Catfish was having a panic attack.

She was pacing back and forth, trying to control her breathing. The morning had gone so wrong, so so wrong, and she felt like she would be held personally responsible. The doors to the corridor opened and Robin walked in, looking around for her before seeing her and walking briskly in her direction. Catfish stopped and leaned against the lockers, covering her face, her eyes a bright red mess as Robin stopped in front of her, the two girls looking at one another. No words were even necessary, the silent gazes said it all. Catfish had been part of a show called "A Greater Porpoise", wherein a child was invited to get into the pool arena with the trainer and a dolphin to perform simple tricks, delight the crowd and give the child long lasting happy memories. But these memories would instead be ones they would have to eventually repress in therapy, because the whole thing had gone horribly awry when the dolphin dragged the small boy down into the water and wouldn't let go. And the only reason things hadn't gone more south? Hadn't ended in tragedy? That was because Fletcher had been on break and was watching, and when he saw what happened, he dove right in, and punched the dolphin in the face, allowing the child to be released.

There were many things Fletcher hadn't expected to do in his life, but punching a dolphin probably topped the list.

                                                                                                          ***

"Am I in trouble?" Fletcher asked, sitting in Nelly's office as she sat behind her desk, staring at him; Fletcher continued, "cause, I mean, okay, I did punch a dolphin in the face, but I only did it to save a child, so I feel like it's kind of justified?"

Nelly didn't say a word, she just kept staring.

"Your silence is terrifying, did you know that? It's like when my mom used to get mad," Fletcher said, "please say something. Please say anything. Seriously, I am begging you, literally say any word. Say toilet. Say amphibian. I don't care JUST TALK."

Nelly finally cracked and started howling with laughter, only confusing Fletcher further, who now scooted away from the desk a bit.

"Okay, now I kind of wish you'd stayed silent, you sound manic," Fletcher said.

"Do you have any idea what you just did?" Nelly asked, finally getting herself back under control, wiping at her eyes with her jacket sleeve, "seriously, do you? Because, yes, there's going to be some fringe group that will be upset at the punch, but more than that, everyone saw a staff member of this zoo jump into the arena without hesitation to protect a child. Do you have any idea what that's going to do to our reputation?"

"Is it good?" Fletcher asked, "I mean, people like kids, right? So saving a kid is a good thing?"

"People do generally like kids, yes," Nelly said, "Fletcher, we need to have some kind of ceremony, some kind of...kind of very public ceremony where you can be awarded for your valor and bravery."

"I don't have to wear a sash do I?" Fletcher asked, "Do I get the key to the zoo? Is there a giant key I could be awarded with?"

Nelly stood up and walked to a nearby filing cabinet, pulled out a drawer and started rooting through it, searching for something in particular. Fletcher sat still in his chair and watched with a confused look on his face. After a few minutes of fingering through files, Nelly finally grasped something and tugged it free from the drawer, tossing it onto the desk.

"You ever hear of Amber Dwyer?" she asked.

"...no?" Fletcher asked.

"Yeah, nobody has, because Amber Dwyer effectively doesn't exist," Nelly said, walking back to her desk and seating herself again, "I mean, okay, that sounded more cryptic than I anticipated. She's very much a real person, but she's done everything in her power to make it seem as though she doesn't exist. Scrubbed herself from the world to the best of her abilities. She worked at a zoo called Zooventure."

Fletcher raised a single eyebrow, and Nelly nodded.

"I know," she continued, "it sounds like the name of a zoo in a movie. It's awful. Anyway, while there, she was the reptile handler there, and one day, she was giving a little tour to elementary school kids at the Komodo Dragon exhibit. Well, one kid, let's call him Jason, decides he's not afraid of the Komodo Dragon."

"Sounds like something someone named Jason would believe," Fletcher said.

"Jasons are universally idiots, it's true," Nelly said in response, nodding in agreement, "so Jason slips away from the group, goes around the rail and gets into the exhibit. So, Amber, in the midst of all the screaming and shouting from adults and classmates alike, hops into the exhibit after him, because at this point, Jason is now pinned against the wall in terror as this enormous fucking lizard approaches him with a malicious intent in his eyes. Jason is pissing his pants."

"Jason would," Fletcher said.

"And Amber, surprising everyone, tackles the goddamn thing to the ground," Nelly said, "and at first, everyone was in awe of her, giving her praise, thanks, everything you can imagine. Until animal rights groups stepped in because, well, the Komodo Dragon is technically classified as an endangered animal. Amber gets ghost, makes herself unknowable, and vanishes into the ether. Lawsuit after lawsuit hits the zoo, and Zooventure is shuttered. But you? Fletcher, you punched a common bottlenose dolphin, which conservation groups consider, in a humorous bit of wording, as 'least concern' when it comes to endangerment. Amber Dwyer was a hero, but she got shafted by politics. But you, Fletcher?"

Nelly smiled and sat on her desk.

"...you're a hero," she said.

Fletcher wanted to vomit.

                                                                                                           ***

Catfish was hiding in the aquarium, one of the child play and exploration exhibits specifically, which was where she often went when she needed to think and get away from everyone. She was chewing on her hair as she stared down at the seashell patterned carpet, the enormous hunks of plastic coral surrounding her, encasing her as though she herself were a fish hiding from a predator. She heard the sound of something shifting nearby, and glanced around nervously, only to exhale when she saw it was just Casper. Casper seated themselves beside her and nodded in silence, almost moping as if in solidarity.

"Today sucks," Catfish finally said, and Casper smiled weakly.

"Today often sucks," they replied.

"How did you even know where to find me?"

"Well, I had Barbara over in security bring up the cameras, and there's obviously loads of them in this area since it's designated for kids, so it wasn't that hard. I just wanted to check in on you, see how you were doing, cause that...that seemed like a lot."

"A lot is putting it mildly," Catfish said, "I...don't think I can do this anymore. We've had incidents before, unhappy animals, and sometimes a trainer gets nipped or hit or slapped or something, but nothing like today, and if we're going to endanger children, while creating an unhappy environment for the creatures that are performing, I don't...I don't think I can morally separate that from my work. What's happening here isn't okay. Sure, it wasn't Kazoo, but they're unhappy too. All the animals are, and clearly they're going to start acting out more as a result. I can't be responsible for the dangers to both people and animals."

Casper nodded and put a hand on her knee, causing Catfish to exhale and rest her head on their shoulder. She closed her eyes, tears rolling softly, quietly down her face. How had it gotten like this? She thought what she was doing was good. Okay. She knew there were problems with live performances, she wasn't an idiot, but she just kind of always told herself they were few and far between enough to not be worried about them. But now...something had to be done. Something had to change.

"For what it's worth," Casper said, "I think it's admirable that you want to enact a difference, regardless of the threat it pays to your employment."

Catfish smiled and held their other hand.

"Thank you," she whispered.

They sat like that together for a while, nothing but the soft soothing sounds of ocean waves and bubbles and undersea currents wafting through the air over the interior speakers.

"I'm gonna take some time off," Casper said, "I need to learn who I am."

"You can do that, and I think that's smart, but I already know who you are," Catfish said, "you're a good person."

Casper wanted to cry now. They'd never once been called that. Another brief period of almost silence.

"I'm gonna free Kazoo," Catfish said.

                                                                                                           ***

Robin was in the break room microwaving lunch. She let the machine run its course, then retrieved her food and, just as she shut the door to the appliance, she turned and noticed Fletcher standing in the doorway staring at his shoes. Robin hadn't expected him, but she smiled at his presence nonetheless. She took her lunch, a premade frozen container of chinese food, to the table and sat down, starting to eat. As she chewed, she watched him, but he never once looked up at her.

"You ever hear of Amber Dwyer?" Fletcher asked, and Robin shook her head as she slurped some beef and broccoli into her mouth.

"Can't say that I have," she replied.

"Yeah, nobody has," Fletcher said, "to be fair, I hadn't either until this morning. Turns out you can do the right thing and still be punished for it."

Fletcher walked over to the table and sat down with a thud in the chair.

"...they wanna give me an award, I have to make a speech," Fletcher said, "but I'm not a hero. They keep calling me one, but I'm not."

Robin chewed, listening, nodding. She'd never seen Fletcher be so introspective. Sure, she'd seen him break down his walls a little bit, openly talk about a few things, but this...this was another level entirely. This was a man who finally, it seemed, had been broken enough to allow himself to fully feel again, and he clearly didn't know how to handle it. He sat there as Robin ate and he looked at the grain of the table, his eyes scanning every knick and grain.

"Amber Dwyer did the same thing I did, and she had to underground as a result, purely because of the difference in the types of animals we went toe to toe with. Part of me thinks that, really, it's because society can't accept the perception of a woman being violent and brave, so they villified her while they celebrate me, a man, because that's how they see men, as violent and brave. Protectors and defenders. But lemme tell ya something, Robin, my mom is the bravest, strongest woman I know and she could kick any dudes ass any day of the week. So maybe some of its sexism, maybe not, maybe it doesn't factor in at all, I don't know, all I know is this..."

Robin took another bite of broccoli as Fletcher shut his eyes and smiled weakly.

"...Amber Dwyer, like all women, deserved better, and I, like most men, deserve far much less," he finished.

Robin smiled warmly. Watching Fletcher gradually come to grips with his concept of masculinity, and his love for women as people in general, had been so fascinating and eye opening, and really, she was proud of him. Proud to be his friend. When she'd first started here, he'd been considered a jerk, a prankster, and he was those things, but that didn't make him inherently bad, and Robin felt that perhaps she was the first one to truly recognize and understand that, and that was now helping him be more vulnerable as a result, because he had women who trusted him.

"What are you gonna say in your speech?" Robin asked, digging around in the container for more beef.

"I don't know," Fletcher said, "but I can tell ya one thing...they ain't gonna like it."

                                                                                                           ***

Fletcher was standing by the platform as Nelly spoke to the crowd of onlookers as well as some press. She'd gotten this arranged quickly, probably for publicity, and likely at the request of the board, not because she really cared to. Fletcher knew her well enough to know that she cared about the zoos public image, sure, but she wasn't the kind to beg for its reputation. He breathed through his nose, a million thoughts running through his mind, namely at the forefront, Amber Dwyer. He looked to his side and noticed Robin standing there, causing him to jump a little.

"Holy hell," he said softly, "I forgot we walked here together."

"You're gonna do great," Robin said, "and, for what it's worth, I don't think you're a hero. Frankly, I don't know of anyone here who ever would."

A moment passed, and Fletcher grinned at her, that snarky, asshole grin that she loved to see, and he hit her in the shoulder playfully.

"You're a good egg," he said, before ruffling her hair as Nelly finished introducing him.

"I've learned a lot recently about speaking to your truth," Robin said, "and I think that's what you should do."

Fletcher nodded, then turned and headed up the steps to the podium. Nelly handed him a little golden trophy of some kind, and he looked at it, grasping it as he adjusted the mic, then cleared his throat, and did what Robin had told him to do. He spoke his truth.

"They wanna call me a hero, but what justifies that label? We often reserve it for people who save other people, right? Firemen, for instance. Firemen are heroes. I am not a hero. I saved a child, yes, because morally it was the right thing to do, and amoral as I may come off as at times, I'm not a heartless monster. But...why is it that people think nothing when rescuing a human child, often doing it without question, but rarely if ever attempt to save a baby animal? What constitutes the difference in their worth? An animal is a living thing, it breaths, it sees, it eats, it feels. It lives and dies, just like us, so why the stark contrast in their value? I'm not a hero. I saved a child, sure, but from what? An animals normal, predatory behavior? And, furthermore, why do we reward and forgive human beings for giving into so many of their base instincts but admonish animals for the very same thing? I didn't want to be the one to break this news to you people, but it's better you hear it now, here, from me, and the fact of the matter is...dolphins are murderers. Rapists. It's all a goddamned lie. They're not the cute, helpful creatures that pop culture has lead us to believe they are. The same irreperable damage that Jaws did for Sharks, Flipper did for dolphin PR."

Robin glanced over at Nelly, who, surprisingly, wasn't burying her face in humiliation, but instead grinning like an idiot.

"You...wanted this didn't you?" Robin asked, "you wanted to give him this award because you knew he would go off like this."

"Exactly," Nelly said, never looking at Robin once, her eyes glued to Fletcher on the stage as she added, "he's my mouth piece, whether he knows it or not, and I couldn't be more proud."

Fletcher continued, "You create campaigns like Save the Whales but it's...it's in spirit, only, really. What's the most an everyday person does? Cut up those plastic things that attach soda cans to one another so fish don't get caught in them? And, admittedly, how much energy and effort should a person willingly give to a cause such as this? I don't have the answer for that, but we have to do better. Bees are going extinct, the wetlands are drying out destroying bird habitats, and now we're celebrating me, a human being, punching a goddamned dolphin in the face. People demonized a woman for saving a child from an endangered animal, and yet because of the publicly perceived notion of dolphins, I'm hailed as a hero? I'm NOT a hero. I'm just not an asshole."

Fletcher finished his speech, stepping down from the platform, and exiting the zoo into the parking lot. As he strolled through towards his car, fishing his keys from his pocket, he noticed Catfish sitting on the hood of her own car, sniffling. Fletcher's eyes softened, and he walked over to her, seating himself beside her.

"You've had a rough day," he said softly, "and nobody even probably asked you how you're doing."

"Casper talked to me," Catfish said, "but yeah, I've been virtually ignored."

"Ridiculous, you're the trainer," Fletcher said, looking at his award clenched in his fist, before sighing and adding, "We can't let this continue."

"I know."

"I can't. in good conscience, continue to work in a place that claims to care for its animals well being but then prioritizes its visitors over that," Fletcher said, "I'm not saying we should let children get eaten or drowned or anything, but...but something has to change. A zoos main concern should be the safety and comfort of its animals, not its fun level for bored families on a Sunday afternoon to gawk at."

"I'm gonna free Kazoo," Catfish said, causing Fletcher's eyes to go wide. He thought about this for a minute, then held his hand out. She grabbed it, and they shook.

"Whale heist," he said, "I'm in."

Robin and Sophie were frozen like deer in the headlights. Robin hadn't expected Kyle back, Kyle hadn't expected to find his longtime girlfriend kissing another woman in their apartment kitchen, and Sophie didn't even know Robin was in a relationship. Robin tried to think of something, anything, to say to perhaps save face instead of being caught sucking face, but nothing came to mind. Sophie looked from Kyle to Robin and back to Kyle.

"What the FUCK?" Kyle asked.

"Welcome home," Robin replied.

                                                                                            ***

Catfish was seated in the changing room where the trainers got in and out of their wetsuits, took showers and the like. As she sat on a bench reading the memo, chewing absentmindedly on her braid, she heard the shower turn off and watched as another trainer, an older woman (in her late twenties) named Laurie, waltzed into the locker aisle wearing her towel and opening her locker to grab her wetsuit. As she dressed, she glanced over at Catfish.

"You okay?" she asked.

"It's this...this memo," Catfish said, "did you get it? Did you read it?"

"Got it, read it, didn't think much of it," Laurie said, shrugging, "Can you zip me up?"

Catfish nodded and stood up, zipping up the back of Laurie's wetsuit. As she finished and Laurie turned back towards her locker, looking at the mirror hung inside it, Catfish exhaled and began scanning her eyes over the paper once more.

"This doesn't feel right," Catfish said, "I know that a lot of what we do is performative, and that...that we work the animals on a rigid schedule, that we are an entertainment aspect of a zoo, but this feels...wrong. This feels like a step beyond."

"Not much we can do about it, so why worry yourself sick," Laurie asked as she started to apply her waterproof makeup.

"I'm worried for the sake of Kazoo and the others, not for us," Catfish said, "my safety is nowhere as tantamount as theirs is to me, so I'm worried for those who can't worry for themselves, can't speak up about being pushed too hard."

Laurie exhaled, finished her application and shut her locker door before turning to face Catfish, hands on her shoulders.

"Okay, sweetheart, listen to me...you are one of those people whose morals and ethics are admirable, but will make you an outcast, alright? You like this job, you want to keep this job? You need to learn to detach, and if you can't do that, then I...I don't know what will happen, but it won't be good, for you, the Splash Zone or Wild Kingdom, okay? And I'm not in disagreement either, I want that made excessively clear. Do you understand?"

Catfish looked in Laurie's eyes, sighed and nodded. She knew Laurie was right, even if her gut screamed the complete opposite at her. After Laurie left, and Catfish had finished getting ready for her day, pulling her hair back into a ponytail best she could, she also exited to find Casper standing outside, as if waiting for her. She flashed them a smile, the sun glinting off her braces.

"Hi!" she said brightly.

"Hi there," Casper replied, putting a hand in their jumpsuit pocket, "I got you something."

"You...did?" she asked, smiling, blushing.

"Yeah I went to an aquarium out of town with my niece and, uh, and I saw this and I thought you might like it," Casper said, pulling a bracelet made of seashells out of their pocket. Catfish wanted to cry. Nobody had ever given her a gift like this before. She held her wrist out and Casper slipped it on, then smiled at it, adding softly, "it looks like a perfect fit."

