Sink or Swim, Part 7
The internet was full of misinformation about fluffies and memory.
You could allegedly reset their brains with a taser, but it didn’t work on anything smaller than a mini fluffy. If you tried it on a toy, tea cup, or micro, you’d just cook their brains. Also, you didn’t use a car battery, you used a stun gun. A car battery would put a hundred amps through their heads and you’d end up with a baked brain pudding. There was something else about nanofluffies but at that point I had stopped caring.
What I was more interested in was how smell linked to memories in fluffies. I had Barbra separate from Otis for the time being because I knew she would never smell like Otis remembered. The closest thing I could hope for was coating them both in something that smelled but wouldn’t stain until they shared space long enough to smell similar. Barbra sat happily chewing on a few sprigs of mint, happily talking about “minty nummies,” and Otis, of course, was being a pain in the ass about eating his.
“Dun wan eat fawkin twee!” he said, throwing the sprig of mint leaves out of his bowl. “Gif … nummies! S….skettis?” He paused, trying to think. “Skettis, wight?”
“Otis,” I said, picking him up, “just remember you made me do this to you.” Whatever he’d been prepared for, it wasn’t getting rubbed all over with mint leaves. I avoided his torrent of shit and just absorbed his torrent of swearing. A minute later, I hooked up the Nutragel habitat and lifted the divider to reveal Barbra, smiling and smelling like a Lifesaver.
The days before this meeting, Bob had been extracting information from Otis about Barbara so I’d know how she acted, how she looked, and what she’d sounded like. I’d explained very carefully to Barbra what I wanted her to do. She was smart for a fluffy, which is to say she could follow instructions as long as she remembered them. I was betting on her memory being better than Otis’s. I’d used some fluff dye on her joints and nose to give her the touch of touch of grey I knew the old Barbara had and given her a description of how she should act. We’d practiced for a few days, and she seemed to get how she was supposed to act towards Otis. The plan was simple: agree with everything Otis said and do whatever he wanted. For her efforts, she’d get almost anything she’d ask for.
“Eben haf babehs?” she asked, hopefully. “Bawbwa be gud mummah, pwomise!”
“I guess,” I said. I had no idea if Otis had been fixed or even if his ancient fluffy bits still worked. “The important part is to make Otis as happy as you can. You do that, you get whatever you want.”
When Barbra waddled into Otis’s freshly cleaned enclosure, Otis stopped yelling for a moment and stared at her like she had descended from heaven above. He sniffed carefully, smelling only mint.
“Bawbwa?” he asked.
“Couwse am Bawbwa, dummeh!” she snapped at him. “How you su owd? You wook aww gwey an uwgys! Yu get eben fatteh since saw you wast!”
“Bawbwa!” he shrieked and tackled her in a flurry of hugs and licks. Barbra was clearly enjoying the attention and I gave her the thumbs up. Bob just looked at me like I was insane as I let the two micros get to know each other.
“Why Bawbwa be mean to Owtis?” he asked.
“Because Barbara was just as angry and ornery as Otis is,” I said. “Otis… Otis is going to have forever sleep soon and I want to make him happy.”
“And new fwuffy be mean to Owtis make Owtis happeh?”
“I guess?” I said. Otis was busy showing Barbra around his enclosure from where he’d stashed food to the litterbox that he never used. “The heart wants what the heart wants I guess.” I ruffled Bob’s dingy grey mane. “And what do you want?”
“Bob want Wogeh be happeh,” said Bob. “Mehbeh go swim?”
Bob reminded me of a girl I knew in college who didn’t want anything out of life other than to make people happy. Last I heard, she wound up with three kids she hated and an ex-husband who was competing for the title of biggest douche bag in existence. While Bob wasn’t likely to get pregnant and married (you could never put anything past flufies, I’d learned) he was just a happiness pump, and all he really wanted to do was make other people and fluffies happy. It was the reason he didn’t complain about exercising anymore, didn’t complain about his swimming helmet, and never broke the few rules I’d given him. As much as I’d ever heard about fluffies being destructive, messy, baby obsessed brats, Bob wasn’t any of those things. He was a simple pet who wanted to make his owner happy.
