I’ve got a headache too. A bad one. I think it’s from the sunshine. I haven’t been in direct sunlight in a decade, and it’s making my brain feel like it’s about to explode through my temples. Even the sun hurts me now—just like everything else good from my life before.
Torrin stays beside me, matching my unhurried pace, looking happy. I wonder if I look the same—because I feel happy. At least what I think happy feels like. Or what I can expect it to feel like after everything.
When we reach the elephant pen, a keeper is standing at the fence, talking to a group of people.
“Elephants.” I hear the excitement in my voice as I smile at Torrin.
He frowns, but it’s another pathetic attempt. “Elephants.”
I hurry around the edge of the crowd and try to wedge in closer so I can hear what the keeper’s saying. Torrin shadows my every step.
“Some of you might have heard of the practice of chaining an elephant from the time it’s a baby. Like most everything relating to the training and exhibiting of animals, it’s a controversial topic.” The keeper leans down to pick up something from the ground. I can’t see what it is. “I’m not going to talk about the controversy because it gets real ugly, real fast. We’re talking the-lions-are-loose bloodbath ugly.”
A soft chuckle rolls through the crowd gathered around.
“I’m just going to talk about the practice of baby elephant chaining and the reasons it’s done. Simply put, it’s done because it works. It’s the only way a person my size can control something that size.” The keeper’s arm swings behind him toward the elephants.
When I see what’s in his hand, I feel like someone’s just stabbed me in the stomach.
“One of these chains we use on a baby, and one we use on big Brutus out there. Which one of these chains do you think goes on a baby elephant? This thick heavy one or this one that looks like paperclips strung together in comparison?” The keeper bounces the two chains in his hands.
The way they rattle makes me want to cover my ears. The way they move in his hands, almost like two iron snakes slithering, makes me want to close my eyes. I feel Torrin’s hand on my shoulder, gently pulling me back, but I don’t move.
The keeper points at a kid who shouts out the paperclip chain. Another kid says the same.
The keeper shakes his head at both and lifts the heavy chain. “This goes on the baby elephant.” His hands switch, and the paperclip chain goes high. “This one’s for big Brutus. You wanna know why?”
The crowd is looking around at each other with surprise. The kids are gaping at him.
“You see, a baby elephant’s going to fight the chain like crazy the first time he’s tied to it. He’s going to cry and fight and make everyone and anyone think he’s being attacked by a herd of hyenas. Baby elephant’s going to fight. She’s going to fight hard.”
The keeper shakes the heavy chain again, and the knife-slashing sensation travels higher. Now it’s stabbing into the hollow of my neck.
“So why does this chain go on junior and this one go on big daddy?” the keeper asks the crowd, still jingling those chains.
No one’s saying anything, probably afraid to be wrong like the two kids before. I’m not afraid to speak up, because I know why.
“The baby elephant stops fighting.” I don’t realize it’s me talking until I notice the keeper’s gaze shift in my direction. “It learns it can’t break the chain no matter how hard it fights, so it just . . .” When I pause, I feel Torrin move closer behind me. “It gives up trying to escape.”
The keeper nods. “That’s correct. It’s called learned helplessness, and I would not suggest typing that into an internet search engine unless you want to spend the rest of your life in a chronically depressed state.”
He’s smiling, and so is the crowd, but I don’t understand why. What about any of this is funny? How is taking an animal and fucking with its head to control it worth a smile?
“So by the time junior grows up into a five-ton mammoth that could move a semi if it wanted to, it’s learned it’s helpless. It doesn’t fight this chain or this one because it’s figured out that the chain is stronger than him.” The keeper lets go of the chains and lifts two different things, one still giant in comparison to the other. “It’s the same with the stakes they’re chained to. Junior gets the one that looks like it’s as heavy as Thor’s hammer, and Dad gets the one that looks like a paper cutter in comparison.”
My lungs are straining, and I feel the urge to run. To remind myself I’m free and no chain is trapping me.
“To make this more relatable, it would be like tying a length of Silly String to this guy’s ankle and staking him to the ground with a toothpick.” The keeper points at a guy who looks like he could be the leader of a motorcycle gang. “It would work too, but only if we’d beaten the fight out of him from the start with something a little more substantial.” The keeper kicks at the chains at his feet.
When my gaze flickers to the elephants roaming behind him, I have this intense urge to rip apart the barrier stretching around their exhibit to free them. So they know they’re free. So it’s not a manipulation keeping them from realizing how powerful they are.
“It’s cruel,” spouts from my mouth before I know I’m thinking it.
Torrin’s hand squeezes my shoulder. It’s not a suggestive one to shut up. It’s not one to pull me away. It’s one to support me—to let me know he’s here.