Orphaned
Page 6
to an even, glowing white,
brightening the greens below.
The ash clouds did the same thing,
and the shift in the jungle’s color
adds an edge to Snub’s adventure,
makes her nervous and watchful.
She looks down the clay-brown river,
where there comes a sound,
a distant, regular thud.
like a tree releasing fruit.
Drum, drum, drum.
Snub has never heard any sound as regular as this before.
When the river dissolves into swamp,
gurgling away into muddy reeds,
the drumming stops.
Snub is left with only the noise of
mosquitoes batting her ears.
Careful as she tries to be, Snub slurps muck
with each step.
Spooked by her own noise, she climbs a tree.
Now that she is up high,
she can see farther.
Now that she can see farther,
she hoots in astonishment.
After the swamp ends, the trees thin out.
Tall yellow grasses sway in hot breeze,
steaming as rainwater rises into the sky.
There, at the base of a nearby tree,
is one of the not-gorillas.
This creature looks like a skinny naked gorilla.
It is longer than Snub is, much longer,
and though its hair is the same black,
it’s as thin as the pink worm’s before he became
Breath with his thick curl.
Its two ears are almost stubs,
as if the weird and hapless thing
got them caught somewhere
and had to bite them off.
It is faced away, hunched over some work in its lap,
making rhythmic repetitive motions
like a gorilla removing stubborn bark from a shoot of bamboo.
Because being still means feeling safe,
Snub keeps as still as she can.
The not-gorilla wipes its forehead,
turning slightly as it does.
Snub can see its face.
What a wretched and ugly thing!
Its nose sticks far out before retreating
to a mouth that is weak and narrow,
a mouth that couldn’t contain teeth
that are strong or long—
or maybe it doesn’t have teeth at all.
Its hair is sparse,
leaving skin exposed to stinging vines and insect bites.
As she stares at the not-gorilla,
Snub feels less fear and more pity.
How can a creature as frail as this survive?
At first she thinks it is a bushbuck on the not-gorilla’s lap,
but then she realizes it’s only the skin of a bushbuck,
that the animal has left its fur behind.
On top of the skin is a heavy blunt stone.
The not-gorilla has another rock in its fist,
which it raises up high and brings crashing down.
Smash.
A fleck chips off the stone, which is becoming
sharper.
The creature examines that stone,
holding it close to its eyes, testing the edge
on its cheek.
Its—his—look is almost tender, almost prideful.
Like how Mother looks at Breath.
Snub hoots softly in wonder,
realizing she can see in the not-gorilla’s expression
feelings that gorillas have, too.
The not-gorilla stands,
showing that he’s even skinnier
than Snub first thought.
Maybe this one is sick.
He walks along the grassland’s edge,
the sharpened rock in his fist.
He twirls, raising and lowering the rock in his hand,
strutting
like Brother does when he’s following Silverback.
Then the not-gorilla stops unexpectedly,
raises the sharp rock as high in the air as he can,
makes weird gibbering sounds, and brings the rock
crashing
into a tree trunk,
breaking it in two and spraying chips.
Snub nearly falls from her perch,
she is so astonished.
When she looks back at the not-gorilla,
he is staring right at her.
For a moment they lock eyes.
Snub’s stomach falls away.
Looking at him is looking into the eyes of a
dream creature that has chased her
into the waking world.
The not-gorilla seems shocked, too.
His jaw hangs open.
Then he’s yelling and twirling his rock,
and Snub makes a
wragh
that is only about fear,
empty of
mrgh.
She races through the brush,
hoots her terror as loudly as she can
in the hope that Silverback will hear her,
that he will come save her.
There are more cries behind her,
more strange calls of the not-gorillas.
It’s not just her crashing through the brush,
not anymore.
Snub imagines the sharpened stone
slamming into her
like how it shattered the tree,
jagged like the hot rocks the mountain
once sent after them.
She tries to follow the clay-brown river’s course
without leaving the cover of the trees,
but at one spot a muddy patch of earth
gives way.