Catfish blushed even harder as she stumbled for words. She'd only known Casper for a little bit, but she was enjoying the time they'd been spending together at the zoo.

"Do you...wanna walk me to the arena?" Catfish asked.

"Why walk when I could drive you?" Casper asked, twirling their cart keys around their finger, making her laugh. The two of them loaded up into the cart and off they headed, towards the arena, for another day of shows with Kazoo. Whatever was worrying her at the moment could wait. She was simply enjoying the presence of people for a change.

                                                                                                 ***

"What the fuck, Robin?" Kyle asked, sitting on the edge of the bed as Robin paced back and forth in front of him. He didn't even seem angry, just...confused. Like this had come out of nowhere. And, rightly so, as it sort of had, even for her. Sophie was still sitting in the living room, completely in shock at the revelation that Robin was apparently involved, and with a man of all people.

"I didn't..." Robin started, running her hands down her face, "I didn't know...I didn't know I could feel things for a girl, I'm sorry."

"I mean I'm not upset about that, I'm not an asshole Robin," Kyle said.

"And we always kept it at work, and this was the first time that I brought it back here and-"

"Keeping an affair at a different venue doesn't really excuse it, but okay," Kyle said, interrupting.

"I know, you're...you're right, I'm sorry, that was a bullshit excuse," Robin said, "I just...you have to understand that this came as just a big shock to me as it did to you. I didn't...I never thought...I didn't wanna hurt you. You've always been so good, so nice, and we got along so well and I didn't wanna hurt you, but I also was so enamored with these...these new feelings that I...it just completely clouded my judgment."

Kyle nodded. At least that was a somewhat valid excuse, and she was taking responsibility for her actions. Robin sat down on the bed beside Kyle and exhaled slowly, deeply, as if letting helium out of a balloon at a steady pace.

"I don't...think I'm the one you hurt," Kyle said, surprising both himself and Robin as he continued, "I think it was that poor girl. She looked shellshocked."

Robin nodded in agreement. She hadn't been back out there to talk to Sophie since Kyle had arrived back in the apartment, and, truth be told, she was scared to. Would she even have either of them in her life after this evening? Robin put her hands on her knees and started crying, her fingertips digging into her knees as Kyle put a hand on her back.

"If you...are gay, Robin, then that's just how it is, I won't hold that against you," Kyle said, "but you gotta do the right thing here. For the sake of her, and honestly, for my benefit. You gotta decide what it is you want, because you're hurting three people here."

Robin nodded again. He was still right. Robin looked towards the door and bit her lip as the tears stained her face, her thoughts turning to Sophie. She could be in an out and open relationship with a wonderful woman, or she could deny her feelings and stay with a man whom, yes, she appreciated and cared for, but wasn't happy being with romantically. But at least the second was far more socially acceptable. Robin finally understood how caged animals felt.

                                                                                              ***

After the final evening show, Casper and Catfish found themselves at the Hippo Campus, watching the kids play on the little playground as they ate their ice cream bars shaped like animals. Catfish took another bite, then raised her hand to her mouth, causing Casper to look over at her as she giggled.

"Cold food make my teeth hurt cause of my braces," she said muffled.

"Ah, I'm sorry, I didn't think about that when I suggested ice cream," Casper said, "um...can I ask you a question?"

"Mhm!" Catfish said, taking another bite, clearly not letting discomfort get in the way of her tasty treat.

"Do you..." Casper said, before pausing and closing their eyes, taking a deep breath and continuing, "do you think that, uh...that your life has turned out the way you wanted it to?"

"I mean a lot I didn't have control over," Catfish said, shrugging as she took another bite, "like who I was born to, stuff like that, but overall yeah I got lucky, and I'm really happy. I'm really genuinely happy. I wanted to be what I am and I achieved that goal, so I can't say that I'm feeling unfulfilled exactly. Why, are you unfulfilled?"

"In more ways than one, but certainly not career wise," Casper said, "moreso with who I am."

Catfish watched as Casper finished their ice cream bar and looked at the stick, smirking weakly as they read it aloud.

"Why do Flamingos lift one leg?" they asked, making Catfish smile.

"Why?" she asked.

"Because if they lifted both, they'd fall over," Casper said, the both of them laughing stupidly; after the laughter died down, Casper raised their hands to their face and started crying, catching Catfish by surprise. She scooted closer and put a hand on their back, rubbing gently.

"Are you okay?" Catfish asked.

"I wanna be you," Casper said through their tears, their weary breath.

"You can do that! You just have to take some courses, get a certification, it isn't impossible to become a trainer and-"

"No, not a trainer," Casper whispered, burying their face in their hands even more, as if trying to vanish into nothingness as they weakly, quietly, whispered, "...a girl."

Catfish hadn't expected that admission, nor did she know how to respond to it, but she stayed there, and she gave Casper comfort, because that was what she'd been trained to do. Give comfort to those she cared about. Be they whale or human.

                                                                                                ***

"I refuse to believe that this was something that came totally out of the blue," Kyle said, "like, there's always signs, triggers, stuff like that. You don't just suddenly wake up one day and realize you like the same gender."

"You're not wrong," Robin said, "but it's more that I was so young and oblivious that I didn't recognize it for what it was. Only after meeting her did I start to see the very obvious signs that had always been there. Girls I was enamored with for seemingly no particular reason while in school and stuff. Girls I looked up to or admired. I always thought it was because I wanted to be like them, not because I wanted to be with them."

Kyle chuckled and shook his head.

"...I gotta admit, you're a hell of an actress," he said, catching her off guard.

"What?" she asked, turning to look at him, a confused expression on her face.

"You had me believing this entire time you were in love with me, that you were happy in a heterosexual relationship," Kyle said.

"I was," Robin said, "I mean...I was until this happened. It wasn't like I was lying, at least not about that. Or...if I was it wasn't intentional, but more because I didn't know at the time, I don't know, Kyle. It's complicated. But it isn't like I didn't like you, or even like I didn't love you, cause I did. So very very much. You were good to me, good for me, steady and stable and kind. We had things in common. You just-"

"I wasn't a woman," Kyle said, smirking, making Robin blush as she looked down at her hands in her lap.

"...yeah," she said, "And the thing is, I don't know that it would've hit me so hard had it been any other girl. It's just her."

"Why do you think that is?" Kyle asked, and Robin shook her head.

"I'd love the answer to that question myself, believe me," she whispered in quiet reponse. Robin sighed deeply. She knew she had to talk to Sophie, who was still sitting in the living room, likely confused to all hell. Robin sighed, slapped her knees and stood up, starting to head to the living room. However, once she reached it, she found that Sophie was nowhere to be seen. This, in fact, worried her more than if she were still around. Robin stood there for a few minutes, looked around, and then chewed on her lip. She knew she would likely see her at work the following day, but she didn't want to have a conversation this heavy, of this nature, in a workplace. Then again, a good portion of their relationship had taken place at their place of employment, so perhaps it would be fitting. Kyle came out, touching Robin on the back reassuringly, as he passed by and went to start cooking. Robin only hoped Sophie would understand. She'd been so understanding of everything up until now, but this...

...this felt like something she might not come back from. And that scared her half to death.

                                                                                            ***

"I'm really sorry," Casper said.

Casper and Catfish were walking down the mainstreet of Wild Kingdom, ensuring everything was closed up for the night. Catfish's shift had ended a while ago, but she'd stuck around to spend time with Casper after their brief breakdown. As Casper turned another key, locked another shop, Catfish couldn't help but smile sweetly at their timidness.

"It's okay," she said, "you don't have to apologize. I've never met anyone who wanted that before, so I'm not exactly used to it or sure what to say, but I don't judge you, for what it's worth."

"I appreciate that," Casper said, exhaling as if they finally were able to relax, "because it's...it's a terrifying realization. And I didn't even realize it until the last few years. I never really questioned who I was until recent times, like, my entire adolesence I felt fine, I didn't...I didn't feel out of place, or anything, outside of the usual teenage confusion, you know? But then...seeing my coworker Robin fall for our coworker Sophie...I don't know. I guess it got me thinking."

"I've never questioned either, I don't think most people do, because most people are comfortable in who they are. Like, for me, I just love being a girl, it's just who I am, but if it's who you are too, you should be able to feel comfortable and happy in your appearance and the way you're perceived by society," Catfish said. The two of them stopped by the Croc Shop, a small snack shop that carried animal themed snacks, and looked at one another, the soft lighting of the neon alligator sign overhead illuminating Catfish's face, making Casper realize just how pretty she actually was.

"I think I'm gonna take some time off," Casper said, "I have some things to work through."

"I think that's a great idea," Catfish said, as they headed towards the front gate together.

Truth be told, and she wouldn't say this out loud, but Casper's willingness to do what made them happy made Catfish think back to the memo she'd gotten earlier, and think about Kazoo. Whose job was it to make Kazoo happy? It was supposed to be hers, her fellow trainers, but none of them seemed to care the way she did. And yet, here she was pushing someone else to pursue doing the right thing when she herself was complacent in doing the exact opposite? No. As they reached the front gate, she stopped and looked at a sign featuring herself and Kazoo.

She had to do something.

"I used to think, I don't know...I used to think that maybe I would get lucky, you know? Get 'discovered' or whatever bullshit actors feed themselves," Robin said, leaning over the railing that surrounded the entrance to the Splash Zone, Catfish beside her, for once not in her work attire wetsuit, but just in casual clothes - a vneck tshirt and shorts with hiking boots - both of them drinking from glass bottle sodas. Robin burped, wiped her mouth on her arm and continued, "but the thing is, you can have all the talent in the world, and still not get discovered. Think about how many great acting talents the world has lost out on simply because one girl wasn't 2 lbs lower than the preferred weight or because some guy had a receding hairline. Now I'm not saying I'm the most gorgeous girl in the world, lord knows I'm up there but I'm not number one, but I'm fairly conventionally attractive AND talented and still...nothing, and yet..."

Catfish glanced over as she took a sip, raising her eyebrow as she awaited the remainder of Robins speech.

"And yet," Robin added, "I can't help but be kinda grateful. Standing here, day in, day out, watching Kazoo perform...I can't help but feel, I don't know, like I dodged a bullet. What starts as a hobby becomes a passion becomes a product and soon you're burnt out and the magic is gone because you still live paycheck to paycheck unless you get mega stardom, and you can only really take projects you don't like because they pay well and not projects you're genuinely interested in because that would take time away from the ones that pay well. Performance is a prison. And yet here I am, same as everyone else who works here, performing, but at least...I don't know...at least now it means something, you know?"

Robin let out a long exhale and took a long drink, then glanced at Catfish who was staring at her.

"What?" Robin asked.

"Well, I'm surprised you didn't make it as an actress, considering you've got monologing down pat," Catfish said, making Robin laugh.

Just then they heard a cart pull up behind them and turned to spot Harvey pulling up in his cart. The girls stood and stared at him as he motioned for them to get into the cart.

"What's going on?" Robin asked.

"Fletcher and Doug have a bet, you're not gonna wanna miss this," Harvey said.

At least the zoo was never boring, Robin had to admit.

                                                                                                ***

"Alright men, this is the deal," Kacie said, standing at an enclosure usually filled with monkeys, as Fletcher and Douglas, both in jumpsuits, stood in front of her with batches of cleaning supplies beside them; she continued, "both of you are going to go into this enclosure, and you're going to see who can clean up their section the fastest, preferably without getting sick."

"What even happened here?" Robin asked, leaning towards Harvey.

"Batch of food monkeys were given was contaminated, and they all got sick, you know, with the runs, and, uh, the place got absolutely splattered as a result."

"Why does everything around here have to do with bodily fluids?" Robin asked, "the peacock in Nelly's car, the whale vomit in the arena, and now this. This place is disgusting."

"It's a zoo, Robin," Harvey replied, chuckling.

Truth be told, neither Douglas nor Fletcher looked much too pleased about this bet, which begged the question of who was the one who brought it up and why? Robin had questions, and she needed answers.

"What do you get if you win?" Robin finally asked loudly enough for them to answer.

"Valor?" Catfish asked.

"Better not be fucking valor," Douglas said, already sounding defeated.

"Can't be pride, I've got plenty of that," Fletcher said, winking and making finger guns at Robin, making her laugh.

"Can't have too much if you're cleaning up a mess of monkey shit," Kacie said, "whoever loses the bet has to clean up the rest of the enclosure. Whoever wins gets that entire day off. I've already cleared this with Nelly, who, surprisingly, was all for it, probably just to humiliate you guys."

"She does take a perverse pleasure in that," Fletcher grumbled.

Robin grimaced at this verbal exchange, as she knew a thing or two about humiliation.

                                                                                                  ***

"I want to be an actress," Robin said.

"Yeah? You think that would be fun?" her father asked.

Robin was 12. They were sitting at an ice cream parlor, one that hadn't changed since her father was a child, eating their weekly Sunday morning ice cream. This was a tradition for the two, and had been ever since Robin could remember forming memories.

"It's not about it being fun," she said, "but it would be fun, yeah, but it's about telling stories. I wanna tell stories."

"Well, being an actor isn't telling a story, it's acting out a story. Telling a story would make you a writer."

Robin hadn't considered this. Maybe her father was right. And so Robin, in addition to trying to act, also started taking up writing in her spare time. Instead of hanging out with other girls, or chasing boys, or even spending her time alone pursuing hobbies those her age would prefer to pursue, she was in her bedroom, at her computer, typing away. She never showed anyone anything she wrote, and a lot of times she barely managed to even finish anything, but she typed and typed and typed. But the thing was...she didn't enjoy writing as much as she enjoyed performing, and she never really believed what her father had told her anyway.

Ironically, however, and much to her own surprise, she was acting all the time anyway. Acting happy when she was depressed as a teenager. Acting strictly heterosexual when deep down, albeit unknown to her at the time, she liked women too. Robin Glass was never an actress just in profession alone, but in life itself, always seeking out ways to ensure that those around her never knew the real her. Not even people like Kyle, whom she cared for very much, got to know her on that level. He got glimpses, but never the full view. Nobody did. Until Sophie. Until the people here at Wild Kingdom. And watching Kazoo, someone else forced to be performative, to put on a show against their will, Robin started to understand just how detrimental to oneself that can be when the desire to do so isn't genuine.

Acting should be a skill, but not one you learn for the sake of survival.

                                                                                            ***

"You ever feel bad for Kazoo?" Robin asked, standing and watching Fletcher do his best to get smeared monkey shit off the glass wall enclosure. Catfish shrugged at the question.

"I mean, I know that captivity is frowned upon, and I know that animals being forced to perform is frowned upon, and that one's at least justifiable on some levels. That's why the circus stopped using elephants and stuff. But I mean...Kazoo isn't treated poorly. They're taken care of, fed well, cleaned, they have a whole medical team watching over them."

"Yeah but...but wouldn't it be better for them to be in their natural habitat instead of such a fake place such as this?" Robin asked, and Fletcher laughed, causing them both to look his way as he dipped his scrub brush back into his sudsy bucket.

"We're all in captivity, Robin, in every walk of life," he said, "people working jobs they don't wanna work, people stuck in marriages they don't wanna be in, life itself is a form of captivity, and the only freedom is death."

Catfish and Robin exchanged a concerned look before glancing back in Fletcher's direction.

"Are you okay?" Robin asked.

"I'm hand washing monkey shit, what do you think?" Fletcher replied dryly.

"So,"  Catfish said, returning to Robin's question, "you're asking me whether I think Kazoo would be better off in the ocean? I mean...generations upon generations have given the whale natural survival instincts, inclinations of how to successfully navigate that world, so I suppose, but...I don't know. I don't know anything. I'm just a trainer. Sure I'm obsessed with whales, but that doesn't mean I have the right answer to whether or not they should be here or there."

Robin sighed. Was she projecting her problems onto Kazoo? Was that all this was? Or did she actually feel sympathetic towards the creature for being forced into this life? It wasn't that she had a problem with the Splash Zone being in Wild Kingdom. In fact, she liked it, and Catfish herself had slotted into their friend group perfectly fine. It was hard to know what exactly she was feeling.

"I have to go train a new person today," Catfish said, checking her watch, "I'll see you guys later. Have a good day!"

"Too late," both Fletcher and Robin said simultaneously, which made them grin at one another. Robin then turned her full attention to Fletcher.

"So," she asked, "how did this bet come about?"

"...I bet Doug that he couldn't get a parrot to say a swear word," Fletcher said, "Turns out he not only managed to do so, but, uh, now it won't say anything but that and has had to be quarantined to a less family friendly place. Once Nelly found out, she had us do this, so now we're having this bet. It's stupid little petty games like this that make working here tolerable."

"You don't like your job?" Robin asked, sounding surprised. Fletcher shrugged.

"I don't mind it," he said, "I like it well enough. I mean, you know, I didn't mean to end up here, just like you."

"I know," Robin said, exhaling, tossing her hair from her face, "I was thinking about that today. About how I relate to Kazoo for being a performer. Is that sad? To emotionally relate to a whale?"

