The Higher Power of Lucky

Privately, Lucky admired snakes because they were very, very highly adapted to their habitat. One amazing true fact she had read was that snakes actually started out as creatures with legs but evolved to not having legs because they could move around better without them. In fact, Lucky figured the average person went around thinking, Those poor snakes sure have been waiting a long time to evolve some legs. She would never have guessed not having legs would be better than having them.

But she doubted that Brigitte knew enough about snakes to tell whether it was a rattlesnake or some harmless kind.

Lucky said, “Brigitte, what does it look like? What color?”

Brigitte shrugged and looked insulted, as if the question had a completely obvious answer. She said, “She is the color of a snake.”

Lucky sighed. “What shape is its head?”

A lot of times when Brigitte didn’t know the answer to something, either she acted like it was a dumb question, or she pretended to know the answer, or else she veered around with an answer that wasn’t really an answer at all. “Lucky, we will look at the shape of her head after she has died—when it is safe.”

“You mean when it dies of old age?” Lucky couldn’t believe how weird that plan was. “That could probably take years. We’ll have to hang up the wet laundry outside and the towels won’t have California softness.”

“Lucky,” said Brigitte, crossing her arms in front of her chest. “Please go get that gray sticky tape right now.”

“Wait—yikes. I left Lincoln on the phone. Be right back.”

Lucky picked up the phone. “There’s a snake in the dryer,” she said.

“Miles’s grandmother had one in her dryer once. It came in through the vent going to the outside of the mobile home.”

“What did she do?”

“Thirty minutes on ‘normal cycle.’”

“You’re kidding!”

There was a little silence on Lincoln’s end. “No,” he said. “That’s what she did. Her dryer doesn’t have a see-through door. Does yours?”

“No, it’s just pure metal. So what?”

“She couldn’t be sure it wasn’t a rattler, so she killed it.”

“Brigitte wants to duct-tape the dryer door shut and wait till the snake dies of old age. After that she’ll probably want to duct-tape the whole entire outside of the trailers.”

Lincoln said, “We could catch a mouse and use it as bait to lure the snake out.”

All of Lincoln’s plans were both simple and complicated. They were tempting, but at the same time they made you feel doubtful before you even got started. But Lucky now had her own idea. “I’ll meet you at Short Sammy’s in about half an hour,” she said, and hung up. She went back to the laundry area with the duct tape and a pair of scissors and gave them to Brigitte.

Brigitte stuck the end of the duct tape on one edge of the dryer, pressing it hard, peeling off more tape and pressing it against the metal, until she had the door very securely fixed. No creature inside the dryer could get out through that door.

Lucky climbed up on top of the dryer, where she could peer out a tiny window.

“What are you doing, Lucky?” Brigitte asked. She was wearing a don’t-you-dare-touch-the-duct-

tape-on-the-dryer-door look.

“Wait a sec,” said Lucky. Still peering out the window, she stomped the heel of her shoe on the dryer. She braced herself against the wall and banged her shoe on the front and the sides of the dryer. Brigitte watched, but one of the good things about her was that she didn’t act like she was the total boss of everything. Especially when it came to the way things worked in Hard Pan versus the way things worked in France, Brigitte was willing to listen to what Lucky had to say.

Pretty soon, through the dusty window, Lucky could see the snake gliding away from the trailer. “It’s gone!” she said. She jumped down and dashed outside in time to see its long, thin, reddish, legless, rattle-less body disappear in the dry wash. It was a beauty—about five feet long, thin as a hose. Lucky thought it was a red racer, the kind of snake that eats rats and even fights rattlesnakes.

Lucky felt very wonderful about her Heroic Deed of figuring out how to chase the snake away without killing it in a gruesome way or waiting for it to die of old age. Plus, if it had been a rattlesnake, nobody got bitten. She went inside, thinking she had to figure out some kind of screen to put on the vent to keep the snake from coming back. At that moment Lucky knew she was a highly evolved human being.

But Brigitte was at the bathroom cupboard, rummaging through the aspirin and Q-tips and hair conditioner. “Now I cannot find the fingernail polish remover! It is the only way to get off that sticky mess of duct tape!” she said. “It is wrong to have snakes in dryers! This is not something that would ever happen in France. California is not a civilized country!”