To Squeeze a Prairie Dog Read online

  To Squeeze a Prairie Dog

  An American Novel

  Written

  by

  Scott Semegran

  Copyright © 2019 Scott Semegran

  All Rights Reserved

  License Notes

  This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Mutt Press

  Austin, Texas

  https://muttpress.com

  [email protected]

  ---------

  Edited by Brandon R. Wood & Lori Hoadley

  Proofreading by David Aretha at Yellow Bird Editors

  Cover Illustration by Andrew Leeper

  Cover Layout by Scott Semegran & Andrew Leeper

  Photo of Scott Semegran by Lori Hoadley

  ---------

  Books by Scott Semegran:

  To Squeeze a Prairie Dog

  Sammie & Budgie

  Boys

  The Spectacular Simon Burchwood

  The Meteoric Rise of Simon Burchwood

  Modicum

  Mr. Grieves

  Find Scott Semegran Online:

  https://scottsemegran.com

  https://www.goodreads.com/scottsemegran

  https://www.twitter.com/scottsemegran

  https://www.facebook.com/scottsemegran.writer

  https://www.instagram.com/scott_semegran

  “A comic sendup of state government that remains lighthearted, deadpan, and full of affection for both urban and rural Texas.”

  — Kirkus Reviews

  “An amusing yet heartwarming romp... To Squeeze a Prairie Dog is an entertaining slice-of-life story that's humorous yet uplifting at the same time. By the novel's last page, readers will be longing for more.”

  — BlueInk Review (Starred Review)

  “To Squeeze a Prairie Dog paints a rollicking story that careens through the office structure to delve into the motivations, lives, and connections between ordinary individuals... an uplifting, fun story.” — Midwest Book Review

  “An accomplished tale... a recommended read for fans of humor, drama, and office politics.”

  — Readers' Favorite Book Reviews. 5 stars.

  “Fascinating and heartfelt.”

  — IndieReader

  For Margaret Downs-Gamble

  And, as always, for my wonderful wife, Lori Hoadley

  Table of Contents

  PART I.

  1.

  2.

  3.

  4.

  5.

  6.

  7.

  8.

  9.

  10.

  11.

  12.

  13.

  14.

  PART II.

  15.

  16.

  17.

  18.

  19.

  20.

  21.

  22.

  23.

  24.

  25.

  26.

  27.

  28.

  29.

  PART III.

  30.

  31.

  32.

  33.

  34.

  35.

  36.

  37.

  38.

  About the Author

  Books by Scott Semegran

  “If any animal has a system of laws regulating the body politic, it is certainly the prairie dog.”

  —George Wilkins Kendall, Texan Santa Fe Expedition

  “I don’t think human beings learn anything without desperation. Desperation is a necessary ingredient to learning anything, or creating anything.”

  —Jim Carrey, 60 Minutes

  “It is the purpose of government to see that not only the legitimate interests of the few are protected but that the welfare and rights of the many are conserved.”

  —Franklin D. Roosevelt, Looking Forward

  “I think it is not wise for an emperor, or a king, or a president, to come down into the boxing ring, so to speak, and lower the dignity of his office by meddling in the small affairs of private citizens.”

  —Mark Twain, Mark Twain in Eruption

  PART I.

  1.

  When J. D. Wiswall arrived outside the building of the Texas Department of Unemployment and Benefits in downtown Austin, Texas, he already needed to go to the bathroom, his bladder full from drinking thirty-two ounces of soda during lunch—something that sounded good at the time but had become an unfortunate inconvenience. He was excited to start his first day of work but his excitement had gotten the best of him. He simply ate and drank too much, something he was prone to do all too often.

  Dang it! he thought. Even when he cussed in his mind, his cussing was toned down as if someone might hear him.

