On October 1, I started a half-time position as a Educational Assistant at our local school division. This has, of course, reduced my available time for creativity. I’m still working on short pieces for contests and literary journal and the final four chapters of The Stinkwater Escapee. The audio recording of Chapter 32 is coming soon, and I’ll announce a release date as soon as I have one.

Don’t forget that you can order The Stinkwater Escapee: Season 1 online at Indigo booksellers.

Thanks for reading!

—Jacob

“Do I know it? I live there, man. Half of Ankerton probably lives there. I would say it’s a big part of what makes Ankerton as weird as it is.”

The employee in the frog costume sighs, says “One of these days I’ll get out of this city. Until then, I’m just amphibbin’ around. Phibbit.” And he hops back to a green chair that resembles a curled lily pad.

Wade makes a light underhand motion to toss the phone to him, but when Big Sal just looks at him, Wade hands it over.

“What do you mean?” says Big Sal, watching the employee settle into his chair.

Why do I feel like I want to be a frog? There are so many frogs here. Real ones. Human ones. And now that I think about it, I think I just saw through the eyes of one.

Mosquitos seem to swarm together, buzzing inside his head.

“Ever wonder why there’s so many people wearing onesies or costumes in Ankerton?” asks Wade.

“No.”

Buzzzz.

Wade shakes his head and motions for Big Sal to follow. As they step toward the door, Lucius—the bullfrog—averts his eyes from staring out the window to settle on Big Sal.

“Boy, what do we have here?” he says in the way that only Big Sal can hear.

“Riddit, riddit,” says Wade, repeating what he heard. “As ancient as he is, this guy is always talkative.”

The buzzing in Big Sal’s head turns up a notch, only to fade as they leave Pond Hoppers.

Big Sal wants to ask Lucius what he means, but Wade is out the door and Big Sal has to hustle to keep up.

My legs are too short for this.

“Today’s my day off,” says Wade, standing at a bus stop again as the bus begins to slow. “Wouldn’t hurt to send Hooks a text letting them know what you’re doing. They should be fine, since you’re doing things that needed to get done anyways. So as for Moratisto, I can get you pointed in the right direction, but you’ll want to know how to get back to Hooks on the bus again.”

“How do I do that?”

The FlaminGo bus announces its stop, they get on, and it takes off, this time in a different direction.

“You send that message to Hooks yet?”

“Not yet. I just talk to my phone?”

“Give it a shot.”

Big Sal holds his phone and talks to it. The screen stays dark.

“’kay, buddy. Phone basics. Turn it on,” says Wade. “If it’s off, nothing’s going to happen. No apps, no alarms, no voice control, no messages and…definitely no calls.”

“Right.” Big Sal pushes the button on the side. A few moments later the phone sits idle.

“Do you know how to keep it charged?” asks Wade.

“What’s that?”

Wade takes a moment, looking from Big Sal to the phone.

“Think of the phone like your stomach. You’ve gotta put stuff inside in order to make it work, right?”

At this, his stomach rumbles. He can’t remember the last time he ate.

When did I stop eating so much? I feel…smaller.

“I guess so,” he says, looking down at his yellow belly. It’s fading, and as he moves his hands over it, dust drifts down.

I need my own space. I think something is happening. Something normal…I think.

“So you gotta plug it in. See that little thing on the edge there?” He points to where the charging port is.

Big Sal turns his phone to look at it.

“That thing takes a plug,” says Wade. “That’s how the energy gets into the phone. You should get a wire at the Moratisto General Store sometime this afternoon.”

“Okay,” says Big Sal. Then, pressing the microphone button, “Send a message to Hooks.”

“Congratulations on your new phone!” says the dried-out phone, completing its reset. “Please wait while we identify your distinct voice.”

“What does this mean?” he asks Wade.

Wade shakes his head, then nods to the phone.

After an animation, it finally blips and says, “I have found four possibilities that you might be referring to. Hooks Bait and Tackle, Hooks Themed Restaurant at the Docks, Hooked…”

“Hooks Themed Restaurant,” says Big Sal, interrupting the voice.

“What would you like to send to Hooks Themed Restaurant?”

“Uhh. What do I say?” he says to Wade.

Wade compresses his lips, looking down at the recording animation on the phone. He leans closer and whispers.

“Tell them ‘I’m getting a place. I’ll let you know once I know more.’”

Big Sal repeats it. “Tell them I’m getting a place, I’ll let you know once I know more.”

“Your message has been sent!”

Wade holds a palm against his forehead and chuckles.

“Man, you’re gonna fit right in at Moratisto,” he says. “So, one other thing you can do with the phone. You can tell it to navigate to specific places. That’s probably how you’re going to want to get to and from work for now until you got the buses memorized.”

“Like this?” he says, then “Navigate me to my new home.”

“You need to set your home location,” says the phone. “Do you want to use your current location?”

“No, no. Don’t do that yet,” says Wade. “It’ll set whatever address we’re at right now, and I don’t think you want to be coming back to…” He looks out the window as the bus crosses an intersection.

“Vine Street all the time,” he says.

Big Sal recalls being unable to smell here, but still being called and spoken to. What was it the strange man had asked him?

Why are you here?

So why am I here?

“Alright, so if the Moors is going to be your new home,” says Wade. “You’re going to want to know that it’s a tight community. Everyone knows everyone.”

“I miss my old home,” says Big Sal. “Everyone knew me there.”

Wade is quiet for a moment. Then, “Yeah, I feel ya man. Maybe there’s something you can do to honor its memory.”

“What does that mean?”

Wade shrugs. “Different people do different things to work through grief. Some people bake. Some people write. Some tend to gardens, care for pets, many different things. Personally, I write.”

“I got you flaming there,” says the bus. “Transit corridor indigo four.”

“We gotta transfer buses,” says Wade.

After a few minutes, an express bus takes them through a different part of Ankerton.

Shops, restaurants and charging stations flash by, blurring with the stinky scent of humanity. The bus moves fast enough that Big Sal decides to sit. His tail seems to squish easier, and he sits in a corner seat.

I need my own space, and soon.

Beyond the tall buildings, several rolling hills appear. As the buildings slip past, Big Sal recognizes Moratisto from the video, a glittering lake below its hills.

I’m not seeing the same thing as the bird. This is what I’m seeing, I guess?

The idea gives him a headache.

The bus zooms across a bridge over the blue lake.

“So, let’s see one of your places to check out,” says Wade.

Big Sal holds up the renter’s note the kiosk printed out. “What do I do with this?”

“Ask your phone,” says Wade.

Big Sal does, and after a moment of confused talk and a request for his location, the phone gives him the first apartment to visit.

“Badger peak, blue level, section S, pad sixteen,” says the phone.

The bus comes to a halt in a bus loop where many buses can pull in and stop. Wade leads out of the bus, shields his eyes and looks up.

“See the badger in the air above the peak overhead?”

Big Sal looks up, and sees what looks like a simple picture of one in the sky over the peak, an outline. It’s not a badger as far as his nose is concerned.

“I think so.”

But a dark spot flying high overhead with a recognizable scent tells him there’s a dark bird watching him.

“There are five peaks. Badger, Dragon, Rabbit, Phoenix and Salamander. Once you’re inside, pictures lead you wherever you need to go. No language required.”

They step through a door that slides open for them, with an interior so big that Hooks Restaurant could fit inside.

The place almost smells like a book with so many different human scents stacked on top of each other. But this place he can walk through.

A curved ceiling stretches overhead like the inside of a mountain. All the way at the back are more doors where sunlight streams in. Between him and those doors, on the left, is a freestanding, interior building with the sign “Moratisto General Store.” On the right a large desk with a sign overhead reads “Residential Support.”

Hanging from the high ceiling just above people’s heads is a large sign with the five different animals and arrows pointing in different directions.

“Badger is that way?” asks Big Sal.

“You got it,” says Wade.

A person in a large yellow chicken costume walks up to him, stands with their hands on their hips. A scent of hot smoke rolls out of the costume.

“Cluck,” says the chicken. It nods its head, as if sizing him up. “Cluck…cluck.”

The scent changes to a milky vanilla and the chicken bows.

Walking away, it says quietly, “Cluuuck.”

“What was that?” asks Big Sal.

“Just someone being ridiculous,” says Wade.

A group of kids runs past, yelling and shouting about being late for class, their voices disappearing as soon as the doors close.

“Don’t worry, once you get into the individual levels, things aren’t as chaotic,” says Wade. “Down here at this entrance, things are always loud.”

