“I know! Me too! But there’s really, right? and then there’s really. And once something happens, you won’t be able to want that something to—”
“You’re right! Oh, but then. Except. But then. I. It isn’t.” The frame starts to shake.
“Don’t cry. This is life! It’s the best!” Adam says.
“I don’t think it’s life. I don’t think it’s the best.”
“It is. Look at Percy. Look how cute the Perce is. It’s impossible, right? How can anything be so cute?”
“It’s really cute. It’s kind of the best.”
“So why are you crying?”
“I don’t know why I’m crying!”
“Zoom in on the Perce.”
Rachel complies.
Just as Percy fills the frame, one of Frankenstein’s claws catches Percy’s left heel, spreading open the flesh to the middle of the sole.
Percy, painsinging, folds up its legs and reaches down to hold them in place by the ankles.
“Oh man!” Adam says. “How’d that happen?” he says.
“I know,” Rach says.
“The struggle! I mean, the struggle…” Adam says, but he doesn’t speak again for another half a minute, as Percy continues, wide-eyed, to painsing, and, no longer free to beseech with its arms, repeatedly lowers and lifts its muzzle, while the sporadic reappearance of Frankenstein’s paw at the bottom of the frame in addition to her audible hissing and spitting indicate that she hasn’t ceased attacking.
“It’s the struggle!” Adam says.
“The struggle!” says Rach.
“In the course of the struggle…” Adam is saying, as his sister zooms back out and pans. “In the course of the struggle, the conditions were overcome by Frankie. In the course of the struggle, Frankie found it in herself to jump that much higher. It’s the highest she’s ever jumped in her life.”
“Oh my God it’s truly amazing!” Rach says.
“But then again maybe not! Maybe, because of all of Percy’s spazzy movements, the tape across its middle loosened a little. Loosened just enough that Percy’s whole body sunk just low enough that Frankenstein was able to reach Percy’s heel. That would mean the conditions weren’t overcome by struggling. It would mean that the struggle…It would mean that the struggle actually altered the conditions.”
“Maybe both things happened!”
“You’re right. You’re right! Maybe Percy went a little bit lower, but still not low enough for Frankenstein to reach, except Frankenstein noticed the conditions had changed and became inspired. The altered conditions gave Frankenstein hope, and the hope gave Frankenstein the strength to reach farther, jump higher—”
At this point, Frankenstein—whose attacks have become increasingly loud, increasingly frenzied, and just as increasingly farther off target—hurtles, nose-first, with a squishy thump, into the doorjamb, lands on its back and slides across the carpet, strikes the opposite jamb, and starts yowling, repeatedly, as if in heat.
“There’s blood, oh no there’s blood,” says Rachel, zooming in on the cat, which, while yowling, looks also to be yawning. One of her fangs has broken off at the gum.
The voice of an angry man is heard: “What the fuck is going on here?”
The camera swings around. The hairy, shirtless father stands hairily and shirtlessly, red-faced, shadow-cheeked, jaw in a clench. He’s squinting one eye and winking the other, an astigmatic without his glasses. “What the hell are you doing out here? Jesus! Adam! What happened to the cat? What’d you do to the cat?” The father reaches for Frankenstein, coughs a scratchy cough. Frankenstein flees. The father turns to follow, but doesn’t follow, coughs some more. Turns to the doorjamb.
“What are you doing to the Curio?” he says. “What is wrong with you?”
“Nothing,” Adam says. “We’re making a movie.”
“A movie of what?”
“We didn’t mean to wake you,” says Rachel. “We’re sorry.”
“I’m sorry we woke you,” Adam says.
“What do you think you’re doing? It’s disgusting.”
“It’s cute!” Rachel says.
“It’s the future,” says Adam.
“The future? The future of what?” the father says. “The future is…” He coughs, shows the camera his palm.
“Tell us what the future is, Daddy,” Rach says.
“The future is shit if this is what it looks like, and you won’t be a part of it. Take the cure off the fucking doorjamb.”
“Why?”
“For one, we paid good money—”
“But we’ve got three clones, and at least three marbles, Dad. It doesn’t matter. The money’s—”
“It matters.”
“Why?”
“Because I say so goddamnit. Get the cure off the doorjamb, and quiet down. In fact, go downstairs. I’m going back to bed. Don’t wake your sister.”
“I’m already awake,” a voice identical to Rachel’s, but not Rachel’s says.
“Great,” says the father. “Good job. This is great. Paula, you go back to bed, too.” The father exits. A door slams. Paula approaches the jamb.
“Oh, Percy,” she says. “That’s such a good painsong. What’s happening to Percy? Is this Percy or Byron? Wow, it’s so cute—what’s it doing with its legs? It’s so cute. I don’t think I’ve ever seen it so cute.”
“You should have seen it before,” Rachel says. “We’ll show you the movie, though. Then you’ll get to see. Don’t you want to see the movie? Pauly? Hey, Pauly. Don’t you want to see the movie. Pauly. Pauly!”
Standing transfixed, Paula, wheezing, strokes Percy’s head, once, twice, then squeezes it firmly between two knuckles. A muted, crunchy pop.
Percy goes limp, and does not again bicycle.
The frame is shaking.
“It’s okay, Rach,” says Adam. “Don’t cry. It’s just a cure.”