A not-so-love story featuring nudity, betrayal, and livestock.
Frank is an asshole. Honestly, the moment a man tries to defend something that pees on him and lives in a box? Red flag. Immediate eviction. I don’t care how many mice it eats.
My husband tried to convince me otherwise, and after Rob knocked on the door to our own house, I should have seen the dead giveaway coming.
“Look at him, babe! He was so afraid, he hid his little head so he didn’t have to see me. I found him hanging out in the shed, curled up in a cardboard bunker!”
I squinted suspiciously. The guilty often look innocent. I would know—and Rob should too.
It reminded me of the last time I had played innocent—big eyes, fake shock, the whole act. Rob had walked in and caught me mid-plant smuggling operation, and I’d tried to lie my way out with the confidence of a toddler covered in cookie crumbs.
“Where did that new rose bush come from?”
“What rose bush?”
Rob pointed at the one I had definitely bought in the Lowe’s garden section. “That rose bush!”
“You haven’t seen this seven-footer before? She’s obviously always been here. I sure worry about your memory sometimes, love,” I said as I shoved a few more plants under the porch with my foot so he couldn’t bear witness to them.
He knew.
We both did.
Which was how I understood his new “friend” was already a troublemaker.
And I also didn’t want it anywhere near me.
“Aww, poor guy peed on me.”
I wanted to vomit.
“Attempt to let it touch me and it won’t live to see tomorrow.”
“You can’t do that—they’re helpful to the farm!”
“The only good one is a dead one,” I argued.
Nikolai came racing toward us and all hope of running it over with the car vanished.
“Ohhh!!! Where did you find him? Can we keep him?”
Please. Lord, no. Don’t wish this on me.
“Kinda! He can live here and you can name him if you want. What should we call him?”
“Ummm… how about Frank?”
My house has a long history of hosting creatures that should come with warning labels and their own bail bondsman.
I. Find. Everything.
Missing lizards Niki had misplaced in the car, frogs where they shouldn’t belong, bugs the size of Chihuahuas that had forced me into learning karate just to win a death match.
I knew I would find Frank.
Not if. When.
There had been a lot of mice in the horse trailer where we kept our feed bin. So naturally, Rob and Nikolai had lovingly rehomed him from the shed to the location I used more than anything else… to fatten up.
And of course, I had been left out of the loop. Why would anyone want to clue mom in?
Months had passed with me peacefully swaddled in a false sense of security, until one morning when I went to grab the horse scooper to feed the chickens.
It was nearing the end of summer, as warm days crept into cooler evenings. Sunlight stretched across the greenery, birds cheerily gathering and stashing seeds, while I hummed a tune with a skip in my step.
Creaky hinges groaned. The door opened to dance with light, and I grabbed the feed bag.
Do you remember that game with the little clown—or sometimes a weasel in a box? You’d crank the handle, wind it up with dread in your gut, bracing for the inevitable—
All around the mulberry bush, the monkey chased the weasel.
The monkey stopped to pull up his sock…
POP! went the weasel.
My hand reached into the bag and Frank launched out.
At. My. Face.
Black. Slithering. Fangs.
I shrieked in horror and ran up the driveway, foot pounding pavement, screaming for my life. Stripping naked for the neighbors like I was starring in a one-woman matinee performance of Snake! The Musical… all to be sure he hadn’t found a way to attach himself to me.
And then I made a vow to buy new chicken feed instead of sticking my hand into the old one ever again.
Izzy had been farm-sitting for me while I was on a trip with Rob. She had gone to the well-house to fill Caspian’s water bucket, and as she reached for the spindly blue knob… there was Frank.
He exploded from the shadows at her as she screamed for mercy, fell on her rear end, and ran to her car to call me for an explanation.
I wish I could tell you it stopped there.
But it didn’t.
One of my best friends found Frank hiding underneath the large, shallow black water bucket I had left out for the chickens when she went to refill it for their daily gulp-and-splash routine.
