The One and Only Ivan & Bob ebook collection

A Plan

It’s been two days since anyone’s come to visit. Mack is in a bad mood. He says we are losing money hand over fist. He says he is going to sell the whole lot of us.

When Thelma, a blue and yellow macaw, demands “Kiss me, big boy,” for the third time in ten minutes, Mack throws a soda can at her. Thelma’s wings are clipped so that she can’t fly, but she still can hop. She leaps aside just in the nick of time. “Pucker up!” she says with a shrill whistle.

Mack stomps to his office and slams the door shut.

I wonder if my visitors have grown tired of me. Maybe if I learn a trick or two, it would help.

Humans do seem to enjoy watching me eat. Luckily, I am always hungry. I am a gifted eater.

A silverback must eat forty-five pounds of food a day if he wants to stay a silverback. Forty-five pounds of fruit and leaves and seeds and stems and bark and vines and rotten wood.

Also, I enjoy the occasional insect.

I am going to try to eat more. Maybe then we will get more visitors. Tomorrow I will eat fifty pounds of food. Maybe even fifty-five.

That should make Mack happy.

Bob

I explain my plan to Bob.

“Ivan,” he says, “trust me on this one: the problem is not your appetite.” He hops on to my chest and licks my chin, checking for leftovers.

Bob is a stray, which means he does not have a permanent address. He is so speedy, so wily, that mall workers long ago gave up trying to catch him. Bob can sneak into cracks and crevices like a tracked rat. He lives well off the ends of hot dogs he pulls from the trash. For dessert, he laps up spilled lemonade and splattered ice-cream cones.

I’ve tried to share my food with Bob, but he is a picky eater, and says he prefers to hunt for himself.

Bob is tiny, wiry and fast, like a barking squirrel. He is nut coloured and big eared. His tail moves like weeds in the wind, spiralling, dancing.

Bob’s tail makes me dizzy and confused. It has meanings within meanings, like human words. “I am sad,” it says. “I am happy.” It says, “Beware! I may be tiny, but my teeth are sharp.”

Gorillas don’t have any use for tails. Our feelings are uncomplicated. Our rumps are unadorned.

Bob used to have three brothers and two sisters. Humans tossed them out of a truck on to the freeway when they were a few weeks old. Bob rolled into a ditch.

The others did not.

His first night on the highway, Bob slept in the icy mud of the ditch. When he woke, he was so cold that his legs would not bend for an hour.

The next night, Bob slept under some dirty hay near the Big Top Mall garbage bins.

The following night, Bob found the spot in the corner of my domain where the glass is broken. I dreamed that I’d eaten a furry doughnut, and when I woke in the dark, I discovered a tiny puppy snoring on top of my belly.

It had been so long since I’d felt the comfort of another’s warmth that I wasn’t sure what to do. Not that I hadn’t had visitors. Mack had been in my domain, of course, and many other keepers. I’d seen my share of rats zip past, and the occasional wayward sparrow had fluttered in through a hole in my ceiling.

But they never stayed long.

I didn’t move all night, for fear of waking Bob.

Wild

Once I asked Bob why he didn’t want a home. Humans, I’d noticed, seem to be irrationally fond of dogs, and I could see why a puppy would be easier to cuddle with than, say, a gorilla.

“Everywhere is my home,” Bob answered. “I am a wild beast, my friend: untamed and undaunted.”

I told Bob he could work in the shows like Snickers, the poodle who rides Stella.

Bob said Snickers sleeps on a pink pillow in Mack’s office. He said she eats foul-smelling meat from a can.

He made a face. His lips curled, revealing tiny needles of teeth.

“Poodles,” he said, “are parasites.”

Picasso

Mack gives me a fresh crayon, a yellow one, and ten pieces of paper. “Time to earn your keep, Picasso,” he mutters.

I wonder who this Picasso is. Did he have a tyre swing like me? Did he ever eat his crayons?

I know I have lost my magic, so I try my very best. I clutch the crayon and think.

I scan my domain. What is yellow?

A banana.

I draw a banana. The paper tears, but only a little.

