“So it’s doneski?”

“That’s the word! Come see, honey.”

Penguin and otter approached the veiled work. Marlene flushed beneath her fur with nerves as she whisked off the gauze cover, ever so careful not to snag it onto the oil painting. That may have been a technique for adding texture to half-congealed oils, but not to this painting. This one needed to shine when dried completely.

She needn’t have worried about its reception.

IOIOIOIOIO

“Oh wow! Wow! Marlene, you outdid yourself. It’s so worth all the posing.” Skipper eyed the work from several angles, his chest heaving and his eyes wet. A whimper escaped him. “Our family. Our team. Brava, cara, brava.”

“I’m not crying, you’re crying.”

Skipper sniffled, but no tear fell. “Go ahead and sob, Marlene. I won’t judge.” He pressed her face against his chest.

After a timeless time, she whispered into the snowy feathers, “Good enough for government work, Skipper?”

That broke the tension and they both chortled before stepping apart. The painting perched on its easel, a masterpiece, really, of a lone otter bending beneficently with paws flung wide as if to embrace six penguins. You could see the edge of the cement block she stood upon while Rico and Kowalski braced little Tactic as he struggled to stand, and Private and Skipper each held a flipper of cuter-than-cute Sally. Skipper’s breath hitched. “It’s like all the troubles and triumphs of the past year in one painting. I love it.”

“Oh, honey!”

“There, there, get it together, Ms. Commando.”

Marlene did and then she ran on and on about sepia techniques, and how you make your own dark brown by mixing burnt sienna with raw umber and shades of red and orange until you reach the darkest shade you were going for.

Skipper only half listened as she rambled. He smoothed her ear after bending it down so he could watch it snap up. “Burnt? Raw? You chefed up a fantastic work of art – hey, where’s my portrait you started?”

She acted like she didn’t hear him and babbled, burbled and boasted how hard it was to find and mix sepia colors so he let her run out of breath before trying again. “My portrait you started last year? It must be finished by now, babe.” He waited.

“Yeah, well, it’s not. I gave up on it.”

He took her face in both flippers and she did not meet his gaze. “That’s not like you, querida.”

She took his flippers firmly. “I thought things through. I’m not the same otter I was then and, and – “

“Neither am I the same penguin.”

“¿De veras?”

“Es verdad.” She took a deep breath and dropped his flippers.

“I abandoned the individual sketch of you to complete this” – she gestured to the family portrait before clasping her paws over her chest – “because it’s more appropriate since you’re a leader of a team so it’s not right to leave out the team.”

He must have appeared at a loss because she blurted, “You can always look in the mirror if you want to see the truth about your individual look. Te ves grandioso, mi vida.”

“You know me so well it’s scary, Marlene.” They stepped closer together. “I’m not sure I like that, but I’m leaning in that direction.”

IOIOIOIOIO

Marlene supposed that Skipper needed physicality as much as he needed oxygen in such a moment. His flippers roamed her backside, cupping her butt cheeks before rambling to her front to diddle her lower tits. She backed away and his expression turned quizzical.

“Not in the mood? Heat coming on, no that’s not it because I keep track by the calendar … what is it, cara?” He put on the expression, oh so familiar, of joyful expectation to savor her charms. He waited for her answer.

She gave him one. “I’m tender there today, I don’t know why. Let’s take it slow, huh?” She traced his bicep. “For me.”

Dad gum it, he was such an alpha because he stepped tighter into her front, tongue out to lick or nibble her chest; she retreated again. He halted as she knew he would.

“All right, Marlene. I get carried away sometimes by titties. We don’t need to do anything to make me happier than I am right now.” His smile radiated genuine feeling as they bantered back and forth. She rubbed her front to clarify her condition so he could see her flick the rosy peaks and then wince.

“Well, don’t mess with these. They’re swollen for some reason.” He made a face as if to tease her by continuing his advances and she grew stern. “I mean it.”

“Okayokay, sheesh you’re touchy.” He clasped his flippers behind himself and admired the completed portrait once more. “So creative! I dig how you blended the colors into each other except for our crisp and decisively marked penguin bodies.” He reached as if to caress his son’s indisputably chestnut brown fuzz. His flipper halted one quarter inch off the still drying canvas. “Also except for Tactic. Somehow I think he’s gonna be exceptional, even for a penguin.”

Marlene dispensed a sideways hug as she admired her work, too. “I worked hard on this piece, Skipper m’love. It’s my first serious do in oils.”

He returned the hug and upped the ante with a sideways kiss. “Mi dulce, let me brief you on our latest routine, Routine 101: It’s Allowed To Be Proud.”

“Heh.” Her voice softened. “So what’s it like, being a parent? Are you proud?”

Skipper continued staring at the portrait. Marlene jostled his elbows until they fell from their usual akimbo position but he still did not answer.

“Ask Private, he’ll tell you,” he said at last.

“Yeah, right, suuuuure I’ll ask him.”

“Trouble in the friendship?”

Marlene pulled a face. “We’re only teammates now. We were close and now we’re – “

“No more than cordial? Let me fix that.”

Her sigh stirred her whiskers. “Let us two parse things by ourselves, you mean. I encouraged him to work his hyper-cute when the rest of you flooped out even though you really, really wanted to leave the zoo to see the movie Thunders Lightning. That ought to count for something when he thinks about me.”

Skipper sighed, too. “Yeah, we fell short of the mark for him when old Balloon Bod carted the zoo’s keycard around her lily white Greco-Roman wrestler’s neck. It was only your cheerleading that distracted the Bod enough to get her key.”

Marlene arched a brow. “Balloon Bod? You mean Alice, right?'”

Skipper snorfled. “Yeah, we nicknamed her Balloon Bod even before she turned up preggers. Wow, did you see how big she got? Leopard seals don’t get no bigger.”

“I would get fat as that if you and I had a baby, Skipper, so would you laugh at me?” Impossible scenario, Marlene, impossible except for an example. Her mood settled into introspection, not sad, not happy, just as analytical as Kowalski at his best and brightest. “Or we might not become close friends again, I guess. I really dunno. Maybe this is as good as it gets.”

“Let’s catch up the kids and the rest of the team in the park.”

“Way to defuse, Skipper.”

“It’s my job.”

IOIOIOIOIO

Central Park changed with the seasons that the East Coast enjoyed, interminably and eternally, and then changed back. In this summer of summers, kids played on the lush grass whether they were human or animal. Strawberry Fields held a string of sheltering trees near the east streetside, so Marlene and Skipper joined Kowalski, Rico, Private, Tactic and Sally near the field’s fringes, venturing out when all clear, disappearing into wraiths under the trees when humans clomped nearby.

At one such hidey hole time, Kowalski presented a lecture as Tactic leaned his young back against Rico while Sally cushioned herself against Private’s tummy as all four sat tailor fashion.

“Tactic and Sally, see this needle?” He held up a sewing needle. “Daddy’s going to show you how to survive in the wild with common, everyday items that any animal would have in their camping backpacks, such as this round of cork salvaged from a bottle of wine – er, I mean, King Orange Crush – and this handy bowl of water. We’re making a compass today.” He flourished the bowl, which sloshed out a little fluid. “Sorry, Rico, didn’t mean to spray you.”

“Gwansokay.” Rico nodded to his commander and his commander’s other love as they approached behind Kowalski, who concentrated on organizing his experiment’s supplies. Private’s expression held polite interest and no more while he cuddled his daughter.

Kowalski placed the bowl of water at his feet and held up the needle and cork. A stray sunbeam filtered through the pines to strike the sharpness. “The next step is to pierce the cork with the needle to form the active part of the demonstration of the awesome power of magnetism. You’ll note that I magnetized the needle by stroking it atop the other piece of common, ordinary metal materiel that anyone might take camping, to wit, a folding pack shovel that serves as an implement for baking baking powder biscuits over coals, emergency percussion musical instrument for impromptu campfire singalongs, in addition to – “

“Lieutenant, get to the point. You’re way over the kids’ heads, humans drifted away for the time being and the afternoon won’t last forever.”

At his skipper’s words, Kowalski’s eyes shot wide, he spun, and the cork and needle flew eight feet into the air while he launched himself three feet only. “Sir! And Marlene! You should have announced yourselves!”

Marlene and Skipper had been holding hands, or their equivalent, during their walk to the group and at Kowalski’s exclamation they parted ways, Marlene to plotz beside Rico and Skipper to place flippers akimbo. Marlene figured he opened his beak to blare a reprimand at hurling dangerous objects into the air, but she saw him visibly place skidchains on his tongue.

“Whoa, Kowalski, calm down or should I say, get gravid?”

At the loaded word, Kowalski deflated into giggles. “Hee hee, sir, that word, I’m sure you mean what I know it means and and and – “

“Yeah, I get it. I just said it to land you onto the tarmac.” Skipper gestured behind him. “Mira, the humans skedaddled so let’s enjoy the field, okay?” He turned to lead the way out to broad expanses of verdure that Marlene ached to roll around on. Speaking of, why not? She skipped past Skipper, twirled with paws outstretched and flopped her bottom onto the ground. She lay back and rolled one way and then the other as the grass tickled all her special spots.

Rico waddled into the clear with Tactic riding on his Jefe’s substantial feet. “Oooooorgh,” the boy offered.

“Ooooooooooorghsweetiepie,” responded Marlene. She patted the space beside her. “Tikkicmere?” Never would she grab him now without an invitation since he’d matured a scosche because for one thing, she remained unsure of his ability to inherit his surrogate father’s response to startling circumstances by burping explosives. She scoffed at her whackadoo notions sometimes, but hey, weren’t stranger things possible? Like a male birthing eggs, for instance? She kept her gaze deliberately on Rico and Tactic.

Fuzzy brown Tactic kept in place as he eyed his sister, who had aped his behavior to ride on Father Private’s feet. “Mrrglp.”

“Daaahhhhorg,” replied Sally. She, too, held fast and tight.

“Geroff, sweetlin’, you can practice standin’,” came the mild reproof from Private. “Come on, lazy buns.” He shuffled his feet, yet Sally still clung to them. “Tactic, you, too!”

“Oh! I guess I’ll have to put your flat feet on the ground,” came a tenor from Skipper while he danced a jig, of all things, and then faced his group with flippers in a conductor’s position, up high before the downbeat. “Singalong!”

“All you want to do is ride around, Sally, ride, Sally, ride,” Kowalski began as Rico howled his Hamarskaftet Nunatak dialect version of the old song. Private shook his head before adding his countertenor.

“Alllllllll you want to do is ride around, Sally, ride, Sally, ride,” Private wailed. He danced as Sally and Tactic bobbed their heads in the usual adorable baby response to music. Marlene rose to boogaloo around Private without touching him, making two circuits before orbiting Rico. Tactic and Rico bobbled in tune with a Funky Chicken. Skipper twirled as conductor before squawking the lyric that sounded like an order.

“Oh! I guess I’ll have to put your flat feet on the ground.” Skipper tugged Sally, whose precious beak opened in protest before she sucked in a breath that everyone knows presages loud, unpleasant vocalizations. Private watched the goings on between his legs calmly.

Marlene nodded to echo Kowalski’s mild warning, “Sir, after about ninety days the chicks fledge, losing their downy newborn feathers, which are replaced with watertight, sub-adult feathers.”

Skipper exchanged the tug for a tickle as Sally subsided into twitches topped off with a lopsided grin. “Look everyone, she’s smiling! And what did you say, Science Boy, because that sounded like it came from a book and I’m sure as hell, uh heck, that you can’t read.” He reached over to chuck Tactic under the chin. “But we don’t care, do we, Tikki?”

“Guys, what I think Kowalski means is that the kids will pass the first stage of babyhood in a few weeks and hey, let’s enjoy them as they are? Cute and cuddly to the max?”

IOIOIOIOIO

Skipper beheld his two loves, Private calm and Marlene the teensiest bit anxious that she offered her opinion about kids, since she didn’t have any “or expect to”, as she always added. A few weeks and they’d fledge to the point of his team of four’s status when Fate shoved their iceberg away from kith and kin. And what was kith, anyway? He pondered these questions in his heart as summer’s heat warmed him head to orange toe. The command issued from his beak with nary a qualm.

“Operation: Enjoy Them As They Are is a go.”

“Roger that, sir.”

“Aye, Skippa.”

Private finally edged Sally off his feet to propel her gently at her own speed. She toddled, tumbled once onto her fluffy bottie and then got up with only a boost from Private. Private assumed the position that Skipper had observed with human parents: head down, trailing his youngster, flippers outstretched to save Sally from any fall whatsoever. Private’s back was going to ache tonight.

Rico and Kowalski each took a flipper, just like in Marlene’s painting which they had not seen yet, and walked super slowly while Tactic wobbled between them. The lad’s eyes took in the horizon with no hesitation, his steps firming by the nanosecond.

Skipper choked up. “Sally, stay where we can see you. Don’t wander away, Tikki darling,” he managed to spew as protectprotectprotect swam full force in his veins; he did not know what to do with this emotion and pushed it far, far down in his gut. He suspected a fourth protect loomed, too, which would shoot his love for threes in the foot.

A good quarter of an hour passed in exploring this new facet of parenthood before humans ventured near to their location and thus the day passed in covert and overt enjoyment of Strawberry Fields. The afternoon’s rays grew longer as the humidity of the day prevented sunset from cooling the air all that much. Skipper pulled his musing self back to duty when the sun slid below the horizon.

“Team, time to go home. We didn’t set up our decoy hologram so Maurice The Zookeeper could suspect that something fishy is going on if none of us show.”

“Feeeeeeeeesh!” bellowed Rico to the general burbling of his children.

“That’s right, compadre,” murmured Marlene. Skipper noted everyone appeared pleasant together, which was a commander’s goal. Any rough spots in the relationships he could work on, or allow them to remain rough as long as missions got accomplished and the zoo flourished with all its new inhabitants: fuzzy penguin chicks, Red Rhodesian Slasher kits, a gazelle with liquid brown eyes, Nanny Goat’s two kids, uncounted spider monkey babies … and others he’d likely think of later. Oh right, a human baby, too. Marlene would not add to the zoo crew, well no she couldn’t with him fathering outside his species, hell his class. Marlene knew this and he respected her choices. He turned to the immediate mission.

“Recon under the trees before bugging out, men. There’s a needle among the pine needles oh you know what I mean. We always clean up our messes.” Marlene cuddled two youngsters drowsy from their hours in the sun and progress with waddling.

“Go on, hunt, I’ll watch over these kits, I mean chicks.” She plotzed in the grass, seeming to glow with motherliness. Skipper shook off the illusion and directed his team.

“Rico, burp up a maglite, Kowalski and Private, eyes wide open now with Routine Twenty-Two: Pure Penguin Vision – ouch!”

Kowalski’s baritone could have reached the Space Squids on Mars. “Attack alert! Private, Rico, defend with Routine Sixteen: Mix ‘Em Up Melée Melange!”

Skipper would remember forever the twilit scene: Kowalski, Rico and Private hustling him inside their perimeter in battle stance, doing him so proud; Marlene gathering herself to flee to safety with the precious little ones; and himself, amazed, amused and astounded at his own response to –

“It’s only a needle.” He plucked it from his left great toe and passed it to Kowalski.

“Don’t panic, sir! We’re all here for you!” Kowalski shrilled.

“Chill. I’m copacetic.”

The freshly mowed grass smelled like heaven.

“¡Aaaw! ¡¿En serio?!” Marlene’s jaw dropped.

There, wasn’t that the Evening Star? It was!

Private broke from the calm which lasted even through the faux battle’s hustle. “Honey! You did it! Routine 101, everyone, Routine 101!”

“Proud.” The team turned as one to Rico’s clearly enounced word.

Earth abided.

IOIOIOIOIO

IOIOIOIOIO

IOIOIOIOIO

”Dere now! Wasn’t dat being a nice story, full of de dramas and de laughings and de tears? You may be sure it is de truth, more or less, sometimes. Your drama king needs a longam smoothie now, Maurice. Mort, no touching de royal feet!”

IOIOIOIOIO

The End.

IOIOIOIOIO

Thanks to readers, lurkers and commenters both. Have a nice day, pronker

Skipper stopped in his tracks on his way to visit Marlene on what she’d termed Greater Heat Day and he called July 23rd. He perceived that she entertained another visitor, one who owned a rich baritone that reverberated in her curved cave entrance. “No good lying, that sort of Skipper is ugly,” the throaty tones said. “It would gross me out, too.” Kowalski sounded soothing and so damn agreeable and, and emotionally intelligent. Was that slapping and tickling he heard? Small grunts and hisses? What the deuce?