Snub lands in the water:
shock of the cold
feeling of quick drowning
a memory of a terrifying night
once spent in the middle of a dark new pond.
Snub’s body hurls itself out at the far bank,
her mind whiplashing after it.
She crashes headlong into the brush,
still hearing the not-gorilla cries,
distant but insistent,
the drumming sound is back,
now she’s lost
on the wrong side of the lagoon,
maybe she’s heading toward the dogs
or the not-gorillas,
but staying still is not an option,
not with her heart racing
her limbs quivering
her body releasing everything that’s inside of her
all over the green-swept earth.
Her panicked cries silence some birds.
Others it sends into raucous flights,
handfuls of color sprinkling the sky.
When she can run no longer,
Snub buries herself in a thicket,
heedless of the winged ants crawling over her,
knowing only that she feels safer to be hidden,
even if being hidden also means being bitten.
Snub smells her own dung,
the dung her fear has produced.
It tells her of home and her family,
of how much she wants to be back.
Staying motionless is easy,
but the feelings that come from being motionless
are hard.
Snub watches for not-gorillas,
every turning leaf
and creaking branch
draining what energy she has left.
Knowing that at least a gorilla asleep alone
is safer
than a gorilla wandering about alone,
Snub can’t help but shut her eyes.
Snub wakes to yellow eyes
in a green spade head.
The snake is as large as the world
until Snub recoils,
until she realizes how small the snake is
and reaches for it,
has it run
ning over her fingers
before it escapes into the brush.
Behind the snake are the two magpies.
One hops near,
pecks a plump winged ant off Snub’s arm hair.
The other joins it,
and Snub watches in wonder as
together
they eat the ants that were crawling on her.
She knows they are trying to fill their bellies,
but it feels like they are grooming her,
like a gorilla would.
It brings a strange
hoo.
Screams nearby, and coming closer.
wragh.
The tendrils of a willow shake,
and then through its leaves
erupts one of the not-gorillas.
When it sees Snub
it tries to turn around
but only trips,
splaying out in the dirt.
Silverback
bursts into the
clearing right
after it.
He is as surprised
as the not-gorilla
to find Snub there.
His heel smashes into
its gut, then
Silverback slams into Snub,
bloodying her mouth,
hurling her
into the dirt.
Silverback charges after the not-gorilla,
leaving Snub staggered and alone,
with only the caws of the magpies
and Silverback’s pungent fear-odor.
Then Brother is there, too.
His eyes are wide in fear.
He’s spraying dung as he goes.
He sees Snub and skids to a stop,
blinks at her in confusion,
then goes off to follow Silverback.
Snub races after Brother.
Until a sound stops her.
Mother.
Snub parts the willow leaves.
They have been softening Mother’s sound;
it’s easier to make out the feeling now,
the pained gasps and whimpers.
Mother is curled in the soil,
head tilted and neck cranked.
The part of her face
above the nose and below the brows
is a mess of red-black-brown.
Mother’s knees are flat
and her hips are high.
Despite Mother’s continuing cries
Snub thinks she must be dead,
that no gorilla who was alive would ever
sit on the earth this way.
Mother wrenches her head up
as Snub approaches, but her face
points only vaguely in Snub’s direction.
A little black creature emerges
from under her,
toddles toward Snub.
Mother was in that strange position
because she was protecting Breath.
Breath is
squealing
agitated
baffled
bloodied.
When Snub steps toward him
he runs back to Mother.
He’s soon up around her neck,
striking her cheeks with his palms,
trying to give her motion.
But though Mother’s limbs may tremble,
She cannot seem to get up.
Snub comes close to Mother,
leans beside her,
frantically grooms
her bloodied hair.
Mother rests her head in Snub’s hand.
It is heavy.
Mother’s mouth is gaping open.
Without quite knowing why
Snub runs her fingers over Mother’s teeth,
feeling them, memorizing their touch.
Excited cries from not-gorillas nearby.
Mother’s body seizes.
