Deimatic Display

"Sometimes you recognise yourself in someone before you've even learned their name."

The morning passed in the particular rhythm of physical work — the kind that occupied your hands and let your mind drift elsewhere. Dennis arrived at nine as promised, and the three of us spent over an hour shifting feed bags, repairing a section of fencing in the macropod paddock that had come loose during the last storm, and rearranging the storage shed in a way that Dennis insisted made more sense but that I suspected we'd be undoing within a month. Taryn complained steadily throughout, her commentary providing a soundtrack to the labour, while Dennis responded with occasional grunts that might have been agreement or might have been the sounds of a man conserving his energy for the actual work.

By half past ten, the Haven looked presentable — or at least as presentable as a working wildlife facility could manage. The paths had been swept, the public-facing enclosures cleaned, the education area set up with chairs arranged in neat rows facing the presentation space. Emily had been in and out all morning, checking details with the focused energy of someone who'd done this hundreds of times but still cared about getting it right.

I was refilling water stations in the small mammal ward when I heard the bus.

The sound was unmistakable — the particular diesel rumble of a school bus navigating the gravel drive, followed by the hiss of air brakes and the sudden explosion of voices that accompanied any group of children released from confinement. I checked my watch. Five to eleven. They were early.

By the time I reached the education area, Emily had already positioned herself near the entrance, clipboard in hand, greeting the teachers with the warm professionalism that seemed to come naturally to her. The children filed past in approximate order — thirty or so Year 4s in matching school polo shirts and jumpers, their excitement barely contained by the supervising adults' attempts at crowd control.

"Jerome." Emily caught my eye as the last of the students settled into their seats. "Perfect timing. I was hoping you could help with the handling demonstration today."

The request wasn't unusual — volunteers regularly assisted with education programmes — but something in my stomach tightened anyway. I was fine with animals. I was fine with the work. It was the performance aspect that got to me, the awareness of being watched and evaluated, the need to project confidence and enthusiasm to an audience that could smell uncertainty like predators scenting weakness.

"What do you need?" I asked, keeping my voice neutral.

"Bruce." She smiled at my expression. "Don't worry, he's in a good mood today. I just need you to handle him while I talk through the presentation, let the kids have a pat at the end. You know how he is — calmer with someone who isn't trying to perform for the crowd."

Bruce was a blue-tongue lizard who'd been at the Haven for nearly four years, a permanent resident after a dog attack had left him with a partially amputated tail and a temperament unsuited for release. He was calm, sturdy, and experienced with school groups — the ideal ambassador animal. He was also, as Emily had noted, sensitive to handler anxiety. If I was nervous, he'd pick up on it, and a stressed lizard made for a difficult demonstration.

"Yeah, all right," I said. "Give me a minute to get him settled."

The reptile house was warm after the winter chill outside, the heating system maintaining the thermal gradients that cold-blooded patients required. I paused just inside the door, letting my eyes adjust to the dimmer light, letting the familiar smell of the place settle around me — the particular mustiness of reptile enclosures, underlaid with eucalyptus from the browse we kept for the blue-tongues and the faint mineral scent of the heat lamps.

There was something calming about this building that I'd never quite been able to articulate. Maybe it was the silence — reptiles didn't vocalise the way birds and mammals did, didn't fill the air with the constant chatter of distress or demand. They just existed, quietly, asking nothing of you except appropriate temperatures and regular feeding. I'd always found that restful. A room full of creatures who didn't need me to perform anything, who would respond to competence and calm and nothing else.

The enclosures lined both walls — blue-tongues and shinglebacks in the larger setups, a pair of bearded dragons in the corner unit, the long-term residents who'd become part of the Haven's educational mission. A young eastern brown snake, recovering from a head injury after an encounter with a shovel, occupied the quarantine section at the far end. I gave her a wide berth out of habit. She'd be released once she was feeding consistently, returned to whatever patch of bushland would have her, but for now she deserved her space.

Bruce's enclosure was near the back, a spacious setup with basking spots, hiding areas, and a shallow water dish he rarely used. He was positioned under his heat lamp when I approached, his stocky body flattened to maximise surface contact with the warm rock beneath him.

"Hey, mate," I said quietly, unlatching the enclosure door. "Got a job for you."

Bruce regarded me with the particular indifference of reptiles everywhere — not unfriendly, just operating on a different emotional register than mammals. I'd always appreciated that about lizards. They didn't need you to perform happiness or enthusiasm. They just needed you to be calm and predictable, to handle them with confidence, to not do anything stupid. It was a standard I could meet.