I lean back, and Mack picks up the drawing. “Another day, another scribble,” he says. “One down, nine to go.”

What else is yellow? I wonder, scanning my domain.

I draw another banana. And then I draw eight more.

Three Visitors

Three visitors are here: a woman, a boy, a girl.

I strut across my domain for them. I dangle from my tyre swing. I eat three banana peels in a row.

The boy spits at my window. The girl throws a handful of pebbles.

Sometimes I’m glad the glass is there.

My Visitors Return

After the show, the spit-pebble children come back.

I display my impressive teeth. I splash in my filthy pool. I grunt and hoot. I eat and eat and eat some more.

The children pound their pathetic chests. They toss more pebbles.

“Slimy chimps,” I mutter. I throw a me-ball at them.

Sometimes I wish the glass were not there.

Sorry

I’m sorry I called those children slimy chimps.

My mother would be ashamed of me.

Julia

Like the spit-pebble children, Julia is a child, but that, after all, is not her fault.

While her father, George, cleans the mall each night, Julia sits by my domain. She could sit anywhere she wants: by the carousel, in the empty food court, on the bleachers coated in sawdust. But I am not bragging when I say that she always chooses to sit with me.

I think it’s because we both love to draw.

Sara, Julia’s mother, used to help clean the mall. But when she got sick and grew pale and stooped, Sara stopped coming. Every night Julia offers to help George, and every night he says firmly, “Homework, Julia. The floors will just get dirty again.”

Homework, I have discovered, involves a sharp pencil and thick books and long sighs.

I enjoy chewing pencils. I am sure I would excel at homework.

Sometimes Julia dozes off, and sometimes she reads her books, but mostly she draws pictures and talks about her day.

I don’t know why people talk to me, but they often do. Perhaps it’s because they think I can’t understand them.

Or perhaps it’s because I can’t talk back.

Julia likes science and art. She doesn’t like Lila Burpee, who teases her because her clothes are old, and she does like Deshawn Williams, who teases her too, but in a nice way, and she would like to be a famous artist when she grows up.

Sometimes Julia draws me. I am an elegant fellow in her pictures, with my silver back gleaming like moon on moss. I never look angry, the way I do on the fading billboard by the highway.

I always look a bit sad, though.

Drawing Bob

I love Julia’s pictures of Bob.

She draws him flying across the page, a blur of feet and fur. She draws him motionless, peeking out from behind a trash can or the soft hill of my belly.

Sometimes in her drawings, Julia gives Bob wings or a lion’s mane. Once she gave him a tortoise shell.

But the best thing she ever gave him wasn’t a drawing. Julia gave Bob his name.

For a long time, no one knew what to call Bob. Now and then, a mall worker would try to approach him with a tidbit. “Here, doggie,” they’d call, holding out a French fry. “Come on, pooch,” they’d say. “How about a little piece of sandwich?”

But he would always vanish into the shadows before anyone could get too close.

One afternoon, Julia decided to draw the little dog curled up in the corner of my domain. First, she watched him for a long time, chewing on her thumbnail. I could tell she was looking at him the way an artist looks at the world when she’s trying to understand it.

Finally she grabbed her pencil and set to work. When she was finished, she held up the page.

There he was, the tiny, big-eared dog. He was smart and cunning, but his gaze was wistful.

Under the picture were three bold, confident marks, circled in black.

Julia’s father peered over her shoulder. “That’s him exactly,” he said, nodding. He pointed to the circled marks. “I didn’t realise his name was Bob,” he said.

“Me neither,” said Julia. She smiled. “I had to draw him first.”

Bob and Julia

Bob will not let humans touch him. He says their scent upsets his digestion.

But every now and then I see him sitting at Julia’s feet. Her fingers move gently, just behind his right ear.

Mack

Usually Mack leaves after the last show, but tonight he is in his office working late. When he’s done, he stops by my domain and stares at me for a long time while he drinks from a brown bottle.

George joins him, broom in hand, and Mack says the things he always says: “How about that game last night?” and “Business has been slow, but it’ll get better, you’ll see,” and “Don’t forget to empty the trash.”

