Page 77 of Apathy
“A male and a female,” he said. “They need to have a companion.”
He must have said something else, but at that moment, my whole attention was on the two boxes and two tiny creatures waiting for me inside.
I placed them carefully on the table, afraid that if I shook it, they would get afraid, and I didn’t want them to be afraid of me. I’d been dreaming of that moment for so long, that once it started becoming true, I didn’t know what to do.
“Why don’t you open the boxes?” Dylan’s voice broke the tension in my body, but I kept staring at the boxes, unable to move.
“What if they hate me?” I asked him as I turned around. He was already starting high school, and I couldn’t wait to go to his football games since he just made the team. “What if they don’t want to play with me?”
“Hey, hey, hey.” He crossed the small distance between us and sat next to me. I didn’t realize he was holding a small cage in his left hand, and it warmed my heart that he did this for me. “I chose them for you, and I just know that they’re going to love you.”
“Promise?”
“I promise, Little One. Now,” he leaned forward and pulled the two boxes closer to the edge of the table, “open them. Don’t make them wait for too long.”
And I did.
The first box revealed a scared little guy, coated in brown fur with one white line running over his back. He sat on his back legs and stared at me, his dark eyes full of wonder and a small amount of fear. I gently pushed the box on its side, and after a minute or so, with tentative steps, he came out, sniffing over the table, trying to understand his new surroundings.
“He looks beautiful, Dy,” I mumbled. “And he has a white stomach,” I pointed out, my voice high-pitched and filled with excitement.
Dylan slid down from the couch and sat on the floor, extending his hand toward the hamster. “This is the male one,” he murmured as he dragged his finger over the hamster’s back. “And that other one,” he looked at the second box, “is the female. I really think you’re going to love her.”
I slid down to the floor and started opening the second box. The moment I opened the lid, a lithe, white body jumped out, and stood on all fours, staring at me.
She was the most magnificent creature I had ever seen.
Dark red eyes stared back at me, and her entire body was pure white, just like the first snow. She didn’t move, didn’t sniff around like her male companion did. She just sat there, observing us just how we were observing her.
I was in love.
As soon as I showed my hand to her, she approached me and sniffed my fingers before climbing onto my palm.
“Hi, Nala,” I murmured, feeling Dylan’s eyes on me.
“Is that her name?”
“Yep.” I smiled. “And he is Donny.”
“Those are amazing names, Sky.”
I extended my palm and placed my hands next to each other, letting Nala climb from one side to the other. The sound of the cage door opening made me turn to Dylan, who was already taking Donny and placing him inside. I slowly did the same with Nala.
The only problem was, as soon as the doors closed behind her, she attacked him, chasing him through the cage.
“What is she doing?” I asked, with panic lacing every word. I wanted them to be friends, to be good to each other, but Nala had other plans.
“I don’t know, Little One, but I’m sure they’ll be fine. They’re just getting to know each other.”
And I believed in that.
I was happy when she finally calmed down after three weeks of relentless chasing, of wounds on Donny’s body, and one morning we found out why.
Nala had babies, but she didn’t want them. She refused to tend to them, while my poor Donny behaved like a mother hen. I again thought everything was going to be fine, that it was just an animal phase, but when I came home from school, only two days after they were born, the grim look on Dylan’s face told me that something was wrong.
He took me to my room, where their cage was located, and the sight in front of me was one I would never forget.
“S-She,” I stammered. “She ate them all.”