Skipper hissed, too, as he edged his back to the wall, anger flaring inward because he’d always advised his troops don’t eavesdrop because you’ll never hear anything good about yourself.

Marlene, on the other flipper, sounded vicious. “And the way it wiggled and bugged out its eyes and scrabbled with its fins, ugh! I was glad to leave it.”

“You’re trembling, Marlene. Was the Skipper really that atrocious?”

“Rub hard right there, oh yes. Atrocious? You bet! I could hardly stand it when it crawled all over me. Ick. Ow, not that hard.”

There followed pitty pap pat pats and a portentous silence.

Then Marlene yelped.

Skipper couldn’t believe the echoes in the cool reaches of his love’s cave. He opened his beak to call out “What the hamsteak?” until covert operations instincts kicked in. He didn’t know whether to be glad or sorry that they did, but they were part and parcel of his character. He listened some more as he told his heart to beat more quietly.

“I’ve hurt you. I didn’t know this was your first time.” The concerned words came from no one else but his trusted second, Kowalski by name. Somehow he needed to repeat that intel to convince himself of its reality.

He’d heard his love’s voice tense like this at the end of their mission two days back to give Roger a better workout than he usually got. He and Marlene had playacted being Roger’s prey, evading the mock bites from an alligator with two-inch teeth. Thirty-one circuits of Roger’s pool later, they had flopped beside him in boisterous breathless laughter. Roger claimed the exercise helped him lose weight, and who were they to argue? The stress he heard today in Marlene made Skipper’s protective instinct war with his covert instinct.

“Do that thing that you did before. I can take it. If I can handle a week’s marathon arting to finish the portrait of us all after switching to sepia plus deciding on oils rather than pastels, I can take this.”

“We don’t need to do so much initially. You’ll be sore.” This could not be what it sounded like, and why the braap would she be sore? Kowalski’s block and tackle did not exceed his own. And the first time doing what, exactly?

“Not if you put my leg over your shoulder again – “

All right, he’d heard enough. What were they thinking, in broad daylight? Had the Space Squid’s sex pollen attack delayed its effect until over a year later? Was this a Blowhole gambit to disrupt the team? Some love weapon from Hans’ l’amour armory? That had to be it, because there was no way in hell Marlene could prefer Kowalski to him even if Kowalski shot her with his Love-U-Laser.

Skipper coughed, cleared his throat and scratched on the rough concrete wall of Marlene’s habitat entrance. He whistled the latest tune from the Pferdegeschirr Sisters, the one that had all the penguins dancing with each other because who could know your moves better than your own brother? After a decent interval, and even though he heard no scrambling from the animals just out of sight behind the entrance’s curved wall, he stepped into view because it was his right.

His jaw dropped.

Kowalski knelt on the floor, hovering over Marlene. She sprawled on her bed, biting her lip while Kowalski pinned her midriff. His other flipper forced the otter’s leg to the side, solicitously grasping it behind the knee as he rotated the hip joint. Marlene’s eyes remained locked on Kowalski, her brow arched, the expression strained on her finely-boned face. “Go away, whoever you are,” she bit out. “Can’t you see we’re busy?”

Kowalski snapped his head around. “Skipper! Am I glad to see you!” He continued what Skipper now saw was a deep tissue treatment, similar to the one that Doc had performed on them both at various times when Doc saw them limp from pulled groin muscles. Kowalski pulled the leg gently up to his shoulder and then over his head, crossing the leg over the uninjured one just so far and no farther. Every smooth movement showed Kowalski’s skill as both masseur and good friend of Marlene.

Skipper winced in sympathy. “I’ve had that problem before, Marlene, so hang in there. Kowalski knows how to start the healing.”

Kowalski sounded as cheerful as ever Skipper had heard him; fatherhood suited him as much as Science did. “Yes, it’s the slow stretches that are good for this. And the ice, too.” He crossed her leg back over his head and then lay it down, wadding her pillow underneath the knees to alleviate back strain for her. Now Skipper could see the icebag that lay between her legs. Her waving feet struck him as somehow inappropriate. Kowalski ought to cover her up.

The otter appeared to know his feelings about seeing her in this position with his own second, not to mention his close friend. “Skipper? This isn’t what it looks like?”

A bad start, to speak in questions rather than a firm explanation. Skipper tried and failed to sound casual. “That’s right. It can’t be. What are you two doing?”

“Kowalski, don’t tell him!” Damn, he’d never heard her this desperate this long. He started to see red.

Kowalski began, “We’re only – ” before he closed his beak with a snap!

Marlene pulled a lightweight blanket from her feet up to her middle. It was uncanny how she sensed his wishes. He didn’t know if he liked that. “All right, all right, dial down the embarrassment, Kowalski. Let me take it from here.” She made an O of her lips. “Ooooh-kaaaaaaay. I didn’t want to tell you, Skipper, that I strained every thigh muscle I own between the annual PT trials practice and our marathon swim helping Roger. So Kowalski – who didn’t know that I didn’t tell you – offered to help get my leg on track for today’s mission. That’s what you’re here for, right, today’s mission brief? What are we doing, anyway?”

Hmph. Keeping secrets and trying to redirect his ire to spelling out today’s agenda. Well, well, well. “We’re getting a bye on missions for today. I came over to find out if you wanted to see the frame I picked out for when you complete our family portrait. I’ll be leaving now.” He made to go, ruffling his feathers as a signal to another penguin, Kowalski in particular, that he was fifteen percent irked.

Kowalski drooped. Really, the bird thought entirely too much of Skipper’s opinion of him. Fifteen percent was nothing and even fifty wasn’t all that bad. It would not be leaderly of him to offer a bitchy reply. “Carry on treating her, soldier. We need every team member fit for duty – on another day.”

IOIOIOIOIO

“Hey, mister! You don’t get to pout on my watch!” Marlene flicked away the blanket and squared off with her lover. Kowalski’s eyes got round as he stepped backwards to bump against the wall.

Marlene had the advantage of audacity in the face of military authority that the rest of the team rarely displayed. Her voice showed no trepidation as she stood up to him, peer to peer. “Aw, come on, Skipper. Don’t leave mad.”

The portrait tilted against the wall and Kowalski nearly stepped backwards through its stretched canvas that hid shyly behind a muslin drape; Marlene had confided earlier that the work showed all of them, Kowalski, Skipper, Marlene, Rico, Private, Tactic and Sally with expressions ranging from blissful to, well, more blissful. He picked it up carefully and settled it upon her easel. “Y-Yeah, please. I mean, yes, Skipper, at least allow me to get out of the blast radius!” He edged toward the drainage grate’s welcome escape. “R-Rico and I are taking Tactic to the park to join Sally and P-Private. Catch you later! If you’re both alive!” He dropped the grate after himself with a clang. Slaps of penguin feet diminished to echoes down the ladder to the underground conduit that connected their habitat with Marlene’s.

Silence lasted almost six seconds after his departure. Skipper huffed thrice before spouting, “I’m mad, I get mad sometimes, get over it, Marlene. You knew I was like this when we got together-together.”

Kowalski wasn’t far enough away to miss hearing Marlene’s raised voice. He cringed and dove into the water as she held her ground. “Well, you knew I like peace, more or less, sometimes!”

“You know that this means war!”

“Bring it!”

The waters closed over Kowalski’s head.

IOIOIOIOIO

“Skipper, did you just turn the air blue?”

“Damn straight, Marlene, and I’m only getting started with my Angry Words! Other animals like me and don’t consider me ugly, so if you want to break up with me, it’s your loss!”

Marlene shrieked, “Ugly? Ugly? Whoever said you’re ugly?”

By the Labyrinthine Mollusk’s dolphin pods, he was full on shouting now as if she were an arch enemy. Did he place her on par with a villain because his pride burned to ash over a silly word? Ugh, men! “You did! You said that my eyes bugged out and you couldn’t wait until I stopped touching you – “

“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh! We were discussing a mudskipper fish who lived in my old Aquarium in California! I used to be passed around for kiddies to pet during Know Your Water Creatures Show ‘N Tell classes! The mudskipper was passed around, too, and sometimes it crawled on me, ickypoo. It was ugly.” The words poured out and eased her heart’s thumping. “It can breathe air for quite a while, so the aquarium docents let the kiddies stroke it, even if they liked my fur better and I’m a nicer animal.” She preened herself with a smirk. “You know human kiddies, always curious.” She blew a raspberry towards him along with an exasperated face. “Really, Skipper, your paranoia is ugly. Get over yourself. Nobody said you own anything but ruggedly handsome good looks.”

Skipper looked thoughtful as he rubbed his neck. “A mudskipper?”

“Screwy small fish that skips from puddle to puddle when it isn’t jumping like Jiminy Cricket. Yeah, mudskipper. Sheesh.”

Marlene poured herself some water from her carafe with trembling paws. She drank too fast and coughed, rubbing her hip. “Ow.”

“No pain, no gain.” His tone was better, much better. Marlene still burned inside, though.

“Don’t. Just don’t.”

“Don’t what?” Oh his meek and mild expression, bleurgh. For a moment, she wished she didn’t know him so well.

“You’re glossing this over like an oyster builds up layers of glop over a grain of sand to make a pretty pearl, but the root of the pretty remains coarse and rough and irritating.” Marlene was proud of her metaphor and simile.

Skipper knocked her reasoning for a loop. “Now you’re calling me an oyster?” He made a big show of relief by wiping his brow. “Waaay better than an ugly fish. Thanks a heap.”

She wasn’t ready to let this go. “Isn’t it time for you to leave? There’s the drainage grate, what’s your hurry?” She turned her back on him in a swift move fueled by anger and twisted her leg. “Ow.”

“You’re hurting. I can help.”

“I’ll live with the pain. Go home.”

“I’m sorry you’re hurting, honeygirl. It’s all on me. Let me make it up to you. Spread your legs.”

“No.”

“Not for that, golly gee whillikers! Even macho commandos know when to take a break! No, I meant for a deep tissue massage. Kowalski says I’m getting better at giving one like what he just gave you.”

Marlene couldn’t help the prurience in her voice plus, she wanted to push his buttons for revenge. The dynamics of four adult males and two kiddies living together was just so far removed from her California aquarium background; she supposed zoo life in crowded New York City would be as crowded for animals as it was for humans. “You? And Kowalski? You massage each other?”

“He is my second. We have an excellent rapport.”

“Is that what they’re calling it nowadays?”

“I see you’ve fantasized about him and me. How unbecoming of you to smutify a simple commander-to-his-lieutenant relationship. Shame on you, Marlene. I’m leaving.”

“Yeah, so go already. Ow!”

“Belay that. I’m staying. Bend over to a one hundred ten degree angle and hold.”

“You can’t order me to – “

“It’s for your leg, chica. Right now I’m not interested in porking you.”

“It’s mutual.”

“So.”

“So?”

“So bend and spread ’em.”

“All right. Ow!”

Skipper continued building pressure in the massage as she breathed harder and harder. “It’ll hurt for a minute and then you’ll feel a burn and a pinch. Discomfort ought to even out the more I rub, er, massage like I did when we thought Burt knew about us before we wanted him to.”

Oh cripes, now he was turning sentimental about their dating past, the stinker. “Ouch.”

“Hang in there. You can do this.”

“Uh.”

“Thaaaat’s it. Relax, I can feel the swelling. Kowalski claims massaging maxitones blood flow for healing.”

“I’ll take – ugh – his word for it. I like Kowalski.”

“So do I. Don’t let on to him or he’ll be insufferable.”

“Uh!”

“I’m only lifting your tail out of the way.”

“It’s not a handle!”

“Hush and stay still. Five more minutes and we’re done.”

“I feel funny, sort of turned on – no, it can’t be that.”

“It’s a natural reaction from your warm nature, Marlene. I expected it.”

Little squeaks escaped her lips and she had to concentrate hard to speak. “I don’t want th-this to happen.”

“You’re in the healing zone so it’s all right.”

“N-No, it’s not!”

“You’re tensing up. Think of oysters.” Oysters who lived in the ocean, oceans with waves, waves crashing, pulsing, surging, sensual waves. Oh, no.

“That isn’t helping! It’s – oh – guh – I didn’t mean to – what are you d-doing -“

“I tell you it’s all right. I can dry off after I’m done. Do you think I’d let a little squirt come between us?”

“I don’t squirt!”

“You didn’t? Okay, you didn’t. Must have been something else. Oh a gush and you’re done. Here, I’ll scoot the rug over the puddle and help you wash it later. Oops, a little drip. Like the song says, let it go, let it go, be one with the wind and the sky.”

“Slow down!”

“Your muscles need this and the team needs your muscles. Brace yourself on the bed if you want. I’ll adjust to a ninety degree angle technique. Three more minutes till treatment completion.”

“Why – Why – Why did you use that word?”

“It’s appropriate for this sitch. Relax, now. Oh ho, you’re going up on your tippy toes, lady?”

“Not – Not – Not – No – No – N-“

“That’s detrimental for this type of massage, Marlene. Come down from your tippy toes if you want to keep it together, but if you don’t or, er, can’t – “

“C-Can’t!”

“That’s an order oh never mind it’s okay don’t startle I’m reclining you flat on the bed. Spread ’em again, relax I’ll do it for you.”

“Guh!”

“One more minute. Don’t try to lift your leg, I’ll do it for you to save your sore core, your leg onto my shoulder, so. Just relax. I’ll lead you through this. You’re clutching the sheets, oh my, you’re close.”

Marlene remembered denying him his come. She realized that was the sort of play she’d never want in her mental toybox. “I’m – I’m – c-c- muh-muh-muhm ag-g-gain – “

“So I see. Easy easy ride through it, arching up yes that’s what you needed, chica, a skilled rub down. Here’s an extra minute of massage for good measure.”

“Guh.”

How could he sound so, so professional when she was coming apart yet again?

“Another?” he marveled. “Go you, babe.”

“Mmmmmmmm.” Blast her reactions! She quivered helplessly with tremors.

“Another and oh one more. Einstein’s jockstrap, you’re responsive! I’m bicycling your leg thrice aaaand now we’re done. Here’s your blankie to keep the muscles warm.” He lay beside her on the outside of the blanket.

“Way t-to get back in my g-g-g-good graces, penguin.”

“I never want to be out of them for long, chiquita.”

Marlene sighed as the adrenaline receded. She’d been touchy the past three days for no good reason, well maybe because she couldn’t decide on her next art project? “Mmmm, no more burn of the strain, just feels nice. Cuddle?”

“Always.” He pillowed her head on his flipper and she sighed.

A long time passed that they declined to reckon. In the way of things, Skipper’s other flipper meandered under the blanket’s edge as he stroked the well-loved form. Marlene remained still until the little blip in her belly fur stopped the cruising.

“Eh?”

“Not a nipple. Keep going, it’s nice.”

“I know it’s not a nipple. I’m not ignorant about female bodies, even mammal ones.”

He thrummed and strummed. His explorer instinct led him to this and his wide-ranging intel base undoubtedly knew her navel’s function when she was a fetus. She felt disinclined to lecture on birthing babies and how you nibbled off the cord per her mom’s instructions and which Cthulhu had undoubtedly done a short span of days ago. Actually, now that she thought more about it, remaining childless sounded acceptable. Anyway, more acceptable than since before she and he got together-together. How cool was that?

“Fascinating, as Kowalski would say.” He poked until she grunted. “Do you feel anything?” He sounded hopeful that he’d stumbled upon a new erogenous zone in mammals.

“I feel kinda urpy, yeah. Don’t do that anymore.”

The fascination continued as Skipper gentled his touch. “Eggs work better than nipples and mammal births,” he concluded as time stretched out into sleepiness. “Nice and neat and – “

“Pure?” smirked Marlene.

“Well, you said it first. Pure creamy white, oval – “

” – and delicate because you could crack one – “

Skipper cringed. “Don’t say it even once! It’s too terrible to think about.”

“I’m sorry, eggs are new to me and if my bellybutton seems new to you, we’re even.”

Skipper cocked a brow as he circled the small dimple. “Being even is important?”

“It so is, yeah.” Marlene leaned away from the fondling because she discerned a nap coming on. She’d been a little more tired the past few days, too.

“Mmmm. So, taking turns being even – “

“Isn’t being even, Skipper. No, it’s gotta be all the time.”

Skipper extracted his flipper from under Marlene’s head to lean up on one elbow, still twiddling. “And you call me a purist!”

“You nut, really, Skipper, just stop or I’ll, I’ll do something you don’t like.”

“Make me.” He switched to a kiss as he continued probing. “Mmmmmmm.”

“Mmmmmno. I mean it this time.” She pushed his rock-hard pecs. “No sex for a week. Keep on and I’ll make it two.”

