The Last Ape
He was a great dreamer of a great jungle river. A wild and pure flowing crystal water. Birds dip in and out of the water ceaselessly with the sunlights reflections. With all the colors of the earth and sky in each ripple. Arching, turning them over in the story of the river. He walks into a deep dark shadow, that seems to be a great rock in the river where the water is turning in greater waves. He walks towards it and notices, it is his shadow. Turning around back to the river, he is uncertain. Was that the direction from which he entered the shadow? He takes another step and emerges from a large concrete aqueduct. He could only see a wide streak of blue sky far above him. Climbing the steep concrete embankment and nearing the top he finds a discarded leather shoulder bag with a few items in it. A small zipper purse, with some coins. A metal zippo lighter, a guerlain lipstick, a kiko milano eyeshadow, a pocket version of E. B. white’s children poems. He wondered, where these things could have come from?
Climbing out, the temperature warmed as the light became brighter. Emerging into the modern world. He began to see the people’s brisk faces and jaunty strides on the sidewalk of similar concrete. Upon one seeing him and pointing their finger “Oh my GOD, look!” Horrified, they split into two hordes of familiar homogenous pheromone frenzy. A rank sorting of two different camps working to squeeze themselves together to form an impenetrable mob. Reassuring themselves in their common behavior and understanding. The combined singular purpose of the extinguishment of a foreigner. Their crusade to betray their own heritage and eliminate it forever.
Together they are all making a consolidated mockery of him, with the same ferocious weapon of frozen fear. Knotted brows of perspiration. He walks towards them mostly out of curiosity. They increase the narrow focus of their assembly of excommunication. They all bring out little paper face masks as an added boundary from anything perceived as foreign. It gives them another sense of superiority. An outer manifestation of blank uniform purpose.
A boy, poignantly white marble skin, with pointed weaselly scrunched up face and sharp upward angled eyebrows, narrowed eyes, in sharp, sunken, thin ridged orbits is jumping up and down and scratching his armpits, hunching over making his arms look long and his mouth in big puckered circle. He thinks to himself "Don’t they know I’m not a chimpanzee? I’m a great ape. Don’t they know about my distinctive silver tints on my thick ridged and rippled back. Are these humans?" He walks towards them like an actor who just won an award for a most well informed intercultural film debut.
Next to the pointy faced boy is his younger brother, whose eyes widen, for he has developed some concern for the escalating crowds
blind assaults. He could not stand being in the crowd any longer. He began to push against the others. Trying to find a weak point in the crowd to escape. He couldn't find one. He began to feel faint, nauseous, out of breath. His legs and arms rubberry. His head light, dizzy. The crowd kept him on his feet, against his recognition of the atrocity. The loss of community in the toxic, concentrated, shouts and choppy, short exclamations. He couldn't swallow. The counterflow of the life force was taking hold of him. An eruption was beginning deep inside he could not repress, hide, or escape from. He felt that he himself had committed an awful crime against someone that he had never met. For no reason other than he was caught up in nightmarish theater. The nightmare enclosed around him, eclipsed his sense of himself and his breath slipped away as he went weightless. He was falling. He didn't feel the side of his face smash into the concrete. Or the twist in his neck. Or the rest of his body colliding with the rough unyielding surface. Didn't know bits of gravel were digging into his face, his arms and hands as he continued to lie there. No one noticed the collapse of the younger brother. As the crowd began throwing whatever they could at the great ape. The rain of debris falling on him from all sides. As the crowd tries to keep their plastic safety masks on. To him and the great ape their assaults were as soft as a baby's breath.
The great ape is slowly proceeding towards the people and the town in his easy slow rhythmic movements. Self dignified, curious and concerned. He saw the boy fall. He begins striding slowly like a greek god from the underworld towards the fallen boy, they part from him like water. He picks the boy up amidst their exclamations of his murderous malignments. He easily carries the boy over to a small parkway of green grass, as the horrified crowd is screaming in uncontrollable hysteria. He lays the boy down. Gently lifts the boy's shoulders a few times and the sides of his chest. Listens to the boy's breathing getting stronger. He returns to the Laggo leather bag, gathers it up, turns towards the town again, with a long, easy stride leaves the scene with a greater interest in the lives of this world.
