Amy handed Veronica the finger in the baggie, saying, “Just take this.  Make sure it gets to wherever the rest of him is going.”

Jeremy rolled a gurney up to the Jeep.  It took two EMTs to load Chad onto the stretcher.

As they rolled the stretcher into the hospital, Chad awoke and started screaming.  Amy, Isabel and Jeremy all watched Chad being wheeled away until they could no longer hear his screams.

“Do you think they’ll be able to reattach it?” Isabel asked.

Jeremy shrugged.  “Who knows?  We might be calling him Dr. Stumpy from now on.”

Isabel giggled.  Jeremy joined in.  Their laughter was infectious and soon Amy was laughing, too.


Steve

 

Jeremy drove the Jeep back home.  He had insisted on driving until Isabel’s adrenaline rush had subsided.  Halfway home, he pulled off onto a side street and into a strip mall.  “I have to pick up a few things.  It’ll only take a minute.”  Jeremy got out of the jeep and walked into Uncle Miltie’s Party Land.

“Is it someone’s birthday tomorrow?” Isabel inquired.

“I don’t think so,” Amy said.  “Maybe that’s not a birthday party place.  Uncle Miltie sounds like a perv.  Maybe it’s a sex shop.”

“Yeah,” Isabel giggled.  “Maybe it’s a sex shop for clowns.”  They both laughed and the tension of the past hour eased.

“So speaking of sex,” Isabel said.  “What’s up with the lesbian thing?”

Amy took a deep breath.  “You know how I’ve been hanging out with that woman Jordan, the one I met at work?”

“The pretty one? Yeah, Jeremy told me.”

“We’re sorta kinda dating now.”

“I don’t have a problem with it.  Just tell her if she’s not nice to you, she’ll have to deal with me.  I’ll sic Steve on her.”

“Who’s Steve?”

“The lobster,” Isabel said.  “He needed to have a name before I could wrap my mind around what just happened.  Besides, despite the Chad thing, I still need him for the race.  I don’t think I can handle picking up another one.”

“We’ve got to find him first.  We should use gloves to handle him,” Amy said, thinking they didn’t need to lose any more fingers tonight.

“Baseball gloves,” Isabel said.  At that moment, Jeremy opened the driver’s door and handed a big sack over to Isabel.  “Mission accomplished.”

“What did you get?” Isabel said, peering inside the bag.

Jeremy smirked.  “I couldn’t resist.  Check it out.”

Isabel rooted around in the bag and pulled out several small plastic lobsters, an inflatable lobster, several hard plastic lobster true-to-scale models, light up lobster patio lights, a lobster cooking apron, a ceramic coffee mug with a lobster painted on the side and one peeking up from the bottom, lobster towels, a pair of lobster boxer shorts and even lobster socks.

“You are terrible,” Isabel said.

“I know, right?”

“Jeremy, aren’t you being a little harsh?” Amy said.

“And the banana thing wasn’t?  Look, he got a lot of mileage out of tormenting you.  Dude gets what he gives.  Picture it:  tomorrow he wakes up and his entire room is lobsterfied. You gotta admit, it’s funny.”

Amy smiled.  Maybe Chad did deserve a little retribution.  Okay, a lot of retribution.

Jeremy started the car while Isabel repacked the bag.  “He is an asshole,” Isabel said.

“And it is funny,” Amy added.

“He uses people, dudes included.  All I’m saying is he needs to come down from Chad mountain,” Jeremy said.  “Doctor Stumpy is going to wake up tomorrow in lobster world.”  He hung a lobster shaped car deodorizer from his rear view mirror.


Here, Lobster, Lobster!

Amy had barely walked through the front door before she heard Isabel yell, “Oh no!”  Amy ran to the kitchen and got there only seconds before Jeremy.  “What? What? What?” Amy said.  “What is it?”

Isabel was standing in front of the stove, staring at it.  There was nothing wrong that Amy could see.  Even the burner was turned off.  Isabel slowly turned to Jeremy and Amy, saying, “The Saag Paneer.  It’s gone.”

“Gone?” Jeremy said.  “It fell on the floor.”

Isabel gestured to the floor.  It was mostly clean except for a twin pair of green drag marks leading toward the dining room.  She picked up the pot the Saag Paneer had been cooking in.  There was nothing inside but a crusty green ring where it had once been.

“Steve ate it,” Amy said, drawing the obvious conclusion.

“Who’s Steve?” Jeremy asked.

“The lobster,” Isabel said.  “I named him Steve.”

“You named a man-maiming, Indian-food-eating lobster Steve?” Jeremy asked.

“Mr. Claw was too obvious,” Isabel said.

Jeremy nodded like it made absolute and complete sense.

