Chapter 7: After a Long Time the Croco-diamond Recovers From His Coma

First, the giant man offered to the driver the use of his home to clean off the cactar jam. But the driver, having seen enough, thought it sufficient to wipe himself off with the giant man’s bandana. He then got into the cab of the ton-o-tap and locked all the doors.

Second, the giant man asked the kangawrong to come out of the ton-o-tap. It didn’t move.

“Please?” Asked the giant man.

It shook its head flap flap. A cringle crisp fell out of its left ear. So the giant man said, “I’m not angry with you. But the driver must leave and he can’t if you are still inside the ton-o-tap.”

It crept slowly, making an awful SCREE CREE sound with its feet. It paused to pick up its fedora, which had fallen off in the melee.

The giant man reached down to help the kangawrong out of the ton-o-tap and noticed its poor oversized feet were cut and bleeding from stepping on the broken baskets. He picked it up in his arms and then lightly tapped the croco-diamond.

“Up please. Up.”

The croco-diamond made a gurgling noise but didn’t move.

“Up Croc!”

No response from the croco-diamond except for air phhhft coming out of his snout.

“I will have to bring you back to the house in the mono-cart if you won’t walk.”

It appeared perhaps the croco-diamond did raise its eyelids a bit at the giant man’s pronouncement, but surely that was the giant man’s imagination because those in a cringle crisp coma can’t move. And a not-in-a-coma croco-diamond would be mortified to be carried in a mono-cart because they are designed to carry rocks and are not dignified at all.

The giant man did carry the croco-diamond home in the mono-cart. And put him in his hammock. And then went to the kitchen to set the kangawrong right.

In the kitchen sink the giant man did his best to wash the kangawrong but even after a thorough scrub the purple color from the crushed cringle crisps remained in spots on its fur.

Though its feet must have hurt terribly from the cuts, once it realized it wasn’t in trouble, it splashed happily in the water and indicated, with its short little arms, that the giant man should make a pile of bubbles on its head like the croco-diamond always did when he bathed the kangawrong.

After its bath the giant man put the kangawrong on the kitchen table and wrapped both of its feet in puffy white bandages. “You’ll have to stay off of those for a few days so they heal. Hm. One minute, I need to find something.”

He rummaged through the closet, then the attic, and finally the barn, returning to the kangawrong with a child’s zippy shoe skate, which he adjusted to the very smallest setting.

“This was my skate as a boy,” he said. He lifted the kangawrong into the shoe. “You can use this to get around.” He handed the kangawrong the crutches it had used earlier in, perhaps best to call it, the accident with the ton-o-tap. “You can use these crutches for steering.”

After a few tries the kangawrong proved to be very adept at moving and steering the zippy shoe skate with the crutches. It used the crutches to maneuver the fedora from the kitchen table, where the giant man had placed it during bath time, into the skate. The fedora was in a sorry state, having gotten trampled and torn. It did stay on the kangawrong’s head, but just barely.

The croco-diamond was another matter. He lay disheveled in his hammock, snooting and phooting, but otherwise not moving or making a sound.

The kangawrong skate-crutched over to the hammock and began to gently clear away the crumbs from the croco-diamond’s spine. Then it polished his nails, which, given every thing that happened, weren’t in horrible shape. And finally it wiped the croco-diamond’s face with a soft damp cloth, imagining it heard the croco-diamond say “perhaps the right nostril could use a better wipe, please.”

#

After a few days, the kangawrong was out of the zippy shoe skate, and able to hop, though it wasn’t quite up to fancy steps or foot slaps. It continued to care for the croco-diamond, who, it was thought, might indefinitely remain in a cringle crisp coma. When not caring for the croco-diamond it helped the giant man make new baskets for the cringle crisps.

“It’s a shame he’s in a coma,” the giant man said to the kangawrong on the third night of the croco-diamond’s unconsciousness. “I am sure he’s not just faking it to avoid answering for his actions regarding the accident with the ton-o-tap.”

The croco-diamond breathed phfooo plllooo but didn’t move.

“His coma does give me more time to plan for a suitable correction to his behavior. And the more time I have to think, the more suitable it will be.”

#

Miraculously, the very next morning the croco-diamond stirred in his hammock and requested the kangawrong bring him some ginger juice. Then he did some calisthenics, as he did some mornings when he felt his belly was getting a little too big. Just as he paused to stretch the giant man came out to the courtyard.

“Lovely morning isn’t it? I feel so refreshed after a good night’s sleep. And it appears that my belly is a little flatter today than yesterday, don’t you agree?” The croco-diamond patted his belly and smiled at the giant man.

“You’ve been asleep for three days, in a coma.”

“I HAVE?”

“We have to talk about the robbery.”

“Robbery? Were we robbed again? By the clouds?” The croco-diamond touched his jeweled spine. “Yes, they must have hit me on the head and caused my coma.”

“In a colossal caper you and the kangawrong robbed the ton-o-tap and destroyed all the cringle crisps.”

“Why… I have no memory of that at all. Are you sure it was me and not some imposter?”

The giant man spoke calmly, but sternly, to the croco-diamond, in a tone that said he meant business.  “Quite. And you should have seen the kangawrong’s feet. Really, I never expected you to do something that could jeopardize the farm. If I have nothing to sell how will I ever pay my bills? And we’ll have no place to live.”

At this the croco-diamond lowered his head and felt bad. And even worse when he saw, out of the corner of his eye, the kangawrong’s feet and its light purple fur.

“Perhaps the kangawrong set me up!” he suddenly exclaimed. “And we know it’s a bit daft, so it’s not to blame for its wrong doings! We should just forgive it and carry on! Just like when it destroyed the termaters in the market...”

The giant man shook his head sadly. “You won’t take responsibility for what you did?”

“How can I take responsibility for that which I don’t remember doing?” cried the croco-diamond. He was upset that clouds and kangawrong had conspired against him to make him appear guilty for a crime he could not possibly have committed.

“And you won’t apologize?”

“Certainly not!”

“Well then, we can move on to the next topic of conversation. Which is your correction.”