He hissed in mock dismay, kissed and fondled until she grew angry. “Oooh, honeygirl, that little nose gets redder and redder. Pissed off, are we?”

She slapped him and he stopped, rubbing his cheek. “Damn. You’ve been working out.”

“Yeah. What you said. And no means no.”

“Okay.” He arose and stretched. “I might get used to this celibacy thing.”

Thoughts of napping fled like fleas before a spritz of Black Flag. “I never would say that.” Let him think on it. He’d miss her if they never got it on again.

“I could do celibacy, don’t you think?” His back was to her as he shot his cuffs, so to speak, primping the tips of the flippers that had the power to drive her to distraction because she let them.

“I d-don’t doubt it, Skipper.” An epiphany burst from her brain stem up to her cerebral cortex and shot back down. Celibacy? From him? Where did that leave her? Did he include Private in the deal? What should she say or do next?

“I’m teasing, Marlene.”

Marlene closed her eyes, spread her paws and mouthed, “Thank you, Labyrinthine Mollusk.”

He indicated the draped easel near her teapot. “Ready for the unveiling because I am.”

“I am, too.”

IOIOIOIOIO

In the teensy bathroom sink of her underground habitat, Frances Alberta washed the moiré silk teddy she’d worn to bed at the same time Moley washed his bulky body in her tiny shower. He flailed in the throes of an unintelligible ballad as he shampooed and when his butt stuck out from the shower curtain, she smacked it. He showed the sense of humor that lived as deep inside him as the Mrsdm ever plunged on their excursions under New York state and sometimes New Jersey.

He waved his hairy butt in her direction for her to smack again. She burst out laughing with Miss Cleo’s rich laugh and he joined her.

Life was good and getting better in Funkytown both above and below street level. Santería said so and more to the point, Frances Lajka Brigid Alberta said so.

IOIOIOIOIO

“Waltz me around again, Hari, around around around,” crooned Alice as she Terpsichore’d through her second story apartment. She presented her son to the ceiling Lion King fashion before sweeping him to her negligéed bosom. “My Hari, it seemed you were the newest thing on our planet for the longest time.” She smoothed his soft spot. “I include animals in that notion since your birthday on June 19th to today, one month later, so sue me.”

Hari burbled and kicked, his fine auburn hair damp from his bath. Alice rediapered his dimpled bottom expertly, snugged on his onesie and cuddled him before handing him down into his crib. He protested until she turned on his musical mobile. Puffins and seagulls swirled over his head to the tune of Aquarius/Let The Sunshine In.

“Your great-granddad’s favorite song and oh how he’d have liked to have met you.” She sighed and then brightened as she bent over him. “Now to cheer me and you up, there’re three Slasher babies in our zoo who are rarer than rare, my boy. Mama Red Rhodesian Slasher done good.”

Hari stuck his fist past puckered kissy lips into his mother’s mouth. Alice made as if nibbling a tasty Chicken McNugget and her son trailed a string of drool onto his chin.

“Oh you cute kid,” said Alice as she extracted his fist. “I done good, too. I’ve said it before, but isn’t nature magical? Oooh, two weeks more of my maternity leave so get ready for your closeup, sweetie, because the reality show cams set up in fifteen!”

Hari made a face too early in the developmental game to be called a smile. “And yes, your Uncle George will visit.” Alice wiggled one broad hip. “You like George, right?” She chucked her baby’s chin. “Me, too.”

IOIOIOIOIO

Much later on the same July 20th when a humid New York City day puddled into a mellow summer night, Marlene confabbed with her Slasher friend’s kits.

“Cutie pies! Who’s a pretty kitty? Whooooo’s a pretty kitty?” Marlene spied Arcturus, a warm red glow shedding its faraway warmth on three squirming, blind blobs of baby.

“Since you ask, mukoma, chop, it was like falling off a log,” began Cthulhu. “Three hours discomfort and then I could see them at last.” The mother Slasher licked the milk-filled belly that still held a stub of cord. She laved until the kit resembled a wet Argyle sock on its way from a Sears clothes washer to a Samsung 220-volt dryer.

Marlene felt her way into conversing with her friend, who now owned experiences Marlene never would have. “Yeah, I was expecting to hear sounds like you yowled when you and their father Pasha-whosis got it on. Why didn’t you scream? It can’t have been healthy to hold everything inside. You could have busted something important.”

After a moment, Cthulhu answered. “It was private and a, a little grody and nobody’s business but mine. Besides, the discomfort was one third pressure, one third weird, and one third pain. I was too busy panting and pushing and licking to yowl.” She paused. “Fershur, I would have scared myself out of being kief.”

When the kits slumped into a pile of fluffy adorability twitching in unknowable baby dreams, the new mother covered them with a blanket of fur snatched from her own belly. Her face did not change expression, but Marlene surmised waves of iron will on the order of stay put suffused the ether.

“Let’s stretch our legs,” suggested Marlene. She began their excursion with a small limp.

Cthulhu noticed.

“What happened, sister?”

Marlene downplayed her owwie. “Aw, Skipper conducted physical team trials yesterday to prep us for autumn’s Teambuilding Week and I’m still sore. Life as an artist didn’t harden me for eight-foot leaps ending in the splits. Ow.”

“Sticking with the team, it seems? Poor mukoma.”

“Yeah, I’m just glad I do routines for zoo guests to keep in shape or otherwise I’d really be hurting. Let’s mosey to Burt’s, how about it?”

“And stop at Roy’s pozzy, too. It would be bodacious to reminisce about Zimbabwe.”

“You got it, lady.” They made their way slowly to where huge animals lived as Marlene concluded that Operation: Galpal would always be one of the most satisfying missions in her life. Not only did she make a new friend, but they shared a motto.

IOIOIOIOIO

Roy whuffed the last of the golden hay from his lips before saying hello. “Hello, little mother,” he said.

“Poser,” riposted Cthulhu. But she smiled.

Marlene repeated what she had overheard from Maurice The Zookeeper. “Roy, your brochure photo shoot is tomorrow, let’s see a big grin!” Roy had nice teeth, Marlene thought. If she weren’t hot for a certain penguin, she could go for Roy. He wasn’t artistic like Burt, so there could be no competition.

Cthulhu zipped from Marlene’s side to the top of the habitat’s brick fence, where she minced back and forth, purring. “Three little kittens, they lost their mittens,” sang Roy, “and they began to cry.” Okay, so his singing voice was nil but he was a nice guy.

“They cry, you know, but it’s music to my ears.” Cthulhu continued mincing and shaking her head at herself. “It’s like my mum said, when they’re yours you don’t mind the noise and the work.”

Roy peered at Marlene. “Do you know what she’s talking about, Marlene?”

The otter’s whiskers twisted into a moue. “No, and I don’t expect to.”

“Oh I wouldn’t count you out – ” began Roy.

Marlene made a meep before broadcasting loudly with outflung paws, “Roy and Cthulhu and anybody else who’s listening in, I’m in love with a penguin. What are the odds we’ll reproduce?”

Roy attempted to continue the topic. “I honestly think that – “

Cthulhu ended the topic. “Mukoma, don’t listen to anything but your heart.”

Arcturus shone as redly as before, spreading its warmth like cream cheese frosting oozing over cinnamon rolls fresh from the oven.

“Manhattanhenge, Skipper? It’s just perfect for a date.” Marlene prodded the disguised penguin. “And you played dress up just for me?”

Skipper’s reply remained noncommittal. “Eh, it worked out. It was this, the koala suit or me in the Snuggly my men stuck me in when I was hurt and that provoked too many bad Åland memories.”

“Poor baby, and I mean that unmetaphorically.” Marlene snogged his cheek peeking out from the monkey suit before tugging him closer on the linden tree branch inside Sutton Place Park. The crowds below them on 57th Street jostled each other as peacefully as New Yorkers ever did and became even more peaceful when Penny and her primary rider sloped by to keep the peace by their police presence. Marlene knew that Penny spied them up fifteen feet up in the tree when Penny whinnied, “Hello, zoosters! Happy Solstice!”

Skipper and Marlene waved and Penny moved on to part the crowds like Moses parting the Red Sea. “Yeah,” Skipper continued, “I felt like a baby when my team did everything for me except breathe. It was humiliating, Marlene. Thank the Endless Iceberg I don’t remember much of those first five days when I lay a useless soldier in a foreign country.” Marlene strove to keep the date lighthearted.

“I appreciate the furry mammal monkey suit, m’man. You’re cute in it, but I hope you’re not too hot this July The Twelfth.”

“I’m always hot, isn’t that what you’ve told me?”

“I didn’t mean it that way, you goof.” She nudged her shoulder to his. “But yeah, you’re hot, hmmmbaby.”

Marlene searched for words when Skipper winked his appreciation for the compliment before he added soberly, “You’ve got me doing more things I never did before, Marlene. Sex toys and now dress up. What’s next, a threesome with you, me and Faux Skipper? Stop looking like you’ll think it over!”

“I broadened your horizons –

” – speaking of horizons, look, there’s the sunset just as Kowalski predicted.” The two animals beheld the sun setting at the end of 57th Street or so it seemed. A giant bowling lane, thought Marlene, with the sun forming a red sixteen pound ball. The sun lingered as time stood still, the earth moved and the sun’s rays danced through summer haze. When Marlene noted stirrings of passion, they took her by surprise. She squirmed on the branch and Skipper firmed his grip on her waist.

The linden swayed in a light East River breeze as crowds darted into the traffic, pointing smartphones at the spectacle. She recalled how Kowalski urged her to record the spectacle with his smartphone and when she replied, “Aw, ‘Ski, I just want to keep things simple and natural,” he kissed her cheek before desisting.

She mused further as the sun seemed poised for an eternal roll down its asphalt bowling lane. “Cthulhu will welcome kits very, very soon,” she thought. “If she needs me to hold her paw in labor, I want to be there for my friend.”

At yesterday’s visit, Cthulhu sprawled immovably by her water dish in the summer heat. “I’m fine, go on your date, mukoma.”

“Sure you’re okay?”

The bulging furred belly rippled as Marlene tried to discern how many babies crowded inside a full womb. She gave up after two.

“I’m sure. Go, go.”

And so Marlene went following a goodbye hug, an average night in her habitat, and a pleasant wait all day before this sunset date tingled her senses. Skipper squeezed harder before putting more thinky thoughts out there.

“So, Marlene, even unofficial solstices make us seem small in the scheme of things and that’s good, most times.”

She felt the same as he did. “I’m cosmic today, too, all revved up for the solstice and our date. Look, there’s New Jersey at the end of 57th, see it across the Hudson?”

“I want to forget New Jersey exists, if you don’t mind. It joins Guatemala and Denmark on my I’ll-Never-Go-There-Again list.”

“A-All right. Forget I mentioned it. I can’t really see that far, you know, I was just teasing.”

“Hmmph. Have a lychee and enjoy the view.”

“Don’t mind if I do.” They sucked and licked the drippy fruit stickiness from real fur, faux fur and feathers when the fruits had been consumed. The exotic treat fostered more heated thoughts in Marlene until she squelched them to concentrate on the glorious spectacle. The two lovers leaned against each other, enjoying the orange-turned-purple twilight after the sunset.

“Let’s stay a while longer, hmmm?”

Marlene was up for it. “It’s a sweet little pocket park, at that. Sort of intimate and look, the humans are leaving.” After half an hour, humanity deserted the park as the animals came out. Opossums, rats, and raccoons foraged in the garbage bins, intent on feeding their stomachs. Little conversation passed between any of them as they sniffed the air and continued hunting because no predator’s scent alerted them.

Marlene and Skipper regarded their industrious fellow animals. “That’s what we’d need to do if we quit the zoo,” Marlene whispered.

“Indeed. No missions, no regular feeding times, no entertaining the guests. It would be a different and challenging – “

” – and sucky sort of life, if you ask me. No painting, no stargazing – “

“No nothing,” finished Skipper. “Just survival mode and how dismal is that?”

Munches, squeaks and rustling arose from the bin chained to their tree. So did an unpleasant odor, so Skipper and Marlene exchanged grimaces before vaulting from the linden into a neighboring sycamore’s lowest branch. She glanced sideways during their leap, a little jarred by the sight of a brown monkey at her side. They settled with Skipper’s back against the bole as he steadied Marlene’s spine against his front.

Upon looking upwards, Marlene giggled.

“What?”

“It’s like we’re underneath a green umbrella with all the leaves shutting out the sky and stars. It’s sexy.”

“If you say so. I don’t see it mys- “

“Shut up and kiss me.”

Skipper did.

Two minutes into the awkward sideways kiss, Marlene twisted to plant her crotch against Skipper’s. She ground into him as she braced her feet against the tree trunk. When she felt his excitement growing, she pulled back to hear what he had to say.

“Solstices turn you – ummfff – on, Marlene? Good to – hmmk hey watch the merchandise with the claws – know!”

Marlene cooled it after a final lick to the tip of his beak. “This is our spot,” she decided as she swung her legs sideways and pressed her ear to his chest. His heart thu-thumped so hard that she could hear it even through the faux fur of the suit. “It’s just for you and me and nobody else.”

“Romantic?” Skipper placed his flipper over her shoulders to hold her in place. It was purely, protectively perfect and her heart melted.

“Isn’t it, though? Small and tree-filled and I love that it’s new to both of us, not like Central Park or the zoo. It’s, it’s like we picked out our home and don’t need to share with anyone.” We can never have kids together flitted through her thoughts.

Did he pick up on the random notion? Was he psychic? “Only for us two, I can dig it. Noted and logged, honeygirl.”

“It’s full darkness now.” Marlene’s voice sank to a lower register, rich with innuendo. She slid her paw inside the suit to twiddle his earhole.

“Stellar observation. Let’s go do something dark.”

“You got it, m’man.”

IOIOIOIOIO

Safely unobserved in her habitat cave, check. Sexy male at her disposal, check. Sexy male who bent to her wishes regarding dress up, check. Unzipping said sexy male from his monkey suit, check. Getting turned on by said unzipping, check. Marlene pulled down the blanket on her bed, ruching it up into a support, of sorts, if they wound up doing what she hoped.

“What’s with the tub?”

Marlene fluffed the lone pillow before placing it underneath the blanket, smoothing the wad of bedding without looking at Skipper.

“You surprise me, commander. I thought you’d mention the Kidsmas tree first.”

The tree blinked its lights out of sync, somewhat disorienting if you thought hard enough about it. The lights spread like a silken spider’s web over the branches of a tree containing long, dark green leaves and white sprigs of small flowers. The tree showed signs of being hastily stuffed inside a celadon urn because its dirt slopped over the sides of the container. Skipper sniffed the blossoms appreciatively before lasering in on his original question.

“Kidsmas in July theme, natch, but what’s with the bathtub?”

She finally looked at him, paws akimbo. “Well, you said we ought to bathe after each time together, so – “

“Ahah. Planning ahead, like a true commando. Am I rubbing off on you?”

Skipper laughed when Marlene fired a volley of raspberries in his direction before replying. “I have my commando moments, but Skipper, about the tree, it’s a Wu Zhu Yu – “

“Bless you!”

“Smart apple. It’s symbolic.”

Now she had his attention. “Of what?”

“Honey, because it’s also called a bee-bee tree because bees like it and you call me honeygirl. There” – she turned her back to him – “is that sappy enough for you?”

She heard slap slaps of his approaching footsteps until he spun her around. Unlike Guillermo’s passive-aggressive hints, Skipper told her flat out what he wanted. “I want you.”

“Hee, cute. And I want you.” They kissed.

Skipper pulled her down under the Kidsmas Tree. “Right here. Right now.”

“Ooooh, we’re not going to leave here at all to stargaze, are we?” Marlene simpered, feeling Skipper’s flipper moving up from the back of her knee to her thigh. The pre-sex atmosphere felt decadent, a rich, sweet indulgence. The plastic ornaments glittered above her head. The star up top proposed a dalliance to remember. The tinsel garlanded in upward spirals that made her dizzier than the blinking lights. The mat she had placed underneath the celadon urn surged back and forth in her vision as she sank to the floor with him right behind.

“That was my plan,” he agreed, bridging the distance between them on the four foot square My Town play mat complete with City, Farm, Airport and Train tracks. Marlene blinked dreamily when his body met hers at Grand Central Station and he pulled her close, tucking her hips and bottom against him, snug and warm.

She came back to Planet Earth. “What else do you have planned?” She bit her lip, moving her behind against his crotch. She couldn’t remember the last time they had indulged in this much pleasure, either, come to think of it. No, wait, that had been yesterday.

“You’re going to find out,” he assured her, sliding over the swell of her bottom, his flipper slipping just under her tail. She gasped and wiggled when he found the sensitive flesh of her pucker, just rubbing there, around and around.