“We need to find Steve,” Isabel said.  “Before the Saag Paneer kicks in and he goes really crazy.”

“Yeah, no way I’m sleeping in this house with him on the loose,” Amy said.

“If you find him, don’t hurt him.  I still need him for the race tomorrow,” Isabel said.

“Okay, well, let’s split up and check all the rooms,” Amy said.

“Can lobsters live outside of water?” Jeremy asked.  He was opening kitchen cupboards.  “I mean, they keep them in that tank at the store, right?”

“They need water but as long as they keep moist they can live outside of a pool,” Isabel said.

“Could he have gotten outside?” Amy opened the back door that led outside from the kitchen.  She turned on the light.  “Here lobster, lobster, lobster!”

“I’ll go out and search,” Jeremy said, pulling on oven mitts.  He clicked his heels and saluted them.  “If I’m not back in three days tell my mother I loved her,” he said, soberly.

Isabel snickered.

“I’ll start in my bedroom.  You start in yours,” Amy said.  She opened the storage closet and grabbed a bucket and a Tupperware tub.  She handed Isabel the bucket.  “If you see him trap him under that.”

Amy left Isabel and went to her room.  She looked under the bed and had just opened the closet door when she heard Isabel’s blood-curdling scream.  She flew out of her room, crashing into Jeremy who was running down the hallway.  Isabel screamed again.

Amy was the first to throw open the bathroom door and step inside.  Jeremy skidded to a stop behind her.  Isabel was standing on the bathroom counter with her pants bunched around her ankles and her panties up, but twisted.  She was bug-eyed and pointing at the toilet.

Amy tiptoed over to the toilet and peered inside.   Sure enough, Steve was in the bowl.  He was trying to crawl out, but kept sliding on the porcelain.  “He looks mad.”

Isabel said, “I peed on him.”

Jeremy burst out laughing and walked toward the toilet.  Isabel flapped her arms, stopping him in his tracks.  “Don’t look at my pee!”

Jeremy jumped back.  “I think we need to get him out of there, Isabel,” he said.

Isabel nodded.  “I know.  But I don’t want a man to see my pee.”

“So Amy can see your urine, but I can’t?  That’s really weird, Isabel.”

“It’s just my thing, okay?   I don’t want you to see my pee.”

“I’m a doctor, Isabel, I’ve seen lots of pee.”

Isabel shook her head.  “You’re my friend.  We’re roommates.  I read in a magazine once that if a man sees you urinate he’ll never look at you the same way again.”

“What way?” he asked.

“Just don’t look at my pee!” she shouted on the verge of hysteria.

“Okay, okay,” Jeremy said, backing up and not looking anywhere near the toilet.

“I have a plan,” Amy said.  “I think I can flush the toilet, the pee will disappear and then we can get Steve out,”

“Won’t that make him madder?” Isabel said, untwisting her panties and pulling up her pants.  “He might get really violent the madder he gets.”

“It’ll just be like a wave crashing over him,” Amy said. “He can pretend he’s on the beach.”   She flushed the toilet.  Steve bumped about and then settled, his antennae seeming to approve.

“You can look now,” Isabel said to Jeremy.

“How about we put him in the tub,” Amy said.  She stopper-ed the tub and turned on the faucet, adjusting the temperature to what she believed Steve would find comfortable.

Jeremy studied Steve, being careful to keep his fingers out of claw range.  “We have those BBQ tongs, right?”

“Yes,” Isabel said.  “I’ll get them.”  She jumped off the counter and ran out of the room.

“Do you think she’s all right?” Jeremy whispered after Isabel was gone.

“I think so.  Although she’ll never sit down again without looking,” Amy said.

“I’ve never sat without looking after I saw that movie where alligators roamed the sewers of New York,” Jeremy said.

Isabel ran back in with an enormous set of metal tongs.  “These should work.”

Isabel poked around in the toilet with the tongs.  Steve thrashed.  “Listen, you little shit.  We have to get through tomorrow and then I’ll set you free, so just settle down and I’ll get you out of there.  I’m sorry I peed on you but if you’re going to hang around in a toilet bowl that’s to be expected.”

“She does know she’s talking to a bug wearing an exoskeleton, right?” Jeremy said.

“Well, they did share an intimate moment,” Amy replied.

“I’ll say.  He could’ve bitten off my vagina,” Isabel said.  She frowned.  “I’d never get a date then.”

“You’re more than the sum of your parts,” Jeremy said.

“That’s very nice of you to say, Jeremy, but a girl that hasn’t got a vagina stands no chance against one that does,” Isabel said.  She furrowed her brow, opened the tongs and clamped Steve around his midsection.  “Ha! I got you.”  She dashed toward the tub with the flailing lobster dripping water everywhere and his antennae going wild.  She dropped him in the tub with a big plop.