Free They Had Goat Heads by D. Harlan Wilson Page B

I cut the parachute loose and bought a newspaper from a kiosk. I opened the newspaper to the business section. This picture was on the front page:

 
     

There was no title, no caption, no accompanying story. Beneath the picture rained the sharp columns of the stock market.
   I walked home.
   She had stripped the hides from all of the umbrellas and stitched together a vast cape. She demonstrated how the cape might also function as a flag, given a tall steel pole. Additionally, the cape could be used as a tent during jungle excursions. She set it up in the living room, using kitchen knives for tent clips, stabbing the fabric of the umbrellas into the carpet, urging me to pretend the walls were deep, dark foliage, a rain forest, full of monkeys and wild things and other preternatural beasts that had existed on earth for millions of years, that were prepared to eat trespassers even if their flesh disagreed with the most sensitive palate.
   I found myself at the zoo. All of the zookeepers had been locked in the cages.
   There were giraffes everywhere, immobile and quiet, loitering. I recognized the one from the rooftop. I tried to get its attention, waving my arms. But it didn’t see me. Or ignored me.
   I stroked the giraffe’s leg. It made a chirping noise.
   The zookeepers pleaded with me to set them free. I said I would have to think about it and went to use the toilet.
   When I came out, she was waiting for me.
   She had climbed atop my giraffe and was trying to ride it. “Giddyap!” she shouted, thumping platform heels against its belly. The zookeepers cheered her on.
   The giraffe swatted her with its tail. She flipped backwards over a fence. A loud crash preceded a tsunami of curses. She climbed over the fence, caught her dress on a picket, and somersaulted onto the asphalt with a great tearing of fabric. She stood, dazed. She realized she was naked from the waist down and tried to cover herself. She yelled at me, insisted it was my fault. Everybody watched her quietly—giraffes, zookeepers, me.
   I told her it wasn’t what I had imagined. She asked what I meant by that. I said she knew what I meant and we should leave it at that.
   She accused me of breaking her heart. I apologized.
   I said goodbye.
   I climbed onto the giraffe and whispered into its ear. It loped out of the zoo.
   The other giraffes followed us. We made our way through the city in a long, proud parade. People gathered on the sidewalks. Soon it was a full-fledged extravaganza, comparable to New Year’s Day. As the applause and cries of joy grew louder, I leaned my cheek against the soft neck of the giraffe, closed my eyes, and conjured images of home.

 
    HOUSEGUEST
     
    I was tossing a boy in the air when the houseguest broke in. The boy fell through my arms and landed on his head. He stopped giggling. He turned pale and went limp.
   Somebody down the hallway screamed like a plane crash.
   I ran upstairs and armed myself with two survival knives I kept in a shoebox beneath my bed for these occasions, then went back downstairs, tentative, vigilant . . . I spotted the houseguest. Tall and lean, he stood in the foyer and held a survival knife in each hand. He wore a weathered veteran’s jacket and had slicked-back gray hair.
   I threw a knife. It sailed end over end and struck the houseguest in the neck. His head snapped back and froze for a moment. He dropped his knives. He waved his arms as if trying to maintain balance on a tightrope.
   Slowly he turned and paced out the front door.
   The boy crawled into the foyer and told me he was going to turn me in to the police for child abuse.
   I said, “You have that right. Good boy.”
   I left.
   The houseguest moved down the sidewalk. Occasionally he tripped over his feet and fell into a parked car, then pushed himself up and slogged on. The knife remained in his neck, plugging a terminal jugular.
   I