She felt as if her body had been keeping secrets, and now it was revealing just how much pleasure it was really capable of.

“But I will tell you,” he went on, his breath tickling her ear, his flipper probing, “that at the moment, my plans involve using that tub over there unless you have a better idea, in which case lay it on me.” He nibbled her ear. “Mi chica mala.”

“Why?”

“Let’s pretend you’re painting me like Marat.”

“Who?”

“A leader who became uncompromising and who never listened or changed his mind. He was a radical. He was assassinated in his bathtub.”

“Interesting choice – “

Skipper produced indignation that Marlene, since she had gotten to know him better, realized was a put-on. “I’m not like that, that radical! I listen! I can take direction, just think how you directed my modeling – “

Anticipation turned her voice into a purr. “Easy,” she whispered, liking his flipper where it was and turning a little so he had more access. “I’m a little sore after yesterday.”

“Pobrecita.” He kissed her neck, licking at the spot that always made her shiver. “A hot bath will do you a world of good, then.”

She stretched and gave a lazy yawn, considering the tin tub in the corner. At least it’s not heart-shaped because that would be really sappy, she thought, and grinned, scooting away with a look over her shoulder as she got to her feet.

“You look positively wolfish,” she said, glancing back to him as she bent and splashed the water. “What are you looking at?”

He was leaning up on one elbow, watching. “Your bottom.”

“One track mind,” she said, shaking her head as if in protest, turning back to the water.

“Maybe, but you don’t seem to mind,” he replied, brushing aside concealing belly feathers to reveal his hardening cock.

Marlene pretended to herself that her flush was from the steam. “So?”

“Show me.” She watched over her shoulder, feeling her breath catch as he slid the skin up over the cocktip and back down again.

She arched her back slightly to tease. “What do you want to see?”

“Spread it open for me,” he said clearly, his eyes a dark and focused indigo.

Swallowing hard, she raised her tail and opened her thighs to tilt upwards the dainty lips that she’d shaved with an oyster shell’s edge just for him. His flipper moved a little faster when she reached between her legs and parted her flesh, showing him.

“Your tailfeathers, honeygirl,” he murmured, his eyes never leaving that spot. “I want to see that other hole.”

Really flushing now, she showed him what he wanted.

“Good redeye gravy,” Skipper groaned, his flipper moving even faster. “That’s so sweet. Use both paws.”

Marlene had to bend completely over to do it, resting her forehead against the edge of the tub, one paw on each cheek, pulling them apart so he could see it all. Standing there, completely exposed and vulnerable, her heart racing, she had never been so aroused. She could almost feel his eyes on her, sweeping up from her smooth lips to the dimpled hole. Her heart thudded so hard that she didn’t hear him move.

“Sore, huh?” he asked, his voice right behind her, his flipper trailing down her crack, making her jump.

“Only a little,” she protested, feeling his cock, hard and insistent, pressed between her pussy lips.

“Maybe we should give sex a rest.” He slid slowly into her, opening her, making her moan as the length and width of it spread her wide. “What do you think?”

“Oh, Skipper,” she gasped when he grabbed her hips to press himself snugly inside, the head of his cock nuzzling itself against her womb. She squeezed herself around him and heard his sharp intake of breath, loving the way he gripped her harder.

“Maybe I should just take your tight little pussy?” he growled, beginning to move, and she grabbed the edge of the tub to keep her balance, making strangled sounds at his words. “Take you until you can’t decide which is more sore – “

“Ohhhh, please,” she whined, lifting her hips, wanting him deeper still. He squeezed her tight, and then she felt him strumming over the delicate opening, sending little shivers through her.

“But I think you still want this,” he emphasized with a firm plunge to make her gasp and squirm. “Don’t you?”

She blushed at the humiliation because the admission felt much, too much revealing. She knew he was going to make her say it and the delicious anticipation made her clench around him.

“Tell me,” he said, removing his flippertip. “Show me.”

Marlene knew what he wanted. Trembling, with his cock still moving slick, slow, in and out, she rested her forehead against the edge of the tub again, reaching back with a paw to hold up her tail and the other to pull on one cheek, spreading the gash wide. He let out a long breath and his cock twitched inside, just the head of it pressing between her wet lips. If he’d learned to like this sort of thing in the tropics of México or the icebergs of the Antarctic, did it matter? Guillermo’s memory burned to ash, replaced by the one animal inside of her, her dearest friend with benefits. Her adored one.

“You love it, don’t you?” he asked, sliding the wet heat of his cock up to touch that puckered hole.

“Yes.”

Just how much she loved it, she couldn’t admit, even to herself. The hole tightened at the thought of being filled, teasing the tip of his cock with its clench.

“You’d better get into the water.” He moved around her to step into the tub.

Marlene sighed when she sank in beside him, the water enveloping and buoying her at once. His flippers ranged from her waist down her hips and drew her toward him as they kissed, the steam rising between them. She found his cock, pulling and tugging it against her belly as they rocked, his tongue doing things to her mouth that her body had forgotten, sending electric pulses straight to her core.

Rubbing him up and down her smooth slit, she couldn’t stand it anymore and sank down onto his hardness, wiggling her bottom and wrapping her hind legs around him. He held her close, using his body to press her up, the water making waves around them as they rutted like Red Rhodesian Slashers. When he found her clit, she whimpered, opening her eyes for only a moment before sinking into darkness again, lost in the sweet sensation.

“So close,” she whispered into his earhole as she gnawed at his neck. Her claws dug hard enough to part his waterproof feathers to allow hot water to warm his skin. He didn’t seem to care at the breach as his breath came faster. Her words spurred him on, and his other flipper slid around behind as she grabbed onto the edge of the tub, grinding her hips down into his.

When his flippertip scratched her other entrance, she gasped, feeling her come only moments away, that prickly probing pushing her closer to the edge. She worked toward it, wanting it, aching for it, her center throbbing for release.

“Deeper,” Marlene growled, arching her back so he had more territory, reaching one paw back to spread for him again. “Shove it in, chico!”

He groaned, pressing his flipper further, and she sank her teeth into his shoulder when he twisted his way through her riffled flesh.

“Ohhhhh yeah, ese!” Marlene could hear herself as if from far away, her whole body taut as they worked together toward that delicious, inevitable end. “Now, ohhhhh yesss! here I’m here I’m right heeeere – Skipper! Skipper!”

Sound receded and the wave hit her like a pulse of heat from some invention of Kowalski’s, taking her body over completely, her belly undulating with it, her pussy clenching around his thrusting cock, the tight ring of her bottomhole working around his flipper until she thought she couldn’t stand another moment of life.

“Please,” she begged him, pressing against his chest, the sensation so incredible she was trembling with it still as she moved away from him, collapsing against the side of the tub and hanging on.

“Well, I don’t care what anyone says, I think the tub was a good idea,” Skipper said and she could picture his grin as she pressed her furry cheek to the metal. She couldn’t even open her eyes, but she felt him running his beak over her shoulders and her back. She could smell something sweet, such as lilacs or lavender. It was like when otters spread their back claws to rub their own marking musk into the places on their mates that the mates couldn’t reach. If not for their different species, she and he would have so been mated by now. She would have insisted.

“Whuzzit?” Marlene murmured as his brawny grip turned her, pulling her to her knees in the tub. Purple foam spackled his flippers as they ran down her paws and back up, suds spreading over her neck and down her chest. Oh right, she had gotten the sensuous stuff some time ago and never used it.

“Isn’t that the point of this bath?” he said in a husky voice, making her shiver when he pinched one of her six slack, never-used nipples. “Getting clean? Keeping our private life private?“

“Ohhh yes,” she sighed, arching as he kneaded her flesh and probed ever so softly the milk glands that snugged next to her ribs. How he, a bird who had never nursed, knew how an otter felt when her kits suckled her nipples she couldn’t guess. She paused for a reality check. Now Marlene, she told herself, it’s not like you ever felt that, either. Well no, I haven’t, Marlene, she answered herself, but I can guess and I remember talking with Mom about it. So there, self. Mom had discussed the subject with the assumption that her daughter would reproduce at some point and yet again, Marlene shoved aside the regret that she never would.

Skipper interrupted her reverie. “Stand up,” he instructed, and he steadied her because her orgasm and the heat from the tub made her wobbly. His eyes met hers and she saw something indescribable in them. “Barbarossa’s sword, you’re as hot as Arlene at her hottest, Marlene.”

She would never know if he were teasing about her actually being Arlene or not but it didn’t matter, it didn’t as his praise sent more heat through her body. Then he was washing her again, moving over her belly and thighs, between her legs, the gentle sawing motion there making her tremble.

“Turn around.”

She did as he asked, his flippers making their way over her lower back, down the soft curve of her hips, spreading her thighs as they made their way toward her knees.

“Bend over,” he commanded, pressing her forward, and she clung to the edge of the tub as he worked the cheeks of her behind. “Time to get you really clean.”

“Oh!” she cried as his flipper worked its way into her rosehole. “Oh, Skipper, honey – “

He didn’t stop even though she called him honey as Private did. He worked the flesh open with one sudsy flipper. She couldn’t resist him or the sensation and her thighs seem to spread wider on their own, her back arching as she took him deeper inside her. He kept going there for a while, encouraged by the soft noises she made in her throat. She groaned when he slowly slid out again, her body aching to feel that fullness return.

Water cascaded over her back and down her bottom to shock her with its heat. She looked around to see him pouring it from her favorite mug to rinse the soap away. His eyes were bright as he watched the water beading over her fur, and she saw his other flipper moving between his legs and knew he was still so hard. She wanted to reach around and grab him, suck him, devour his cock because he loved when she did that, but he had other things in mind.

“Skipper!” she cried when his tongue found its way between that cleft, working over that puckered hole.

The heat that filled her face didn’t have anything to do with the steam rising from the tub, but she couldn’t deny how incredible it felt to have him there. She moaned when he made his tongue hard and probed.

“Spread yourself more,” he said, and she did, ashamed of her own eagerness. The edge of the tub was becoming familiar to her cheek while she clung to balance there.

He had complete access now and he took advantage of it, his tongue lapping over the furrowed crease that defined her existence at the moment. He added a twist to the flipper slipping into her pussy as he rubbed her mound with the other one. She was trembling, going up on her tiptoes in an attempt to seek even more sensation.

“Ohhhhh good glory!” Marlene cried when he started spearing her bottom with his tongue, one flipper moving in and out of her pulsing pussy with the same easy rhythm. She spread herself even wider, wanting more and getting it, the probing between her cheeks going deeper. She could feel the tip of his tongue moving around that tight band of muscle, making her whine.

“Noooooo,” she protested when he slid his tongue out and reached for something beyond the edge of the tub, but the next sensation jolted so much she nearly fell over. She probably would have if he hadn’t steadied her as he pressed something hard and round against the throbbing pucker.

“What?” She turned to look and her eyes widened when she saw what he had. “That wasn’t in our toy box!”

“Surprise! It’s new, all the way from China. Phil showed me his six-pack of them, all new, and cellophaned, and, and just the right size,” he said with a wink, pressing the first bead on the string further into her balloon knot. They were small beads, but they felt huge as he worked them against the taut opening under her tail.

“Where did those come from?” she gasped as the pressure began to build when he pressed hard, harder. “What are you, Skipper, a magician? Did you pull those out of you? Did you upchuck them like Rico could?”

“No,” he chuckled. “But they’re going into you. To answer your question, I planted them here yesterday for our next time together although I didn’t know about your tub since our pond swim yesterday washed our, er, sexiness off us both.”

“Gosh!” she cried, biting her lip as the first one slid in as easily as she could down a Prince Edward Island oyster. The sensation was strange and different. She felt full there, but not quite completely, so different from his cock or a dildo.

“Ready for another one?” he asked and she shook her head, screwing her eyes shut. He seemed to know that she didn’t mean it and pressed on anyway, working another bead past that ring of muscle that was just tight enough to hold them. “Tienes que relajar pronto.“

She could imagine the bead nestled against the first one inside, and then there was another, pushing the rest deeper still as it went, making room, tunneling through. She really felt full now, and something in her wanted them out. She bit her lip, fighting against the urge to push outwards. He worked in yet another bead.

“Two more,” he reassured as her paws trembled, holding herself open. She found that if she spread herself wider, he could ease them in better, so she struggled to stay still and relaxed, opening herself up for him. The steam from the tub caressed her blown open hole. She couldn’t take much more.

“Please,” she begged, feeling that gentle pop as another slid past taut resistance.

“Almost there, honeygirl,” he murmured, kissing her spread ring as he worked the last one in. She could feel his flipper go in with it, guiding them deep, and she thrust forward three times without thinking about it.

Panting, she looked back at him, her eyes wide. “Now what?”

“Now I drive you crazy,” he said, standing up and grabbing her hips. His cock was like granite as he slid into her wetness that dripped with her juices and his sopping kisses.

The stretch of his cock inside her pussy made the sensation of the beads buried inside her even more pronounced. With every thrust that feeling of fullness seemed to grow, until she couldn’t tell anymore where or how she was being filled. She brimmed to capacity, like a seedpod swelling and ready to burst.

One of his flippers slid under her belly, holding her steady as they rocked. She gripped the edge of the tub, searching for some sort of hold on the slippery surface. Below them the water churned and sloshed, Skipper’s weight cannoning into her to make even more waves as his low grunts gave a tell-tale sign that he was getting close.

“Esquiper, ¡estoy quemando!” she moaned when his flippers delved between her pussy lips, searching for and finding her swollen clit. “Yes, hard! More!“

Marlene didn’t have to ask because he was working her with his cock and one flipper now, shoving in deep while he rubbed over and over her aching clit. She had almost forgotten the beads buried in her pucker when he tugged slightly on the string, making her squeal and jerk beneath him.

“Hold your cheeks open for me, chica bad,” he muttered next to her ear, pulling his cock almost all the way out so the head of him sat pulsing just inside of her. He must be close to coming if he mangled his languages like that. Pride flared at being able to affect him so much and then sensation was all that she was at that precise moment, sensation and the desire to see what would happen next.

Whimpering, she wiggled and positioned herself so both paws were free and she was resting her cheek against the tub again. The tension on the string was incredible; it felt as if he were going to turn her inside out. She felt the tension ease just a little as she spread herself to the fullest.

“Mamacita mami,” Marlene cried when Skipper slid his cock between her lower lips, using the head of it to rub at her clit. He knew how much she loved the spongy, wet tip making a hot, fleshy trail over the sensitive bud.

He slapped at her pussy with his cock, jerking it roughly a few times against her lips to make her say oh oh oh ohhh. Then he found her clit again, rubbing fast and steady. Her legs trembled, sensing her impending come. She panted and writhed and worked toward it, arching her back and rolling her hips. Everything between her legs felt thick and swollen, ready to pop, and then something did. Skipper pulled one of the beads out!

“Ahhhhh!” Marlene moaned, shivering when the thick orb slid out of that tight, contracting knot.

“You like that, hermanita?” Skipper murmured, and then he was kneeling behind her, his beak buried up between her legs, his tongue doing the work his cock had been doing just a moment ago, with a much more deft and precise aim.

“You’re gonna make me come,” she warned him, as if he needed a warning.

He knew just what he was doing, his whole face buried up against her pussy, the tension growing as he tugged on the string that led into her bottom. The tug grew insistent, a pull and release as she could feel the beads inside of her shifting somehow because they were tense, too.

“Now, oh, now!” Marlene cried, grinding her pussy against his tongue, the sweet pulse of her release beginning to overtake her control. He made a deep sound in his throat, still sucking and licking at her flesh, and the tension in her bottom became incredible as he pulled hard and tugged all of the beads out of her bottom in a row.

Her climax became something surreal with that motion. What began as a sweet lapping wave kissing a sandy shore became a storm surge. The otter screamed as it hit with the aching sensation of her bottom being emptied, each bead popping through that taut ring in quick succession, slipping out of the secret cavern.

But Skipper wasn’t done with her. Her pucker no longer a pucker, her body still vibrating with her climax, he stood and slid his cock into the space where the beads had just been. She gasped at the soft insistence of his flesh that felt so different from the unforgiving demand of the beads as he tunneled his way past that still pulsing band of muscle. She couldn’t believe his strength as he forced his way deeper than seemed possible.

“Ohhhh yeah,” he keened, grabbing her hips and sinking deeper still before beginning to move. He pulled one of her paws and then the other up behind her back. He held them there while he thrust, his cock driving like a piston into her.

“Come inside me,” she pleaded, wanting to feel the heat of his cock exploding to fill that hot, aching passage. “Do it, honey, fill me up!”

