I tried to coax the egg yolk drippings back onto the soggy piece of Wonder bread. No one gestured to help me salvage my breakfast. After a sharp left turn, the egg yolk spread, inching towards the middle-aged woman with carrot colored skin sitting directly across the bus aisle. I would have warned her, but something about her struck me as undesirable. Her eyes remained glued to the window as we passed the hallmark Bushville landmarks: the former train station, the artisan candle store, the mural on the corner of South Sixth and Milwaukee Street. 

 

At the next red light, my aisle neighbor finally caught wind of the runny yellow cholesterol coming her way. She nearly sprinted to the nearest available seat, save the one directly next to me. 

 

The young mother of three that my former aisle neighbor now cozied up to shot me a look of disapproval. 

 

Blending into a crowd is different than clearing a crowd, or a bus aisle, with just your neon orange parachute pants and a minor breakfast mishap. 

 

Since the incident, not even my roommates wanted to be within a six foot radius of me. My roommates, Meg and Greg, avoid using the downstairs kitchen and bathroom because these facilities are adjacent to my room. Now, they eat hearty meals full of protein, like Spam Meatloaf and Peanut Butter Egg Casserole, so they only have to eat once a day. They also relieve themselves elsewhere, which I know because I saw Meg squatting over our neighbor’s Hydrangeas a few nights ago. 

 

“I just couldn’t hold it,” Meg said after she saw me watching her use the shrub’s blossom as a cushion for her behind. I suggested that perhaps she could do her business elsewhere. Meg said that she is protecting me, and I should be thankful, since human waste keeps the Finlandian frogs away. I thanked her.  

 

If either Meg or Greg need to leave the house, they catapult themselves out of their upstairs window to avoid opening the front door and letting in any Finlandian frogs that may be loitering, and also to avoid crossing my path. I like to watch their robust figures glide past my window, like a bird in flight that you catch briefly out of the corner of your eye. There is a brief moment when I remember that I am not alone. 

 

Today is Saturday, so I am taking my weekly trip to Walton’s. It has been two weeks since the lockdown started. My neon orange parachute pants relegate me to a spot at the back of the bus. I am grateful to be in the presence of people besides Meg and Greg, even if each half-smile I give is met with a seething glare. I do not worry about this being real hate, though. I have seen true hate. This hate is not that hate. 

 

True hate is the kind that our collective student body has for our rival college. It is the hate that makes students at our rival school accuse us of being Flat Earthers or of not believing in climate change. But I know that climate change is real. Climate change is the reason that father doesn’t have a job. 

 

I know the hateful glances I receive from strangers on the bus route out of Bushville are not real hate. My fellow bus passengers are simply stuffing all of their angst about the escape of the Finlandian frogs into a tightly wound feelings box and throwing this box in my face, because that’s what people do when they are scared. 

I ponder this thought as I sit at the back of the bus, alone except for the semblance of life that used to exist in my breakfast sandwich. We pass the mural, indicating that we are exiting Bushville proper. The Bushville neighborhood used to be home to the majority of the town’s Black population, and today, a mural kitty corner from my favorite artisan candle store depicts unnamed members of the influential Black community. At the candle store, you can buy wax replicas of the mural or perfect portraits of each individual's head. Today on my walk to the bus stop, I smelled the candles burning. They smelled like clover, geranium, and cotton. 

 

In preparation for our arrival at Walton’s, the man sitting in front of me gathers the Coca-Cola and Coors light cans that have fallen out of his bulging grocery bag. He is also wearing parachute pants. I wonder which university building he works in. Deep grime stains have made the color of his pants unrecognizable. From the collar on his raggedy t-shirt and the faint smell of body odor and lavender dish soap wafting off of him, I guess that he is a dining hall employee. 

 

After the university-wide shut down, students began to complain about their inability to determine which university buildings would stay open to serve their urgent needs, such as finding the nearest available printer. To appease students and their parents, Kenny B made it mandatory for all employees to wear parachute pants denoting which building they worked in. That way, students remaining on campus could spot an elderly man sweeping the street wearing yelloe pants, and know immediately that the Koch Commons Chipotle was still open. 

 

Dining hall employees wore green parachute pants, and all lab employees donned highlighter orange. Every weekday I schlepped to work through the deserted streets wearing my fluorescent orange parachute pants and my standard uniform, the “We Didn’t Mean It, We Swear” Sackler Labs t-shirt. University policy also requires us to wear our parachute pants when we are not working, which explains why my fellow bus riders are so keenly aware of my presence. 

