Day 70: Future Hopes

Gabu returned in the early hours of the morning. Mei, who was usually asleep by this time, had stayed awake to welcome him back and ask how the hunting trip had gone.

“It went well,” Gabu said, visibly exhausted. “Takkan met me outside the forest and said something like, ‘It seems you’ve had a pleasant night so far,’ and smiled at me.” Gabu grinned awkwardly. “I don’t know how he knew.”

Mei smiled back sleepily. “Did he tell you how to hunt randomly?”

“He took me to the middle of the forest and told me to walk in any direction until I reached the edge of the forest, counting how many tracks of prey I could find, but without actually hunting any of them. I counted ten, which he said was impressive since he only counted eight. I won’t have to do that bit again now that we know the answer is ten; Takkan said that was just to ‘calibrate’ it.

“When we were back in the middle of the forest, he told me to pick a leaf from a bush, let it fall to the ground, and look at which direction it’s pointing in. Then, I look up and count how many stars I can see through the treetops and clouds. If I count to ten, I have to start back over at one. Then, I walk in the direction the leaf was pointing until I’ve found the same number of tracks as there were stars, coming back the other way again if I don’t find enough tracks. That’s the track I’m allowed to follow, and I’m allowed to hunt any animals it leads me to.”

Mei had a hard time following all of that. “That sounds like quite a lot of work for you. Are you sure you want to do that every time you hunt?”

“It’s not too bad. Takkan says it will take me to a different part of the forest every night, and I won’t have to make any decisions about who I hunt. We can’t tell anyone the part about the stars, though.”

“Hmm, let me guess,” Mei said. “If they know that part, everyone will know to stay away from the middle of the forest on a cloudy night, right?”

Gabu smiled. “That’s exactly what Takkan said.”

Mei thought about this for a while. “I’ve got an idea. When you’re counting the stars, start from the number you counted to last time. Oh, and if you can’t see any stars, add three instead.”

“Will that make it more random?” Gabu asked.

“I think so, or more fair, at least. That way, you’ll only get the same number twice if there are exactly ten stars, which I doubt will happen very often, and you’ll spend about the same amount of time near the edges of the forest as you do in the middle.”

“I’ll do that instead, then. There were only two stars tonight.” They both turned to look out of the cave at the sky, growing brighter in the early morning light. “Last night, I mean.” Gabu yawned.

“It’s been a long day,” Mei said. “Let’s get some sleep. It’s a free day today, so we won’t miss anything.”

By midday, restlessness had overtaken Gabu and Mei’s desire to remain curled up together in a state of half sleep, half wakefulness. They got up, stretched, and looked out at the world. The forest was as alive as ever, with birds flying happily in the sky and squirrels scurrying throughout the trees.

“It’s a lovely day today,” Gabu said. “It would be a shame to spend all of it inside.”

“We haven’t visited Toto and Riri in a few days,” Mei said.

Gabu smiled. “We could go and see how their chick is doing.”

They left the cave and made their way through the forest towards the sparrows’ nest. As was now the norm, calls of “Gabu! Mei!” and “Oh my goodness, it’s them!” followed them wherever they went. Gabu smiled and nodded, and called out brief replies to anyone addressing him directly. Mei still found the attention a little overwhelming, and kept his head facing forward as he walked alongside Gabu.

When they arrived at the sparrows’ spruce tree, Mei called up a greeting. Three sparrow heads appeared over the side of the nest, Toto and Riri smiling down at them. Hikari looked a lot more grown up than last time they had seen him. His patchy grey and pink flesh was now almost entirely covered with a thin layer of brown feathers. Mei could see the resemblance to his parents.

“Gabu, Mei, so kind of you to visit,” Riri said. “Just give us a moment.” To Mei’s astonishment, Riri picked Hikari up in her talons and flew with him down to the ground, where she set him down gently. Toto followed shortly after. “That’s better. Now we can all talk without having to shout.”

“Hello,” Gabu said to the sparrow chick, lowering himself to the ground to be closer to him. Hikari stared up at him impassively.

“Say hello, Hikari,” Toto prompted. Hikari gave a half-hearted chip.

“This is Mei, and this is Gabu,” Riri said, pointing to each of them in turn. “Mei is a goat. They usually live in wide, open fields and eat grass. They go...” She looked at Mei expectantly.

“Meeeeeeei,” Mei bleated.

“Meh,” Hikari echoed inexpertly.

“Goats only eat plants,” Riri said, “so they’re safe if you stay away from their hooves. Show him your hooves, Mei.” Mei did so bemusedly. “Gabu is a wolf. They live in forests, fields and rocky mountains, and they eat other animals. Most wolves are dangerous, so you shouldn’t go near them unless you know they’re safe. Gabu is a friend, so he’s safe to be around. Isn’t that right, Gabu?”

