Goldfish And Clowns

Late at night, when the zookeeper was sound asleep, unbeknownst to him the animals would on occasion free themselves and each other from their homes and mingle.  Those that in nature were mortal enemies here were fast friends; the lion laughing with the zebra, the cobra and mongoose exchanging small talk.  Such was the way of things at the zoo, a zoo the humans thought they ran but in fact was entirely the realm of the animals playing a perpetual inside joke at the expense of those who fancied themselves keepers.
Gord the polar bear, along with Cherie the thrasher who although not one of the animals in the zoo lived there anyway, liked to visit their friend Alec the arctic fox during these nights.  Now, were this in the wild Gord and Alec would have nothing to do with each other.  Foxes on occasion carefully follow behind polar bears to pick up on whatever leftover scraps there might be from the unfortunate animal that cross the bear’s path, and for the bear’s part they have been known to munch on the occasional arctic fox or two.  However, even if this had been the wild Gord was much too gentle to ever contemplate such a thing, much preferring nuts and berries.  Besides, how could anyone ever dream of harming Alec?

Alec was old, older than most of the other animals at the zoo.  He was too weary and ill when he was found in the wild to last much longer there, let alone elude capture, and so here he was.  Alec’s movement was stiff, his back slightly twisted from one of the many hunts he had been on during his youthful days.  He bore the scars from these encounters with neither pride nor shame, but rather the nonchalant manner of one to whom such things were a fact of life deserving no great attention from any angle.  These things Gord noticed.  But above all else Gord noted Alec’s eyes, still penetrating and clear despite his advanced years.

What Gord enjoyed the most about Alec were the stories he told, stories that were all the better for being true.  His tales were rich treasures, tapestries woven with all the shapes and dazzling light of the aurora borealis Gord saw a few times in the days of his youth.  They were stories of and from the Canadian forest that for years had been Alec’s home and for a time was Gord’s home as well before they had both been brought to this place.

It was not home, of course.  It could never truly be home; this artificial place of concrete and ditches designed to keep the animals far away from the people and each other.  However, Gord tried to make the best of it he could, even with the nasty other bears around with their silliness and shouting along with the zookeeper who for reasons Gord could never quite figure out was usually unpleasant to him.

On this night, as Gord and Cherie made their way toward where Alec lived, he saw them first.  “Why, hello,” he said in a perfect imitation of Gord’s usual greeting as the three broke into laughter.

“Why, hello yourself,” Gord replied.

“I suppose you’ve come for a story,” Alec said with a smile.

“But of course,” replied Cherie.

“Very well.  A story you shall have.”  Alec paused for a moment, then closed his eyes as he began to speak in a soft, slow voice.

One day many years ago, one of Alec’s ancestors, who was named Osi, was out and about with his mate Violet, seeing what could be found to eat.  It was a clear warm day, very quiet and very still.  No one else seemed to be about.  No one at all.

“Well,” Osi said to Violet, “it looks like nothing but a few berries for us today.”

Violet was about to agree when something struck her attention.  She immediately looked up at the sky, Osi looking up with her.

“What could that be?” she said.

“I don’t know,” replied Osi.  “It must be a bird, but it certainly doesn’t look like any bird I’ve ever seen.”

“It’s certainly the noisiest bird I’ve ever seen,” Violet commented.  “What kind of bird would make such a racket?  It’ll never catch anything like that.”

“Perhaps it feeds by diving on to the lake.  It’s not like the fish can hear it.”

“Perhaps,” replied Violet.  “It appears to be diving now.”

“That’s strange,” added Osi. “The lake is many miles from here.  Well, it certainly is diving, and it appears to be quite large.  Best for us to move away, just in case it has fox on its menu for lunch!”

“Agreed.”  The two scampered away to a spot where they could keep a wary eye on the bird, now ever increasing in size as it drew closer, making a unfamiliar noise that grew louder along the way. Then, both Osi and Violet jumped from fright as the bird, rather than swooping down and then lifting itself back in the air as one would expect it to do, crashed with a horrific sound into the very spot where the two foxes had been standing just a few moments before.  The sound died away, and once again all was still.

For several minutes neither Osi nor Violet moved or made a sound.  Then Osi whispered to his mate, “I believe the bird has begun to fade.  It hasn’t moved once.  And no one could survive such a fall, not even a bird as mighty as this one.”

