Chapter Twenty-seven

THE ANDERCHRONICLES

By Me, Ellee

[WARNING: The following story has been rated FNF*]
*Fiction NOT Fact

[SECOND WARNING: This may not be funny. Then again, maybe it is. But, you won't know unless you read it; however, by then it will be too late. So proceed with caution]

“S n a r k y”
Part I

My poor heart, beating wildly, having been excited not only by Andy a little earlier, and then by the adrenalin which kicked in when the screaming started, but also by what I saw when I burst into Andy’s office and encountered first hand the source of all the screaming, was now prepped and ready for what was on the other side of those massive mahogany, matched-panel doors, which I was clinging onto in hopes of keeping what was on the other side, ON THE OTHER SIDE! But then—it hit me! ANDY WAS ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THOSE DOORS, TOO!—WITH . . . ‘IT’ !!! And I didn’t mean, Ms. PT.

I WOULD HAVE TO GO BACK IN THERE AND FACE . . . ‘IT’ . . . SO I COULD SAVE ANDY! And probably Ms. PT, too.

The thought of that suddenly caused my knees to buckle, and I crumbled to the floor, but at the same moment something, probably . . . ‘IT” . . . bashed into the door with a horrible BAM! accompanied by more screams—all of which induced another hit of adrenalin to slam my arteries, arming me with sufficient fighting power to jump up and throw the wooden doors wide open, revealing . . .

THE BIGGEST SNAKE I HAD EVER SEEN IN MY ENTIRE LIFE!

And there he was! In Andy’s office—this giant beast—a boa constrictor, at least fifteen generous feet long, with a frightening girth of fifty inches—give or take an inch. Once again I had an overwhelming urge to turn and run, but when I saw that he had a length of his powerful body wrapped around Andy in a death grip, I knew running was out of the question.

Andy had both arms around him, trying to control him, but this reptilian monster was whipping him all over the room: back and forth, and to and fro, and up and down, over and under, and even around and around, just like Hurricane Katrina had whipped him all over that pier! My poor, poor Andy! I HAD to do something!

Ms. PT was up on the desk—still bare footed and powerless—hurling threats of legal action against him, if he didn’t let Andy go. Then she began jumping up and down when the threats produced no results, screaming and yelling, shaking both hands at the same time, like maybe if she shook them hard enough that ornery reptile would just lower his vicious-looking head and slither away with his prehensile tail between his . . . uhhh well . . . he would just slither away.

And what, at that precise moment was Gargantua thinking? I couldn’t tell, but I was pretty sure it was not favorable. Then, all of a sudden, it became evident—LUNCH was written all over his evil face, and I knew Andy was on the menu, and would make a very tasty little morsel for him.

I couldn’t think what to do, I mean, what can you do in a situation like this? I started running back and forth, and shaking my hands, too, and that’s when Andy screamed,

“Grab hold of his tail! Grab hold of his tail . . . NOW . . . Ellee, NOW!”

Sure, Andy, I was thinking, like I was really gonna grab hold of that snake’s tail!!!!!!!!!! Many questions were running through my head, like what is a snake of that size doing in Andy’s office—DANG!—what is a snake of any size doing in Andy’s office? And how is it he and Ms. PT didn’t notice a snake that big when they first entered the room? Why didn’t I notice it when I brought in the drinks? And where was he hiding? I mean, he was bigger than anything else in there. How could he just . . . hide? How do you overlook something like that? All these questions needed answers, but as the snake’s tail started coiling around my right ankle, I realized now was not the time for it.

“Annnnndy . . . Annnnnndy!” I yelled out in fear, panic setting in. “What do I do now?” Andy was still being thrashed about the room, and Ms. PT was still screaming, but she was no longer threatening legal action.

“Grab hold of him,” Andy bellowed out.

“Grab hold of him??? Andy, HE just grabbed hold of ME!!!!”
I screamed.

“ Elleeeee . . ." he was frantic, “we gotta get him back to his room.”

“His room?” I shouted, disbelief resounding. “His rooooom??? You mean this . . . this thing has his own room? Andy, you KNOW this snake? You’re . . . acquainted with him?”

At that moment, the snake, now seeing an opportunity for a two-course meal, instead of one, was writhing muscle by muscle, swiftly up my leg, and I knew if I didn’t do something fast, he wasn’t necessarily going to wait for the Bearnaise sauce.

When Andy saw that my situation had become a clear and present danger, he let go of his end of the snake, and ran to help me at my end of the snake. As he did so, the snake, being the opportunist, made a lightening-fast move and slapped his huge body around the two of us, successfully trapping us in his vice-like grip around our middles, slamming us against each other, face to face. He now had lunch all wrapped up, and was quickly tightening his grip, squashing the air from both of us, preparing us to be swallowed—whole.

He then reared his ugly head to assess his captured prey, looking first at Andy, and then at me. His sinister eyes, devoid of any real warmth, were wide, with vertical slits running down the centers. They were red. He was laughing. His forked tongue was flicking in and out, most likely to sense which of us he would scarf down first, or maybe it was just a scare tactic, which was actually working quite well.

“Ellee . . . yes . . . I DO know this snake. He’s MY snake— my pet snake, Snarky.”

Pleased ta meet ya, I wanted to blurt out with all the snark and sarcasm I could muster, but I WASN’T pleased to meet him!—so I said, instead, “Your WHAT?”

“My pet snake, Snarky,” he enunciated, trying to make it perfectly clear that, this snake about to eat us, wasn’t just any snake. This mammoth monster was HIS very own!

“You have this . . . leviathan, behemothic, evil, cold-blooded killer serpent as your PET!!!!!?????? Andy, whatever happened to furry little bunnies? Why would you have a . . . a . . . PET . . . like this thing?”