Big Sal follows the Badger signs to an elevator, where he pushes the button. In a moment, the doors open and three adults, two kids and one dog exit.

The dog sees him, sniffs the air and yips twice quietly.

SEE YOU LATER, GATOR, says the dog to him.

Big Sal watches the dog go. It doesn’t feel like a snack.

I don’t understand this. Now…do I eat at all?

“Push the blue button?” he asks as they enter the elevator.

“Mmhmm,” says Wade with a nod.

After a few moments of zooming upwards, it slows, and the doors open.

Wade explains how section S means south. Big Sal finds apartment sixteen. At first, he doesn’t understand how to open the door, but Wade suggests he look at his phone.

Raising his phone, it flashes “Temporary Viewing Access Granted.” The door beeps and unlatches, letting him in.

From the door, he can see out a window across the apartment. It is mostly blue sky, with streaks of white clouds high overhead. Moving a little closer, other peaks and their valleys come into view below the window.

Wade whistles.

“Now that’s a view. Mine is on yellow level in Salamander. It’s…”

“…too high. I feel like I’m going to fall out,” says Big Sal. Using his phone, he finds the next closest apartment.

“Alright, let’s keep moving,” says Wade.

An escalator takes them down one level to a hallway with a green Rabbit on the walls leading to the next peak.

I wish I had legs like Wade.

The next apartment looks great, but smoke lingers despite an open window. It seems to be in the walls, making Big Sal’s nose twitch.

“That smelled like sandalwood incense,” says Wade as they head to the next apartment to view. “Like it had been burned every day for years.”

“My nose did not like how strong it was,” says Big Sal.

“Neither did mine.”

Upon opening the door to the next place, Big Sal begins to feel like he’s coming home. The furniture looks comfortably worn. The apartment overlooks the middle valley between the five peaks, and terraces are visible with dirt paths snaking between gardens and yards. But there’s a rot smell.

“Nope,” says Wade. “On your phone, indicate that this one needs attention. They need to find out what’s rotting in here. Too bad, nice place.”

Big Sal tells his phone this, and when they leave, the door clicks shut and a red light turns on next to the door knob.

“What else do you have?” asks Wade.

“Uh, Yellow Dragon S 7,” reads Big Sal from his phone.

“Oh, that’s just around the corner,” says Wade.

My legs are so tired. I may as well just go to Hooks and do this later.

But when they open the door to Yellow Dragon S 7, Big Sal feels less overwhelmed.

Similar to the last one, it also looks out over a valley, this one to the Salamander peak. A double-wide patio door next to a large, open window leads to a small yard edged with bushes. Slightly green and smelling of algae, a swimming pool nestles into the yard, leaves floating on its surface. A mature maple tree sits at a far corner, giving shade to the pool and the yard, a syrupy sweet scent that he has not smelled before. Between the bushes on the side opposite the tree is a gate opening onto a dirt path that runs up and down the valley. A vine with sour-smelling red berries twines the gate, the hedge, and the tree together, tendrils snaking their way into the apartment around the doorframe.

“Ohhh,” says Big Sal. “This is nice.”

Cork flooring near the doors offers soft walkspace, but the living room floor is a high pile carpet that looks like grass. It smells a little like feet, but it’s been cleaned and smells more of lemon. A ceiling fan turns slow overhead. Inside at the left of the front door is a large mirror, while to the right of the door a kitchen opens up with silvery kitchen appliances. A large curved faucet in the sink drips water and sounds like music to Big Sal.

Wade walks across the room to the patio door and opens both doors. A gentle breeze fills the space.

“See the pool with the blow-up zebra?”

Big Sal moves next to Wade. “What’s a zebra?”

“Black and white. Looks like a horse.” He points.

Big Sal spots the zebra.

“That’s my place. We’ll be able to see each other!”

“That’s a good thing,” says Big Sal.

Wade claps his hands, rubs them, and breathes deep.

“You good, big guy? I should be going. Got some errands I need to run.”

“I think so.”

“Remember how to get to Hooks?”

“Yes.” And with this, Big Sal pulls out his phone and, pressing the microphone button, tells it he has found his place. After a short conversation the phone asks him if he wants to pay the deposit and his first month’s rent. Using both his voice and a few taps on the buttons, he confirms.

“Congratulations on your new pad!” chirrups the phone. “Pond Hoppers and Moratisto would like to invite you to our community breakfast every Saturday morning at 10:30 AM! Bring your loved ones, your pets, even your old shell of a person to enjoy the new you!”

“You should go to that,” says Wade, heading to the front door, his hand on the knob. “It’ll be good. It’s free food, paid for by the Homeowners Association, which we all pay into. You’re going to want to talk to Maury, the chatbot in the Moratisto app.”

“What’s a chatbot?”

“I’ll be home later tonight after dinner if you need a hand with that. But I really got to get going here man.”

“Thanks. Uh. Thank you for your help, Wade.”

“My pleasure, Sal. I’ll be seeing you around.”

Wade pulls the door closed as a dark form blots out the light in the small yard outside.

“Raven,” says Big Sal, turning to watch the wings flap as Raven lands in the yard, rippling the water in the pool and sending leaves flying in a whirl through the open patio doors and into the room, the air itself picking up more speed like a diving bird.

“Boy, what do we have here,” caws Raven, the voice cracking as Big Sal feels himself begin to crack.

“It’s just a molting, right?” says Big Sal as he finally relaxes and watches the dust begin to accelerate off his skin, larger pieces falling away onto the cork. But this time, instead of just falling off, the downdraft from Raven’s wings pushes the dust, the skin around him, faster. Then the wind picks up, bursting, something alive inside its belly.

I thought I was a frog for a moment. And then I thought I was a bird. I saw this place. From Raven’s eyes.

This thought turns his mind into a fluttering, spinning whirl, and to keep from getting dizzy, he has to close his own eyes.

Wind rushes around and scents begin to pour out of him. Cilantro fills the air like it is the air, then comes a peachy bison stew…

Why peachy? What is happening? This isn’t a normal molt…

More human scents begin to stream from him, from banana to hot metal and mango, all swirling and turning and rushing and buffeting him until he can’t stand. Off-balance, he thinks he falls, but can’t tell if he’s on the floor or not. Where did his tail go? Spicy butter whooshes out of him like a tornado, followed by a deep clover honey that fills the room like a cloud.

Rocking him like he’s riding waves in a swamp, or a pool, the maelstrom whips up leaves and dust and dirt and he feels it tearing at him, reducing him, but still lifting him up. He feels himself getting even smaller in this storm of confusion, but also something else, something he hasn’t felt since his first flight out of Stinkwater. Lighter?

“Boy…what do we have…here?” caws Raven. “Boy.”

The swirl cracks open, bursts skywards, only to patter into the ceiling fan, spinning it backwards and scattering across the apartment. Wind skitters along the wall to the mirror next to the front door, which rattles, falls off the wall and smashes on the floor at an angle. Shattered pieces scatter across the room.

He opens his eyes as the swirling in his head begins to subside.

Fingers. Smallish human fingers are the first thing he sees. Sticking out of soft sleeves printed with scales. He crinkles the onesie’s printed, yellow belly. Underneath, his own belly is smaller, smoother and yet somehow him. The onesie shuffles around his body as he moves.

“Where’s my snout? My nose?” he cries, reaching for it, but instead his hands hit his face so hard it hurts.

“Ow! Why so sensitive?”

“Cawww,” says Raven. “Cawww!”

He waits for the words, but the cawing stays cawing.

I can’t…I can’t understand Raven anymore. Oh no.

Bigger than a horse, the giant bird ducks, hops into the apartment through the open patio doors and fills the room.

Big Sal holds his hands up to shield himself against Raven, thinking the huge bird might just eat him. That thought is entirely new. But he can’t decide what’s more terrifying, the human fingers he sees, or the giant, black bird towering over him.

Raven looks about the room, tilting its head, then leans forward, tapping its beak against the cork floor once, twice, then three times.

Raven wants to show me something.

Raven’s beak begins to scratch through the leaves and flakes of his shed skin.

Big Sal gets to his feet to see what Raven is scratching, wobbles, and collapses to all fours. A large hood falls down over his head. His palm pins the loose cuff down, pulling the zipper tight under his chin. At first, he likes the discomfort, the pressure, then the zipper digs into a soft part under his chin. He grabs the zipper roughly and tries to shove it aside.

It doesn’t go as far as he’d like.

