The Green Place [Short Story]

I never asked for this.

I never asked for them to stand up there on their little walls, pointing and gawking and shouting all day.

I’ve never known anything else. I have been here for as long as I can remember, surrounded by concrete and glass and poor excuses for trees. I know there must be something else though. I see it almost every night in my dreams.

I’ve named it the green place, because there isn’t really a better way to describe it. Everywhere you look, you see the deepest green you’ve ever seen in your life. Trees filled with fruit, their branches stretching halfway to the clouds. Soil so rich and fresh you can smell it. And in the soil, flowers. Seeds. Insects. Real food. And other chimpanzees. Just like me and my family, but wild. Living like they’re meant to live. Free.

I’m going there. I’m going to find the green place. I’ve been trying to figure it out my whole life, but the humans designed their prison well. Standing between me and freedom is some kind of artificial river, sitting low beneath its concrete banks. Beyond the river, a short wall, rough and sturdy and impossible to hang on to. The guardrails on top of the wall look easy enough to climb, but there’s no way to get to them. Even the trees are too far from the wall to be any good for jumping.

Until now. They praise our intelligence, then mock us by locking us away. I may not be able to escape on my own, but I’m smart enough to take advantage of last night’s storm. The wind howled for hours, catching the trees and ripping at their branches. No trunks broke, but upon inspection I discovered that the roots of one particular tree lost their hold in the earth. The tree is still standing, but its roots poke out of the dirt now, and it’s ready to be used for an escape. It’s a tall, thin sort of tree, leaning at an awkward angle and pointing directly at the wall that keeps me in here.

Climbing comes naturally. It’s rooted deep in my instincts, older than me or the walls around me. I leap the first four feet up the trunk, wrap a hand around the back side. Walk up the smooth surface, hand over hand and foot over foot. The first branch is at a point over three times my height, but I’m there within seconds. A few more seconds and I’m close to the top of the tree, which is already swaying under my weight. I pause to adjust my grip, and then swing outward as hard as I can without letting go. Far below, the subtle sound of shifting earth tells me I’m on to something, and I can hardly contain my excitement. My plan is going to work. I’m going to be free!

I swing again, throwing all of my weight in the direction of the tree’s lean. Then I listen. It’s easy to form a rhythm. Swing. Listen. Adjust. Swing. Listen. Scramble down the trunk as roots erupt from the earth and the branches fall away. Nearly slip, leap for the safety of a nearby tree at the last possible moment. Watch in horror as the branch I reached for slips out of my grasp. Miss the sound of the tree crashing into the ground because all I can hear is my own impact.

Groan. Struggle to rise, slip back into the dirt. Rise again. There’s no time to waste. It’s inevitable for humans to be watching in the middle of the day, and I can’t risk any of them noticing.

The tree is completely uprooted, just like I hoped. What used to be the highest branches now dangle over the river at the edge of my enclosure. I run alongside the tree, only pausing for a moment to grab the highest branch and drag it with me. When shallow water splashes around my ankles, I turn to give the tree another yank. The first branches dip gingerly into the water, leaving little ripples that are quickly crushed by the rest of the tree.

Humans point and shout up above, but that isn’t terribly out of the ordinary. I ignore them, dragging the tree until my back hits the wall. Time for the hard part. Standing on only two legs, I heave the top of the tree over my head until it rests against the wall, then slide it forward. Keeping it balanced is difficult, but the lifting part isn’t so bad. Branches scrape up the wall in little leaps and lurches, each push getting me closer to freedom. A branch finally catches on the guardrails at the top of the wall, holding the tree in place. Perfect.

I wrap my arms around the trunk and swing onto my makeshift ladder. I need to hurry. By now, the humans will have figured out what I’m doing, and someone will inevitably try to keep me inside. As if on cue, one of them starts screaming before I’m even halfway up.

The steel guardrail nearly burns my hand, but I force myself to hold on, to touch it with my other hand and then with my feet. All of the humans are screaming now, running backwards and yanking their children out of strollers and still pointing. Why are they screaming? The noise nearly sends me into a panic. I take off along the guardrail, leap over the sidewalk and onto a park bench. More screaming. Into a tree hanging over the bench, which blocks out some of the noise.

The realization of what I’ve accomplished finally dawns on me. I made it over the wall! I’m free! I leap to the edge of the tree and call out, urging my family to join me. We can get over the wall! We’re free!

