CROC'S ORIGIN TWO

In the following weeks, Harlan traveled to town more times than he had in the entirety of his life. Each time, with a babe, and, each time, there was no sign of its mother.

He got better at figuring out what the boy needed, and developed a routine: feed the babe, change the babe, clean the babe, repeat. As soon as he had that down, the boy rarely cried, just as his mother had claimed.

His grandson was a curious thing. Always watching and mimicking. Whenever Harlan would say something, he would babble back in the same tone. His chubby hand was always up, pointing out things, and asking questions in that odd language composed of gurgles, coos, and spit bubbles. What is this? Who is that? Then, in the truck, where are we going?

Harlan answered him as if he understood every word. That's a glovebox. Those are my keys. We're going to town to look for your mama. Yeah, I know, she is a tough woman to track down. Why, yes, I'd love to tan her hide too.

While Harlan searched, he stocked up on supplies, buying things he never thought he'd have to buy. Tiny clothes, including a suit; no way could he have his grandson parading around town in that getup he'd had on. Some extra bottles, so he could prepare ahead of time. A hand-cranked blender, to make it easier to mash up vegetables for the boy to eat. Though, the amount of teeth in that T Crocodile suggested Harlan wouldn't need it much longer. He found himself on aisles full of toys and books, and—before Harlan knew it—he'd spent a quarter of his savings.

So much for retirement.

There was something more nerve racking about being in town with the babe. It was bad enough when he'd been by himself. Now, he had someone even more defenseless than him relying on his protection. Because of this, after the third week, he limited his trips to every other day. Then, as time passed, they started going on Saturdays only. Then every other Saturday. Then once a month.

When the boy turned a year old, Harlan made him a cake and took pictures with the Polaroid camera he'd bought for the occasion. That's when he discovered T Croc's love of chocolate and spent more money adding candy bars to the stockpile.

He sang him the songs Mama had sung, then they sang them together as the boy learned the sounds. Harlan watched him grow like a miracle, each milestone making his chest swell with such an intense pride it sometimes escaped in sobbing laughter. His T Crocodile. His kin.

He took him everywhere he went. When he tended the garden, Croc played in the dirt. When he just sat on the deck, Croc sat with him, watching the swamp with a look that made Harlan smile. Because he knew that look. That feeling, and for the first time since his Papa died, he had someone around who could appreciate the things most folks turned their noses up at.

It was in the boy's blood.

Harlan discovered a kind of love he never thought he'd experience, but the more it grew, the more terrified he became.

As the babe aged, so did he.

On his seventy-fourth birthday, he got boxes from town, and began packing.

"What did Pappy say about getting too close to the water?" he asked the boy, who was hanging off the edge of the dock, looking ready to fall in head first.

Croc jumped to his feet and scampered toward him. At four years old, he was level with Harlan's hip. "Alligators think Croc's a snack." Even as he said it, he glanced over his shoulder, back to the water as if it had called his name.

Harlan sighed. It was getting harder and harder to keep up with his grandson. Like the tortoise and the hare, his legs were longer, but that boy was steadily moving, and all Harlan wanted to do was nap. "Get your shoes on, T Croc. Pappy's got to go to town."

"Again?" Croc asked, already sprinting to do as told. They'd gone just last week, but time was running out.

What would happen if he died out here, and the boy was left alone? He'd end up sick, malnourished, or worse, gator food. At the first sign of illness, Harlan would be ready to hand him over to anybody, just to ensure the boy wasn't alone. His Mama was nowhere to be found. He'd be surprised if she were even in the same state. Everyone he asked said they hadn't seen or heard from her in years, and—from the information he had—there was no other family left to contact.

He didn't want to leave his swamp, but Harlan had put it off long enough. It wasn't as important as the babe, and if he had to leave to ensure his safety, then that was all there was to it. He'd find them a place in town, then he'd begin searching, getting to know folks, until he found someone he could trust to take over once he was gone.

Croc sprinted out the door, flying past Harlan to hop onto the fan boat. "Can Croc drive?"

Harlan grinned, then—much slower than the boy had moved—joined him on the boat and set him up in front of him. "Alright, T Croc. You know what to do."

* * *

Harlan slowed as they entered town. He had to; there were too many people. Lines piled out of shop doors, spilling down sidewalks, and into the street. The truck crept through at a glacial pace, the people pausing to stare before they'd move.

The outside world was always changing, but it had never declined so fast. A man slapped the back of the truck as it passed, and Harlan gripped the wheel tighter to stop himself from trembling.

"Hey! You got any more food?" a woman asked as she walked alongside his window. When Harlan didn't answer, she tapped it with her finger nail. "Hey! Old man! What, you too good to talk to us?"

"Pappy?" T Croc whispered. Someone hit the side of the truck with both hands, and the boy jumped. "Pappy!"

"It's alright." Harlan thought about the loaded gun beneath his seat but pulling it out felt like too big a bite to chew. The last thing he needed was to escalate the situation.

The crowds thickened as more people lost interest in the stores and focused on them. They blocked the way, crowded around him as if he were the God who'd forsaken them.

