Unsaid: A Novel Read Online Free PDF Page A

animal companions.
    But it was more than just the money. The job gave David another family—one that could never be taken from him because it lived on and in the insulated world of facts, legal reasoning, and case law. This family helped make up for the history of his profound aloneness and, frankly, took some of the weight off my own shoulders.
    So, was I disappointed? No. I just wanted a little more for David, not from him. I wanted him to relax more, to enjoy his life more, to revel in our animals, their antics and little idiosyncrasies, more. I wanted David to feel connected and be in the moment when he was with us instead of distracted by what he’d just left or where he needed to go next. I wanted David to realize that he had succeeded in the practice of law, had mastered the craft of being a lawyer, and now needed to learn the much more difficult craft of creating and living a full life.
    I guess I really just wanted him to value what I was able to contribute to our relationship.
    I wanted.
    Perhaps David’s feeling that he disappointed me is understandable after all. Letting someone you love know that you want more for them probably does go into the ear at the same pitch as disappointment.
    When David returns to the front hallway of our house, the three dogs are waiting. David walks past them, but they don’t follow him this time and instead continue to stare expectantly at the door. It is disturbing to see the recognition that finally crosses David’s face.
    “It’s just me,” he says to the dogs. “I’m sorry, but it’s now always going to be just me.”
    The two big dogs eventually give up and move elsewhere. Only my Skippy retains his vigil for me by the front door.

2
    T he most forceful evidence of the lasting significance of Dr. Jane Cassidy’s work to my life is how easily I can find her again in death. I can’t seem to see the friends who supported me in my illness or relatives who sent me on my way with grieving good-byes, but whenever I’m not with David or my animals, Jane Cassidy (“Jaycee” to me), Cindy, and the Center for Advanced Primate Studies (known as CAPS) swirl into focus before me. Of course I cannot rule out the possibility that I’m actually only observing false images manufactured by a decomposing brain, but I would hope that the universe isn’t that cruel.
    Jaycee and I share a painful history. In our final year at Cornell, we became research associates for Dr. Renee Vartag, considered by many (including herself) to be one of the more brilliant minds of her generation in the field of primate immunology.
    Our work for Vartag involved caring for a long-term test subject—a bonobo or pygmy chimpanzee named Charlie. Charlie had been born in captivity and was four years old when we met him.Bonobos, like their chimpanzee relatives, are commonly used in immunological research because their immune systems are nearly identical to those of humans. At the time, that was the full extent of my knowledge of chimpanzees, pygmy or otherwise. Unfortunately, I soon learned more.
    Charlie lived in a twenty-by-twenty indoor/outdoor enclosure that had been built to Vartag’s specifications. Vartag had given us only a few responsibilities for him. We fed him, made sure he always had fresh water, cleaned him, and gave him (as specified in one of Vartag’s many terse memos to us) “no less than sixty minutes of human interaction a day.”
    We also were required to give Charlie his “supplements”—a carefully measured cocktail of natural and synthetic vitamins and nutrients that we added to his food. According to Vartag, Charlie had been receiving his supplements since he was two and they were specifically designed to improve his immune system against disease or infection. We collected urine and fecal samples every day and sent them to the lab for analysis, presumably to measure the results of Vartag’s hypothesis.
    Although Jaycee and I were only obligated to spend a daily hour with