turtle, turtle.

A grey-washed wooden dock hovers atop still glass water. The breeze carries a chilled flesh-white chicken drumstick in the sun’s invariable fervor. My sweat-pooled hands deploy fingertips, mechanically playing the thin string like a puppet master, the drumstick summoned to dance in the pungent seawater.

A tug.

I pull.

And carapace scutes appear.