Mack glances over at the picture Julia is drawing. “What’re you making?” he asks.

“It’s for my mum,” Julia says. “It’s a flying dog.” She holds up her drawing, eyeing it critically. “She likes airplanes. And dogs.”

“Hmm,” Mack murmurs, sounding unconvinced. He looks at George. “How’s the wife doing, anyway?”

“About the same,” George says. “She has good days and bad days.”

“Yeah, don’t we all,” Mack says.

Mack starts to leave, then pauses. He reaches into his pocket, pulls out a crumpled green bill, and presses it into George’s hand.

“Here,” Mack says with a shrug. “Buy the kid some more crayons.”

Mack is already out the door before George can yell “Thanks.”

Not Sleepy

“Stella,” I say after Julia and her father go home. “I can’t sleep.”

“Of course you can,” she says. “You are the king of sleepers.”

“Shh,” Bob says from his perch on my belly. “I’m dreaming about chilli fries.”

“I’m tired,” I say, “but I’m not sleepy.”

“What are you tired of?” Stella asks.

I think for a while. It’s hard to put into words. Gorillas are not complainers. We’re dreamers, poets, philosophers, nap takers.

“I don’t know exactly.” I kick at my tyre swing. “I think I may be a little tired of my domain.”

“That’s because it’s a cage,” Bob tells me.

Bob is not always tactful.

“I know,” Stella says gently. “It’s a very small domain.”

“And you’re a very big gorilla,” Bob adds.

“Stella?” I ask.

“Yes?”

“I noticed you were limping more than usual today. Is your leg bothering you?”

“Just a little,” Stella answers.

I sigh. Bob resettles. His ears flick. He drools a bit, but I don’t mind. I’m used to it.

“Try eating something,” Stella says. “That always makes you happy.”

I eat an old, brown carrot. It doesn’t help, but I don’t tell Stella. She needs to sleep.

“You could try remembering a good day,” Stella suggests. “That’s what I do when I can’t sleep.”

Stella remembers every moment since she was born: every scent, every sunset, every slight, every victory.

“You know I can’t remember much,” I say.

“There’s a difference,” Stella says gently, “between ‘can’t remember’ and ‘won’t remember’.”

“That’s true,” I admit. Not remembering can be difficult, but I’ve had a lot of time to work on it.

“Memories are precious,” Stella adds. “They help tell us who we are. Try remembering all your keepers. You always liked Karl, the one with the harmonica.”

Karl. Yes. I remember how he gave me a coconut when I was still a juvenile. It took me all day to open it.

I try to recall other keepers I have known – the humans who cleaned my domain and prepared my food and sometimes kept me company. There was Juan, who poured Pepsis into my waiting mouth, and Katrina, who used to poke me with a broom when I was sleeping, and Ellen, who sang “How Much is That Monkey in the Window?” with a wistful smile while she scrubbed my water bowl.

And there was Gerald, who once brought me a pack of fat, bright crayons and a luscious pad of thick paper.

Gerald was my favourite keeper.

But mostly it’s Mack I recall, day in and day out, year after year after year. Mack, who bought me and raised me and says I’m no longer cute.

As if a silverback could ever be cute.

Moonlight falls on the frozen carousel, on the silent popcorn stand, on the stall of leather belts that smell like long-gone cows.

The heavy work of Stella’s breathing sounds like the wind in trees, and I wait for sleep to find me.

The Beetle

Mack gives me a new black crayon and a fresh pile of paper. It’s time to work again.

I smell the crayon, roll it in my hands, press the sharp point against my palm.

There’s nothing I love more than a new crayon.

I search my domain for something to draw. What is black?

An old banana peel would work, but I’ve eaten them all.

Not-Tag is brown. My little pool is blue. The yogurt raisin I’m saving for this afternoon is white, at least on the outside.

Something moves in the corner.

I have a visitor!

A shiny beetle has stopped by. Bugs often wander through my domain on their way to somewhere else.

“Hello, beetle,” I say.

He freezes, silent. Bugs never want to chat.

The beetle’s an attractive bug, with a body like a glossy nut. He’s black as a starless night.