“Marleeeene,” he moaned, his grip tightening as he thrust again, rocking her hard against the edge of the tub. She felt it then, a thick pulse on the underside of his cock as his climax began.

“Yes, yes, yes,” she encouraged, squeezing his cock, making him jerk and buck as he emptied himself deep into her. He pulled back a schosche then, and she could feel more of his come in hot spurts, leaving a slick trail of heat as it slid down her pussy lips.

With another heartrending sound, Skipper released her, collapsing down into the tub, and she went with him, crawling into his lap. They rocked in the waves, kissing, still panting, both spent in their wild and free delirium.

“We need another bath,” she murmured against his earhole.

“Give me the soap,” he chuckled, sliding a commanding touch over the rounded swell of her bottom.

“Aaaaaaaa I can’t handle any more,” Marlene managed. “You’re going to kill me like Marat.”

“But we’ll die happy,” Skipper smiled, probing her. She smiled, too, murmuring an agreement and opening for him once again. “I’m glad you introduced me to toys, honeygirl.”

Marlene was beyond talk and only nodded. She just couldn’t seem to help herself. She reflected that Kidsmas in July seemed different this year, and that it was a good difference. All that was missing was an appropriate song for this occasion. She would compose one later.

After a second, more leisurely session with no toys and more kisses, they lay together under the Kidsmas Tree while ornaments, tinsel and flower bedecked branches blurred together in Marlene’s befuddled mind. Skipper, bless him, slept beside her as if he were estivating. Before she joined him, she thanked the Labyrinthine Mollusk for the good fortune in finding a love such as this. She lay on her belly as she traced the train track on the MyTown play mat, walking her exhausted digits into Grand Central Station. When she reached the rumpled monkey suit, she pulled it towards her to use as a pillow.

“Mmmm, a sweet kiss, thank you, Skippa. K’walski and Rico hinted they’d stop to show the kids to Fred in the park so we’ve got oodles of alone time.”

“They are? That’s nice. Ooooh, that’s even nicer, yeah, keep going, babe.”

“I twigged you’d like this for a change from the last fifteen nights.” The bubbles rising past the portholes distracted Skipper from laser-like concentration, not that he truly minded on this mellow evening of July The Third.

“I think it’s time we trimmed your claws,” Skipper mentioned idly, leaning to the side to see Private’s feet better.

Private sat back on his heels, glowering at his commander. “Do you mind? I’m tryin’ to concentrate.” He leaned forward, grasping Skipper’s cock firmly.

“Dammit, Private, you’re not trying to start a lawnmower.”

“Sorrysorry. But could you just be quiet? Are you sure you even want this?”

“Rightarooney. Go ahead.” Skipper snickered at his choice of words.

Private rolled his eyes and bent to take Skipper in his beak. For long moments the only sounds were the sounds of sucking.

“Did you ask Rico to buy the muskmelon that I wanted when you two went to the market this afternoon?” Skipper asked.

Private sucked harder.

Skipper grabbed his head, stopping him. “Did you? Because if you didn’t – “

Private reached up, disentangling the fist from his feathers before pushing away from his commander and standing.

“Is that all you can think about? I’m suckin’ you off and you’re worried about a melon? Wotever happened to Routine Thirty-Four?”

“Marlene’s coming over tomorrow and it’s her favorite. I plan to serve muskmelon smoothies when she’s here. I am cooking lunch because, well, never mind. Actually, Maurice is lending me his blender and advice -“

“You’re thinkin’ about mammals Marlene and Maurice whilst I’m givin’ you head? Do you know how that sounds?” Private screeched.

“You are over-reacting, Private.”

“‘Private’? Oi, I’m not ‘babe’, not ‘my Private’, but ‘Private’? Fine. That’s just great! You want your melon, fine.” Private marched into the kitchen and retrieved the muskmelon before storming back towards the bunks. He plunged his beak into the thick rind, spun the melon and quickly spat a wedge of mushed melon to the floor. He tossed the fruit to his commander. “Here. When you’re ready, use the melon. It’s the only hole you’re goin’ to get in these quarters.” Private turned and stomped to the refrigerator, muttering.

Skipper looked at the perfect hole in the fruit and then down at his cock. Hmmm. He shook his head. What was he thinking? He hadn’t even wanted sex, but Private expected it every night just like clockwork. Now Skipper himself was contemplating an inanimate object. That was sad. Very sad. He was sure that Private would learn to be an amazing lover, given time. And he could live with the impatience of youth.

He looked at the fruit again and licked the hole. Ohhh, that was nice. All pulpy and warm from the friction of Private’s beak. It would feel really nice around –

No. Absolutely not. He resolutely pulled out his tongue. He should be talking to Private. Maybe he was hornier than he realized. He turned to the door of the refrigerator and knocked to announce his presence to Private, who was bent over in a suggestive manner as he searched the crisper bin for something or other.

“Private, let’s talk about this.”

“Talk to the melon.”

“Just open the door,” Skipper sighed. Damn. The bird sure had his waddle out of joint over this.

“Like hurt feelin’s would stop you.” Private continued poking through celery, radishes and onions that Rico used making sushi.

Skipper pulled the door open until it hit the automatic stop. Private straightened up with a hand of ginger sprouting from his curled fist. The knobs of the ginger appeared as knurled as the King of the Mole Men’s thick fingers. Private said nothing more. Oh, the silent treatment?

Skipper felt utterly ridiculous as he pictured Ringtail’s reaction to all this. The lemur king would roll on his back in hysterics if he ever found out about Stinky Fishy Bird’s problems on this particular subject. “Private, don’t get sore. I just had my mind on other things.”

Private snorted and slammed the refrigerator door shut.

Skipper spoke reasonably. “I just said that your skills aren’t refined, and that perhaps you need more drills. Drills that I am happy to provide. Now calm down.”

He pulled Private next to him on the bottom bunk and stroked his shoulders. “Relax. Let me show you what I mean.”

Private pouted. “I don’t want you to. You like the melon better than me.”

Skipper smiled as he ran a bold flipper downwards. “No, I don’t. I like you best of all birds. I like the way you sigh when you’re turned on. I like the way you fluff – no, not that way, but you’re improving at that, too, now listen to me – fluff your chest feathers to tangle in the feathers on my belly when we kiss.” Skipper reached the erogenous zone encircling Private’s preening gland. He tickled before caressing it and as it obliged with a dollop of oil, Private squeaked before he flopped into a limp heap.

Skipper rolled into the routine he knew by heart even though it had no number assigned it. He shifted Private’s legs apart as his oiled beak closed around a snatch of flank feathers, suckling gently before moving on to a fresh patch. Private moaned, arching into the preen. “See how sweet a slow seduction can be? Play with your lover, Private, don’t suck the skin off his cock. Take it easy and, and tease me. Make it more than just another mission to finish.”

Skipper drew his tongue backwards through the feathers before burying his beak in Private’s right pit. “You even smell scrumptious, babe.”

Private sputtered a laugh. “Stop makin’ fun of me,” he mumbled as Skipper realized his love was trying to maintain his brattiness.

“Teasing, teasing,” Skipper murmured against the snowy throat. “Privates are so damned sensitive.”

“And you love it. Or at least I thought you did.”

“Ummm.” Skipper stroked Private’s stomach with light, tickling touches, grinning as the muscles twitched beneath his touch. “You’re ticklish.”

Private frowned. “No, I’m not.”

Skipper laughed. “Yes, you are. Here, here and especially here.” He found the soft skin of Private’s inner thigh from the back while diving through the sharp line of black feathers touching white.

“Stop! Oh, don’t! All right, I’m ticklish! Just stop!” Private shrieked, fighting to get away.

“No you don’t, Private. Get back here.”

Private stuck out his tongue. “Make me.”

“Last warning.”

Private rolled his eyes.

“Fine.” Skipper pounced, picking up his love and tossing him face down on the bunk to pin him. “Remember, I warned you.”

Skipper spread kisses over Private’s neck and shoulders before laving every inch of back and thighs with his tongue. He paused, nipping the taut buttocks. “Teasing, tickling, laughing – it makes everything better.”

Private moaned. “Please, sir. I understand. Please, finish it,” he panted. Funny, Kitka had said these very words and she hadn’t been under his command at all.

Skipper didn’t answer. He kissed the cleft of Private’s ass, his tongue arrowing between the cheeks. Private rose to his knees in offering, opening himself. Time stood still as Skipper used that tongue to tease Private, to teach him the delights of anticipation, the delicious agony of wanting.

Finally, Skipper pulled away and Private whimpered in loss. “Do you understand, compadre? Do you see what I was telling you? The difference between Patton’s bulldozing and Eisenhower’s finesse is patience and consideration. There’s no hurry tonight.”

Private turned pleading eyes to his commander. “Please, Skippa. Please. I can’t take anymore. Please – ” Skipper knelt behind Private, easing inside. Private groaned, forcing himself back onto Skipper’s hard length with one long push.

“Yes, oh yes, finally,” Private sighed. The pair shared full on sex heat as the tight ring bloomed around its delightful invader.

Skipper panted his agreement. His hips found the driving rhythm that pushed them both to the edge of the waterfall and over into the bubbling pool beneath.

“Aaaaahhhhhhhh!” Private wailed as he came, collapsing onto the ruffled blanket.

wheee ooooo wheeeee oooooo whhhheeeeeeee ooooooooooooo

dingdingdingdingdingdingdingclangclang

Intruder. Alert. Intruder. Alert. INTRUDE-

“Computer, code Alpha India Whiskey, repeat Alpha India Whiskey!” Skipper shouted. “All is well, computer! Sheesh!” The din ceased as he added, “Damn, Private, setting off the intruder alarm is a new high for us.” His recovery time remained a bit under Private’s as usual. “Always keep me guessing ’cause babe, you rock!”

It took a moment before Private could reply. “You made me rock sex, honey, and braap, now I know why intruder alert includes rude. Good thing our, um, Thing isn’t covert anymore not that it was after we had kids.” He snuggled closer. “I’m ever so sorry my appreciation of your talent spoiled our afterglow. You blew me away.”

Skipper rolled to his side, laughing. “Aw, afterglow is overrated and I didn’t even want sex. I was just appeasing your ego – “

Private raised his head, giving him a stern glare. “Hush, oh great commander, or I might have to practice wot I’ve learned.”

Skipper laughed harder. “I look forward to it. And Private? We still need muskmelon. You’ll have to pick up some tomorrow. Tell Rico to buy extra. Marlene told me she’s had a craving for it lately.”

“Wotever can a cravin’ mean? Couldn’t be the obvious, could it? Well, never mind then” – Private stretched languidly – “you know, Skippa, this time was easier than ever before.”

Skipper picked up on the ever before. “Huh? How so?” He pulled Private’s head onto his chest.

“Mmmm, you’re kindasorta large, well, bigger than me, at any rate, so there’s this twinge now and then, don’t pay it no mind it’s just for a teensy tinesy instant – “

Private kept his head nestled where Skipper liked it, but Skipper stopped his idle petting altogether. “You mean I hurt you when I storm the beachhead?”

“Like I say, pay it no never mind shouldn’t have said anythin’. It’s all right, and and totally worth it, worth more.”

Slumber retreated for one penguin and advanced for another. Private’s breathing grew heavy and slow while Skipper’s shallowed out as he stuttered, “I’ve not hurt any partner in-intentionally, please believe me. Please.”

“‘Course not, silly willy ding dong. I know that.”

Skipper flailed, “Kowalski, we’ll ask Kowalski, he would know, they’ll be back on schedule or I can call them back via BlackBerry.”

“Honey, everythin’s stretched out from the eggs, I think? At least from before I laid them?” Private’s voice grew strained and he sat up. “Wait, wot? Does that make sex less pleasin’ for you now? I hadn’t glommed onto that … hmmmm … “

Skipper shuddered. “Don’t go there, just don’t. I want you and I want us to go on, just like the day I gave you my pebble, just the exactamente same. This thing isn’t important, if it even is a thing. We’ll soldier on.”

Private lay back down. “Goes without sayin’, doesn’t it. Rest well, Skippa.”

Skipper did, after five hours. Kowalski and Rico sensed the situation and bedded down both the kids and themselves quietly at their return.

IOIOIOIOIO

“How was it?” Skipper asked. “Does this satisfy your needs?”

“I could get used to having that regularly.”

“You’re incredibly responsive, Marlene, the way you move, it’s, it’s – “

Marlene worked her shoulders, tilting her head this way and that. “Thanks for the neck rub. I’m up for more television, what’s on?”

Skipper aimed the clicker, passing by a Teletubbies marathon and Bob Ross painting happy trees. “The news.”

Skipper’s flipper circled Marlene’s shoulders as they settled in. When she grabbed the remote, he tensed so that she noticed. “Just in case the news gets too, er, newsy, I want to change the channel. No bleeding tonight, er, you know what I mean, Skipper. I’m keeping the back button on the Bob Ross station, if you don’t mind.”

She was cute and made his life better, so he relaxed enough to let her control the TV. “Seguro, mi reina.”

Marlene purred her contentment as the screen droned political commentary from Commissioner McSlade and Akili Wangai-McSlade, a montage of today’s Dragon Boat Festival competitions that brought out squeals of joy from a bouncy otter, which was followed by a squib acknowledging Fathers Day last weekend that made her kiss Skipper hard. Gil Force promised more sunny skies and then came a banter-filled ending segment by Bonnie Chang and Chuck Charles. Marlene analyzed their reportage clinically, to Skipper’s amusement.

“Jokes? They tell lame jokes now? I heard that last one in my cradle.”

Skipper shrugged. “Looks that way.” He’d never snoozed in a cradle like the IKEA one in the halfway renovated Rockgut Room, which was currently empty of babies. Private, Rico and Kowalski strutted around the zoo this evening after dinner, receiving oohs and aahhhhhs from zoomanity admiring their fuzzy offspring. Private had suggested both the visit and the promenade, hmmm, was he pushing his love and his love’s other love together? Chuck and Bonnie radiated camaraderie, so maybe they receded from passion into the friendzone. Their cheery voices invaded Skipper’s musing.

“… and Bonnie, I see by the clock on the wall that it’s Happy News time.”

“Chuck, happy is the word and also mysterious. This just in from the Jumla region of Nepal: a yeti and her offspring shepherded a herd of yaks across the Chinese border into the fabled land of the Lamas, not the animals but the priests oh you viewers know what I mean. Local legends tell of such an event portending the end of the world.” Bonnie snorted in an unladylike fashion. “This reporter needs more proof than the following clip.” She nodded to someone offscreen and a blurry yeti carrying her child on her back swayed to and fro as inexpert camerawork frazzled the footage. The black and white images lasting forty-five seconds jolted Skipper onto his feet as he ran forward.

“It’s Sasquatch! Dayyum, she made it back to Nepal!”

“No way!” Marlene joined her love as he thrust his beak six inches away from the screen. “You’re sure it’s her?”

Chuck’s deep authoritative tones struck Skipper dumb. “Bonnie, legends call her Mikaela. No doubt Nepal media will poll viewers to name her child suitably unisex, like Lee or Chris or Pat or Amiya – “

“Undoubtedly. Chuck, let’s move along to sports. Scooter, are you on?”

Skipper folded to the floor, staring sightlessly ahead of him. Marlene plotzed by his side, rubbing his neck as he had rubbed hers. “I’m sure it’s her, Marlene. Hugo is his name and he’s her orang friend and not her child,” he declared. “Our team is the only group in the world who knows that Blowhole bioengineered her from yak to yeti.”

“Gosh, I hope they’ll be okay.”

His voice sounded stunned to his own earholes. “So do I. So do I. Dayyum, their segway deserves an award, I’ll ask Kowalski how far it is from Åland to Nepal but how in the hell did they get the segway aboard a ship to reach the mainland – “

“Mikaela sounds gutsy. I like her even if she did try to kill you because she made up for it by switching sides.”

He just knew his face remained slack with disbelief. “Mikaela. I suggested the name but she turned it down, said she wanted only to be called Sasquatch. Marlene.”

“Hmmm, sweety?”

“Do I look psychic to you?”

She leaned away from him, looking him up and down and finally cupped his face. She ran her digits over the downturned corner crease of his beak. “I can’t tell. What would a psychic penguin look like?”

“Me.”

“Then you look like one.” Marlene smiled. “C’mon, so you called her Mikaela and legends call her Mikaela, too? What’s that have to do with anything?”

Skipper’s face fell. “This’ll give me nightmares if it’s true. I’m the Anti-Psychic, Marlene. It creeps me out nearly as bad as the Grim Reaper, did I ever tell you about trying to teach Rico how to move things with his mind? Little Private took over Rico’s training because I turned wimp – the whole psy ops program proved a bust – “

Was Marlene kissing away his mental owwie? Because she dotted his temple with smooches large and small. “Hush. Hush. C’mon, now. There are things real and true and there are things not. Just like Roger thinking I was a monster, remember?”

