Someone Told Me It’s All Happening at the Zoo

Despite his surname, Eneko Green did not have a green thumb. Possibly out of boredom or curiosity, but more likely loneliness, Eneko had bought a small sapling off the internet and decided that he would get into bonsai. After perusing dozens of sites and researching tree species, he had ordered a ficus bonsai starter. It arrived 3-5 business days later, as promised by the seller, in a stiff cardboard box carefully packed to protect the delicate branches and leaves. Lifting the tree from the box, so as to not bend any of the branches, Eneko was initially disappointed. The rectangular blue pot that he had picked out of his many options was closer to a dull grey. Nothing to fret about, thought Eneko; he could order a new pot tomorrow from a website with better reviews. Eneko placed the pot with the plastic wrapped mini-tree on the kitchen table where he had prepared his newly acquired tools: stainless steel bonsai shears, a spool of copper wire, a pair of wire cutters, and a small watering can with a long delicate spout already filled with room temperature filtered water. Unlike the pot, the tools looked the same as they had in the pictures. Eneko sat down in his wooden chair that was old enough that he wouldn’t have been able to order it online, ready to shape a beautiful little tree.

Eneko slowly removed the white mesh bag that had protected the tree during cross country transport and placed it to the side. The anticipation of seeing his bonsai had almost made his sleep impossible the previous night. Unlike the disappointing pot and the gleaming tools, the condition and shape of the Ficus retusa he had ordered remained a mystery up to this point. Although he knew that what he had ordered was not much more than a seedling, his anticipation had aggrandized the tree, and he had conjured an image of a tree with a thick gnarled trunk, roots protruding from the soil, and a green cloudlike canopy. However, the little shrub he found himself face to face with was truly a sapling. The light brown trunk was no thicker than his pinky finger and came straight out of the soil like one of those razor clams burrowing into the sand that he had watched his father catch every spring. About two inches from the base of the trunk, the ficus split into two limbs, making an almost perfect V-shape that extended nearly a foot high. The oval emerald leaves created a chaotic verdant canopy. Leaves protruded from every branch, twig, fork, and even the trunk. It was an ugly bush and the scraggliness of it made Eneko uneasy. Looking up from his station towards the window, he made eye contact with his fat orange tabby, Puddles, who knowingly said: “You’ve got some work to do.” Determined, Eneko began his examination of the wily tree.

Eneko had done his research, so he knew that this particular ficus broke all the rules of what a pruned bonsai should look like. Little sprouts were growing from the trunk, limbs extended beyond the tree’s profile, the upper branches crossed in every direction, and leaves were blocking his view of the trunk. Puddles was right. Eneko picked up the shears and placed the scissored blades at the base of a disproportionately large branch near the top of the canopy that definitely needed to go. He was about to squeeze the blades shut, ridding the tree of some of its ugliness, when he felt the all too familiar sensation of blood trickling from his cuticles. What if he made a mistake cutting off that branch? What if taking that specific branch off made the bonsai unbalanced in its aesthetic appeal?

 Once you cut a branch it will never grow back. 

Eneko retracted his shears and looked down at his other hand, where his index finger was scraping away at scabs on his thumb. He took a handkerchief from his shirt pocket and dabbed away the smear of blood. He turned his attention back to the tree and chose a different crooked limb. Surely purging this branch with its grotesque contour could only make the tree more beautiful, more natural, but Eneko could not find it within himself to cut the branch. 

Indecision had always been his problem. As a child, the coast was only an hour drive from his home, so many weekends, Eneko, his father, and his sister would drive to shore to explore the tidepools, fly kites, and go clamming. Some strength is required to pull the clams out of the sand, so most of the time, Eneko and his sister would watch as their father used the cylindrical clam gun to heave the mollusks from the shore. He remembered he was seven or so, the first time his father taught him and his sister how to dig for razor clams. He explained to look for the clam’s show, the small round dimples in the sand where the clam waits between tides. Clams burrow fast, his father had told them, so they had to dig faster when they found a show. They walked slowly along the intertidal zone, his father scanning the sand while Eneko and his sister trudged after him. Every few minutes, the incoming tide creeped a few feet further up the beach, lapping at their rubber boots. His father found a grouping of clam shows and handed the clam gun to Eneko. 

