Miracles and Meerkats

Excerpt from Men and Beasts and Gods

an unpublished novel by James Callan

It is always with the meerkats, usually when I collect the scattered clusters of their little raisin shits, early in the morning before the zoo opens, that I ask myself the same question, day in and day out: how much longer will I continue to work at this dismal zoo? Nothing against the meerkats. It’s not a question provoked by their presence, or even their little raisin shits. It’s just the timing. Early morning. The uplifting effect of coffee having already worn off. It’s performing a task, the same as the day before, an activity that signifies another start to a new day. Not exactly a miserable task, or even mildly bad, just mundane, repetitive. So very fucking repetitive.

The meerkat enclosure is even higher up on the hill than the chimps’. It’s at the very top of the zoo. I pause from gathering up the bitty turds strewn in the sand and gaze out over the city, layer upon layer of lofty glass towers reflecting early morning sunshine. I consider all the offices and shops, the restaurants and hotels, motels, movie theaters, barbers, bars, and petrol stations. I think of hospitals and universities and governmental buildings, of cathedrals and churches and mosques. I envision each taxi, each bus, each subway, each city commuter, collectively, like a hive of ants, a neat trail, trickling down the urban roadways that are chaotic and orderly all at once. I think of all the many jobs available, the diversity of modes of living. I think of all the countless avenues life may lead a person, the unsavory path which fate has funneled me down, ushering me here, to this faux Kalahari stretch of sand, this imitation Namib desert, this windswept patch high up on a hill that looks out across one million different ways of living.

Then I look back down to the sand. I resume my tidy gathering of sprinkled raisin shits. I continue my mundane task and get on with the day. Another fucking day.

Meerkats scurry energetically at my ankles, weaving around each one of my steps. More ADHD toddlers -- no shortage of those here at the zoo. They dart about, spasmodic, a mob of tweaked-out cokeheads. Meanwhile, one or two designated sentries remain sober, scan the horizon, gaze up into the wide open sky, and watch for predators, ready to alert the others should they note a low-flying hawk or a moronic dad who lowers his little boy down to the sand to join them.

At the far corner of the enclosure I timidly skirt Spike Lee, an African crested porcupine. He’s a bit of an ornery bastard so when I get close he shakes his many thousands of quills at me. I respect his need for space, or, more accurately, I don’t give a damn about his need for space, but I’m not about to go anywhere near those foot-long, hollow spears that cover his body. The meerkats, however, are bold as hell around their roommate, the comparative giant who is a veritable walking contingent of javelineers. Seemingly unimpressed with, unconcerned about, all those sharp quills, the mob of meerkats get all up in Spike Lee’s business. They swarm around him like flies on shit, the paparazzi on Kim Kardashian, or, to a lesser extent, the paparazzi on Spike Lee.

Over two feet long, Mr. Lee showcases the prominent size of his species, the largest of all porcupines and one of the largest of all rodents. His mate, Ala, hardly ever leaves her small den, possibly antisocial or stressed, flustered by the paparazzi meerkats crowding at her door even as human gawkers snap photos through the glass window of her not-so-private cave. Then again, perhaps the prospect of being fucked by Spike Lee is what sways her to seclusion. It is what the zoo is hopeful for. Baby animals bring visitors.

I edge too close, leaning in to gather more Milk Duds and chocolate-covered raisins. Spike Lee vigorously shakes his booty, he twirks in my direction. I recoil as his dense population of quills rattle like cheerleader pompoms. How anything, including a female African crested porcupine, could fuck something so densely covered in protruding spears is beyond my comprehension. I look to Ala, named after the Odinani goddess of earth and fertility. Here at the zoo, it is her assigned station to be fertile, even amongst the barren sands of her overcrowded enclosure. Ala is also the ruler of the underworld, which adequately explains her propensity for cave dwelling.

Up until this point, the goddess of fertility remains motherless, not yet becoming pregnant. Maybe Spike Lee is shooting blanks. Maybe his penis has been lost in a sea of spears. Maybe the meerkats worship Ala, and that is why they crowd the entrance to her den. Perhaps they chitter devotions to her as they deposit those Milk Duds and raisins. It would explain their prolific, routine pregnancies, which in turn explains the zoo’s routine, systematic culling of their mob. Culling, a fancy word for murder.