She’s frantic,
arms flailing in the dirt.
Snub thinks she’s trying to get to her hands and feet,
but instead Mother’s arms are around Breath,
clutching him clumsily and roughly,
making Breath cry out in pain and bite at her fingers
until she holds him out to Snub.
You must take him.
I will die here.
Snub realizes what Mother wants.
She backs away in terror,
but Mother is holding out Breath,
shaking him,
making him cry in fear and nip at her arms to get down.
Snub hears the cries of the not-gorillas as they race nearer,
and that terrible drumming.
Snub remembers the sight of
Silverback’s desperate rage
and Brother’s fear
and the weight of
what she must do
blows her back.
Snub takes the squirming
gorilla child into her arms.
He clutches tight to her,
head buried in her chest.
Snub backs toward the willow leaves,
toward the noises of Silverback.
She makes sounds of
acha
for Mother to hear
instead of the drumming.
Even as she crashes through fronds and branches,
away from the not-gorillas,
Snub sees only the last sight of Mother,
rickety arms crossed over her chest.
Snub would have stayed with her
if Mother hadn’t given her Breath to care for.
You must take him.
I will die here.
Snub holds Breath close and runs,
keeps her mind on the warm jiggling life
in her arms,
races over trunks and thickets
and nets of vines.
Breath is quiet against her chest.
Snub knows from the cheek against her breastbone
that he is staring back after Mother.
Silverback’s pungent fear-scent leads Snub
to the edge of the lagoon’s river,
where it vanishes.
A gash has been ripped into the foliage at the far bank,
a fresh tan oval of mud where a large stone
has tumbled into the water.
Snub picks her way across,
Breath shifting up to her shoulders,
arms slapped across her forehead,
fingers anchored in her ears.
At the far bank she finally stills.
She allows herself
a moment to live
in the memory of Mother.
Snub finds Silverback and Brother in day nests,
splayed out and panting.
Silverback has a gash on the high crown of his head.
Brother cradles one hand in the other,
whimpering while he massages his palm.
Snub sits between the two males.
Breath gets down from her head
and settles into her lap,
making confused hoots.
He walks a few lengths away,
one direction and then another,
pleading.
He is looking for Mother.
Breath lifts Silverback’s giant hand,
looks beneath it for Mother.
Silverback, startled out of his sleep,
grunts in
amrcha
and cuffs Breath, sending him
sprawling into the dirt.
Breath surprises Snub by making a grunt of
amrcha
back.
Snub runs forward, cringing, and scoops up Breath,
retreating with him to the other side of the clearing.
Breath fights mightily in her arms,
jumps down,
breaks sticks,
thumps trunks.
Snub races after him,
trying to get him back into her arms.
This work,
this wran
gling of Breath,
seems like the only way to
move against the heavy sight
of Mother wounded,
of Mother dead,
of dying Mother left by Snub.
This work is also the reason
Snub can’t go back to her.
Breath keeps Snub
from endangering Snub.
Finally Breath’s tantrum hurls him into the dirt,
fists pummeling soil.
Snub wrenches him roughly up,
hunches her body over the child.
She accepts his bites and scratches,
deserves his bites and scratches,
muffles his grunts
in the coarse, thick hair of her belly.
Gradually he shudders into silence.
Snub folds over his little heaving body,
feels his gasps wetting her hair.
Snub’s thoughts are on Mother
in a clearing far away,
or no longer in a clearing.
Mother gone.
A long time without feeding,
without moving at all.
Snub spies a bracket fungus
growing from a stump.
A gorilla would have to be in
this very nest,
in this very position
to see it.
She fills her mouth with its woody, tooth-squeaking flesh.
As she’s chewing and swallowing she is aware of her teeth.
She thinks of Mother’s, of the touch of them under her fingertips.
Snub’s eating slows,
she lowers her hands
to her lap,
stares dazedly off.
She has been fighting for
hoo,
but
hoo
cannot come from fighting.
Breath is facedown in Snub’s nest,