A whimper escapes from him, a sound and feeling that’s new and…smaller than before.

Again, balancing carefully, he stands to see what Raven is doing.

Raven draws an outline, filling it with crude eyes, claws, teeth and a tail.

It’s a crocodile. Like those simple pictures above the peaks. No smell.

Instead of scents drifting through his large, perpetually open nostrils so far away, now his nose is stuck to his face.

I can’t smell, he thinks. Not the way I used to.

“CAWWWW,” screeches Raven, drawing him back to the crocodile.

As he watches, Raven adds something else. It almost looks like an arrow pointing at the crocodile’s eye. But is that an eraser? A pencil drawing the crocodile?

“What? What is this? Why am I not a crocodile?” he asks Raven, pleading.

“Why am I not that?” he says, pointing at the floor.

His voice breaks and doesn’t sound like him. It’s a kid’s voice, an echo of what it once was.

“I can’t roar,” he whispers, tears welling up. “I can’t do the snap and sweep.”

Raven shakes a big, black head, eyes looking through him, reminding him of a different time and space. The sketch on the floor gets one last tap from the giant beak.

Shape your own end, is the thought that Big Sal thinks might not be his own.

Deftly and with great patience, Raven backs away so as to not disturb the artwork, ducks out the patio door, and hops into the cloudless void.

Sitting back onto his haunches, the creature once known as Big Al looks at his human hands, his feet, and wishes he hadn’t been wishing.

He catches his reflection in a large shard of mirror. His much smaller stomach sinks.

“Why am I…human?” he says.

Chapter Index

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Chapter 32 text drops October 10

It grew into the longest chapter so far and needed more revision time than I’d planned. Those revisions are now complete, with the final read-through and recording still to come.

Thanks for your patience!

—Jacob

Big Sal’s next chapter, Midsummer’s Eve, will be posted as soon as it’s done. I expect this to be early this coming week.

—Jacob

Big Sal’s next chapter, Midsummer’s Eve, will be posted Sunday, September 27.

🛡️ We respect inboxes. One story, one email. No spam.
Just one offer when an edition is ready.

This episode includes:
✅ Chapter 31 - Pond Hopper
✅ Hooks Missing Croc Notice

Read the full story archive for The Stinkwater Escapee:

https://stinkwater.ca

“But it has to have something of this,” says Big Sal, holding his hands out.

Wade looks at his hands, but his face doesn’t quite understand.

“Uh,” says Big Sal. He holds his hands up again and draws a figure eight in the air.

“That?” asks Wade, pointing at the pond, the duck, the cattails.

“Yes, that,” he says, “and this.” He holds his hands still, then gestures at himself.

“Ah, I think I gotcha,” says Wade. “A place that fits all of you. Inside and outside.”

“Exactly!” Then, “Oh, I miss my home. I can’t believe it’s gone.” That scent of his, the dandelion-cattail-cilantro, pulses out. He puts his hands over his eyes, breathes deeply, and tries to count to four.

One…two…

Wade compresses his lips, sits forward and rubs his hands. “Yeah, that sucks. I’m sorry. You know, I have not been through what you’ve been through, and I won’t pretend I have. Now my home wasn’t perfect. I moved away as soon as I could, but I left little brothers behind. By the time I tried going back, everyone had moved on. The house belonged to someone else. So yeah, there’s a home I miss too.”

The lemony-persimmon scent is deep and rich, and Big Sal can tell Wade is feeling something similar.

Did I make it to four?

Start over. One…two…

Inside him, a small part seems to grow and spread sadness through him.

“I didn’t know what I was leaving,” says Big Sal.

“Yeah, I didn’t either.”

“Hooks Themed Restaurant is calling,” says his phone, vibrating hard. “Do you want to accept the call?”

Big Sal is so startled that the phone drops from his hands, tumbling down the shoreline towards the pond. Halfway through the tumble, a button squishes down, accepting the call. The phone lands screen up in the water—and turns off.

“That phone wasn’t waterproof?” asks Wade. “I’m surprised.”

“What just happened?”

“Uh, well it seems like you just received a call from Hooks. Huh,” says Wade. “You know what? Let’s take a bus. But we’re not going to Hooks. You just got this phone. Where from?”

Wade stands, goes to the water’s edge and kneels.

“Phone Nerds.”

“Ah, that’s an easy bus ride.” He picks it up. “Not long. Don’t forget your other stuff. Come on.”

Big Sal puts everything back into his purse, slips it on and scrambles up. Wade leads them across the street where a FlaminGo bus pulls up.

“Bus is sure easier than walking,” says Big Sal, getting on. The bus is almost empty, but again a few people sit in the back glued to their phones.

“That it is, my friend, that it is,” says Wade. “So let’s do this. Phone Nerds should be able to help you out. Especially if you’ve had it less than a week. And to be honest, these things are usually salvageable. Let’s see what they say.”

“I don’t know what that means,” says Big Sal.

“Don’t worry about it. By the way, there’s someplace next to Phone Nerds you should see.”

“What kind of place?”

“The place with the bullfrog.”

“It didn’t make me hungry,” says Big Sal.

“Yeah. That old guy has been there for as long as I can remember. He’s gettin’ old.”

“Right.”

They transfer once and are at Phone Nerds in fifteen minutes.

Big Sal sees the bullfrog as he gets off the bus. Above the window, a sign shows a pond with the words ‘Pond Hoppers’ on the left. Lily pads dot the water, and a frog leaps between two of them.

“Pond Hoppers,” says Wade. “Ankerton is known for a lot of parks and ponds, right? Go inside and talk to the frog. I got Phone Nerds.”

“Talk to…”

“The frog.”

Seems simple. I think it’s not.

The bullfrog still looks bored, staring out at the street with a plate of dead flies before it. Big Sal steps through the door and turns to talk to the bullfrog.

“I’m supposed to talk to you?” he says, connecting with the animal the way he usually did. The bullfrog looks up at him.

“Greetings and welcome!” says a voice behind him.

Big Sal whirls around. A human in a frog costume stands behind him.

“Welcome to Pond Hoppers. I see you are getting acquainted with Lucius! He’s a mighty big guy, but he’s been with us almost since the beginning! You must be looking for residency?”

“I don’t know what that means. I need a place.”

“That’s what we do here. Ever since City Hall decided nobody in town should be without a home, Pond Hoppers is where many find the housing best suited for them. Do you have your ID?”

Big Sal looks from the person in a frog suit to the bullfrog.

“RIDDIT,” says the bullfrog.

For a moment, it felt like Stinkwater, but here in Ankerton.

“Yes,” he says, digging into his purse.

“So come over here. See the kiosk with the touchscreen?” He gestures towards a tall, skinny box with a large touchscreen where water undulates, and an umbrella of cattails offers shelter.

“Uh. I’m going to have problems with the touchscreen,” he says, looking at the cattails.

Those don’t smell real. But they look like it.

“Do tell?”

He holds out his hands, dust drifting downwards from dry scales. “I miss my…”

“We have moisturizer for that!” And the frog-clad human pulls a bottle of moisturizer from a hidden pocket, offering a squirt to Big Sal.

“Did you get that from Ellie May?” he asks, amazed and accepting the skin moisturizer as carefully as he can.

“I don’t know who that is.” The employee smiles and gives Big Sal one squirt.

The scent is definitely not what Big Sal had before. Not as rich as most scents, it almost smells as though it sat at the bottom of a swamp for a long time before having most of its smell taken away.

“Where did you get that then?” he asks.

“Oh, probably a dollar store somewhere,” he says, looking down at Big Sal’s hands, still out for more.

The smile gets a little tighter, but he gets another squirt of moisturizer.

Still holding his hands out, Big Sal gets one more squirt, and then the frog-suited human clears his throat and coughs.

The red scent of embarrassment rolls out of Big Sal as he realizes the employee expected him to stop.

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to take…”

“It’s alright. Let’s find you your pad, shall we?” says the employee. A mix of human scents slowly wafts out, some sweet, some fruity, and some almost fermented.

“Does your finger work now?”

He taps the touchscreen. Water ripples outward from his finger, and a lily pad rises through the waves. A pair of frog legs stretches into view and lands on it, as though Big Sal were looking through frog eyes.

“Pond Hoppers, let us help you find your landing pad!” sings the kiosk.

“My finger works,” says Big Sal. “Amazing.”

“Great. Now just follow the buttons.”

“Is there a way to make it talk to me?” he asks.