It seems all those prayers to the goddess of fertility have paid off. Meerkat pups are everywhere. It would seem the mob pays for life with life. Their devotions to Ala may beget sons and daughters, but for each new infant brought into the world, an elder must make its exit. The goddess of fertility is also the ruler of the underworld. She gives life. Perhaps she also takes it. One thing remains clear; meerkat pups are everywhere.

At first they remain in their dens, nursing in safety and keeping warm. After about two or three weeks they emerge and begin to forage. The meerkat mob looks after the young, each member involved in their care. They are devoted to each other, ordered, and vigilant. I watch them scurry around in fast forward, a functioning commune of cokeheads. I can’t help but smile, forgetting to ask myself that familiar question: how much longer will I continue to work at this dismal zoo?

Perhaps a fair bit longer.

***

“Bravo-2 to Kilo-5.”

“Kilo-5, go ahead.” My words come out, a spectral mist, vapor in the late autumn cold.

“I’ve just walked past the meerkats. One of the pups wandered out of the den it would seem. Dead, I’m afraid. Got too cold.”

Ala, it is said, holds the souls of the dead in her womb.

“Roger that, Bravo-2. That’s a shame. I’ll head up the hill now.”

“I’ve set the little guy in the enrichment closet for you. On the shelf.”

“Thanks, Bravo-2.”

“Sorry for your loss, Kilo-5.”

Bravo-2 is a good guy. Kind and a natural leader, he offers help but doesn’t step on any toes. He would make an ideal boss, a shining embodiment of Alpha-1. Paul, by contrast, is scum and can’t tell a good joke. But that’s neither here nor there.

On my way up the hill the chimps eye me with faces far too human for my liking. The slightest use of imagination and I am transported to Mordor. I look upon goblins and orcs, monsters at play in a shit-smeared rumpus room. I look down upon the large rocks and moat below where Mel presently fishes out a squirrel or maybe a baby racoon, something, in any case, bent into geometric complexity, bones and all. She looks up at me, offers a knowing, sad smile. She has heard over the radio, just as all the keepers have. It is known, I march up the hill to collect the dead.

I summit the hill and survey the meerkat mob, coke addicts all -- and they’ve just had a good fix. They run and play and chitter and abuse Spike Lee and pray aggressively to Ala. The remaining pups play and nurse, nibble at each other, and sleep. All around them an active community happily goes about its day. Minutes ago, an infant son lay dead in the sand. Now, all is well.

Nature is cruel, but it sure comes with an ability to cope. Meerkats will defend their pups with their lives, yet do not mourn for them when they are lost. Few animals seem to, and those that do don’t linger on it. Not like men do. Or so it certainly seems. For each creature, its own umwelt, its own unique perspective of the world experienced through its species’ lens. As a human, I witness meerkats and see cocaine addicts and commune living, a disconnect with sorrow, but a very deep connection to life, to preservation. What do I know? My own umwelt is uniquely mine, and I’m no expert.

Maybe it’s what I had for breakfast, but my mind goes to far off places. I consider the notion that the world, existence itself, is shaped in each mind a different way, radiating a different hue, with various, contradicting “truths” that are only actually truths to one’s own perspective, in one’s own mind. It all has me thinking, prompting me to explore with serious consideration the Hindu concept of maya, a philosophy that states the world is illusory. Maybe I should ask Shiva, the red panda, or his mate, Pavarti. Perhaps they could impart their wisdom, share their own unique umwelt. Come to think of it, many Buddhists adhere to the concept of maya as well. I could pick Rajah’s brain. A penny for his thoughts, or maybe some obliterated horse meat from Thailand. But since I’m here already, I’ll see what Ala thinks. I’ll get a good take from the Odinani perspective, the porcupine umwelt.

I leave the mob to their own frenzied devices. I enter the enrichment closet and at once see the dead pup stretched out on the wooden shelf. It is no larger than a fun-sized candy bar, a miniature Snickers or Baby Ruth. It is cold to the touch and fixed rigid in the position it lies. Rigor mortis. This tells me the pup has been dead for at least a little while before discovered by Bravo-2.