"Not really, I emotionally relate to your mom," Fletcher said, grinning, making Robin cackle. Though she was laughing, Robin did have to wonder just how many people here at Wild Kingdom were here because they wanted to be, and how many were here because they couldn't go anyplace else. She always thought you had to be a qualified animal trainer or something to work at a zoo, but as it turns out, to be a 'guide', the way she and her coworkers were, you didn't have to have those sorts of qualifications. So she was very curious about what their origins were. She knew why Fletcher was here, she knew Nelly had worked hard to get where she was and loved her job, but what about everyone else?

What about Sophie?

                                                                                             ***

Sophie was sitting on a marble bench in the graveyard, away from her family, away from the ceremonial act of her sisters burial. She was staring at the grass waving gently in the wind by her feet, when she felt the bench shift, and looked to her side to see her Aunt Carrie had sat down as well. Neither one acknowledged the other, and it seemed like Aunt Carrie had only really come over here to give Sophie company without the expectation of a response, which Sophie appreciated. Silent company was golden. However, after a while, Sophie herself cleared her throat and found herself initiating conversation.

"Do you think they love me as much as they loved her?" she asked.

"I used to wonder the same thing about your mother and I," Aunt Carrie said, "ultimately, what I came to realize, is that you're wasting your time vying for affection from those who are incapable of showing it."

"What do you do then? Love yourself? I don't think I can do that," Sophie said, "I can't be her. I can't be myself. Who can I be?"

"If you can't be either one, why not be someone totally new? Create an entirely new persona?" Aunt Carrie asked, shrugging, "that's what I did. I didn't like who I was, and I couldn't be your mother, the golden child, so I became someone else. People grow and change throughout life as it is, so how's this any different? One should be natural, and this is artificial? Bah. Humanity itself is artificial. We're all just actors, Sophie. Most just chose to do improv."

Sophie had never really considered this. She'd never really considered simply being someone else. But maybe her Aunt Carrie was right, and this was the way forward. So, come the years after, she decided to change everything she could about herself. She decided to create a persona that her parents would like, that would even help her get a job, which it did, at Wild Kingdom, and in the end, she used that very same persona to entice Robin to like her. And then Robin liked her too much, and knocked down all the wals around her, and made Sophie want to be herself again.

And that...that was something she was terrified of showing, even to the woman she loved.

                                                                                                ***

Robin didn't stick around to see what happened with the bet. Stuff like this happened at Wild Kingdom every day, so it was just background noise anyhow. As she walked to the parking lot, preparing to go home, she saw Catfish standing by a scooter, swearing to herself. Robin approached, concerned, only to have Catfish turn around at the last minute and the both of them scream a little, laughing at the others sudden appearance.

"Bad day?" Robin asked.

"I mean, at least I wasn't cleaning up monkey feces," Catfish said, unbuckling the strap to her helmet, "but yeah it...it wasn't good. The longer I work with Kazoo, the more I work with other trainers, the more I start to realize just how not okay what we're doing is. Kazoo seems unhappy. I know it's hard to tell whether a whale is happy or not, but...sometimes I think about just somehow stealing them and releasing them back into the ocean, you know?"

"Whale heist, awesome," Robin said, nodding.

"Anyway," Catfish continued, tugging her helmet on and latching it, before climbing onto her scooter, "that's just the guilt pangs one gets I suppose for loving animals too much. See ya tomorrow."

And with that, she rode off into the road and down the street. Robin then turned and headed back to her car, where she found Sophie standing opposite passenger side. Neither one had seen eachother all day, and Sophie looked...concerned.

"Hi," Robin said brightly, smiling.

"Can I come home with you?" Sophie asked, taking Robin by total surprise.

"Excuse me?" she asked.

"I need to come home with you," Sophie said, "please."

How could Robin say no to that face, that voice. She unlocked the car, and both women climbed inside. Robin started the car up and drove back to the apartment. Once inside, Sophie looked around, as if taking in the place in a weird curiosity, and that's when it dawned on Robin. Humans were just zoo animals. Everyone had their enclosure, their enrichment, some had their mates, and when others came around, they gawked awkwardly at the way these creatures lived. Robin went to the kitchen and got a drink from the fridge, but then, as she shut the fridge and turned back around, she was surprised to find Sophie standing right in front of her.

"Whoa, hi there," Robin said, chuckling.

"You don't know me," Sophie said, "you don't know me at all. You just know the me that I let others know. I want you to know me. Actual me. Not this fake version of me. I want you to know the things I actually like, like puzzles and bird watching and pastel painting and how...how much you make me want to be myself."

Robin felt her breath catch in her chest, their eyes locked. Sophie had never, not once, been this forward. She was totally caught off guard. Except for their initial kiss in the butterfly hutch, Sophie had always been fairly reserved, and Robin had been the one to be rather upfront, but today everything seemed topsy turvy.

"Well, I...I love you no matter who you are or what you wanna be or what things you like," Robin said, smiling nervously as Sophie backed her against the fridge, "you know that, you know nothing can change that."

"I'm challenged, but I'm not stupid, and I'm not my sister," Sophie said, "and I'm tired of pretending to be, and I'm tired of pretending to be the person I created to not be her, and I'm tired of having nobody in my life know me. I want you to know me."

Robin nodded, exhaling.

"I...I know how you feel," she said, "I really do."

"I'm crazy in love with you," Sophie said, taking Robin even more by surprise, as, again, Sophie was rarely this vocal about her romantic feelings, adding, "and...I'm tired of pretending I'm not or that that's something shameful that has to be hidden as well."

Robin pulled Sophie's face to hers and kissed her, and for one brief moment everything in the world was right. And then the door to the apartment opened, and Kyle - who was supposed to have been working late - was standing in the living room staring at the girls as Robins eyes connected with his over Sophies shoulders and time itself felt like it stopped. The enrichment was over.

The zookeeper was home.

"What's your body count?" Kacie asked, looking at Casper, who gave her a look.

"I hate that term," they said.

"You mean, like, sexually, or like how many people I've killed?" Fletcher asked, making the group chuckle as he took another bite of his fast food breakfast, "cause there may be overlap."

"...what...what does that mean?" Robin asked, holding back laughter, her eyes squinting, "...are you...fucking corpses?"

"That's between me and the feds," Fletcher replied, shrugging, making everyone laugh harder.

The door to the break room opened and Nelly waltzed in, looking surprisingly chipper, her hair done up, wearing a brighter colored suit than they were used to seeing her in. All in all she just had this glow about her that they weren't expecting. She walked to the counter and began pouring herself some coffee, then sipped it before turning and looking at her crew.

"Good morning," she said, sounding chipper, "what fresh hell are we discussing today?"

"Body counts," Kacie said.

"Still uncertain of what definition you're expecting for your terminology though," Casper remarked.

"You know," Nelly said, playing with one of the buttons on her suit, "back when I was in college, especially freshman year, I was...pretty popular. I got a lot of attention, went to a lot of parties, was pretty sociable. Had a lot of sex, is what I'm trying to say."

"Do I wanna hear this?" Fletcher asked, furrowing his brow.

"And I wound up having so many various partners, and I was safe so don't worry, that eventually the other girls formed a club about me on campus, because apparently I was sleeping with their boyfriends without knowing it. But you know what? I've always been under the assumption that if you aren't satisfying your man, there's a woman out there who will, so, I didn't harbor any judgment against myself."

"Yeah, I don't wanna hear this," Fletcher added, turning away and back to the table.

"You don't wanna hold any accountability?" Kacie asked, "isn't that kinda...sleazy?"

"Well, I didn't know they were in relationships when I slept with them, and after I did I didn't sleep with them again," Nelly said, "just was a thing that happened enough times that they managed to have enough members for a club. So yeah, my body count? Pretty high. But that was then, not now. Nowadays I'm lucky if I get laid on a yearly basis."

"Please for the love of god stop talking," Fletcher said, "I don't wanna know about my bosses sexual proclivities."

"Oh, but it's fine for men to openly discuss it?" Nelly asked, "isn't that a bit of a double standard?"

"No, because men are disgusting, we're supposed to be gross, it's...like...in our contracts!" Fletcher said, making Robin snort laughing, which made him smirk. He loved making his friends laugh. Just then the door to the break room opened up once again and Douglas entered, standing there, not saying a word. Everyone stopped and stared at him.

"What?" Nelly asked.

"We have a problem," Douglas said.

Scant moments later, Nelly found herself in her office with a woman in a button down collared shirt, with a black cardigan and black pencil skirt, her hair in an updo, sitting across from her at her desk. Nelly, hands cupped on her desk, simply listened to the woman speak. Once the woman had come in, and she and Nelly had retreated to her office, the crew had all gone to their various duties, so Nelly was all alone with her.

"I understand that you can't control what animals here do," the woman said, "but I don't bring my child here to witness things such as that."

"Copulation is perfectly normal," Nelly said, shrugging, "it just happens. As you said, there's nothing we can do about it. They're wild animals, and wild animals have urges and drives and-"

"No, the copulation isn't the issue," the woman said, holding up a hand, "no. The issue is that it was between two animals of the same sex."

That....Nelly had to admit....hadn't been what she was expecting.

                                                                                               ***

Robin had kept quiet during the earlier discussion because, well, she'd only had 3 partners in her lifetime. Her first boyfriend, Peter, her boyfriend Kyle and now Sophie. And the thing was, she had never really once considered she might be gay until she'd met Sophie, despite, in retrospect, all the glaring clues right in front of her face the entire time. But the discussion had gotten her thinking about it all, and about how Sophie, at one point, had told her she was a virgin. Robin, who didn't have any tours scheduled today for a change, was currently with Fletcher while they were getting frozen yogurt in one of the restaurants housed in the zoo called Feeding Time. Standing over the bar, adding various toppings to her yogurt, Robin couldn't help but feel awkward.

"Can I ask you a question about your sex life?" Robin asked, and Fletcher laughed.

"I suppose, if you wanna know something that horrifying," he replied.

"When did you, ya know, lose it?" Robin asked and Fletcher stopped adding toppings momentarily to think.

"Uh...." he said, clearly trying to recall, "hmmm...must've been...17? Yeah that sounds about right. Believe it or not, despite clearly being a ladies man with charisma falling out of my butt, it did take me a while to find a woman, but not because they weren't interested, and more because I was picky."

"First of all I don't think things are supposed to fall out of your butt," Robin said, "Except, ya know, shit."

"Please don't talk about feces when I'm about to enjoy soft serve frozen yogurt," Fletcher interrupted, making her laugh.

"Secondly," Robin continued, "what do you mean you were picky? Picky in what way? Like the way guys generally are, where it's all predicated on the basis of appearance or was there some deeper reasoning for your waiting?"

"Picky in the sense that I wanted it to mean something," Fletcher said, the two of them finally seating themselves at a table by a window that housed a small aquarium, "because I watched a lot of my guy friends get together with girls and have it mean absolutely nothing and, I mean, I'm not by religious or anything but I guess I didn't want something so...personal, so deeply one time, to be taken by someone who didn't actually wanna stick around."

Robin smiled warmly as she sucked yogurt off her spoon, smacking her lips, "that's really sweet actually," she said before adding, "so did they stick around?"

"Yeah," Fletcher said, "for a while anyway. But nobody sticks around forever do they? Eventually you'll leave too."

She tried not to take the tone the wrong way, but it was clear that Fletcher was scared she, and others might leave, and he clearly was wrestling with abandonment issues. Robin merely smiled and took some more bites of her frozen yogurt, shrugging.

"I doubt it," she said, "I don't think they let caged animals leave the zoo," she said with a smirk, making Fletcher laugh.

                                                                                               ***

Catfish had never really been popular.

Even as a young girl - well, younger than she was now, considering she was still fairly young - she'd had trouble making friends, fitting in, and dating? Forget about it. Not even a remote chance in hell that that was an option that was on the table. So she simply stayed away from it, especially since it didn't really seem to be changing being here at the Splash Zone. She thought, perhaps much too positively, that by working in a field where she would have things in common with her coworkers, that they'd create a shared sense of camaraderie, but that didn't turn out to be the case. A popular kids club. That's all life ever was. And she wasn't invited.

Sitting alone in the aquarium, watching the sharks swim by as she ate her italian sandwich, the bread getting stuck in her braces, Catfish couldn't help but think how nice it must be to be a solitary animal that didn't NEED friends. That was happy simply peaceful existing outside of any kind of social circle. Imagine that. Being jealous of a fuckin' fish. She saw a cart come to a crawl in front of the aquarium, through the window, and saw someone get out to check it. She watched, interested but cautious, as she finished up her sandwich before finishing her drink, gathering her trash and tossing it into a nearby recycling can that was modeled to look - ironically - like a coral reef and heading over to see what was happening.

"Do you need help?" she asked, as the person looked up from where they were kneeling and sighed.

"My cart has a bad wheel," Casper said, "um...this happens far more often than I'd like it to, honestly. And they won't pay to replace it, no matter what, it seems like, so I'm constantly stuck doing vehicle maintenance, which isn't even a skill I have."

"Who says you have to fix it? Why not just...slack off?" Catfish asked, causing Casper to smirk at her, surprised.

"I just...I like my job, I like working," Casper said, "but, if you're willing to entertain the idea of keeping me company until Zoo Triple A gets here, I suppose that'd be okay."

Together the two headed back towards the aquarium to escape the sun, and once inside, Casper was grateful just how air conditioned and dark it was compared to the outdoors, Fish of all varieties in all manners of tank surrounded them, and they couldn't help but feel immediately calmer. Caspers eyes caught Catfish as she stopped by a nearby tank housing crabs, and they looked her up and down, never having really spent much time with her before. She was young. She had to be the youngest trainer there by far, but it wasn't like Casper was much older, so. They were definitely in the same age range, she just looked very young for her age, perpetual baby face. The braids and the braces didn't help either. Hands behind her back, holding one another, Casper couldn't help but feel the way they always did around pretty girls.

...jealous.

"So why fish?" Casper finally asked, "like, of all the animals to be trained in, work with, why fish?"

"Technically I train whales, which are mammals, not fish," Catfish said, "but I guess it's just because I love whales. I remember being a teenager and going with my parents on vacation to Hawaii and I really didn't wanna go, I didn't like water, don't like islands, really don't like crowds, but we went on this glass bottom boat tour that also allowed you to snorkle, and I saw all sorts of fish through the boat but then when I got into the water, which my dad practically had to drag me kicking and screaming into, I saw a whale, and...and it really....it just opened me up completely. They're just so beautiful."

Casper smiled, nodding, crossing their arms.

"They are pretty," they replied, "and very intelligent, and emotional."

"I guess I just related to them. That being said, I wish I did anything other than what I actually do. I'd love to work with whales in a better capacity, because training them to do tricks isn't right, for them or for us, morally speaking anyway on our end," Catfish said, continuing, "but what can I do, ya know? This is...this is what I've decided upon. And I don't regret it, for the record. Don't take that wish as me saying I hate what I do. I'm happy that I've made the choices I've made to be who I am and do what I do, but I wish I were doing it in a better way. A way that made me truly happy, not just those around me."

Casper knew exactly how she felt. They'd never say it, but they felt it at their core. They'd been hiding a similar secret for so long, and now, being here with Catfish, sharing in this exact emotion, all they wanted to do was blurt out what they were unhappy about themselves with, but were too scared not only to do so but also to act on it if they did, so instead they were happy to simply have a friend who understand, albeit unknowingly. Casper smiled and nodded.

"I guess some days," Casper said, "all you can do is be grateful for your bravery, those of us who have it. Takes a lot of courage to get in the water and train a whale. Wish I were half as brave as you."

And they did. They really meant that.

They also wished they were half as pretty.

                                                                                                  ***

"Sex is overrated," Fletcher said, walking through the zoo with Kacie and Robin. Sophie was having a busy day being a helper in another part of the zoo, so she hadn't been around much, but something about the earlier conversation made Rpbin feel like maybe she was purposefully avoiding her and the subject, for obvious reasons. Fletcher continued, "like, people act as if it's this big connection, but it's really just...it's not. It's a nice way, certainly, to be with someone you love, but it isn't the end all be all for a relationship like most people seem to think it is."

"Weird to hear this from a guy," Kacie said as she chewed her candy bar while they walked past a small petting zoo.

"Yeah, well, guys have feelings, most just don't accept them," Fletcher remarked, shrugging, "I don't know what to tell you other than it's not what you think it is."

Robin felt conflicted. In one sense, she wanted to be closer to Sophie, but she knew Sophie was not only a virgin, but also asexual, and while she had expressed the possibility of them sleeping together, Robin felt awkward ever making any kind of push in that direction. And she couldn't deny Fletcher was right, after all. She was happy just being with Sophie, having fun, but all this talk about the act of mating and body count...it had begun to get to her. They stopped at a small gift shop and stood around, watching a woman dress her baby in a tiger onesie. Kacie smiled and wiggled her fingers at the baby, trying to make it laugh as Fletcher exhaled.