 

Today marks my second full week of parachute pants. The announcement came about one week after the incident, now two weeks ago. The Board of Governors made the decision to cancel all university activities via live-stream from trivia night at Harper’s Pub. 

 

“All in-person construction for the best of the suh-ghoul year is damselled,” announced Kenny Birbiglia, Director of the Board and a junior in the College of Life Sciences and Harper’s Trivia Gold Club member.  

 

Most of Kenny B’s announcements are made during bouts of heavy drinking. After his secretary on Long Island sent out a transcript of his speech, the news spread like wildfire, as did the fires started by a group of seniors in Epsilon Chi Omega Nu. The group of boys symbolically burned the graduation caps, tassels, and gowns that they no longer had use for. Days later, the event, which came to be known as “Fyre Festival”, would be understood as ground zero for Finlandian frog mania. 

​

Kelly Kildee, a senior whose apartment was directly next to the frat house, reported witnessing a knot of skunk-sized Finlandian frogs scurry past her with rodent-like agility that could only be attained by amphibians which had morphed into something no longer amphibious. The Finlandian frogs were undoubtedly attracted to the fire because of the gowns, which are made out of recycled plastic bottles and exceedingly noxious when burned. 

 

Many students were already out and about before the fires started at Epsilon Chi Omega Nu, being that it was Wednesday and it being trivia night at Harper’s. Students were encouraged by the Board of Governor’s to come to trivia night to share their thoughts about how the board should respond to the incident. A correct answer in trivia bought each table 30 collective seconds to share their thoughts and feelings with the Board. But because the topic was 80s Hair Bands, Kenny B’s passion, very few tables were able to weigh in. When Kenny B or another Board member answered correctly, they would spend the 30 seconds chugging beer. If someone stopped drinking before the 30 seconds were up, they lost their vote on whether to close the university or keep it open. When trivia night concluded, the Board took all the input they received from students, and took a vote with the remaining Board members. Kenny B, Barb G, and Mike T voted unanimously to shut down university operations. 

 

Rumor has it that Kenny Birbiglia himself attended the Fyre Festival. He denies being there, but screenshots from his since deleted 745 second long Snapchat story that night suggest otherwise.

 

Last year, an almost identical incident occurred at our rival university while working with the same donor. Despite being offered full access to their response plan by our rival university’s Director, who is also Kenny B’s ex-girlfriend, Kenny B refused any assistance on the matter. After he caught her canoodling with Ray Glietzen at last year’s Governor’s Convention, he vowed never to speak to her again.

 

Bushville, where I lived, had already reported its first Finlandian frog infestation. The tenants were forced to move out and throw away any items in the house that the frog might have touched. After exposure to the outside world, the frogs were toxic. Mania spread when one of the residents of a Bushville house started to emit a slight neon tint and experience trouble breathing. Authorities believe it is related to Finlandian frog exposure, but the resident's lungs were already damaged beyond repair from her tendency to hit her juul twice every 85 seconds. This complicated the physician's ability to assess her lung situation. 

 

I worried that a university shutdown would mean losing my job as a lab assistant in the Sackler Health Sciences Building. The Sackler Health Sciences Building is the building that the frogs escaped from. The Finlandian frogs were being used for testing for a new drug that University Labs was developing in conjunction with an unnamed donor. The drug was originally developed in Finland, and was thought to have something to do with weight loss, since escaped frogs were reported to be severely underweight. Drug testing moved to the U.S. when the husband of Finland’s Prime Minister was discovered to be trading samples of the drug for unreleased copies of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. Known side effects of the drug are hair loss, mood swings, and death. 

 

Physicians guessed that the neon tinted skin of those exposed to Finlandian frogs was a result of the sodium salicylate and diphenyl oxalate in the drug. When ingested directly by humans, the sodium salicylate and diphenyl oxalate are released through human waste without any known harm to the body. When ingested by frogs, however, the chemicals - the main ingredients in glow sticks - turn off the frog’s ability to filter the gases they absorb through cutaneous gas exchange. The mechanism in their cutaneous underbelly that normally separates the toxins from the oxygen and water needed by the amphibians stops. The frogs absorb all toxins in their environment without discrimination. This is why it was so important to keep the frogs in a toxin-free lab environment. Once they were outside, the newly installed campus incinerator fed their froggy souls. From what authorities could tell, with each ounce of toxin absorbed, the frogs grow stronger and more deadly to humans. Probably. 