“Accessibility options are in the lower right-hand corner.”

The L made by his left hand reminds him which side is left. He finds the button on the opposite side and turns on the voice.

“How many tadpoles will be sharing your pad, if any?” the voice asks cheerily.

“Tadpoles?” says Big Sal.

“Children,” says the employee, a little too rich, a fermented vanilla scent crawling over the floor.

Following the kiosk, he taps a few buttons. It asks him to scan his ID and then slide his bank card.

Options appear on the screen: a house, an apartment, connected townhouses, a motor home and a special habitat with rocks, trees and water.

“I can live in a house?”

“We have thirteen hundred and sixty-seven pads available,” replies the kiosk, again very cheery. “We will find the best pad available for you—with or without loved ones! There is always a soft landing with Pond Hoppers!”

He selects the house and discovers he can navigate through it on the kiosk.

Too square.

He backs out and selects an apartment.

Too dark.

He backs out again.

He looks at the townhouses, but they still aren’t quite right.

Too small.

He skips the motorhome. And definitely not something with wheels.

Then he taps on the button with the rocks, trees and water.

Something called ‘Moratisto’ appears. When he selects it, instead of an individual home with a picture, the kiosk begins playing a video.

From the viewpoint of a bird, he flies toward what looks like a small mountain range with several peaks. As the bird draws closer, the soft curves of the mountain become terraces. Terraces with ponds, gardens, trees and sloping yards placed directly above apartments. Warm orange light radiates from windows that glint in every direction. In the green valleys below, people kick balls across larger, unbroken yards. Others swim in reflecting ponds or sit on gravel banks with fishing rods.

That looks amazing. Birds can really see a lot.

He taps through the options, and the kiosk prints off something called a ‘Renter Note’ with different places within Moratisto to visit, then asks for his phone.

“Um, I don’t have it,” he says.

“Welcome to Moratisto!” says the kiosk as it prints a code his phone can scan. “Ankerton’s premier village within our larger village. You won’t be disappointed! Feel free to visit as many places as you want! Once you’ve found one that fits your lifestyle and your needs, just tell your phone which one and it’s yours! Lifestyle complete!”

Sounds like…a trick.

But he shrugs and turns to see Wade pushing through the door.

“Hey man, Phone Nerds remembered you and were able to dry out your phone. Good as new!” Then Wade sees the image on the kiosk.

“No way. You chose the Moors? Which peak? Which level?”

“Uh…I have a few different ones to check out.”

“Oh man, you’re gonna like this place.”

Chapter Index

🔍 Want to preview Chapter 31?
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Chapter 30 podcast drops September 5
Chapter 31 text drops August 12

Come say hello, find The Stinkwater Escapee: Season 1, and pick up a postcard for the continuing chapters and Mudwater Mutters podcast.

This episode includes:
✅ Chapter 30 - Lemony Persimmon
✅ Hooks Apology

Read the full story archive for The Stinkwater Escapee:

https://stinkwater.ca

On a wooden bench facing the pond sits the trucker.

“What else would a croc be doing in the industrial district? Battling forklifts? Chocking two trailers at once? Nah,” he says. “Figured even if you are the Hooks croc, you’d probably be out here looking for water.”

The lemony-persimmon scent is strong, but another smell radiates out, something Big Sal hasn’t smelled in a long time. Of all the humans he’s met, Wade’s clean-swamp scent is the most relaxing. It brings a feeling of safety, and even a hint of adventure. His old adventure, the one that brought him from Stinkwater to Hooks.

“You’re the guy who drives a big truck,” says Big Sal. He swims to the shore and, shaking himself free of water, sits down on the bench next to the man.

“Haha, yes, guilty as charged. Name’s Wade. Been driving for Molly’s Long Haul for twenty-some-odd years. It pays the bills, keeps the heat on, and gives me a few adventures along the way. You don’t look so good. Is life getting in your way, or are you in the way of life?”

A green-headed mallard paddles out from the reeds and cattails. It catches Big Sal’s attention. He watches it, seeing it as a colorful animal, minding its own business and just looking for water bugs.

Things were simpler back then. Before all this.

He hunches over his clasped hands.

“I heard that my old home, the one I left, is all gone. And now that Raleigh took my key, I don’t have anywhere to go. I thought things were good. There at Hooks. But now I don’t think I know anything. I just woke up, but I’m tired. So tired.” He sighs.

And as he says this, dust rubs loose from his hands and drifts to the ground. He watches it, and a thought crosses his mind.

“Sounds like life is getting in your way,” says Wade. “I’m sorry to hear that about your old home, my man. Sometimes we go through things we can’t make sense of. The world keeps moving around us, but it feels like we’re watching everyone else and only passing through.”

Big Sal’s thought vanishes. The memory of crossing the street after Raven’s Mirage rises in its place.

“Exactly!” he says. And then, quieter and more to himself, he asks, “Why am I here?”

“I don’t know, man,” says Wade, also quiet. “I don’t think many of us truly know. I suppose that’s part of what life is.”

“I think...I miss being around all this. The pond, the birds, the changing sky—this is me. I mean, I loved the attention at Hooks. But this is where I came from. It’s not what I left, that’s different. That’s so different.”

“Yeah, I think I know what you’re getting at. People can be great. Sometimes not so much. But being outside things can often just be easier. Less stressful. Less drama. Nature has its own flow.”

Cilantro seeps from Wade, disappearing into the green of the trees and grass and cattails.

Wade takes a deep breath and holds it. He gently nods four times and breathes out.

“Ahh. It’s what I do when things get too overwhelming. Breathe with me, brother. When we can’t fix everything, and things are all broken on the outside and on the inside, keep it simple, silly. Find a quiet place. And breathe.”

Big Sal doesn’t think Wade understands what he is trying to say, but he shrugs.

“Alright,” he says. He takes a quick breath and lets it out just as fast.

“Slow down, slow down, man. You gotta let that oxygen get into your bloodstream, let that mammalian heart rate come down.”

“Uhm. Ok.”

Big Sal tries again, this time doing it much slower. It doesn’t fix things, but it does help settle the tired feelings.

“There you go. Keep doing that and you’ve got it.”

He does it several more times. The pressure holding him tight inside his body releases, and there is suddenly more of him inside. A lot more.

“Wow. That... did something. I’m not sure what.”

“See? That’s what I’m sayin’. Now, what was it you were saying about not having a place?”

Big Sal sighs and watches more dust drift down from his scaly skin. This time, Wade notices.

“Man, you gotta take that suit off and get a good cleanin’ done.”

“I... I’m not sure. I... I think this is... something normal. I’ve done this before. I think.”

“Mmkay.” Wade gestures to the proximity band on Big Sal’s left wrist. “What’s that thing?”

“Raleigh gave it to me. It tells me when to dance at Hooks.”

“Guy takes your key, but doesn’t take that thing? Man, I don’t think Hooks is done with you.”

“Well, last night I slept out here. The night before, I slept at Hooks, but they said I couldn’t stay there long. So, I went and got all that stuff Petra told me I needed, like a bank account and a cell phone. Normal human stuff, I guess. And then I hung onto an old crocodile skin that I was told to hang onto, but found out later I was supposed to leave at Hooks. Raleigh didn’t like that. I don’t know why he got so mad. Humans are so confusing…”

Wade chuckles at this.

“And so now I don’t have any way of getting a place to stay. And why are you laughing? I’m…I’m trying to be serious here.”

Wade smiles, clears his throat and shifts. “Sorry, you’re right. Go on.”

“I don’t know. I guess that’s it.”

“So let me get this straight. You got normal human stuff. Bank account. Cell phone. That’s more than plenty of humans start with, man.”

No scent indicates that he’s joking. Big Sal looks at Wade to make sure.

“Really?”

“You bet your butt. It takes time for people to get this stuff. Gotta be old enough for this stuff. Gotta have money to put into the bank account.”

“I…didn’t know.”

“So you got money in that account?”

“Yeah. Something about a signing bonus from Hooks.”

Wade looks away and shakes his head. “Man, so you need a place, and you got money. You’re ten times farther along than I was when I was your age.”

“I…how old am I?”

Wade gives him a look. “Man, you could be twelve years or twelve thousand years. I dunno.” He thinks for a moment. “I’m guessing you went to Raven’s Mirage to get ID if you opened an account. Check your ID.”

“How’d you know that?”

“Ankerton, man. It’s a weird place, but the weirdness has a consistency to it. Just know that Doctor Crow doesn’t decide who you are. You do. He just gives Ankerton enough to work with while you figure that out. If he signed off on your ID, whatever’s there is good enough for Ankerton.”