"I guess," he added, "in the end, what really matters, is, ya know, just knowing that you can love a person for completely unsuperficial and non animalistic reasons that don't entirely depend on the release of a hormone in your brain." 

"But...that's what love IS, it's the release of a hormone in your brain," Kacie said.

"Yeah but you know what I mean," Fletcher said, "I don't know, nevermind."

Before Kacie could follow up, the speaker system jolted to life, and the three of them looked up at one of them that was attached to a pole, the speaker crafted in such a way to look as through the noise were coming out of the mouth of a lion.

"Hello guests, this is Zoo Manager Nelly Gish speaking," Nelly said, surprising them for the mere fact that she rarely, if ever, used the speaker system; she continued, "today we had a complaint from a parent who brought their young child to the zoo, only to witness copulation. And while this is a perfectly natural thing to see between two animals in a protected space such as this, her issue lay more with the fact that it was between two animals of the same gender. So I'd like to make a statement to anyone who may be listening who may also have an issue with this. Same-sex behavior is widespread in the animal kingdom, documented in over 1,500 species, including mammals, birds, reptiles, and insects. While often referred to as homosexual behavior, it actually encompasses a far wider range of activities beyond genital contact, like pair bonding, courtship rituals, and mutual grooming. These behaviors are not limited to a few species or sexes; they are a natural part of animal life, just as they are a natural part of human life. So, with that in mind, if you see any instances of same sex relationships between either people or animals while at our establishment, please just kindly redirect yourself to the nearest exit, go home, and live your totally unfulfilled heterosexual life where you hate your spouse. Thank you for coming, and enjoy the rest of your day."

The three of them stood in total awe, until Fletcher and Kacie started to crack up, hysterical, while Robin got the widest grin on her face. She had never once anticipated that she'd someday be a part of a group that required any form of protection - well, outside of being a woman, she supposed - but boy was she glad to know her boss had her back.

Now it was time to find Sophie.

                                                                                                 ***

Sophie was sitting by Flamingo Funhouse, a small, almost arcade style area with playsets for kids among a little restaurant and, of course, a small area that housed a handful of Flamingos. She pushed her big, circular lenses up onto her face and looked out at the Flamingos while the noises of children playing and arcade machines humming and pinging behind her filled in the silence. Suddenly she felt someone by her side, and glanced to see Robin standing there, hands behind her back.

"Oh, hello," Sophie said, "I'm sorry I've been absent today. I really had a lot to do and-"

"These are for you," Robin said, holding out a large bouquet of Violets, surprising Sophie, who took them and blushed; Robin went on, "Violets are commonly the sapphic flower, so I ran down the street to a nearby florist and I got these for you because I love you."

Sophie looked at her, taken totally by surprise. Robin put her hands on Sophie's shoulders and smiled, her eyes wet with tears.

"I...love you," Robin said, "anyone else I've ever said it to...I meant it but I didn't mean it the way I do to you. It was never...real the way it is with you. Because...because until you, I didn't know I could love another person, especially another woman, the way that I love you. But I love you. I love you more than words could ever say and maybe flowers will be a fine substitute."

Sophie blushed even harder, smiling now, her big teeth showing, making Robin love her all the more. Robin, holding Sophie by the shoulders, pulled her in and kissed her, the bouquet held carefully between them. After it ended, their foreheads resting against one another, each unable to stop smiling and giggling, Robin whispered.

"If I have to be captivity," she said, "at least I got a good mate."

"Couldn't have put it better myself," Sophie replied, kissing again.

Nelly normally would find it rather uncomfortable to be fucked against a glass case, wherein all the animals around her could see it happening, but in these instances, she didn't care one bit. Besides, they'd locked the doors to this area of the exhibit, and she'd killed the cameras for a brief period of time. As Harvey pushed up against her, kissing her neck, her fingers in his hair as he screwed her, Nelly couldn't remember the last time she'd actually been happy like this, particularly with a romantic endeavor...if ever, honestly. Afterwards, as they both attempted to get themselves looking halfway decent again, Nelly couldn't help but bite her lip and think about the future.

"You know," she said as she tried to smoothen out of her tie, "I had kinda given up on love."

"Is that right?"

"You all know that," Nelly replied, "it's not like it was a secret what he did to me. But...I don't know, you made things so much better. You make me feel like...like maybe there's a good part of life I can still attain, you know, where I'm loved and cared for."

Harvey smiled, but inside his heart was breaking. If she ever knew...if she ever knew about his wife, it would destroy her. Not to mention he felt guilty. This affair hadn't come out of nowhere, nor had it been created as a result of a marital rift. He had his reasons. But it was starting to eat at him. Nelly finished buttoning her collar and approached Harvey, who was cleaning his glasses and putting them back on his face.

"You just...you have this way of making life seem worthwhile," Nelly said, "I don't know if it's your attitude or what, but...you make me want to keep going even when I feel like I'm at the end of my rope."

"I'm glad I can give that sort of resilience to you," Harvey said, smirking, as Nelly put her arms over his shoulders and leaned up, kissing him, before hearing someone scream. They each turned towards the doors and quickly raced to unlock them. Once out in the morning sun, admist the guests, they saw it. A group of people centered around a little exhibit, a monkey exhibit to be precise, where a baby monkey was being brutally attacked by the adults around it. Nelly didn't know what to do, as Harvey quickly leapt into action, going over the rail and into the exhibit, scooping the baby up and rushing back out best he could to avoid being attacked himself. Nelly was grateful for his swift efforts, but god...

...it was always something, wasn't it? Never a dull day.

                                                                                                ***

"What causes parents to just start abusing their children?" Casper asked.

"The child forming an independent personality, more often than not," Fletcher replied, him and Robin fist bumping at the table.

"It was awful," Nelly said, leaning against the counter, sipping coffee as she waited for her muffin to warm up in the microwave, "like...it was just a full on attack. They would've killed it had we not intervened. 
In some monkey species, males kill infants to eliminate competition for mates and increase their own reproductive success by causing the mother to become receptive sooner. Even in controlled environments like these, I suppose, it can happen."

Robin looked to her right and saw Sophie staring at the ground. She didn't seem to be taking in any of this, completely lost in her own thought. Robin reached out and touched her arm, trying to jolt her back to reality, but to no avail. The door to the break room opened and Kacie entered, sitting across from Fletcher as she ripped open the lid to her yogurt and started pouring things into it from the little packets it came with, Fletcher paying her simply no mind whatsoever. Robin started to wonder if anyone was okay today.

"How's Harvey?" she finally asked, looking back up towards Nelly, who was now retrieving her muffin from the microwave.

"He's okay, it seems," Nelly said, shrugging, "he didn't appear to be too bothered by it."

Nelly took her muffin on a plate with her coffee and headed for the door.

"If anyone needs me, I'll be in my office," she said, before exiting, leaving the five of them alone together. Robin looked at Kacie, who was just eating silently, then at Fletcher, who was reading a magazine, legs propped up on another chair. Her eyes then turned back to Sophie, who finally looked up to meet her gaze, and the two smiled softly at one another before Robin, taking her by the hand, led her out of the break room. Casper stood up and stretched, yawning.

"Well," they said, "guess I better get to my tour duties. Kids ain't gonna educate themselves."

"Oh is that what you call what you're doing?" Fletcher asked, making Casper laugh as they too exited after the girls, leaving just Fletcher and Kacie alone now.

"You seem...invested in what you're reading," Kacie said.

"It's interesting," Fletcher remarked, shrugging, "it's about a species of bird that went extinct and now scientists are trying to bring it back."

"Are you for or against-" Kacie started to ask, before he abruptly got up and also exited the room, leaving her feeling bewildered. She was starting to notice what Robin had noticed, which is that nobody today seemed to be alright.

                                                                                            ***

Since Sophie didn't really have a job, other than odds and ends around the zoo, Robin had recruited her most time as an assistant on tours. Miss Gazelle and Miss Kudu, and they were by far one of the most popular, if not the most popular, touring guides available. Today they gave 4 different tours, and after the last one wrapped up - a final one would be had later in the evening before the zoo closed - the girls found themselves by the Hippo Campus, sitting at a table and enjoying some iced tea and sharing a big basket of nachos.

"You ever get the feeling," Robin started, "that people only come to the zoo cause they lack better entertainment options? They don't really care about animals, exactly, it's just that there's nothing else?"

"I know lots of people come cause they love animals," Sophie replied, shrugging, "so I don't think that's a fair generalization. But you're probably not wrong for a lot of them. The nice thing about zoos, especially Wild Kingdom, is we have seasonal passes. Movie theaters don't. Minigolf courses don't. But we do. So you pay a lump sum and then you get to come here whenever without paying more, outside of snacks I guess, which you can bring in yourself and aren't necessarily required to purchase."

"That is true, we are kinda cost effective in that regard," Robin said, nodding in agreement before adding, "...are you okay? You seem kinda...not with it."

"Do I ever seem with it?" Sophie asked, making Robin chuckle.

"Good point," she said, "I just...I love you and I want to know that you're doing alright, that's why I do these little emotional check ins."

"I'm okay," Sophie said flatly, in such a manner that Robin didn't buy it.

"Cause, you know, if you're not, I want you to know that you can come to me, and-"

"I'm okay," Sophie said again, smiling now, "really, I'm fine."

But she wasn't. She wasn't okay. And the thing was, normally she would go to Robin for reassurance, but in this instance...she simply wouldn't be able to understand. She would empathize, certainly, give her comfort, but she wouldn't get it. Robin nodded, finishing up the nachos and gathering their trash to throw away in a garbage can that looked like a Hippo with its mouth wide open at the top of the receptacle. Robin then wiped her hands on her pants and put her hands on her hips as she looked at Sophie, who was still drinking her tea.

"Nelly didn't seem too upset about the incident," Robin said.

"Nelly only seems to get upset at incidents that are avoidable and human made," Sophie remarked, "this was just...nature being nature."

"I guess that's fair," Robin said, "still, weird to see her react with virtually no animosity."

"Animosity. Cause there's animals," Sophie said, the both of them giggling as Robin leaned down and kissed Sophie before excusing herself to go to the bathroom. Sophie, now sitting alone, let her thoughts wander back to the event of the morning, and to other related things. She heard a cart pull up and noticed Fletcher getting out, then walking up to the table and seating himself.

"Figured you'd show up eventually," Sophie said.

"...I can't stop relating it to my sister," Fletcher said.

"Me too," Sophie replied.

Robin wouldn't have understood, but Fletcher...Fletcher understood all too well.

                                                                                             ***

Nelly was, as she'd stated, in her office.

She wasn't working. Hell, she wasn't doing much of anything, to be honest. She was, instead, just sitting behind her desk listening to music, staring at nothing. Her thoughts had returned to Rufus. God, he still took up so much space in her brain and she hated herself for allowing him to do so. Even now with Harvey in her life, Rufus invaded her thoughts more than she'd prefer he did. The door opened and Nelly immediately tensed up, then flinched when it was closed. Harvey was standing there, looking at her.

"Do you wanna talk about it?" he asked.

"...about what?" she asked.

"You know damn well what," Harvey said, "that couldn't have been easy to witness, if it reminded you of him."

Nelly exhaled and leaned back into her chair once more, trying to let her body unclench. She shut her eyes and shook her head. She'd only ever told Harvey a little bit about Rufus. The others knew about him, knew he'd hurt her, but they didn't know to what extent. Only Harvey knew a little bit more, but even he didn't know the full brunt of what she'd been through.

"He didn't just hurt me," Nelly finally said, almost whispering, "...when we first started dating, I didn't know he had a daughter. Cutest little girl, 5 years old, just...just the sweetest thing you could imagine. She and I got along famously, better than he and I did I think, and I think that made him jealous. I started to see her with bruises, scrapes. I knew what he was doing. Then when I confronted him about it, he turned his ire to me."

"Nelly, for christ sakes-"

"And in the end I couldn't do anything to stop it," Nelly said, almost in tears, "like...I wasn't the girls mother. Hell, I wasn't even her stepmother. Tried to tell the cops, but nothing came of that. Called CPS but nothing came of that. Course doing these things, even anonymously, he knew it was me and I bore the brunt of it again. But...but so long as he was taking it out on me and not her, then that was a win in my book. He's not in my life now, and sometimes she calls and leaves me messages, but I still flinch at doors slamming, or people suddenly coming into my personal space. Watching that little baby monkey today get almost killed by the very adults that are supposed to nurture it, I guess...I guess it fucked me up."

Harvey nodded and sat down across from her at the desk. He adjusted his frames and ran a hand through his hair before running it back down to his face, massaging his stubble that was quickly becoming a beard.

"You know you're not responsible in either case, right?" he asked, "I mean, sure, you were dating the guy, and sure, you run this zoo, but in both instances you aren't solely responsible. She wasn't your daughter, and in nature this is just what monkeys do."

"That doesn't make it hurt any less," Nelly said, leaning back in her chair, hands cupped on her lap as she stared wide eyed at the ceiling, "do you have any idea what it's like to want to protect everything you love, only to find you can't protect any of it?"

Harvey didn't say anything, but he did understand. Like Fletcher, he understood all too well. Hell, he constantly had to sit across from Nelly.

                                                                                              ***

"It's like...it's like you can try so hard to protect what you love, but it doesn't ever really seem to be protected, does it? Something will find a way to ruin it," Fletcher said, sounding so defeated, shrugging, "maybe that's just how the universe is, though. Cold and unfeeling."

"In my sisters case, there wasn't anything I could do, she just...was going to die, no matter what," Sophie said, "but at least your sister is here. Not to diminish what happened, or the severity of her issues, but yeah."

Fletcher nodded and exhaled.

"No, you're...you're right," Fletcher said, "I guess just...witnessing a child be attacked, be it human or animal, kinda fucked me up."

Robin suddenly sat back down at the table and Fletcher immediately perked back up, almost as if putting his mask back up and not allowing her to really see the depth of his pain, back to his usual jerk ass self.

"So," Fletcher continued, "got anymore tours today?"

"Feels kinda wrong to give tours today," Robin said, "honestly, I kinda wanna just go home. Well, not home, but-"

"We could go to my home," Sophie said, surprising Robin, who nodded happily, smiling. Fletcher smiled as he stood up and walked back to his cart. He climbed in and started the vehicle, waving by to the girls before driving off towards the bird area. Sophie and Robin stayed at the table and canoodled, while Fletcher drove, a little faster than he should've, dodging visitors and workers alike. Finally he pulled up to the little area Kacie worked at, and he parked, almost skidding into a column. He quickly climbed from the cart and found Kacie standing at a wall of cages, doing feeding. She turned to see him when he entered as he walked towards her.

"What are you doing in my neck of the woods?" she asked.

"I was rude this morning," Fletcher said, "and not rude like I normally am, but rude, like, ya know. just casually, I don't know how else to put it. Not playful rude. Just actually rude. And you're the last person I want to be rude towards, because you're awesome."

Kacie set the bird feed bag down and now turned to fully face him, leaning against a cage, playing with her braid, biting her lip as she grinned.

"I'm not a very...open person," Fletcher continued, "but, ya know, sometimes some people are worth being open with, and you're definitely one of them. So I was thinking maybe, after work, you would like to go out with me somewhere. And not just...not just casually, the way we have been, but like...on an actual date. I got scared to get close to people cause I knew what could happen if I did, how I could so easily lose them, but maybe the love is worth it."

Kacie nodded, stood upright and put her arms around his shoulders, leaning on her tiptoes to kiss him, surprising him. He happily kissed her back as she tossed her other hand, still full of bird seed into the air near the surrounding cages, making the birds squawk and go nuts, their sounds filling the area. Fletcher hadn't expected to almost lose his sister, but he aslo hadn't expected to fall in love, and he realized that sometimes, as in nature, life has things you just don't see coming and you have to adjust for.

And he was ready to adjust.

Meanwhile, back in her office, Nelly and Harvey were laying on the floor together staring at the ceiling, both fully clothed. Nelly sighed and ran a hand through her hair.

"I take time for myself," Nelly said, "and bad things happen. We get intimate and bad things happen."

"Bad things just happen, Nell, that's just life," Harvey reminded her, shrugging, "but it doesn't mean good things can't just happen too."

Nelly rolled her head to face his and smiled.

"You're a good thing," she said, making him smile, as she leaned in and kissed him.

He was. He was a good thing.

But he was also a very bad thing, and she just didn't know it yet.

The nice thing about having late shifts at the zoo was you could do things under cover of night and (relatively) get away with them, but especially since Splash Zone had just opened and hadn't yet gotten around to installing security cameras the opportunities seemed endless, which is exactly how Harvey sold the idea to Robin. So, that night, they both opted to take the late shift - relieving Fletcher, albeit not happily - and, once they were certain everyone else was clear of the premises, they headed over to the Splash Zone. Turned out, Harvey had been doing reconnaissance for a while, so he knew where they stored the spoiled krill. He and Robin gathered up what they could onto a tarp, then loaded that tarp into a cart and drove it back to Kazoo's stage show. Once there, they unloaded it and dumped it into the water for the whale to "enjoy". After this, they headed back to the main zoo and awaited the results.