Harlan put the truck in park and took a deep breath. He focused on the wheel as the horde buzzed like a swarm of angry bees. "T Croc." He turned and bent, leveling himself with the boy. "Pappy wants you to close your eyes, then keep them closed. Can you do that?"

The boy clenched his eyes tight, and three fat tears escaped to roll down his cheeks.

Harlan wiped them away with his thumbs. "There, now, no need to fuss. Pappy will protect you." But even as Harlan said it, he could hear the fear in his own voice. How could he protect him? What could he possibly do?

The boy nodded, and Harlan cracked his window, addressing the person directly outside it. "Y'all are scaring my grandson."

"You got any food?" the woman asked again, less hostile than she'd been. Despite her found manners, the crowd simmered with hostility.

"I sold what I had last week."

"Then why are you here?" she snapped. "To buy? Ain't you got enough already?"

A commotion broke out beyond the crowd, but Harlan couldn't see what it was past the masses. The woman's attention turned with the others, like bugs to a light.

"They closed the store!" someone shouted.

A crash sounded, glass shattering, then like water through a hole in the boat, bodies spilled. Harlan caught glimpses of people fighting their way inside the market. T Croc got smaller as he shrunk into the seat, hugging his knees, and burying his face into them. Harlan pulled the truck into drive and used the opportunity to break through. He held the brake as he revved the engine, warning everyone to get the hell out of the way. It was now or never.

A few stumbled sideways, then scrambled as he kept moving. The crowd roared, bangs erupting as they pounded the sides of the truck, the windshield, the side mirrors.

T Croc began to sob.

"Cover your ears, boy." Harlan reached between his legs and retrieved the pistol, placing it in his lap for easier access. His mind shouted commands like an army that didn't know which side it was on. The urge to hit the brake was nearly impossible to ignore. He didn't want to hurt nobody, but he couldn't let them hurt the babe.

A rock hit the windshield, splintering the glass. "Hold on!" Harlan gripped the boy's shirt and pulled him into his side, his other arm stretching as he braced himself. Then he closed his eyes and hit the gas hard.

Screams erupted as the truck bounced and rocked. Harlan imagined he was on the dirt road. They were potholes. That was all. Just potholes. He imagined those forgotten houses returned to their former glory. Friendly waves from all who sat on their sprawling front porches.

When the rocking stopped, he opened his eyes, finding a path clear enough for him to gun through. Tires squealed. The back-end fishtailed. But he didn't let off the gas. He ran the truck like it wasn't meant to run until he'd made it off the main strip, then he circled around and took the long way back to the dirt road. The whole time, he watched the rear view, waiting for someone to chase him down. But, with cars being a luxury most townsfolk no longer had, he knew there was little chance of that.

When they made it to the boat, he threw the gear into park and got out, taking the boy with him as if he were still just a babe. "You can open your eyes now."

It took a moment for Croc to comply. His cheeks were wet, his chin trembling. He cracked one eye open, glanced around, before he relaxed a fraction and looked to Harlan.

"Are you alright?" Harlan asked.

Croc nodded. "Pappy protected Croc." Each word was separated by a choked, hiccupping sound, his tiny body shaking so hard, he was practically vibrating.

Harlan sucked in a deep, shuddering breath, pressed his grandson's face to his shoulder, and started for the boat. Yes, he had protected him, but barely. There was no way of knowing how long he had left on this Earth, and, after today, he no longer had a viable plan for what happened once he was gone.

He only knew one thing for certain: town was no place for his grandson.

"That's Pappy's job."

* * *

Harlan Bordeaux held his grandson on his hip as he watched the fan boat drift aimlessly away from the mouth of the canal.

"Pappy? Why does the boat have to go away?"

"We don't need it anymore." Harlan set him down, then squatted to eye level. "You see this spot, where the big water starts?"

Croc nodded.

"That's where our world ends and theirs begins. Pappy doesn't want you to cross that line. Even if Pappy isn't here to tell you."

"No more town?"

Harlan paused, then took the boy's hand and started the long walk back home. "We don't need town anymore."

Even as he said it, he knew it wasn't true. He did need town. Desperately. He needed people who were sane. But the town he'd once known was insanity, and the few people he might have trusted were long dead.

So, he took the babe home with him for the last time. He fed him, cleaned him, sang to him, rocked him to sleep, then stayed with him through the night, planning how he could protect him, even after he was gone.

* * *

In the coming months, Harlan did his best to build the boy's independence. He taught him to dress himself, bathe himself, collect his own food from the garden and help prepare it. Harlan soon realized that there were certain tasks T Croc couldn't do, no matter how smart he was. His hands were too small, his coordination not developed, and Harlan was pushing him too hard.

"It's all right. It's all right," Harlan said as T Croc threw an ear of corn across the kitchen. It hit the wall with a hard smack, then fell to the floor, rolling beneath the table.

Harlan had been trying to teach the boy how to shuck it, but no matter how hard T Croc yanked, he wasn't strong enough to remove the husk.

His face was red, hands fisted at his sides, as he huffed like an angry hen about to lay an egg.

"It's all right." Harlan pulled the boy in for a hug and patted his back, then gave him a little shake, as if he could rattle the frustration away. "You're doing good. Pappy is proud of you. Let's focus on something else for a while."