“Of course,” Gabu said, “during the daytime, at least.” Riri gave him a glare that said very succinctly, “If you eat my child, daytime or not, I’m never speaking to you again.” He hastily said, “I mean, yes, I’m totally safe.”

“That’s right,” Riri said. “Now, you’ll know that there are wolves around when you hear this sound...” She looked at Gabu.

Gabu’s ears flattened and his eyes shifted from left to right self-consciously. “Awoo,” he said. It was the softest howl Mei had ever heard.

“You can do better than that,” Mei said with a grin.

“Awooooo,” Gabu howled a little louder.

“Whoo!” Hikari said, flapping his wings with excitement. Gabu’s eyes practically had hearts in them.

“He’s growing up fast, isn’t he?” Mei said.

“He’s about normal for a chick of his age,” Toto said. “It’ll be about a week before he’s able to fly, and another three or so weeks after that before he can fully take care of himself.”

“It’s been hard work looking after him,” Riri said. “But at least he can tell us what he wants now, can’t you?”

“Food! Food!” the chick said.

Toto laughed. “You had food an hour ago.”

“We could look after him for a while if you’d like,” Mei said. “It sounds like you could do with a rest.” Gabu nodded his head in agreement.

Toto and Riri exchanged a glance. “Actually, if you wouldn’t mind,” Toto said, “that would be a big help. What with one thing and another, we haven’t had any time to ourselves in quite a while. Are you sure you want to, though? Our little Hikari can be a bit of a wingful at times. You needn’t go to the trouble if you were only offering to be polite.”

“Aww,” Gabu said, “how much trouble could he be?” As someone who had been a troublesome kid himself, Mei could hazard a guess.

“You’ll be on your best behaviour for Gabu and Mei, won’t you, Hikari?” Riri said. “Now, let’s see, he won’t need feeding for another few hours, but if he gets thirsty, I’m sure you’ll be able to fetch some water from the river. Don’t leave him alone, especially while he’s down here on the ground. The only reason I’m letting him be down here is because you two are here; I wouldn’t risk it at all if it was just us protecting him. And above all else, don’t let any other—” she stopped herself, “...don’t let any predators eat him. Can you remember all that?”

“Water from the river if he’s thirsty, don’t leave him alone, don’t eat him,” Mei summarised. “Uh, don’t let anyone eat him, I mean. I think we’ve got all that.”

“And if anything seems to be wrong with him, just howl and we’ll come straight back,” Toto said.

“Of course,” Mei said. “You two enjoy yourselves.”

“Thanks so much for doing this,” Riri said.

“It’s the least we can do after all you’ve done to help us,” Gabu said.

“We’ll be back soon, Hikari. Be good!”

With that, Toto and Riri hopped into the air and flew off out of sight. Gabu and Mei were left with Hikari staring up at them inquisitively. They glanced at each other, both realising at the same time that they had no idea how to start a conversation with a child who was only a few days old. It didn’t seem like Hikari was about to break the ice either.

“So,” Gabu said after a while, “how much have your parents told you about us?”

Hikari was silent for several seconds. “Not much.”

They waited for the child to say more. When it became clear he wasn’t going to, Mei said, “Did they tell you that we came from far away, over the mountain?”

Hikari shook his head. He didn’t seem particularly interested. Remembering how disinterested he himself had been in adults’ personal lives when he was a kid, Mei decided to drop the subject.

“Do you know any songs?” Mei asked.

Hikari scrunched up his face in concentration, and then made a sequence of chirping sounds that went, “Cheep-cheep-cheeeeep, cheep-chchchch cheep-cheep.”

“I don’t think I know that one,” Gabu said. “Could you teach it to us?” Hikari looked up at Gabu impassively. “Or we could teach you a song? Here’s one that a friend of ours taught us. It’s called ‘Roll Me Over—’”

“I don’t think that’s quite the right song to teach a young sparrow,” Mei said hurriedly. “Let me try your song, Hikari. Meh-meh-meeeeeeh, meh, meh-meh-meh-meh meh-meh,” he bleated. “Was that right?”

“Need t’ trill,” Hikari said.

“I’m not sure I can do that without a beak. How’s this? Meh-meh-meeeeeeh, meh, mhmhmhmh meh-meh.”

“‘T’s better.”

“Let me try,” Gabu said. “Awoo-woo-woooo, woo, whuuuu woo, woooo.”

Mei laughed. “Not so loud, or else Toto and Riri will think something’s wrong. Thanks for teaching us that, Hikari. Can you tell us what the song means?”

Hikari thought long and hard. “‘T means, ‘I am here.’”

“That’s sort of like how howling works,” Gabu said. “A howl can mean lots of different things, but the most important one is, ‘I am here.’ And if you hear it, you howl back, ‘I’m here too.’ ‘We’re all here together.’” Gabu got a faraway look in his eyes, seeing which somehow made Mei miss being with his herd, if only for a moment.