“What… what should we do?”

“We should take a look.”  With that Osi started walking slowly and cautiously toward the bird, with Violet following behind.

As the two drew closer, it became obvious that the bird was indeed beginning to fade.  Its head had a massive wound, its back was broken and bent, and its wings were twisted beyond all hope.  It also became obvious that this bird was most unlike any Osi and Violet had ever seen: featherless, unbelievably enormous in size, with its blood emitting a foul and unfamiliar odor.  Nevertheless, the two came close enough to sniff about in the odd chance there might be something to scavenge.  Then Violet stopped.

“Osi,” she said in a frightened near-whisper.  “Look.  This bird… it ate the upright ones.”

Osi went to Violet’s side and peered inside the bird’s torn-apart belly.  Indeed, inside and beginning to fade were two upright ones, the ones every fox was taught since they were pups to avoid at all costs, for they brought nothing but pain and sorrow to any fox they happened to encounter.  Only how they had obviously begun to fade when the bird had eaten them before beginning to fade itself prevented the two foxes from immediately fleeing.

“What… what should we do?” whispered Violet.

Osi thought for a moment, then softly said, “This is an evil place.  We should leave here and never return.”  And they did.  Or at least, Violet thought they did.

Over the years that followed, when he was out alone Osi would sometimes return to the place.  His initial opinion that the place was evil was confirmed by the birdnot completing its fade into the earth as did all other fallen animals, but instead by how the plants no longer grew where the bird had bled.  The upright ones inside the bird did fade, but slowly, strangely; their fur remaining intact while what was inside gradually withered and faded to bone.  This was truly an evil place.

Then one day when Osi was old and knew that he himself would soon begin to fade, he decided to make one final visit to the bird.  As he approached, suddenly he heard noises that he knew could mean only one thing…

The upright ones.

With what little stealth he still possessed, he scampered to a hiding place from where he could watch without being watched.  There were many of them, noisy and shouting as they usually were, all walking or climbing around the bird.  Osi saw some them go inside the bird’s belly.  One of them let out a great shout, and then they suddenly stopped making noise.  In total silence they carefully took what was left of the two upright ones inside the bird and placed them in separate things they were known to use for carrying things about.  Then they left.

“How strange,” Osi said to himself.  “How very strange that after all these years, the upright ones should come to take away their faded.”

And that was the end of the story.

Alec opened his eyes.  He looked at Gord and Cherie, then said, “Do you understand?”

They both nodded in agreement, for they knew.  No matter what they might do for the animals, ultimately the upright ones, the humans, would take care of themselves first.  With that, Gord headed back to his home, looking forward to the next time he could hear one of Alec’s stories.

Gord the polar bear yawned.  It was a warm afternoon, and for whatever reason there hadn’t been many visitors at the zoo that day.  On some days this would be okay, but on this day… well, it was already kind of a lazy day, and lazy days often became boring days.  Gord didn’t like boring days.  He much preferred having something to do, or better yet someone to talk to about whatever topic might come up.

Gord yawned again as he looked around.  He noticed that across the walkway, some workers were moving a few trees around inside what would eventually be the new aviary.  At least that’s what he heard the zookeeper say it would be.  Not that the zookeeper said this to him, of course.  He was talking to another zookeeper one day, and Gord happened to overhear the conversation.

The zookeeper never talked to Gord.  It would probably surprise him to learn that Gord could talk, let alone have things he’d like to talk about. If he knew I could talk, thought Gord, and perfectly understood everything that other people said, hopefully he would no longer be as unpleasant to me as he often is when he brings me my food. Instead, the zookeeper was usually quite rude to him.  “All you ever do is lay around, you lazy bear,” the zookeeper would often say.  “After all the trouble I went through moving the other bears near you, you ignore them.  What do you want, anyway?”

“Why, someone to talk to, like my friend Cherie,” Gord often thought about replying.  However, Gord knew better than to say anything to the zookeeper, or to any adult.  He had tried talking to adults a couple of times, and they had reacted in a very strange manner.  Some shrieked and ran away, while others kept looking around to see where the voice was coming from even though Gord was standing right there.  People can be a little odd at times, Gord thought.