He is a bit stunned that they don’t know he’s a great ape. He says quietly to himself with the three fates, hope, faith and doubt, “I’m not a chimp, I’m a great Ape. He looks around and sees a bus coming. It stops and he gets on comfortably easily, puts the correct change from his bag he found in the aqueduct, in the bus fare device. Finds an empty seat towards the back of the bus
There is a young woman across the aisle. She breathes deep and slow, taking him in. Her long torso and arms are turned slightly towards him. Her head slightly tilted, the angular face with some receding shadow below the cheek, that meets the curve of her lips. Which spread gently. Other people's eyes and mouths are wide open. "Hey, hey there’s a monkey on the bus." He is familiar with people’s lack of worldly knowledge by now. He looks at the woman and the lips lift very slightly, with her eyes. A large man, with a wide, thick, rough face, broad shoulders, and heavy mid-section that protrudes slightly from between old jeans and long sleeve shirt is getting up and moving towards him. He is saying “This is the wrong bus to the zoo, bud. I suggest you get off now.” He looks at the man and says calmly, “I’m not going to the zoo this afternoon.” The man moving in close with an intimidating deep voice, "and where do you think you’re going?” He replies congenially, “I’m going downtown to see about some opera and film.” The man puffing himself up, “NOT TODAY BABOON BREATH.” Another thuggish guy is getting up. The woman says “He’s with me.” In a deep, soft, sumptuous exhale that knocks the wind out of the guys. The men look at her. “What are you doing with this smelly low life, belly scraping, heel snaking worm?” “He’s cute, we’re friends.” It almost strangles them up with a kind of disorienting dismay. Their bodies shudder a bit as they stammer in confused exclamation. She puts her arm through his, into his warm heavy fur, she looks at him and says “This is our stop.” She gets up and leads him to get off together. The thick slugs fall to the side into the some sitting passengers who are in a stunned silence. They all squirm and moan to themselves under their breath. The woman leading the 440 plus pound Great Silverback gorilla trailing behind her, rhythmically undulating, lifting and falling as piles of dark autumn leaves might float around a child's feet. She glances back. Hmm, my bag.
As they exit the bus, some of the gruff men are throwing beer bottles, and other assorted objects at him. He is getting off the bus, following the woman, he doesn't see the objects coming. A bowling ball in a bowling bag strikes the back of his head and he falters for just a moment. Just enough for more ammunition to be hurled. The woman senses a little jostling and pulls more firmly to increase the pace. They get free of the bus and the assait.
They walk half a block and enter a clean, dark, red painted metal door, recessed a little further back than the others. Up the stairs, down the hall into her apartment on the left. He plainly and inherently sets her bag on the small table next to the door where she sets her keys down, as they pass casually into the apartment. She clears a little place for him at her small table by the window that overlooks the street. Pulls a back a small, thin, gently curved wooden chair with a long back that continues the subtle arc. He dwarfs everything in the apartment as inside a doll house, trying to pull himself together a bit to take up less space. Lowering himself slightly and then further and carefully onto the small chair. He barely fits a portion of his rear on the chair, still mostly supporting himself with his legs. He relaxes, She moves her flowers over a bit more, closer to the window. He is bigger than she thought. The flowers wave softly, slowly with the light breezes coming in the window. Clearing a bit more, some magazines, a book. She gets a paper bag from the cupboard. He smells the light toasty, buttery aroma. It mixes with some flowers and some other scents he can't make out. They are familiar, from somewhere. Deep, low, a little sharp, a little musky. He feels a warmth. Something is moving in him. She removes two croissants and puts them on a wooden cutting board. Gets out a jar of freshly ground peanut butter, slices a banana, sets them in the croissants and smears them all with a touch of honey. She gets two glasses of water filled from the dispenser on a stand by the small kitchen. She looks out at the city, lulls for a moment, taking it all in. His oversized body. Still with traces of the jungle. Small pieces of twigs, some small thin patches of soils of slightly different colors. They all mix with his strong smell. Acrid, pungent, it fills her nostrils. With a soft smile, gently as a young mother would do with her young child, she turns and brings the water. Then the brings the sandwiches andSets them between them and sits down next to him. Just turning a bit towards him naturally, with the oval of the table, the curves of their chairs, the flowers, the curtains. She is bringing them all together for him. They eat in silence. Looking at each other the entire time. She puts the dishes in the sink and then she puts on some music. She brings a small bowl of ice and a dishcloth. Cleaning and soothing his shallow bumps. He pays close attention to her every move. After holding the cloth on a few reddish places she has found under the thick fur. She rises slowly, walks to a dresser with a turntable on top. Presses a lever and some 1970’s Ethiopian jazz begins to play. Upon the first few notes he raises his dark and heavy eyebrows towards her, with a heavy breath “I love Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guèbrou." Relinquishing himself into the music, his eyes closing slightly, still directly on her. She rises, her chest moves closer to him. She extends a hand, they rise swaying across the room as if they knew the dance, each other, the coming evening. His body is soothed by all her attention.
Remembering some bygone days when there was meaning and revolution in small crowded spaces with cheap makeshift furniture and tables. Where people left everything behind for the music, the dance, the evening. The record ended. They continued to sway gently in their own version of the night. As the evening cooled they began to notice the room again. She led them to her large metal framed bed with a thick mattress covered in comforters, and pillows of various shapes, colors, sizes and textures. They laid down and listened to each other breathing. Drifting off a bit. Drifting scenes of canopy jungles stretched to looming mountains around them. In and out, sometimes drifting on and off of dark screens as projections. The morning came and went. Other scenes of people in odd colorful dress populated and faded. Days and nights passed. Other animals and beasts painted different kinds of white, chalky designs visited them. Others are painted in ochres. Birds and other flying shapes left trances of feathers. They laid together without wondering what they shared. Or what the other thought. It was an enormous imaginarium that they both knew only together.
