Five minutes, twenty-nine seconds for milk, bread and a few other items? Ridiculous. The clerk transfers the time from my corporate God Assurance card to the store’s account. “Here you are, Mr. Spencer.” He gives me a rattler.
I pass the diamondback between my hands a few times then raise it to eye level to complete the required time. As I give the snake back to the clerk, I hear a woman in the next booth gasp.
“That can’t be,” she says. The clerk assures her that her paycard is depleted. He offers store credit. She hesitates. No wonder. Store credits are notorious for having low-quality God Assurance.
I hang around to see what happens. The woman decides to risk it. The guy puts on thick gloves, reaches into a glass cage and gives her a copperhead.
Whimpering, she handles the snake for a couple of minutes then boas it around her neck and lifts the head to her eye level. I see from her grocery bag she shouldn’t owe much more. As the copperhead flicks out its tongue and hisses, the woman takes short stabs of breath. I catch myself doing the same.
“OK, time’s up,” the clerk says. Whew. “Payment complete. Have a nice day.”
When the woman drops it back into the cage, the snake strikes the glass and leaves a smear of venom.
Walking to my car, I wonder if the woman had any antidote on her. Likely not, considering how scared she seemed. Would I have given her mine if she’d been bitten? I hate to admit it, but I probably wouldn’t have. Not because it costs two month’s wages, but because of what happened to my wife.
On the way home, I stop for just enough fuel to get by until payday. Even for such a minimal purchase, I have to go eye-to-eye with a water moccasin for 58 seconds. When I finish, my God Assurance card beeps a “nearing depletion” warning. That does it. I need a raise.
#
I hate going into Mr. Jenkins’ office. He keeps it too warm for one thing. The black and white walls make me dizzy. Looming display cases, stacked to the ceiling and crammed with holy books and artifacts of every religion imaginable, give me claustrophobia. Gaudy, framed posters boast the company’s line of snake farming products.
As always, Jenkins sports a black three-piece suit and a white tie with the company motto, Closest to God. “What can I do for you, Spencer?” He positions himself in front of a large sculpture of a goddess with multiple arms such that the limbs appear to spiral from his own body.
Just spit it out, I tell myself, or he’ll hijack the conversation. Say I deserve a raise. “Since I started working here five years ago, I’ve been the top sales —”
“Five years? Congratulations.” He squints at my lapel. “Didn’t I give you a service pin?”
“I … forgot to wear it today. Anyway, I’m here because …” I hem and haw, my non-words in sync with my shifting weight. Pretty good choreography, but not getting me anywhere. I can do this. Be firm but respectful. “You have to give me a raise, Mr. Jerk … Jenkins.” OK, that might not have sounded respectful.
Jenkins sits behind his desk and motions for me to take a seat. “Spencer, I want you to think quality, not quantity.” He points to the words on his tie.
Here it comes.
“Our God Assurance wage rate may not be the highest, but its purity far exceeds the industry standard. We estimate 97 percent.”
I’ve heard this spiel ever since my new employee orientation but try to act impressed. “I knew it was good, but didn’t realize it was that high.”
“When one of our people handles a serpent to make a payment, there’s only a 3 percent chance of them being bitten.” He opens a desk drawer and dangles a coral snake by the tail.
Bite him. Bite his nose. I’m sure he has plenty of antidote, but at least he’d be embarrassed.
He drapes the snake over his shoulder. “Faith, Spencer. Currencies always have been about faith. Faith in gold, the full faith and credit of your country, faith in the vagaries of cryptocash.” The coral snake slithers under his suit coat and sticks its head out from under his vest. He holds up the snake in one hand and his corporate God Assurance card in the other. “Now we have perfection: a currency of serpents backed by the ultimate faith.”
He sticks the head of the snake in his mouth. Bite his tongue! After a moment, he puts the serpent back in the drawer.
“That’s top quality God Assurance, Spencer.” He looks down and shakes his head. “What happened to your wife was tragic. If she’d stayed with us, I’m confident she wouldn’t have been bitten.”
At least Caroline went to a job she liked, even if the pay wasn’t great. And if she hadn’t given her antidote to save a stranger, she wouldn’t have died writhing in pain while trying to buy a sweater for my birthday.
“Did I send flowers to Carol’s funeral?”
I jump over the desk, grab his vial of antidote and smash it against the wall. Then I shove the coral snake down his pants, my laughter harmonizing with his screams.
“Yes, you sent a bouquet.”
Jenkins tells me he has another meeting. I glare at him. He stares back. I leave.
I can’t really murder my boss, but I can go to my desk and email him my resignation. I can get a job at the library where Caroline loved working. I can move into a smaller place with less expenses and upkeep, where I don’t see my wife’s ghost everywhere I look.
I can have faith in myself when I stare into the dark, vertical pupils of a deadly snake. I can refuse to blink.
Image: pixabay.com
literally stories 
Hi Dave,
There are some clever touches in this and as always, your imagination always impresses.
The idea of faith in a currency is quite thought provoking as so many do worship the green! When you add in what you need to have faith in, this adds another level.
I also need to say congratulations as I believe this is story number twenty five for you.
I’ve written a wee spiel in Saturdays Post beside the review of your story.
