Cat Melvin

The last time I saw Lena, she was peering from behind heavy steel bars, eyes pleading, her hands wrapped around them. I choked out good-bye and caressed her knuckles.

She whimpered.

I think I did too.

We’d grown up together, Lena and I. My mom had sort of adopted her when her own mother didn’t want her. I fed her bottles, learned to change diapers, loved her and played with her. When she was old enough, Lena and I learned sign language together. Mom said it would let her express herself to people around her. Her first signed sentence was "Lena loves Scottie."

I guess it was my Scot’s stubbornness that brought us to that goodbye. I was determined that Lena would learn to be strong and capable, independent. I argued fiercely that she could do the same things I could, if I just showed her how in ways she understood.

Mom agreed, and let me do things mostly my way. Dad, exasperated and admiring, would run his hand over my tangle of copper curls and say, "Ah, Scottie. You don’t know the meaning of can’t, do you girl?"

When I was twelve and Lena was around four, she began calling me "Firetop." It was a reference to my hair color but could just as easily have been for my temper. I could not stand people who gushed hypocritically over me and regarded Lena with amused condescension. "So bright . . . look how well-behaved she is."

When I bristled, they smiled over my protectiveness. "So sweet . . ."

The summer before I turned thirteen, we moved to a rural area in Florida. Mom and Dad decided Lena and I needed more space to finish our growing up, more than we had in the city, even on a large private lot. There were palm and oak trees, a small tobacco-brown stream blanketed with water hyacinths that wandered through pine and willow, and twenty-five acres of "running around room," as Dad called it.

Mom taught Lena and me to gather wild plants to eat. She showed us how to use giant green elephant ear leaves as umbrellas and drink rainwater that collected inside the throats of the yellow daylilies by the front door.

Dad showed us how to find tiny game trails, walking where quail and foxes crossed the grassy areas going to the stream to drink.

I didn’t know it then, but they were teaching us survival skills.

Finally, when I was sixteen and through with my high school education—I was homeschooled and skipped a couple of years—Mom sat me down to talk about Lena’s future. My protests that, of course she would stay with us, sounded hollow even to me. I had always known, I think, that Lena would have to leave us. I just ignored what I couldn’t bear to think about.

We found a gorilla reserve where she would be welcomed, where she could make new friends. I wavered between hoping she’d find a new family, and that she’d always miss me.

Soon, too soon, it was the day she was to leave. I’d explained the best I could what was happening. So did Mom. I could tell Lena didn’t understand.

We drove to the airport, pointing out cars and trucks and Taco Bell signs. She loved watching the TV commercials with the talking Chihuahua.

We arrived an hour early so we’d have time to prepare her for the trip. In her Lion King carryall, she had two children’s books with pictures of baby animals and her favorite stuffed kitty, loved almost to tatters. She was excited by all the activity, but didn’t comprehend what was really happening. My throat was too tight to speak, so I let my hands say it all.

"Lena, you’re going on a long trip. Mom and Dad and I can’t come this time, so you look after Kitty, OK? We love you very, very much. Some nice new friends will be there to meet you. They know you like orange juice and apples for lunch, and stories before bed. Be a good girl."

I had to turn away as I stepped out past the barred cage door. I felt miserable, like I had betrayed Lena’s trust, but I knew it was best for her. The reserve where she was going, lush and green in the pictures, had other gorillas who knew sign, and permanent live-in human caretakers. She’d be safe there, and might even have a family of her own one day.

Watching the plane taxi down the runway I thought, Maybe I can save up so I can fly over to see her. She’ll remember me and forgive me for sending her away and take me to meet her friends.

Mom, Dad, and I walked silently through the deserted boarding lounge. Time to go home.