Chapter 7

Three hours and nine attempts later, the pencil lines David put to paper still looked like deformed monstrosities that begged to be released from the pain of existence. Whatever trance Mano went into while drawing, David didn’t seem able to replicate it.

“How are you good at art?” David said, needing a break from abject failure. “You’re a rabbit.”

“It’s just a matter of being able to correctly view the world around you,” Mano said. “I can see, whereas you, artistically speaking, are blind as the proverbial bat.”

“Well, is it possible to teach people how to see?”

“People, yes. But you? Probably not.”

David sighed. “I have to get better,” he said. “I can’t work at this godforsaken store forever.”

“Well,” Mano said. “Unless you have someone else draw for you, you’re stuck where you are.”

David paused a moment. “That’s not such a bad idea…”

Mano acted confused. “What’s not a bad idea?”

David smiled at his epiphany. “You could draw for me.”

“What? Absolutely not. I was being facetious.”

David tried to think of ways he could convince Mano otherwise, while Mano thought about how easy humans were to manipulate.

Even though it seemed hopeless, David continued to practice drawing at work the next day. He didn’t feel like drawing animals, so he stayed behind the counter and sketched from his imagination. Without something to use as a reference, David’s lines looked even more random than usual.

Mano hopped toward the sketchbook to get a closer look at David’s work. Calling what David produced “scribbles” would be a compliment it didn’t deserve.

“What are you drawing, anyway? Is that a rhinoceros?”

“No,” David said, his voice devoid of emotion. “It’s Amanda.”

“I wouldn’t tell her that.”

David dropped his head and let it thump against his open sketchbook.

“This is so hopeless,” David said. “I’m going to be trapped in this fucking pet store forever. My bones will be buried here.”

That was unlikely. It was more probable that David’s corpse would end up in the mass grave that held all the genetic failures that died in the pet store without being sold. Considering it was a pit for losers, David’s body might actually feel at home there.

“Can’t you do that body-share thing again?” David said. “Maybe I’ll understand more this time.”

“That little ‘body-share thing’ left me with a terrible headache that still hasn’t gone away, yet,” Mano said. “I will not be doing it again.”

“But I’ll never learn to draw without your help!”

“Find something else,” Mano said.

“There is nothing else.”

“You’re not an artist.”

“No,” David said. “But you are.”

“I am not a trained monkey that will dance whenever you grind the organ.”

“Huh?”

“It means no.”

Mano let David go on pleading for another week before he made a proposal. They were in David’s apartment, it was late, and Amanda was already asleep.

“I have a condition,” Mano said.

“Sure, yes, what?” David said. A week of begging had left him feeling desperate.

“I’m lonely,” Mano said. “I want female companionship.”

“Yes, sure, I’ll buy you a companion tomorrow,” David said, proving he was daft as ever. “What color would you like?”

“I’m not interested in rabbits!” Mano said. “I want to spend time with human females.”

“But… You’re a rabbit.”

“With human DNA,” Mano said. “How did you think I could talk?”

“But… You’re a rabbit. You look like a rabbit.”

“Yes, but you don’t.”

The gears in David’s brain completed a very difficult half-rotation before going still again; it was just enough for him to realize what Mano was asking of him.

“I, um…” David wasn’t sure what to say. “That’s weird.”

“That’s my condition,” Mano said. “Take it or leave it.”

“You want to use my body… to be with other women?” David said. It was a rhetorical question; mostly he was thinking out loud. “Amanda would not be cool with that.”

“I could spend time with her, then,” Mano offered.

“She’s my girlfriend!”

“So, you don’t want me to be with your girlfriend, and you don’t want me to be with other girls,” Mano said. “That sort of eliminates all possible human females.”

David didn’t say anything and Mano didn’t press the issue.

Rule Three in the Art of Negotiation: Know when to wait.

The next day was Saturday, and David was determined to see some progress. He scrawled furiously in his sketchbook while Mano stayed in his little bed in the corner.

Amanda returned from grocery shopping and took a moment to glance at his work.

“You’re still doing this?” she said.

“I’m getting better,” David insisted.

“No, hon,” she said. “You’re really not. Give up, would you? Do something useful: help me with the groceries.”

Amanda placed the groceries down on the kitchen table. The bags were brown paper bags carrying the Organi-Mart logo and specifying in large type just how much recycled paper was used in the making of these bags and also save a puppy by donating a kidney. David sulked to the kitchen and tried to help her put the groceries away, which mostly consisted of him placing something in the fridge and her moving it to its correct designated location.

He looked through the bags as he helped empty them.

“Did you buy pie?”

She made a face. “Ugh, you know I hate pie.”

He put the milk in the fridge and she moved it to the right by an important inch and a half.

“If I keep practicing, I’m bound to get better,” David said.

Amanda looked at him with pity. “You can’t draw,” she said. “Whatever it is that makes a person an artist, you don’t have it.”

David sulked his way back to the couch without another word. He waited for Amanda to finish in the kitchen and go do whatever it was she did after stomping on his feelings. He was pretty sure she called her friends to give them the details of his humiliation.

David sat, staring straight ahead of him at the wall above the television.

“Mano?” he said, not even turning to look in the rabbit’s general direction.

“Yes?”

“Does that offer still stand?”

“Yes,” Mano said. “Have you decided the specifics of our agreement?”

David felt dead inside. He begrudged the terms, but his options were limited. “You can spend time with Amanda.”

“You sure you’re comfortable with that?” Mano said. “She is your girlfriend.”

“Well, it is my body,” David said. “So it’s not really wrong, right? I mean, she won’t know the difference, will she?”

“Even if she noticed a difference, I doubt she’d suspect it’s because you let someone else borrow your body,” Mano said.

It was strange, and maybe not entirely ethical, but in the end it seemed reasonable to David. After all, if he could make money from his art, it would definitely be worth it. Amanda would surely understand that if she knew, right?

Mano knew the answer to that, but he kept it to himself.