This is some achievement my fine friend as less than 3% make double figures, never mind hitting the quarter of a century.
All the very best!
Hugh
LikeLike
Thanks for the kind comments, Hugh. I feel happy and fortunate to be a part of the 3 percent!
LikeLike
David-
As Hugh says, the having to show faith in currency is a brilliant idea. Should get Samuel L. Jackson to endorse a credit card. You could buy a house if you survive the red eye from NYC to LA. Like all good conceptions that are absurd at first glance, the more you think on it, the more it resembles reality. This is extremely good.
Leila
LikeLike
Thanks, Leila. SLJ should’ve received a snake-handling refund for that wild plane ride.
LikeLike
Nice bit of satire, well written & snappily executed. And of course all currency involves an act of faith! (The £5 banknote in my wallet despite being made of some sort of plasticised paper still has the words ‘promise to pay the bearer the sum of five pounds’.)
LikeLike
Glad you liked the story, Steven, and I appreciate your taking the time to comment.
LikeLike
Wild imagination story, Jenkins put his money where his mouth was, for sure. There’s faith in currency and in the product received, we have more faith and trust in paper currency than in our fellow man or woman. Snakes might take a bigger bite for sure, and financial matters can bring out the serpent in the best of us. Congrats on the double digit story acceptance. As a side note, I read many of your stories elsewhere, also.
LikeLike
Thanks, Harrison. I also enjoy your excellent stories in (on?) a variety of publications. Your consistently high level of quality is impressive!
LikeLike
Thanks, Diane, for the graphic. Today we both probably creeped out any ophidiophobes. (Had to look that up.)
LikeLike
hello – he’s pretty impressive, isn’t he?
LikeLike
Stern expression from the Python (speaking of snakes) whose name I don’t remember “And now for something completely different.” As close to completely different as is possible with nothing new under the sun.
LikeLike
Thanks for commenting, Doug. Another story might be about a world where people pay for things by walking funny.
LikeLike
Hi David
This is a great story and there’s much that can be said about it! The wit and verbal accuracy of this piece packs a deadly punch; this tale is both entertaining and disturbing, both fantastical and realistic, worthy of some of Mark Twain’s wilder pieces or the exactitude of a Franz Kafka nightmare flash fiction.
This piece also has the dreamlike resonance of a modern fairy tale. The animal nature of a modern fable. And the profound human meaning of a modern parable. All of those aspects wrapped up into one, plus the great usage of compactness and brevity in other ways, make “A Currency of Serpents” a model short story that can stand up to multiple reads and be used as a model of the form for other writers to study. I also liked how this tale has a science fiction feel to it while re-routing that notion into a space where one of the most primitive animals lives. Deadly snake eyes. And we all know what guise HE (Satan) first showed up in here on Planet Earth.
I LOVE the way you virtually, or LITERALLY, attack The System in this piece. The way you satirize the modern corporate mindset, hierarchy, and super-structure in this piece couldn’t be more important in the world we live in now. This shows a sensibility behind the writing that has a quietly revolutionary nature. The revolution Jesus and other great world spiritual leaders wanted to start was an internal one that would travel, bloom, and blossom from, and in, the heart of one individual at a time. That was why Jesus said, “Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s” and “The son of man is inside you.”
“A Currency of Serpents” is revolutionary in that quiet, most profound kind of way. The ending to your story – including the last two lines – really CAPTURES that theme in the most subtle, convincing, story-telling kind of way.
As such, this piece bravely deals with the horror and the madness, the mundane insanity and quiet killer nature of the generic, corporate modern world and mindset. The Boss in this piece is so hatefully horrible, humorless (even though he thinks he’s funny) and shallow, and yet so utterly typical of so many corporate bosses in the real world, that it makes me applaud you and hang my head in shame for the world at the same time.
Sensibility, vision, worldview, deep knowledge of what this world really is beneath the surface – all of this comes through powerfully in this story, and this story is also extremely entertaining and with a prose style that can match Bukowski for compactness and simplicity. “The essence of genius may be the ability to say a profound thing in a simple way,” said the great Bukowski. That apothegm gets made real here again.
This one really hits it all the way out of the park! Great job!
THE LAST TWO PARAGRAPHS ALSO OFFER THE READER A WAY OUT OF THE MADNESS: THE ONLY WAY. Thank you!
Dale
LikeLike
Thanks so much, Dale! Your views enrich the LS site every day, and I much appreciate your thoughtful comment on my story.
LikeLike
I could feel the snake’s cool glide and the bite. Great images of the diamond back and copperhead! Then comes the deadly coral snake, and the lousy boss. I think this is an excellent example of raising the stakes.
The boss’s crass proclamation about Caroline’s passing–just like people are… Then the MC’s wild imaging of his boss’s demise.
I bought in, Well done!
LikeLike
Thank you! Some the human snakes are worst of all!
LikeLike
*Sometimes
LikeLike
I always look forward to reading your work David, and as usual this one moves along at slick and entertaining pace, not to mention with great imagination. I love the use of precise numbers in this one for seconds and percentages and so on, as it adds not just a quirkiness, but a kind of obsessiveness to the narration that I really like.
LikeLike
Thank you so much for your generous comment, Paul!
LikeLike