The results, as they would discover two days later, would only lead to further rifts between the zoo proper and Splash Zone, but it was the smallest victory they afford. Nelly, however, felt differently.

                                                                                             ***

"Okay," Nelly said, "a lot of things around here I can let slide. I didn't hold anyone accountable for when Casper promoted Kangaroo Boxing Day, but this sort of thing, because it didn't technically take place on our property, I cannot ignore. So now either someone comes forward and takes responsibility for making Kazoo sick or-"

"Or what?" Fletcher asked, "we're all gonna fail the class?"

"...OR...I'm going to make every single one of you swim in the tank with the mess you created," Nelly said sternly, "because you know what happened right? The whale didn't just vomit. It vomited during the show. ON its trainer. Poor young girl just absolutely covered in whale vomit. You have any idea how traumatizing that had to be? She had to be escorted off the property and has since undergone a whole day of work appointed therapy to deal with what occurred to her. Are you guys proud of yourselves?"

"It wasn't me, but if it were, I'd say yes, I am," Fletcher replied, high fiving Robin who was seated next to him before she stared at his hand, her eyes wide.

"...uh...there's a lizard attached to you," she said quietly.

"Oh, yeah, I know," Fletcher said, "happened during a show earlier, can't get him off."

"Isn't that...uncomfortable?" Robin asked.

"Not really, I kinda forgot he was there," Fletcher said, shrugging, "he's my little guide guest now."

"You aren't seriously giving tours like that are you?" Nelly asked, her attention now turned solely to this new issue, "because that is remarkably unprofessional."

"More unprofessional than just not doing my job? Jesus, can't win with you," Fletcher said, rolling his eyes.

"I...I genuinely don't know, actually," Nelly said, "my point is, guys, someone is going to be held accountable for what happened to the whale, and to its trainer, because I will take the blame for a lot of your shenanigans, but this is one I cannot bear the brunt of. So either someone comes forward, or everyone takes a pay dock. And as for you-" she said, turning her attention to Fletcher, "get. that lizard. off. your hand."

"Don't talk about Gregory like that in front of him, you'll hurt his feelings," Fletcher whispered.

"Don't name it, you'll get attached to it," Harvey said.

"I'm already attached to it," Fletcher said, "that's the crux of the issue."

With that, Nelly, frustrated and ready for a break, turned and exited the break room, leaving everyone to themselves. Fletcher posted his elbow up on the table and held his hand out flat in the air, the lizard dangling from his index finger. Robin leaned forward, somewhat fascinated, staring at it.

"So it doesn't hurt?" she asked.

"Nah," Fletcher said, "he's not biting hard, he's just stuck on me."

"Have you tried just shaking him off?" Harvey asked.

"I'm not shaking him, he's not a human baby," Fletcher said.

The thing was, there was one person who knew how to deal with this, but...Fletcher didn't want to call her.

                                                                                              ***

Sophie was standing with Robin out by the churro concession stand by the Zebras, just chewing and watching. This had become somewhat of a morning routine for them. They would find a snack, generally a sweet snack, Robin would get some coffee, and the two would just animal watch before the zoo got really busy. But today in particular, now that Nelly was somewhat on the war path for accountability, it was definitely needed. Robin had to clear her head. She didn't know that her and Harvey's little joke would result in this sort of reaction, putting everyones financial standing in jeopardy, not that Sophie was that concerned, seeing as she lived with her parents. Robin took another big bite of her churro, washed it down with coffee, and sighed.

"Last night," Robin said, "I got home and all I wanted was to have you there."

Sophie blushed and looked at her shoes, mumbling, "It'd be nice to go home with you sometime."

They each wanted it, but Sophie knew Robin had a "roommate". A roommate. That's what she had begun to refer to Kyle as, and it made her sad to be lying to them both. Robin exhaled and tossed her coffee cup in the empty nearby bin before holding onto Sophie's hand and squeezing it gently, before lifting it to her lips and kissing softly, making Sophie blush even more.

"It just feels so...lonely there, even with them around, you know? I want you there, in my arms, on my bed, just...holding and protecting you."

Sophie giggled. How had she gotten so lucky? Suddenly an arm grabbed Robin's other arm and tugged her away, causing her to yelp in surprise as she saw Harvey pulling her from Sophie and a bit aways, shouting back at Sophie that he was sorry but he needed to borrow her for a minute. As they got a bit aways, now standing near the Rhinos, Harvey lowered his voice, his eyes darting every which way, clearly anxious.

"We committed such a crime," he whispered.

"We got a whale sick, we didn't commit vehicular homicide," Robin said snidely.

"We got a young woman covered in vomit by animal 4 times her size," Harvey said, making Robin smirk and start giggling.

"Oh yeah, I forgot about that," she said, "Oh well, it's puke, right? It's not like she was trapped in a well."

"Okay first of all, what a wild comparison, like, who gets stuck in wells?" Harvey asked, making Robin shrug.

"It happens."

"No, it doesn't, this isn't 1870, there's no wells!" Harvey said, "and secondly-"

"I'm sure there's wells somewhere," Robin muttered, interrupting him.

"-and secondly," he continued, repeating himself through gritted teeth, "we got everyone in trouble. We need to come forward."

"...yeah, that part does kinda suck," Robin said, sounding a little defeated, "but what happens to us if we do?"

"I don't know, Robin, but I know Nelly well, and...and I'm sure I can get our punishments to be less severe, you leave that part to me, but by the end of the day, whether you do or not, I'm coming clean. I can't take the guilt, and...and it's the right thing to do."

With that, Harvey turned on his heel and started to head back to his post, leaving Robin there. She knew he was right. She knew that, morally and ethically, he was right. But the outcome...the result of such actions...that terrified her. All she'd wanted to do was play a prank. Now they'd seemingly traumatized a woman as well as made an animal very ill. Kazoo didn't deserve that. If anything, Kazoo was a victim of circumstance, a monkey (well, a whale, actually) in a cage forced to perform. And if Robin knew anything about the entertainment industry, it was that being forced to do something that once was your lifeblood eventually wore you down to nothing.

                                                                                              ***

Fletcher was standing at the Alligator exhibit, leaning on the railing, watching. He saw some kids across from him on the opposite of the exhibit tossing in some small hunks of meat, a little treat the zoo offered the kids to do, and that a few of the smaller, younger alligators had gathered to enjoy their gifts, the kids overjoyed at the experience. Fletcher couldn't help but crack a smile.

"Reptiles are cool cause dinosaurs were cool," a voice said, and Fletcher looked to his side to see a woman standing there in a leather jacket, leather pants and a button down white collar shirt with a thin black tie. She had small oval glasses and shoulder length hair with bangs. She smiled at him, then added, "you're a sight for sore eyes."

"Stacy Keebler," Fletcher said, grinning wife, "how's the hand?"

"Still gone," Stacy said, raising her arm and showing off a well built prosthetic, wiggling her mechanical fingers at him.

"That's so cool, you're like a Terminator," Fletcher whispered, making her crack up before asking, "wait...what are you doing here?"

"Well, I was informed that you have a lizard stuck to you," Stacy said.

"Nelly called you?" Fletcher asked, and she nodded.

"Yeah, she knew you wouldn't take the initiative," Stacy said, "frankly I admire your tenacity. And your stubbornness."

"The two are interchangeable," Fletcher said, pointing at her while winking before looking at the lizard still hanging off his hand, "...it's hard to do finger guns with a reptile attached to you. So what's your big plan on how to dislodge this little guy? Cause he's stuck to me like a child you didn't want to have."

"You're gonna make a great, neglectful father someday," Stacy remarked, "come with me. We're gonna go use the only tool capable of prying him off without hurting him. We need... The Dislocator."

The name, Fletcher had to admit, made him somewhat nervous.

                                                                                               ***

Robin was standing outside the Splash Zone, chewing her lip, mulling over what Harvey had told her.

Sophie had gone on to do her duties for the day, and Robin had done her few tours, and was now thinking about the consequences of coming clean for her actions. Their actions. She knew it was the right thing to do, she knew Harvey was right, and yet...and yet she just simply couldn't do it. As she stood there, lost in thought, she suddenly felt a hand on her arm and looked to see Catfish standing beside her in her wetsuit, drinking a smoothie.

"Oh, hi," Robin said meekly, "how are you?"

"All things considered I couldn't be better, seeing as how I wasn't the one covered in whale vomit," Catfish said.

"Fair enough," Robin replied, smirking slightly, "...but...I guess I feel really bad about the situation, it sounded like it was fairly horrendous for her. I hope she's doing okay?"

"She's hanging in there," Catfish nodded, sipping on her straw, "but an apology probably wouldn't hurt."

Robin looked at Catfish and squinted, raising an eyebrow, causing Catfish to smirk.

"What?" Catfish asked.

"How come you're so....calm about it all?" Robin asked.

"Cause it's one of the risks of doing this job," Catfish said, shrugging, "listen, I wanted to work with whales ever since I was a little girl. I used to get books about whales out of the library, I slept with a whale plush that I still sleep with, and I watched every nature documentary about whales that I could get my tiny hands on. I love listening to CDs of whale songs. If you come into this job not expecting things like that, then you're just...no offense, but you kinda deserve to be barfed on," she said, shrugging again, causing Robin to crack up.

Say what you want about the Splash Zone, she enjoyed Catfish, and it was nice to have at least one friend on the inside of this rivalry. After laughing a bit, Robin exhaled and put her hands on her hips, nodding.

"Alright," she said, "I know what has to be done about this."

                                                                                               ***

Sitting in the tiny medical office, Fletcher seated on a table as Stacy searched for something in a nearby cabinet. Fletcher raised his hand to his face and looked at the lizard, before looking past at Stacy, who was still searching, shifting things around in the cabinet. After a few minutes, Fletcher grinned and rolled his eyes.

"So," he started, "what's it like losing a limb?"

"Technically didn't lose the whole limb, just lost the hand," Stacy said, "but it's...it's definitely an experience."

"It's kind of cool to be part robot, right?" Fletcher asked.

"In technical terms I'm more of a cyborg, but sure," Stacy said, finally grabbing something and turning around to face him, grinning, holding a plastic bottle as she took a seat on the spinning stool in front of him, Fletcher lowering his eyelids in annoyance.

"That's The Dislocator? It's Amonia," he said.

"Yeah but The Dislocator sounds so much cooler doesn't it?" Stacy asked, laughing, pouring just a small amount on the tip of a Q-Tip and and then, taking Fletcher's hand in her other hand, waving the Q-Tip soaked in Amonia in front of the lizard. After a few moments, Fletcher, much to his surprise, felt the lizards grasp on his finger begin to soften until he dropped completely into a small jar Stacy had placed beneath them. She quickly gathered it up and screwed the lid on top, then held it in front of her, smiling at it.

"Wow," Fletcher said, wiggling his now free digit, "that...that was really cool."

"Yeah, well, I'm pretty cool, so," Stacy said.

Fletcher scratched the back of his head nervously and sighed, shutting his eyes and lowering his head.

"Listen," he said, "Stacy, uh...I need to apologize. When you lost your hand, I...I kind of made a big joke about it. That's just what I tend to do, I make jokes about horrific things so they seem less horiffic, it's a coping mechanism, and not a great one I admit, but it's...it's how I manage. Regardless, it wasn't...it wasn't fair to you, and I am sorry for that, because what you went through had to be traumatic and-"

"Fletcher shut up," Stacy said, surprising him; she smiled, setting the jar on the counter and looking back at him, "actually I'm glad you did. I'm glad you did it cause it forced me to look at it in a humorous light, so in a way, you didn't pity me, you made me laugh at it, and that...that really helped. Now I'm a cyborg, and that's awesome. I know people tell you you're a jerk, but you're not. Just because others believe something about you doesn't make it true, okay? You're not a jerk Fletcher. You're an ass. But the two aren't the same."

Fletcher smiled and nodded as Stacy walked back over and they hugged.

"Thanks for getting him unattached," Fletcher said as she patted him on the back.

"My pleasure," she said. Just then they looked towards the door and saw Sophie standing there.

"What?" Fletcher asked.

"You're gonna wanna see this," she said.

                                                                                                ***

The workers from both the Splash Zone, as well as Wild Kingdom proper, had all gathered around the large tank Kazoo performed in, and were awaiting anxiously. As Fletcher, Sophie and Stacy pulled up in the cart, they climbed out and approached Casper and Nelly, both of whom were standing by Catfish. Fletcher stopped by Nelly and lowered his voice.

"What's goin' on?" he asked.

"You're about to witness a spectacle," Nelly said, arms folded, seeming smug.

"Lady, I had a lizard stuck to me all day, I was a spectacle," Fletcher remarked, making her laugh.

Suddenly the doors to the trainer area opened and Robin and Harvey, both in wetsuits, exited and walked towards the tank. Fletcher's eyes widened and he grinned. That's when he knew what exactly it was he was about to see. Robin and Harvey approached the diving spot by the tank and Harvey removed his glasses setting them down on the edge. He looked at Robin, who smiled at him.

"We're doing the right thing," she said, and he nodded.

"Doesn't make it any less disgusting," Harvey said as Robin laughed and grabbed his hand. They each looked in the direction of those watching. Harveys eyes met Nellys and she smiled at him, shaking her head, making him smile back. Robins eyes landed on Sophies, and she waved playfully, blowing her a kiss, making Robin blush and giggle. After a moment, the trainer who had been vomited on, Alissa, also approached the tank, standing by Catfish, who put her arm around her in a caring manner and pointed at the two by the tank. Robin and Harvey looked at one another, took a deep breath each and lunged forward into the vomit soaked water.

After the show had ended and they'd exited, Robin, Sophie and Fletcher were standing by the tank as Robin tried to clean herself off with one of the hoses, Sophie helping her clean vomit out of her hair as Fletcher leaned against the wall, arms folded, laughing.

"That was pretty badass, I gotta admit," Fletcher said.

"It was vile but it was the right thing to do," Robin said.

"I'm gonna say, I'm surprised it wasn't you who made the whale barf," Sophie said, glancing at Fletcher.

"Me too, honestly," Fletcher said, "primo prank and I didn't lay claim to it."

Suddenly they heard two people walking up to them and turned to see Catfish with Alissa.

"Um..." Alissa said, meekly, looking at her feet, "...th...thank you. Thank you for doing that. I'm still upset it happened, but...thank you."

Robin smiled and nodded before watching them walk away and looking back at Sophie and Fletcher.

"Who wants diner food? Cause I need something comforting after swimming in vomit," Robin said.

Meanwhile, out in the parking lot, Harvey was unlocking his car, ready to head home and shower himself. Suddenly he felt a hand on his shoulder and turned his head to see Nelly standing by him. He smiled and adjusted his small glasses, as Nelly stood by him.

"Hi there," he said.

"...you're amazing, you know that?" she asked.

"I always had a suspicion," Harvey said, chuckling, as Nelly put her arms around his shoulders and leaned in to kiss him. To kiss Nelly...that was more than worth swimming whale vomit for. After the kiss, she pulled back and looked at him.

"You smell terrible," she said.

"Well, I'm covered in puke, it's not an aphrodisiac...typically," Harvey said, the both of them laughing and continuing to kiss. A shower could wait. This was far more worth his time.

The billboards had gone up 7 months ago, and now opening day was closing in on them. Standing in front of the large sign inside the zoo, staring at the massive killer whale in front of them with the comic book style lettering almost shouting KAZOO! at them, Fletcher, Robin and Nelly couldn't help but feel a little bit anxious about it all. Fletcher raised his cup to his lips and sipped on his straw as Nelly continued eating her cotton candy, Robin standing there with absolutely nothing.

"Isn't it supposed to be frowned upon to keep killer whales in captivity now?" Robin asked.

"Frowned upon doesn't mean illegal, it just means it's seen as less favorable than it used to be," Fletcher said, "which, for the record, by no means impacts a companies interest."

"I wasn't happy about it, believe me," Nelly said, "And I fought tooth and nail against it. But after some of the recent events, HQ and the board felt like it was necessary to bring something big and splashy to the zoo to maintain interest and generate new interest as well."

"Splashy, cause it's water based, I get it," Fletcher said, winking at Robin and elbowing her, making her laugh.

"It isn't just the whale either, he's just the main attraction. There's a whole little aquarium, dolphins, whatever you can think of," Nelly said, "Kazoo is just the main draw so that's why he's on all the promotional material."

"Why aren't I on any promotional material?" Fletcher asked.

"Because we want people to come back," Nelly said, turning and tossing her now empty cotton candy stick in the trash, walking off. Fletcher took another long sip of his drink, free hand in his coat pocket, and looked at Robin, who just shrugged.

"Am I that repulsive?" he asked.

"You're a goddamned eyesore," Robin said, the both of them chuckling. Little did they know that one week later, when the aquarium section of the zoo finally opened its doors and Kazoo began doing regular shows, that their lives at the zoo would change forever. And, by the end of it all...

...they'd be criminals.

