lucyoncolorado

In which R is having a heart attack but it takes me a long time to notice...

R mentions he doesn't feel well. I'm ranting about Pine Island Capital Partners so I just nod at him and continue. Then I notice he's sweating. I walk over and feel his cheeks, and they're balmy. I notice his eyes are foggy. I ask what symptoms he has. He says he's having severe chest pains and struggling to breath, that he's been having a heart attack for an hour at least. I ask why he didn't say something before. He says he did, but that I can't stop yelling about the military industrial complex long enough to listen to him. I place a cold wet towel on his forehead. He asks me why I'm doing that, and I say it's what people do in Victorian books when people they love are seriously ill.

In which Lucy turns into a tiny snake...


We leave Lucy in our parked car in front of a gas station while we go inside. After a short time, I see that she is running across the lot up to the glass store front. As another customer exits, he holds the door and she runs in to my side. I'm telling the clerk that she's well behaved when she starts to lose control of her back legs and they splay out to the side. R catches her with one hand on either side of her waist and tries to pull her up, but as he does so, she starts to pee. I rush over with a piece of cardboard and slide it under her to catch the mess.

She immediately transforms into a tiny snake with Lucy's face, ears and tongue. She's no more than three inches long and only as wide around as a pencil. I cup her in my hands for safety then walk outside which is now a swimming pool. I'm standing about breast deep in the water with Lucy the snake cupped in my hands. She's wiggling and sliding around. R says she is a snake and therefore a natural swimmer so I release her into the water. But she immediately sinks. She's so small that I lose sight of her.

I shout at everyone in the pool to remain still so I can find her. I spot her under the water, but someone's motion pushes her away and I lose her again. I start to scream and panic. R tells me to calm down as she's already dead. I tell him I know she's dead already but that this doesn't mean we should let this version of her suffer the pain of drowning. We see her again and scoop her up to safety.

Then I place her in R's small whiskey glass. She coils her tiny snake body in the bottom and lets her Lucy face lean over the edge of the glass, her eyes bright and ears alert and tongue panting. I ask her if she's happy. I worry that she's hot, so I hold the bottom of the glass under the water in the pool so that she stays cool and dry.