Respectful Distance

“He looks like he needs a hug mom!” Leo shouted, pointing towards the hippo paddling across the murky waters of its personal swimming pool.

“I think he just needs a friend,” Leo’s mom responded in a mumble. Her eyes drifted from her son and looked over to the rhino enclosure behind them. Leo was at the age where he believed the world revolved around him and he was indestructible, so he did not take this as a passing remark. He saw it as an instruction.

With his mother’s eyes focused on pachyderms less reminiscent of oiled potatoes, Leo pulled himself to the edge of the fence separating him from the lardy beast, ignoring the not too subtle signs exclaiming Danger! Do not climb the fence! If Leo was partial to reading, he also might have taken in the word on the plaque at the exhibit’s wall:

Clyde was found in Djibouti. His parents were hunted by African poachers and he was left for dead with a broken leg and cuts across his face from the attack. A group of animal researchers found him dehydrated and clinging to life. They nursed him back to health. Although they were able to save him, Clyde was young and had grown too accustomed to living with food and shelter provided for him. If he was sent back into the wild, he would not have the tools learned by most adolescent hippos to survive in the wild. He has lived out his life in various zoos but has had trouble finding a keeper he feels safe around due to his negative experiences with humans as a baby. For this reason, please admire Clyde from a respectful distance.

Instead, Leo stared straight at Clyde, leaning closer and closer. He was gliding just below the muddy film of his pond, and the hippo’s eyes poked above, surveying the crowd of little boys and girls tugging on their parent’s sleeves and pointing at him. Some had tiny binoculars to see the hippo’s fangs hidden inside its large mouth and the deep scar across his left cheek while others wore oversized hats to protect them from the sun’s summer rays. Beneath the surface, Clyde kicked his legs in swift anxious motions and pushed himself across the water. His eyes were focused on the screaming children to his left. Clyde didn’t see Leo tumbling over the edge of his enclosure to the right.

Leo was so entranced by Clyde that he didn’t notice the hat slipping off his shaggy blond head until was passing over the fence. He reached out to grab his baseball cap, but he reached too far, and his weight shifted over the bars. The ground was approaching at a terrifying rate and his screams did nothing to slow him down. Fifteen feet of terror later, he was blinded by a cloud of ochre dust. When it cleared, and he wiped the dirt from his eyes, he was confronted by an angry purple snout barreling towards him. 

Twenty feet away and Leo screamed for his mom. Fifteen feet and he started stepping back. Ten feet away and Leo tripped on a loose rock. Five feet away, and Leo was yanked back and a bale of hay was thrown over his head. Clyde planted his foot in the ground and made a sharp turn to chase down the flying grains.

A zookeeper in a  brown suit and a white name tag with blue letters that spelled out Diana was holding Leo by his t-shirt collar. She scolded Leo and wagged her finger at him, but Leo’s eyes were still glued to Clyde and his fanged maw shredding the hay like it was lettuce in a blender. His outward physique was reminiscent of forty year-old man who reached his athletic prime in high school and then devoted his life to beer and steak, but the power of that first-string quarterback was still there. Clyde could tip a school bus on his own, but Leo could only see beauty past his thick oily skin.

* * *

Leo stood at the front of Mrs. Perkin’s classroom. He straightened a few note cards between his fingers and nervously looked at the signs hanging along the back wall.

Take a breath

Look Up and Pause

Speak Up!

Be Confident!

“Leo, what will you be talking about today?” asked Mrs. Perkins as she wrote his name across a rubric in red pen and stared with her infamous apathetic gaze.

“Hi… Uh I will be speak-, talking for- I mean about hippos today Mrs. Perkins,” Leo said, trying to avoid eye contact with every pair of eyes in the room.

“Great,” she responded with a warm smile. “Your time starts now, you have five minutes.”

Leo’s palms clutched a handful of notecards. Sweat was seeping through them and leaving darkened splatters of perspiration on the wooden podium below. “Um hello class. Today I will be talking about um the m-most beautiful animal to have ever walked the earth.” The class laughed. Leo crumpled his notecards and straightened his posture. “Hey!” he shouted. Every pair of eyes turned to him and greeted him with silence. “I know how the world sees hippos. They’re fat. They’re ugly. They smell like they’ve been rolling around in their own excrement all day,. And I will concede the last one is true, but there is so much more to them than being the fat kid of the Serengeti.” Mrs. Perkins gaze began to shift from apathetic to intrigued.

Leo caught his breath for a moment and began again, “Did you know that hippos sweat a red liquid that acts as a natural sunscreen? I bet not, you bigots. How long can any of you hold your breath? A minute, maybe? Well, you would look like a fool among a bloat of hippos gasping for air while they stay fully submerged for five minutes. Hey you Todd,” he said, pointing to a smirking boy wearing a backward hat and a football jersey with a five on it. “How fast can you run a mile? Maybe six minutes on a good day? Well if hippos played football, you wouldn’t even be fast enough to make second-string JV special teams. An average hippo can run a mile in under four minutes and would crush you under seven thousand pounds of lard. You all might think they’re gross, but I see olympian power and, honestly, they’re pretty cute.” Mrs. Perkins was now fully engaged. The rubric was still unmarked.

Leo’s fist’s made a firm thud on the podium. “And yet,. And yet human beings still think they matter more. There are strong and majestic beasts out in the world, and humans are under the impression they matter more. They hunt hippos for their meat and for sport. W-why?” Leo’s eyes began to well,  “Because we’re smarter and we have thumbs? That’s bullshit. We’re no better than hippos. Hell, we’re worse. It’s not even a contest. Hippos kill to survive. We kill them because we think it’s fun.” Tears flowed down Leo’s face. “I’m done” he mumbled and walked towards his desk with his head pointed towards the ground to hide his tears. Mrs. Perkins opened her mouth to speak, but couldn’t find the words. She looked at Leo’s rubric and frantically filled it with a red pen and a soft smile on her lips. 

* * *

Leo wiped his forehead with his hand. Sweat coated his hand and ran across the band of pale skin wrapping around his tanned fingers. Hot air whipped his face as he drove through a long sodden plane of dirt in an uncovered 4x4.  Leo saw a pool of water approaching him and he gently pressed the brake pedal. Mud splattered from beneath the wheels and then he was at a full stop, a quarter-mile from the water feature. Without breaking his gaze at the pool, he grabbed his binoculars from the empty seat next to him.

Through the concave lenses of his binoculars, Leo observed the quiet tranquility of the watering hole hidden by patches of tall green grass surrounded by miles of mud and trees creating shade for various critters clomping through the mud. the grass swayed with a soft breeze, and through the blades, he could peek into the lake. Birds flew in and out of the oasis, taking turns drinking and, quite literally, wetting their beaks. Wildebeests came in droves to cool themselves down. It was awe-inspiring, but Leo focused his eyes on a single creature. Water rippled from the center of the pond. Two eyes emerged, followed by a purple snout.

Leo’s excitement took over, and he was no longer in the car. He was walking toward the water. Birds flew away from him as he drew closer. In a moment, Leo was at the edge of the murky pool. He locked eyes with the hippopotamus. Has my whole life been for this moment? The hippo glided towards him from the other end of the pool. Water slide down it like oil across a war skillet. He sees me! The hippos glide gained momentum. He wants to meet me! The glide turned to a sprint. His hooves splashed water in every direction, creating a misty field around the hippo. Oh no. Leo started to run. 

Leo studied hippos since he was eight years-old. Today, on his twenty-ninth birthday, his studies ended. Leo’s last thought was of a plaque he had forgotten about a long time ago. Please admire Clyde from a respectful distance.