                                                                                              ***

Robin and Sophie were standing in the girls bathroom out near the small prairie rodent exhibits, both looking in the mirror. Robin was reapplying her eye makeup while Sophie washed her face, seeing as they'd just had lunch. The girls had come over to this area to eat and watch animals, and now were preparing to go their separate ways to get back to their respective jobs, especially Robin as today was a busy tour day for her.

"How many tours do you have left?" Sophie asked, and Robin thought for a second, biting her lip.

"....4? I think 4. It's a busy day," she said.

Just then one of the stall doors opened and Casper walked out, stepped up to the mirrors and sink and started washing their hands alongside them.

"You know this is the ladies room, right?" Sophie asked.

"Yeah, but have you seen the mens room?" Casper asked, "it's...it's like horrors you've never witnessed, far beyond your comprehension."

"Who designed it, Lovecraft?" Robin asked, the both of them laughing.

After finishing, Robin and Sophie left the bathroom hand in hand, leaving Casper on their own. As they exited, they leaned up against the trellis that surrounded the alcove to the entrance of the bathroom, Sophie pinned up against the wooden slats as Robin leaned in and kissed her. These had been the happiest seven months of her life, finally being in a relationship with a woman, this woman specifically. As a mother and teenage daughter walked past them, the girls tried to maintain their innocence, giggling like idiots before Robin pinned her again and kissed her more, this time with more passion.

"I really do need to get to my next tour," Robin whispered, forehead on Sophie's, making Sophie blush.

"And I should pick up more garbage," Sophie said.

"What, I'm not good enough for you?" Robin asked, laughing.

"You're not garbage," Sophie said softly, lacing her fingers through Robin's, "you're the best."

Robin blushed deeply. Sophie didn't really know how to banter exactly, the way Fletcher did for instance, but in a way that's exactly what she loved about her. She loved how just absolutely serious and sweet she always was. Robin pulled away a bit and ran a hand down Sophie's face, smiling at her, making Sophie look down at her feet, smiling but embarrassed. Then they headed out into the zoo, only to be surprised by the loud voice on the speaker blaring at them, all the kids and parents running in one direction. Robin and Sophie exchanged a confused look, before Fletcher pulled up in his cart.

"You guys are gonna wanna see this," he said, and Sophie climbed in beside Fletcher, Robin holding onto the back of the cart, standing on the bumper like they were pegs on a bike as Fletcher drove towards the area reserved for the aqua center construction.

"What's going on?" Sophie asked.

"Kazoo's finally having a show," Fletcher said, "First show at the zoo, so everyone's rushing over there."
"Gee, it's like they've never seen a whale performed trained gymnastics," Robin muttered.

Fletcher parked and they all climbed off and out of the cart, only to spot Nelly and Harvey sitting the bleachers, clearly here to keep an eye on things. The three of them watched from a bit aways, mostly because none of them were interesting in being what was commonly called the "splash zone". Fletcher turned his head and a read a sign.

"Warning: the first three rows will get wet," Fletcher said.

"Like I'm not always wet," Robin said, the two of them high fiving.

"Hey," a voice said from behind them, and they all turned to see a woman in a wetsuit coming up; she looked young, younger than even Sophie, her hair in braids and braces on her teeth as she smiled at them, "you guys work here?"

"No, we work there," Fletcher said, pointing back at the proper zoo, "you work here."

"Why do you have a Catfish on your wetsuit?" Sophie asked, leaning in and squinting at the image on her sleeve.

"Oh, well, we each had to pick a fish or aquatic animal we liked best, so I picked a catfish," the girl said, "I like their stupid whiskers, they're just cute. It's mostly to keep us organized into groups for showings and stuff."

"Well Catfish, it's nice to meet you," Fletcher said, "but really we're here to witness the inevitable disaster with the trainer, as is common with these things."

"I'm the trainer," Catfish said, all of them staring at her now.

"...well this is awkward," Fletcher mumbled.

"I'm sure you'll do great," Robin said warmly, "forgive Fletcher, he's an ass."

They watched as Catfish walked towards the tank, Robin sighing as Sophie hugged her arm and laid her head on Robin's shoulder.

"This is so girly but I always had this dream of swimming with a whale," Robin said, "when I was a little girl, we went to a theme park where they did shows like this, and I thought it looked so cool. I know it's, like, dangerous, potentially, but I love it. I just think it would be SO cool."

Sophie nodded as she listened, chewing on her lip, her brain racing.

                                                                                              ***

After the show, Nelly was in her office doing paperwork. It had been a busy morning, what with the actual opening of The Splash Zone and she had been fielding a lot of calls from reporters and the media and, of course, the board. They were thrilled at the earnings the zoo had already seen thanks to influx of patrons due to it, which put her more at ease, but the ease never lasted, the anxiety always crept back in. The door opened and Harvey entered, carrying two bags in his hand. He shut the door with his foot and waited as Nelly cleared her desk so he could place the bags down.

"Lunch?" she asked.

"Yep," Harvey said, "figured some comfort food could be..."

"Comforting?"

"I was hoping to dredge up a different adjective, but I guess that'll have to do," Harvey said.

Nelly smirked as they unbagged and unwrapped their burgers, biting into their respective lunches. This had become a tradition, the two of them having lunch in her office. Thankfully it turned out they both enjoyed the same foods, so it wasn't a hassle, either.

"How're things going with the opening? Have you met who's running it yet?" Harvey asked, and Nelly shook her head.

"Surprisingly no," she said, mouth half full, "but I'll get to, I'm sure. Eventually we'll cross paths."

"That was quite a performance we saw," Harvey said.

"I guess I'm just worried moreso about the zoo turning into a park of sorts, you know? Like a...a Seaworld or something. Less about the animals and more about attractions such as that. I want to present a safe environment where animals are nurtured and seen in what is, admittedly, a pastiche of their natural habitat, so people can learn and respect them. We're not a goddamn circus, and that's what scares me about the Splash Zone...and Kazoo. It feels so very...circus like."

"Valid fear to have I think," Harvey said, picking up some curly fries and eating them, "but," he said while chewing, "I do think not having so much pressure on you is a good thing. You know, you were so worried about not pulling in enough people, enough money, always scared you were going to lose your job. Now it seems fairly secured, and that's something, right?"

Nelly didn't want to agree to this, but he was right, and she couldn't deny it. Still...she'd gotten into this business because she loved animals, not money. Was it unfair to the creatures she swore to protect to find some kind of middle ground between the two? After all, the zoo did need the money to stay in operation, keep the animals safe and well taken care of and healthy. She could care less about her paycheck, personally. Her priority when it came to the cash was that it was going to be put towards good use for the animals.

"Am I a hypocrite if I say I'm glad we're financially stable, even though I love the animals more?" Nelly asked.

"It isn't like you're shoveling money down your throat, you're shoveling burgers. You're not some capitalist pig obsessed with cash, you're obsessed with the safety and the well being of the creatures we've sworn to protect. One facilitates the continuation of the other. So no, you're not a hypocrite. I'm sorry you think you are. For what it's worth, your moral compass is one of the things I love most about you, it's very attractive," Harvey said, and Nelly smiled. He always knew just what to say to put her mind at ease.

Now if only he'd tell her he was married.

                                                                                              ***

The zoo was emptying out, cleanup for the day had begun, and Casper had volunteered to take Sophie's shift on the janitorial team. They weren't sure why, exactly, but they'd agreed nonetheless. Standing in their uniform trying to gather up garbage and empty cans near the Splash Zone, they turned at the sound of a metal door closing, and seeing a woman exit. She stopped upon seeing them and smiled politely. Casper raised the grabber they were using for trash pickup and waved back at her with it, making her laugh.

"I didn't see it, but I heard you put on a good show this afternoon," Casper said.

"I put on multiple good shows this afternoon," Catfish said, "it isn't like there's one show, I have to do it repeatedly throughout the day. The nice thing is there's 3 trainers, so we alternate throughout the week."

"Aren't you scared of getting killed by Kazoo?" Casper asked.

"Nah, honestly, it's a rarity, people make it out to sound like it happens more often than it does. I'm not saying captivity or making animals perform is a good thing, but our health and safety being questioned is far overblown," Catfish replied, "actually...if you want to come see, I'm about to go back into the tank right now."

"You are? The day's over, zoo's closing," Casper said, snagging a piece of trash from the ground and dumping it into the basket on wheels.

"Yeah, but someone asked me to do something, so," Catfish said, shrugging.

Casper put the grabber in the basket and left it there, opting to follow Catfish into the Splash Zone, towards the tank. Meanwhile, across the zoo, Sophie and Robin were heading in the same direction. Robin had no idea why Sophie had asked her to stay and go with her, but it wasn't like she was in any kind of hurry to get home. Besides, Robin liked Wild Kingdom at night. All the lamps turned on a low dim and gave the whole place a magical, almost ethereal feel. That, combined with the multiple sounds coming from the various animal exhibits made her feel calm.

"Where you two going?" Fletcher asked, pulling up and driving alongside them in his cart.

"We're going back to the Splash Zone," Sophie said.

"Why?" Fletcher asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Beats me," Robin said, "why are you still here?"

"I've been taking night shifts," Fletcher said, "anything to go home and be alone."

Robin nodded. That was a sentiment she understood more than she wanted to admit. Sure, Kyle was at the apartment, but she didn't want Kyle to be there. She wanted Sophie to be there. She wanted to spend her nights with Sophie, holding Sophie in her arms, but because she lived at home with her parents, and because of Kyle, they simply couldn't unless they opted to go to a hotel overnight, which would simply raise suspicions from everyone involved, especially Kyle. Robin sighed. They stopped by a bathroom so Sophie could run in for a moment, leaving Fletcher and Robin alone outside. Fletcher patted the passenger seat of his cart and Robin smiled weakly, sitting in it.

"Why is it so hard to get what you want?" Robin asked in a low voice.

"What do you mean?" Fletcher asked.

"Like...like I wanted to be an actress, but I'm here. I want to be with Sophie, but that isn't possible really...I want so many things that would make me so happy that I simply can't have," Robin said.

Fletcher sighed and rested his arms on the steering wheel, chin atop his arms. He shut his eyes and shook his head.

"Before I worked here," he said, "I went to college, as one does, hoping to obtain a degree in history, maybe eventually become a history professor. I was smart. I was good at it. I could budget my time efficiently and still have a somewhat active social life if I chose to do so. I had always been a history nerd in school so this was, like, my dream. And then, in my sophomore year...my little sister had an accident. She was hit by a car while riding her bike to school, and...and it was severe. Brain damage, physical damage, lots of surgeries and therapies and medications to manage the severity of the pain. Insurance wouldn't cover it all. We weren't wealthy. We weren't poor, but we were middle class. Somewhat lower middle class. I opted to drop out of school and use the remainder of my college tuition, which my parents had spent a lifetime building for me, to instead help fund whatever she needed. It was just the right thing to do. She's my little sister."

Robin looked at Fletcher with wide eyes, so engrossed at his story, surprised at his thoughtfulness. She always knew, deep down, that he was, in actuality, a good person and not a jerk like everyone assumed he was, but she had no idea how deep that ran until now.

"Sometimes we don't get the things we want the most. She wanted to grow up, become a vet, she loved animals. I wanted to be a history professor. Closest I get now is reading historical books. But sometimes...sometimes I'll bring her here late at night, so she can see the animals, and she can at least, sort of, have what was taken from her in some weird way. So you aren't an actress, Robin, so what. What matters is you're here. I'm here too. Where we came from doesn't matter. What matters is where we are now. For what it's worth, I'm glad you failed. I failed too. But at least we're here together because of it. Silver linings and all that, right?"

Robin nodded, smiling warmly.

"...thanks Fletcher," she said quietly.

"Don't mention it," he said, shrugging, as Sophie finally re-emerged from the bathroom and got in the cart on Robins lap. Fletcher drove them the rest of the way to the Splash Zone and dropped them off before going about his night shift. The girls entered to find Casper and Catfish standing together chatting. As they approached the tank, Robin noticed Kazoo was out in the pool.

"What are we doing?" Robin asked.

"You said you always had a dream of swimming with a big aquatic animal," Sophie said, "so, uh...so I asked Catfish if she would mind helping that dream come true."

Robin looked from the tank to Catfish, then to Sophie.

"You...you did this...for me?" Robin asked.

"Well, you did a lot of sweet things for me when we first met, and...and I guess I wanted to do the same. Cause being with you has been the happiest time of my life, and you don't care about any of the things that I think are negatives about me. So I made sure your dream came true."

Robin grabbed Sophie and kissed her, making Catfish smile. They then also changed into wetsuits Catfish had brought for them, and, the three together, dipped into the water cautiously. The whole thing was magical. The soft lighting of the pool, the stars overhead, swimming hand in hand with Sophie, her other hand on a whale fin, Robin suddenly felt a freeness that she hadn't felt before, and suddenly her sadness about not being an actress, about her relationship with Kyle, all of it just melted away and she found herself laughing, feeling so very happy and in love. Kyle had been there when Robins dreams had fallen apart, but Sophie had come along when she needed new dreams. And Sophie...Sophie was determined to make them come true. Much like Fletcher did for his little sister, Sophie really just wanted to give Robin something she otherwise couldn't have.

And that...that was love.

It was "Pride Week" at Wild Kingdom.

Pride Week was yet another event that was framed to get more than the usual number of guests to come visit, much like Birdapalooza, and this one was even more popular to be honest, because, well, kids love giant cats. Pride Week saw lion tamers come in from the local circus and do very basic and very safe tricks with the lions. Simple "jump through hoop" type tricks. Nothing that would irritate, aggravate or in any way harm the lions. As a result, this wound up being one of the most popular events of the year, and Nelly had to miss it, sitting in her office, doing paperwork. The door opened and she looked up, only to see Harvey slink on in. She smiled, pulled her glasses from her face and hung them around her neck.

"How can I help you today sir?" she asked.

"I have two deliveries for you," Harvey said, approaching the desk, and, with one palm placed firmly on the topside, leaned across to kiss her, then added, "that was the first, now here's the second."

He pulled his other arm out from behind his back and handed her a stuffed Alligator. Nelly took it and giggled. She leaned back in her chair and after a few moments of appreciating it, looked back up at Harvey, who'd now seated himself on the corner of the desk.

"Well this is cute, nobody has given me a plush as a present since elementary school Valentine's day," Nelly said.

"His name is Mr. Chomps," Harvey said, "I won him in a machine. Figured, ya know, he'd like it here more, at the zoo."

Nelly played with Mr. Chomps momentarily in her hands before hugging him to her chest and looking back up at Harvey, who was just smiling gently down at her.

"You're really cute, do you know that?" he asked, and she shook her head.

"No, I don't, you should tell me more," she said, grinning.

Seemed like everywhere around the zoo, love was in the air.

                                                                                                             ***

"That was incredible," Robin said.

One of the performers who'd worked with the lions that day, an older woman named Maria, was sitting out during her break, as Robin sat along with her. Robin had no tours scheduled for the day - nobody did in fact - considering it was an event day, and so she spent most of her early afternoon simply watching the lion tamers work with the animals in front of crowds.

"How did you even get into this line of work?" Casper asked, sitting alongside Robin.

"Well, as I'm sure you're aware," Maria said, taking a long drink from a bottle of water, "it isn't exactly the kind of thing you often just plan to wind up in. Nobody goes to school for lion taming. It's a little...off the beaten path, you know? Technically, my job falls under the title of 'animal trainer', not just lion tamer, because you've got to be proficient in a handful of areas. Originally I was gonna be a veterinarian, cause I always had interest in animals, but then once I got into college I had this boyfriend who took me to a circus cause he had a cousin who was in it. Seeing her perform with big animals, that was all it took, man. I changed my entire career path that afternoon."

"Aren't you scared?" Casper asked.

"Of course I'm scared, it's a giant fucking cat that could tear my throat open with ease," Maria replied, laughing, "but, you know, you do what you do with confidence and hope for the best. Besides if you're properly trained - I mean I'm not saying accidents don't happen even with training but still - then you're much less likely to have that sort of accident."

"Hey nerds, what're we talking about?" Fletcher asked, taking a seat at the table, eating a churro and, surprising to everyone else, handing them their own as well.

"Lion taming," Robin said, biting into her treat.

"That's pretty cool," Fletcher said between chews.

"What's more dangerous in your opinion," Kyle asked, "lions or tigers?"

"Or bears? Oh my!" Fletcher said, making them laugh.

"Frankly," Maria said, taking another long swig of water before capping it shut, "I would say Tigers. Lions, I think are more powerful, but a lion really is just a giant cat. A tiger is a totally different breed of animal. I mean, sure, it's a giant cat too, but it isn't the same. You see plenty of wildlife photographers taking photos of themselves lounging with lions in the Savannah, you only ever see people interact with tigers during Vegas magic shows. The two are not the same."

Robin looked around at the people milling about, enjoying the event, and wondered where Sophie was. She said she'd join her when she was done with her janitorial shift - during events they always hired extra help for the day so she wasn't the sole one keeping the zoo clean - and yet here it was, early afternoon now, and she hadn't shown up. Robin took another bite of churro and, as she chewed, she just hoped everything was alright. Things between them were crystal clear now, emotionally, so she had no real reason to worry.

