Jim Shepard - Lights Out in the Reptile House

Karel said he could, after a pause in which he realized he was expected to reply. He wasn’t listening well, he realized, flattered that Kehr was talking to him as an adult.

Was there anything Karel was devoted to? Anything that gave him a reason for being? What was Karel doing? What was he here for?

There were the reptiles, Karel thought. But what would that come to now? There was Leda. He imagined Kehr’s response, and winced.

“I see these people’s lives,” Kehr said, his voice coming out of the dark, “and I just don’t understand it. Their lives just go on, like lights left on in rooms when everyone’s gone.”

Karel slid down in the bed, imagining himself like that. He was saddened and angered by his own mediocrity. He focused on Leda. She was crouching on the talus slope with him, intent on his nooser. Kehr was still talking. The photograph of his mother was up there somewhere in the dark. He put his hands over his eyes and wished for another world. Kehr finished and got up and gave his leg a pat and then went downstairs. Karel heard him talking with the others in a low voice, and then they all went to bed.

School was now closed indefinitely. Leda asked to meet him somewhere other than either of their houses, so he chose the zoo. He didn’t want to go back there, but the café reminded him of Kehr and the zoo was all he could subsequently think of. Another walk south of town was out because of all the activity around there, and he was worried that if he hesitated too long she’d suggest Nicholas’s hospital. He showed up early and regretted his choice even more: he had to pay to enter. He walked around as just part of the crowd. It felt like the confirmation of his new outsider’s status.

He trailed his hand on the railings fronting the enclosures and thought about the work going on behind them. The anoles and whiptails seemed miles away. It was early and the constrictors were still not out, and neither was the tortoise. He wondered if it was having problems again.

He ended up in front of Seelie and Herman. There was a shank of something dark brown and covered with flies near the glass. He guessed that she was still giving them trouble with her eating and they were letting the meat go to see if it would tempt her.

He watched her while he waited. She was drooped along a granite lounging area on the far left of the enclosure. It was the way she got when she was unhappy or irritable. Herman was lying on his side on the opposite end, his eye fixed on the wall. It was like an illustration of reptile divorce or estrangement. He imagined the two of them in their blank matter-of-fact way having given up on each other, having registered, the way Karel imagined people did, that it had come to this.

When Leda arrived they went to the restaurant. Karel showed his work card to the waiter and asked if he still got a discount and the waiter said no.

Leda said, “My mother’s at home and we couldn’t talk at your house because of that guy.”

“So,” Karel said. He folded and unfolded his arms at the table. He was unhappy and beginning to get a little worried. “What’s up?”

“I want to get out of here,” Leda said.

Karel made his I-know-that face.

Soon, because of Nicholas, she said. She pursed and unpursed her lips in a small, affecting way.

“Your cousin again, in the Civil Guard?” Karel asked.

She nodded. Had that guy said anything about anything going on at the hospital?

“I think he’s in another bureau,” Karel said. She looked at him skeptically.

“I want to have it all set up,” she said. She began drawing lines and then boxes on the table between them with her index finger. “Then I’ll tell my mother. If she wants to go, fine.”

“It’s going to be real hard to travel now,” Karel said. She looked off, and he knew he was losing her when he said things like this, fulfilling her worst image of him. He hadn’t done much at all to find out about getting out, as she’d asked him to. Kehr he figured would know things like that, but he didn’t know if he should bring it up around Kehr, however obliquely.

“Also David says he wants to join the Kestrels,” she said morosely.

He found himself trying to trace the outline of the invisible box she’d drawn. “Can’t you say no?” he asked.

“My mother says it looks bad. And that they’re not so horrible in the first place. It’s getting so the only other kids who haven’t joined are off with Nicholas.”

There was an older couple beside them who hadn’t said anything in a while. Karel had the impression they were listening.

Here was the thing, Leda said. She wanted to know if he wanted to come, if he wanted to help. It was going to be hard, taking care of Nicholas and David and her mother.

And getting travel passes, Karel said.

And getting travel passes, she said. She looked at him and he felt nasty and cynical. Five was a lot, she said, and it would be easier if two different families tried to get them. Plus maybe his friend Albert from here could help. Leda said, “You told me they have to travel to get specimens and stuff.”

Karel said he didn’t think Albert would help. He was feeling again that she just wanted something from him, and he was fighting that feeling. She ran her fingertips tenderly over her eyes and then pulled sideways at the skin on her temples, accentuating her eyes’ slant. He had a momentary and clear sense of how much all of this was hurting her, how much the planning and worry were taking out of her. “But maybe this guy in my house can,” he added.

She looked at him cautiously. “Him then,” she said. She sounded as if she hadn’t had much faith to start in this meeting and had just lost most of that. “But we have to do something soon. I’m taking Nicholas for a walk on Saturday and I’m not bringing him back. My cousin says there’s going to be something over there again on Saturday night, Sunday at the latest. He says to get him out of there. When I don’t bring him back they’re going to send somebody, and when they do we can’t be home.”

“So you’re going to go by this Sunday?” Karol asked incredulously.

“Yes,” Leda said. “Yes.”

“What if I can’t get any stuff by then?” he said, panicked. “Information?”

“Then I’m going anyway,” she said.

“But they’ll pick you up,” he said. “How will you get anywhere?”

“ Do you understand what’s going to happen to Nicholas ?” she said.

The metal table rang with the question. They shifted in their chairs, and noticed the quiet. The older couple listened in for a minute more, and then the man cleared his throat.

“I better go talk to this guy,” Karel said. “I better go now.”

“Why do you call him ‘this guy’?” Leda said. She was looking at him suspiciously. “What’s his name again?”

“Kehr,” he said. “What’s the matter?”

She continued to look. “Nothing,” she said finally. Then she said she didn’t want to call and they should meet back here tomorrow.

“I need more time, I think,” he said.

“Tomorrow afternoon,” she said, getting up. “Just find out what you can. If you’re not going I have to start figuring out what I’m going to do.”

She waved, once, from across the street. The waiter came and asked if he was ready to order. The older couple at the next table chuckled together. They were sharing a piece of honey cake. He got up while the waiter waited and pushed in his chair before he left the table, to make up in a small way for his not having bought anything.

He had two days. On top of that he had to meet with her tomorrow, too. No one was home when he returned. The spare room was locked. He sat at the kitchen table with his head in his hands and looked at two spoons crossed and balanced over a coffee cup as if the configuration meant something and had been arranged for him to find. The ringtail tracked by in a jaunty trot.