Dan by Joanna Ruocco

spent the holiday with Randal Hans, the two of them in dungarees, riding the same bike. After many hours, they dismounted, ate string cheese, and laughed about Melampus, who had announced to Melba the day before that she had decided to succeed Ann Dump as town clerk.
    “But Ann Dump is so young!” laughed Randal Hans. “Younger than Melampus, and she would never give up her position. Ann Dump told me she was born to be the town clerk and that she would die as town clerk, and Ann Dump should know! She controls all the records in Dan. Melampus is very determined, and she is very beautiful and unafraid of hard work, but that will only set Ann Dump more firmly against her. Doesn’t Melampus wonder why she is named after a snail? Doesn’t she remember that she used to be named something else, something more appropriate for a beautiful girl? Who does she think changed her name to Melampus?”
    Melba was laughing too hard to answer. Her mouth tasted mild and grassy with the string cheese and she was so happy!
    “Melampus is stubborn and foolish!” she sputtered at last. “She says she likes the name Melampus. She says Ann Dump’s changing her name can only be considered a mark of distinction. She says only termagants and other women without desirable qualities prefer the names they were given at birth to the names they might acquire later on, through another person’s discretion. She even says she likes snails!”
    Randal Hans’s eyes had disappeared; his cheeks were swollen with laughter. Melba grasped Randal Hans’s right hand.
    “What do you most want in the world?” Melba asked Randal Hans, impulsively. Randal Hans hiccupped, then giggled, then drew a long breath, wiping his eyes which were just beginning to reemerge.
    “I would like to be town clerk!” he screamed, doubling over. When he and Melba caught their breath again, he unwrapped a piece of string cheese and nibbled it, more or less soberly. He seemed to be thinking. They were at the top of Jake Hill so Randal Hans could look down at Dan as he thought. Lop Street and Satin Street and Hotot Street and White Street and Dwarf Street and Spot Street and Wooly Street and Tan Street and Main Street and Champagne D’Argent Avenue—all below, crisscrossing or winding off, missing the other streets completely, dead-ending in some lot or field, visible at this height as a pale or sable patch. Randal Hans had propped the bike against a telephone pole and he and Melba sat down beside it on a flattened box.
    “I would like to be ribbon-shaped,” said Randal Hans at last.
    “But not a ribbon?” said Melba Zuzzo cautiously, afraid of ruining the moment.
    “Not a ribbon,” said Randal Hans. “A flatworm, maybe. Something that wiggles into the mud and the mud exerts even pressure on every part of its body.”
    “You want to be squeezed?” offered Melba Zuzzo, more cautiously still. She bit into her string cheese, then, emboldened, flung the remainder into the dark tangle of roadside vines. She cupped her mouth with her hand. Her hand smelled sweeter than the string cheese. It smelled like a prune. She swayed toward Randal Hans and their shoulders jolted together.
    “I want to be squeezed evenly,” said Randal Hans. “All over. It wouldn’t be possible from a human.” He sounded wistful.
    “A bear?” asked Melba Zuzzo.
    “It would have to be four bears,” said Randal Hans. “Enough to make a cube, or a sphere.” He continued to stare at Dan, the rooftops and scaly greenery and the sluggish holiday foot traffic, and Melba stared at Randal Hans. His yellow hair had picked up a stain, as though he’d been wearing a freshly dyed borsalino. Melba imagined squeezing Randal Hans, squeezing him tightly, joining forces with three bears, all of them working together, finding some way to exert synchronous pressures, wrapping Randal Hans in fur and flesh and bone, the bears blowing hot, fishy air from their mouths on her face and neck. She wouldn’t like that