And yet, by the end of the day, she would be.

                                                                                                          ***

Harvey and Nelly had gone for a walk through the zoo, Mr. Chomps tucked tightly beneath Nelly's arm, as they each ate their own stick of cotton candy that was colored like lions. Harvey, after finishing half of his, held the stick away from his face and grimaced.

"I don't like the color of this," he lamented, "it makes me feel as though I'm eating pee in physical form."

"Ew, come on, I'm trying to enjoy this," Nelly said, laughing.

"I'm just sayin'," Harvey responded, shrugging, "fluffy pee treat."

They continued walking aways until they each finished, tossing the sticks into a nearby garbage can, then leaning against a small rail looking into a pen full of lion cubs and mothers. They were all laying around, being groomed by their respective parents, and Nelly smiled, hugging Mr. Chomps to closely to her chest.

"I keep thinking I'd like children one day," she said, "but, god, with the job being the way it is...would I even have the time to be a mother, you know? The animals are my children. I mean, ya know, not really cause giving birth to a giraffe as a human would probably kill me-"

"Not to mention raise a whole lotta questions about the depth of your-"

"-but still," Nelly continued, interrupting, holding back laughter, "you know what I mean. This zoo is what I care about. It's my child. It's what I worked my whole life to achieve, you know? I'm so happy to be in charge, and the last thing I wanna do is screw it up, much like a child, actually. I just worry that I wouldn't be capable of giving a kid the kind of attention it deserves. But god it would be nice."

"I imagine what it would be like to have kids sometimes," Harvey said, "but I totally get where you're coming from. It's a lifelong endeavor, and one that you're scared to do wrong. I guess it's okay to substitute stuff in the place of having a family, but...having a family, a proper family...there's something really nice about that. Knowing that, at the end of the day, you have something to come home to that loves you, that you work to protect and nurture. I like that."

Nelly blushed. Harvey wasn't like the other men she'd been interested in or involved with. In fact, that was mostly what she liked about him. She could tell her cared about things like family and love. That he held her interests close to his heart. She'd never felt so...claimed.

"I just wouldn't wanna do it wrong is all," Nelly said.

"You never could," Harvey said, "even if you tried to, I promise you never could."

"Hey," Nelly said, grinning, "how about we go into the butterfly hutch and make out?"

Harvey laughed as she took his hand and led him up towards the building. In so many ways, he made Nelly feel like a teenager again, and she loved it. As the doors to the Hutch closed behind them and Nelly locked them within it, all she could think of was how Mr. Chomps didn't need to see the adult acts that were about to go down amongst all these beautiful butterflies. He was simply much too innocent for that.

                                                                                                         ***

Fletcher and Casper had each gone their own ways, leaving just Robin now sitting with Maria as Maria prepared for her next show. As she stuffed things back into her backpack and got her costume back together, Robin bit her lip and finally spoke again.

"Do you ever regret not doing what you initially set out to do?" Robin asked, "like...say you had gone to veterinarian school, right, and gone on to work in the medical field helping animals instead of this. Would you feel fulfilled or would you feel like you'd missed out?"

"Well, I don't know that I'd feel like I'd missed out because unless I partook in it firsthand I wouldn't know what it is I'm missing to begin with, right?" Maria asked, putting her baton on the table and turning to face Robin, hand on her hip, "but I'd always wonder. That's the killer, I think. The things you don't do you always wonder for the rest of your life what it'd have been like if you had done them. And besides, if you can so easily be swayed by something different, then you weren't really all that attached to the original thing in the first place, were you?"

This statement was what Robin needed to hear. The last few months, working at Wild Kingdom, her blossoming relationship with Sophie and hiding it from Kyle...she'd had this twinge of guilt, as she rightfully should. She was, in essence, having an affair. But hearing someone tell her that, in the end, it was because she wasn't happy to start out with...well, that alleviated a good chunk of her guilt.

"And besides," Maria said, continuing, "the risk is worth the reward, I would say. It sure was for me. In a way, I'm still helping animals, because I know there's worse trainers out there, and I know I do it with a gentleness they wouldn't bring to the job, so in a way, I'm protecting them."

Robin nodded absentmindedly. Again, her thoughts turned to Sophie. Sophie had told her about how everyone she'd ever tried to be with had hurt her or rejected her, and Robin knew she would never do that. Robin knew she would only ever treat her the best that she could. Robin stood up from the table and pulled on her jacket over her uniform.

"It was really nice talking with you," Robin said, pulling her hair out from under her jacket, "and good luck with your next show, but I really have to go do something."

With that, Robin climbed into the nearby cart and started driving away. She really had to find Sophie.

                                                                                                         ***

Harvey and Nelly were laying on the floor of the Hutch, both breathing heavily, both nude. The Hutch had drop down shades, so nobody could see inside, and the entrances were locked, so nobody could walk in. Nelly ran a hand through her hair and sighed, grinning widely as Harvey coughed a few times. Nelly rolled her head to face him, and he did the same, smiling back at her.

"Who knew you were such a girly girl, wanting to fuck in a butterfly hutch," Harvey said.

"I'm allowed to be girly," Nelly said in response, giggling, "it's just a nice space. It's quiet and, most importantly, it's capable of being locked off and blocked off. Between the door locks and the shutters, we're completely alone in here. That's more than I can say for most exhibits around here."

Nelly rolled onto her side and looked at Harvey, who just kept looking back at her, smiling.

"What?" he asked.

"Nothing. Nothing at all," she said quietly, "I'm just happy to be here with you. Doing this. Really, it's...it's all I've wanted for a very long time. I'm just...happy. I'm happy, and I don't...I don't really know how to feel that or to trust it. How do you trust it when you've been so unhappy for so long?"

"You just gotta," Harvey said, shrugging, "you just gotta give in, know that it's worth it, worth the risk. I know how you feel. It's taken me a long time to trust the happiness too, cause for so long I was convinced I didn't deserve it. But that's what you have to allow yourself to believe. It's selfish, but there's nothing wrong with that if it's for your well being. There's differences between positive and negative selfishness. Happiness is not on the negative spectrum."

Nelly nodded and rolled back onto her back, looking up at the butterflies fluttering away overhead. Did she deserve it? So many people had told her she didn't that she'd internalized that belief herself now. She chewed on her lip and thought about her last relationship. How much he'd taken from her. How much he'd belitted her. How much he'd made her think so lowly of herself. But she'd worked hard to get to where she was now, and she was proud of being the one in charge of Wild Kingdom, and she was happy being here with Harvey. Suddenly he rolled over, pinning her down a bit, making her laugh in surprise as he looked down at her face and gently brushing some hair from her face.

"It's beautiful in here," Harvey said, "but I think I'd rather look at you than butterflies."

With that, he leaned in and kissed her, then kissed down her jaw to her neck and to the crook of her shoulder. Nelly let herself go, just enjoying the moment as it started to rain outside, the water hitting the glass of the Hutch. He was right. Sometimes it was right to be selfish.

She was gonna try that someday.

                                                                                                         ***

Robin pulled over her cart near The Lions Den - a small playground area filled with lion themed equipment - and parked. She looked around until she spotted someone sitting underneath the slide, wearing a yellow rain slicker. Robin climbed out from the cart and, zipping her jacket up and tugging the hood on over her head, began walking towards them. As she reached the space, she sat on the end of a seesaw beside the slide and just waited, but the figure didn't move. That was when she could hear them crying. Sophie reached out and put her hand on their knee, causing them to finally look up.

"What are you doing out here?" Robin asked, "especially now that it's raining?"

"Where else would I be?" Sophie asked, wiping her face on her slicker sleeve, "this is where I belong, right?"

"What?" Robin asked, confused.

"...this morning, I overheard my parents talking...talking about me," Sophie said, "about my sister. My father said that they really got screwed cause one didn't get to grow up physically, and the other didn't get to grow up mentally, and as a result, they just had two failed children. It isn't my sisters fault she died, and it isn't my fault I'm stunted."

"You're not-"

"I am, but there's nothing wrong with that," Sophie said, interrupting, "I have no shame in it. So I figured, well, if everyone sees me as a child, then maybe I should only exist in childish spaces. I came here after my shift and I've just been hiding here ever since. I didn't think you'd come looking for me since it's an event day. I figured you'd just, ya know, have fun."

"Can't have fun without you around, you know that," Robin said, smiling as she shifted from the seesaw down to the underside of the slide, putting an arm around Sophie; Robin sighed and said, "you know, this event? It's about pride. About...about lions and their prides. But what you just said...you have pride in yourself, in who you are. No shame in your mental abilities. No shame in your queerness. I wish I had any kind of pride remotely close to what you have. It's inspirational, admirable."

Sophie looked at Robin, who ran her other hand up to Sophie's face and wiped at her eyes, then ran her thumb over her lips.

"So if today is about pride," Robin continued, "maybe we should be proud. Not hiding away. This lion tamer I talked to today told me that if she hadn't taken the chance to see what doing the career she had now was like, she would always be wondering. That's how I feel about what we have. It was scary, but it's been so worth it. The most worth it of anything in my life. So I'm gonna take pride in being brave enough to take that risk, to walk away from the heternormaitve path and, instead, embrace something else. Embrace you. Cause god are you worth it. What do you say? What do you say we try having pride instead of shame?"

Sophie nodded weakly and leaned against Robin, pushing her head under her chin. Robin smiled and gently held her close, stroking her hair as the rain fell on the plastic and metal playthings around them.

"I'm glad you're in my pride," Sophie whispered, and Robin chuckled.

"There's nowhere else I'd rather be," Robin replied, kissing her on the head.

Robin Glass had attempted to be an actress. She was still trying to do that, best she could. But if she'd followed that path, she wouldn't have met Sophie Hart, she wouldn't be at Wild Kingdom. Sometimes, as Maria had put it, the best things in life aren't the things you plan for at all. Robin hadn't planned to come work here, and she sure as hell hadn't planned to meet Sophie and fall in love. But it definitely was the best thing in life, now.

And she took pride in that fact.

"Whatever I get her, it has to be perfect," Robin said as she, Fletcher and Kacie stood in the gift shop, admiring all the trinkets and other various zoo related items for purchase; she picked up a small, glass Giraffe and examined it, then exhaled, "all this stuff is so...kitschy. And not in the quirky kind of way. In the 'I bought it at a zoo gift shop' kind of way."

"Yeah, well these are your options," Fletcher said, biting into the half wrapped taco he had in his hand. He, Robin and Kacie had walked down the street to a small taco cart and purchased lunch before coming back to the gift shop and perusing. Kacie pushed some lettuce between her lips and cleared her throat.

"You know, I could help you do something," Kacie said, "I have a lot of skills. We could always buy something here and then screw with it to make it unique."

"Why are you even doing this, aren't you two already, like, a thing?" Fletcher asked, sipping the soda he and Kacie were sharing, clutched in his other hand.

"I mean, kind of, but I wanna make it official official, you know?" Robin said.

"Women, always needing clarification," Fletcher said, smirking, making it apparent he was joking.

"I just need her to know that, yeah, what we have currently is lovely but I want her to officially be my girlfriend, I need a label," Robin said, "...Kacie, what kind of skills do you?"

"What kinda skills you need?" she asked, grinning.

                                                                                                        ***

Harvey, Casper and Nelly were sitting in the employee lounge while Harvey put his sandwich back together after applying his condiments. He then took it to the table and seated himself beside Casper, across from Nelly, who was eating a burger she'd ordered in.

"Why do you wait until now to put your condiments on?" Casper asked, eating from his ramen cup.

"Because if you put it on at the start of the day in preparation for lunch, by the time lunch rolls around, it all soaks in and is no longer fresh," Harvey said and Casper nodded, his eyes widened a bit.

"Yeah, that makes sense," he said.

"Does it though?" Nelly asked, making Harvey look up at her; she tossed her hair and added, "I mean, you could just put 'em on, then stuff it in the fridge so it retains its coldness and doesn't do that. You don't have to wait."

"Hey, you're not the sandwich master here, okay?" Harvey said, biting into it as the door to the lounge opened and Doug walked inside, causing everyone to shout in surprise. Doug stood there and looked around, hands on his hips, then exhaled.

"Welp, doesn't look like much has changed here lately," he said.

"When did you..." Nelly asked, grinning, approaching him, "you didn't even tell me you were coming back yet!"

"Well, to be fair, this was a sudden decision. I was actually scheduled to come back next week, but Arthur told me that today would be just fine. Says he's feeling much better, doesn't need me around the house as much now," Doug said, "so what's been goin' on since I left?"

Harvey and Nelly - Harvey chewing his sandwich as she sipped her coffee - exchanged a look.

"Not much," they said in unison.

                                                                                                          ***

Robin was sitting on a child sized chair shaped like a rhino when Kacie sat beside her in one shaped like a hippo. Fletcher was off across the store looking at books about bird watching. Kacie glanced over at Robin, who had the most exasperated look on her face, and for a brief moment, their eyes connected. Robin sighed and buried her face in her hands, presumably to hide her frustration.

"I'm probably not the best at giving dating advice, considering I've had maybe two previous relationships in my life, but in my experience, what you get someone doesn't matter nearly as much as the fact that you got them something to begin with," Kacie said.

"Yeah, yeah, 'it's the thought that counts', I know, but still, that feels lazy. I want her to know that I took a lot of time, put in a lot of effort, and not because I want the recognition, that could mean less to me, but because I want her to know that she means that much to me that I'd be willing to do so," Robin said, "I've never..."

Robin chewed her lip and sighed again.

"...I've never felt like this before. Whenever I dated someone in the past, and admittedly I've only ever dated men, I never went out of my way to make them feel special to me. To make it seem like I was thinking of them or caring about them deeply. That isn't to say we wouldn't do things. Like, for our birthdays, for example, we always did nice stuff for eachother. But this is so different. I want to make her happy every. single. day. I want her to realize, every waking moment that passes, she is loved more than the moment that came before it. It's like...it's like my heart is a hostage and I don't know how to deal with it."

Kacie smiled, reached over and patted Robin on the leg.

"How about this," she said, "how about you get two animal plushes, animals she likes the most, and then give them to me so I can do something with them. Trust me, it'll be unique, and nobody else will have anything like it."

Robin looked over at Kacie and smiled weakly.

"Why are you so interested in helping me?" she asked, half laughing.

"Because, until a few weeks ago," Kacie replied, "I also thought I wasn't really worthy of being loved, and from what you've told me about this girl, and what I've noticed firsthand, she seems to kind of suffer from that too. So, if I can help someone prove to someone else who felt the way I did realize they're wrong, then that's a win in my book."

Robin looked towards Fletcher, who was now acting out a little puppet show with animal hand puppets for younger kids across the store, making them laugh. She smiled and nodded, looking back at Kacie.

"He's surprisingly good, isn't he?" Robin asked.

"He really is," Kacie agreed, "and...I think that's what matters. Seeing the worth in people who either can't see it in themselves, or have been told there isn't any. A lot of people think Fletcher is a goof, an idiot, a jerk, but he isn't any of those things. I mean he's kinda goofy, but, hah. But the thing is, he didn't internalize any of that. Sounds like this girl might've."

Robin nodded, remembering the stories Sophie had told her last week about growing up, about how her mother had spoken to her in regards to her mental disabilities. Robin sighed, stood back up and walked over to the plush shelf, gathering two she knew she'd love, and handing them to Kacie, who smiled upon receiving them.

"Let's go get you a girlfriend," Kacie said, grinning.

                                                                                                             ***

Nelly and Doug were walking through the zoo - seeing as Doug had just returned on a whim, sooner than he'd been anticipated, he didn't really have a schedule yet, so Nelly thought she'd just walk around with him for the afternoon - near the endangered animal section. They stopped at a certain kind of tiger and looked into the encasement, Nelly still sipping from her coffee as Doug shook his head.

"I'm still worried that he needs me at home," Doug said, "how can I be so good at taking care of animals and so bad at taking care of people?"

"Because they're not the same, Doug, you...you do realize that, right?" Nelly asked, the both of them chuckling as she continued, "like, caring for people is so much harder. Animals are base. That isn't to say they lack intelligence, but it all comes down to, essentially, base instincts. What to eat today. Where to sleep today. Is it safe here for me. A Kangaroo likely never wondered if its love interest was cheating on them, for example. Humans are messy. Complicated. Honestly, relationships, platonic or otherwise, are generally too hard and not worth the effort."

"Jeez Nelly, what happened while I was gone," Doug asked, making her laugh again.

"I'm just tellin' it like it is, that's all," Nelly responded, shrugging, "people are hard to deal with. More often than not they'll disappoint you. How do you do it, Doug? How do you trust that it's okay to love someone?"

"You just do," Doug said, "I don't know, you just do it. It's a conscious decision, but it's one you make every day. You tell yourself 'this person loves me and I deserve that', and some days that's harder to believe than others, but hopefully whoever you're with will continually prove you wrong even on the worst of days."

Nelly smiled and sipped her coffee. Doug had always been her go to for relationship advice, and she appreciated having him back. She patted him on the back as they kept looking at the tiger.