Mei caught Gabu’s eye and smiled. “We’re here.”

Gabu smiled back. “We’re all here together.”

Hikari, oblivious to the moment that had passed literally over his head, went back to pecking at the ground disinterestedly. Everything was quiet for a few minutes until the chick said, “‘M cold.”

“You’re cold?” Mei said in alarm. “What do you parents do when you’re cold?” he asked, already knowing and dreading the answer.

“Mama ‘n Papa sit ‘n me.”

“I think we might hurt you if we tried that,” Gabu said.

“Let’s try this instead,” Mei said. He moved to lie down right next to Hikari, who pressed himself into the fur on the goat’s side. “Is that better?”

Hikari shook his head. “Still cold.”

“Okay, Gabu, very carefully—”

“I’ve got it.” Gabu lay down on the other side of Hikari and gently shuffled closer so that the chick was squeezed between them. “How’s that?”

“‘T’s good,” came the muffled reply.

It was a little different to how Gabu and Mei usually lay down together, on account of Gabu being so much further forward than Mei that they couldn’t look each other in the face without Gabu turning his head. After a while, Mei began to suspect that Hikari had fallen asleep. Sure enough, when he asked in a soft voice whether the chick was awake, there was no reply except for a quiet, regular breathing.

“This isn’t quite what I would call a wingful,” Gabu said quietly. “I don’t know what Toto and Riri were worried about; looking after him is a breeze.”

“Don’t forget we’ve only been doing it for a few minutes,” Mei said. “I’m sure there’s more to raising a chick than playing games and keeping them warm.” He remembered a conversation he’d had with his grandmother not so long ago. “Have you ever thought about having children?”

“Not really,” Gabu sighed. “I mean, when I was growing up, I thought that I would one day, because it seemed like the sort of thing that everyone does. But there was never really anyone I would have wanted to have pups with. Until I met you, that is—which isn’t to say I would definitely want to if we could,” he added hastily.

Mei started to laugh, but quietened himself. He didn’t want to wake Hikari up. “There’s nothing stopping us from trying,” he said in a playful voice. “But seriously, there might be other ways. Not all children have someone to take care of them like Hikari has—or like we had, for that matter, even if it wasn’t our parents. If there was a child who was in need of someone to raise them...”

“You’re saying we could adopt someone else’s child and take care of them as if they were ours?”

“It’s a possibility. Only if we decide we want to.” Mei looked up into the trees, where the forest’s many inhabitants were going about their varied business. “It would be a big responsibility. I’m not even sure we’d be able to raise a child who isn’t a goat or a wolf. Who would teach them the things they need to know to survive? I mean, I could probably teach a deer how to run, or you could teach a fox how to hunt, but how would we teach a squirrel how to find nuts and seeds?”

“I’m not so sure that teaching more animals how to hunt is a good idea,” Gabu said solemnly.

“You’d rather they starve?—sorry, Philosophy Day was yesterday. Anyway, my point is that becoming parents is still an option for us, if that’s something that you want.”

“Something that I want?” Gabu turned his head around to look at Mei, smiling. “What about what you want?”

“I’ve never really wanted to have kids, but...”

“But you’re worried that I want them, and being with you means I can’t have them?” Gabu said, still smiling.

Mei sighed. Sometimes, Gabu knew him far too well. “Okay, yes, I might have been thinking that. And now you’re going to tell me that you don’t see me as a hinderance to your happiness, and you probably weren’t going to have kids in any case, so I shouldn’t do something I don’t want to do just because I think it’s what you want?”

Gabu laughed. “Actually, I might want to have kids someday. And you’re right, there are plenty of ways we can do that if we want to. But not right now. Not any time soon, I mean, and it’s not like there’s any rush. We can spend the next few years thinking about it and decide when we’re ready.”

Mei smiled. “That’s a good plan.”

Just then, a voice they’d thought was asleep said, “If you two gonna have a baby, I wanna play with them.”

“It sounds like someone’s awake,” Mei said to mask his surprise. “Did you hear all of that conversation?”

“Not much. ‘M too hot.”

Gabu and Mei moved apart quickly. “Sorry about that,” Gabu said. “I guess we’re warmer than Mama and Papa, huh? Do you want a drink?”

Hikari nodded.

While Gabu went to the river to fetch some water, Mei said, “Do you ever get lonely, not having any birds your own age to play with?”

“Sometimes.”

“I wonder if we can do something about that.” Mei looked up into the trees again. No one was paying attention to them anymore. “Hello? Um, excuse me?” A squirrel met his gaze inquisitively. “This young sparrow is Hikari. I was wondering if you could ask around and see if there are any bird families with young chicks who might like to be friends with him.”