“My purse—it’s over there.”

Big Sal stands and retrieves it from under the tree.

“Man, you shouldn’t be leaving things like that lying around. You’re lucky it’s still there,” says Wade.

“What do you mean?”

“Theft. Someone could come along and take it.”

“People do that?”

Wade’s smile thins and he shakes his head. “You’re lucky you got the wicked suit, man. No one’s gonna challenge you.”

“What?”

Wade sits forward and puts his hands over his face. “Don’t worry about it.”

Big Sal opens his purse. His phone, wallet, the map, and the prepaid card fall out.

“I like your wallet. Cute fox,” says Wade.

“Yeah. I miss him.”

Wade nods but doesn’t ask.

Big Sal slides out the ID. The crocodile in the hologram has become cloudy. He shifts the card, and something else begins to emerge: a curved silhouette without much definition.

“I don’t get these holograms.”

“No one really does. They’re a mystery.”

“So how do I tell…”

“Right there,” Wade says, pointing. “DOB: TBD. Huh.”

“What’s that mean?”

“DOB is date of birth. TBD is to be determined. Huh. Like I said. A mystery.”

Big Sal shakes his head. “How do I know how much money I have?”

“Well, just open the bank app, pair the card and log in.”

“I don’t know what that means,” says Big Sal, tapping buttons on his phone. “And now the phone doesn’t work.”

“Um, did you turn it off?”

“I don’t know.”

“Here, push this button on the side…” Wade reaches over and shows him the button.

“I thought that just made the ding stop.”

“Well, yeah—quiet and off.”

The phone powers up, the logo spinning.

“Yo, that phone is voice-controlled. One of those new models with old-style buttons. So cool.”

“It’s a phone. For a croc. I don’t know why I need it yet. I don’t take pictures.”

Wade watches the mallard paddle between cattails at the pond’s edge. “Well, they’re supposed to help us communicate with each other. Talk. Text. Video chat.”

The phone finishes its boot process and sits idle for a moment.

“What do I do?” asks Big Sal.

“See the microphone button? Push that.”

Big Sal pushes it. The phone makes a soft chime.

“Now tell it to open your bank account,” says Wade.

“Open your bank account.”

A voice from the phone asks him to press his bank card against the back. Wade helps him follow the unfamiliar instructions. Soon, the account appears on the screen.

“Do you need me to tell you how much money you have?” asks Wade.

“Yes.”
Wade leans in and whistles. “Wow. That’s what’s left of a signing bonus? You could buy a car with that.”

“So… I can get a place?”

“You’ve got more than enough to get started. I guess the question is, do you want to live by yourself, or with other people?”

Big Sal doesn’t hesitate.

“With others.”

Chapter Index

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Chapter 30 podcast drops September 5
Chapter 31 text drops August 12

This episode includes:
✅ Chapter 28 - Broken
✅ Chapter 29 - Elemental

Read the full story archive for The Stinkwater Escapee:

https://stinkwater.ca

As he walks out the sliding door, someone tries to enter. They freeze when they see him, fear-tart rolling toward him.

I’m so tired, he thinks. I’m not even trying to scare them and they still get scared.

“Whoa. Nice suit. Guess we’ll see you later, gator.”

Humans smell one way and say another. Right now, he doesn’t have the energy to understand why.

And seeing me later? I doubt that. I think Hooks is done with me.

He isn’t sure where to go. Then a thought crosses his mind, and he starts trudging away.

At a bus stop near Hooks, a FlaminGo bus pulls up. The driver opens the door and looks down at him.

“Why the long face, croco?” he asks with a chuckle. “Get on. If you’re going that way, I’m going that way.”

Big Sal gazes up at the bus driver. He isn’t sure what the scent coming from the driver means, but it reminds him of deep water moving beneath a still surface.

“Sal!” calls Petra, running out the door, but she’s too late.

Big Sal taps his card. A loon warbles, and the bus doors slide closed behind him.

The bus heads in the direction he had been thinking of. He stands, holding the overhead railing, and takes a deep sniff, hoping to smell another book. But the bus is almost empty. The few people aboard stare at their phones without registering him.

It’s kind of nice for a change.

He sighs and rubs his face with a hand.

What did I think I was doing here? It’s all wrong. And I don’t even have a place to go back to.

His mind feels slow and numb.

No squirrels, no owls, no grouse.

A strange longing swirls in his belly.

Then, No elephants, no foxes, no other crocodiles.

This time, the longing seeps into the center of his chest.

The bus turns onto Handyman Road, slows, and stops. Big Sal smells cold water, the faintest trace of algae and something strangely clean. He turns toward the front doors.

Before he can step down, a man with close-cropped hair and kind eyes starts onto the bus. His eyes find Big Sal before Big Sal smells the lemony-persimmon scent.

“Ohh, I know that look,” says the man.

Big Sal says nothing. He sighs, steps around him and trundles off. The bus starts up with a fwip-fwip-fwip that echoes down the road. A CRANK News truck emblazoned with Don Maroon’s face pulls away from the far side of the pond, heading the opposite direction.

The pond isn’t far, and as he approaches, he smells something familiar.

Heron.

Splashes and rapid strikes tell Big Sal where the bird is long before he reaches the water. Too distracted to notice him, the bird scrambles through the shallows, trying to eat everything he can.

Setting his purse beneath a tree, Big Sal settles into the pond. A few cattails fringe the edge, but nowhere near as many as he’s used to. There is hardly any algae, and the water smells more like a bathtub than a pond. The cold closes around him, almost like home.

But not.

Eyes closed, he drifts across the surface like only a crocodile can.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa! What—what are you doing?” exclaims the bird.

Opening his eyes, Big Sal finds the heron beside him. He had smelled the bird drawing closer but hadn’t bothered to move. No belly beast stirs inside him. The heron may as well be sticks and spiderwebs, more memory than food.

“Just napping. I’m sorry you lost your home. It used to be mine too.”

The heron squawks, shivers, and stares at him.

“Big Al?”

“Sal. Big Sal now.”

“Aren’t you going to eat me?” the bird finally says. “I mean, I’ve been eating fish and water bugs. Isn’t this how it works?”

“Mmm. Not hungry.”

He closes his eyes. “I did what they told me to do, and I still got it wrong. Now I can’t go back there. Or home. Our home.” He sighs. “I’m tired. Very tired.”

The heron’s scent changes, filling with confusion. It reminds Big Sal of Carney the Crane, the bird who taught him to stand. Carney had once tasted so good. Now Big Sal wishes Carney were there.

“Can you sing?” he asks the heron, opening his eyes.

“What?”

“Can you sing? Like songs?”

“I, uh. I don’t know. What kind of songs?”

“Uhm.” Big Sal whistles the “still standing” tune that Carney sang for him, so long ago.

He remembers walking into the Zit & Grit and whistling it. The band had joined him, and then the entire room. For the first time, he had felt welcomed. Accepted. He thought he had found that again in Ankerton.

Now he isn’t so sure.

“I don’t know that song,” says the heron. “But let me see. Ah, uh. Hm.”

The heron’s song echoes across the rippling water and weaves through the cattails. It begins with words about a long and lonesome highway, somewhere on one side of Omaha. Later, the song follows the traveler onto a stage beneath the lights. Big Sal lets the loneliness of it wash over him.

When the heron finishes, Big Sal says, “I was like that for a bit. In the spotlight. It didn’t feel so lonely. I felt accepted. I liked it.”

“I wouldn’t know,” says the heron. “The highway part reminded me of leaving Stinkwater.”

“Yeah. I get that.”

For a while, neither says anything. Neither moves. The fire in the sky burns through the clouds, then sinks beyond the city.

The sky never becomes as clear as it was from the roof of the truck. Instead of Stinkwater’s haze, Ankerton’s city lights dim the stars.

Still as a tree, the heron sleeps beside him on one leg.

Good.

In the morning, before Big Sal opens his eyes, the scent of dragonfly blasts into his left nostril like a hose.

He sneezes violently.

With a beat of wings and hardly a splash, the heron rises into the blue sky. The dragonfly that had been sunning itself on Big Sal’s nose tumbles away, buzzes once around his head on shimmering wings, then darts for the cattails.

Big Sal watches the heron shrink into the distance.

I wonder where he’ll go.

