This is my air-rifle; there are many like it, but this one is mine. I named her Diana, and we spent our teen afternoons in Beirut shooting flies off the garden wall, and putting a proper scare into mum’s petunias.
My last night in Beirut, I woke up to something poking my nose. Wait, that’s not entirely accurate; I woke up to my right fist violently pounding my nose, in an attempt to make whatever was poking it quit. I flicked on the light and a large lizard fuzzed into view.
Our eyes locked and he let out a menacing squeal. I lunged at him, but he was gone before I landed; and the hunt was on. My flat soon looked like a warzone. The ninja lizard had defied half a dozen laws of physics and stayed in sight but well out of reach for the better part of two hours. I had burned through two sandwiches and 800 calories of cardio, and my last attempt to grab him had resulted in nothing more than a scraped elbow.
‘There’s someone I’d like you to meet,’ I explained. ‘Excuse me for a moment.’ I headed to the attic and found Diana, along with a box of old pellets. She needed oiling, but would forgive a couple of dry shots under the circumstances. Back in the battlefield I scanned the area for the smug imposter, and took aim; an easy shot, ‘Say hello to my lil’ friend.’ And I couldn’t do it. With a quiet, lingering glance the lizard was able to squeeze some sympathy from my sleepy brain. Just enough to save his own life, ‘I can’t just let you stay here,’ I finally explained, but he was unmoved. I couldn’t catch him, I couldn’t kill him, and I couldn’t possibly sleep if he kept crawling around on my face.
Crawlies on your pillow might be annoying, but a pet sharing your bed is probably fine. All I needed was a name. ‘Fine. I’ll call you Bob; why don’t you hunt around for some spiders, okay? Goodnight Bob,’ and with that I slept. For a couple of hours, at least.
‘Here Fishy, Fishy, here Fishy, Fishy.’ It was too early in the morning, and my brother was hunting in my room, ‘Here Fishy, some nice bugs for Fishy?’ I tried to protest but he shut me up, ‘Quiet. You have a lizard in your room.’
‘I know. His name is Bob.’ ‘His name is Fishy, he bit my nose, and he’ll be leaving.’ Before I could remark on the coincidence, and forward my witty lizard nose-fetish theory, my brother exploded in a puff of smoke, bounced off two walls, enabled slow-motion, momentarily levitated above the upturned couch and snatched the somersaulting lizard out of thin air. Or something like that. Bob squeaked loudly in protest.
My brother opened the window and sent him flying into the garden, then he turned to me and grunted a goodnight. ‘Goodnight,’ I replied, ‘And goodbye, Bob.’ ‘His name was Fishy.’