“Choose one of the holes and push the gun into the sand like I showed you,” said his father. 

The clam gun was heavy so he dropped it on the beach while he decided which hole to dig. There were so many of them, littered over the damp sand like craters on the moon. Some of them were shallow and Eneko could see that they were filled with sand almost to the brim. Others were deep and dark and some of them were on the tops of small mounds of sand, like little dormant volcanoes. Eneko started picking at his cuticle. How was he supposed to know which hole to pick? He didn’t know if it was better to pick a big hole or a small hole, a deep hole or a shallow hole, a dry hole or a hole filled with some water. 

“Pick one already,” whined his sister. 

Eneko dug his fingernail deep beneath his cuticle causing a sharp pain. What if he picked the wrong hole? His father had explained that they could only keep the first fifteen clams they found so what if he came up with a small clam not worth eating? What if he wasn’t strong enough to pull the clam out and it burrowed away before he could free it from the sand?

“Just dig this one,” said his father pointing to one of the bigger holes. 

Eneko picked up the clam gun, walked up to the hole, and peered inside. It was hard to imagine that some shelled creature could be lurking there beneath the surface. He lifted the gun and placed it over the hole, looking back at his father for assurance. 

“You’ve got to dig before the water comes in.”

Eneko rocked the clam gun back and forth, like he’d seen his father do, burrowing the PVC pipe into the damp sand. The task was difficult, and after half a minute, he was out of breath and still had a ways to dig.

 “Come on, son. You need to hurry up or the clam will escape.”

Resting his gut on the hard plastic handlebars, Eneko used his body weight to push the tube deep into the seashore. He stood and tried to lift the clam gun, but the weight of the wet sand was too much. No matter how hard he pulled, it was as if the pipe was now cemented to the beach. Eneko let go, panting and red in the face, small tears welling in his eyes. His father came up behind him and heaved the clam gun upward, releasing chunks of wet sand adjacent to the hole. He raked the sand with his fingers, breaking up the large chunks, but there was no clam to be found.

“This is why you have to be faster. When you pick a show, you need to be quick about it or the clam will escape.”

Eneko’s cuticle was dripping blood onto the beach and it absorbed into the sand, leaving small crimson dots. Staring at the scraggly plant on his kitchen table forty-nine years later, Eneko wondered if there had even been a clam in that hole in the first place. 

“Action is the antidote to despair,” stated Puddles boredly. Eneko was startled from his reminiscing because Puddles had left her perch on the windowsill and was now stretched out in the mid-afternoon sun on a shelf of books right behind him. Puddles’ comment had jarred him. He needed to act. His indecision had caused him to lose the clam, and instead of living with Lydia, he lived with a sarcastic cat who was always quoting the verses of American folk singers. No more! Today was a day of action! Eneko took the shears and lobbed off the crooked branch. 

The amputated limb fell unceremoniously to the table and a pearl of white sap oozed from the wound of the tree and dribbled down the trunk. Eneko was fascinated. He had seen in his research that Ficus retusa had a latex sap that served the purpose of healing any gashes or wounds that the tree might endure, but he hadn’t expected it to come gushing out in such an ejaculatory manner. With his free hand, Eneko dabbed the sap with his thumb and pinched it between his fingers. It was not viscous, but still it was sticky, and Eneko could feel slight resistance when pulling his fingers apart. Even more interesting was that after thirty seconds, the sap on the tree had fully calcified and was now a transparent glaze on the bark.

Eneko was proud of himself for taking action, and after having observed the sap, he turned his attention back to the tree. But his satisfaction was short lived. He had made a mistake. The removal of the crooked branch had left a gaping hole in the canopy and the bush was now even uglier than before. Eneko picked at his cuticle as he began to panic. Why had he been so stupid? Of course it was a bad idea to take unthoughtful action! When did he start taking advice from Puddles? What did she know about bonsai? There is no way to fix this. Once you cut a branch it will never grow back. He knew that, and he still cut it right off. Eneko took a breath. 

You can fix this. Just take a branch off the opposite side. Symmetry is beautiful, right?