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Chapter 29 podcast drops August 22
Chapter 30 text drops August 29

The afternoon included readings from the published book, chapters beyond the book, history behind the creation of Stinkwater, appearances from some of its odd institutions, and the peculiar sort of promotional material one might expect from Ankerton.

The complete event recording is now available.

This is a recording of a live presentation, so you’ll hear some of the room along with the program, but the full event, including the slides and audio presentations, has been preserved.

Running time: approximately 77 minutes.

Thank you again to everyone who attended, helped organize the event, bought a book, listened, laughed, or followed The Stinkwater Escapee through Mudwater Mutters.

Continue into Stinkwater

Read from the beginning:
Chapter 1

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www.stinkwater.ca

At one point he would have thought of this group of children as a buffet of snacks, but not anymore. Fear-tart oozes into the bus from them, but the older ones are more interested in him than scared. Mango and banana billow out the bus windows.

“That costume is killer, croc dude.”

“Can I get a selfie?” asks another passenger.

Big Sal poses for the selfie, his attention still drawn to the scent so unlike anything else. It smells like every human scent he knows, all at once.

He finally traces it to two people near the middle of the bus, away from the daycare children. An older brother of about twelve sits with his eyes downcast over a book. His index finger points at words on a page for his little sister. She is about five and small enough to disappear behind the bus seats. She quietly says the words he points at. When she doesn’t know a word, he says it aloud.

But the scent isn’t coming from either child. The book is a furnace pushing out aromas like a smokestack.

The strong scents seem to come from the pages, the paper itself. Every page gives off different shades of emotion. Some carry whole spectrums of fear-tart. Others glow with mango and banana. It smells like hundreds of humans layered together within the pages.

He waddles along the bus aisle toward the two. They don’t notice him until he’s standing right next to them.

“It’s not…often that someone comes along who is both a true f…fr…”

“Friend.”

“Friend. And a good wri…writer,” says the little girl.

She looks up and sees Big Sal next to them.

“Are you a friend?” she asks, unafraid of him.

He thinks he is. He wants to be. But he doesn’t think everyone will think that yet.

Her older brother looks up and smiles.

“Hey Croc. You like books?”

“I don’t know. What is that? What smells like so many different humans?”

“What do you mean?” asks the older brother.

“What she’s holding.”

His sister pipes up. “It’s a library book.”

“Hey Sal,” calls Petra. “It’s our stop.”

“I got you—Flamin’ there,” says an automated voice from the bus as it comes to a stop. “Hooks Restaurant by the docks.”

“You good, Sophie?” says Petra to another adult sitting with the Evermore kids.

“Good as always, Petra. We’ve got this, right boys and girls?”

“Bye-bye Petra,” says a chorus of voices.

“Come on, Sal,” she says.

I never get enough time for the things I really want.

He lumbers off the bus behind Petra.

“You got everything done?” she asks as they wait to cross Sparrow’s Strait. “I did. But now I have more questions.”

Petra laughs. “Oh?”

“Why do I need a phone number? Why are there spaghetti and meatballs on the pirate ship that is City Hall? Why do books smell like so many different humans? And what’s a hologram?”

“We’ll get to them, Sal. What is your new number?”

He gives it to her. She takes out her phone and taps at it. His phone makes an electronic ding that hurts his ears.

“I can change that, right?”

“You can change the sound to whatever you want, yes.”

“Can I try making bison stew sometime in the kitchen?”

“Uhm. You would need to talk to Raleigh and the chef about that.”

As they enter the Hooks dining room, Don Maroon is interviewing someone on the television over the bar. The guest sounds more like squeaks and calls.

“I can’t tell if this is real or not,” says Petra. “I’ve seen Don Maroon improvise with comedians before, but this really takes the cake.”

Standing in a lagoon in the center of a city park, Don Maroon wears hip waders and attempts to interview a heron. The heron dips its beak into the water between answers, swallowing small fish while its wings shake.

“It’s all dried up. Everyone left.”

“I’m sorry, you do look very tired. Where did you say you were from?”

“Oh, it doesn’t exist anymore. Some of us called it Stinkwater Marsh, but like I said, it isn’t there anymore.”

Big Sal slows down and stands as still as a floating log.

“I don’t understand anything but Don Maroon,” says Petra, stopping next to him. “Can you make any of this out?”

“Uhm.”

What? No Stinkwater? No home to return to?

His stomach churns, but not in a hungry way.

“Good morning main cast!” says Raleigh, coming out of the kitchen. “Petra, can you set the proximity bands to siesta mode? Today is Taco Tuesday! Sal, this is Mr. Longbottom. He’s the curator of the Centre for Ankerton Culture, History & Exhibits. He’d like to ask you a few questions and get your profile loaded into CACHE.”

A roundish man in a plaid blue button-up shirt and brown tear-off shorts approaches Big Sal. His mustache sticks out like two chopsticks. Banana and beaver dam whirl around him. He holds out his hand.

“We’re delighted to welcome the new Hooks croc. We’ve wanted to close the chapter on the previous one for a while. Since you have your own suit, CACHE would like to preserve the old costume in cold storage as part of Hooks history. If I can just get the old suit, we can get started with your story.”

“I…what? I did what I thought I was supposed to do.”

Raleigh and Mr. Longbottom stare at him as their scents shift.

Petra looks at him. “I told you to hang on to it. Where is the old crocodile suit, Sal?”

“I did. Until Henry asked for it back.”

Green tea washes over him from the three people around him.

“This is highly unusual,” says Mr. Longbottom. “Highly unusual. Huh.”

Raleigh’s scent changes to fear-tart and then to hot-metal and salt. Like the big guys at the Zit & Grit.

“What did you do that for?” he yells. “How much did Henry pay you for that?”

“Wait, wait,” says Petra. “We don’t know that Henry paid him anything. Let’s not make assumptions.”

“What did I do?” asks Big Sal. “I didn’t mean to…I don’t understand.”

“Out!” yells Raleigh. “No, wait. First, give me your key.”

“Are you sure this is necessary?” asks Mr. Longbottom, his green-tea scent held behind beaver dam.

What is happening?

As Big Sal hands the key to Raleigh’s outstretched palm, a scent seeps out from beneath his scales: damp wind whispering between cattails, dandelion pushing through sunbaked mud, and hints of cilantro.

Is that me?

Customers turn from their tables to watch.

Raleigh floods the space with fear-tart and hot metal.

Petra’s scents change faster than her face. Cilantro rises from Petra as she seems to put something together.

“You hung onto it and walked past The Cinnamon State on your way to Phone Nerds, didn’t you?”

“Exactly! What did I do wrong?”

“Oh, Sal.” Her voice goes quiet. She looks down and rubs her forehead. “I should have told you to leave it in the closet. It wasn’t Henry’s anymore. It belongs to Hooks.”

“That costume has been waiting patiently like a dead crocodile for four years!” yells Raleigh.

“He didn’t know that, Raleigh,” says Petra. “We put it in a bag before he left this morning, and I told him to hang onto it. I…didn’t think I needed to explain that Henry couldn’t take it back.”

“What’s happening, Mommy?” asks a little girl before someone quickly shushes her.

“How does this even—GAAH!” yells Raleigh. “Out!”

As he turns to go, Big Sal glances up at the TV, where the heron eats fish out of the pond.

I wanted to make bison stew. How did I take too much?

His tail has never felt so heavy as he walks out the front door of Hooks.

Chapter Index

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Chapter 28 podcast drops August 8
Chapter 29 text drops August 15

This episode includes:
✅ Chapter 27 - Chained
✅ Don Maroon’s interview with a Heron
✅ Local 327 FISH School response

Read the full story archive for The Stinkwater Escapee:

https://stinkwater.ca

On the street, Petra’s map fills him with confusion. He looks at the bullfrog, who doesn’t even twitch when he approaches.

“Can you tell me how to get to the bank?”

The bullfrog’s throat inflates outward in a mottled yellow balloon.

“Come on, you’ve seen everything here.”

“RIDDIT.”

He knows that he has to go around the ship that towers over him so high it’s mast tears a cloud. Something about turning back is uncomfortable to him.

Argh, what does this mean? Another weird human thing?

He keeps walking, growing dizzy.

Or…is this a me thing?

It’s not like the flood he experienced earlier, rather, it’s like a bird fluttering its wings inside his head.

He passes under the stem of the prow, where a carving of something like spaghetti and meatballs wraps around it like an octopus. Strands of rope mimic noodles that drift in a light breeze. A noodle drifts down and for some reason, his head clears, mostly.

