Dribble

When I was twelve I was working after school at a pet shop and instead of money the owner used to pay me with the animals that nobody wanted.

My first ever payday I brought home two Siberian dwarf hamsters.  After six months of constant breeding they mushroomed into dozens and they took over the house.  They were living in cages and ten-gallon aquariums scattered anywhere there was room, and the upkeep involved in changing the bedding for all of them became a full time job.  Almost every day I would be either feeding or watering them and uncover a fresh nest full of wriggling pink dwarf babies.  Everyone we knew ended up with a pair or more of hamsters, and soon even the pet store where I worked refused to take them for free.  Trying to name several dozen inbred hamsters who all looked exactly the same proved impossible, so only the most unique (deformed) and recognizable hamsters were named.  

Apart from the hamsters there was a chinchilla that I earned one week. This thing was a crazy demon of an animal that never let us sleep.  At midnight every night it would start running circles off the walls of the cage like a nascar driver and wouldn't stop until dawn.  I't sounded like someone was breaking down the door with a metal garbage can. 

Besides the chinchilla there were two lovebirds and several parakeets. I also had a tank with a turtle, several frogs and toads, a bunch of snails, fish and even a crawfish living in it.  Lily was a huge hinge-back tortoise who walked around the house and slept under my TV.  There was also a Yorkshire Terrier pup living in the house which belonged to my sister and an iguana that was a real asshole.

Two chameleons that I ordered from a Boy’s Life magazine stayed in a shoebox in my room, and there was also an ant farm and a drinking glass next to my bed that a colony of Sea Monkeys was living in. 

After the tube of huge ants came in the mail from California for the ant farm my mother drew a line in the sand and forbade me from bringing home any more animals. She said that we already had too many and that enough was enough.  Looking back I can see that she had a valid argument and I probably should have listened to her. Every week I would get paid in animals and I would sneak them home when she wasn’t around. This went on for a while and she didn’t catch on because generally she couldn’t keep track of all the creatures and therefore didn’t know when new ones were arriving. 

One particular payday I was given a painted turtle named Dribble who had been at the pet store for ages but nobody ever bought because they always wanted the baby ones.  He was about nine inches long and strong as hell and mean as a son of a bitch from all the months of fending for himself in a huge tank with limited food.  I figured I could put him in my aquarium with the rest of the pond life, so I held him under my arm and bicycled home.

When I got home I did a little reconnaissance by peeking through the front window.  To my disdain, mom was sitting on the couch watching TV.  This was a problem because there was a flight of stairs directly in front of her that I had to get up if I was ever going to get Dribble into the tank.  I did some rigid thinking and decided that stuffing the turtle into the waistband of my jeans and casually walking up the steps would be the best tactic to sneak it past her.

I stuffed the turtle into my pants and covered him up with my shirt before opening the door.  I was confident that as long as she didn't try talking to me everything would be fine.  I sidled in and made it up the first three steps without incident. 

"Where are you coming home from?"  My mom asked. 

I ascended another two steps and stopped, trying to seem nonchalant.  "Just the pet store."  I said.  

"Don't let me catch you bringing home any more animals!"  she warned.

She started to say something else but I missed it entirely, because at that exact moment Dribble bit-down on my stomach flesh with all his might and everything went wrong.  I instantly buckled in pain.  As I went down, the turtle was thrown loose from my pants and it bounced down five stairs and landed at the bottom; spinning on it's back.  My mom saw what was happening and flew toward me in a blind rage.

I held my wounded stomach with one hand while tying to deflect her rain of blows with the other and apologizing at the same time.  Dribble went back to the pet store, where i’m assuming he died of old age.