  He ascended the granite steps to the building entrance with trepidation, his left hand over his gut, his right hand clinching his lunch box full of afternoon snacks: roasted pecans, pecan rolls, and pecan pralines. He loved pecans; they fondly reminded him of his rural hometown: Brady, Texas. Inside the great, granite building, the mustiness of decades of public service molested his nostrils, but he was determined to relieve his bladder before starting his new job. He approached the only person he thought could help him: a security guard. The black fellow in uniform manned a desk—holding a telephone receiver to the side of his weary head with one hand and supporting his body with the other hand planted on the desktop—and spotted J. D. as he frantically approached him. The security guard’s name was Emmitt, as stated on a name tag pinned to his starched white shirt. Emmitt raised a patient index finger to J. D., indicating silently to wait for him to get off the phone. J. D. danced impatiently. Soon, Emmitt hung up.

  “Can I help you?” he said, flashing a pleasant, toothy smile.

  “Is there a restroom I can use?” J. D. said, still dancing a urination two-step.

  “Well, that depends if you have business here today.”

  “Excuse me?” J. D. said, his face flushed.

  “Do you have business here today at the Texas Department of Unemployment and Benefits?”

  “I start my new job today.”

  “Well, well! A new face for a new day! That’s wonderful. Who is supposed to come down and get you?” he said, lifting a guest log from a drawer in the desk. He waited with a shiny grin for J. D. to answer.

  “Mr. Baker,” he said, tiptoeing in place. “Can I use the restroom now? I really have to go.”

  “I’ll call him while you use the restroom,” he said, pointing over J. D.’s shoulder. “It’s right over there, down yonder.”

  “Thank you!” J. D. said, running down the hallway in the direction Emmitt pointed, except when he got to the restroom, a sign perched on the door declared it closed for repairs. A similar sign was taped to the ladies’ room as well.

  Dang it! J. D. thought. He couldn’t wait another minute. He speed-walked back to where Emmitt guarded the entrance.

  “Mr. Baker isn’t answering his phone,” the guard said. But J. D. didn’t respond. He quickly turned and left the building. “Where are you going?!”

  Outside, the warm afternoon sun hung high over the great Capitol lawn, an expansive garden of grass, oak and pecan trees, statuary and monuments, and shrubbery that separated the Texas Department of Unemployment and Benefits building and the Capitol Building of Texas. J. D. hoped to find a building to run into so he could relieve himself but, being from a small town in the country like Brady, Texas, he also wasn’t opposed to peeing in the out of doors if the need arose—emergency situation, accident, or otherwise. He preferred avoiding humiliation almost above all else, though, particularly
on his first day at work. Why is this happening to me? he thought, as he scrambled to find a business or building.

  Seeing a nondescript building just beyond the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, he ran in that direction, pressing his palm against his belly. The St. Augustine grass was thick and lush, and treading across it was akin to running in wet sand. The pressure in his bladder increased to emergency level. But as he rounded the monument, something caught his eye that stopped him in his tracks, something very strange to see laying in the grass jutting out from behind a granite bench: a foot. The pressure in his gut dissipated as he stared at the well-worn, leather, men’s dress shoe.

  What the heck?! he thought, looking around to see if anyone else had seen what he’d seen, but no one was around except an uninterested squirrel a few feet away in the grass, juggling a pecan in its paws.

  He slowly stepped toward the foot, thankful that it was still attached to a leg, which belonged to a man, laying on his back in the grass, a stranger sight J. D. had not seen in years—maybe even stranger than seeing one of his pet dogs trying to mate with a goat a while back at his parents’ home. He knelt next to the middle-aged, white man to see if he was alive, and it seemed to J. D. that he might be sleeping, except for the weird angle his head rested, twisted and bent at the end of his neck as if he had been sucker-punched by Mike Tyson and left for dead. His chest slowly raised and descended with his breathing but he didn’t look good. J. D. looked around again for someone to call to, someone to help him, but only the squirrel was close by and it was more interested in cracking his pecan nut than helping this poor guy in the grass. J. D. wished at that moment that he was somewhere else—far away—ripping open the packaging of his own pecan snacks.

  Also, J. D. knew deep down that he had to do something, anything to help. So, being the good young man he was, he ran back to the building of the Texas Department of Unemployment and Benefits to tell the security guard about who he had found outside in the grass and hoped—by God, he hoped—that the restroom was finally available for him to relieve himself before he started his new job.

  2.

