It seems impossible, but the lanky Petco cashier with the shiny blonde pompadour insists he’s telling the truth.
“Shortage?” i ask.
he nods.
“All of them?” He nods again.
I look at his name tag with the idea that I will use his name and thus become attractive, and he will confess that he was lying, and I will avert disaster from happening to my son. Her name tag reads, Hi, my dog’s name is Betty. Nervously, I stare at the name tag. Should I call her “Betty” or “Petco cashier whose dog is named Betty”?
She noticed my staring and adjusted the name tag consciously.
“Cute name,” I say.
“What?” He says worriedly.
I’m worried he’ll think I called him cute, so I say, “Dog, your dog’s name, it’s cute! Daughter? Daughter?” I point to her chest and repeat “daughter” until another Petco employee approaches, a large man with freckled black eyebrows and, according to his nametag, a parrot named Van Helsing.
“crisis?” the man asks.
“No, no, no,” I say, pointing and laughing.
“This lady,” the cashier says almost in a whisper, “is looking to buy some big crickets.”
“But there is one drawback,” the man replies.
I decided to try another Petco. It’s across the bridge, and I’ll have to drive thirty-five minutes and pay a six-dollar toll to get to it, but I’ll drive and pay. It’s not that I don’t trust Petco employees in the first place. It’s such that I can’t imagine a reality in which big cricket could be lacking. nationwideHe said. some problems with breeders. I believe this is un-American.
Climbing the bridge, I try to imagine all the cricket breeders in the country and their futile efforts and frustrations, their late nights spent worrying over tiny mating habits. Shouldn’t crickets breed too much? It seems like they have to, considering how many things can kill them. They need to refill the world with bouncy, crunchy bodies.
At another Petco, another cashier – this one an older woman with painfully tight buns and a cat named Rebecca – tells me the same thing. “Nationwide Shortage.” She sighs, as if she has had to say this a lot.
I call my son from the car with trembling hands.
“He’s dying,” Noah says. “Copernicus is dying, mother.”
I doubt that’s true. My son’s lizard looks emaciated and remains hidden under a piece of wood all day and night. This is because I haven’t fed him for over a week. I kept forgetting to go to Petco after work because Dave was on cricket duty. And now that I’ve finally remembered, I can’t find any big crickets. Absolutely.
“But there is one drawback,” I say.
“You’re lying,” says Noah. Then he hung up the phone.
In the resulting silence, I hear blame. I heard Noah say this with an adult precision he doesn’t have, Why did you promise that Dave would stay in our lives forever if he was just going to pack up and leave? And of course I can’t tell him, Well, how could I have known that one day I would find Dave stuck in a stereotype, his hand up the skirt of one of his college students – a girl who, even in her Instagram photos, has the confused, brand-new look of a kid? Or that I would barely—unfortunately, even—be able to muster up the courage to ask him out? Let me ask you, how did I know? After all, how could I know?
Instead, I cry and honk in protest against the chaos and cruelty of the universe. The Petco cashier with the cat named Rebecca knocks on the hood of my car. A long line of vehicles extended on either side of his old body. “Dear?” She says as I roll down my window.
I wipe my nose with the end of my sleeve and look up at his face.
“Maybe I can help you with some baby crickets?” She continues. “I think we have a few of them. These are big crickets that no one has because they take time to mature.”
I honked the horn one more time – because why can’t breeders figure things out? Why couldn’t the Petco employees guess that I would accept small crickets over large crickets? Why can’t I think of the right questions to ask, like Are, perhaps, any other sized crickets available? Or Can I really trust you with my life and my baby Dave?-And follow him inside.
Copernicus becomes angry the moment he hears small crickets slipping out of the bag. Noah laughs. For a moment, I think all is forgiven, but then Noah sits on the floor near the terrarium and clasps his arms tightly around his body. Her slender fingers almost touch behind her back. “Hey,” I say. “Hey, now.” Noah closed his eyes.
I can see the reflection of her stiff little face and body in the mirror, surrounded by the debris of her children’s things. His raw bed. Her bright-orange socks and Nintendo Switch.
“You were lying,” he says without opening his eyes.
“Hey,” I say again, sitting next to him. I wonder how I can explain the greatness of cricket breeders and their issues, or the problem of never fully knowing a person, or the inevitability of heartbreak. Now I can even see my face in the mirror, but my expression is unreadable and that doesn’t help.
Even I wouldn’t believe it.
Still, I reach out to Noah, to pull him closer. At the sound of my movement he opens his eyes and moves away.
I know I shouldn’t do this, but I approach her again, lean to the side and put my arm around her shoulders. He gets to his feet and runs towards the door.
“Where are you going?” I call after him.
He walks away as if he can’t hear me, or as if my voice is forcing him to leave. A few seconds later, I hear the low sounds of the living room TV.
For a while, I sit alone and look at Copernicus’s terrarium. I imagine that Noah is still next to me and I manage to move and speak in a way that doesn’t push him back. In fact, I don’t try to attract her at all; I am no more anxious for her skin, for her steady pulse, than for my own skin. Instead, I remain in His presence, content with His anger, which is temporary. Satisfied with the fact that at last, I have successfully fed Copernicus. And Noah and I continue to watch Copernicus’ light pink tongue licking tiny crickets.
Eventually, Noah laughs again, and this time it’s the laughter that releases his anger, that sets me free. “There,” Noah says to all of us. “That’s better.”
And I feel better.
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derive from Please do not touch the body: stories. Used with permission from the publisher, Bloomsbury. Copyright © 2026 by Emily Doyle
