by Heide Goody
I advanced, a naked warrior with my strange domestic weapons. Ashbert was squealing unhelpfully, going on about how he could feel all its little legs when it ran over him. I closed my mind to everything except the task at hand. The creature was in the corridor. It was butting the wall on either side, maybe looking for a hiding place. I put the bin on its side, hoping that it might look like an attractive cave or something. It would save me a lot of bother if the thing would just run inside, as I really didn’t want to get hands-on with it. It ran off in the opposite direction. I cursed lightly and followed it. It ran to a corner and scrabbled ineffectually at the wall. I put the bin down, making sure it was open, advanced with my sieve, and in one smooth movement, I scooped it up and swung it into the bin.
“Yes!” I shouted, jubilant at my skilful manoeuvre.
“Oh no!” shouted Ashbert, who still hadn’t managed to stand, but who emerged from the bathroom as quickly as a prone, slithering man could, “there’s another one!”
“Balls there is!” I cried in terrified disbelief, but he was right. They were everywhere.
Is this the way the world ends? I thought. Consumed by killer woodlice? That would be a crap apocalypse. I’d rather have the asteroid any day.
In the end, I repeated my patented sieve-to-pedal-bin move another three times. I sank, exhausted, onto the bathroom floor after the last one. There was a lot of cleaning up to do, but right now I was worried about those creatures and where they might have come from. There was something about them that was oddly familiar, but I couldn’t quite place it. I checked the whole flat for further intruders, making sure there weren’t any more insects that might pop out. When I got over to the front door and looked at the box of fossils that was still there it came to me why those insects looked familiar. They were the same size and shape as the fossils. I turned over one of Adam’s rocks and now there was no fossil. It was just a rock. The others were the same. I counted them: four in all. Four fossils that were now rocks and four weird insects in the pedal bin.
“Lexi, can you phone Adam please?” I said.
“Calling Adam.”
“Sound only! No video!” I shouted as Lexi put the call through. I was still naked after all.
Moments later I heard the sound of Adam’s phone ringing out.
“Yes?” came his voice.
“Adam, you know your rocks.”
“I think I do,” he said. “Igneous, sedimentary and metamorphic. And a good afternoon to you, Lori, or whatever time it is there.”
“Your rocks, Adam. The fossils.”
“You are taking care of them, aren’t you?” he said, suddenly concerned.
“Sure.”
“Because there’s a really rare enosuchus in one of them.”
“Emo sucker? Is that the one with the stripy shell and too many legs?”
“No, the enosuchus was an amphibian. You’re thinking of the trilobites.”
“Right. Trilobites. Trilobites. And I don’t suppose there are many live trilobites around these days…?”
“Live? Lord, no, Lori. They were wiped out in the Great Permian Extinction.”
“Of course,” I said breezily, as four of them rustled round in the bin.
“In fact, I delivered a lecture in Atlanta about the clathrate gun hypothesis as the main cause of the mass extinction.”
“Someone shot them?”
“No, silly. I was going to use those fossils for a similar series of talks when I do the Volga cruises in October. You haven’t broken them, have you?”
“No,” I said, uncertainly. My mind was whirling with an odd new sense of responsibility. If these were the only trilobites in the world, I couldn’t let them die. “What sort of thing did they like to eat?”
“Trilobites? Lori, I’m about to do a piece to camera for a documentary series on Peruvian mummies. What on earth –”
“Lettuce maybe?” I tried. “Might they like to nibble on a carrot?”
“Jesus, Lori, are you high? Trilobites were marine creatures. They would never come across lettuce or carrots.” He sighed. “There’s arguments about what they would eat, nobody really knows. Those ones of mine lived in the muddy ooze, so it’s thought they ate worms.
“Worms, right. Got it,” I said.
“Listen, I really need to go now, Lori.”
“Sure. Go and do your thing, Adam.”
Ashbert emerged from the bathroom, wrapped in a towel. He’d been trying to shower off some of the oil. “Hey, should we get back to Sizzling Sex Positions for Adventurous Lovers?” he asked.
“No time, get dressed!” I said. “We need to go and dig up some worms for these little fellas.”
“I thought you said something about killing them with fire and flushing them down the toilet?” he said, with a puzzled frown.
“I might have been a bit hasty when I said that,” I admitted.
I went into the bathroom and ran an inch of water into the bath. Then I got the pedal bin and tipped it up gently, just over the water. The trilobites splashed into the water and immediately started scooting around all over the place. As far as cockroachy-looking things were able to express pleasure, they looked absolutely over the moon.
“It seems these are trilobites,” I said to Ashbert, “and they’re the only ones in the world. They should have died out years ago.”
“They don’t look very dead,” said Ashbert, pointing at one that was continually trying and failing to climb up the sloping side of the bath.
“Get down, Dougie,” I told it.
“Dougie?” said Ashbert.
“Tom, Danny, Dougie and Harry. McFly.”
“And why’s that one Dougie?”
“Cos he’s the cute one. Anyway, I have a sneaking suspicion that I know how they came to be here, too.”