  Emmitt the security guard couldn’t believe what J. D. was telling him. It just seemed too strange to be true. As he listened to J. D., his thin arms gesticulating and flapping like that of a baby bird, Emmitt thought, This white boy is crazy! He looked the short, thin young man up and down, examining him from his short-sleeve, red and green, plaid shirt down to his pressed khaki pants and worn canvas shoes, then back up to his mane of auburn hair with a cowlick at the back like a stalk of wheat dancing in the breeze. It certainly seemed what J. D. was saying was too strange to be true except that he was sincere in his pleading, so sincere that Emmitt second-guessed his own judgmental prognostication.

  “Well, come on, then,” Emmitt said, sarcastically. “Show me this man in the grass.”

  J. D. led the security guard across the great lawn, toward the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, where he had left the stranger in the grass. The squirrel was still juggling a pecan nut but in a new, safer location further from the trouble. As the two men approached where J. D. had witnessed the unconscious man on the ground, the foot was not where he had left it.

  “I’m certain he’s back here,” J. D. said, skepticism in his voice.

  “Mmm-hmm,” the security guard said. “I’m not supposed to leave my post, you know.”

  “He has to be back here.”

  They rounded the back of the monument and to J. D.’s relief—the unconscious man was still there, except this time, not unconscious at all. He sat in the grass, rubbing his noggin with blades of grass sticking out from his hair like thorns of a cactus. He didn’t seem to know what planet he was on and he looked around in a confused state, but, once Emmitt the security guard recognized him, he looked relieved that he was being rescued.

  “Sir, sir!” Emmitt said, rushing to the ground to assist him. “Are you OK, sir?”

  “Yes, yes. I must have blacked out.”

  “Oh no, not again!” Emmitt said, offering support.

  “I’m afraid so,” the man said. “Again.”

  “Let me help you up,” Emmitt said, assisting him to his feet, dusting blades of grass from his back and shoulders. “Luckily, this young man found you and asked me for help.” They both looked at J. D., who stood sheepishly a few feet away. He waved a limp acknowledgment.

  “I’m fine. Really. I’m good,” the man said, dusting off the front of his gray slacks. As he straightened his posture, he appeared to J. D. to be rather lanky and tall, his business attire starched yet worn at the ends of the sleeves and collar of his light blue shirt, the cuffs of his starched, grey pants lightly frayed at the ends. The only thing he found unusual about the befuddled man were the bright tattoos around both of his wrists: one of a green lizard and the other of an orange fish. “Will you accompany me back to our building?” he said, putting his arm around Emmitt’s shoulders for support.

  “Of course, Mr. Baker. Of course!”

  The security guard escorted him back to the building of the Texas Department of Unemployment and Benefits as J. D. followed behind them, relieved that the man he had discovered in the grass on his back was not actually dead, just temporarily unconscious. He worried that this was a bad omen for his first day at work, a stranger thing he couldn’t imagine happening.

  Back inside the lobby, Emmitt manned his desk again while Mr. Baker straightened his shirt and lifted his pants in place. Then unceremoniously he said, “Thanks again, Emmitt,” and began to walk away.

  “Wait, sir!” Emmitt said, waving his arms. Mr. Baker stopped and turned around. “I believe this man is here to see you.” Emmitt extended his arms toward J. D. to accentuate his presence.

  “See me?” he said, confused. He looked at J. D., examining his manner of dress from head to toe. “Why would he want to see me?”

  The uncomfortable pressure in J. D.’s bladder had returned and he danced a little two-step again. He was embarrassed at his predicament.

  “Today is my first day of employment,” J. D. said. “And I’m sorry to say, I really have to go to the restroom.”

  Mr. Baker looked at the security guard, who confirmed what J. D. had said, then added, “He does need to tinkle.”

  “Yes, yes!” Mr. Baker said, approaching J. D. and then patting him on the back. “You must be the new guy in our unit. And your name is?”

  “J. D. My name is J. D. Wiswall.”

  “Yes, that’s it! J. D. Wiswall. The coolest name I’ve heard in a while. Want to use the facilities before I take you to Unit 3?”