I examine the cute corpse, neither more nor less precious than one of those frozen baby chicks, nor, if I am being extremely diplomatic, one of the ice-cubed pilchards. Yet holding the tiny pup in my hand, witnessing its apparent happiness and health a handful of hours ago, I feel a depth of sorrow the goes beyond tossing a rejected male chick into a plastic bucket. Nature is cruel. Man is cruel. In my current state of sorrow, I set aside all professional tact. I get ideas. I attempt to buck nature. I aim to cheat death.

I take my pup -- yes, my pup -- to the staff bathroom. On the way, off display, I see the Servals, or I see Kijana, anyhow, as Princess Jasmine remains in her dark chamber of ammonia and skeletal remains. Kijana crashes against the mesh to get to me. He eyes the dead pup in my hand believing it to be his meal. “Not for you, friend,” I tell him. “Chicks and pilchards soon.” He hisses at me and sprays a laser beam of urine through the mesh to tally my trousers at the knee.

In the bathroom, I activate one of the hand dryers and hold out the cold meerkat corpse a modest distance under its stream of hot breath. I repeat this three or four times. I am careful with the pup’s body, sure to only warm it, not scorch it. I rub it a little, and perhaps against good hygienic practice, I kiss it on the top of its head. He feels warmer, but remains stiff. He? I’ve no clue if it’s a boy, but in my mind, my umwelt, I perceive a male.

For good measure, I place the pup under one last stream of hot air. Then perhaps for luck, I breathe my own hot breath down upon the infantile mongoose body. I breathe out the word upon that cute nugget of death: live. My act is symbolic, almost wholly, but not at all holy, a ritual to send off the dead into the next realm, with but a tiny shred of hope to resurrect a corpse for a second chance in this illusory world, a sequel to that little thing we call life.

I bring the pup, still dead, to the vets, who much more than any zookeeper are cold and unfeeling towards animal life. There is but one among them who has any bedside manner, who shows compassion for her patients, and she happens to be the prettiest, by far, which is beside the point, but my umwelt sees her as a little sexy which only makes the comparison between her and the other veterinarians all the more glaring. They are all good at their jobs, in a medical, fix-you-up sort of way. Don’t get me wrong. But only Baukje, the Dutch beauty, demonstrates that she cares one iota. Remember, these are the ones that administer the euthanasia. These guys pull the plug on a lot of the healthy ones. Sure, it may not be their call most of the time, but their calloused hearts sure don’t skip a beat when it comes time to murder for the benefit of the animal.

Baukje smiles, both sad and reassuring, as she takes the dead meerkat pup from my grasp. Our hands touch, and in this moment I fall in love. I’ve done it again. She takes the pup, ever so gentle, and rubs it, lengthwise, down its body. The other vet staff cross their arms, scowl, hold the needle at the ready, forgetting the animal is already dead. Baukje dons a stethoscope. She becomes the first woman in history to make a stethoscope look sexy. She places the cold metal on the cold corpse and waits. Waits some more. Then smiles. Her smile is beautiful, like her, and so are the words that escape her soft, delicious lips.

“He’s alive,” she says.

“He?” I ask.

“A male, yes.”

“Like me,” I remind her.

Baukje smiles. The others scowl, set down their needles, wait for the next chance to be the one to play god.

After some fluids and a little more rubbing the little pup is crawling around like the rest of its cokehead brethren. Baukje hands me the meerkat and when our hands touch again I feel as if I too, like the meerkat baby, have been resurrected. I didn’t die, but part of me felt dead. In this instant, I am fully alive. It is a miracle. Baukje is the goddess of fertility, the bringer of life.

I return the meerkat pup to its family, who are unfazed by the fact that their dead child lives yet again. Miracles are cheap. Their unique umwelt.

I watch the small pup waddle across the sand. I watch him re-enter the den. Through the glass window on the other side I witness him reconnect with his mother. She is casual, expectant. She bares her front side and allows him to nurse. He drinks and fills his belly. Then warm and well fed, he nuzzles to sleep. He sleeps like a baby, like a log, like a rock.

He sleeps just like the dead.

***

James Callan grew up in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He lives on the Kāpiti Coast, New Zealand on a small farm with his wife, Rachel, and his little boy, Finn. His writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Bridge Eight, White Wall Review, Beyond Queer Words, Millennial Pulp Magazine and elsewhere. His novel, A Transcendental Habit, is in the early stages of publication with Queer Space, an imprint of Rebel Satori Press.
jamescallanauthor.com