“Time machine?” Ashbert suggested.
“I’m going to try something.”
I fetched my sketch pad and sat down on the toilet seat. Ashbert looked at me curiously.
“Are you planning to sketch them?” he asked.
“No. I’m going to draw them some worms,” I said.
I drew a simple wiggly worm. Tempted as I was to give it an amusing face or expressive eyes, I resisted because of what I suspected was about to happen. I held my pendant on one hand and stared at the picture.
I stared really hard and waggled my eyebrows a bit like an evil hypnotist.
Nothing happened.
“What’s supposed to happen?” said Ashbert.
I sighed and looked at my pendant. The weighty lump of red onyx, the cameo of the woman and her adoring bloke. Huh, kind of like me and Ashbert.
“He hardly charged me anything for it,” I said. “I guess they’re probably mass-produced in a factory in Athens or China or something. I thought…”
“What?” said Ashbert.
I grinned sheepishly.
“I thought that it was the pendant, that it was magic. And if I…” I pointed at the worm drawing and at once there was a worm resting on my sketch pad. The picture was gone and a real life wriggly earthworm was there.
“You saw that?” I gasped.
“I saw it,” said Ashbert.
I tipped the pad over the bath so that the worm fell in. The trilobites all piled on, and used their front mouth parts to dig into the worm. It wasn’t long before it was gone completely.
“I’ll draw you some more in a minute,” I told them.
I looked up at Ashbert. “Well I think this explains where you came from,” I said.
“What?”
“I created you in a scrapbook when I was a teenager. The other day when I looked through all my old stuff, I animated you with this pendant. Just hold and point. That’s it.”
He looked genuinely shocked. “That explains why I have no memories,” he said.
“I guess.”
“Because I’m not real.”
“Oh, you’re real all right,” I said. “You are the reality that I imagined. You embod
y everything that I wanted when I was a teenager.”
He looked slightly mollified by this. I could see that he was having even more difficulty than me absorbing this news.
“Promise me one thing?” he said in a small voice.
“What’s that?” I said, concerned at his tone.
“Please don’t feed me to them,” he said, pointing at the trilobites.
Chapter 13
It was Sunday and I didn’t need to get up early for work. I contemplated my strange new talent for bringing things to life. There were so many questions in my mind. Luckily, my first, and quite possibly my finest creation was lying there with me. I rolled over and gave him an experimental prod between the ribs.
“You’re real,” I said.
“I am,” he replied.
“I mean you’re really real.”
“I feel real.”
He ran his hand down my naked side to make the point. Sure, he felt real. Possibly even flesh and blood like me. I pinched his upper arm to makes sure until he pulled away with a brief ‘ow’.
“You’re an enigma, Ashbert.”
“Is that where they stick a pipe up your –”
“I mean you’re a mystery,” I said firmly. “What’s my favourite colour?”
“You like purple,” he said promptly, “but not for nail varnish. You’re not an emo.”
“An emo? Crisps then. What are my favourite crisps?”
“Salt and vinegar.”
“Have I got a favourite television programme?”
“Yes of course, it’s Malcolm in the Middle,” he said. “You think that Francis is cute.”
I was coming to a definite conclusion. Years ago, I had been seriously addicted to the show. I had always looked forward to the appearances of the dashing older son, but I’d gone right off him since then and developed a rather disturbing crush on the dad instead (although I hear in a later spin-off series he becomes a meth cook and drug dealer and wears a disturbing hat). It seemed as though Ashbert had a very specific range of knowledge about my likes and dislikes. If he was ever required to go on a quiz show and have a specialised subject, he’d completely ace the Lori aged fifteen round.
“I think that some of your information is a bit out of date,” I said, as tactfully as I could. “I’ve grown up since then.”
“That’s not what your parents say.”
I wriggled away from his touch.
“That’s not fair! You’ve not met my parents.”
“You said they said it.”
“Yes, but…”
I reflected on that statement. Had I grown up or just got older? I slipped out of bed and pulled the cushions away from Lexi.
“Lexi, how do I know if I’m an adult?”
“An adult is a human or other living thing that has reached sexual maturity.”
“Not that. I want to know if I’m behaving like an adult.”
“Would you like to hear Seven basic adulting tips for today’s generation?”
“Bingo.”
“Number one. Your daily meals don’t just appear by magic. Understand where food comes from. How much is a box of eggs? Number two, wash and dry your own towels. As a stretch goal, put them away in the correct place. Number three, make your own dental appointments. Number four, understand your energy bill. Number five, look after someone other than yourself.”
“Whoa Lexi! Hold on!” I flopped back onto the bed in exhaustion at the sheer scale of the tasks before me.
“I think we should double check the sexual maturity bit,” said Ashbert, reaching for me.
“Really?” I said. “I think we spend enough of our time getting hot and sweaty.”
“Nothing better than a bit of a dirty fun and getting hot and sweaty.”
“Not now,” I said. “Go get a shower.”