“Alright. To the bank.”

Again, he hears the warbling hoot from the bank first, and then the dry-bone smell rolls towards him.

I don’t know why, but those dusty bones smell…like something bigger and meaner than I ever was.

The loon calls again, beckoning the coins and the croc inwards.

Coffee-security people wait just inside the doors.

“Hello, may I help you?” asks a young man in a large lobby.

“Uh, yes. Hi. I’m looking for Marley…the…chains?”

“Marley Deschaines! Yes. I believe…” He checks a tablet. “You’re in luck. Come with me.”

Dry-bone scents float around the floor like swamp gas, and Big Sal feels a shudder ripple down his back.

I don’t want to be here. But here I am.

He leads him down a bright hallway to an office door with the name ‘Marley Deschaines’ on it and knocks.

“Come on in!” says a voice that sounds like the grave.

The door creaks open, and the scent of red-rose tea rolls out from a young woman in a cardigan, thick-rimmed eyeglasses sitting behind a large desk. The desk has a varnished scent of hardwood.

“Ah! The Hooks croc! What brings you this way?” she says. Then to the man, “Thank you Percy.”

The young man nods and leaves, closing the door behind.

The red-rose…it reminds me of…somewhere. Somewhere nice.

He feels himself relaxing, even if just by a scale.

“I need…bank stuff,” says Big Sal.

Marley snaps her right fingers. “Yes. I can help with that. But first, do you have ID?”

Big Sal nods, and pulls his purse up to open it.

“That purse…that looks, that looks handmade. By…oh what’s her name? May I see it?”

“Uh, sure.”

Setting his wallet on the desk, Big Sal carefully takes the purse off and offers it to Marley.

“Oh, Izzy,” says Marley quietly as she finds the creator’s tag inside. “You never told us you did one out of linen.”

The scent from Marley is of cedar-nutmeg and water-return.

“I…don’t understand,” says Big Sal. The cedar-nutmeg is new, and she seems to be looking into the past.

“Who gave this to you? Was it Isabella Fast?”

“Uh. Yes. It was before the big truck ride. After I…crawled out of the ditch. She gave me soup, bison soup.”

Marley chuckles. “Her hospitality was always, yes, Fast. So, you’ve come all the way from Arcanum Glades? That’s quite the trip.”

“Farther, actually. I flew into Ar…Arcanum Glades from Stinkwater.”

“Don’t know that place, but Izzy was renowned for her handmade purses. Most of them were leather or even silk. This must have been one she kept for herself. Between waitressing downtown and selling her wares, people knew her. Here you go.”

Marley hands the purse back to him.

Big Sal holds the purse in his hand for an extra moment. It’s so smooth and soft he’d barely noticed it.

“It doesn’t smell like anything,” he says, confused at how he missed this.

“Oh, Isabella knew her crafts. She was good at giving people what they needed. But I believe I can help you with something you need as well, right?”

“Yeah. Something called a debit card, I think.”

What…is that?

Shifting the ID in the light, a silver picture of himself seems deep within the card. He had seen that. But it disappears when viewed from an angle. Something else is in there too, seen from a different angle, but it’s more hazy than anything. Something that wasn’t quite defined, but starting to be.

“Those holograms in Ankerton’s ID are pretty neat, aren’t they?”

“That’s a picture, but not from over here?”

“Things change from different perspectives, right?”

“I don’t know what that means.”

Marley smiles and shakes her head. “Can I see it?”

Big Sal hands it over, and she copies information from it into a laptop on her desk. She asks him a few questions, and when he doesn’t know the answer, she nods, looks something up on her computer, and continues.

Near the end, she hands him a card that has a loon on the front, and a black stripe on the back.

“You take care, Sal. Thanks for stopping by. And if you ever see Isabella again, tell her I said hi.”

“Thanks. I don’t think that’ll happen, but I’ll try to remember.”

“That’s the best we can do. Tootles and Slightly!”

Big Sal nods, not sure what that means, and Percy appears at the door to take him back to the front doors.

The dusty bone smell has shifted, and instead of scaring him, there’s more of a smell of bones with cooked meat on them, and his stomach rumbles.

I should try making bison stew sometime.

As he walks back out to the street, a FlaminGo bus pulls up beside him.

“Hey Sal! You should get on! Next stop is Hooks!”

Petra waves to him from inside the bus.

“You can cover this, right?” says the bus driver. “Not like the other croc who wanted handouts?”

Big Sal sees the ‘Tap’ near the driver, and presses his Loon to the tap. A warble echoes down the street.

“It’s the Hooks croc!”

Every eye on the bus turns to him, except for one set. Petra sits near the front with a group of children that look both terrified and amazed. Scents of mango, banana and cilantro fill the bus as it takes off.

“Hi Sal, have a seat,” says Petra, pointing at a spot next to her.

“Thanks, but I’ll stand,” he says, holding an overhead rail next to her.

There’s something else on this bus that smells more human than humans. It comes from the set of eyes that remain downcast. It’s only two rows back further.

The kids around Petra all wear the same color t-shirt, orange. In black letters, EVERMORE DAYCARE.

Chapter Index

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Chapter 27 podcast drops July 25
Chapter 28 text drops August 1

This episode includes:
✅ Chapter 26 - Strained
✅ Captain Clamjaw ad
✅ Department of Fourth Wall Deconstruction PSA

Read the full story archive for The Stinkwater Escapee:

https://stinkwater.ca

He feels lighter without carrying the old skin around anymore, and there’s a new energy lifting him out of his rumble.

I feel less like a croc and more like a heron with two long sticks for legs.

The Henry-smell that he’d been carrying around is gone, and where it had been his nose finds only clean air.

“This could make it easier to dance,” he mumbles, different songs stumbling their way through his head.

Inside Hooks was a picture painted across the back of the dining area of a pirate ship sailing the high seas. As he walks, another ship emerges from behind a tall building. But as he grows closer, he realizes it isn’t a picture at all, but a large building. Windows glint from cannon ports. A black flag with a human skull and crossbones flies from the top of the mast.

Okay, so did someone bake this? From pictures to real things, right? What menu did this come from?

The mast stretches as high into the sky as the buildings surrounding it. A few people on the street wear something shiny on their heads. The ship-building smells dry, boring, and nothing like Hooks.

He checks Petra’s map. He needs to walk around the bow.

“May the Great Noodly Appendage bend in your favor!” says an older woman who walks by him with a shiny hat on her head. It reminds him of what the chef uses to steam vegetables at Hooks.

“Uh, thank you?” says Big Sal. “You too?”

The woman beams at him. “You know, it’s a special thing to be the new croc at Hooks. Nothing is more Ankerton than the Hooks crew.”

Big Sal shrugs. “Really? I’m just figuring things out as I go.”

“Oh, but we all are. Here at City Hall, we make sure everyone can do that. Tootles and Slightly!”

And with that, she disappears down the sidewalk.

That human smelled like pasta. Like, spaghetti and meatballs. This town is meatballs.

Big Sal makes his way around the bow, passing a couple others with shiny, metallic hats. Once on the other side he sees a giant frog. It sits in a shop window, it’s bored, bullfrog stare fixed on the busy street. A pink tongue drools from its mouth. A plate of insects sits on a table in front of it. Next to the shop window a door sits propped open with what looks like a fabric brick with a plastic antenna. Blinking in the door’s window is a twizzly-smelling sign that says ‘Phone Nerds.’

Big Sal can’t help but look at the frog that is far bigger and juicier than he ever saw in Stinkwater.

“May the Great Noodly Appendage bend in your favor,” he says to the bullfrog.

“RIDDIT,” comes the throaty reply.

It isn’t until he’s inside Phone Nerds that he realizes something.

That frog didn’t even make me hungry.

“Greetings, Mr. Croc!” says a girl’s voice. “Check this out!”

And she twirls the phone in her hand to show him what she’d been looking at when he walked in; the video that he’s already seen of himself walking out of the refrigerated truck carrying a pallet stacked with boxes.

“That’s the best debut for a Hooks croc,” she says. “The last one opened with a dance that was great at first, but then became boring.” Then, with a grin, “Your entrance, like ROAR…”

“Sorry to cut you off,” says Big Sal. “But I need a phone. Can you help me with this?”

“Sorry! Yes!” The girl puts down the phone and starts showing him the phones in a glass case. She takes one out and offers it to him to try.

“Oops,” he says as it slips from his dry hands and hits the floor with a smack.