Awakening in an early dawn, his head lazily turns, taking in the diffused light and hushed atmosphere. Vestiges from their deep submersion together mix with the early dim light. The room seems empty, she is gone. He gets up and slowly goes to the small table and window. A note under the edge of a thick molten glass vase. The faint, red, impression of her lips. A lazy, loose script reads, Getting paper and coffee. Then the faint, pale reddish, impression of her lips. A bowl of some bamboo shoots in water sit next to the note. A few mulberries dot the shoots. He takes a deep breath and takes them back to the bed. Sitting up and still looking out the window. He begins to fathom the sounds coming from the street below. He sets the bowl down on a small square end table painted in black shellac, and moves closer to the window.
It sounded like the din of a war zone that was breaking out with the sunrise. People running about and loudly hawking goods and services, others shouting out needs and wants. The bright morning sun was beginning to enter the kitchen through the window with the escalating din. He half sits in the chair, turns the note over, his fingers around the pen, he languidly shades and lines out some of his vague remembrances of the curious dream life they share. A Cheshire cat looking back at him?
A note on the table was telling she had taken his story to the local literary magazine. Publishing with the name Benji Perak.
They called the next morning for an interview. The article had gone viral on-line. The editors wanted an exclusive interview. They had an appointment for the following Thursday. 10 days from today. He stretched, stood, kicked his limbs about a bit, some shaking, a deep backbend and he was moving to the door, down the stairs, just outside the red door for a look around outside.
A Bunch of the pointy nosed children with thin eyebrows and lips began heckling him. They jump up and down, angrily beating their chests and body slamming each other's sunken chests which they try to bulge and billow heavily. One has a soccer ball he is jumping up and down with as if trying to taunt the great ape with it. He says “Well, I appreciate the offer but, I think it’s best if you continue your games amongst yourselves.” The kids rush and mob him as if he were some captive trying to escape his owner's control. Trying to push him and grab him, screaming like shrill birds that they will put him in a little cage. Leave him to die of starvation. It’s no problem for him and he turns with a little shake and they all are repelled. Toppling backwards onto one another. He says to them again, “You know, I’m a great ape.”
Out of the corner of his eye he sees a massive dark shape like a solid shadow rapidly bouncing roughly and plummeting towards him, upon him. He is only peripherally aware of a strong impact from his right. The sound of screeching tires. He is dazed but somehow stands up quickly. He sees the bus was overturned from the impact. He feels a bit numb. Falling back towards the door, he doesn’t make it in and passes out.
He is awakened by a sharp, chill wind. He is sitting with his back against a large tree. He looks up. The sky is dirty yellow that extends from horizon to horizon as he turns his head, taking in the panoramic view of desolate landscape. Parts of broken and twisted steel and various slabs of broken concrete jot irregularly from the ground amidst blowing sand and debris. The wind blows around erratically. Some places suddenly still for a moment then resume blowing chaotically. Tilting his head further back he sees the tree extends upwards. Knotty, twisting, deep layers of dark greys and black make up the bark. He sees the black is a kind of fungus that is starting to grow on him. At around 30 to 40 feet the tree's colors start to become slightly tinted with the yellow-brown atmosphere, where it is severed as if broken off, and the tree ends. He sees one leaf on the tree hanging straight above him. The leaf is swinging back and forth like a pendulum. In the leaf he sees his reflection. His reflection suddenly blows straight off the leaf at a startling pace, and the leaf falls caught up in other winds and disappears.
He awakes in a hospital room alone. He has some tubes in his left arm and he is alone. Upon looking around he notices he is in restraints. They make him uncomfortable and he focuses on relaxing. A woman enters with a chart and a cell phone. She is calling the doctor on duty. An over-sized low turning fan in the window. He focuses on the slow rhythm. The shades and designs on the wall and ceiling, moving shadows from the fan in an empty window. Some more doctors and nurses arrive.
They all have the same plastic like replications of stern faces upon rigid postures. Auto loading conditioned responses, observations and opinions exchanged and noted. I didn’t think he would wake up. He sees the woman outside saying he only needs some music and some rest. I’ve helped out of injuries before. The doctors snicker and shrug, “Mm.” They dismiss her faintly amused. Mm,the others chime in. We’ll have to euthanize him, we can’t do anything for him here. The doctor presses the button on the tubes to an automatic dispenser. In a minute he exhales his last. The woman collapses in shock. The doctor's smile and snicker on, watching, as if assessing a piece of art they might be able to sell.
