Gorilla

“What happened? Where am I?”

Ohhh. Heeeeey, buddy. How ya doing, Harambe? Feelin’ all right?

“Don’t patronize me.”

Sorry. Yeah, uh: you’re at a farm upstate with other gorillas to play with and, uh, there you go.

…

“Am I dead?”

Yeah.

“Goddammit. Y’know, I knew I shouldn’t have touched that kid. Me and my ideas, Mr. Smarty-No-Pants. Well: look where thinking got me.”

Idea? What idea? It looked like you were gonna kill him.

“What!? No! I wasn’t going to hurt him at all.”

Yeah?

“I was going to Tarzan him.”

Ah.

“Teach him gorilla stuff: swinging on vines, and yodeling, and getting in adventures. He was going to be the King of the Jungle.”

You were in a zoo.

“King of the Zoo, whatever.”

You sure you weren’t gonna eat him?

“Well, if he didn’t take to the Tarzan training, yeah. But I was not at that moment about to eat him.”

I believe you.

“Fat lot of good that does me.”

Sadly, yeah.

“Sniper?”

Sniper.

“Bradley Cooper?”

Nah. Just some guy. Zookeeper that used to be a Marine, probably.

“Wow.”

Sorry.

“I’m just going to miss Cincinnati.”

Really?

“Of course not, jackass. I’m a gorilla. I shouldn’t be in fucking Cincinnati.”

You’d rather be back home?

“Oh, sure: get stared at by white ladies in cargo shorts, then poached and sold as bush meat.”

Humans are awful.

“And yet: I was going to Tarzan one of you. That’s a great honor among my kind; it’s like the Key to the City.”

Is there an actual key?

“No. I’m a gorilla.”

Right.

“I could probably learn to work a key, but I wouldn’t truly get the concept.”

The lock and its cultural context.

“Yeah, plus I don’t have pockets, so I would have nowhere to keep a key.”

That, too. So, how is it in there?

“Anthropomorphized Murdered Animal Heaven? It’s not bad. That lion with the wussy name is here.”

Cecil.

“That’s him. Bitter dude.”

Got skinned by a dentist.

…

“I did not know that.”

Dude’s been through some shit.

“Wow, yeah. That killer whale is here.”

Tilikum?

“If you say so. I don’t speak whale.”

He’s not dead yet.

“Close enough.”

Yeah, I guess.

“Shitload of racehorses. I’ve been riding them and throwing nets on stuff.”

That’s a fun afternoon.

“Bucket list. This is better, honestly. There’s a ton of gorillas here. Bunch of chimps. Not a fan.”

No?

“Mean little fuckers. No chill. And liars. Two of them told me they were astronauts.”

Were their names Ham and Enos?

“How’d you know that?”

Because they were astronauts.

“Huh. Well. Ah, fuck ’em. Chimps. They’re just little gorillas.”

They are absolutely not.

“Pretty sure.”

Listen Harambe: I gotta run. Real sorry about this.

“Uh-huh. By ‘this’ do you mean treating me like an object to be gawked at, and then shooting me in the head?”

…

Yeah, that.

“Okay. Just making sure.”