 

My main job was taking care of the underweight frogs, feeding them worms, moths, mosquitoes, and dragonflies, and making sure they absorbed enough water. I grew attached to some of these frogs, and thought of them as my own pets. I never had a pet before. My father said that the only animal allowed inside his house was mother. 

 

I looked forward to the long hours I spent with the frogs. I even named a few of them, the ones that I could identify. Stanley was pudgier than the others, and had a bright red spot on his underbelly the shape of a kidney bean. Fiona was fussy, especially during feeding time. Despite being cold-blooded, Fiona and Stanley were especially warm to me. Stanley could even tell when I was having a bad day. When he sensed I was having a tough time, he made sure to organize his droplets in one corner of the tank for easy retrieval. I appreciate small gestures such as this one. 

 

One can imagine my surprise when I came to work two Mondays ago and all the frogs, including Fiona and Stanley, were gone. I was the first employee to arrive at the lab that day, and I immediately called Jenelle, my supervisor, who immediately called Kenny B. Despite it being well past 2pm, Jenelle told me that she woke Kenny B with her call. He immediately referred Jennelle to his secretary, a Mrs. Birbiglia on Long Island. Jenelle didn’t hear from Kenny B again until later that night, when he called her back to ask what provisions the lab had taken to address the situation. Jenelle reminded him that the lab was not permitted to take action until he, as Director of the Board, authorized a response. By this point, the frogs had been loose for approximately 12 hours, and rumors were starting to spread. 

 

I was relieved when Jenelle called to let me know that despite urges from the university to halt operation, emergency funds from the Sackler family would allow us to forge onward with their other projects, like the topical cream meant to counteract the effects of age-induced baldness being tested on gerbils. This project was especially important to the Sacklers and their top donors. 

 

I was grateful to have today off to take care of my shopping, and for a break from the lab. Now that the frogs escaped and classes were cancelled, I was working full-time and work days typically went well beyond 12 hours. 

 

I knew that when people saw my orange parachute pants, they blamed me for the outbreak of the frogs. I only knew this because the first day wearing my parachute pants, on my walk to work, a group of boys playing Ultimate Frisbee on the University Lawn yelled at me. I am not sure if they said “fucking frog freak” or “sucking dogs reek”. I do not have a dog, so my guess is the former. It was difficult to hear over the campus incinerator. 

 

I guessed that many people probably shared this sentiment. It didn’t help that Sherman Cole Johnstone, the professor overseeing all lab operations, resigned immediately after the outbreak. In his resignation letter, S. C. Johnstone cited “gross negligence by part-time staff and contracted employees” and “ineptitudes that (his) developed leadership skills simply could not compensate for”. 

 

I arrived at Walton's after two near hit-and-runs while crossing the street from the bus stop. It is as if the drivers of the Prius and Corolla that almost hit me could not see my neon orange parachute pants. One of the driver's yelled "Fucking Frog Freer!" out of his sunroof. I wish I would have freed the frogs. Then I would know where my friends were. 

 

​The grocery store was a haven for the solitary. Though paths cleared when I walked down an aisle because even in the adult world  neon orange meant Sackler labs and Sackler labs meant froggy finagling, I breathed in the familiar scent of packaged bread and middle America and felt like I was finally home. I walked through the produce aisle, close enough to steal a bit of the cold mist from the vegetables. When grabbing my Trident Seafoods Ultimate Fish Stick 44 pack, I stood with the freezer door open, taking in the blissful chill. It felt nice inside the freezer. I felt safe.  

 

The first time I came to this particular Walton’s, strikingly similar to my home Walton’s except here there is a ___ aisle where the grain and feed aisle should be, was when my parents moved me into the dorm freshman year. This was the first and only time mother and dad have visited campus. 

 

“For all the money I’m giving this damn school, you would think that they could do better than this!” dad would say when he was within earshot of other parents. Dad was referring to the rodent infested communal showers and lack of central heating and cooling. I didn’t mind when dad said this. Despite dad’s frequent reminder that he gave me life and what the hell else could I want, I knew that they would help me if they could afford it. Times were tough at the coal mine ever since The Sierra Club launched their multi-million dollar “Stop Bad Coal 4 Good!” litigation initiative a few years ago. 