Otis seemed to accept that Barbra was Barbara just fine. After a few days, her over the top salty attitude eased a bit as they got used to each other, and she realized she could dial back the bitchiness. She was surprisingly good at covering Otis’s memory gaps, calling him “dummeh owd fwuffy” when his memories didn’t quite match up to the reality. It was a week or so later when I was headed to bed that I heard the soft, squeaky “enf enf enf!” coming from the safe room that I knew Otis had finally accepted that Barbra was the real deal. The next morning, Bob didn’t get out of bed at 6am like he normally did. Instead he dragged himself off his cushion, bleary eyed and limp tailed.
“You okay, Bob?” I asked.
“Owtis an Bawbwa up aww night havin’ spechaw huggies,” he complained. “Nu can sweep wiff aww dat noise. Fwuffies s’possed go enf, enf, enf, den don! Nu go on fow houws!”
“Good job, Otis,” I said to no one in particular. Bob looked at me expectantly when he realized I wasn’t holding a food dish.
“Wheh nummies?” he asked. “Pwease gif nummies. It time fow bweakfast!”
“Not today, Bob,” I said, clipping his leash on. “Today you’ve going to see Dr. Stein to get your fluff replaced. Are you ready to be a brand new color?”
“Bawb guess so,” he said, noncommittally. “Haf bweakfast when git back?”
“You’re going to be there overnight to make sure everything is fine,” I said. “I’ll pick you up tomorrow, then next week we’ll head to the lake to go swimming.”
Bob grumbled about being hungry on his way to the vet’s office, for which I really couldn’t blame him. I was hungry too, having neglected to pick up anything for myself before we’d left. We arrived after a short drive at Dr. Steins office where I handed Bob into the care of the techs.
“Good luck Bob,” I said. “Be good for Dr. Stein.”
“Bawb be gud,” he assured me. “Haf pwetty nu fwuff when see next!”
A guilt that I didn’t know I could feel washed over me. Here I was trusting a stranger to do what was essentially cosmetic surgery on my pet so that I could make him do something he only wanted to do because I’d convinced him it would be fun. What if he didn’t make it out of surgery? What if he rejected the transplant? What if he didn’t like his new color? What if Otis didn’t recognize him? What if he didn’t recognize himself? I left Dr. Stein’s office with my stomach in knots.
In just two months, I’d gone from a guy who drowned half a herd of fluffies to worrying myself sick over the possibility that I was going to hurt my precious fluffy friend. I felt like a moron. Weren’t fluffies supposed to be disposable pets? Enjoyed for a few weeks, then tossed in the streets for something shiny and new? And here I was reupholstering a fluffy rather than just buying a new one. Whoever thought of fluffies as disposable was either a sociopath or just didn’t understand the purpose of pets. Then again, never having pets before, maybe I was missing the point and was overly attached to the fluffy doofus.
Either way, I’d already set in motion things that could not be undone, so I went home to prepare for school instead. With the school year fast approaching, summer break waned like a gibbous moon and another year’s worth of ungrateful asshole middle schoolers awaited me. It wasn’t so long ago I remember being bright eyed and endlessly optimistic about the youth of tomorrow. Every year brought me a few examples of kids that would go on to great success but there were an equal number of irredeemable asshole children for whom there would be no hope.
Dealing with Otis and Bob all summer had given me a bit better perspective about the whole thing. Otis was, functionally, a middle school aged child. He had endless urges he could barely control, was forgetful, and used the few curse words he knew often and without context. He was miserable and angry all the time without really knowing why. Bob, on the other hand wasn’t as stupid as I thought he was. if you presented new concepts in the right context, he picked up on them immediately as he’d done with swimming. It was a handy reminder that not everyone learned the same way and it reminded me that I needed to vary my lesson styles to suit all my students. It meant more work but it was making me a better teacher.
I spent a few hours at my desk, working through lesson plans as Otis and Barbra played together or napped in their enclosure. Otis had gotten much better about his general hygiene, something which I always hoped middle schoolers would pick up on, but never did. He did like the Nutragel enclosure, as it gave him an entire world of food to horde, as well as a slightly bigger apartment. It wasn’t until Barabra started calling out for me that I gave either of them much thought.
“It wunch time, Wogeh!” said Barbra. Somewhere along the line shed learned to read digital clocks. “Can haf skettis?”
“Skettis!” said Otis. “Skettis! Skettis!” I’d never seen him bounce around like a colt before, but the combination of a young paramour and low dose aspirin must have been doing him wonders.
