They Called Her Fay Wray

Chapter 4

Something was really wrong.

After acting so happy when she first came home, Amanda spend much of that evening very quiet and withdrawn. She did not want to watch TV. She did not want to play much at all. And, she would not even sing when Charles played the piano for her. And Caesar knew it had something to do with the strange incident in the kitchen. Not even Caroline's coming home, flushed and excited, to deliver her news that Amanda's friend would probably be out of the hospital in a day or two cheered her up much, and Caesar was torn between wanting to ask her what was wrong and being afraid to make things worse.

And, just to make things worse, Will and Caroline had a big fight when Caroline found out that Amanda had slept in Caesar's room the night before. Caesar only overheard part of it and didn't understand why Caroline was getting so mad about it. He loved her, she was like a Mother, but Caroline did get worked up about the silliest things, sometimes. When Caesar had once asked Will, Will had just shrugged and said, "That's women for you, Caesar."

Well, this was not a helpful explanation at all, in Caesar's opinion.

So, the young chimpanzee also made himself scarce upstairs, and he waited. He expected Amanda to come up to his room after everyone else was settled in bed, much as they had done the night before. She went to kiss Charles goodnight. But after waiting up there for several minutes, it became clear she was not coming. So, Caesar decided to go down to her, instead.

Without making a sound, he slipped out of his attic room and crept down to Amanda's door. He raised his hand to lightly knock, but just before his knuckles touched it, he heard her voice speak softly from inside the bedroom.

"It's open, Caesar. Come on in."

Caesar slipped inside and softly closed the door behind him. Amanda got up from where she had been stretched face down across her bed. She sat up and moved over and they perched together on the foot of her bed.

Caesar could see that she had been crying. He put a hand on Amanda's and was startled to feel her trembling.

"Don't cry. Caesar here now," he signed into her hand before wrapping both arms around her.

"Why Amanda scared?" he asked eventually when she had stopped trembling so much and he felt safe to release her. He gave her hand a gentle squeeze.

Amanda squeezed his hand back, hard.

"You wouldn't believe me," Amanda sniffed. "And if you did... Well, that's worse."

Caesar made an indecisive sort of sound.

"I know, I'm not making any sense, right?"

Caesar huffed out his agreement and was pleased that it almost made her smile. It was the first hint of one he had seen all evening.

"I don't want to scare you away like I scare almost all of my friends away," Amanda told him tearfully.

"Caesar not scared of you," Caesar signed insistently.

"Not yet," Amanda murmured sadly.

A short silence stretched between them, but just as Caesar was trying to think of what to say next, Amanda spoke up first.

"Caesar," Amanda began very cautiously. "Do you know what the word psychic means?"

He shook his head and huffed twice. This was a quick short code they had developed for yes and no. One huff meant yes, and two meant no.

"Yeah, I didn't think you'd know about it. I wish I didn't. Well, it has to do with the mind, Caesar." Amanda tried to explain. She put a finger to her forehead just in case he still was not getting it.