelsey H
10:29 Jan 11, 2023

I found this very enjoyable to read, it was a meaningful and important theme written in a way that was entertaining but also never losing sight of the sadness of what is happening (the way she imagines Richard floating like a duck - great imagery). It really touched on how as humans we can be well intentioned and want to do the right thing and yet also continue to cause harm. I also very much enjoyed the turtle facts, the way you used them as headers for each scene worked very well, and then other bits were woven into the story so it flowe...

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Liv Chocolate
21:32 Jan 15, 2023

Thank you so much, Kelsey! I'm glad you liked the facts as headlines structure. I was second-guessing it after posting it. I agree we're well-intentioned and perhaps a lot of us don't believe *our own* plastic waste is part of the issue. It's just human nature, I guess, and I still don't know what the solution is to plastic waste. I've tried swapping out a few things, but I've heard even the alternatives are just as harmful--like reusable bags. The energy they take to produce cancels out any positive effects they may have apparently. It fe...

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J K
03:20 Jan 11, 2023

This was so sad and so enlightening. I appreciated the interspersed humor ("erase fine lines, wrinkles, and perhaps also the remaining 85,000 green sea turtles still floating around in the ocean"), but I absolutely still got the message.

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Liv Chocolate
21:25 Jan 15, 2023

Thank you very much! :)

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Michał Przywara
21:46 Jan 10, 2023

Love it! And I gotta say, when her anti-plastic crusade was forgotten and we learn she had a 3 year old, my breath caught in my throat. Things suddenly became extremely tense - but then, more or less, worked out. The initial meeting with Richard was great, really sold that sense of guilt, that idea that "I'm part of the problem and I should really do something about it." But it's hard, isn't it? Willpower is a scarce resource and we live in a society that fights change with easy conveniences. That last point about the plastic looking lik...

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Liv Chocolate
21:21 Jan 15, 2023

Thank you, Michael! Your comments are such a joy to read as always I thought about Tide Pods too when writing this! I was reading there's a biological reason why some people, especially children, feel the urge to eat them. "plastic crap well-wishers"--I absolutely love the way you described them. People with a "cause" tend to be irritating, regardless of what that "cause" is I think. Whenever I see someone with a clipboard outside a Target, for example, you can bet I'm driving all the way across the city to find another Target. It made...

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Susan Catucci
16:11 Jan 10, 2023

Wow, Liv, I positively love and admire what you have here. I've been to turtle sanctuaries and rescue centers and you are correct with all your facts - which makes this story so valuable on several levels. It's an extremely well-crafted piece, charming, funny - you had me from the first paragraph ( the Jehovah Witnesses knocking line )! And devastating. To align the value of nature with the lives of our children I thought was extremely effective (frankly, knocked the wind out of me) Wonderful, meaningful work. (And I got a kick out of...

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Liv Chocolate
21:13 Jan 15, 2023

Thank you, Susan! :D About to stalk your profile in a bit for your latest stories

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Susan Catucci
21:59 Jan 15, 2023

I wish you would - :)

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Wally Schmidt
19:53 Jan 09, 2023

Wow -what a powerful story. The prose is beautiful and the way you have organized it all works well. The story speaks volumes about how well-intentioned we all are -or would be-if everyday life didn't keep getting in the way. Beautifully written.

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Liv Chocolate
21:10 Jan 15, 2023

Thank you very much, Wally!

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Daniel Allen
19:31 Jan 08, 2023

This is a really interesting way of looking at the vicious circle of plastic and just how integral it is to our lives. Love the symmetry between Richard and Xavier. Great work!

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Liv Chocolate
02:26 Jan 09, 2023

Why thank you, Daniel!

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Zack Powell
01:34 Jan 08, 2023

We're friends, so I was gonna always click on this story. But if we weren't friends, I still would've clicked on this because, oh baby, that title! Tell me you wouldn't read a story with this title just to figure out what it all means. Which is my roundabout way of saying: Thanks for using prime real estate to hook your audience before we even read the first sentence. Good titles are SO underrated. Title game aside, I love your writing style (you probably know this about me) and your range (you might not know this). From magical wish-granti...

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Liv Chocolate
02:24 Jan 09, 2023

Thank you so much, my friend! Your analysis of the floating metaphor was spot on (I honestly hadn't even realized it was a metaphor until now, and it's perfect!) This was one of those stories that started as a title idea, and then . . . I had no idea where it was going from there. I always prefer when the title comes after the story idea. So much easier that way. Thank you again for this comment :) !

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Tommy Goround
22:52 Jan 07, 2023

Synthetic Estrogen, WHO, death to smoochie.

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Liv Chocolate
02:26 Jan 09, 2023

Who is smoochie?

