Part 5
“No, I’m sorry,” Ruth said. “That section stays covered.” She showed him the route to the other viewing area, where he might find the gorillas outside, and stepped away from the panel.
The man thanked her, a little disappointed, and went to look. Another visitor asked about the burlap. Celia explained how the animals used the materials the keepers provided, then let the group spend a few minutes looking at what was actually there. Ruth stood by her unfinished wall with the folding stool under one arm.
Nobody asked who had made the mistake. Ben introduced her as the fabricator and talked briefly about the extra turning room. When a woman using a walker eased into the viewing position, Ruth offered the stool and waited for an answer before setting it down.
The woman sat. She could see a leaf stem on the ledge, the folded cloth, and a small brown bird that had found its way in from the open habitat doorway. She watched the bird hop twice and disappear behind a rock.
“Somebody’s getting a free lunch,” she said.
Ruth laughed. She didn’t apologize for the absent gorilla again.
After the visitors had moved on, Ruth helped Ben carry the chairs back to storage. Then she found a scrap of old vinyl stuck beneath her tool case and picked it off the floor. There were several more pieces she had missed.
On Sunday, Willa asked Dana if she could go to the zoo with her grandmother. Dana called while Ruth was sorting the discarded window panels in the shop. Ruth had been trying to work out which pieces were large enough to use for something else; she’d found a place to store the rest without throwing them away yet.
“She wants to visit,” Dana said.
“All right.” Ruth set down the offcut in her hand. “What time would she like me to come?”
Willa was waiting on the front step with the blue pouch. Ruth had returned it on Friday, untouched, along with the paper bracelet from the bench. The girl wore the bracelet under her jacket cuff, where it had bent into a soft, uneven ring.
“I’ve got a piece we could use,” she said, holding up the pouch. “For the bottom.”
Ruth said they could look at it after their visit. She had a small sewing kit in the van for emergency repairs to cloth banners, and they could take their time over it. Willa climbed into the passenger seat and checked that the little patch hadn’t fallen out through the hole.
At the zoo, they paid for ordinary admission. Ruth left her contractor badge in the van and asked Willa which way she wanted to go. The girl chose the gorilla building, but stopped along the path to watch a groundskeeper replacing a sprinkler head. Ruth stood with her until Willa was ready to move on.
The small gallery was open, with a few visitors coming and going. The new wall panels were easy to read from the entrance. At the end of the room, the plain section beside the window looked just as bare as Ruth remembered, and she had to resist measuring it with her eyes.
Willa inspected the low opening. “That’s smaller than your picture.”
“Yes.”
“Can he still sit there?”
“He can. He might be somewhere else today.”
They sat on the public bench for a while. Willa set the pouch in her lap and put both hands over the torn bottom. A toddler passed with a squeaking shoe, then came back, delighted to have discovered that the noise followed him. Willa smiled at him, and Ruth caught herself preparing to shush a child who wasn’t hers.
When the family moved on, Willa went to the low opening. Boone was in the farther part of the room, gathering the edge of his burlap beneath an arm. He paused when he looked toward the window. Willa stood where she was, her shoulder near the opaque panel, and let him look.
Ruth stayed on the bench. She couldn’t see his whole face from there, and she didn’t move to improve the view.
Boone approached the ledge, settled behind its covered end, and drew the burlap across one thigh. Through the opening, Willa could see him. Ruth could see only part of his hand and a patch of silver hair. The girl leaned slightly to one side, then settled back, seeming satisfied with what she had.
“He’s got a new hole,” she said softly.
Ruth followed the child’s glance to the burlap. “I see it.”
Willa held the blue pouch against her stomach. She stayed there for several minutes, sometimes looking toward Boone and sometimes down at her own fingers. Once he raised his head when she shifted her feet. She gave a small movement of her fingers at her side, and neither of them came any closer.
Then he turned his attention to a gorilla moving through the doorway. Willa watched him get up and go. She came back to Ruth and asked if they could find a table to fix the pouch now.
They sat outside the cafe, away from the passing strollers. Ruth fetched the sewing kit from the van, and Willa laid out her patch: a small piece of striped cloth cut from the sleeve of a shirt she’d outgrown. Dana had helped her cut it, leaving generous edges.
Ruth started to turn the pouch inside out. Willa put a hand over hers.
“I want the stripes outside.”
The fabric would fray there unless they folded the edges in. Ruth showed her with one corner and waited while Willa tried the next. They didn’t match exactly. The girl pinned them where she wanted them and handed Ruth the needle.
“Can you do this part? Through both bits?”
Ruth threaded it. Willa held the pouch steady on the table, lifting her fingers out of the way as the needle came through. At the second corner, Ruth paused with the thread loose, waiting for Willa to turn the cloth.