  “I would love to,” J. D. said. “But the restroom is closed.”

  “There’s more than one restroom in this building, my man. There are many modern amenities here. It’s 2005. Follow me.” Mr. Baker offered a fist bump, to Emmitt, who enthusiastically bumped his fist in return and then followed it with a routine too elaborate for Mr. Baker to follow. He then led J. D. to the elevators. After pushing the up button, the elevator door opened and the two got inside.

  “Excited for your first day?” Mr. Baker said, pushing the button labeled “3.” The elevator herky-jerkied up.

  “Oh, yes,” J. D. said. “Very excited!”

  “Are you from Austin?”

  “No, I’m from Brady, Texas,” J. D. said, his hand over his bladder.

  “Brady, huh?” he said, noticing J. D.’s discomfort. The elevator bell dinged and the door slid open. “I’ll ask you more about Brady after you take a leak. Come on!” Mr. Baker led him to the restroom nearby. “Here you go.”

  “Thanks, Mr. Baker,” J. D. said.

  “Call me Brent.”

  “OK. Thanks Brent,” J. D. said, then he entered the restroom.

  As J. D. placed his lunch box on the plumbing pipes above the urinal and relieved himself—a finer feeling he hadn’t experienced in quite some time—Brent appeared next to him, out of thin air, continuing their conversation as he peed into the other urinal.

  “Is Brad
y near Dallas?” Brent said, examining the sheer amount of urine he was releasing. “Too much beer!” he said, chuckling.

  “No, Brady isn’t near Dallas. It’s kind of in the middle of nowhere. I guess you could say it is literally in the middle of Texas.”

  “I see,” Brent said, zipping up his pants before leaving the restroom without washing his hands. J. D. quickly splashed his hands with cold water and followed him.

  “Sir?” he said, catching up to Brent. “Why were you laying in the grass?”

  “Epilepsy,” Brent said.

  “Epilepsy?” J. D. said.

  “Yep.”

  “And it’s happened before? You passing out?”

  “Hundreds of times.”

  “Hundreds?”

  “Yep, hundreds, maybe thousands. It’s not a big deal, really.”

  “Thousands?”

  “Never mind that. This here building is the Main Building of the Texas Department of Unemployment and Benefits. But this isn’t where our unit resides. Unit 3 is in the Annex Building, just across the skywalk, up there.”

  As they crossed the skywalk, J. D. stopped and gandered out the window, down at the pedestrians below, other government workers hurrying to their jobs, no doubt. Dang, he thought. It’s a long way down from here.

  “Pretty cool, huh?” Brent said, not stopping to look. “Let’s go! No time to waste.”

  J. D. followed Brent into the Annex Building, which he noticed smelled mustier and danker than the Main Building, the scents of mold, mildew, and dust mingled like an offensive potpourri. The walls and floor tiles were beige, as well as the ceiling tiles, although it was clear they were once white, maybe a long, long time ago. Brent briskly entered the first door to the left, the entrance to J. D.’s new workplace: Unit 3. J. D. followed him inside.

  The clickity-clack of the computer keyboards of the three workers typing in the back of the small office space was like the cacophony of a chorus of cicadas while they performed their data entry duties. J. D. was surprised at just how small the office was, seeming almost too small for five people to work in comfortably and humanely, the aisle between the four desks of the data entry clerks barely wide enough for someone to walk through sideways. The three workers didn’t seem to mind the close proximity of their desks and they happily typed away, their synchronized tapping accompanied by the whirring and buzzing of dot-matrix printers lined up on a table against a wall in front of them to the left. Nearest the doorway was Brent’s desk, which he stood behind, checking something on his computer. As J. D. stood there in the doorway—looking around like a child in a strange, new world—he noticed the three workers who would inhabit his new work life in the coming months: Rita Jackson, Deborah Martinez, and Conchino Gonzalez. As well as Brent Baker, the manager of Unit 3, all of them occupied this tiny space called an office. J. D. had seen pigpens in Brady, Texas, bigger than the office of Unit 3. The three soon stopped typing and J. D. cautiously raised his hand to greet them.