Box Turtle

She built the pen herself. Two-by-fours and chicken wire, wedged it up against the deck. Big as a card table. Ten inches high.

The tortoise paces it like a convict. Wall to wall, wall to wall. No burrow. No shade. Nowhere to hide.

She tosses in watermelon rinds and soft fruit when she remembers. The sweet rot rises from the pen, thick in the heat. The tortoise lifts its head, follows the scent, chews, swallows, then resumes the circuit.

Another thing he left behind for her to care for.

“Daddy’s coming this weekend,” she tells her son. The boy scatters his blocks across the floor.

He’s got the deadbeat’s eyes.

Aquariums bubble in three rooms. Fish, turtles. The electric bill looks like my car payment.

Spare tires and car parts stored in my garage. His Jordans sit on the shelves I built in the basement.

Orange boxes, size twelve, stacked in neat rows, labels facing out. Hundreds of pairs. Each one worth more than I made in a day, back when I made anything.

Outside, the tortoise lumbers, paces wall to wall, climbs every corner, hoping to escape. Claws hooked over the rim, neck straining, eyes bulging.

For a second, he balances there, ancient and determined. Then gravity intervenes. He topples, lands hard on his shell, legs scissoring the air, desperate.

I right him.

He pulls his head in, waits, then starts the circuit again.

My wife says, “Leave it alone,” not looking up from her crossword. “Not our business.”

But it is my business.

Every night, it’s my business when I hear my daughter soothing her baby at three in the morning, hear them both sobbing through the walls, hollow and tired, hear her rocking that child all alone.

The sour stench of soiled diapers drifts from the nursery, rank and constant.

I can’t separate it from the deadbeat—like he’s stamped into the air itself.

I want to dismantle that pen, set the tortoise free, watch him disappear into the trees.

Dismantle the deadbeat, pack him up with his spare tires, car parts, aquariums, and Nikes. Call in a favor or two. Make it all disappear.

But I don’t.

My daughter says she still loves him. Still dreams of a family. Wants her son to have a father, however thin.

She grew up without one while I sat in prison. She’d never forgive my interference now.

So I let the shoeboxes sit. Let the tanks bubble. Let the tortoise pace his cell.

I stand here, night after night, fists thrust deep in my pockets, lock-jawed, teeth on edge.

Through the glass, I watch the ancient lumber across the pen, see him claw, climb, topple. I see myself layered in the reflection.

My breath fogs the pane, and I don’t look away.

Tonight I’ll listen to my daughter weep through the walls. Wish awful things on that deadbeat boy drifting in and out without consequence. Resent my wife for insisting on silence.

I tell myself, “Let it go,” that I’m better. Better than him. Better than leaving a baby to cry at three in the morning. Better than storing my tires in the garage and sneakers in the basement while someone else pays the bills to provide for my family. Better than caging an animal that deserves better. Watching that animal claw, climb, topple, and struggle to escape without lifting a hand.

But the longer I stare, the less I believe it.

Because the tortoise keeps climbing.

Keeps toppling.

Keeps righting himself to start again.

And I keep standing here.

Complicit.

Doing nothing.

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