Lock, Croc and Two Smoking Barrels

"It's worth something everywhere but here." Michael mumbled grimly.

Michael showed Odile how the backpack worked, how to wear it, and how to operate the zipper. He noticed her glancing at his groin, seeing the same strange metal fastening device there. Odile put the backpack on and jumped into the water, swimming off into the swamp, the backpack briefly visible like a shark fin before vanishing into the muddy water.

Returning into the hut, Michael decided he would eat a banana. He wanted them to last, depending how long he was out here and how much food Odile could find. He snapped one banana free from the stem and was about to peel it when he found himself staring at the fruit-hatted woman on the blue-and-white sticker.

They didn't put the stickers on the bananas while they were still on the tree... did they?

Michael peeled the sticker off the rubbery hide of the banana and looked for a place to stick it. He decided to affix the sticker to his wallet, now full of credit cards, bus passes, and some money... all of it as useless and worthless out here as the fast-food receipts he absent-mindedly crammed in there instead of discarding.

He ate his unpleasantly starchy banana, looking around the hut for a garbage can before feeling like a total fool. He threw the peel out the hole in the wall he kept calling a 'window.' He contemplated the stalwart coconut again, not daring to try to cut it open with his flimsy Swiss Army knife, even if the flesh inside interested him. These things were very useful to Gilligan, but not to him. He could probably cut it in half and give it to Odile as a coconut bra... but he'd need a bigger coconut. Much bigger.

Michael shook the thought from his head. Then again... for a man trapped on what was essentially a desert island, he at least had some company. The kind of pleasant company any derelict sailor would be happy to visit him in his solitude.

Maybe she wasn't a mutant. Maybe she was a mermaid. Maybe this was what mermaids actually looked like, much to the disappointment of modern sensibilities. Maybe the brush under her bed was aspirational of a future with flowing red locks. Maybe a bra of two scallop shells would serve her better. He could picture it on her...

Michael cursed at himself as he'd made himself hard again. He spent a while thinking about if she'd ever know if he'd taken care of it. He decided he should have some discipline. As it were, the only times he got horny was when she was here, in all her unique but unmistakeable beauty, and when she wasn't, and his imagination wandered.

If he really had no way of leaving this hut... this was not going to get easier.

Chapter 5: Croc Open a Cold One

Michael was starting to get just a touch bored, stranded out here in the swamp. He was deprived of even so much as a ball to bounce against the wall like... whatever that movie was. In every direction, there was nothing to look at but trees, algae, reeds, grasses, and lots of muddy water. No direction looked any different from another. The only thing in the swamp he found interesting... was swimming back towards the hut.

Odine had returned from a small hunting trip. She'd eaten a few fish while swimming to satisfy her hunger, but she returned with a very waterlogged backpack, bringing it to the deck with a wet plop. Odile's own nude body shimmered with moisture, and Michael looked away... for a moment. It was weird to see any woman emerge from the water and not have to mess with their hair. The water quickly left her impervious waterproof hide, with two stubborn oversized drops hanging from her nipples.

She went inside the backpack and removed its contents. Inside were a few more coconuts, floating among... unopened aluminum cans of soda.

"Where did you find these?" Michael asked.

"Those are everywhere." Odile shrugged. "I see those shiny things all the time."

"Unopened ones?"

"No, usually they've been emptied."

"That's litter." Michael checked the expiration date on the bottom of the can. It was in date. "On behalf of everyone from the city, I apologize that some people throw their garbage in your swamp." He pulled the tab on the soda, and the resulting hiss and pop startled Odile, who tensed and pulled her fingers into an aggressive claw stance. "Sorry." He said. Odile relaxed.

Michael took a sip of the soda. It was warm as piss, and it was some off-brand soda he'd never heard of, but it was soda, a little taste of civilization. Odile looked puzzled; even without eyebrows, she had a ridge of muscles in the same area that helped her express this confusion. It seemed strange that something edible was inside a metal can, like finding coconut milk in a bowling ball.

"Do you want to try some?" He offered the can to her. She mimicked his puckered lips as she rocked the can towards her mouth. The beverage poured into her mouth. She lowered the can and coughed and made a 'bleah' sound.

"You really drink that?" She looked at him slightly sideways.

