My Wild Man

A Passion

Thick clouds coated the sky above the treetops, darkening the forest further, though no rain fell. I kept the thieving little monkeys from picking my pockets for their shells, determined to use them for Tarzan's paint later in the evening. Two of them wrestled and fought around me in a lively and energetic manner that I envied. A third seemed quieter and more preoccupied with me, sitting in my lap or clinging to my shoulders, playing with my clothes, intrigued by the buttons and sleeves. Their mothers were nearby in the trees or resting in beds of tall grass, though they seemed to have warmed up to me and did not watch as closely as they had the times before. I observed the two furry little figures as the other sat with me, massive round eyes following his friends while his fingers fiddled with the rolled up sleeve of my left arm. At first, I was unable to discern who was who. And Tarzan informed me they had not yet been given names. But the more I visited them over these past few days, the more I began to differentiate between them. The quiet one was slightly thinner and favored his right hand when walking or climbing. The two playing- one was always very vocal and liked to bare his teeth. The other had smaller eyes and larger ears. I wondered how they acquire their names. Is it when they've gotten old enough to pick one themselves? Or one day do their mothers just wake up and decide? Or maybe they have no real names, and Tarzan just creates them as best he can for me?

Speaking of Tarzan, he had brought me with him today to visit the group. I had yet to ask him why he didn't simply live with them. My thoughts drifted around as I zoned out, staring into space and absentmindedly rubbed the furry knee of the little one in my lap, leaning back against the large and tangled roots of the jungle tree we sat beneath. Over time I had noticed that there were no older males aside from the alpha who had inspected me- plenty of younger ones. The oldest I'd seen was maybe about my size. I wondered if they had to leave the group once they reached a certain age or if they became rebellious. Maybe this was the case for Tarzan, too. Did they leave to start their own groups? Perhaps Tarzan had to leave officially, but clearly remains in close contact with them. They still treat him as family, so I doubt something bad had happened between them.

My thoughts drifted to the camp on the beach. Several small shacks had been constructed, now enough for all of us to huddle inside during the night. The days of the sailors were spent fishing out from the shallows, skinning and drying the fish, tending to the sick, distilling water and storing it in whatever containers had been retrieved from the wreckage, creating weapons such as spears and knives. Then there was the captain and my father. They took turns going out on hunt into the jungle and maintaining the camp. While at the campsite, they also spent a fair amount of time in one of the cabins, scouring over water-damaged maps of our previous course and discussing with the first mate and a few other sailors quietly. The rumours heard from Mr. Finnigan and others were that the captains planned to build a small ship to send half of the crew down to the next closest port, where they would then send a rescue effort back to those remaining stranded. A glimmer of hope for us all. Perhaps we would be able to return home, or at least to some semblance of normalcy, well before the original sentence of three and a half years. But I dared not hold out hope.

In addition, quite a large part of me wondered about the fate of Tarzan, should we return home. Would I ask him to come with us? Would he even accept this? Is asking him to come with me to a new and foreign land full of entirely confusing experiences and technology the same as myself being stranded here on this shoreline?

As my eyes returned to focus, I noticed the thing I'd been staring off at for minutes. A portion of the foliage, large bushes and tall grass below the thick vines hanging from and crawling down the massive trees. I blinked away my thoughts and almost turned to look at the two little gorillas wrestling, but stopped when I caught a glimpse of something. Two somethings. They reflected the low light like silver shillings, except they glowed an iridescent golden shade. At first I was simply caught off guard, curious about the nature of these orbs. Captivating and mesmerizingly unlike anything else I've seen before. Then they moved a step closer, only maybe twenty paces from me, and their surroundings moved with them. I recognized yellow-brown fur with a dense pattern of thick black rings under which taut muscles moved gracefully like flowing water. The focused eyes and hunched posture made it clear that it was hunting. The initial curiosity turned to immediate fear that shot my heart rate up and pounding into my ears, realizing that we were the hunted. Like birds to a cat. Unbeknownst to any but myself, a leopard preyed upon the group's most vulnerable beings. My breath caught painfully in my incredibly tense throat. I wanted to search the surroundings for Tarzan, or the nearest mother gorilla, or strangely even my father, anyone who could even stand a chance against this threat. However the fear overpowered me- the fear that one glance away would provide the perfect opportunity to pounce upon us. The big cat seemed to realize that I'd noticed it and hypnotically held my gaze, stopping only momentarily before continuing a slow and careful approach.