| The Snake For the three-hundredth-and- sixty-fourth consecutive day, the snake lay coiled neatly on Noel's chest, waiting for him to wake up. It was a small snake, the length of his arm. As he opened his eyes, he found himself looking into the snake's yellow pair, with their black horizontal slit widening and narrowing. He felt the whisper of its black slick tongue, slashing through his morning breath. A year ago, he had known nothing of snakes.. Since his visitor had started appearing, he had read as much as he could about them, and was now able to talk at great lengths about their life spans, which ones were dangerous and which were not, which lived where. He had decided, with the coming of the snake, to become a sort of amateur snake expert. Herpetologist, as he now knew. He knew that the only poisonous snakes in his area were rattlers. These had a toxin that worked at the location of the bite, breaking down the tissues immediately around the area. This could hurt like hell, but was not necessarily fatal; unlike the cobras that lived in India, which utilized a neuro-toxin that went straight to the brain, causing restricted breathing and slowed heart rate. A deadly combination. Of course, none of his knowledge helped him much, because the snake he was dealing with was entirely imaginary. Or at least, despite all his frantic searching, he had never been able to satisfactorily identify the snake. He had checked both local guidebooks and world catalogues, in case some rouge had wandered out of a zoo or from a neighboring apartment into his life. This snake seemed, after all, to be a completely unknown variety. This, coupled with its elusive nature, caused him some doubt about its existence. It made caution all the more necessary: who could predict what poison, if any, this snake possessed in its jeweled mouth? Now Noel leaned forward a little bit, preparing to scoop the snake with a practiced maneuver. Something in the yellow eyes made him pause for a moment. The snake stared at him for a long time, longer than usual, and to began to weave its head back and forth seductively. He admired the narrow neck, which held aloft the essential head. He noticed the leafy scales, which lay flat or prickled with each slinky motion, and discovered the yellow sunlight slipping down its oily spine. As his eyes crossed and uncrossed where the tail should be, he realized that the snake had moved rapidly forward while he was in a daze. He couldn�t see at a glance what had become of the thing. He knew only that it was not living up to the established ritual, wherein Noel scooped it with a Newsweek and flicked it into the empty trash can, to be released outside. He tossed aside the comforter in a panic, hoping to fling the snake off the bed. He didn�t see it go, so he ripped up the sheets. It had been somewhere in the mess, he heard a soft hiss and looked down. Its mouth was open, in a big grin or maybe a belly laugh. It was looking up at him, with topaz eyes set in its dragon's head. Then it reached forward six inches and bit Noel on the big toe. The snake quickly threaded its way through the peaks and valleys of the crumbled sheets, and slipped under the bed. Noel stood staring for a second. He had never been bitten before. He didn�t know if the bite was dangerous. He didn�t know what kind of snake it was. He didn�t know if it was even real. He finally collected his wits and walked slowly out of the room and into the kitchen. He closed the door firmly and sat down on a kitchen chair. The sun was streaming in from the window and pooling on the floor and on the table. Noel took a couple of breaths and picked up the phone. "Hello? Cheri?" "Noel? Is that you? Mom's been worried sick about you." "Remember that snake I was telling you about?" "Yeah, that one that comes into your place every day?" "That�s him. He bit me today." "He bit you?" "You have to do something." "When did he bite you?" "Just now, goddamit. You have to get me to a hospital. If I move too much, it could send the poison to my heart. It could kill me." "Relax, will you? Don't get stressed out-" "But I just got bitten by some kind of snake that isn't in any books, and no one knows anything about it, so it could be some new poison that goes right to my brain-" "Mom wants to know if you've been taking your meds." "My meds? We were talking about snake bites." "Jesus, Noel. I'll call you back in ten minutes." She hung up. "You'll be talking to a corpse," Noel grumbled into the phone as he hung it back up. He inched over to the kitchen door and softly rested his hand on the door knob. He turned it slowly and pulled the door towards him. In his room, the sheets and comforter lay crumbled in the honeyed sunshine. Birds were singing on the slick black bough right outside his window. At his feet, green as spring, lay the snake. It was laying in a dripping patch of sunlight, with its tail in its mouth- a symbol in many cultures of the perpetual nature of the universe. |
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