I’m not sure if anyone hears me over the humans’ grating voices, but there’s no time to find out. A strange little vehicle screeches to a halt under my tree, and two men climb out. I recognize the first one as one of my keepers. He shouts at the other humans, who respond by backing away. His partner pulls some strange looking human tool from the vehicle, and then they both gaze up into the tree. They can only be looking for one thing.

How did they find out so quickly? No matter. It’s time to go if I ever want to make it to the green place. I scramble up a tree branch and leap to another tree. By the time the humans even realize I’ve left the first tree, I’m sliding down the trunk of a third. My feet slam into the pavement. I sprint down the sidewalk, dodging screaming humans who seem incapable of doing much besides pointing and shouting and tripping over each other. The noise grates against my skull, and I finally panic. Too much noise, too many colors. Screaming humans and their long legs all around. Off to the left, a child flings popcorn at me before being rushed away by her mother. I need to get away. Back into the high places, where humans never go.

I vault over another bench and onto the nearest high thing—a metal statue of a giraffe. The giraffe’s back is even hotter than the guardrail, so hot that I nearly jump back off again. I don’t though. Instead, I haul myself up the statue’s neck and leap from his head to the safety of another tree.

The keepers aren’t far behind, and I glance back just in time to see one of them aim the strange tool at me. A dart tears through the leaves to my left, only barely missing my arm. An involuntary scream escapes my throat. What was that? I need to get out of here, somewhere they can’t follow me. Just on the other side of the tree sits a building with a high roof. Humans are terrible climbers, so I know I’ll be free if I can just make it there.

I don’t even have to think. My body knows what to do. My arm stretches, grabs, releases, and flings me forward. My feet kick out, touch down on a knotted branch for less than a heartbeat, and then launch me out of the tree. At just the right moment, my fingers wrap around the edge of the roof, and in two more heartbeats I’m on top of the building. Without missing a step, I fling myself onto another roof and drop to all fours to increase my speed. I’m going to make it! I don’t even know which direction the green place is, but I know it isn’t here. And as soon as I get away, no one can stop me from finding it.

“Cheeeerrrryyy!”

The name the humans gave me. I slow to a halt and look back. One of the keepers, the one I actually like, is standing on the roof I just jumped from. The man who shot at me joins her, still wielding his dart gun. The sight of the gun makes me nervous, and I back away until the keeper pulls something from her pocket.

Chocolate. My favorite treat. I’ve only had it a few times before, but it’s been wonderful every time.

“Hey Cherry. You want some chocolate, buddy? You have to come over here to get it, okay?”

Maybe just a few bites. It could be a long way to the green place anyway. Warily, I creep back to the edge of the roof, eyeing the chocolate the whole time.

A dart rockets out of the gun, burying itself deep in my shoulder. Pain shoots down my arm, and I stagger back. I’ve been betrayed! They’re trying to keep me from reaching the green place! I scream at the humans, rip the dart out, and chuck it back at them. They can’t stop me. I turn and race across the roof, leaping onto a chain link fence that towers over everything else. The fence is easy to climb, and on the other side waits a whole field of cars crouching in their spaces. I’ve never seen this before, which means I’m exactly one step closer to finding the green place.

The humans won’t ever be able to catch me here! I slide down the fence, sprint between the first rows of cars, up and over the hood of a truck, and slide between a couple of bumpers. Then I pause for a moment to catch my breath.

This should be easy, but I’m suddenly so tired I think I could fall asleep right here if I tried. Why am I so tired? I continue to work my way through the cars, but much more slowly to conserve my energy for the journey. I nearly slip off of the hood of a red sedan, but shake myself awake and leap onto another car. I’m only a few cars away from the end of the lot, but my vision blurs before I reach the safety of the ground again. My limbs feel impossibly heavy, even after sliding back down the pavement. Running is impossible. I sink to the ground, fighting to keep myself up with every inch that I drop. My eyes shut against my will, and suddenly I’m not worried about that at all. My mind is too foggy to worry.

Human voices approach, but they sound distant and fuzzy. The sound of human footsteps grows, then fades again as my hearing shuts down.

I know on some level that I’ve failed. The humans will find me, and I’ll wake up back in a cage. But a gentle breeze brushes across my fur, and the pavement under my back is suddenly soft and lush. My eyes are closed, but I just know the trees are there, full of fruit and stretching halfway to the clouds. My family is close by, and I’m overjoyed that they decided to join me, so glad I could show them the way. The green place is perfect. It looks exactly like it always does in my dreams.

And in that last delirious moment before sleep, I really believe that maybe, just maybe, I made it. That finally, I’m free.

#shortstory #zoos #captivity #chimpanzee #monkeys