"That's what I think when you go in that stuff." He pointed at the almost-equally brown muddy water that surrounded them. Michael noticed something as Odile kept grimacing. "Oh, my God, you lost a tooth!"

Odile rose her upper lip. There was a tooth missing somewhere near where a human's canine might be, but most of her teeth looked like any other. "Yes, I did."

"I gave you one sip of soda and you're already losing teeth?"

"This was from earlier, when I had fish. It's no big deal. It'll grow back."

Michael almost hoped it wouldn't. Not only did less teeth mean less things that could kill him if her mood soured unexpectedly... seeing her smile with the gap there was actually kind of cute.

Michael took another swig. "You know that plastic thing with the six circles on it you have under your bed?"

Odile looked nervous that he brought it up. "Yes...?" She said suspiciously. Retrieving it from under the bed, he took one of the unopened cans and jimmied the can back into the plastic ring.

Odile scowled, offended by this pedestrian explanation. "Is THAT what that accursed thing is?" Michael nodded, removing the soda from the ring. She took the ring between her thumbs like a Cat's Cradle, looking down at it. "When I was small... I almost died when I got tangled in one of these. I didn't know what it was, but I'd seen it attack lots of other life in the swamp. I hung this dead one from a branch to scare intruders away from my home, but... I took it down when the city folk never seemed afraid of it. I reckon I know why now."

"Do you have a family?" Michael asked after another sip. He'd had to define some words for Odile, but this one took him by surprise. "Parents, siblings, relatives? Someone you grew up with who's... like you?"

She grew still. "No one is like me." She looked at her scaly hands. Michael scooted over and put his arm around her shoulder.

"Do you know what a mermaid is?" She didn't respond. "They're half-human, half-fish. Ancient ships would crash because they were so beautiful, they would get distracted and crash into the rocks. Maybe that's what you are."

Odile scoffed. "Half-fish? I am no fish." She said pointedly. "Fish are brainless slivers of meat that are designed to be eaten. They are prey. I am no prey."

"OK, maybe you're not a mermaid, then." Michael said. "But..." He looked down at her, her green eyes wide in the darkness. "I think that... I think you're beautiful."

A smile appeared on Odile's face, the gap in her teeth looking even cuter. "I think you're beautiful, too."

Whoa. Michael wasn't expecting that. Yes, his growing attraction to her was unusual, but then again, he was a lonely man who wasn't good with women even before he was stranded. But why wouldn't Odile prefer a man who looked more like her? Someone stronger than him, less pink and soft, and a better swimmer.

They gazed into each other's eyes, and Odile reached up and rubbed Michael's pathetic three-day stubble. "I like this grassy stuff..."

"It'll keep growing." He smiled as the cold, slightly rough grip caressed his cheek and chin.

"Oh, you must've learned something." Odile smiled, looking at his crotch. Something else was growing, too.

"Yeah, it's been a big day for both of us." He discreetly adjusted himself. Odile wrapped her arms around him in a hug. Michael put his fingers on her cranium, stroking the scales.

"Can you feel that?" He asked.

"No."

He pulled his lips together and pressed them against the top of her head.

"Can you feel that?"

She left him in suspense for a few seconds before responding, "No."

Despite the less-than-romantic response, Michael slowly did something he'd never managed in the city: he coaxed a woman into her own bed, helping Odile to her feet and walking shoulder-to-shoulder to the straw thatch of her bed. She wrapped her arms around his torso, and pulled her feet around his shins.

If Michael had paid attention in science class, the term 'amplexus' might have entered his mind. But if he'd done that, he might not be in the swamp, with the reptilian enchantress that swam in his thoughts, whether she was spooning him or not.

Chapter 6: Croc on the Wild Side

Michael withdrew his knife and carved a new notch next to the previous ones, knowing Odile would widen it later with her mighty clawed finger. It was now day four of being trapped out in the swamp. Four days in this little hut not much bigger than a prison cell... but with more pleasant company.

He bravely pointed his nose towards his underarm. He didn't have to get too close before he could smell himself. OK, there had to be something he could do about this, even out here.

Michael pawed under the bed for the sand castle bucket underneath the bed and went out to the deck. He scooped a little water from the swamp into the bucket. As nearly opaque and muddy as the swamp water looked, inside the bucket, it was merely slightly gritty, with little particles of dirt and shredded leaves in it. He would certainly not drink it, but...