“Well, it is Thursday,” I said. “Though Bob’s not here to enjoy spaghetti with you.”
“Bawb find own skettis!” Otis shouted. “Nawt my fawlt he nu heh! Why Otis haf suffah cause Bawb git wost?”
"Bob’s not lost,” I said. “Bob’s at the vet.”
“Dat Doctah a dummeh!” said Otis. “Put tings in poopie pwace! Touch no-nos!”
I didn’t know how to respond to that, so I just left to go fix lunch for my tiny pets. I might as well fix lunch for myself whiles I was in here, and so I put on a pot of pasta to boil. Julia Child I was not, and thus lunch would be jarred Ragu and store brand noodles. As I heated the sauce, a call came in from the vet’s office.
“Bob’s all done,” said a chipper receptionist. “You can come see him if you’d… hold on a second.” She put the phone down and I heard footsteps before the whip of a sorry stick and a fluffy pony crying. “I told you no! Do not try to enf him! Yes, it’s a him! Do it again and I’ll have Dr. Stein take your balls away again!” The phone picked up again. “Sorry, my fluffy was being an asshole. Anyway, Bob’s awake and you can see him whenever you’d like.”
“How’d the surgery go?” I asked.
“I’m not sure you’re going to be happy with the color,” said the receptionist.
“I’m sure it’s fine,” I said.
I finished up lunch and headed out to go see Bob. When I got there, I was amazed to find that Amy was there as well with her own deaf alicorn. The fluffy waved at me and I waved back. Amy smiled as I approached.
“I can’t wait to see if this worked,” said Amy. “But, you might not be happy with the color. I only had the one sea fluffy I could donate to the cause. I suppose we could have gone hunting for another, but my harpoon is in the shop.”
“You’re the second person to say that,” I said. “The color thing, not the harpoon thing. Do you really have a harpoon?” The sly smile indicated she probably did.
The receptionist led us past a sullen looking fluffy and into the holding area where a few other fluffies sat in recovery. I looked around for Bob, only to realize I had no idea what color he was going to be. It wasn’t until I saw the orange fluff and grey mane that I knew which sea fluffy Amy had volunteered as the donor.
Bob was the same color he’d been this morning, but with oily fluff. That orange trouble maker probably hadn’t seen this coming. Bob smiled as he saw me, but didn’t get up.
“Doctah Stein say nu get up tiww next bwight time,” said Bob. “Buh wook at Bawb! Bawb pwetty now!” He held up a leg to show off his new fluff, then turned his attention to Amy’s white alicorn. “Hewwo, nice fwuffy! Hewwo nice wady!”
“Hi Bob,” said Amy. “Wendy can’t hear you. She’s deaf.” Wendy made a hoof sign at Bob, and amazingly, Bob returned with a few of his own. We both stared in stunned silence as the two had a conversation together, hampered only slightly by the fact that Bob was lying down. Wendy signed something to Amy.
“Where the hell did you learn sign language, Bob?” I asked.
“Fwom teebee!” he said. “When watch swim, pick new teebee fow watch. Wots to watch on teebees!”
It seemed that I’d inadvertently given my fluffy access to the entirety of my streaming services. I’d have to check what he’d been watching once I got home, but if he’d learned sign language, what else had he learned in the process?
“So Wendy said she’d like to see Bob once he got out of the vet’s office,” said Amy, skeptically. “Seems she’s really interested in his neat fluff.” I looked at Bob, skeptically. He was the same color, now just greasy. What physical attraction there could be, I’d never know, but I wasn’t a fluffy pony, so what did my opinion count? By now a small crowd of fluffies gathered around Bob’s cage with oohs, ahhs, and questions about when he was available.
“You have to let me do something for you,” I said. “Bob’s going to be able to go swimming now and he’s apparently popular with the ladies.”
“You can buy me dinner,” Amy said. “I take my steaks medium rare.”
Bob came home with me the next day, though Dr. Stein warned me against letting him swim for at least a week. He was a bit sore, as expected after having his skin replaced, but otherwise in good spirits. Even though he was effectively the same color as he’d always been, he now spent time actually grooming himself and preening in the mirror. Even Barbra and Otis took notice, though they were usually too busy hugging and napping together to pay much attention to what Bob was doing with himself. Everything seemed to be going great.