I lifted him carefully, supporting his weight along my forearm, and felt him settle into the warmth of my body. His scales were smooth and cool against my skin, his tongue flicking occasionally to taste the air. Forty centimetres of placid blue-tongue, ready for his close-up.

I took a breath, watching Bruce's tongue flick once more, and turned toward the door.

The walk back to the education area felt longer than it should have. I could hear Emily's voice carrying across the space, bright and engaging, explaining the Haven's mission and the kinds of animals they cared for. The children were listening — mostly — with the restless attention that characterised their age group. A few had already spotted me approaching with Bruce, their eyes widening with the particular excitement that reptiles provoked in kids who'd never held one.

"And here's Jerome now," Emily said, turning to include me in the presentation with a gesture that felt like a spotlight. "Jerome's one of our volunteers, and he's studying zoology at university. He's going to introduce you to Bruce, who's been living here at the Haven for four years."

Thirty pairs of eyes swivelled toward me. I felt my throat tighten.

"So, um." I stepped forward, angling Bruce so the children could see him properly. "This is Bruce. He's an eastern blue-tongue lizard — Tiliqua scincoides. They're one of the most common lizards in Australia, and you've probably seen them in gardens or bushland if you've been paying attention."

A girl in the front row raised her hand. "Why's he called Bruce?"

"I... don't actually know," I admitted. "He was already named when he came in. Someone probably thought it suited him."

"He looks like a Bruce," the girl said, apparently satisfied with this non-answer.

"Blue-tongues are skinks," I continued, trying to find my footing. "That means they're part of a family of lizards that have smooth, overlapping scales and relatively small legs compared to their body length. You can see how Bruce's legs are sort of... tucked under him. He's not built for running. He's built for—"

"Does he bite?" A boy near the back, already halfway out of his seat.

"He can, but he usually doesn't. Blue-tongues are pretty calm as lizards go. Their main defence is the tongue." I stroked Bruce's head gently, and on cue — or perhaps just coincidentally — he opened his mouth and displayed the vivid blue-pink tongue that gave his species its name. A ripple of delighted disgust moved through the audience.

"That's so gross," someone said, with obvious approval.

"It's meant to startle predators," I explained. "The bright colour is unexpected, so it might give Bruce a chance to escape while the predator is confused. It's called a deimatic display — a way of startling rather than actually fighting."

I could feel myself settling slightly as I talked about the biology, the facts providing solid ground beneath my feet. This part I could do. The information was there, organised and accessible, and Bruce was cooperating beautifully, his tongue flicking occasionally to punctuate my points.

Emily caught my eye and nodded slightly — encouragement, or perhaps just acknowledgment that I was doing all right.

"What happened to his tail?" A different girl, observant enough to notice the truncated end where Bruce's tail should have extended further.

"Dog attack," I said. "He was found in someone's backyard after their dog got hold of him. Lost part of his tail and had some internal injuries. He recovered, but he can't be released back into the wild because—"

"Because the dog might get him again?"

"Partly that, but mostly because he's been in captivity too long now. He's used to being fed, used to being handled. He wouldn't know how to find food properly, wouldn't have the right instincts to avoid predators." The words came out before I could consider them, and I heard the echo of my earlier thoughts about Ghost. "Sometimes animals can survive an injury but still can't go back to being wild. So Bruce lives here now, and he helps us teach people about blue-tongue lizards."

"Is he happy?" The first girl again, her expression serious.

The question caught me off guard. Happy. It wasn't a word I'd normally apply to reptiles — their emotional lives, if they had them, operated on different parameters than mammalian experience. But she was nine years old, and the question wasn't really about Bruce's neurological capacity for subjective wellbeing. It was about whether we were taking care of him properly. Whether his life mattered.

"He's comfortable," I said carefully. "He's got warmth, food, shelter, and he doesn't have to worry about predators. Whether that's the same as happy... I don't know. But we do our best to make sure he has a good life."

She nodded slowly, processing this. I had the odd sense that she'd heard what I'd actually said, not just the reassuring surface of it.

Emily stepped in smoothly, redirecting attention to the broader discussion of reptile care and what to do if you found an injured lizard in your backyard. I stood to the side with Bruce, letting her words wash over me while I focused on keeping him calm and supported. The handling demonstration would come at the end — supervised pats, strict rules about being gentle, the carefully managed chaos of thirty children wanting to touch a real live lizard.

