Hippopotamus Eye

Don't look at me with your hip
Not at me with your hip
Don't look at me with your hippopotamus eye

A rap lyric that popped out of nowhere. My brain must have been working on it in its spare time. It started the other night as I was going to bed. I reached over to switch off the light and there he was with that eye of his, a disembodied eye that doesn't belong to a face. Sees right through you. But it's not scary. Leo's still my friend after all these years. Just don't look at me with your hippopotamus eye. And then we go to sleep.

No one can know what it means. Nobody knows the story, except me and Val. Maybe Mad, if she remembers. I told her once. You can't guess what it means. It isn't something you can guess.

A boy testing the limits. Going where he's never been before, violent, out of control. Leo flung down hard onto the blacktop from the roof of the playhouse. Didn't make a sound when he landed. Just pop. When Val picked him up we saw it was bad. That cracked glass orb. The horror. We saw what happens when you go where it's not safe. People get killed. They break and you can't fix them.

We sacrificed a hippopotamus nobody liked. Touched the eye up with orange watercolor and glued it in with Elmer's glue. That dead, leering eye. It was sixty years ago. No one could have guessed what rap music would turn out to be one day, or anything else, for that matter. He sits on the nightstand now and wishes me good night every night as I turn out the light. Still my friend after all these years. Just don't look at me with your hippopotamus eye. And then we go to sleep.