Whatever she tried, it worked when he wasn’t looking. “Noted and logged, babe. Ahem. You up for stargazing? Arting? Shooting some pool?”

“And miss the scores for the second round playoffs of the Stanley Cup?”

The two of them leaned forward as Scooter Alvarez smoothly described the highlights of tonight’s Rangers game.

IOIOIOIOIO

“‘Kiiiippppaaaaahgobye?”

“No, for the seventh time! He’ll handle the sitch with all our help.” Kowalski felt it upon him to uphold team authority, sorely tried though it had been. “He’ll not need the jetski I reserved for him to cross the Big Pond with. I canceled and lost only half the fee.”

“Hmmmph, K’walski, he caused the Sithly sitch so we should bail on him, righto?” Private looked shocked at his own words and waddled faster, Sally peeping in distress until he slowed.

Rico’s pace continued as disciplined as Kowalski never thought to see it in the before-baby time. His love strode purposefully through the zoo, pausing to let Tactic peek out to the admiration of the zoosters. Burt curled and uncurled his trunk to make the lad giggle, Roy allowed Mason and Phil to use his horns to handstand upon and Pinkie’s flock held up their own young ones so the babies could see other babies. Cheep-cheeps and skrawks filled the air of the digesting zoo as June’s long evening stretched after dinner feeding time. Sally practiced her vowels extensively.

“Cute, oh yes, Daddy’s baby is cute,” cooed Kowalski to Sally when they had passed the flamingo habitat. “Never you mind that you can’t fly like a flamingo, Daddy will have surrogate penguin wings perfected by the time you are old enough to use them. No dangerous soda bottle rockets for you.“

Rico seemed to home in on Private’s disquiet better than his lieutenant. “Whyyuvite‘Eeniedenfurteevee?”

“Why? Because I can be the bigger bird, that’s why, and tonight Skippa’ll see it.”

Kowalski reluctantly tore his attention from his little boy to the one who was his first little boy. “Private, beyond any strange comparison test that nobody asked for, by any chance are you hoping to catch Skipper and Marlene in flagrante delicto at our return?”

Private blinked. “Wot?”

Rico explained violently before Kowalski could riffle through his list of euphemisms again. “Witsmokingun.”

“Gun? Smokin’ gun? Whose – I don’t – oh. Oh!” Private dropped to a whisper. “Not in front of the kids, K’walski! And Rico, thanks ever so for that disgustin’ image! Ew!”

Protectprotect echoed in Kowalski’s brain as they neared their habitat. Upon jumping carefully over the railing, the three birds dove into the water for the prescribed ten seconds before bringing their offspring back up to breathe on their faux floe. Sally and Tactic gasped comically at the dunking and soothing wasn’t that fun and good job kiddos encouragement suffused the night air. Kowalski pitched his voice louder than usual.

“Here we are, home again, home again jiggety jig I say jiggety jig!”

The hatch slid aside and Skipper’s voice boomed from below. “Hurry up, men, I saved you some!”

Rico and Private threw sideways glances at each other before looking to Kowalski to lead them downwards. “Coming, sir!”

Kowalski backed down the ladder, brushing off invisible bits of grit from its steps as he descended. When he reached bottom, he looked around to see the main lair empty and a trail of red on the floor leading past the TV into the kids’ room. What could that mean? Did they have a terrible fight? Who won? Or was Marlene enduring heat far from her schedule, was she ill – he bit off speculating until a full examination could be made because he refused to guess about mammalian mysteries. Despite his resolution, a cloud of options shadowed his mind until he shook his head to clear it.

When he looked around again, Rico and Private had gained the floor and followed the trail rapidly, Rico hyperventilating and Private silent as a ghost. Kowalski flung his tall frame after them to the kids’ room. He stumbled over the baby monitor wiring that he hadn’t gotten around to clinching to the floor because boy howdy hard wiring was the only safe way to ensure proper transmission within thick stone and/or concrete walls –

“Red, white and/or blue petunias, mi segundo? You pick.”

Skipper pointed to the mural growing organically from the far end of the space, near where Rockgut’s old timey spy equipment had squatted. A vine blossomed upwards, its languid diagonal length the backdrop for Marlene’s artwork. “Come on, you guys,” she offered from a paint spackled body, “use bare flippers for that natural feel. Skipper and I did a lot but you’ll help, yeah?”

She included them all in a smile before returning to completing the circle on what Kowalski figured to be a moon gate. He stared at its artistry; why this would take a week to finish with proper shellacking and ‘Eenie, my friend, how clever of you to arrange a group project. All of us ought to be used to the New Normal in one week, even Private.

Private, for his part, lifted Sally from his brood pouch to plunk her into the cradle she shared with Tactic. Kowalski could nearly hear Routine Three: Be Polite If It Kills You caroming around the young penguin’s skull. “Sure. Why not. Let’s all have a go.” Private dipped both flippers savagely into the open bucket of red paint to slap scarlet petals onto a vine whose species, realistically, ought to have yellow blooms, not that Kowalski would mention it.

Rico dumped Tactic beside his sister and passed him a soft toy. The two babies focused on each other in pre-sleep routine as their world shrunk to the two of them. One point nine days ago, Kowalski had noticed that Tactic and Sally observed each other more frequently, even if they had not yet advanced to the play together stage. Skipper seemed happy, Kowalski thought, and because happiness happily proved contagious, Kowalski felt happy. He chose white paint to try drawing a star far from the moon gate to give it perspective and not overwhelm the gate.

Marlene ignored all penguins to concentrate on slicing the moon gate’s circled wet paint to represent a pattern of bricks. She turned her head this way and that, reaching as far up as possible. “Rico, a little boost, huh?”

Rico obliged as he knelt to allow Marlene to straddle his bull neck. He straightened and the otter continued placing slashes at regular intervals until she came to the top of the arch, where she angled the slashes to represent its keystone. Her absorbed concentration touched Kowalski’s heart enough to forgive her for the imbalance she had brought to the penguin habitat in Central Park Zoo. It wasn’t her fault she was a loving animal and loved Skipper, who loved her right back because he had a river of love to spew, too, that would brook no damming. Private might or might not accept that fact with better grace than today, in time. Kowalski hoped he would.

Rico chose magenta for his flowers, stroking broad, fat petals onto the vine. Up high, Marlene added shading to the moon gate to give a three-dee effect before she slid from Rico’s neck. They high fived and laughed at the paint splashing between them.

Skipper and Private chose to work a flipper’s width apart, crafting red, yellow and blue flowers that nobody had yet seen on this planet. The whole group pursued the project steadily until empty buckets littered the floor. Marlene burbled, “Hey, brainstorm alert! Stay put, guys.” She affixed clean up rags to their feet and dumped every last drip, drop and drab of paint onto the floor. “Now skate!” She skated, too, swirling the paint over each bit of unlovely concrete flooring. Bright colors slurried into uneven paint designs using magenta, white, blue, red, yellow and puce in a unique pattern.

Skipper and his team stared at the floor when they were done. “It’s op art, Marlene, and a puzzle to take years to unravel. Congratulations, artiste.” He grasped her two painted paws and bowed ceremoniously over them.

“‘Eeniefoedawin!”

An algorithm completed in Kowalski’s mind, throwing him back to Åland Island. “It’s, it’s Vasarely Vision all over again!” He high fived Rico, Skipper and Private.

Marlene curtsied left and right. “Why, thank you! I’m glad you like it and even gladder that Sally and Tactic’s little minds will be stimulated, at least when they wake up.”

“Shhhhh,” whispered Private as he turned on the baby monitor. “Back to adult space, everyone.”

The five animals made a date in a few days to further the finishing touches.

IOIOIOIOIO

“Saint Romuald Hospital? This is Mounted Officer Filomena Irizarry of the Parks Enforcement Patrol. I’m bringing in Alice Nelson to your maternity ward as she planned. Best treatment for my friend, correct? All right then, see you in twenty.”

Filo clicked away and punched in another number quickly. “Channel One, today is not the best day to start filming your Zookeeper Surreality Show with Ms. Nelson – oh, they’re on their way in the truck? Well, stop them – do not tell me you can’t, I’m the law and I say – wait, Alice, don’t answer the door and don’t you dare lift that suitcase – ay Dios mio, el día se va al garete.”

Two veteran newscasters and an intern lugging equipment waited outside Alice’s front door as it opened. Filo took charge after flashing her badge. “She’s in labor, go away until next week, for pity’s sake. Let her alone in the name of the law.”

“Thought it was” – Alice gasped – “Doc Peary. Before this began, he said he’d stop by today to see me, he said, he said, heeeeeeeeeeeeee – “

“Breathe like we practiced! Puff puff like a puppy! You can do this, girlfriend! Breathe! Buh-reeeeathe!” Filo’s policewoman voice rang loud and clear without need of a bullhorn.

Chuck, Bonnie and the intern hastened back down the cement steps. “I’m not cut out for this,” mumbled Chuck to Bonnie at the halfway point. “I’m more scared of this than unicorns.”

Bonnie and the intern looked at each other and then at Chuck. “Forget you heard that if you want to keep your position, young lady,” sighed Bonnie. “Chuck, honestly, get a grip. It’s not your baby and we’re leaving – hey, watch it, fella!”

A bespectacled man in unseasonably warm clothing pushed his way past them, taking the steps three at a time. “Alice! I’m here! You can breathe now!”

A clutch of Channel One personnel set up camera tripods until Chuck and Bonnie joined them and shook their heads. “Is dis a Mama Naycha show or what?” griped a grip as he took down what he had just set up.

Voices tumbled rat-a-tat at the top of the stairs as the TV crew couldn’t help but hear the drama.

“It’s under control, George. I’m taking her.”

“Why can’t I come, too? I’m a scientist!”

“Doc, Doc, Doc George, let me lean on you – ow ouch ow – puff puff whoosh – oh God stairs why did I want to live upstairs – George, hold on to me tight – “

“This situation calls for division of labor! Yes, I know what I just said. George, stay with her while I bring the black and white around, that’ll get these alcahuetes out of our way.” Filo patted Alice’s arm and darted down the stairs towards the service entrance gate of the cafeteria. Alice took the rest of the stairs one at a time.

A black and white police car with strobing light bars soon surged frighteningly near the Channel One truck.

“Come on, people, hustle and bustle! You, reel in the power cables, and you, young lady, be careful with that microphone, it’s Chuck’s favorite.” Bonnie and Chuck grimaced what Filo took to be smiles in her direction before jumping into the sound truck as it trundled sedately away. The truck would have peeled out but for her police presence, Filo surmised with a wicked grin. She opened the back door and gentled Alice inside. George held the suitcase to have something to do with his hands as he sat next to Alice, Filo assumed. It was a good thing a primipara faced hours of labor or George might witness a human birth for a change.

Alice delivered a baby boy fifteen hours later. She named him Hari.

A June moon had no right to be this gorgeous. Full and rich, it dominated all stars, city lights and Private’s expectations as he and his love meandered with a purpose, at least on Private’s part.

“Photo snaps, Skippa?” His question roused the photo booth’s neighboring occupant.

Roy nodded his enormous head over his habitat fence that, really, had no chance of withstanding a charge from his bulk tipped with a masterfully wielded horn. “Have fun, kids,” he said with a yawn.

Hmmm, Roy sounded as mellowly fatigued as if he had just returned from Tijuana. Private nodded in return while Skipper reached high to pat the rhino’s lower jaw. Roy and Skipper exchanged a look that Private stowed away for later pondering before Roy left them in privacy. “We will, Spikenose. Happy napping with a dream to keep, palio.”

The Saturday night bloomed with promise before them, their kids taken care of, and their lair rested at peace. Private hopped atop the spinning photo booth seat to whirl it to the proper height. He plunked in the coins. “Wot filter, Skippa?”

“You choose, since you wanted photo snaps after our session taking them kablooified on our second date.”

Skipper sat behind Private, cuddling his waist before laying his head on Private’s shoulder. Private playfully tapped his temple against his love’s before tabbing through the filters. “I like this one.”

“Madagascar-y jungle? Why?”

Private squirmed in Skipper’s snuggle. “It’s mysterious as, as why you belong to the zoo. I’m workin’ on understandin’, I am, but I’m not there so far, honey.”

Private couldn’t tell if the snort blasting past his earhole denoted impatience, pique or a strangled laugh. “Okay, I guess we have to have this conversation. Private, I belong to the zoo because it’s impersonal. In my time commanding, I’ve learned that all individual animals have flaws, even my loved ones, even” – now Skipper squirmed before inhaling sharply enough to stir Private’s delicate head feathers – “me. The zoo represents an ideal, like Freedom or Patriotism.”

Private couldn’t help asking, “Aren’t they the same?”

Now Skipper sounded more sure of himself. “No. I love America best as a patriot, but it’s not the only home of Freedom. In México, I met many who love Freedom as much as I do and they were not Ewe Ess of Ay citizens or even from our wor- hold on. Forget I said that because despite your upped clearance since Kastelholm, you don’t get to know about México.”

“Done and done, Skippa.” Private leaned towards the camera and then slumped. “Awwww, pinfedderers! Our time ran out.”

Printed letters bleeped and blooped from a flashing screen that neither bird could read. “Did you bring more money?”

“No, Skippa. I thought one session would do. I’m sorry.”

“Watch me make lemonade out of lemons, babe.”

Skipper grabbed Private hard and spun the two of them so that the seat twirled all the way down. Private got into the spirit and rolled his weight to rev up their momentum and they spun to the top height and back down again three times, which made them laugh as much as clowning for photo snaps would have.

Their moonlight stroll through Central Park led past Fred’s tree. “Look, Skippa, there are our hearts!”

“Aww, yeah.” Since last November, bark grew, faded and blotched the entwined hearts they carved on their first date; the basic shapes remained solid and true in June. Private embraced his love from behind as long moments passed.

“Lots of water under the bridge in just eight months,” mused the young penguin. “Wot’s next for us?”

He felt Skipper jolt from wherever his mind had taken him. “What’s next? We got voodooed into parenthood, we nearly drowned in Howe and we’ve had enough sex for eighteen penguin couples of all species, Gentoos included. I need, I mean the team, needs normalcy now that our staycation ended.”

Private diddled where nipples would be if penguins owned them. “You sound gobsmacked.”

Skipper broke away from the touch. “I am. Don’t tell anyone.”

Private plotzed on the neatly trimmed grass and patted the space beside him. He was searching for words when a laconic voice droned, “What does gobsmacked mean?” and they both looked twelve feet above their heads.

“Hi, Fred,” said Skipper. “It means how you present yourself ninety-nine per cent of the time.”

“There’s a word for that?”

“So Skippa says. Fred, have you heard our good news?”

“I don’t think so. Wait.” Fred placed both paws on his temples to massage in some smarts. “No, I have not. What is it?”

“Skippa and I had babies, a boy and a girl.”

Private heard Skipper mumble covert need to know and he does not need to know this but he barreled along anyway. This was a date, which relaxed military discipline.

“Is that possible? Did you adopt?”

“Actually, Fred, Skippa and I – “

“Actually,” Skipper stated firmly, “it’s a long story that’s none of your business.”

Fred did that impossible thing that squirrels did and scurried headfirst down his tree to settle beside them. He traced the entwined hearts above him before leaning companionably into Private’s shoulder hard enough to make the shoulder knock Skipper’s shoulder. He rocked the three of them back and forth. “Now cut out the fooling, fellas.”

“You’re intruding on our date, squirrel.” Before Skipper’s voice got any more combative, Private spread oil upon the waters.

“Fred, just go with it or, or ask your granny because she knows everythin’, righto?”

Private counted till six as the suggestion filtered through Fred’s skull. “My granny? You’re right, I’ll ask her when she wakes up. She’s old, you know, so every time she wakes up I bring her a walnut ’cause one day she won’t wake up. Walnuts are good for you.”

“Is she sick, Fred?” Now Skipper homed in on an animal problem as he was wont to do so he could fix it. This would turn their Official Date into a mission, ho hum.

“No. She’s old, though.”

Private’s heart warmed as Skipper replied, “Then just enjoy her as she is with no worries. Things will take care of themselves because life is like that even at its end.”

Another count of six. “I’m on it!” Fred zipped up the tree to disappear through the hole leading to his home.

“He didn’t say goodbye, Skippa.”

“I noticed, Private.”

The two birds gazed at the few stars seen through city haze. The Ploughman and the Bears twinkled faintly above Manhattan as each penguin invited his soul to savor their togetherness and separateness.

