Divided Loyalties (Serialized Novel in 2 Parts - 12 Chapters Each)

Chapter 8 - Life Goes On

The monkeys moved on and so did Consuela. The budding naturalist dared not look up but she managed to follow them like that for days, foraging just like them, sleeping in the trees. One day towards the end of the summer break from school during the summer of Tomas's gambit with Ophelia, after days and weeks of skulking around the outskirts of the territory of the troop she was following, a small male came down the tree with food in its hand, some banana and left it on a tree trunk near Consuela.

Her heart thumped in her chest. She ventured to look at him peripherally. She didn't dare touch the offering, but she noticed he had a scar on his face, on his right cheek. That was the day she began naming her howlers. Scarface became her first monkey friend under the volcano. When the monkeys left, Consuela finished eating the banana. All of the monkeys seemed eager to watch what she would do with Scarface's offering. Chattering became raucous when she started eating it, then they left, their noises echoing behind them. It would be months before she would have another success, but the die was cast.

A naturalist was born that morning. As she would later learn, her success would confirm Leakey's ideas about women working best with primates. Before leaving the jungle that day she made her first rough field notes, ideas and observations that, despite her lack of formal education, would one day appear in prominent scientific journals.

Tomas's tragic gambit sent Consuela camping into the forest in August of that year. She took Pedro with her every day because he was unable to shake his doldrums. Their friendship grew as she taught him to live like a howler monkey in the wild. He never talked during the first few days in the forest with her and she didn't force the issue. He mimicked everything she did by watching her. Somehow the monkeys caught on and they started coming down out of the trees to greet the wounded pair.

One day late in August, Pedro broke down as they sat eating fruit and nuts they had found in the early light of the day.

"It's my fault she's gone. I could've helped her," said Pipi through tears streaming from his eyes.

"What're you talking about? Tomas went crazy and shot her," said Consuela.

"But I saw them doing it and I could've stopped him. I just watched."

"You saw him shoot her?"

"No, no. Doing it."

"Doing what, Pedro? You're not making sense."

"One day in June, I was looking for Ophelia in the forest because she had started escaping from me to run off with Tomas. I was hurt. Then I came near that clearing with the fallen log where Tomas made a log seat like the one I made for all of us."

"So?"

"They were kissing and he took off his pants and he was pushing himself between her legs."

"You saw them making babies in the forest."

"Yes. I should have stopped him. Then none of this would have happened. Then she would be alive."

"First, Pipi listen to me. If what you say is true then it's not your fault. They wanted to be adults and they both made decisions. It's not your fault."

"Can you keep a secret?"

"I only talk to you and my monkeys."

"I loved her, Consuela. I was so —"

"You think that's a secret. Everyone's knew that. You were like a lost puppy around her."

"If Tomas hadn't disappeared I would have killed him."

"That's a good idea. Spend the rest of your days in prison—"

"I mean it. When he comes back I'll kill him."

Promise me something, Pedro?"

"What?"

"When you go to kill him bring me with you."

"I'll hold him for you. You know how he chased me around the forest trying to make me do that too. I was just luckier than Ophelia was. I saw the monkeys doing it so I ran away from him all the time. Promise me, Pedro."

"Cross my heart and hope to die."

From that moment Consuela and Pedro cemented what would become a lasting friendship. Tomas never returned and there would be another funeral to attend before Christmas that year, the year that changed it all for the inseparable foursome.

For Consuela, the monkeys became the main focus of her existence, while Pedro decided he would become a policeman so he could stop people from hurting themselves and others. It was also the year that Pedro's dreams became even better measures of reality around him.