As uncivilized as this little hut was, this was not the time of pirates. He would actually have to clean himself more than once a six-month voyage. He removed his boots and socks, his shirt, unfastened his belt and dropped his jeans. He thought about leaving his boxers on, but that region needed the most care of all. He stepped out of them, piling his clothes in a heap. Maybe Odile had the right idea with the overalls.

Michael crouched down and scooped up a pailful of water, throwing it against his chest. He rubbed it around with his hands, quickly deciding to sacrifice the shirt to scrub the rest of him. He rubbed the T-shirt around his bare chest, up and down his arms, feeling the grime and dead skin lift from his body.

Another pailful was poured over his head, his eyes and lips closed and his nose pinched shut to avoid letting any of it enter his mucus membranes. He wiped his face clean with the shirt before raking his fingers across his scalp to sling the sweat and salt out of his hair.

Michael sighed. The wet, clammy feeling still hung on him in the humid air... but it wasn't the old, wet, clammy and rather dirty feeling he had before. This was the right move. And who knows? Maybe Odile would be impressed.

As if on cue, Odile's head popped out of the water like a gopher. Michael yelped and grabbed the sand castle bucket and placed it over his crotch. She hoisted herself out of the water by her forearms, his hands occupied at keeping his dignity. Odile looked him over, moving in closer. Michael valiantly tried not to stare at her nudity while in such a predicament.

Odile grabbed the bucket and effortlessly pulled it from his fingers. His hands went over his groin, and his face went red. "Mine." She said playfully. She entered her house, still wearing the backpack, water dribbling out all the corners and seams.

Michael took his pile of dirty clothes into the house. Odile opened the backpack and pulled something out, a small piece of black fabric. "I found this. Maybe you could wear it." She tossed it to him. He unfurled it to discover it was a black men's Speedo.

This was not the swimwear of choice for Michael, but between this and putting those four-day-old boxers back on... he would chance it, even thinking this mysterious pair had been on some unknown man. He stepped into the leg holes and pulled them up. They were a bit snug, probably by design.

Odile watched him dress from a short distance. "You have more of that grass..." She strode over and hooked her claw into the waistband of his Speedo, pulling it gently out and exposing a small patch of his crinkled pubic hair.

"If I were more manly, I'd actually have some on my chest." He rued as she pinched a sample of the hair between her fingers. It wasn't as soft as the hair on his head, or as satisfyingly brushlike as his facial hair. She released it, turning back to the contents of her backpack, unloading a few more coconuts. "Do you ever wish you could have your own hair?"

"Hair?"

For once, he wasn't going to drop it once she encountered a word she didn't know. "That's what the grass is called. It's hair. We mammals have it to stay warm."

She contemplated that for a moment, considering the fussy coir on the husk of one of her coconuts. "The sun and water keep me warm." She answered. "And now, so do you."

"What about the brush under the bed?"

"The what?"

Michael got down and grabbed the old hairbrush from under the bed. "This."

"That's for hair?" She said. "I was using that to scratch myself. My claws are too sharp for that. Also... it's pink. I like that color. There's so little on my water that's pink." Michael wondered if she was warming up to him as his skin grew more pink from the inevitable sunburn he would get.

Seeing something else pink in her hands, he pointed. "What's that?"

"It's the other swimclothes I found." Odile said. "They weren't using them. They were on the shoreline naked, and she must have been teaching him a lot, because his second brain had grown a lot." Michael felt the fire of inadequacy roar in his heart. Even with a decent-sized member, no male mind could withstand the notion of an unseen one a woman had just described with admiration.

"Are you going to wear it?" Michael asked.

Odile considered the swimsuit, looked at him bashfully, and crumpled it into a ball and threw it to the bed. "No, I'll just put that on." She said, referring to her overalls.

"Why not? You're obviously not shy. You walk around naked all the time."

Odile turned her head. "Well... you always look away when I'm naked. But you were looking at me real hard when I had that on. So... I reckon you think I look better when I'm covered up."

Was this that 'male gaze' thing he heard about on the Internet and tried talking about to pick up chicks? (It didn't work.) Only under his eyes for a few days and her self-esteem has crumbled. Those pictures of decidedly non-reptilian women on the covers of magazines... actually, with Photoshop, some of them did look pretty darn weird.