Ashbert plodded off dutifully and I got up to fetch my sketch pad.
“Right Florrie,” I said. “You’re coming on this journey with me. We’ll have a series, called Florrie learns adulting. Now where to start? Lexi, how much are eggs?”
“Free-range or barn-raised?” she asked.
“Free eggs you say?”
“Free-range eggs.”
“And are they free?” I asked.
“I cannot find free eggs in the local area. A box of six large free-range eggs is available for the best price of one pound fifty,” said Lexi.
I sketched Florrie opening a box of eggs. It was a great picture, if I say so myself, with the eggs having something of the mysterious, pristine appeal of a box of chocolates before you take the first one. Florrie gazed at their speckled brown surface in adoration and quoted the price of them in a speech bubble, before declaring that she might have a delicious egg for her breakfast, safe in the knowledge that she could afford it.
Ashbert had come back, unshowered.
“It might be tricky to use the bathroom,” he said. “Those horrible trilobites are still in the bath.”
“True,” I said and then, “Oh! That’s perfect!”
“Is it?”
“Yes. Don’t you see?”
He looked puzzled. “If you’re thinking they could be like those fish that nibble dead skin off your feet, I think these little guys might be a bit too hard-core.”
“No. I mean, as an adult, I need to look after someone other than myself.”
“You can look after me if you like.” He raised a suggestive eyebrow.
“I can look after the trilobites. If I can make them happy then that will prove I’m adulting properly! You know what I need?”
“A total rethink of your life?”
“No. A vet.”
Lexi chipped in at that point. I hadn’t put the cushions back in place. She was like having a nosy, super-knowledgeable older sister. “There are five veterinary practices in your area.”
“Huh? Really?” I said. “Can I speak to one of them?”
There was a dialling tone and then a female voice came on the line. “Good morning, Furry Friends Veterinary Practice.”
“Oh, hi,” I said. “I’m after some advice on animal care. Can you help me?”
“I’m sure we can help you. What kind of an animal is it?”
I didn’t want to get into specifics. It wouldn’t end well. “Let’s just say it’s a cross between a woodlouse and a guinea pig,” I said.
“Is it?”
“With a little bit of crocodile thrown in, yes. Likes to eat worms. Would you keep that in a cage or what?”
There was a pause. “I wonder if you’d like to bring your animal in for an examination by a vet?” she asked slowly.
“No, I don’t think that’s a good idea. There are four of them all together and I think Dougie likes his own company rather than being cooped up with the others.”
“It’s going to be difficult to offer advice without knowing what kind of animal you’re talking about,” said the voice. Why was she being so difficult about this?
I tried again. “Well I just need a bit of help. If I put them in a cage, I think they might get out between the bars. They like water and mud so how do I make some sort of house for them?”
There was an exasperated sigh. “I don’t think it would be appropriate to offer specific advice without the vet seeing your animals. Or, indeed, if you can’t tell me what they are. Some animals need to live in a cage, some in a tank and some in a terrarium.”
“Terrari-what?”
“Terrarium. For pets such as terrapins which need a semi-aquatic environment.”
“Yes, yes! That’s what I need. A semi-aquatic environment. How do I do that?”
“A basic terrarium can be created from a large fish tank. Look I really think you should consider bringing your animals in to see the vet so that you can get some specific advice. We can put you in touch with suppliers for your animals’ needs as well. It sounds as if you’re new to –”
“No, I’m good now, thanks,” I said. “Bye.” I didn’t want to answer any more difficult quest
ions about what these animals were and how I came to have them in my bath.
Lexi ended the call and I was about to replace the cushions when another thought crossed my mind. “Lexi, what are the other things on the list of adulting tasks?”
“Number six, learn to drive. Number seven, learn basic household maintenance,” said Lexi.
I could see that those were for advanced adults. I was on a roll though and I knew that I could tackle these if I really put my mind to it. Look how far I’d got in the last ten minutes!
“Driving, huh?” I said. I still had some of the money left from the pile that Ashbert had acquired. “Lexi, how do I learn to drive?”
“There are fourteen driving schools within your area,” she replied.
“Cool!” I said with a grin. “Let’s book a lesson.”
After booking my first driving lesson for tomorrow morning with an instructor called Terence, I was a little shaken at how expensive it was. I either needed to learn incredibly quickly, in three lessons or less, or I would need some more money. I rang Cookie, on my mobile.
“Boredom, food or money?” she said when she picked up.
“Eh?” I wondered briefly if Lexi had texted her.
“It’s before twelve on a Sunday,” said Cookie. “This is not normal for you, my friend. I’m guessing that an essential strand of your being needs attention. As I say, boredom, food or money?”
“You’re a genius,” I said, genuinely impressed.
“Just in tune with the vibrational matrix of the multiverse, meow-meow.”
“I wanted to ask you about earning some extra money.”
“First you had no job. Now you’ve got one, you want more. The first step on the path to nirvana is recognising that desire is the root of all suffering.”
“You’ve got like a million jobs, Cookie.”