The squirrel looked at Mei as if sizing him up, and then glanced at Gabu, who was busy soaking a leaf in the river a short distance away. The squirrel nodded and scampered off.

“There. I’m not sure if anything will come of that, but it doesn’t hurt to ask.”

Gabu returned with the water-soaked leaf for Hikari to drink from, and Mei told him what he’d just done. “That’s a good idea,” Gabu said. “There must be plenty of young birds who would be happy to have someone new to talk to.”

Toto and Riri returned a short while later, looking a lot more relaxed than Mei had seen them in months. While Toto was telling Hikari how much they’d missed him and asking whether he’d been well-behaved, Riri asked the two of them whether there had been any trouble.

“None at all,” Mei said. “You must have done a good job of raising him so far. He’s smarter than I would have guessed for a child of his age too.”

Riri chuckled politely. “He does have a tendency to understand things you don’t expect him to. We’ve had to watch what we say around him.”

“Thanks for letting us look after him,” Gabu said. “It’s been a great experience.”

“Not at all. You’re welcome to do it again any time you like—goodness knows we could use the break. Although, please don’t feel obliged.”

After Gabu and Mei had recounted everything that had happened while Toto and Riri had been away, and after the sparrows had thanked them for their help another half-dozen times, Hikari was getting sleepy and needed a nap. Gabu and Mei said their goodbyes.

As they were walking back home through the forest, they heard a familiar-sounding voice from somewhere close by. “We call this one speckle leaf. It’s good for treating scrapes and small cuts, but you can only find it in the spring and early summer.”

They rounded the trunk of a large oak tree and saw Greta and Mii talking to one another in a clearing. Mii was showing Greta a green, leafy plant with dark green spots on the leaves.

“I see,” Greta said. “Do you eat it or put it on the wound?”

“You dip it in water to make it damp,” Mii said, “and then you cover the injury with it until it starts to heal, which usually takes about half a day for scrapes and one or two days for cuts. You need to change the covering once a day, and it’s important that it doesn’t get dried out.”

Mei waited until Mii had finished talking, and then said, “Hello, you two.”

Mii and Greta looked around. “Oh, hello, Mei and Gabu,” Mii said. “I didn’t see you there. I’m showing Greta some of the herbal remedies we learned back in Sawa Sawa Mountain.”

“I’ve never heard of most of these before,” Greta said. “Does everyone in your herd know these things?”

“Definitely,” Mei said. “We’re taught all the herbal remedies as children. It’s important that wisdom like that gets passed on every generation, since it must have taken a really long time to find these things out in the first place.”

“We did the same in my pack,” Gabu said. “You’ve never heard of speckle leaf before, Greta?”

“I haven’t even noticed it before now,” Greta said. She looked between Gabu and Mei as if in confusion. “Do goats and wolves both call it the same thing? If they found out about it separately, I would have expected them to give it different names.”

Gabu and Mei looked at each other. “We’ve always called it speckle leaf,” Gabu said. “I guess I’ve never thought about it before now. That is strange, now that you mention it.”

“Wolves listen to rumours from other animals, right?” Mii said. “Maybe the goats found out about it first and the news somehow reached the wolves. Or it could be the other way around.”

“It could have been any species that learned about it first,” Mei said.

“An entire forest sharing wisdom with each other, regardless of species,” Greta said in wonderment. “Just think of the good we could do if everyone collaborated like that on everything.”

Mii laughed. “Let’s start with just our two forests sharing wisdom about herbs, all right? Speaking of which, Mei, have you seen any sun root in this forest?”

“I haven’t really been looking for it,” Mei said. He remembered all too well the unpleasantly strong taste of the pale orange root given to young goats to improve muscle growth. “I’ll let you know if I find any.” Mii looked a little disappointed, so Mei added, “Although I did see some violet bloom on the northern bank of the river, near where it curves out to the side. I can show you if you want.”

Mii hadn’t known about that, so Mei led the four of them there, explaining to Greta on the way the uses of violet bloom for relieving anxiety and insomnia.

They spent the rest of the day exploring the forest, showing each other where to find herbs that the others hadn’t known about and discussing their uses.

Greta continued to dwell on the benefits of inter-species and inter-forest collaboration, a prospect that seemed to interest her greatly. Mei, at least, knew what she meant. The community he and Gabu had found in the Emerald Forest was unlike anything he’d ever known back home. His herd had always had a strong sense of community, and it was the same with the wolves from what he understood, but it was always out of self-preservation.

This was something completely different. The animals here, herbivores and carnivores alike, were thriving in a way that never would have been possible with every species keeping to themselves. And it was with immense pride that Mei realised that he and Gabu had helped to build this community. They had been the focal point around which everyone had gathered together.

Perhaps Greta was right. Perhaps everywhere could be like this.