"I've never had a guest long enough to really get to know me, you know, because I ate all my other visitors, but... it's clear you think I'm weird and gross. And I get it. I'm not like you city folk—"

Odile didn't finish her sentence before Michael wrapped his arms around her, holding her bare chest to his, her scales digging uncomfortably into his soft skin. He caressed the hard tissue, unsure she could even feel it. Her breasts squished against his bare chest, as soft as their mammalian counterpart.

Michael caught his breath as Odile nervously placed her hands on his back. "I think..." He whispered into her ears, a part of her he hadn't considered yet. They were like human ears, but affixed almost entirely flat against her head, probably to keep her streamlined in the water. "I think you are so beautiful. And I hope you never doubt your beauty again for a single second."

Michael pulled his face up to hers, resting his nose against her noselike snout. They stared into each other's eyes, her vertical pupils wide and her brow soft with confused joy. She looked like she might cry, but she did not. If she did, of course, Michael couldn't be sure that she meant it, based on the adage regarding that variety of tear.

"You know... I reckon you're a pretty good-looking fella yourself." She said.

"Me? You don't want someone more... like you?"

"There is no one like me. Growin' up, I saw lots of men and boys from a distance. That's what I saw, so that's what I grew up liking. So yeah, you're... what do you city folk say? You're my type." Michael felt his heart pound and his cheeks burn. Odile looked down. "You're learning a lot today."

"I sure am." He said, a quiver appearing in his voice. "May I kiss you?"

"No." She smiled crookedly, that missing tooth from yesterday already back in its proper place. "I'm kissing you first." She put her claws in his hair and pulled him forward. They kissed, Odine's lips cold and slippery, yet still soft. He took her head in his hands, rubbing her smaller neck scales. Michael stepped in and pressed his groin against hers. Maybe she'd finally get the hint and realize he lied about the second brain thing.

Michael parted his lips to slide his tongue into her mouth, but thought better of it. Odile looked confused. He asked her to stick her tongue out, but she could barely get it past her teeth, as it was attached to the roof of her mouth.

French kissing seemed to be out, but that was OK. Michael hoped he wasn't going to find teeth or spires or something else intrusive somewhere else. They smiled as they separated, Odile recovering that swimsuit from the bed.

Odile pulled the top over her shoulders and sliding her legs into the bottoms, catching her scales a few times before it reached the proper position on her hips. The top consisted of two triangles held together with thin pink fabric, and the bottom was a small thong-style bottom in a deep Y-cut, allowing her tail to move freely.

"I love pink." She said, looking down to her body with a bit of confidence. She took a seat on the bed. Michael sat beside her. He handed her a coconut, and she broke a hole in the husk effortlessly with her thumb. Luckily, Michael was not emasculated asking his girl to open a jar for him.

He took a sip of the water from the fuzzy hole and watched Odile pull a pile of round dumpling-shaped things out of the bottom of the backpack. She popped one in her mouth like a marshmallow, swallowing it without chewing.

"What are those?" He asked.

"Oh, how rude of me. Here you go." She handed him... a wet rock, about the size of a quarter.

Maybe it wasn't actually a rock. "What is it?" He inquired.

"It's a rock."

It was a rock. "I can't eat rocks, Odile."

"Really?" She plucked the rock from his open palm, not quite as fast as David Carradine, and tossed it in her mouth like a piece of popcorn.

Despite the wilting condition of his second brain, Michael really was learning a lot. He wished he could text his friend and tell her he finally got a girl. She's tall, athletic, green eyes, real chill, she loves to swim, loves sushi, she's got her own place out by the water...

And best of all, she swallows.

Chapter 7: New Kids on the Croc

Michael was on his back looking up at the sun, broken up into patterns by the canopy of the trees overhead. He heard the wind blowing the humid air about, the bugs fluttering around, something splashing around in the water that apparently hadn't learned to stay clear of this hut yet. He was shirtless, his head on his left hand, wearing the Speedo under his jeans.

Odile was on her stomach, in her brand-new stolen bikini and her old straw hat. She would appear to be tanning, but her robust green skin would surely never tan. Michael had gotten tanned as he stayed here, spending enough time inside to avoid burning. If she could somehow find sunscreen, that would be ideal. Evidently, she'd been close enough to some form of beach to get soda and two poor people's bathing suits... unless it had all been washed out to her.