“Well,” he began, “he wasn’t ALWAYS like this. I got him when I was 9 years old. He was cute THEN and . . . I mean, very little . . . probably less than a foot long, and maybe an inch around. I took very good care of him with, you know . . . with infra red light and humidity and a mouse every 2 weeks or so . . . and he grew . . . and grew . . . and then grew a lot more. And after he got so big, I didn’t know what to do with him. *cough, cough* I mean . . . like . . . what DO you do with a snake this big? How DO you dispose of it? And, well . . . *cough, cough* I called zoos and pet stores. I even placed an ad in the New York Times, but it seems no one wants a snake like Snarky. But even if someone DID want Snarky, how would I get him out of *cough* here? And, in what? I mean, the logistics here are mind boggling .”

As crazy as all this seems, Andy was right, of course. There is nothing you can do with a snake that big.

Snarky had just about arrived at the last notch on his belt, as his cinching couldn't get much tighter. He had wrapped his long body around us until our arms were trapped—around each other.

Just then Ms. PT’s cell phone rang. She stopped screaming momentarily and reached for her Gucci bag, and began rummaging around inside until she found it. It took a moment, but she managed to pull herself together enough to press “talk.” Then, throwing her head back, to resume her air of authority and control she said,

“Yes, Elizabeth Depecher speaking. Be quick. What is it you want? . . . Oh yes, of course, Mr. Dracksell. No. Well, I really can’t say, just yet—the negotiations have . . . how should I say this . . . come to a standstill . . . at least momentarily. Of course . . . possibly as soon as tomorrow . . .Well, Mr. Cooper is . . .” she glanced over at Andy . . . .“uhhhh tied up at the moment . . . I see . . . Yes . . . No . . .Well, maybe . . . yes . . . no . . . yes. I don’t’ know! . . . possibly . . . well . . . yes. I’m not sure. Okay . . . I see. . . I don’t really know . . . it could be . . . but. . . .”

“Ms. Depecher . . . I mean, would you mind . . . uhhh . . . could you just . . . uhhhh . . . shut the h*** up and get over here? WE NEED HELP! SNARKY IS GOING TO EAT US—ALIVE AND WHOLE! HE’S UNHINGING HIS JAWS RIGHT NOW !!!!

Ms. PT gasped in horror and dropped the phone as she ran over to us. Seeing the desperate and now almost hopeless predicament, she started running her fingers through her hair in a nervous attempt to determine how best to command this dire situation, over which she obviously didn’t have one ounce of control. All her years at the corporate top hadn’t prepared her for this. As her fingers raked through her already troubled hair, she inadvertently dislodged the now infamous hairpiece—for the third time—flipping it high into the air, and sent it sailing straight across to where Snarky was, slapping him across the side of the head. As he jerked in response, the hairpiece fell, but before it could hit the floor in ignominy, he swiftly snatched it right out of the air, and with jaws already unhinged, gobbled it whole.

The abject humiliation of losing her hair for the third time, plus seeing it devoured as an appetizer by a hungry, mammoth boa constrictor, who was about to eat one of her clients AND his housekeeper, proved all too much for Ms. PT, and once again she started pulling at her remaining hair, screaming and hyperventilating. Ms. PT was approaching total meltdown—probably for the first time in her adult life. At this point she slapped her cheeks with both hands and ran screaming from the room like the mad woman of Chaillot. She had deserted us completely, effectively cutting us off from any hope for rescue.

I could now feel life ebbing away as the air left my lungs and could not be replenished. I could see that Andy was in the same state. The snake had bound us so closely together, that when I felt our hearts pounding in unison, it was hard to tell which was his heart and which was mine. They were no longer separate hearts, but one---- beating together violently in absolute fear. We were going to die! I knew it! He knew it and Snarky knew it!

As our eyes sought each other and locked in terror, the only consolation I had at that moment was knowing I would die in Andy’s arms. I wondered, did he have this same consolation?

After it was all over, we would be found there in his office, first crushed to death and finally, when the life was gone, swallowed up by this big, bad boa. There would be an investigation, an enquiry. The whole truth would eventually surface–the world would know of our last fatal seconds of life.

And what of CNN? Their star anchor—indeed the very hope of CNN crushed to death by his PET SNAKE, SNARKY AND EATEN IN ONE BIG BITE! How would they cover this story? Would it be a week-long coverage replete with in-depth interviews with national, state and local herpetologists by Wolfe, John and John? Would there be complete daily analyses of how this could happen in the first place, with updates and follow-throughs and more importantly, would they be kept honest?

Would neighbors be questioned? And ambulance, fire and police personal interviewed? Would there be segments to zoos and local pet stores? Would Larry interview Ms. PT for a whole hour on LK Live, pressing for each and every last detail of her eye witness account? Would clips from that interview be run morning, noon, and night for days on end? And then the whole interview repeated as a CNN special on the week-ends? Would there be an examination by state and local representatives concerning reptile ownership and a review of federal laws governing reptile activities? Would they squeeze every ounce of life out of this story, just like Snarky had squeezed every ounce of life out of us? I realized I didn’t have much time left to consider these questions in any depth, but they did flit across my mind, much as one’s life flits across the mind as the moment of death approaches.

Just then, locked in our embrace of death, I looked at Andy; he looked at me and . . .



Bye for now,
Love,
Ellee

[Author’s Note: No snakes were harmed in the writing of this story]

[WARNING: Any resemblance of the aforementioned characters to known mammalians, reptilians, or even amphibians is purely coincidental and should be ignored, over-looked or forgotten.]