That’s it! I’ll draw him.

It’s hard, making a picture of something new. I don’t get the chance that often.

But I try. I look at the beetle, who’s being kind enough not to move, then back at my paper. I draw his body, his legs, his little antennae, his sour expression.

I’m lucky. The beetle stays all day. Usually bugs don’t linger when they visit. I’m beginning to wonder if he’s feeling all right.

Bob, who’s been known to munch on bugs from time to time, offers to eat him.

I tell Bob that won’t be necessary.

I’m just finishing my last picture when Mack returns. George and Julia are with him.

Mack enters my domain and picks up a drawing. “What the heck is this?” he asks. “Beats me what Ivan thinks he’s drawing. This is a picture of nothing. A big, black nothing.”

Julia’s standing just outside of my domain. “Can I see?” she asks.

Mack holds my picture up to the window. Julia tilts her head. She squeezes one eye shut. Then she opens her eye and scans my domain.

“I know!” she exclaims. “It’s a beetle! See that beetle over there by Ivan’s pool?”

“Man, I just sprayed this place for bugs.” Mack walks over to the beetle and lifts his foot, preparing to stomp.

Before Mack can lower his foot, the beetle skitters away, disappearing through a crack in the wall.

Mack turns back to my paintings. “So you figure this is a beetle, huh? If you say so, kid.”

“Oh, that’s a beetle for sure,” Julia says, smiling at me. “I know a beetle when I see one.”

It’s nice, I think, having a fellow artist around.

Change

Stella is the first to notice the change, but soon we all feel it.

A new animal is coming to the Big Top Mall.

How do we know this? Because we listen, we watch, and most of all, we sniff the air.

Humans always smell odd when change is in the air.

Like rotten meat, with a hint of papaya.

Guessing

Bob fears our new neighbour will be a giant cat with slitted eyes and a coiled tail. But Stella says a truck will arrive this afternoon carrying a baby elephant.

“How do you know?” I ask. I sample the air, but all I smell is caramel corn.

I love caramel corn.

“I can hear her,” Stella says. “She’s crying for her mother.”

I listen. I hear the cars charging past. I hear the snore of the sun bears in their wire domain.

But I don’t hear any elephants.

“You’re just hoping,” I say.

Stella closes her eyes. “No,” she says softly, “not hoping. Not at all.”

Jambo

My TV is off, so while we wait for the new neighbour, I ask Stella to tell us a story.

Stella rubs her right front foot against the wall. Her foot is swollen again, an ugly deep red.

“If you’re not feeling well, Stella,” I say, “you could take a nap and tell us a story later.”

“I’m fine,” she says, and she carefully shifts her weight.

“Tell us the Jambo story,” I say. It’s a favourite of mine, but I don’t think Bob has ever heard it.

Because she remembers everything, Stella knows many stories. I like colourful tales with black beginnings and stormy middles and cloudless blue-sky endings. But any story will do.

I’m not in a position to be picky.

“Once upon a time,” Stella begins, “there was a human boy. He was visiting a gorilla family at a place called a zoo.”

“What’s a zoo?” Bob asks. He’s a street-smart dog, but there’s much he hasn’t seen.

“A good zoo,” Stella says, “is a large domain. A wild cage. A safe place to be. It has room to roam and humans who don’t hurt.” She pauses, considering her words. “A good zoo is how humans make amends.”

Stella moves a bit, groaning softly. “The boy stood on a wall,” she continues, “watching, pointing, but he lost his balance and fell into the wild cage.”

“Humans are clumsy,” I interrupt. “If only they would knuckle walk, they wouldn’t topple so often.”

Stella nods. “A good point, Ivan. In any case, the boy lay in a motionless heap, while the humans gasped and cried. The silverback, whose name was Jambo, examined the boy, as was his duty, while his troop watched from a safe distance.

“Jambo stroked the child gently. He smelled the boy’s pain, and then he stood watch.

“When the boy awoke, his humans cried out, ‘Stay still! Don’t move!’ because they were certain – humans are always certain about things – that Jambo would crush the boy’s life from him.

“The boy moaned. The crowd waited, hushed, expecting the worst.