 

Standing in line at self-checkout, a man asked me to please step away from him. When I did, the line behind me shifted five feet back. I interacted with the frogs before they were exposed to the outer world and the toxins that inhabit it, but I could not expect the neighborhood Joe's and Randy's to understand this. It is scary how many unknown chemicals are floating around in our environment, ready to be absorbed by those who are most vulnerable, like the Finlandian frogs. I thought that these people should probably be concerned with PM10, O3, NO2, CO, and SO2, rather than the person wearing neon orange parachute pants in the grocery store.

 

It was on the way out of the grocery store that my day changed. As I walked out of Walton’s, past the Value Value Mart and the Marshall’s Rack, around the back and past the dumpsters, I saw him. He was standing alone behind a garbage can, probably due to the high concentration of hydrogen sulfide. He was munching on batteries, out of sight from miscellaneous shoppers who did not need to take the bus. 

The last time I saw Stanley, he could stand in my hand or on my arm or on my lap. He could fit in a teacup or at least an average sized ramekin. Now the tip of his tympanum was even with my hip and his webbed feet were probably a men’s size 13. Poor Stanley, I thought. He would surely have trouble finding sneakers at Foot Locker. 

 

“It’s… it’s you,” I said out loud, to no one in particular. To my suprise, Stanley stopped chewing the Duracell AAA’s and looked at me. His hazel eyes, now the size of ice cream scoops instead of sugar snap peas, blinked my way. Before, he rarely answered when I called his name. Now he looked at me as if I was the only earthly thing he recognized. He saw me. Not my innard organs or my neon parachute pants, but me. The real me that not even Meg or Greg or mother could see. I felt the urge to stand still, locked in his gaze. Stanley was able to see all of the things that no one else had bothered to look for. 

 

Stanley’s vocal sacs inflated and began pulsing in time with my pounding heart. The sound of air rushing through his vocal cords filled my ears. As I got closer, the sound grew louder, a sweet siren of anticipation. I had never seen Stanley perform this primal act before. Not even with Fiona, his Sackler Labs assigned mate. It was as if the sight of me and our newfound stature as equals lit the match that had been kindling for eternity. 

 

And then I felt it. The sudden urge to shelter Stanley. To keep him safe and give him sustenance and not the kind from before but a different kind. The tender kind. He needed me and I needed him. Together I could keep him safe from the toxins of the human world and he could keep me safe from the demons in my shadow. 

 

I was the hand that fed him. His were the digits that I wanted to hold onto for the rest of my days. 

 

Suddenly I thought of mother and father and Meg and Greg, and Jenelle and even Kenny B. I thought of all the relationships I would compromise by leaving their world and entering another. I felt a pang of grief for the life that I knew I could never return to after this moment in time. The one I lived in right now. Stanley beckoned my appetite with his gaze, and I knew it was us. Where he led I would follow. 

 

The pollutants had instilled in him a sense of self, or rather exacerbated an already present hunger. From news coverage I knew that scientists discovered late stage toxicity producing a voice within the frogs. I also knew that frogs captured with this level of toxicity were the most likely to die once in captivity. I felt grateful that Stanley had not found his voice, yet excited for the day that our affection could find its place in words. So often love exists initially and predominantly in linguistic form. When mother spoke of the early days with dad she spoke of how often he would tell her that he loved her and compliment the way her leather skirt emphasized the smallness of her waist in comparison to the bigness of her backside. I know how much mother revelled in these reminders of his affection. But I knew that Stanley and I didn’t need that. Somehow, we had more. 

 

Stanley broke our gaze after what felt like an infinity of milliseconds. The sparkle in his eyes invited me to follow him. I hopped onto his trunk, settling my legs comfortably into the rivets of his back. He jolted in reaction, but eventually settled and came to accept the coming together of our bodies, mine mammalian and his amphibious. I rested my cheek comfortably next to his tympanum and relaxed into the sweat of his mucous membrane. It was the glue keeping us together. I felt like a queen. 

 

Initially I held onto my grocery bags, refusing to let go of the fruits of my labor. The bushel of green bananas, frozen fish sticks, and bucket of instant coffee weighed heavily on my shoulders as Stanley sauntered out of the dumpster’s shadow. 

 

The weight that I carried was no longer my own. It was shared, because I was no longer alone. Out of sight of what I knew of humanity, I dropped my grocery bags to the ground and let the weight of a past life hit the ground like one hundred unanswered cries.

 

I wouldn’t need them.