Christopher Ransom - The Birthing House

'I'm not an idiot, Alex. They're in vermiculite, sealed in tamper-proof acrylic shoeboxes, holding steady at eighty-eight degrees. Humidity here is high, so I haven't bothered misting them.'

'All right. What do you want me to say?'

'How about, wow, that's a miracle?'

'A miracle? Conrad, please. If anything it's parthenogenesis.'

'What's that?'

'The animal kingdom's version of your virgin birth.'

'I'm not a biologist, Alex.'

'Cases involving insects and plants are well documented. Less so with vertebrates, but it happens with some species of fish, amphibians, and, yes, even reptiles. Every now and then you read about it happening at one of the zoos. A tiger shark couple years back. A komodo dragon just a few months ago. But hold on. Don't get excited. It is possible for a female to lay eggs without the benefit of fertilization, but it is extremely rare with reptiles, and almost impossible to prove because most of our stock comes from the wild, where the female's mating history remains unaccounted for. Even with semi-captives such as our Boelen's, it's dicey because most keepers do not document thoroughly enough to disprove the animals in question have never been put with the opposite sex. But I am not most keepers. I'm the fucking Curator of fucking Herpetology at the fucking San Antonio Zoo.'

'But it's possible? This partho thing, it's a real thing, not some Ripley's Believe It or Not hoax?'

'It's real, but it doesn't make any sense for your animals, or the Boelen's in particular.'

'Why not?'

'Because parthenogenesis occurs only in all or predominately female populations. As with honeybees, when you have a queen and her many drones. Parthenogenesis occurs only when the queen bee, the only female in the hive, dies before reproducing another queen. The male drones panic, or their genetic make-up panics, knowing their future is lost without her. In her place they begin to reproduce, but it is all in vain. They will only bring more males into the hive, and eventually these drones will die, too.'

'How do you know that isn't exactly what happened?'

'Because it's all in the environment, Conrad. Parthenogenesis occurs when environmental conditions are near perfect, when the balance of females to males is less than ideal, or all male. On top that, the Boelen's is such a delicate creature, even in the wild, it's a wonder they reproduce at all. It is why they almost never breed in captivity, let alone accomplish something as rare as this kind of virgin birth. The odds of this happening in a small population of males and females . . . in your, what, your garage? Preposterous, my friend.'

'But, Alex, how would she know there are males in her population? For all she knows, she is alone in the world.'

'Oh, so what you're telling me is, you've never put these animals in a bucket for a soak, never put them in the same bag for transport, never once shared cages, never once left one of them to crawl over another?'

'Not long enough to get their freak on.'

'Conrad, they don't have to get anything on - they just have to understand, to sense that reproduction with the opposite sex is possible. It's like us guys in a bar. We don't even have to be in the bar, or a whorehouse. We can look through the window, smell the perfume wafting out the door. This stuff is in the air. We've known for some time that snakes track pheromones emitted at mating time. Believe me, the snakes know who is or isn't next door, especially when they haven't closed the deal since last spring.'

'Shit,' Conrad said.

'Speaking of, how's your rack these days, chum? Things between you and the missus going all right since the move? You sound a little backed up.'

Conrad ignored the swipe. 'Have I ever lied to you?'

'Well, there's a simple way to prove all this one way or another.'

'Yeah, what's that?'

'Hatch the eggs. We can fingerprint the DNA on the hatchlings. If there's paternal contribution, we'll find it.'

'You can do that now?'

'It's not cheap, but you hatch these Boelen's, the zoo will pay for it.'

'I guess that's something,' Conrad said, dissatisfied but out of ideas.

'You've got eggs? Fine, take care of them. Keep me posted on their development. When they hatch, I'll see that we're published and we'll go to Costa Rica to celebrate.'

Conrad heard chatter in the background and the doctor cleared his throat.

'I'll let you get back to your talk, Alex. Good luck with that monitor paper. Maybe they'll name the thing after you.'

'That is my intention. We've an excellent shot at Varanus salvator hobarthi , as is only proper considering I discovered the little beasties.'

'You deserve it, Alex. Sorry I bothered you.'

'Conrad?'

'Yeah?'

'I don't care how it happened. You hatch those eggs, it's a hell of an accomplishment.'

'Thanks, Alex.'

'Dr Hobarth to you, knucklehead.'

Conrad slipped the cordless into his pocket and stared at the eggs in the box. The black, volcanic-looking vermiculite soil was slightly moist and sticky, the eggs leathery, free of fungus, healthy. No sign of movement within, even when he shone a flashlight over the smooth, opaque surface. He wasn't really expecting to see much - it would be another hundred days before they hatched.

If they hatched. Man, that would be something.

He thought about Jo and the life she carried inside of her now. He tried to feel the same welling of pride, but it wasn't the same. Compared to the delicate Boelen's, adding one more child to the six billion souls ravaging the planet seemed trivial. Or maybe it was a proximity thing. The eggs were here, now, under his watchful eye. Jo was in another state, pulling herself away from him with every passing day.

He hoped that when she came home he would feel that the life within her was his creation, too.

15

By the time Conrad finished their evening walk, he could smell the ozone in the air and the humidity was like a fist of moist cotton balls in his chest. Fat drops fell on his skin, warm as bath-water. Just before he made it home he saw movement out of the corner of his eye and turned to see Gail Grum waving him over.

'One second!' Conrad let the dogs in and darted across the Grums' lawn.

'You made it just in time.' She was laughing when he joined her under the covered porch, where she had established a narrow wicker living room. Gail had to raise her voice above the din of the rain. 'What would you like to drink? I have beer or iced tea.'

'Iced tea. Please.'

When Gail returned with his tea and a Sierra Nevada for herself, another arc of lightning illuminated the gray afternoon haze.

'How's the job hunt?'

'I'm still gainfully unemployed.'

'Oh, goodie. Now that I know you're free you can't say no. Nadia told me how you rescued her from that awful Eddie the other day. Very smooth, Conrad.'

The gist: Gail and Big John were embarking on a road trip through Kentucky and Tennessee. Bourbon distilleries, horseback rides, something involving a canoe. She showed him B&B brochures. The stated purpose was to visit a sister, but Conrad gathered the real motive here was to re-ignite the dying cinders of their middle-aged sex life. One of the stops was named Lovers Last Ranch, for God's sake. Pay Per View, massages, balcony spas . . . yes, Gail had good reason to be excited. She was already out the door, practically vibrating with visions of saddling Big John up for one last ride into the sunset.

'The catch is,' she said, sipping the beer.

The catch was Nadia. She had been 'acting up' all last year. Her freshman 'adventures' at UW Madison had led her down some 'wrong paths' with 'poor choices' in friends and this summer she had 'relapsed' several times.

'Drugs?' Conrad asked, cutting through the quotation marks.