Read Online Larger Than Life (Novella) by Jodi Picoult - Free Book Online
Authors: Jodi Picoult
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air, and she wrinkles it, sniffing. She lifts her rear foot
so that it hovers over the dusty ground.
Suddenly, there is a rumble in the distance that I would guess was thunder if not
for the drought.
Lesego breaks into a run. I start after her, but Neo pulls up beside me in the vehicle.
“Jump in,” he says, and we bounce up the hill after her.
When we see the herd, they are in a valley, all pointed in the direction of the crest
where Lesego waits and watches them, every fiber of her body vibrating with excitement.
Loose-limbed and light-footed, she races toward the giants. From our position on the
hill, we watch the other elephants immediately form a circle around her. “I can’t
see her anymore,” I say, panicking.
Neo points. “There. See the one with the single tusk? That’s Mpho. She’s gotLesego under her belly.”
Another elephant shifts, and then I see it—the matriarch using her trunk to pull Lesego
close.
I have heard of elephants who think kindly of humans, who will come to the camp for
help if they are tangled in a snare or barbed wire. Maybe it will be that way for
Lesego. Maybe she won’t forget me.
I don’t realize I am crying until I feel Neo’s warm hand cover mine where it rests
on my lap. “Let’s just go,” I force out, because I don’t think I can stand to watch
Lesego walk away.
“Not yet,” Neo murmurs.
Mpho suddenly takes her trunk and shoves Lesego away. The matriarch rumbles,
Let’s go
, and the herd begins to walk north. When Lesego scampers to follow, one of the other
large females roughly pushes her back.
“They won’t take her,” I say, realizing what I am seeing.
“Maybe,” Neo says. “She stinks of human.”
Suddenly I realize the great disservice I’ve done to Lesego. I might have always planned
to set her back in the wild, but I have tainted her with salvation. Lesego smells
of cookies and soaps and laundry detergent and the hundred other man-made items with
which she’s been in contact. A herd that is terrified of humans—that associates those
smells with death—will naturally reject her.
Confused, Lesego turns to the only elephants that haven’t moved off with the matriarch
yet—the young bulls that are too juvenile to live apart from the herd but too old
to hang out with their mothers. They begin to charge Lesego, who is so surprised she
doesn’t even feint to avoid the blow. They knock her over, and she struggles to her
feet again. One bull crunches into Lesego with an audible crack; I see blood well
up where his tusk has sliced open her forehead. Lesego lets out a distress call, but
in this social experiment of my own creation, none of the mature females come to her
aid as they would have in the wild.
I stand up in the Land Rover. “Stop them,” I shriek. “They’re hurting her!”
“Alice—”
“I said
stop them
!” Without a second thought, I leap out of the vehicle and startrunning into the pack of juvenile bulls—a stupid move, but all I want to do is help
Lesego. Neo immediately revs the engine, flying by me in the Land Rover to drive the
bulls away. It takes him three tries before they jog off up the hill, a delinquent
pack of teenagers, rumbling as if they are already embellishing the story for the
telling.
Dazed and stumbling, Lesego tries to join them.
It’s not that she’s a glutton for punishment. It’s not that she’s not terrified. It’s
that she wants a family, even if they don’t want
her
.
With strength I didn’t know I had, I run after Lesego, rugby-tackling her with all
my weight so that she tumbles to the ground. She trumpets, another cry for help, as
I pull her ears over her eyes so that she cannot watch her cousins leave her behind.
I don’t know what Neo says to convince Grant to call the bush vet, but he is summoned.
Lesego is given two milligrams of etorphine and twenty milligrams of azaperone—sedatives
to calm her while the gash
so that it hovers over the dusty ground.
Suddenly, there is a rumble in the distance that I would guess was thunder if not
for the drought.
Lesego breaks into a run. I start after her, but Neo pulls up beside me in the vehicle.
“Jump in,” he says, and we bounce up the hill after her.
When we see the herd, they are in a valley, all pointed in the direction of the crest
where Lesego waits and watches them, every fiber of her body vibrating with excitement.
Loose-limbed and light-footed, she races toward the giants. From our position on the
hill, we watch the other elephants immediately form a circle around her. “I can’t
see her anymore,” I say, panicking.
Neo points. “There. See the one with the single tusk? That’s Mpho. She’s gotLesego under her belly.”
Another elephant shifts, and then I see it—the matriarch using her trunk to pull Lesego
close.
I have heard of elephants who think kindly of humans, who will come to the camp for
help if they are tangled in a snare or barbed wire. Maybe it will be that way for
Lesego. Maybe she won’t forget me.
I don’t realize I am crying until I feel Neo’s warm hand cover mine where it rests
on my lap. “Let’s just go,” I force out, because I don’t think I can stand to watch
Lesego walk away.
“Not yet,” Neo murmurs.
Mpho suddenly takes her trunk and shoves Lesego away. The matriarch rumbles,
Let’s go
, and the herd begins to walk north. When Lesego scampers to follow, one of the other
large females roughly pushes her back.
“They won’t take her,” I say, realizing what I am seeing.
“Maybe,” Neo says. “She stinks of human.”
Suddenly I realize the great disservice I’ve done to Lesego. I might have always planned
to set her back in the wild, but I have tainted her with salvation. Lesego smells
of cookies and soaps and laundry detergent and the hundred other man-made items with
which she’s been in contact. A herd that is terrified of humans—that associates those
smells with death—will naturally reject her.
Confused, Lesego turns to the only elephants that haven’t moved off with the matriarch
yet—the young bulls that are too juvenile to live apart from the herd but too old
to hang out with their mothers. They begin to charge Lesego, who is so surprised she
doesn’t even feint to avoid the blow. They knock her over, and she struggles to her
feet again. One bull crunches into Lesego with an audible crack; I see blood well
up where his tusk has sliced open her forehead. Lesego lets out a distress call, but
in this social experiment of my own creation, none of the mature females come to her
aid as they would have in the wild.
I stand up in the Land Rover. “Stop them,” I shriek. “They’re hurting her!”
“Alice—”
“I said
stop them
!” Without a second thought, I leap out of the vehicle and startrunning into the pack of juvenile bulls—a stupid move, but all I want to do is help
Lesego. Neo immediately revs the engine, flying by me in the Land Rover to drive the
bulls away. It takes him three tries before they jog off up the hill, a delinquent
pack of teenagers, rumbling as if they are already embellishing the story for the
telling.
Dazed and stumbling, Lesego tries to join them.
It’s not that she’s a glutton for punishment. It’s not that she’s not terrified. It’s
that she wants a family, even if they don’t want
her
.
With strength I didn’t know I had, I run after Lesego, rugby-tackling her with all
my weight so that she tumbles to the ground. She trumpets, another cry for help, as
I pull her ears over her eyes so that she cannot watch her cousins leave her behind.
I don’t know what Neo says to convince Grant to call the bush vet, but he is summoned.
Lesego is given two milligrams of etorphine and twenty milligrams of azaperone—sedatives
to calm her while the gash
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