Their evening led to the pond for communing with Nature more than the law allowed. Frogs serenaded the moon and each other, drowsy peeps made their way through Momma Duck’s feathers as she nodded over her latest brood and they didn’t see Eggy or his agemates anywhere near her nest.

“No Poppa Duck in sight, hmmm,” whispered Skipper as they swam near her without splashing. She deserved her rest as much as they did because parenting was hard work.

Private waited until they reached the middle of the pond before saying what was on his mind. “Could they have split up? Oh, I hope not!”

“I hope not, too. I like Momma Duck.”

“I love Eggy, I can’t help it.”

“Why should you? He’s adorable.”

Private mulled over the words. “Lots of babies are adorable, like, like the flamingo chicks or babies in the nursery, but I don’t love them.”

“Agape?”

“Except for that, yeah. I mean down deep love like I feel for you and the team and our kids.”

“Congratulations, Private, you’ve matured. Love does that.”

I don’t love Marlene was on the tip of Private’s tongue. After shoving away the thought, he dove to the bottom of the pond where starlight could not reach. Ten minutes later, he surfaced to find Skipper paddling idly until the commander stopped dead in the water.

“Look over there.”

“It’s a mudbank, wot about it – oh. Penny’s sister died there.”

“You and Rico nearly died that day, too.”

“I guess we did. I don’t remember much about it.”

“I’ll never forget it.”

Private kissed Skipper’s cheek. “I know.”

From lighthearted fun to somber end of our date, Private mused, as Skipper continued.

“Private, if you consider how a relationship succeeds or doesn’t, then it’s not about two birds looking at each other but two birds looking at the same goal. Everything works excelente.” Private mulled this over before offering his thoughts.

“Or a bird and a dolphin because K’walski and Doris was so snakebit from the beginnin’ … gah. I’m startin’ to understand more why you like impersonal.”

“Right on, compadre. He loved her to hell and gone.”

“Wot about Rico and Xochi?”

Skipper paddled slower. “They blazed up in a flame I didn’t even try to control and maybe couldn’t. It was like hot tropic Guatemala acted as an accelerant oh I don’t know. I was fairly new to commanding and when Manfredi and Johnson died on our return trip from there, I, I – “

Private splashed water onto Skipper’s face. “Stop. I triggered awful memories and I’m ever so sorry. This evenin’ is supposed to be fun.”

“We’re swimming in deep waters, Private.”

“You can’t mean the pond, it’s only three meters – oh.”

“Take your time thinking. I didn’t learn all at once and I’m a work in progress, too.”

“I’ll think about relationships some more, Skippa.”

“Home?”

“Home, honey. Directly after some makin’ out.”

Marlene tugged at Nipple Number Four, rubbing the oil onto its ridged areola before shifting attention to Number Five. She made a bored face until her cheek twinged. Ow ouch ow! Skipper you don’t get to hit me like that again ever no way nohow for any reason unless it’s to save my life oh let it go girl. In the event of his voyaging to Overseas HQ, which he still wouldn’t disclose as to purpose and location, she would advise him before he departed on ship, blimp, sub, hot air balloon or plane that she was quitting the team. How ghastly last Wednesday had been! She ought to have had nightmares about it.

She didn’t. The mudfight eased tensions with no permanent disfigurement? Was that it?

She patted her cheek. Hmmm, a bit of oil ought to help, at least Mom and Dad would say so. Marlene dotted her digits with oil from her special gland and dabbed the sore spot. She closed her eyes to breathe deeply of natural, normal otter musk, welcome as flowers in May.

Her daily grooming finished, she hit the pond for seventeen laps, six deep dives and ended up floating peacefully on her back. What a superb sunny day! And guests to perform for in three hours, too, such fun that life offered, different than California, which had been pretty sweet.

“Can I – May I come – I mean, enter your habitat, Marlene?”

She answered Skipper without looking at him. “Sure.”

He aced a pike dive into the pond like a knife, no splash, barely a ripple. He stayed down three times longer than she could at her best. Was he avoiding her?

Finally, Skipper rose to swim on his back beside her. They breathed in tandem with no words until Skipper’s firm “You are my significant otter” broke the silence.

“You’re cute, too,” came the steady reply.

“So where do we stand?”

“You tell me.”

Marlene surveyed her chest; all six nipples hid inside like usual when she swam. Since Skipper liked when she did this, she swirled the fur over them coquettishly until she halted herself. “I think I need a fresh start.”

“Do that pronto and I’ll watch.”

She frowned. “I mean from both of us about our Thing because it’s out in the open with no secrets from the team, friends and fellow zoosters.”

“Aw, Marlene, I do touchy-feely like Chico Marx plays the harp.” Skipper slapped his feet louder than normal on the water’s surface. If he were a civilian, she would have called it a tantrum.

“I don’t expect perfection and hey, wait, didn’t Chico play the – “

“Exactly.”

She chewed on this for some time, paddling at his side. It was true, her love in flux for this penguin resembled the tides, sometimes out, sometimes in, always there. Over the past three days, she had come to grips with the notion of a longer lasting relationship than she had ever planned in her life. The challenge of how to keep it fresh proposed a more serious pathway that intrigued and puzzled her by turns.

“Play it by earhole, Commander McTerse.” Was that a flinch? “I mean,” she added more softly, “I don’t want to hear you gush or call me babe in public, I mean, well, how about a hug or paw squeeze now and then? Just to show others we’re together-together.”

He spun in the water in what looked like approval. “With no words? I can do no words because action is more my bag. All right, babe.” He held her paw. They sculled, hearing early morning zoo sounds, seeing the just born blue of the sky, feeling the cool water against their waterproof coverings, smelling the chlorine and tasting contentment.

“My cheek is still sore.” There came another flinch and he made to pull his flipper away, but she held onto it. “I’m not reporting to the Big Boss. You didn’t mean to hit so hard and, and I guess I’m daintier than I thought I was.”

“I’m sorry.” He leaned over for the smallest butterfly kiss in the world to her sore cheek and then inhaled her fur. “It’s all my fault.”

“Let’s move on.”

“You got it, babe.”

Ten minutes, three dives and one tandem porpoising around her pond perimeter later, they relaxed more into their usual casual chat.

“So you peeked at me before announcing yourself? Why?”

Skipper cleared his throat. “Simple recon. If you’d looked grumpy, I might have run away to visit another day. What were you doing, anyway?” He glanced at her tits.

“Are you sure you want to know? It’s touchy-feely.” She had the power to make a commander of commandos run away. Huh.

“Crap. I – I – yeah. Seguro. Bring it.”

It felt like a step in the right direction to tell him this in confidence. “I’m just out of heat and my nipples get sore at that time so I don’t oil them up and now I can and it feels good to massage them again.” She heard him swallow with a glunk.

“Okay? I guess? Thanks for telling me aw shit.”

Marlene chuckled. “You asked.”

“Mammals.”

“Rightarooney. Mammals.”

He tugged her nearer and leaned in to sniff her throat, ogling down her body. “I like how your tits look under water. They’re a holiday gift all wrapped up just for me to open.”

“Sniff all you want, you can’t smell my musk underwater.”

“Bet I can.” Without further words, he let loose her paw to stick his beak underwater.

She angled away from him before he choked himself sniffing. “Let’s stay in the friendzone, huh?”

“Not forever, I – I – um – “

Gah, what did he think? “No! Naturally not forever, I mean a little while longer. Not forever.” Time to change the subject. “How is the kids’ room progressing?”

“Want to come see? Like right now?” So eager he was, awwwwww. Teasing was called for.

“Well, no, I don’t, so some other time. Any missions upcoming from Overseas HQ?” If he said he planned to zip across the Big Pond for a top secrety-secret something-or-other with the Big Boss, she’d tell him here and now that she planned to quit. It would spoil their pleasant morning, though.

“No, all’s quiet on the Eastern Front. I decided not to bother Her Big Bossiness with our problems unless strictly necessary since the attempted coup in Atlantis, hell I didn’t mean to spew that so you didn’t hear anything, right?” Marlene shrugged and then nodded. All Atlantis meant to her was a hecka wordy song from a long time back before she was born. It was on the tip of her tongue to ask Skipper once more how old he was, but she’d be put off again so nah, not worth the breath. She appreciated a more confident Skipper than the one who dove into her pond thirty minutes ago. His voice stirred something deep inside her, something she tamped down as he continued.

“I’m positive we can work things out here in Central Park despite Roy, Burt and the whole damn zoo knowing our private business. Shit, the only worse sitch would be if humans found out.”

“Everyone has a bad day now and then. We tried our best to keep covert, Skipper.”

“We sure did! You were splendid!” She felt cheered by his cheerleading as he no doubt intended, the stinker. Dang, he was good at his job. Come to think of it, so was she as sometimes-commando. It couldn’t hurt to add to his stash of intel before she quit, she waffled.

“Speaking of last Wednesday’s mud fight – “

“Didn’t we move on, querida?”

“In a minute. I never thought that I’d join in the traditional Goodbye To Annual Flowers Mud Fight, but I did.”

He glanced sideways at her. “I can’t begin to parse that.”

Mom, give me words. “It’s a human tradition Mom and Dad told me about where a posse of friends planting rice flings mud on June 6th and the one getting the most mud stuck on is the most popular boy or girl in the paddy.”

“That would be you.” He was getting bolder and rubbed the pads on her palm as a short-lived tingle rippled through her. “You looked like a teddy bearus cutus gigundus afterwards.”

“You think? My pond filter got clogged when I washed it off and Maurice The Zookeeper had to put on scuba gear to clear it.”

He still stared at her chest. “Huh. How about that.”

“You look like Savio about to eat me, chest first.”

He shrugged until water washed over his throat. “I’m a boob bird.”

“A booby? Don’t they fly over ginormous oceans, fail intelligence tests and have blue feet?”

“Oh stop, you know what I mean. I never knew it before I got involved with a mammal.”

“You and I are pretty special.”

“Um. I meant Doris.”

“Oh.”

IOIOIOIOIO

Skipper yearned to twiddle Number Five Titty out of habit. Someday she would respond with enthusiasm, his gut just knew it. “And about that other thing, Doris’s nipples are naturally inverted inside her titty slit – “

“Stop! I don’t need to hear this. I’m not like you and want to bang just everybody I meet.”

Marlene, you have a huge, misshapen bent for exaggeration plus I have never given that impression, therefore you are wrong. “Hmmph. I do not. There’s a whole list I keep of unattractive species: flamingos, lions, zebras, hippos, giraffes, cockroaches – “

“Why not flamingos? You’re both birds.”

He had to come up with a reason? “Um, well, just going by Pinkie, they’re all sarcastic which would shrivel Little Skipper down to nothing. I’m good, but no bird is that good. The best sex begins in the think melon.”

Marlene snickered. “And proceeds downstairs – “

“Well, seguro, mi corazón. But it starts upstairs.”

“Agreed.”

“Little Seaman Recruit Skipper” – she made as if to flick the tip of his cock nestled in belly feathers and he twitched – “gets excited about boobs. I get that, I do.” She rubbed one ripped black shoulder, instead. “I get turned on by muscles.”

“Different strokes for different folks.” He sobered at an uncomfortable memory. “I overheard Chuck Charles and Bonnie Chang fight last year when they visited the zoo. They got it on for awhile right after we returned from Åland and then split up, you know.”

“How did you find out?”

“Don’t let my casual disinterest fool you. I know everything about Chuck Charles.” Chuck and Bonnie’s off duty zoo visit turned mean in that horrid pre-break up way. It seemed Chuck hollered Banzai! at certain inappropriate moments, while Bonnie’s inverted nipples formed part of the ammunition that Chuck fired indiscriminately with enough rancor to downgrade Skipper’s opinion of his favorite anchor team’s offcamera character. Skipper hadn’t liked reassessing two A-list humans, but their argument over something unfixable did add to his nipple intel. Eh, what was Marlene saying?

IOIOIOIOIO

“Siempre estaremos ahi para ti.”

“Huh? Who’s the ti and why not estoy?”

She had his full attention. Good. “Because it’s one for the money, two for the show, and three to get together-together in a relationship, as Mom and Dad drilled into me at puberty. The ti is the relationship while estaremos is you and me.” The next words left her lips before she could stop them and once she heard them aloud, she agreed with them as she flicked water onto his face. “Soy tu reina, mi rey.”

He choked out, “Nada es eterno, mi reina,” while his shoulders heaved and he squeezed her paw hard.

Comforting, she could do comforting. If he belonged to the zoo as much as he claimed, then she belonged to the relationship and making it work. “So we live each day as it comes, Skipper. If I can do it, you can, right?”

He nodded before he turned his face away from her, the softy. When he turned his face back after dunking it into the water, he mumbled, “Don’t bring all your sappy emotions to the table, Marlene, this is love.” The pond water had washed away what she absotively knew were tears.

She had thought of a followup to her loud raspberry at his words when he blindsided her with Routine Thirty-Two: Confuse And Distract. “Regarding boobs, more than a beakful is too much.”

Marlene bppppd another raspberry before replying. “Yeah, I get that when you keep going and going like the Energizer Bunny on mine even though it doesn’t do anything for me.”

He stayed quiet for a long time and she thought she heard him mutter Bonnie, forgive me for outing you but before she could ask, “Whaaaaat?” he blurted, “Your inverted nipples make it tough for me to please you, babe. I try hard.”

“Huh? I’ve never thought about it. Aren’t mine the way every other female mammal’s are?”

Oh good grief, he talked so fast she couldn’t make out the words easily. “Nopecauseyou’reanAsianshort-clawedotter.”

“Well, excuse me, I never looked at other nipples! I don’t swing that way! Gross gross gross.”

It seemed she deployed Routine Thirty-Two to confuse him. “I don’t – why can’t – understand – why gross, Marlene?”

A slurry of feelings swirled through her. “It. Just. Is. End of story.”

“I can’t fight your pre-conceived misconceptions.”

“Good.”

“Gotta go.” He disengaged, dove deep and then spiraled upwards from her pond into her plane tree. Wow, he seemed adrenaline charged by something because he’d never exited so powerfully before. Leaves pitter pattered down as he somersaulted onto the brick path.

“Bye!” she shouted.

“Bye!” came the echo, or maybe it was his reply. Whatever, she grumped to herself as she entered her cave. A friendly game of tiddly winks remained set up on the floor, prelude to well, whatever led to something or other. Eventually.

Marlene grabbed the squidger and snapped one wink, missing the oyster shell target cup by a mile before calming herself into showing her skills. She squoped and won the game against herself handily. It was okay, sort of restful.

It was good to have a quiet night like this once in a while.

“While my guitar gently weeps,” Skipper sang as he strummed the instrument while settling into his perch atop Roy’s head. “With every mistake we must surely be learning, still my guitar gently weeps,” he continued as the rhino’s exquisitely sensitive ears followed his every move. He played a few more chords and stopped singing when his voice cracked on the next chorus. He kept hold of the guitar neck with one flipper and self-medicated with the other. By the great Walter Reed, he had hurt Private in spirit and Marlene in body. There must be a way to fix things. He tried to sing, “I look at you all, see the love there that’s sleeping while my guitar gently weeps, I look at you all, still my guitar gently weeps,” and then quit for no reason he could name.

“Still worth it, bird?”

Skipper slumped between Roy’s horns, straddling the short one like Ringtail rode his Tuna Melt in what surely had been a boa-inspired hallucination. He snugged his spine against the longer horn in a comfortable curl as he tipped back the Unicum bottle for a long swig.

Worth it? Worth possibly damaging his reputation as protector of the zoo who let nothing come between him and the mission? The booze helped him think, in a way, maybe a scosche unfocused on some issues but deeper than before on others. He might indeed lose, in the following order: his reputation; the respect that his fellow zoosters showed for him as they approached him to solve their troubles; and last, the hard-earned, treasured regard from his Big Boss, who would call him to report in person regarding rumors of being as un-covert as you could get. He might have sacrificed his commander’s reputation in exchange for a family and for love both parental and romantic.

Worth it? He thought harder with his thumping skull until he had an answer.

Protectprotectprotect and sometimes, sacrifice.

“Seguro, Roy, it’s worth it. Not just yes but hell yes.”

Roy’s snort bobbled his head as Skipper held onto his sardine luncheon with both tonsils. “If you say so, Skipper. I’ll charge you rent if you spend any more time with me like in the last three days.” The rhino tittered at his little joke.

“I don’t get paid so you’d have to take it out of my hide.” Skipper let the guitar slip to the ground and ruffled his chest feathers idly, pressing down his scar until he hissed. That pain wasn’t too bad today; the ulcers were worse.

Roy swung his head again as Skipper belched fumes of Hungarian liqueur said to be healthful for digestive problems. “Poor baby.”