“Jambo led his troop away.

“Men came down on ropes and whisked the child to waiting arms.”

“Was the boy all right?” Bob asks.

“He wasn’t hurt,” Stella says, “although I wouldn’t be surprised if his parents hugged him many times that night, in between their scoldings.”

Bob, who had been chewing his tail, pauses, tilting his head. “Is that a true story?”

“I always tell the truth,” Stella replies. “Although I sometimes confuse the facts.”

Lucky

I’ve heard the Jambo story many times. Stella says that humans found it odd that the huge silverback didn’t kill the boy.

Why, I wonder, was that so surprising? The boy was young, scared, alone.

He was, after all, just another great ape.

Bob nudges me with his cold nose. “Ivan,” he says, “why aren’t you and Stella in a zoo?”

I look at Stella. She looks at me. She smiles sadly with her eyes, just a little, the way only elephants can do.

“Just lucky, I guess,” she says.

Arrival

The new neighbour arrives after the four o’clock show.

When the truck comes lumbering towards the parking lot, Bob scampers over to inform us.

Bob always knows what’s happening. He’s a useful friend to have, especially when you can’t leave your domain.

With a groan, Mack lifts the sliding metal door near the food court, the place where deliveries are made.

A big white truck is backing up to the door, belching smoke. When the driver opens the truck, I know that Stella is right.

A baby elephant is inside. I see her trunk, poking out from the blackness.

I’m glad for Stella. But when I glance at her, I see she is not glad at all.

“Stand back, everyone!” Mack yells. “We’ve got a new arrival. This is Ruby, folks. Three hundred pounds of fun to save our sorry butts. This gal is gonna sell us some tickets.”

Mack and two men climb into the black cave of the truck. We hear noise, scuffling, a word Mack uses when he’s angry.

Ruby makes a noise too, like one of the little trumpets they sell at the gift store.

“Move,” Mack says, but still there is no Ruby. “Move,” he says again. “We haven’t got all day.”

Inside her domain, Stella paces as much as she’s able: two steps one way, two steps the other. She slaps her trunk against rusty metal bars. She grumbles. “Stella,” I ask, “did you hear the baby?”

Stella mutters something under her breath, a word she uses when she’s angry.

“Relax, Stella,” I say. “It will be OK.”

“Ivan,” Stella says, “it will never, ever be OK,” and I know enough to stop talking.

Stella Helps

The men are still yelling. Some of the yelling is at each other, but most of it is at Ruby.

We hear scrambling, pounding, shifting. The side of the truck shudders.

“I’m starting to like this elephant,” Bob whispers.

“I’m getting the big one,” Mack says. “Maybe she can coax the stupid brat out of the truck.”

Mack opens Stella’s door. “Come on, girl,” he urges. He unties the rope attached to the floor bolt.

Stella pushes past Mack, nearly knocking him down. She rushes as best she can, limping heavily, toward the open back door of the truck. She catches her swollen foot on the edge of the ramp and winces. Blood trickles down.

Halfway up the ramp she pauses. The noise in the truck stops. Ruby falls silent.

Slowly Stella makes her way up the rest of the ramp. It groans under her weight, and I can tell how much she is hurting by the awkward way she moves.

At the top of the incline she stops. She pokes her trunk into the emptiness.

We wait.

A tiny grey trunk appears. Shyly it reaches out, tasting the air. Stella curls her own trunk around the baby’s. They make soft rumbling sounds.

We wait some more. A hush falls over the entire Big Top Mall.

Thump. Thump. Step, step, pause. Step, step, pause.

And there she is, so small she can fit underneath Stella with room to spare. Her skin sags and she sways unsteadily as she makes her way down the ramp.

“Not the greatest specimen,” Mack says, “but I got her cheap from this bankrupt circus out west. They had her shipped over from Africa. Only had her a month before they went bust.” He gestures toward Ruby. “Thing is, people love babies. Baby elephants, baby gorillas, heck, give me a baby alligator and I could make a killing.”

Stella ushers Ruby towards her domain. Mack and the two men follow. At Stella’s door, Ruby hesitates.