A week later, I found Otis sitting in the top section of his enclosure, apparently hiding from Barbra. She’d been fat with foals for a few days now, owing to their truly legendary enfing sessions for the past few weeks. Micros had a gestational period of about a month, and soon there’d be a tiny family of micro foals to contend with. She’d been even grouchier than simply acting could account for, and I imagined she wasn’t taking to the reality of pregnancy as much as she thought she might. Otis sat staring out the window, looking out onto the world with tears in his eyes.
“What’s wrong buddy?” I asked.
“Owtis nu see bebehs,” he said.
“What?” I asked, a little surprised. “Otis, you’re fine. I’m sure that…”
“Owtis nu dummeh, Wogeh,” he said without yelling. “Wong sweepies come soon. Can feew thinky pwace nu wowk so gud. Huwties aww dah time. If nu haf Bawbwa, tink take wongest sweepies maneh dawk times befowe.”
A fluffy who could comprehend his own mortality was a sobering site. Fluffies were supposed to be bundles of endless childlike joy. Here one was weeping not of pain, but for the children he wouldn’t know and the future he wouldn’t see. It was a rare lucid moment I was getting from Otis, and I had to make the best of it.
“Barbra’s going to have her babies any time now,” I said. “You’ve got more spite and anger than pretty much any creature I’ve ever met. Use that anger and spite to hold on just for a few more days. You want to see those babies? You make the longest sleep come for you.” Otis wiped away his tears and set his fluffy brow in determination.
“Owtis make wongest sweepies sowwy ebeh twy come fow Owtis,” he said.
With August half over, school now loomed like a gargoyle. Staples had brought it’s “The Most Wonderful Time of the Year“ commercial back. Barbra and Bob had taken to singing it together, loudly, at random, and out of tune. I would have to kill them both if they decided to take up the habit of singing Christmas carols, but that was a few months off from worrying about. More importantly, Bob was ready to head out to the lake for his inaugural swim. We were getting ready to head out when squealing coming from the micro enclosure.
“Big poopies!” shrieked Barbra. “Owies! Huwrties! Nu wan”
“Big bweaths,” said Bob. “Time fow bebehs is heh! Make wike poopies and jus bweaf!”
“What do?” Otis asked.
“Gif huggies!” said Bob. “Make bebehs come bettah! Wogeh, gu get nummies fow Bawbwa!”
I left the room, only to pause outside the door. Was I taking orders from a fluffy pony? And where had Bob learned midwifery? I’d have to check his tablet’s history once we were done, but I suspected he’d spent his recovery learning up on how best to help Barbra bring her new babies into the world.
It came to me as I looked through the cupboard that Bob wasn’t stupid after all. Not only that, he’d had more foresight than I did. I brought in the “Nursing Nummies” I’d purchased earlier in the week, and found Bob propping up his tablet against the cage. It wasn’t until I heard a familiar voice that I figured out what he was doing.
“Hi Bob!” said Amy. “Is it time? Wendy! Get… oh wait.” Sounds of stomping echoed from the tablet.
“Is time!” said Bob. “Ebeyting wook otay?” Barbra shrieked again in agony.
“How do you know how to make video calls?” I asked.
“Wogeh, you nu hewp wif dummeh questions,” said Bob with a confidence and authority I would have never thought a fluffy could manage. “Mow huggies, Owtis!”
“Gif aww huggies Owtis can, asshowe!” Otis shouted back.
The first of the foals appeared, followed quickly by four more. Otis handed off the babies to Barbra who licked them clean one after another. No one had ever mentioned that micro foals were so small. Barely bigger than an eraser topper, the tiny foals peeped and chirped as they drew their first breath. Otis and Barbra cradled them in their tiny hooves, both of them weeping with joy. The pile of multicolored fluff looked so small and delicate in their tiny hooves, I couldn’t imagine how something so small could ever survive.
“Well it’s nice to see fluffies born into a home that wants them for a change,” said Amy from the tablet. “Good job, Bob. And congratulations Otis and Barbra.” Otis could only wave at Amy, and Barbra was too busy cuddling her newborns to make any real response. Wendy signed something or other to Bob, and Bob signed back.
“Well this calls for a celebration,” I said. “Spaghetti for everyone! Except Amy and I. How about we celebrate over that steak dinner?”
