The Last Elephant Keeper

Part 1

Jonathan followed Khumo into the house, his voice laced with concern. "Can we talk about this?" he asked, but Khumo ignored him.

She tossed a pile of clothes onto the floor, searching for something in the drawer. Jonathan sighed and moved to the closet. "Your briefs are in here," he said.

Khumo snorted, throwing the drawer's contents onto the bed. "I like them out," she said.

Jonathan shook his head, unable to comprehend her haste. "Why are you doing this?" he said. "Is going back there really worth it?"

Khumo didn't answer. She grabbed a toiletry bag and hurled it at Jonathan, who dodged it in time. He had enough. He stormed out of the bedroom, slamming the door behind him. Khumo smiled, glad to be rid of him.

But Jonathan couldn't let her go without a fight. He came back, clutching a photograph in his hand. He faced Khumo, his eyes burning with emotion.

"She's gone, Khumo," he said, his voice breaking. "Going to that hellhole won't bring her back."

Khumo glared at him, her jaw clenched. She walked past him, her gaze falling on a small table by the window. A photograph of her mother smiled at her from a frame.

Jonathan followed her, his voice trembling. "You wanted me to react, so here I am," he said. "You have her picture right here, and you have a home...with me."

Khumo shook her head, tears stinging her eyes. "This isn't my home," she said. "That place was my home. It was everything to her before we left."

Jonathan's eyes filled with tears, his heart breaking. He walked out again, and Khumo reached for him, trying to stop him. But he pushed her away, too hurt to stay.

"I need to see where she's buried," Khumo cried out. "Don't you understand?"

Jonathan turned around, his face twisted with pain and anger. He threw the photograph at Khumo, who caught it in her hands. "Happy anniversary," he spat

Khumo attempted to hold in the lump in the throat, to the point of irritation. Unwilling to even look up to him, she turns away with her head turned over happier times they used to share.

Recalling the work to do, she left behind the smell of burnt toast and the sound of his heavy breathing. Methodically walking through the dark corridor, she reaches their room, and locks the door behind her.

She moved through the room like a well oil machine, but her belongings reflected a truer expression of herself. Everything not tied down, or to heavy was shoved in. Her tar covered boots, military fatigues, water sterilizer, radiation medicine, but not the firearm, not after the violence it caused, but everything else?

All shoved with precision onto a rectangular suitcase, something that reminded Khumo of someone else as she turned over to picture that had fallen from the rampant slamming of the bedroom door. Beside her photo that had been pushed onto her earlier, she placed the portrait of her mother into her pocket. her mother sat snuggled onto her chest, as she turned over the window.

She appreciated the sight of the bright blue sky pierced by the kilometer long skyscrapers, that would be replaced by the eerily green tinted pictures of her polluted and isolated homeland. She grabbed a hold of her suitcase and her hands quaked. The calmness that she had packed her life up with had been swept away as she still had to confront her partner on the other side of the bedroom door.

Jonathan bawled on the cold ceramic tiles, his eyes fixated on the floor and his ears impenetrable. She struggled to take a look at him, instead making her way out of the dark corridor with her bulky suitcase bandaged on her chest, and her eyes scanning a place she hoped she would find when she would come back.

Khumo sighed, "Jonathan, do I always have to be the one to say something?"