Riding The Raccoon

I rushed swiftly at the rainbow ostrich, tackling it low, right below its knees. It was caught unawares and fell with a woosh and a ferb and lay stunned for a moment—but only a moment. Holding tight to ostrich legs that felt like old baseball gloves soaked in pickle brine, I wondered why I had tackled the bird in the first place. Before an answer arrived in my brain, the odd-looking creature pecked my pate and bit the living hell out of my arm. Reasons no longer seemed to matter, running away did. I let go and rolled away, into a clump of damp pampas grass. The ungainly bird rose, gakking and sputtering. He looked around and spotted me laying there, wiping blood off my right arm. He walked over to me on his velociraptor legs and proceeded to kick my body like a street fighter as I pled insanity. Eventually tiring, the pissed-off geek-bird screamed an ostrich curse, spit on me, and then pranced away into the night.
I felt like a torn bone sack, but I was alive. Mirasol was not going to like this; she was not going to like this at all, so I decided the best thing to do was to stay away from Mirasol. I re-saddled my raccoon, Gerde, and rode towards the bluffs where I knew I’d find solace and solvents at my friend Leotis’ penguin-free condo.
I arrived after midnight, but Leotis was still up working on his new play about the celery stalkers of lower Saxony. He welcomed Gerde and I with open arms and quickly filled plates of foul-smelling cheese and cups of licorice soda for our sustenance. When we had finished, Gerde crawled off to a nearby sofa and fell into a bushy tailed slumber. Leotis inquired about my rather disheveled appearance and the state of things at the lab. I filled him in on the man vs. large-mean-bird episode and brought him up to date on Mirasol’s work. He glowed like a beaver’s wine bottle and said, “Mirasol is not going to like this.”

As Mirasol undressed in the bedroom, the muscles in her tan shoulders were aching. It had been a long day at the lab, working on her notes and trying to finish the report for Elgin, the project’s manager. The depletion of energy she was feeling exacerbated her irritation at Charlie. Where was he? He could have at least called. This was the third time this month he’s gone off on “a short ride of spontaneous discovery and cultural survival,” as he like to call his brief disappearances.
After a shower and her ritual “rubbing of the beauty oils” into her toned and tasty skin, she lay in the bed and wondered briefly if Charlie might be having an affair. “Highly doubtful” was her conclusion. They had been married for 20 years, and although she knew he appreciated the magic of women, she was confident that she, and only she, possessed the right mojo for him. Although they were opposites in many ways—she, a scientist, he, a writer of novels; she, a detail diva, he, a big-picture dreamer—the bond was strong. Charlie was a brilliant wing nut, a gilded loon who often saw things too painful or beautiful to see. He was a curious curiosity, and she loved him enormously. “Goddammit, where is that son of a bitch?” she said out loud, frustration and worry weaved into her voice. She looked at the clock on the nightstand; the digital numbers displayed 3:00 a.m. She turned her body onto its sleeping side and closed her eyes. At 3:01, the telephone rang.

Leotis Andrews loved Charlie like a son. They met at a reading Leotis had given during Charlie’s first year at U.C.L.A. Andrews was touring in support of his latest novel Green Beans, (which won a National Book Review Award), and Charlie wanted a chance to meet a “real” writer. Charlie got his chance at the “meet-and-greet” after the reading. He took Leotis’ hand, looked him directly in the eyes, and said, “Mr. Andrews, you make my brain dance. You make castles and cottages with words, and I am pulled into their parlors where you and I spend a few hours together. When I walk out the doors, I feel pleasantly plump. My name is Charles Rainwater, and I am, at the moment, professorial fodder, a lump of clay that is being kneaded and shaped by the higher educational system of the great state of California. But no matter what the system needs, wants, or says I should be, I will be a writer.” Leotis Andrews invited Charlie Rainwater to dinner that evening, and a great friendship was born.
Andrew’s was now 65 years old, and Charlie had recently celebrated his 45th birthday. As Andrews watched Charlie talk, he recognized there was something different about his long-time friend. He couldn't say what is was in particular, but some thing was a little off. Charlie had lost weight since the last time they’d been together, but the sight change he noticed wasn’t physical. No, this was something in the waves, a current flux maybe.
Charlie was very talkative tonight, but it wasn’t like a methamphetamine induced word rush; he wasn’t spewing out manic word bullets. On the contrary, he was quite lucid. He spoke cogently, in well-measured sentences; his words flowed with insight, wit, and color. It was just that he seem that if he stopped talking he might collapse. Leotis listened attentively, throwing out a comment now and then, but he instinctively knew that Charlie needed to talk…about anything. He needed to rid his mind of and excess of words.
Gerde, Charlie’s raccoon, was making soft snurgerling noises on the sofa, and Leotis was beginning to tire. “Charles, my dear friend, you’ve been talking to me for half the night; are you really going to begin talking to me, or should we turn in?” said Leotis.
Charlie poured himself some more soda and took a long drink. He tilted his head down for a few seconds, as if gathering his thought. When he raised his face, there was a hint of a smile on his lips as he looked into Leotis’ eyes. “I think I’ve become more than human.”