The minutes stretched and contracted in the strange way they did during public events. I was aware of my own presence in a way I rarely was during normal work — the angle of my shoulders, the expression on my face, whether I was standing naturally or like someone pretending to stand naturally. The self-consciousness was exhausting, a constant drain on attention that should have been focused on Bruce.

A movement at the edge of my vision caught my attention. One of the children — a boy seated at the end of a row, slightly apart from his classmates — wasn't watching Emily's presentation. He was watching me. Or rather, he was watching Bruce, with an intensity that I recognised because I'd felt it myself at that age. Not the casual excitement of kids who thought reptiles were cool, but something more focused. More serious.

He was small for his age, with the kind of stillness that often got mistaken for shyness but might have been something else entirely. While the children around him fidgeted and whispered, he sat motionless, his eyes tracking Bruce's small movements with the attention of someone cataloguing data.

I shifted slightly, angling Bruce so the boy could see better. His eyes flicked to mine for just a moment — startled, maybe, at being noticed — before returning to the lizard. But something in his posture relaxed fractionally, as though my small acknowledgment had meant something.

"All right," Emily announced, her voice bright with energy. "Who wants to pat Bruce?"

The response was immediate and overwhelming — hands shooting up, bodies lurching forward, the maintained order dissolving into eager chaos. Emily handled it with the experience of someone who'd managed hundreds of these moments, establishing rules and queues with a few firm sentences that somehow transformed thirty excited children into an orderly line.

"One at a time, gentle touches, and we follow Jerome's instructions. He'll tell you where you can pat and how to do it properly. Remember, Bruce is a real animal, not a toy, and we want to make sure he feels safe."

I positioned myself at the front of the line, Bruce settled along my forearm, and began the slow process of supervised patting. Most of the children were appropriately gentle, their touches brief and wondering, their faces lit with the particular joy of contact with something wild. A few needed redirection — too fast, too grabby, approaching from angles that Bruce might find threatening — but nothing I couldn't manage.

The boy from the back of the room was near the end of the line. When he reached the front, he didn't immediately reach out like the others had. He just stood there, looking at Bruce with that same focused attention.

"You can touch him," I said quietly. "Along his back, with the scales. Like this." I demonstrated the motion, slow and deliberate.

The boy reached out and laid his hand on Bruce's back with a gentleness that surprised me. Not hesitant — deliberate. He held the contact for a long moment, his fingers curved to match the shape of Bruce's body, and I saw something in his expression that I couldn't quite name. Wonder, maybe. Or recognition.

"He's warm," the boy said, almost to himself.

"He's been under his heat lamp. They need external heat sources because they can't regulate their own body temperature like we can."

"I know." The boy's eyes met mine again, briefly. "I've read about them. But I've never touched one before."

"First time's special," I said.

He nodded, withdrew his hand carefully, and moved away to rejoin his classmates. I watched him go, something tugging at my chest that I couldn't identify. Maybe it was just the recognition of a familiar pattern — the quiet kid who found animals easier than people, who processed the world through observation rather than participation. Or maybe it was something else. The reminder that every interaction mattered, that you never knew which moments would stick with someone, which small experiences might accumulate into something larger.

The last of the children patted Bruce, the teachers rounded up their charges, and Emily delivered her closing remarks with the same warm energy she'd maintained throughout. I stood to the side, Bruce a comfortable weight on my arm, and let the relief wash through me. It was done. I'd survived.

"Thank you, Jerome," Emily said, as the bus loaded and the noise gradually receded. "You did well."

"I stumbled a bit at the start."

"Everyone stumbles. The kids didn't notice." She paused, tilting her head slightly. "There was one boy who seemed particularly interested. Small, dark hair, sat at the end?"

"I noticed him."

"He asked me afterward what subjects you need to study zoology at university." A small smile. "I think you might have made an impression."

I didn't know what to say to that, so I just nodded and turned toward the reptile house to return Bruce to his enclosure. The morning's warmth was building now, the winter chill burning off under a sky that had turned from grey to pale blue.

I settled Bruce back into his enclosure, checked his water dish, and watched him arrange himself under the heat lamp with the unhurried satisfaction of a creature who knew exactly what he needed.

"Good job, mate," I said quietly. "You did good."

Bruce flicked his tongue once, tasting the familiar air of home, and closed his eyes.