Freddy the Frog

Freddy the Frog was very sick. He perched on the rail of the Corniche and looked out at the dark water. Frogs are supposed to like water, but seeing that much of it always confused Freddy. He always felt it looked threatening, like a monster waiting to rise up and eat him. He would stare at it for hours, waiting for it to attack him.

There were some panthers walking behind him. And some monkeys, and buffalo too, going down the pathway of the Corniche. Sometimes, when he was on a ledge like this, animals would push him from behind and into the scary water. He'd fall in, in a total panic, and then hop his way back out. There was nothing he could do about it, because the animals were much bigger than him. And he's just a frog. But he always found himself coming back. Maybe a part of him liked getting pushed in.

But no one pushed him in tonight. Maybe out here in Casablanca the animals are nicer. After a while of staring at the water, he began to vomit. He really was very sick. It was probably because he ate too many flies on the plane. He knew there was something wrong with them. Flies are supposed to taste like cardboard, with a little salt. But these flies tasted sweet. Flies aren't supposed to taste sweet. He should have stopped eating them, but he had about a dozen. And he hadn't even been hungry. Maybe, he wanted to see what would happen to him.

He hopped off the rail of the Corniche and looked at the big steel blocks. There were a lot of them these days. They each had a thousand eyes. He wondered why they needed so many eyes. They were powerful, because they ate the humans with their tiny mouths. They ate the humans without even moving. It was if the humans wanted to get eaten by them; they just walked right in.

It was very late at night. But many of the animals were still out. He was only out because in his hometown it was 2pm in the afternoon. It was his first day in Casablanca. He was a little scared and very sick. So far, he was enjoying himself.

He wanted to go to the desert. He knew the Sahara desert was somewhere around here. He wanted to hop in the sand. He knew a lot about sand. Well, maybe he didn't know a lot about sand, but he thought about it a lot. When he was four months old, he once played with his brother in the park. They were pretending they were knights battling a dragon to save a princess. Once they saved the princess she would kiss them and they'd become human. Except while they were fighting the dragon a human boy came up to them with a big bucket, a bucket filled with sand, and he dumped it on Freddy's brother. His brother was completely smothered. Freddy didn't hear or see anything from his brother. He went to help him, and the boy kicked Freddy. He kicked him hard, and he went flying across the park. Freddy thought maybe he should go back, but he was scared and hopped away as fast as he could. He never saw his brother again.

So he knew a bit about sand. He wanted to go to the desert to hop across the sand. He wanted to go all the way across, to the other side, and whatever was beyond there. He didn't know what was on the other side, but that was okay. In a way, not knowing the final destination made it more exciting. His brother might be there, on the other side. He got excited and started hopping faster. But then he started throwing up again. Those flies really were awful.

A male leopard stopped by to ask him if he was okay. He looked up, and saw a female leopard next to the male. In the dark night, the female looked nice. Probably, he is only asking whether I am okay because he wants to impress this female. He wants to show the female how kind he is. So Freddy threw out his tongue and licked the leopard in the nose, then again in the eye, then again in the mouth. The leopard recoiled. He raised his paw - and then stopped. He put it down and kept walking with his female. Hopefully she figures it out, thought Freddy.

Freddy the Frog thought he should get back to his bed. He was sleeping under the palm-bed of a nice Giraffe couple. He always liked Giraffes, they let him climb on their necks. Maybe, they just couldn't feel that he was there.

He started hopping back, and thought about Fanny. Fanny the Frog. She was a female, but she could jump higher than most of the males. She had been his brother's girlfriend. But secretly, he loved her. He loved her because one time it was raining and he saw her staring at a dead tree for a very long time. He watched her watch the tree, in the rain, and wondered what was in her mind.

He knew that she knew he loved him - the females always know when a male loves them - and after his brother disappeared he hoped he could be with her. But one day not long after his brother was gone he saw her climbing a telephone pole with Michael the Frog. Michael had always been a doofus, so Freddy was confused. There were many things in the world that confused Freddy.

An elephant passed Freddy. Elephants always fascinated him. One time he climbed inside one of them, through the big nose. He climbed up it as far as he could, and the elephant started stamping and roaring, and swinging its long nose like a maniac. It tried to blow him out, but Freddy kept climbing in further. He wanted to see what was at the other side. Eventually the elephant whipped him out - he'd only made it about half way - and he landed on the ground in front of the elephant. He felt something inside his body had broken. The elephant looked at him for a moment. It slowly raised its trunk as if to smack him with it - but then stopped and just held the trunk high. The trunk was shaking, and Freddy realized the elephant was afraid he might somehow get back in there. It fascinated him that something as big as an elephant could be afraid of him, especially since he was laying broken on the ground and couldn't even move. Then the elephant galloped away. Freddy was so covered in mucus he could barely breathe. It took him a week to fully recover. But he was glad he did it.

Freddy stopped hopping for a moment and looked straight up at the sky. It was a cool night, and the wind was blowing, but the sky did not move. Freddy thought that was interesting - the sky never moved. It looked a lot like the big scary water. Except it was bigger. And emptier. He really stared at it. He looked at the shiny dots. What were those things? He started hopping straight up. As high as he could. But he didn't seem to get any closer. But he kept trying. And he thought, maybe if he hopped hard enough, it would just suck him in. Suck him in and swallow him in to its world. A new world. A world he might be able to understand.