How it Is
Well I whistled as the wolf went down down in the water, and also I laughed. Right out loud.
Like I used to laugh, when I played games with my dad in the forest. I haven’t laughed like that for a long time. He would carry me on his back through the trees, swaying to and fro like a monster out hunting. Those were my favourite times. Afterwards, we would go home and watch Monty Python on the sofa.
When I saw the wolf sink, I felt the same wild feeling in my guts, so I laughed. I clasped my hand over my mouth quickly, to stop the sound from coming out. But it escaped anyhow.
I saw him walk heavy to the water, the wolf. His grey fur striped with tree shadows as he staggered confused to the lake. I knew. And I think the birds did too, because they went quiet and hid high up in the trees. On the top-most branches. The Greenfinches, the Linnets, the Tree Creepers, the Wood Peckers and the Jays. They too watched. From the top of everything.
I knew what would happen, because I put the rocks inside of him, of course. One by one.
Go and find rocks, was what the man said after he slit the wolf’s belly open and saved me. The best ones. The heaviest.
And I went, I flew. Through the trees, deep deep to the dark patches of the forest. I pretended I was Katniss Everdeen, in the Hunger Games. Fierce like a warrior princess, you know, that kind of thing. It was fun.
I brought them back, so heavy. And I put them in one after the other. A whole pile. In the space where I was.
Go on – the man said. We are tricking him. This how it is. Revenge is putting more stones in. So I did. Right full to bursting. I knew I would laugh when he fell right in.
Before, when the wolf offered me his paw, and then his big eyes and then his sharp teeth, I was gone.
Now I whistle as he drowns.
I look at the man. He is watching me and his eyes are dark and narrow.
I smile at him. I wonder if he is angry at me for whistling on such a serious occasion. I try not to make any more noise and not to fidget, even though, I am a little bored by now.
We watch solemnly together as the water goes blank and steady.
This is how it is to be saved.
Catherine Taylor is currently working for an international development charity in the foothills of the Himalayas in Nepal, living in a house which is made of mud and watched by snow capped mountains. Previously she has worked in Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Kenya.