He had chased her to our porch.
As if that wasn’t enough, Frank decided to up his game. Rob had been searching our old Ford truck glove box for a part he had stashed.
The door flipped open, papers began rustling on their own… and then came the sound of a rattler.
Rob had snagged a screwdriver for protection, heart racing. A flash of scales.
A jolt so sudden and visceral he forgot to breathe for a few seconds.
Frank became an unintentional kebab.
Injured but not near death, Rob used his military first-aid skills to patch him up.
He petted him. Whispered words of comfort and healing.
The man even apologized to his reptilian mastermind. And Frank didn’t even own a rattle.
I couldn’t have been more appalled. Disgusted, even.
And then Frank had been released, to commit more acts of trespassing and treason.
A few weeks ago, a ghost skin of scales the size of an anaconda was found and pulled out of the headlight within the Colorado farm truck we used regularly.
I wanted to cry—because I knew Frank would return. And his last known sighting had been the well-house incident from Izzy’s account.
I had begged Rob to hook up the hoses for me before he left for work. They were long enough to hydrate the roses, Caspian, and some of the farm dogs, without needing to haul water.
I walked out to the field, ankles bare. Chest, arms, and face exposed to the breeze.
Exploring the edges of the garden and preparing to pull the hose and press the button that would send water shooting out.
The hose was coiled like a spring and I was about to launch… my anger through the speaker phone at my wonderful husband—on behalf of forgetting. The ends were unattached and unattended.
I had to go in. Turn the blue lever. And pray I was alone.
I. Had. No. Choice.
Honestly, if anyone deserves sainthood, it’s me—for not burning the well house down and pretending it was lightning.
I made noise.
I pleaded for my sanity as I stomped closer toward the cement brick walls. Swallowed bile. Terrified.
Replayed the time I had found him tucked into a hay bale I was pulling apart to use as mulch for the garden bed—when he was nearly in my hands.
The flashbacks crept in as I edged closer, cursing my husband, cursing the day Frank slithered into our lives and refused to leave.
POP! Goes the weasel.
I heard a rustle as I reached for the knob—something moving quickly.
I begged my hands to turn fast as my rib cage thrummed.
A lurch. A movement I didn’t get a good look at had me reeling, running backward—unknowingly straight through the same patch of poison ivy I’d already face-planted into earlier at the well house.
Which was probably now smeared on my ankles, arms, neck, chest… maybe even my lips.
Doing my best owl impression—mouth rounded in a panicked oooh, eyes scanning the grass—I once again stripped for the neighbors as Nikolai yelled:
“Hey Mom! I need you for something!”
Poison ivy oil sets in fast. The quicker you get your clothes off, the better your odds.
So I danced, trying not to touch my face—except my ear itched from a mosquito.
I stupidly shooed it away and touched my lobe.
Arms waving, running in floral tennis shoes with alabaster thunder thighs sliding sweatily together. I made it to the house without eating the rocks on the driveway, or getting bit by Frank. Looking like a possessed scarecrow mid-bender knowing he was still out there somewhere.
Watching me.
Laughing.
Mocking.
Pissing me off for all the damage he had caused.
Whether he had been there or imagined—I blamed him for everything.
Because Frank is an asshole.
Who deserves what he gets.
Rat snake or not.
Niki was still behind me yelling, “MOM! MOM! MOM I NEED YOU!”
While I was yelling, “After the shower, kid!”
One shock to the system and a sudsy Dawn dish-soap dip later, I thought I had it licked.
12 hours went by—clear.
24 hours—nothing.
Day two?
A steroid shot in the ass for a poison ivy reaction was not what I had signed up for.
Frank. Is. An asshole.
And you never know where he’ll show up next.
I’m already avoiding the truck where his skin was found… dangling like a promise, out of the headlight.
And if you see him? Tell Frank I’m coming with car keys in hand.
Everpine & Petal 