The Cuckoo Colloquium

26 - Moonch

"Everything can fly if it tries, Marilyn!"

The thing, some sinister re-creation of Doreen Zitney, heckled Moonch from the trees all afternoon. It used her first name, and she hated that name-Marilyn sounded so twinky; she sure never felt like a Marilyn; she did, however, feel exactly like a Moonch.

Except for now ... By poking along with only one boot all afternoon, she had to admit that her grim situation made her feel more Marilyn-ish ...

... Twinky-like. Weak. Pathetic.

Usually, she ignored the Doreen-thing, clomping resolutely westward. But sometimes she'd snap back at it with her own jeer: "Last time we met, you were swinging by the neck over the trampoline-which is for jumping, by the way; swinging would be the parallel bars."

The thing tittered as if passing the joke along to friends, yet Moonch was never able to draw it out, to find out what was going on ... Had Doreen corralled the wildlife to do her bidding for her? And what did the foul little thing really want her to do-climb up a tall legume to see if her stomach would turn into a concave wing? That was just crazy, and Moonch wasn't crazy. Not yet.

She had found her backpack a couple hundred yards downstream. That was very good news, because all sorts of important stuff was inside. Her paper-back jungle book from the Sabah Tourist Agency got drenched, however, and looked more like a giant, wavy egg noodle, with the pages all stuck together-not good, because the inside of the back cover had an emergency phone number for tourists in trouble...

Moonch figured she was definitely one of these.

Also in the backpack sat the empty tin can of pears, and an extra T-shirt and socks, wrapped in a plastic baggie. She withdrew, with great relief, her small lighter from a side pocket; this was instrumental to her survival-she needed to make a fire. But under the lighter was a small, steel fishhook, and she knew this could be even more life saving.

Moonch finally dropped to the ground in a small clearing, heralding the day's end to the tramping. "If I'm going to die out here, might as well die colorfully," she mumbled, examining her feet. The ulcers, the jungle rot, had grown worse, now traveling beyond red on the color scale, to something purplish, bulbous, more painful.

She was happy to see that only two ticks had burrowed into her during the day's trek, and she rubbed her fingernail over the backsides of the ticks, and the bugs eventually got annoyed and pulled out. "He-he-he," she chuckled, waiting for this, and then crushing them with her nails.

It could be raining, but she wouldn't know; it was always difficult to gage the weather under the deep cover of flora that arced over her in a damp and obstinate encirclement.

"Only when you want it enough can you make it happen!" peeped the Doreen-thing.

It was like Doreen had been programmed with only a dozen lines to heckle her with, yet every utterance sounded like something from the section on Personal Growth Moonch recalled from the colloquium website.

"Flying, even gliding, it's not possible for humans. Not now, not this century-So just shut up!"

"Never know until you try."

Moonch scowled up at the canopy; it was like she had been shanghaied into some sadistic funhouse, one with soft walls that went on forever like a gigantic padded room, all for the twisted pleasure of a concealed devil-whoever, whatever it was-under the pretense of personal growth.

Her back started to ache and she scuttled up against the enormous root of a tree. To Moonch, the trees of the jungle were interesting creatures, forced to grow rapidly to reach the sun above the canopy; it was all about height, not width. That's why the trees needed the enormous buttress roots for support as they reached for the sun-because the jungle was one mother of a competitive ecosystem.

Her own mother had to go to jail for forging tax papers, and the only reason she did that was to help her father. That's why the Moonch family had to vacate the apartment; that's why Moonch had to live with Lorraine and weird old Stan, who taught her exotic wrestling holds-while rubbing his groin all over her every chance he got. Sometimes, when he had her in a particular hold, she could feel his little hard-on pressed against her. At first, she thought he was trying to cheat by using some extra mini-leg to gain an advantage over her. But things just got creepy after that.

The unspoken deal went: As long as it stays in the pants, Stan.

But then it started to come out of the pants, and then they had a new deal. But Moonch endured it-Anything was better than a state facility, even Uncle Stan's little wee-wee. Her Mom would be out next year, and then things would get better-even though Moonch had no great love for either parent; they were abusive and soulless. But she respected them; she respected their power, and what they could do to her when they were in one of their nasty moods.

"Factors like risk and uncertainty are central to personal growth!"

Moonch looked up, but she had surrendered to never spotting the thing. "That's why you want me to jump from a two-hundred-foot tree? ... Why don't you come down here, we'll have a little chat about your factors, Doreen."

There was some hushed tittering as if the thing had discovered some soft Moonch underbelly.

"Marilyn needs motivating!"

Moonch rubbed her tired eyes. Did Doreen intend to slam her in the back of the head with a dodge ball? Moonch didn't think so; it would be motivation jungle-style-with a lot more intensity than a ball to the head.

"You ever come down here, I'll kick you all the way to the Philippines-How's that for personal growth?"

But all Moonch heard was the easy silence of the forest. The air felt less oppressive, the jungle felt like it was breathing again-because Doreen had left, vanishing to another space, or another dimension, gone who-knows-where. Even the mosquitoes had been hiding, and now they whizzed, landed, and fed on her blood as she sat there against the buttress root, and the balm of sleep soon overcame her.

***

There was something else in the forest that night which eyed the sleeping Moonch, something four meters long, lurking in the canopy, watching her, calculating the possibilities.

Perhaps its hunger urged it forward, or perhaps the Doreen-thing pressed it for a taste of her- Moonch would have no time to consider the conniver of the assault.

Whatever the motivation, the python seemed to like its chances.

It slithered silently down the tree for a closer inspection before deciding its plan of action, though its tactics seldom varied, and it went for Moonch the same way it went for other, large prey: its mouth dropped open, thanks to loosely joined jaws, and the assault began, with the intent to swallow her whole.

It certainly had the element of surprise-before Moonch could react, it whipped its fat body over its prey and began constricting the air out of her so that the assault would go trouble-free...

***

It was not the increasingly strident force on her skull that woke Moonch. Instead, it was the sudden weight on her chest as the snake enfolded her, pressing-motivation, jungle-style, and Moonch looked like a very surprised birthday present, one with a green, reticular ribbon on top.

Like what you read? Don't forget to vote.