He took the shears and slashed off a similarly sized branch on the other side. The limb fell and sap began to ooze from the newly formed nick. There was now another large gap in the canopy that mirrored the absence of the first branch. The tree looked horrible. Although symmetrical, the ficus looked so unnatural that Eneko let out a small yelp. Furiously, Eneko began to butcher the bush. Every time he cut off a limb, branch, or singular leaf, thinking it would somehow repair the damage of the previous dismemberment, the sapling became more mangled, and his dismay only grew. Eneko chipped away at the ficus. The table and floor were littered with bits of wood and leaves, his fingers were sticky with sap, and his face red and teary. The bonsai was vile, and it was all his fault. Finally, after pruning a perfectly healthy and aesthetically pleasing twig, Eneko couldn’t take it any longer. He put down the shears, grabbed the tree by its puny trunk, and with a cry, snapped it in half like a pencil. 

The cathartic release of that moment was short lived. Sap gushed from the stump of the little ficus, like a clam ejecting sand and water from its siphon, and pooled in the soil of the pot. The bonsai was dead and it would never heal from such an amputation. But he would try. Eneko picked up the maimed tree from the table and placed it back on the stump that was still exuding sap. He clasped both his hands tightly around the trunk and held the top part of the tree in place. He hoped that the latex sap could adhere the two segments back together and somehow heal the mortal wound. Eneko sat hunched and shaking while sap leaked between his interlaced fingers.

Looking down at the years of coffee rings on the table, he thought of Lydia. She would have talked him out of buying the bonsai; she was sensible like that. They were acquaintances through mutual friends in college and it wasn’t until many years later that Eneko ran into her at a bar on the northwest side of town. She had seen him from across the room which was adorned with brown leather couches and oak tables.

“Eneko?” she had asked in disbelief. “It’s really you!” as she threw her arms around him.

She smelled like jasmine. 

“Lydia! It's been what, ten years?”

“Eleven! Last year was the reunion. I didn’t see you there. I was looking forward to catching up,” she said with a smile.

“I forgot,” he lied. 

She gave a small laugh that made the corners of her eyes crinkle: “Well, I’m glad I’m seeing you now.”

In that moment, the way her hair clips glowed under the artisanal tungsten bulbs persuaded Eneko to make possibly the only gut decision that he did not ever regret: “Can I buy you a drink?”

They decided to start dating a week and half later, and, after six months of commuting between each other's apartments, they decided to move in together. After a year or so of dating, as all couples do, they began having casual conversations about marriage. After two and a half years, they decided to get a cat and picked up Puddles at the local humane society. Back then, the cat was a better conversationalist and the three of them would play parcheesi and eat brunch on the weekend. Three years after that, they decided to rent a little yellow house together. Eneko wanted to get married, someday. Lydia was patient and things were good. After nearly seven years of living together, Eneko got a phone call from his father. He told him that he’d been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and didn’t want to go through chemo. At the end of the call, his father said, “You better hurry and ask that woman to marry you. She won’t wait forever.”

Every week after that, Eneko got a call from his father, offering to take him ring shopping, but every time, Eneko would say that he was unsure and that maybe next week would be better. 

His father died later that year and Eneko decided to buy a ring. He went to a jeweler and initially wanted to buy three, unable to decide which one he liked best, but settled for a simple one with a small triangular diamond. He carried it in his pocket for weeks as he planned the perfect proposal. He took Lydia back to the bar on the northwest side of town. It hadn’t changed a bit, aside from a younger, more tattooed bartender. When Lydia left, momentarily, to go to the restroom, Eneko could have slipped the ring into the bottom of a glass of champagne, but then worried she might choke on it. Then, when they danced to the music of the live jazz band, none of the songs seemed to perfectly encapsulate the moment that Eneko had anticipated. And, when Lydia commented how thoughtful it was for Eneko to bring her to the place they had truly met, gently grabbed his elbow, and left a blanket of silence between them, Eneko’s mind wandered to the coast where he dug for clams with his father.

“This isn’t working,” said Lydia the next morning, while drinking their espressos at the kitchen table. 

Eneko took a sip of his espresso, but didn’t detect any unnatural bitterness. 

“Do you want a family?” she asked, palms flat on the table. “Kids?”

“In a few years, probably.”

“All my sisters have kids.”

She packed her belongings that afternoon, told him to keep the house and the chatty cat, and was gone from his life.