The scent of vinegar steams out from the girl. Excitement drains from her face. For an instant it says ‘Oh no’ before settling into a placid, bored look similar to the bullfrog.

“Sorry about that,” says Big Sal, leaning down to pick up the phone. “I broke my moisturizer, and….” He sighs. “My hands haven’t been the same.”

Cracks spiderweb across the phone.

He pushes the side button.

It doesn’t respond.

Her cheeks dimple, and she holds out her hand for the phone.

“It’s a floor model,” she says. “Let’s put the next one in a case.”

He points at another one.

She gives it to him and it stays in his hands this time.

“How do you work these?” he asks.

“Tap the screen and it’ll come on.”

He does, but nothing happens. He taps it again. And again.

“That’s weird,” she says. She takes the phone and pulls a spray bottle and cloth from beneath the counter. After wiping the screen, she hands it back.

Again, nothing happens.

With a frown, she reaches out and touches one of his claws.

I’ve never felt anything like that before, he thinks.

“You really need that moisturizer. Either that, or…”

She lets go. Then taps her chin with a finger.

“Just a moment.”

She disappears into a door in the back marked ‘STAFF ONLY’.

Big Sal looks at the claws on his forearms. He touches the glass on the counter, and it’s hard, smooth, and cool.

Usually…

“Here, I found a different one. Let’s try this out.”

The device she removes doesn’t have one large touchscreen the way all the others in the case do. This one has the same buttons found on the sides of the other phones, except these cover half the front, underneath a smaller screen. A few bigger buttons near the bottom have large symbols on them.

“I think this is going to be what you want,” says the girl. “It’s what some might call a dumb phone, but it’s smarter than that. All those buttons you press instead of tapping a screen, and those bigger buttons on the bottom? Push the microphone to talk to the phone, the green button to send, and yeah, it’s pretty self-explanatory.”

Big Sal feels water-return welling up and rushing out of himself.

“Thank, thank you. Thank you so much for this.”

She gives him a smile. “Hey, not a problem. That’s just my job here. Glad we could get you the right device for you.”

She gets him set up with a number. He pays and looks at it.

“Can those numbers be changed to a real clock, one with, uh, fingers?”

“Hands, and yes.”

She quickly sets him up with an analog clock on the much smaller phone display. It’s getting close to ten o’clock. He needs to be moving.

Chapter Index

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Chapter 26 podcast drops July 11
Chapter 27 text drops July 18

This episode includes:
✅ Chapter 25 - The Cinnamon State
✅ Don Maroon’s coverage of The Cinnamon State
✅ Big Sal singing

Read the full story archive for The Stinkwater Escapee:

https://stinkwater.ca

Big Sal has settled up with Stacy and left Raven’s Mirage. crossed the street towards Phone Nerds, only to run into Henry. Chapter 25 opens here.

“Smells like you,” says Big Sal. The cinnamon scent he had been following is background to the sweaty scent that comes from the bag and the human that stands before him. But the toast costume is throwing Big Sal off. He vaguely recalls eating toast in a dumpster once. It smelled nothing like the toasted human that stands before him.

“I don’t smell like butter and toast,” says Henry, misinterpreting Big Sal, thinking the croc was getting a dig in at him. “I smell…” He sniffs his armpits.

“…like Eau de Croco. It’s expensive!”

“No. The bag. It smells like you.”

Henry blinks. Once, twice, three times.

“What in the bag smells like me?”

“I think it’s your old skin. I don’t know why I’m carrying it. Do you want it?”

“You’ll have to show me. This big butter knife is glued to the gloves and I can only rub it around. I can’t get my hands out of here.”

Big Sal doesn’t know how to undo the knot the bag was tied with.

If only I had fingers…

“Is it okay if I tear it open?”

“Sure. No skin off my back.”

Big Sal sets the bag down, tears it open, and pulls out an arm. It flops against the ground and makes a hissing sound as it rubs against the bag.

The smell that snaps out of Henry is like a wet twig breaking. Another adds to it. And then his beaver dam breaks open, a flood washing over broken branches.

“Why did you bring this here?” asks Henry. “You aren’t from around here so you don’t know what this was to me.”

“I don’t know,” says Big Sal, wondering where this is going for Henry. Henry’s actions are different from the last time Big Sal smelled broken beaver dam on a grieving trucker.

“Man, can you only use simple sentences?” says Henry. “Why did you bring this here?”

Big Sal’s nostrils flare. Henry’s scent says something familiar, while his actions are very different.

No skin off this croc’s back. This human is…conflicted.

“Petra said not to lose it.”

Henry’s scents change again, and they are honey and mango mixed with mud and woody brokenness.

“Ah, Petra.”

And tears run out of the face nestled inside a pat of butter, darker streaks tracing over the yellow and into the corrugated toast.

“Those were the best days of my life,” he says quietly, with a singsong rhythm.

Big Sal’s own eyes begin to leak, tears running over his fading crocodile skin.

Henry blinks at him.

“Your eyes, they looked human for a moment there.”

Big Sal shrugs and grunts. “I’m just me.”

Henry looks at the bag. “I think this costume found me. What I’m going to do with it, I don’t know. But thanks.”

Why are humans so confusing? The way this one smells, he’s trying to rebuild old dams that have broken but never moved them upstream.

Big Sal glances towards the bakery, where fresh baked cinnamon buns steam in racks just behind the front window.

“Can I…”

“They won’t let you in,” says Henry.

“What do you mean?”

“They don’t like crocodiles. Trust me. Their sign…”

“Croc that, I’m gonna try.”

And with that, Big Sal leaves the crocodile skin in the bag by the toasted human and approaches the Cinnamon State bakery.

“You really don’t want…”
Big Sal waves his front paw the way he did to Security at the Zit & Grit and approaches the door.

Three customers stand in line inside the bakery, two people behind the counter. At the till, a wide man with a nose that sticks out and up gives a sniff and looks out the window, his eyes narrowing at Big Sal. He might be looking at a piece of carrion too bad to eat.

“Can’t you read?” he yells, and slams his hand onto the counter, startling his customers.

“Read what?” says Big Sal, opening the door. Cinnamon is the strongest scent, but underneath it is a fear scent so tart it almost makes Big Sal pucker. There’s also a rot within a sweetish coriander smell that is the baker.

“Get out! Crocodiles are not allowed! Never have been and never will! We do not serve crocodiles, whether from Hooks, the zoo or Egypt! Get out!”

One of the customers, a teenaged boy, gives the shopkeeper with the tilted-up nose a snort. “That’s the new Hooks croc dude. He’s famous. You’re making a bad decision.”

Turning red with anger, the shopkeeper takes the cinnamon bun from the boy.

“You do not know what you are talking about,” he yells, shaking the cinnamon bun in the boy’s face, frosting going everywhere.

“This kind sunk family bakeries over many years. WE. DO. NOT. SERVE. CROCODILES. Read the sign!”

“Nuts to this,” says the boy, walking out. “I’ll take my business to Zenbucks.”

“Go!”

“I just want a cinnamon…” says Big Sal.

“Get out you scaley freak! I will call security! I will call the police! I will call everyone!”

The other customers scurry out another door, one eating the cinnamon bun on the way out, the other leaving it behind.

“Hey Boondaggle,” says Henry from behind Big Sal.

“Yes, patsy?” says the baker, Boondaggle.

“I would not know…” Henry moves a hand, and the large butter knife waves in one direction. “What might happen if I were to, oh accidentally trip, oh whoopsie!”

Henry leans on one leg, teeters…

“Oh you…” starts Boondaggle.

Henry goes down face first onto the sidewalk, unable to stop himself with hands glued to the butter knife.

CRUNCH

Big Sal whirls around, his tail sending a garbage can flying. Reaching down he pushes Henry face up, the side of the toast costume folding over.

A scent that Big Al hasn’t smelled in a long time tickles his nose.

Blood.

A trickle runs down from Henry’s forehead.

“This costume never passed safety,” whispers Henry. “Remember, my hands are stuck in here and I can’t catch myself. He’s liable. Get out of here.”

Big Sal’s nose flares, but then he decides to do exactly that.

Cinnamon buns are harder to get than anything else. Maybe one day I’ll have one. And maybe I’ll bring one to Henry.

So, with a chagrined grumble, Big Sal rumbles down the sidewalk, while Boondaggle’s voice chews out the toast on the sidewalk.

Updated June 24 for clarification and scents.

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Chapter 23 podcast drops May 30
Chapter 24 text drops June 7