Rex and I had been watching a PBS special on TV. The program was about bats; I have always liked them and found them fascinating to observe.
As we watched from the couch—I on my back and Rex sprawled over my thorax after having devoured by himself half of a Costco pizza for lunch—the show host brought out a fruit bat. They are very large for bats; not the mousy-sized ones. No, fruit bats are as large as a . . . as a . . . SMALL BLACK DACHSHUND!
“REX! Look! You look just like a fruit bat, but you don’t have any bat wings, and fruit bats don’t have a tail like yours. But my God, Rex. Look! Look at the fruit bats!”
Rex did not seem to be interested in my discovery. But indeed, fruit bats look just like small black Dachshunds. My mind shifted into high gear (which is probably 2nd gear for the average man or woman on Earth).
“Rex. This is going to be big. We can make a lot of dough with my idea.” I had to snap my fingers at Rex to keep him awake. “Come on! Wake up, man. Just because you ate half of your body weight for lunch doesn’t mean you can slack off.” He gave me a vapid stare; he had been on many outings with me and my grand ideas. He had witnessed them all turn to dust and blow away in the wind, other than my re-enactment of the Lincoln-Douglas debates with my two hand puppets at the Farmer’s Market. That he really enjoyed.
“Rex, this is big. You know that organ grinder with the little monkey that used to be down on Fisherman’s Wharf? I hear he nabbed $40,000 in a summer. JUST ON WEEKENDS!” Rex was looking out the front window; perhaps for a little relief, perhaps for a little sanity.
“Look, buddy. Here’s the deal: I’m going to make some fruit bat wings for you. Have you seen my duct tape lately? Yessiree, my little friend, we’re going to work the wharf! ‘Pet a Real Live Fruit Bat from Oingo Bongo for five dollars.’” I picked Rex up and he tried to squirm out of my arms.
“Hold your horses. I’ll tape your tail up under your belly, and I can make the wings from those old black satin bed sheets I could never get the stains out of! You’ll look just like a fruit bat, Rex.” Rex stopped his squirming. Evidently he had given in and acquiesced to the idea of wearing stained black satin bed sheets and having his tail duct taped to his belly. It’s a wonderful thing to witness dread and fear melt into apathy.
In short order, I had fashioned wings from the sheets and taped short sections of bamboo sticks to the undersides to make them look authentic. Well, kind of authentic. Well, they looked . . . let’s just say they looked . . . like black satin sheets with bamboo sticks taped to them and leave it at that.
I taped the wings to Rex and held him up for inspection. “Come on, Rex. Get in the mood. Here, let me mush a banana around your mouth to make you look more like a fruit bat. And maybe I’ll brush your teeth to get the aroma of Costco pizza away from you.”
In the end, I had myself a good-looking fruit bat in a very foul mood. We drove down to the wharf and I casually worked my way through the crowd.
“Fruit bat! Fruit bat, folks. Pet a real live fruit bat for five dollars. Get your picture taken with one for ten bucks, folks! Step right up. No need to push or shove. Hold the rare Oingo Bongo fruit bat for fifteen dollars, folks. Who’ll be next? You, young man?”
A small boy had stopped to look at the “fruit bat.” His mother gave me a measured, quizzical look. She reached for her purse. IT WAS WORKING! As she fished out fifteen dollars for her son to hold an authentic Oingo Bongo fruit bat, she asked, “Does it bite?”
“No, he’s as docile as a lamb. He prefers bananas, apples, and the occasional bratwurst . . .”
“BRATWURST? A fruit bat?”
“Unfortunately, he has slid into the typical American diet. He’s probably riddled with cholesterol, diabetes, and God knows what else. Why, just today he ate half of a Costco pizza . . .”
“A FRUIT BAT?”
“Yes, ‘em.”
“Well, okay. Johnny, you can hold the fruit bat, but be careful.”
Unfortunately, in transferring the “bat” to the boy, Rex’s wing snagged on the woman’s purse and tore loose. The game was up. Rex hopped to the ground and took off running. I tossed the woman her loot and took off after Rex.
I finally found him waiting at the car, wings in tatters and a wad of duct tape hanging on his tail, which had worked its way loose. He did not appear to be pleased with me.
On the way home, he totally ignored me. I looked over at him and the black satin sheets with stains on them. Those sheets . . . those sheets. Who was that, Dakota the pole dancer or Kimmie the CPA? I can never remember.
“Want me to pull over and take the duct tape off your tail?” He dramatically exhaled and looked out the window. If he could have crossed his arms to totally dismiss me, I bet he would have.
* * *
Tom Burns can be reached at burns100@earthlink.net. Rex is accepting fan mail.