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Tommy Goround
03:11 Jan 09, 2023

Edward Norton plays a politically correct stuffed animal that looks like Barney. Meanwhile, Robin Williams, who is fired for creative financing -- wants to regain his position as America's sweetheart (ages 8 and below). The world health organization says that the global average of young girls becoming women has gone from 12 to 8 years old. Synthetic estrogen. The Swedish study of sperm counts in young adolescent boys (because Swedish scientists have actually gotten grants to find out if brain cells die if someone farts in an elevator; sour...

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Wendy Kaminski
19:22 Jan 07, 2023

"bloated his stomach with the sharp fragments of objects that made only a marginal difference in her everyday life" So embarrassingly, tragically true. A scathing indictment of our wasteful ways, wrapped in a soft shell of kindness, both to the turtle and to the possibly-clueless reader. I really loved the fact-based list that headlined each "chapter," giving a pivot point for the information and plot furtherance. This was, as always, brilliant, Liv!

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Liv Chocolate
02:28 Jan 09, 2023

Thank you, Wendy! : )

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Delbert Griffith
19:02 Jan 07, 2023

What a great way to wake us all up! This was told in excellent fashion, and if you don't see the moral of this story then you're nor trying. Fantastic job, Liv. Simply fantastic.

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Liv Chocolate
02:28 Jan 09, 2023

Thank you, Delbert!! I wasn't too happy with how this one turned out personally, but comments like yours make me feel better

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14:38 Jan 07, 2023

I enjoyed learning something as I was reading this. The 8 facts about sea turtles added a good structure. And it's so true that we will promise to change and then slip back to whatever most practical. A subtle irony that when her son is sick, everyone brings plastic gifts. Your writing is very smooth and a delight to read as usual.

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Liv Chocolate
02:30 Jan 09, 2023

Thank you, Scott! I wasn't really sure where this story was going at first, but I learned a thing or two about turtles myself!

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BRUCE MARTIN
05:07 Jan 07, 2023

Liv, I really enjoy your sensitivity to the subtle thoughts and insights of the human mind. You have a very special talent in your introspective ruminations. And, once again, an amazing phrase: "150 years is still nothing more than a fraction of forever." Great story.

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Liv Chocolate
11:01 Jan 07, 2023

Thank you so much, Bruce! The human mind is a very interesting place, isn't it?

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Lily Finch
22:23 Jan 08, 2023

Your title clue was intriguing. The writing and going with a factual statement about sea turtles and then equating her experience she has with her son as similar was brilliant. I enjoyed reading this story as it played with my thinking and allowed me to make connections with our involvement in our environment. At the same time, pointing out the potential dangers to children with plastic toys. Thanks for the great read. LF6

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Liv Chocolate
02:26 Jan 09, 2023

Thank you so much, Lily! I was a little conflicted over writing this story because it's hard to write about the environment without sounding preachy. I just discovered the genre Cli-Fi. It's still pretty new and has a long way to go. Most Cli-Fi comes off as a cautionary tale. I'm so glad you enjoyed it!

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Lily Finch
03:03 Jan 09, 2023

I did - it was fab. LF6

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Tommy Goround
22:49 Jan 07, 2023

Plush is toxic? Idk. At one point it was like fiberglass and then they had to make sure it was fire retardants and make sure it wouldn't choke the kids. So this is a lovely thinker piece.. .you read and get smarter. Maybe you like the turtle and consider changing a lifestyle But realize turtles are often eaten in many parts of the world. Extra points for the ending. Points for the crossover into a human child. Points for going beyond a Wikipedia article and making me think that my kids have really boring pets. Clapping.

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Liv Chocolate
02:27 Jan 09, 2023

:) Thank you, Tommy Who's eating turtles btw?

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Tommy Goround
03:00 Jan 09, 2023

What's his name, Selkirk. The Scottish man that actually lived the life of Robinson Crusoe. He was so emphatically happy when there was a sea tortoise that came over to become dinner. Turtle/tortoise... I'm going with the Genesis naming method. Anything with a shell on its back. Turtle soup is very popular at some of the restaurants that I could afford in Asia. I can't tell you if this is normal because I was poor and would try to get by with dim sum and ramen.

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Liv Chocolate
03:04 Jan 09, 2023

I'm reading now that turtle flesh is apparently delicious. Plastic-stuffed turtles, anyone? They're too adorable, and I want to save them all

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Tommy Goround
03:16 Jan 09, 2023

Ok. I got an idea about that. Obviously UNESCO world heritage site will not work because they blew up some hundred foot mountain Budha. What if you went back to that ancient idea of the turtle is Earth. We are all living on the back of a turtle tortoise.. the turtle is possibly floating in space with its arms... Now when you see people eating turtle soup you can say, "get my God out of your mouth."

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Unknown User
18:16 Jan 07, 2023

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Liv Chocolate
02:29 Jan 09, 2023

I love you. ❤️ You know, they say the worst thing you can do for the planet is have a child. Want to create one with me? A little snek?

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Unknown User
16:37 Jan 10, 2023

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