Eneko didn’t know how long he sat there waiting for the sap to harden, but when it did, the sun had set and his hands were cramped from holding on so tight for so long. With a sigh, he released his grip on the tree, but he could not let go. Opening his eyes, he saw that the sap had fully calcified like a glass blown cocoon around his fists. He was stuck to the tree. He tugged a bit harder, expecting the shell of tempered latex to crack under pressure or at least for the tree to be uprooted, but to no avail. Confused, Eneko inspected the situation and quickly realized the predicament he was in. The sap that had cascaded out of the guillotined stump had flowed through his interlaced fingers, over his hands, flooded the soil, overflowed the pot, pooled on the table, and dribbled down the legs, creating a sticky puddle in the middle of his kitchen. The sap had hardened and Eneko was essentially glued to his kitchen floor by route of hand, bonsai, pot, and table. He couldn’t help but laugh. Eneko laughed maniacally as he tried to pry himself away from the wicked tree. He stood up and pulled, using his full body weight in an attempt to uproot his hands, but it was futile. The tree would not budge, and he was trapped.

Eneko sat down defeated, still uttering small giggles as he contemplated how he got himself in this predicament. 

“You’re in a sticky situation,” said Puddles disdainfully.

“Were you watching me this whole time?” asked Eneko. “Why didn’t you stop me? Or better yet, how about you go get me some help?”

Puddles looked at him and licked her paw.

“I should have brought you back to the pound years ago.”

“And you should have gone to therapy years ago,” Puddles sighed. She got up from her perch on the shelf and sauntered to the stereo and shuffled Simon and Garfunkel’s 1968 album, Bookends. 

“I think you pretend to despise me, but you know what, she left you too. I think that’s why you’re always in a foul mood,” he said decidedly.

Puddles’ jumped up onto the table in front of Eneko, ears flat and anger in her eyes. “I didn’t ask to be trapped in this sad house with a middle-aged man who couldn’t make a decision without the help of his father. I know you didn’t want me. I was a kitten, but I remember the day you came to the pound. You didn’t want me scratching the furniture and Lydia begged for you to adopt me.”

Eneko’s arms were shaking and he could feel the pressure of his finger under the sap, trying to reach at his mangled cuticle.

“You couldn’t ask Lydia to marry you, because you were worried about being trapped. I heard you on the phone with your father. Is she the one? Will we still love each other in twenty years? What if there is someone else better for me? You’re pathetic. She loved you and I loved her and you ruined everything!” Puddles paused and flicked her tail. She sauntered off the table and purred, “Someone told me it's all happening at the zoo.”

“I hate you,” Eneko seethed, but his worst fear was realized. He was trapped, and he knew that it was his own fault. It had always been his fault. It’s the same reason he looked at twenty different websites when buying the bonsai pruning kit, why he couldn’t just dig for the fucking clam, and why he never would’ve asked Lydia to marry him. Of course she had left him! She knew that he couldn't commit to anything in life so he could never commit to her. Eneko was tired of being a victim to his own destiny. He was going to escape this bonsai, send Puddles to the pound, track down Lydia, and marry her. The details didn’t matter, he was determined. Eneko leaned forward in his chair and began gnawing at the crystallized sap that encased his hands. He chewed off a good layer of the hardened latex, but as he got deeper in, the sap beneath was still gooey and his teeth got stuck, like one of those strawberry hard candies he’d get at the dry cleaners. His teeth were now just as much attached to the tree as they were to his skull. It didn't matter. He couldn’t pull the clam out of the sand all those years ago, but he was stronger now. He pulled and pulled and committed every cell of his body to getting himself free. He yanked his head back and fell into the chair. His incisors ripped from his gums and they stood, implanted on his sap covered knuckles, still firmly attached to the tree. Eneko looked at the distorted reflection of his face on the side of the metallic watering can, and despaired at his baggy eyes, bleeding gums, and grey hairs. 

“Put it in your pantry with your cupcakes,” sang Puddles.

Eneko closed his eyes and was back at the coast. He was alone in the misty rain and all along the shore, gaping holes scarred the sand where people had excavated for every remaining razor clam. Looking down at his feet, Eneko saw the one survivor that had escaped its brethren’s fate, erupting a slurry of water and sand from its siphon as it buried itself into the coastal shore. It went to a deep place, safe from the sorrow of fathers and their sons. 

- Max Friedenwald-Fishman