The One and Only Ivan (12 page)

“Exactly.”

“And you want me to do it without Mack's permission?” George asks.

“Exactly.”

“No,” George says. “No way.”

Julia goes to the edge of the ring, careful not to step on any of my paintings. She picks up Mack's claw-stick. She walks back and hands it to her father.

George runs a finger along the blade.

“She's just a baby, Dad. Don't you want to help her?”

“But how would it help, Jules? Even if lots of people see Ivan's sign, it doesn't mean anything's going to change.”

“I'm not exactly sure yet.” Julia shakes her head. “Maybe people will see the sign, and they'll know this isn't where Ruby belongs. Maybe they'll want to help too.”

George sighs. He looks at Ruby. She waves her trunk.

“It's a matter of principle, Dad. P-R-I-N-C-I-P-A-L.”

“L-E,” George corrects.

“Dad,” Julia says softly, “what if Ruby ends up like Stella?”

George looks at me, at Ruby, at Julia.

He drops the claw-stick.

“The ladder,” he says quietly, “is in the storage locker.”

I watch Mack's car slam to a halt in the parking lot.

He leaps out. He stares at the billboard. His jaw is open. He doesn't move for a long time.

A mad gorilla is loud. But a mad human can be loud too.

Especially when he is throwing chairs and turning over tables and breaking the cotton-candy machine.

Mack is kicking a trash can across the food court when the phone rings.

He answers it, red-faced and sweating.

“What the—” he demands.

He glares at me.

“I don't know what you're—” he starts to say, but then he stops to listen.

“Who? Julia who?” he asks. “Oh, sure. George's kid.
She's
the one who called you?”

More talking. With the phone to his ear, Mack comes closer to my cage, eyeing me suspiciously.

“Yeah, yeah,” he says. “He paints. Sure. We've been selling his art for quite a while now.”

There is another long pause. “Yeah. Absolutely. It was my idea.”

Mack nods. A smile starts at the corners of his mouth.

“Photos? No problem. You want to see him in action? Come on down, have a look. We're open 365 days a year. Can't miss us. We're right off I-95.”

Mack picks up the overturned trash can. “Yeah, I think he'll be adding more pictures. It's a, you know, what do you call it? A work in progress.”

When the call is done, Mack shakes his head. “Impossible,” he says.

An hour later, a man with a camera comes to take my picture. He is from the local paper, the one Julia called.

“How about you take one of me with the elephant?” Mack suggests. He drapes his arm around Ruby's back, grinning as the camera clicks.

“Perfect,” the man says.

“Perfect,” Mack agrees.

A photo of my billboard is in the newspaper. Mack tapes the story onto my window.

Each day more curious people arrive. They park in front of the billboard. They point and shake their heads. They take photos.

Then they come into the mall and buy my paintings.

While visitors watch, I dip my hands in fresh buckets of paint. I make pictures for the gift shop, and pictures to add to the billboard. Trees with birds. A newborn elephant with glittering black eyes. A squirrel, a bluebird, a worm.

I even paint Bob so he can be on the billboard too. I can tell he likes the picture, although he says I didn't quite capture his distinguished nose.

Every afternoon, Mack and George add my new pictures to the billboard. People slow their cars while they work. Drivers honk and wave.

My gift-shop pictures now cost sixty-five dollars (with frame).

I have new names. People call me the Ape Artist. The Primate Picasso.

I have visitors from morning till night, and so does Ruby.

But nothing's changed for her. Every day at two, four, and seven, Ruby plods through the sawdust with Snickers on her back.

Every night she has bad dreams.

“Bob,” I say, after I've soothed Ruby to sleep with a story, “my idea isn't working.”

Bob opens one eye. “Be patient.”

“I'm tired of being patient,” I say.

This evening a man and woman come to interview Mack and also George and Julia.

The man has a large and heavy camera perched on his shoulder. He films me as I make my pictures. He films Ruby in her cage, with her foot roped to the bolt in the floor.

“Mind if I take a look around?” he asks.

Mack waves a hand. “Be my guest.”

While Mack and the woman talk, the cameraman walks through the mall. He pans his camera right and left, up and down.

When his eyes fall on the claw-stick, he stops. He trains his camera on the gleaming blade. Then he moves on.

Mack turns on the TV.

We are on
The Early News at Five O'Clock
.

Bob says don't let it go to my head.

There we all are. Mack, Ruby, me. George and Julia. The billboard, the mall, the ring.

And the claw-stick.

In the morning, several people gather in the parking lot. They're carrying signs on sticks.