“Yeah, poor me. I’ve got two partners, two kids, two dead soldiers on my conscience and I see two of you, Roy. Will you stop it with the head swinging? I’m about to hurl.”

“Don’t, bird.”

“Like I could brrrrroosh help myself. I’m warning you.”

Similar to Bossy The Mini Holstein Cow in the Children’s Petting Zoo, Roy sagged down for an afternoon rest on his belly, knees bending first, hips skyward and then folding underneath him. He lay his chin flat onto the dried mud of his paddock. “Better, old friend?”

“Hrrrkbuuupltz. Don’t do that again without telling me, old friend. Maurice The Zookeeper will need to hose you off if I lose control of my gut. Zzzrtm. Mmmm.” Skipper sprawled his legs wider around the lower horn. Laziness he would discipline out of his troops enfolded him like swirling schools of krill that would attract Antarctic toothfish which he would hunt on a sortie in the Ross Sea.

Skipper scratched the back of his neck. Say, did he eat breakfast? He thought as hard as he could and blammo, there came the headache. No, no breakfast, just chug a lugged some water and then out for “patrol” with nary a backward glance at his team or his kids. A quick slide around the zoo ensured that all was well and thank whatever powers that be, nobody hooted woo woo loverboy or anything of that nature.

After the hullabaloo three days ago, every zooster knew of goings on in the otter and penguin habitats, so the next question was natural. Skipper himself would have asked it if his and Roy’s situations reversed. The commander steeled himself for what he must say next.

“So how are Private and Marlene?”

He had rehearsed this. “They are each fine as individuals. Together wise, they eye each other like schnookettes at a debutante cotillion waiting to see which poor schnook will ask a schnookette to dance so every animal will know that heretofore mentioned schnookette is not a wallflower. Guess who the schnook is, Roy, huh? Guess!”

Roy waved his ears in lieu of bobbing or snorting. “You.”

“Don’t be shy, Roy. Say what you really think.”

Roy laughed until Skipper joined in with rueful chuckles. “So you nixed the missions that day, yeah?”

Skipper scowled, swinging the Unicum bottle before taking another snort. “I did. Regrouping my team comes first before fixing the clock, envying Gus’s tools or visiting damn bunnies like Private wanted to do.”

“Private, er, is he, um – good?”

“Absolutely, he’s good – oh. That way. I don’t kiss and tell, Roy.”

“Sorry. I already know about Marlene and wondered about him.”

“What? How in the hell would you know that?”

Roy waggled his ears until their movement made Skipper dizzy. “You two made an ingewikkeld racket on May Day. Burt and I didn’t want to say anything.”

“Holy – Burt, too?”

“Well, bird, between his ears and mine, well. Yeah.”

“Shit.”

“Uh huh.”

Skipper tapped the cap onto the Unicum, slithered down from Roy’s head with an ow damn headache when he landed and replaced the guitar and Unicum behind the photobooth, muttering all the while. “Don’t ask me anymore if it’s worth it, Spikenose. It is, but don’t ask me please.”

“You got it, buddyboy. See you later?”

“I dunno, maybe. Maybe it’s date night? I dunno.” At Roy’s throat clearing and opening his mouth to speak, he added, “Don’t ask me who with, either!”

“Chill, bird. I can keep my mouth shut.”

Skipper patted the sturdy leg of his friend before stopping with an ouch bad move Skipper at the jarring movement. “It’s one of the things I like about you. Does it bother you to keep secrets from Burt?”

“No. I don’t ask him about Paris and he doesn’t ask me about Tijuana.”

“Excelente. That’s the way to keep friends, well, enough introspection, ‘bye.”

IOIOIOIOIO

As Skipper approached his home with stolid resolve to wring enjoyment from this Saturday however he could, he witnessed that Rico burped something up for Kowalski and passed it to him. The leader swam slowly through the pond, willing his ulcers to remain quiet after their medicinal liqueur treatment. Instead of jetting out of the water like he generally did, he clambered up with one flipper, then the other and then one leg at a time onto the faux floe. Kowalski stayed involved with some problem and did not helicopter over him for once.

“Sir, Tactic bit me.”

Skipper burst out laughing, then held his hungover head. “Ow. Remind me to check my sense of humor at the door. Kowalski, Tactic is a kid.”

“Easy for you to say. He drew blood, see?” The tip of Kowalski’s flipper showed red until he slapped Rico’s Band-Aid over it. “That’s my smartphone dialing and computer poking appendage, too.”

Rico held Tactic firmly as he asked the tot face to face, “Jefepank?”

The isabelline baby hiccupped to the awwws of Rico and Skipper. Kowalski glared at the lad. “Not awwww, Tactic, not at all. That hurt Daddy.”

“JefenTikkipayfy,” said Rico as he went into his favorite play with his son.

Skipper and Kowalski stood a little apart from the demo expert who swung Tactic round and round Rico’s substantial waist like Lindbergh landing in Paris. When Rico stopped spinning, he brought Tactic’s belly to his beak and bzzzzzed against it, to the baby’s delight.

Kowalski and Skipper observed with the nipping experience still simmering between them.

“That little … little … oh I can’t say it. That hurt, sir.” Kowalski put his flipper into his pit and looked aggrieved.

“Kids can hurt us and not mean to, compadre.“

“But after all we do for them! It’s not fair! It’s, it’s, almost Gentoo of them!” Kowalski pulled out his flipper to examine it. The Band-Aid had absorbed any blood but Skipper bet it still stung.

“Pain is part of life. Forget about it, pendejo,” murmured Skipper.

Kowalski ducked his head. “You haven’t called me that since we – “

“Aw, hell, I call you that because I love you.” Skipper cut Kowalski off as he watched Private toss the thongs from flipper to flipper as he skipped around the island before approaching them.

“Wh-What?”

“Agape, pendejo, agape.”

“Oh. Right back at you, sir.”

Private moved towards Skipper in a way that could only be called a mince. The young penguin displayed a school girlish grin which Skipper mirrored while answering Kowalski without looking at him directly. “And about that other thing, I remember, you know. It’s been awhile since Guatemala, but I remember.”

“A lot has transpired since then.”

“Yup. Private, you look chipper.” Private threw him a saucy glance before slingshotting both thongs into his love’s face. Kowalski thought that Doctor Phil would have detected a twinge of malice in the throw as Skipper laughed shortly and let the things hit him.

Rico guffawed as he bounced Tactic and Kowalski joined in guffawing, a little too loudly. Sally remained slumbering in between the scientist’s legs.

“Honey, it’s super to be rid of these thongs, no offense, K’walski. Now we can cuddle our babies to our heart’s content.” He offered a meaningful look to his commander. “And get back to normal or new normal, wotever you want to call it.”

He goosed his commander and tsked at the resulting jump.

“Whoa now!” gasped Skipper.

Private wilted. “I’ll stop if you don’t like – “

“Did I say I didn’t like it?” Skipper gestured to Sally between Kowalski’s legs. “We don’t need to plant seeds in Her Ladyship’s teensy mind with sleep teaching, though. So later, okay?”

Private’s lower beak quivered. “R-Righto. Later.” He turned as if to leave and then turned back. “A d-date?”

Skipper caved. “If you say so.”

“A d-date. A d-date. A da-” and then Skipper and Kowalski couldn’t hear his tiny voice any more as he retreated down the ladder with stumbling steps.

“Poor kid.”

Kowalski looked to have forgotten about his injury. “Why so?”

“He’s adulting like crazy. Makes me – “

“Sad? Nostalgic? What, sir?”

“Horny.”

It was Kowalski’s turn to laugh, but he didn’t. “Color me unsurprised. Sir.”

Skipper’s Log: This is the entry I dreaded. I’ll send it to the Big Boss at some point.

Maybe.

The second I said that Marlene could crash sometimes in the old space that we plan to fix up for the kids, steam came out of Private’s earholes. My Åland scar ached like it never did before, not bad like this, anyway. It took all I had not to rub my chest and show the others that I was in pain, the pain I would not feel if Private had not saved my life that day at Kastelholm; I would be at peace, dead peaceful peace. No pain and no pleasure, either, just Godmother Death punting my corpse into the Eternally Foggy Sea and then it’s swim like a flashy tarpon for the Endless Iceberg. I hope I make it there someday to chitchat with Manfredi and Johnson. They never endured such goings on like these, I am positive. They mastered the love ’em and leave ’em technique.

I also would have been dead if Marlene had not pulled my unconscious self from grody sewage.

My chest scar throbs.

See, most everybody interprets scars as evidence that a leader has lived dangerously. I dismiss one hundred per cent the assertion that scars likely prove a leader has lived dumbly. Whoever says that knows nothing of the masculine principle.

And I am one hundred per cent Antarctican male.

I owe Private as much as I owe Marlene. Hell, I owe Rico and Kowalski and even Ringtail my life.

All that introspection faded away as I spluttered, “We’re not getting anywhere. I’m heading right now for transport. Kowalski, find me transport.”

“As you wish.” Mi segundo gestured to Rico and the two who cradled my kids between their legs, borne on loving feet, headed out of Marlene’s habitat. Rico boosted Kowalski up onto the top of the habitat fence, gentle as always to save the little from tipping out of a snug abode. Kowalski hauled up his love easily and they both turned away from me.

My jitters increased by a factor of twenty-seven. “What was that you said, Kowalski? Why does it sound familiar – is it from Doctor Phil?”

“No.” The negative response contained nary a sir, which was unlike Kowalski. It even sounded like a Spanish no, short and hard and sharp with a definite punto at the end. Again, unlike him. Rico would not meet my eyes and the last I saw of the two of them was a flirty tail flick as they gained the top of the habitat fence before disappearing onto the brick path. They carried with them my, well, our kids, excelente to protect my darlings from tense, unhappy vibes.

I turned to Private and Marlene, Private simmering and Marlene at a slow, steady boil. Damn.

I raised my flipper to signal Team, assemble, but no one was looking my way. They cut me out of the picture as they flayed each other with cutting looks, hyperventilating until they sounded like the Lionel train set we had given Eggy and his sibs for Kidsmas huhshoosh huhshoogh huhshoosh.

Flashbacks from various loves swam before my eyes, Private first, shy and then bold in turns as I ushered him into sexual maturity and he helped me sustain mine. Doris? Why would I remember Doris? I must be losing it.

One thing Doris could not do without harm to me and Marlene could do with appealing warmth was to drape herself all over my back, clinging and purring when it was time for me to leave. Doris’ skin was surprisingly smooth to the touch but Marlene’s fur suited my feathers better.

I groaned. I’d better watch it or this friends with benefits thing with Marlene would get out of control. That must not happen. The secret must be maintained only, only now it wasn’t, not anymore and I’d failed to keep my team from upset.

What was Marlene saying?

“Private, today is Mature Grain In Beard Day so let’s try maturity on for size, huh? How about it?”

“Marlene, wotever that means I’m not buyin’ it. You took him from me.”

“You didn’t want him in your bed. I did.”

“We are parents and that will never change.”

“Who wants it to change? I like your littles, I’m no monster. I like kids even if I don’t have any or expect to.”

I asked, “Can the rag doll say something?” I did not raise my voice because I didn’t need to. They both seemed to crave a break from battle. Battle. Today was D-Day Memorial Day and Marlene’s haul out spot could stand in for Omaha Beach. I had to direct this my way and by Eisenhower’s oatmeal, I would win, for the team’s sake and mine.

Two pairs of eyes burned into me. I half expected otter and penguin to tell me to butt out of their sparring. “Well?” they both began and then glared at each other. I rubbed my chest in the pretense of drawing a deeper breath than normal, but the ache continued.

“Private, I’m sorry to have hurt you. I never would on purpose, but you are hurt. Marlene, we tried to keep us covert and failed. It’s all on me.”

Looking back, Log, I reasoned that saying sorry would solve a great deal and I was a fool to think that.

What happened next leveled the playing field and I saw was a good thing, once I got my temper under control.

“Oh no you don’t, Skipper, no you don’t! Grabbing all the blame for yourself – no!” And Marlene scooped up a pawful of mud to fling at me. I ducked and it hit Private, who had waddled behind me and had his beak open to say something sweet or cloying or, alternatively, bitchy, I wasn’t sure.

“Awwwrk ptooey so it’s like that, is it?” And then Private hurled a double ice cream scoop’s worth of soppy mud at Marlene over my head as I scrambled out of the way. This was good, this was perfect to get out steam, as effective as Team Building Week’s simple competition that determined the weakest link. It was time for the leader to step out of the line of fire and take notes.

“If I want him” – Marlene shrieked and oh hell, Ringtail and the other lemurs perched on the so-called King’s throne to watch this foofaraw – “and you want him” –

“He was mine first!” hollered Private. “I love him!”

“I love him, too!” Marlene dodged the main blob Private flung but the sloppy edges of it spackled her white cheeks.

Private pitched mud with both flippers and stomped his feet, too, really throwing a tantrum like he had not done since age three. My love resembled a dervish spinning out of control as mud streamed towards Marlene, blob after gobbet after clod like an overclocked Osterizer.

Uh oh, now Ringtail’s squalls of delight added sound effects that I would give a great deal not to hear.

Too bad this sitch was no longer covert.

“So it’s like that, is it?” bellowed Marlene and tackled Private like Refrigerator Perry. The two rolled and kicked. Somebody would get hurt.

My other love looked to be getting the better of Private, no, it was Private on top because the mud blurred their bodies into a single thing I could not recognize.

“Now cut that out!” I squawked and stormed over to them and they both stopped. There, my rep as commander stayed secure –

Fwap came the mud ball in my direction and then a sploopsh dotted my front as Marlene and Private ganged up on me. They ripped up the greensward; every groundskeeper repairing this habitat would wonder why on earth one little otter destroyed a third of her nice fescue grass.

“You belong to me!” Marlene tossed a blob really hard at my crotch, ow. She was on top of Private now, still covering him head to toe. Her amber eyes edged towards the sickly yellow that Anakin Skywalker showed when he fell to the Dark Side.

“You belong to me!” Private threw underhand and caught me on top of my head because I had bent over to protect my crotch.

It was time to show what a really good actor I was. “Ow ouch owwie! I don’t belong to either of you! I’ll never belong to anything but the zoo and my team! Never, do you hear?” This was it, my coup de grass. I didn’t have anything else to offer, my back was against the wall and the stakes were as high as the ones in Atlantis long ago.

Bring it.

Private still huffed indignantly when Marlene answered my rhetorical question. “I hear.” She disentangled herself from Private, helping him up, and then they faced me.

I was ready.

“I belong – “

“To the zoo. Yeah, Private and I get it.”

Marlene and Private stood shoulder to shoulder as they parsed their way through my acting.

“So, Skipper, it’s the team first and always will be?” Marlene’s challenge did not faze me.

“Seguro, mi dulce.”

“Skippa, make me understand. I want to.” There was my little Private, unofficial Morale Officer! I nearly cried until I swallowed hard.

“I belong to the zoo, my team and since you both are part of my team, I belong to you, too. I refuse to get into an exclusive arrangement because I want you both and if that is okay with you, we’ll keep on keeping on.” I’ll push for the kids’ room sometimes starring Marlene later, if I know what’s good for me.

Marlene glanced around the zoo and then pressed her dirty paws together, bobbing like she was delivering a satnam ji. “Julien stopped watching us. He’s such a drama whore.”

“We three gave Julien a run for his money today, Marlene.” Private’s voice was soft and he resembled Tactic because he was covered in brown mud. A blob fell from his beak and he wiped the residue off, looking thoughtful. “I don’t understand yet, Skippa. I’ll work on it. I don’t want to lose you.”

Marlene regarded her love straight on. “Did you really expect us to knuckle down to your idea of belonging, Skipper?”

“At least without a fight?” Private’s voice sounded stronger, good for him.

And now I wasn’t acting. “I don’t know. I hoped we could work things out, but” – I softened my answer at the last second from I was prepared for another breakup or two – “I don’t want to lose either of you and did the best I could.”

Marlene retreated with incomprehensible words and a look I had never seen on her. “I wish I could say I remembered today holds the Mud Battle Custom saying goodbye to Annual Flowers until next year. I wish I could, but I can’t. Catch you later, guys. I’m outta here.”

“What?”

“Never mind. Buh bye.” And she disappeared into her interior habitat without washing up in her pond, huh. I really gave her food for thought. Her swollen face stabbed my conscience and I rubbed my chest hard to make it hurt more.

“Let’s go home, Skippa.”

So, Log, the battle ended in a draw, or maybe we all won. I’m hopeful but not sure about our future and since introspection is not my bag, I’ll let it go at that so help me Walter Cronkite.

And that’s the way it is on Wednesday, June Sixth.