The afternoon was still warm, and being a polar bear Gord was not very comfortable.  He walked over to a shady area of his home and lay down. Best not to let this lazy day turn into a boring day, he thought. I’ll just lay here for a bit and close my eyes for only a moment until it cools down…

“Hey bear!”

A startled Gord looked up.  Standing in the walkway in front of his home were three children of different ages and their mother.

“Hey bear!  You look funny,” said the smallest of the three children.

Gord looked away.  Once in a while someone would ray rude things like this to him.  Best to pay it no mind.  Besides, the boy’s mother was there.  Surely she would correct his poor behavior.

“Hey bear!  You smell funny too.”

The other children looked away.  Well, at least they’re not misbehaving like their brother, thought Gord.  That noted, Gord was rather disappointed when the mother started laughing as the smallest child continued, “You look funny and you smell funny.”

Just then Cherie the thrasher flew by and landed near Gord.  She observed the scene for a moment, then quietly said to him, “That is not a nice boy.”

“No, he isn’t,” Gord softly replied as the boy was now making strange faces while making obnoxious sounds at Gord.

“His mother certainly isn’t helping, letting him act like that.”

“Why, no she isn’t.  Very disappointing.”

After a few minutes of this, the other children started whining about being tired of this and wanting to get going.  The mother grabbed the smallest child and started walking away, with the others following behind.  As they did so, the smallest boy turned around and looked at Gord as he yelled out, “Stupid bear!  You’re just a stupid bear!”

Cherie let out a sharp sigh.  “Not a nice boy at all.  Well, I have something I need to do.  I’ll be back later.”  With that she flew away.

Gord also sighed.  No.  There’s nothing to be done about it, though, he thought.  With that he closed his eyes again…

“Sir?  Excuse me?”

A very startled Gord sat up on his haunches.  Standing not in the walkway in front of his home but directly in front of him was a young boy.  Now this is most unusual, thought Gord.  Other than the zookeeper, he was quite certain people weren’t supposed to come into his home.  However, it was a boy, and he was being polite; something Gord appreciated as he always tried to be as polite as possible.

“Why, hello there,” Gord replied.

He then noticed much to his embarrassment that there was an adult woman standing next to the boy he hadn’t seen at first.  The woman didn’t look like the boy’s mother, though.  Gord noticed she had a very sad look on her face, and she didn’t seem alarmed that Gord had spoken aloud.  Instead, she leaned down next to Gord and quietly whispered, “Please be gentle with him.  He’s very sick.”

“So that’s why he has such a shiny head with no hair and those bruises around his neck and arms?” whispered Gord to her.

“Yes.”

“I see.”  Gord turned away from the woman and turned back to the boy, who had a very serious look on his face.  “I’m quite glad to see you today,” he said, not quite certain what else to say.

The boy replied, “Are you a real polar bear?”

Gord smiled, “Why, yes I am.”

The boy’s reply surprised Gord.  He reached out and as best he could placed his hands around Gord’s front paws, which he was holding together in front of him.  In a voice as serious as the look on his face the boy said, “Do you think we’ll win?”

Gord was now very unsure what to say.  He didn’t know what was supposed to be won, or who was supposed to be doing the winning.  However, he also thought it would be impolite to ask.  What to do?, he thought.

Then, Gord knew what to do.  He smiled again and said, “Why, if we work together and never stop believing, of course we can win.”

The boy reached up and as best he could hugged Gord around his neck.  As gently as he could Gord hugged the boy back, being ever so careful not to hurt him.  Then, the boy and the woman vanished…

“Here you go, you lazy bear.”

Gord looked up and blinked, seeing the little door the zookeeper usually used to give him his food close and a plate of food in front of it.  He was very puzzled by all this.  Then he thought, Why, I must have fallen asleep and dreamt the whole thing. He sighed and got up to eat his food…

… and then stopped when he saw something on the ground in front of him.

He bent down to take a closer look.  It was a bracelet, like the ones he saw children wearing when they came from the hospital for visits.  On it was printed not a name, but rather one single word:

BELIEVE

“Why, I’ll do just that,” Gord said aloud.  He carefully scooped up the bracelet in his paw, the gently placed it in a secure place in his home where it wouldn’t blow away.  Only then did he walk over to where his dinner was waiting.  And as he slowly ate, he smiled.