So they did, and Harlan stopped pushing quite as hard. Like it or not, there were things that would take time; Harlan just hoped he had enough.

He did his best to leave the stockpile alone, only pulling from the shelf to see if the boy could use the can opener, or rip open a package, and once he succeeded in both those tasks, Harlan let them sit. Croc would need them, should anything happen.

They tended the garden together, and Harlan showed him all the basics to keep the harvest coming: the planting, the weeding, the watering, the picking. It was high on the list of things the boy needed to learn, and Croc's natural curiosity helped a great deal.

That same curiosity was a mountain Harlan felt too old to climb. No matter how many times he warned him, the boy wouldn't stay away from the water. He was drawn to it, to the shadows lurking beneath its surface, and the gators hidden in plain sight.

Harlan's scolding did no good. He tried to explain the danger, but the boy didn't hear him. Didn't listen. Harlan tried to watch him, but his body couldn't keep up like it used to. Like the world outside, he wasted away. It got harder to tend the garden, then nearly impossible to even walk to it. He found himself taking unwanted naps, oversleeping in the mornings, and barely managing to get dinner on the table at night. Then, on a particularly hard day, when Harlan was too tired to leave his spot on the couch, Croc began to shout.

"Pappy! Pappy!"

Harlan jolted awake, barely registering what he'd heard past the sleep still clouding his brain.

Then the boy shouted again—"Pappy!"—and the front door flew open with a bang.

Croc ran inside, a fish held out with both hands, smiling from ear to ear. "Croc caught a fish!"

Harlan struggled upright, his heart hammering against his ribs as he imagined every other reason the boy might have shouted for him. He envisioned waking to find the boy in the jaws of a gator, or worse, missing. "What did Pappy say about the water!" Harlan roared.

Croc flinched.

Harlan had never yelled at him. He'd always strived to remain patient, no matter how hard it'd been at times. But his fear got the best of him. "The water is dangerous! Why won't you listen to Pappy!"

Croc's chin wobbled, and he bowed his head.

Harlan watched his shoulders shake as he began to cry, then heaved a sigh loud enough to wake the dead. "T Croc." His voice was softer, echoing all his failure and his fatigue. "Come here."

Croc sniffled, wiped his nose on his arm, still holding the fish, then stepped forward without lifting his head.

"Sit down. Let Pappy at least get a look at this big ol' fish you caught." He took the carp and had to admit it was quite large for such a small catcher. He held it up, noting the weight, then sighed again as he lowered it to his lap.

Like it or not, he was dying. He wouldn't make it as long as he'd hoped. He wouldn't last the six years he'd determined necessary for the boy to not need him. He'd be lucky if he made it to his next birthday. "Pappy shouldn't have yelled at you like that."

Croc sniffed, then wiped his nose again.

"Look at me, T Croc."

The boy's head lifted, and in his shiny eyes, Harlan saw every day they'd spent together. From the first, to today. If Harlan were younger, and things were different, he may have rejoiced in his grandson's catch. He might have swallowed the nerves and chocked it up to kids will be kids. But Croc wouldn't get to be a kid. Not much longer.

"Pappy's just worried something is going to happen to you. That's all."

"But Pappy will protect—"

"Pappy won't always be here." It was something he'd never said aloud, not wanting to take away the boy's sense of security, but he couldn't put it off any longer. He needed to say it. He needed to figure out a way to make the babe understand.

Harlan sat the fish on the side table, grimacing at the mess it created but unwilling to interrupt the conversation he'd only just conjured the courage to have.

He settled back into the cushions, pulling Croc with him. "People don't stay around forever."

Croc was quiet for a long time. He let Harlan rock him, mulling over what he'd said. "Will Pappy go like the boat?" His voice was so small, Harlan barely heard him.

"No. Not like the boat." Harlan searched his brain for the best way to explain it. "You know how when Pappy has you working hard in the garden, you sleep extra good at night?"

Croc nodded.

"Well, Pappy's been working that garden for a long, long time, and, one day, he'll be so tired he won't wake up. That's just how it is. It's what happens to everybody. If they're lucky, that is, and they don't get eaten by an alligator first."

Croc pondered this, not missing the hidden scolding in Pappy's explanation. "Then Croc will be all alone?"

Harlan held the boy tighter so he wouldn't look up and see him crumbling. Yes, he would be alone. There was nothing Harlan could do to stop it. All his life, especially his later years, he'd thought that, as long as he had his swamp, he would die in peace. But, now, Harlan's one true love was no longer the cypress trees, with their Spanish moss, or the murky water, or the wildflowers, or the smells, or the sounds of gators, birds, and bugs. His one true love had come too late; a babe he never thought he'd have.

"Not all alone," Harlan choked when he finally managed to speak. "Pappy will still be here. You just won't be able to see me."

"Will Pappy hear me?"

Harlan thought on that. "Yes, but you won't hear Pappy. That's why you have to remember the things Pappy told you and keep yourself safe. Once Pappy falls asleep, it's up to Croc to protect himself, and take care of the swamp, the garden, and our home."

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