"I'm glad yer back, I missed ya," she said.

"You're not just sayin' that?" Doug asked and Nelly laughed.

"No, I'm actually not just saying that," Nelly said, resting her head on his arm, "I really am glad you're back."

Doug had been gone for months at this point. After his husband, Arthur, had been diagnosed with a serious medical issue, Doug had to take a large amount of time off to help care for him, something that Nelly allowed him to do while keeping his job and still retaining a paycheck. Being the one in charge of the zoo, she was able to do that, so long as she doctored his time cards accordingly. Thankfully for Doug, Nelly was always willing to do the right thing for the right people.

Unless the person was her, of course.

                                                                                                       ***

Sophie hadn't had the best day.

In fact, she'd had a pretty lousy one. She'd had to clean up multiple instances of vomit, had a drink thrown on her by a 2 year old and then, to top it all off, had been expecting to get a pay raise and been declined yet again. So yeah, it was safe to say Sophie was feeling, more or less, like shit today. Now sitting in the janitorial closet near the Hyena exhibit, she found that hiding was in her best interest. She was leaning against the wall, her legs pulled up to her chest as she read a kids book she'd brought from the library about bats, when the door suddenly opened. Light spilled in, and she put one arm across her face, squinting to see Robin enter, shutting the door behind her.

"Figured I'd find you here," Robin said as she sat cross legged in front of Sophie, a small plastic bag by her side.

"...how did you know?" she replied.

"Cause you weren't in any of your other usual spots, and I know you like to come here when you're not feeling good," Robin said, and Sophie blushed.

"You sure do know me now, don't you," she said.

"I'd like to think that every day there's something new about you I could learn," Robin remarked, making Sophie blush; Robin then cleared her throat and added, "listen, um...there's something I wanna talk to you about. About us. Whatever, like, us is. You know I like you, like, a lot. I know you like me a lot. I know that, for me, these kinds of feelings are new and scary, in a way, and that for you they're also kind the same. Um...that being said, I also know that when I find something that matters to me, I do everything within my power to keep it. I want to keep this. I want to keep...you."

Sophie smiled. Her heart lifted a bit. Maybe today wouldn't be so bad after all.

"And," Robin continued, swallowing nervously, "uh...I guess I...I've never done any big, like, declaration of feelings, and I think it's cause, until you, I didn't have anyone who warranted it. Most of the people I dated - well, actually all of the people I dated - were men, and I never felt attached enough, emotionally, to want to do that for them. But you..."

Robin raised her eyes to meet Sophie's, and saw her smiling at her, which made Robin blush, made her knees weak, her heart beat faster.

"...god...you...you are someone worth doing that for. You're worth doing everything for. Things that scare me don't scare me when I think about doing them for you, and...and I want this to be official," Robin continued, "I want us to be official. If you'll let that, if you want that too. I got you something."

Robin reached down to the bag beside her, picked it up and handed it across to Sophie. Sophie took it, curious, and opened it, reaching inside. She then pulled out a turtle and a giraffe stitched together in a sort of Frankenstein's monster way; the turtle body was still in tact, but i had the head of the giraffe coming out of the shell, along with the tail out the back. Sophie's eyes widened, and she put a hand to her mouth.

"...nobody's ever done anything like this for me," she whimpered.

"Good, cause that means I get to be the first," Robin replied, "so...will you be my girlfriend?"

Sophie looked back at the plush, and then, clutching it to her chest, she got on her hands and knees and crawled closer to Robin, kissing her. Robin happily kissed her back, giggling, as Sophie rested her forehead on Robin's and nodded.

"Nothing would make me happier," Sophie said, before curling up in a ball between Robin's legs, squeezing the plush to her chest and resting her head on Robin's stomach. Robin reached down and gently stroked Sophie's hair, as Sophie whispered, "thank you. I had a really bad day."

"Well, that's what girlfriends are for," Robin remarked, "making bad days better."

"Well then, I have a pretty great girlfriend," Sophie said, making Robin smile.

                                                                                                              ***

Harvey was driving home, but the entire time, his mind was on Nelly.

He hated himself. He loved Nelly, but he hated himself. He should stop and pick up dinner, he thought. Anything to make things less conspicious about his late arrival. So he did. He stopped and he got fried chicken from a restaurant, and then he got home. He walked in through the back kitchen door, as he always did, to find his wife, Maria, sitting at the table, scrapbooking. She looked up at Harvey and smiled at him, and he forcefully smiled back at her as he placed the bag from the chicken restaurant down on the nearby counter. He then stood behind his wife, hands on her shoulders, and watched her do her hobby.

"What's the theme of this one?" he asked.

"This one's theme is 'mothers I wish I had growing up'," Maria said, making Harvey laugh.

"That's extremely specific," he said.

"Well I have specific issues that need to be address," Maria replied, the both of them laughing as he kissed the top of her head. Harvey walked to the nearby standup mirror and started removing his uniform, wearing a basic shirt and his shorts underneath, while he could hear Maria rustling in the chicken bag in the kitchen, and he sighed. He wished he could be an animal.

Preferably one that mates for life.

It was a slow day.

No tours had been scheduled, there was barely any work to be done, and most everyone was able to kind of do whatever it was they wanted. This meant, for Robin, being led by Sophie towards The Lagoon, where the turtles lived. Robin had been sitting in the break room with Fletcher and Kacie initially as he read through a magazine with a feature spread on Seahorses. Robin was sitting in a chair, drinking coffee, as he read aloud.

"Seahorses are the only species in which the male gets pregnant and gives birth, when a female transfers eggs to a male's enclosed brood pouch," Fletcher said, "you know, I can't say I envy those that have to carry children. Birth sounds like a painful, horrifying process."

"You're a painful, horrifying process," Robin said, making Kacie chuckle.

"Yeah, but in me it's endearing," Fletcher replied.

The door opened and Sophie walked in, leaned against the wall and sighed heavily. Clearly she'd been working hard, gathering garbage and doing cleaning. Taking advantage of the fact that the zoo was, more or less, empty today so she could really manage to get things clean and tidy again. Sophie locked eyes with Robin and Robin smiled at her, making Sophie blush.

"What are you reading about?" Sophie asked, glancing at Fletcher.

"Seahorse pregnancy," Kacie said, answering for him.

"Why can't you ever read something normal? Like a good ol' fashioned kids mystery book?" Sophie asked.

"Yeah, don't you wanna read The Hardy Boys and the Case of the Seahorse Embryo?" Robin asked, everyone laughing.

"Look, you guys don't have to be in here," Fletcher said, "I'm just trying to educate as well as entertain, alright?"

Sophie walked past the table and stopped by Robin, leaning down and whispering.

"Do you want to come see something with me?" she asked, and Robin smiled, nodded, and got up. Together the two women exited the room, leaving Fletcher and Kacie to their ingestion of animal reproduction material. They headed down the hall and out the main hall, then into the main foyer until they reached the outside, the circle of the zoo, and Robin looked around, removing her little visor cap and tossing her hair. Sophie reached down and grabbed Robin by the hand, leading her, which made Robin blush.

"So where are we going?" Robin asked.

"We're going to see a turtle," Sophie said.

                                                                                                           ***

"There's no question," the doctor told Sophie's parents, "We've run a gamut of tests, both psychological and educational, and all indicators point to our suspicions. Your daughter clearly has a myriad of developmental delays. She's just not where she should be when compared to her peers."

The thing that Sophie hated, looking back on these memories, was how everyone spoke about her in front of her, but never to her. She felt like furniture, or a sick pet that didn't have a say in her autonomy. So instead she sat quietly, patiently, simply listening to adults discuss her apparent mental disabilities.

"This isn't a bad thing, for the record," the doctor continued, "many children with developmental delays and disabilities go on to be successful and manage to have completely fulfilling lives, if they get the help they need to do so. Really, all it means is that she won't be the same as her peers. Her interests might lag behind that of her peers, for instance. She might prefer to do childlike things well into her teens, or act like a teenager somewhat into adulthood. She might struggle to learn things. But there are things you can do to help her."

Sophie looked from the doctor to her parents, both of whom seemed absolutely distraught, as if their daughter had just died in front of them. Her mother had one hand clamped over her mouth, squinting, as if near tears, while her father was rubbing his forehead. Sophie didn't understand what the big deal was, she didn't really care one way or the other, but apparently it was a big deal to those around her. And then, when she was a teenager, her mother would say something to her that would change her entire perspective on the situation.

                                                                                                            ***

"It's Gordon's birthday," Sophie said, carrying a small bowl of leaves and greens to the turtle habitat, Robin by her side; Sophie continued, "he's not the oldest turtle here, but he's my favorite. So every year I bring it upon myself to get him a nice little meal so he knows that he's appreciated."

"That's really cute, Sophie," Robin said, quickly leaning in and smooching her on the cheek, making Sophie blush.

"Well, not enough people give attention to the turtles, cause they're not generally the most exciting animals," Sophie said, "but I love turtles. I think they're a great example of not taking life too seriously and not to go too fast, to just sort of take things as they come. Be relaxed. Nothing wrong with being slow."

"I think that's a good way to see it, sure!" Robin said, "So you've just taken it upon yourself to do this?"

"Well, kind of," Sophie said, "but they also remind me of myself."

Robin raised an eyebrow, confused at this. They finally approached the Lagoon and Sophie whistled, and much to Robin's surprise, a very large turtle carried himself up a little hill and to the gate, where Sophie knelt and slid the bowl full of food through and to him. Gordon started chomping away as Sophie sat cross legged on the ground in front of the habitat, watching, as Robin seated herself beside Sophie, watching as well.

"Okay, I need to ask," Robin said, "how do turtles remind you of yourself? Such an interesting animal to find solace in."

"Because they're slow and I'm slow," Sophie said, "like that little girl on that tour, but not as bad as she seemed to be. Course she was also really young. When I was a little girl, I had trouble learning anything, retaining information, or having the same interests as the other kids around me. I didn't start talking until I was 5, I couldn't read until I was 10, and even then, as I got older, I still liked little kids cartoons while other girls my age were getting into age appropriate dramas and talking about boys they found cute."

Robin stayed quiet, listening intently, very surprised to hear this.

"But...while my parents seemed really upset about it, I never really was," Sophie continued, "I just...saw myself as me. There wasn't anything wrong with me. I was just not like them. I mean, there were times when I felt a little bad about being so different, but that was mostly when my parents made me feel bad about it, or some of the other girls would make fun of me. So I like turtles, cause they're slow too, but they're also the most amazing animals. They live forever, and they don't live their life according to anyone elses expectations of them except their own, and that's so admirable. So I'm slow. So what. I'm also able to understand things others can't. Things about people. Because I can take more time to think about it instead of acting immediately on emotion. I think the trade off is fair."

Robin wanted to cry. She had always had a sneaking suspicion that Sophie wasn't exactly neurotypical, but she'd never expected an admission like this. Sophie had always come across as 'different' in some sense of the word, but she'd never come across as what she was describing, so Robin was very surprised.

"For what it's worth," Robin said, dabbing at her eyes with her sweater sleeve, trying not to openly cry, "I think you're very capable and intelligent."

"That's cause you haven't seen me at my worst, but you will, and then you'll feel different. They always do," Sophie said quietly, looking at Gordon eating, and Robin's heart broke a little bit more.

"Why...why would you think anything would ever change how I feel about you?" Robin asked, and Sophie shrugged.

"Cause that's what my mom told me," Sophie said.

                                                                                                         ***

"Are you really that surprised nobody has asked you to go to the dance?" Sophie's mother asked.

They were both in the kitchen - this was a few months before Sophie would ultimately be pulled from school and be homeschooled for the remainder of her academic career - with her mother baking while Sophie herself sat at the kitchen table reading an easy chapter book, despite being in 7th grade now.

"I mean, really," her mother continued as she stirred the mix in the bowl on the counter, "you can't blame them. And it isn't because there's something wrong with you, it's because of their perception of you, and what being seen with someone with your perceived status would say about them to your peers. They'd scared of being judged, so they won't ask you."

Sophie shook her head, wanting to respond, but scared that anything she might say would upset her mother.

"Listen," her mother added, finally walking away from the counter and sitting down at the table next to Sophie, a hand on her back, rubbing gently, "it isn't indicative of your worth, it's indicative of the way they interact with the world, okay? So don't let it let you feel bad about yourself. But...at the same time, you have to know that things like relationships are always going to be hard for you, and it might be impossible to find someone patient and understanding enough to be willing to love you in the way you need and deserve, but again, not indicative of you, but moreso indicative of how selfish and callous people can be."

"So nobody will ever love me?" Sophie asked, finally looking up from her book at her mother.

"I didn't say never, I just said it might be harder for you than it is for most," her mother replied, "but that doesn't mean it's impossible."

Sophie nodded, listening but not wanting to believe what her mother was telling her, because, well, who would? Who would want to believe that, thanks to something they had no control over, they were suddenly less worthy of love and understanding from another person? That was heartbreaking to even attempt to accept. In the end, however, her mothers words rang true. Anytime Sophie did try to reach out to someone in a romantic manner - which, admittedly wasn't often but still - she was rejected time and time and time again, almost always based on the grounds of her intelligence, her weirdness, her inability to be like a normal partner. So Sophie withdrew into herself, and she internalized her mothers words to the nth degree, believing that, okay, she really was incapable of being loved and accepted and understood. No woman would ever treat her with the understanding and compassion and kindness that she so desperately craved.

And then she met Robin Glass.

                                                                                                          ***

"Well," Robin said, "first of all, I'm grateful you feel safe enough with me to tell me these things, because that means a lot, and secondly, your mother was clearly wrong. Sure, most people probably are that shallow, but I'm not most people, and there are other women out there who are like me who would also see your value, and your worth, and love you too."

"I don't want other women," Sophie said, sniffling, still not looking at Robin, "...I want you."

"Well you have me," Robin replied, smiling, reaching out and squeezing Sophie's hand, causing Sophie to suddenly lean in against her and bury her face into the chest of Robin's uniform. Robin could tell this was a hard thing for Sophie to talk about, and she clearly needed comfort, so she reached up and ran a hand through her hair, petting her comfortingly like she knew she liked.

"I have you now," Sophie cried gently, "but what about when you get tired of dealing with me?"

"That's not gonna happe, Sophie," Robin said, half laughing, "god, I don't know if it's this belief your mother instilled into you or what but...you are SO worthy of love, and I'm going to give that and more to you. I promise that I'm not going to just up and stop feeling for you just because of who and how you are. If anything, who and how you are is exactly why I fell for you in the first place. You're so..."

Sophie raised her face up a bit and looked at Robin, who shook her head and smiled down at her, her hand on her cheek.

"You're so everything," Robin continued, "I'm...god I'm so in love with you."

Sophie blushed and Robin leaned down and kissed her, making Sophie start to cry as she kissed her back. In that moment, anything that Sophie's mother or any doctor or her peers could have ever told her melted away and she finally felt safe and heard and seen. Robin had taken all of Sophie's fears, crumpled them up and thrown them directly into the garbage. All that mattered was that she adored Sophie with all her heart, and never questioned her or doubted her or misinterpreted her.

"Think of it this way," Robin said, resting her forehead on Sophie's, "...if you can love a turtle because it's slow, because everyone else doesn't see its worth, then I can love you for the same reason. You're both so much more than you see yourselves as, or as others see you as."

Sophie smiled, her eyes squinting, biting her lip.

"Please don't stop kissing me," she whispered.

"Can do," Robin replied, giggling, leaning in and continuing to do so.

It was a slow day.

But it was a good day.

                                                                                                           ***

Robin entered Sophie's house, her parents not being home, and Sophie led her upstairs to her attic bedroom. Once inside, Sophie turned on her soft fairylights and then, taking Robin by the hand, led her to the bed. Together they lad down and Robin started spooning her. There was nothing sexual about it, it was all about comfort. Sophie pulled a plush turtle she'd bought at the gift shop at the zoo to her chest and squeezed it tight as Robin buried her face in Sophie's hair and breathed her scent in.

The thing was, neither of these women ever expected this sort of thing. Sophie never figured she'd find someone to love her this way, and Robin never thought she'd fall in love with another woman. Robin squeezed her arms tightly around Sophie's waist and kissed Sophie between the shoulder blades. Sophie smiled and shut her eyes.

"Thank you," Sophie whispered.

"For what?"

"For everything."

Robin chuckled and nodded, pressing her cheek against Sophie's skin.

"Of course," Robin said, "I'll always do it."

Sophie pushed back into Robin, and Robin held her as close as possible. The door was locked, so her parents weren't able to get in if they wanted to check on her when they got home. She was entitled to her privacy if nothing else, and she knew her folks would never force their way into her room and invade her personal space, so. As they lay there, Sophie thought back to that conversation with her mother, about how difficult she would be to love, and in the end, she couldn't help but laugh internally at the concept. Difficult to love? Nah. If anything, she was the easiest thing to love in the world, and all the love that she had given to others was finally being given back to her threefold.

Maybe tomorrow she'd take Gordon a fish.