The signs have words and pictures on them. One has a drawing of a gorilla cradling a baby elephant.

I wish I could read.

More people with signs come today. They want Ruby to be free. Some of them even want Mack to shut down the mall.

In the evening, George and Mack talk about them. Mack says they're protesting the wrong guy. He says they're going to ruin everything. He says thanks for nothing, George.

Mack stomps off. George, holding his mop, watches him leave. He rubs his eyes. He looks worried.

“Dad,” Julia says, looking up from her homework. “You know what my favorite sign was?”

“Hmm?” George asks. “Which one?”

“The one that said ‘Elephants Are People Too.'”

George gives her a tired smile.

He goes back to work. His mop moves across the empty food court like a giant brush, painting a picture no one will ever see.

A tall man with a clipboard and pencil comes to visit. He says he is here to inspect the property.

He doesn't say much more, but he makes many check marks on his paper.

He looks at my floor. Check. He examines Ruby's hay. Check. He eyes our water bowls. Check.

Mack watches him, scowling.

Bob is outside, hiding near the Dumpster. He does not want to be a check mark.

Every day there are more protesters, and cameras with bright lights. Sometimes the people carrying signs shout, “Free Ruby! Free Ruby!”

“Ivan,” Ruby asks, “why are those people yelling my name? Are they mad at me?”

“They're mad,” I say, “but not at you.”

A week later, the inspecting man comes back with a friend, a woman with smart, dark eyes like my mother's. She has a white coat on, and she smells like lobelia blossoms. Her hair is thick and brown, the color of a rotten branch teeming with luscious ants.

She watches me for a long time. Then she watches Ruby.

She talks to the man. They both talk to Mack. The man gives Mack a sheet of paper.

Mack covers his face.

He goes to his office and slams the door.

Something strange is happening. The white-coated woman is back with other humans.

They place a large box in the center of the ring.

It's Ruby sized.

And suddenly I know why the woman is here. She's here to take Ruby away.

The woman leads Ruby to the box. She places an apple inside. “Good girl, Ruby,” she says kindly. “Don't be afraid.”

Ruby inspects the box with her trunk. The woman makes a clicking sound with a little piece of metal she is holding in her hand. She gives Ruby a piece of carrot.

Each time Ruby touches the box, she gets a click and a treat.

“Why is she making that clicking noise?” I ask Bob.

“They do that to dogs all the time,” Bob says. I can tell he doesn't approve. “It's called clicker training. They want Ruby to associate the noise with the treat. When she does something they want, they make that noise.”

“Great job, Ruby,” the woman says. “You're a quick study.”

After many clicks and carrots, she takes Ruby back to her cage.

“Why is that lady giving me carrots when I touch the box?” Ruby asks me.

“I think she wants you to go inside,” I explain.

“But there's nothing inside,” Ruby says, “except an apple.”

“Inside that box,” I say, “is the way out.”

Ruby tilts her head. “I don't get it.”

“See the picture of the red giraffe on the box? I think the lady is from the zoo, Ruby. I think she's getting ready to take you there.”

I wait for Ruby to trumpet with joy, but instead she just stares at the box in silence.

“I'm not sure you understand. That box might be taking you to a place where there are other elephants,” I say. “A place with more room, and humans who care about you.”

But even as I say these words, I remember with a shudder the last box I was in.

“I don't want a zoo,” Ruby says. “I want you and Bob and Julia. This is my home.”

“No, Ruby,” I say. “This is your prison.”

The lady comes again. She brings an animal doctor with an awful smell and a dangerous-looking bag.

He spends an hour with Ruby, poking and prodding. He looks at her eyes, her feet, her trunk.

When he's done with Ruby, he enters my cage. I wish I could hide under Not-Tag like Bob.

Instead I do a nice, loud chest beat, and after a moment the doctor retreats.

“We're going to need to put this one under,” he says.

I'm not quite sure what he means. But I strut around my cage feeling victorious anyway.

No one asks me to paint today. No one asks Ruby to perform.

There are no shows. No visitors, unless you count the protesters.

Mack stays in his office all day.

I wake up from a long morning nap. Bob is on my belly, but he isn't asleep. He's watching the ring, where four men are placing a large metal box.

It's me sized.

“What's that?” I ask, still blurry from sleep.

Bob nuzzles my chin. “I believe that box is for you, my friend.”

I'm not sure what he means. “Me?”

“They brought in a bunch of boxes while you were sleeping. Looks to me like they're taking the whole lot of you,” he says casually, licking a paw. “Even Thelma.”