Staci Simba sat listening in an easy chair on Luke Leoparde’s veranda.  He had just told her of having flown his wife and her cubs to join Shane in Kitale.  

“Don’t you ever want a wife who is not someone else’s lover, Luke?  Janie is great but she’s all about my dad.”

“If you would marry me, Staci, I would ask Jane for a divorce.  We have that kind of agreement.”

“Luke, I love you but I’m not ready to marry.  I still have a long way to go in my career as a nurse.”

“I almost wish you didn’t use birth control so you’d maybe get preggers one day and have to marry me,” he chuckled. 

“I always do practice it,” she giggled. 

“Something your dad doesn’t adhere to, obviously.  Staci, speaking of your nursing career, are you having a sexual thing with Juma Mnyama?”

“Don’t ask me that, Luke, please.”

The very avoidance of the subject was an affirmation in Luke’s mind.  He went to the teak, steel lined cooler and brought out two more beers.  Popping the tops, he handed one to Staci.  He clicked his bottle to hers.

“Here’s hoping I have a reason to ask for a divorce and marry you one day, Staci.  I do love you so.”

“As I do you, Luke Leoparde.”

            Lucy Cougar was in seventh heaven.  Her classes in nursing school were going splendidly.  Her main professor adored her and was allowing her to attend training sessions with Dr. Trevor Tau, the new lion doctor in charge of the malaria program.  She would go from nursing classes early and join Dr. Tau on his rounds.  She invited Staci Simba to spend the night at her home on the Mara River.  There, the hapless Staci was inundated with chatter regarding Lucy’s new crush, Trevor.  She realized that despite Lucy’s three children and a failed marriage, she remained totally naïve.  Lucy, in her zeal about the malaria doctor, had forgotten a dinner date with her ex-husband, Alexander Simba.  Alexander had stood at the bar of the Watering Hole Pub for three hours awaiting Lucy.  Finally, quite sloshed, he returned to Simone Serval’s penthouse and bed. 

Dr. Trevor Tau and Lucy Cougar in the malaria clinic...

“Mrs. Simba, what makes you think you can never live without your husband?  If he’s unfaithful and in love with another female, why stay?”

This question was posed by Betty’s new shrink, Dr. Cate Ocelot.  Lachlan had finally turned Betty over to a female in the hopes she would be more simpatico with the First Lady.  Lachlan had been wrung dry on the subject of Betty’s woes with Shane Simba. It was time for new energy to come into play was his thought on the subject.

“This is all confidential, isn’t it?” asked Betty, shifting uncomfortably on the long chaise in Cate’s office.

“Mrs. Simba, it would be confidential even if you weren’t the President’s wife,” assured Cate. 

“Please, just call me Betty.”

            A furious upheaval took place when Roy Lee Simba and Bertram Baboon decided that rather than have Chloe Cougar take the role of Blanche Dubois in their film production of A Streetcar Named Desire, the older Bop Boon would be more appropriate.  

“Chloe, you are too young for the film version,” explained her ex-husband, Roy Lee.  “You can tell on the screen that you’re a young cat.”

“So you prefer an ugly tooth baring, long schnozzle ape to play it instead of me?  Is that what you’re trying to say, Roy?”

By this time Chloe was on her feet and holding a very large Marc Jacob’s bag.  The unfortunate lion superstar was not able to avoid the swat to his head that Chloe gave utilizing her purse as a weapon.  He ended up on the floor looking up at a horrified Bertram.  Chloe made a hasty retreat. 

“I particularly enjoyed the tidbit about the long nosed ape,” laughed Bertram as Roy Lee picked himself off the floor. “And you must admit to being slugged by the latest fashion statement.”

 

“I didn’t enjoy a damn bit of it,” groaned Roy Lee, feeling through his mane for lumps. 

            Bertram and I were back at OKAPI’S for our luncheon date.  The management, possibly noticing our absence of late, sent an especially magnificent array of veggies for Bertram to munch on.  It was accompanied by a terrine of goose pate with crisp toast squares.  Our martinis even seemed a bit larger.  Ossie Okapi swung his head toward us and gave what passed for a smile among hoof stock. 

“My dear wife, Gloria, is quite disturbed about the current state of her sister.  She is hoping that Betty will dispense with the donated uterus and get back to normal once the twins are born,” said Bertram, sipping noisily on his martini. 

Bertram seems to be taking to heterosexual marriage agreeably.  He is constantly alluding to ‘my dear wife’ this and ‘dearest Glo’ that. 

“She certainly needs to do something soon or all will be lost,” I agreed.  “And did you realize that Shane Simba’s children are now your nephews and nieces?”

Bertram looked shocked but then realized that due to his marriage to Gloria Chimpo; he was indeed the uncle of Betty and Shane’s cubs. 

“Dear me, what an astonishing thought, Maurice.  Whoever guessed that I, a baboon, would ever be kin to a lion’s offspring?”

“We live in a new day and age, Bertram.”

“I’m not sure I like it that much,” he stated, taking a fork and spearing a chunk of goose pate.

“If it hadn’t come about, you would never have been a film producer with a lion partner nor married a chimpanzee from Tanzania,” I reminded him.  “Nor would we be sitting in the ritziest restaurant in town owned by an okapi.”

“Quite right you are, Maurice.  Nor would you have had sex with a now departed leopard and have inherited millions.”

He placed the lump of pate on a toast square and crunched loudly.

“Quite right,” I agreed.

            Betty rested in her bedroom in the mansion wondering why these cubs weren’t early like her others.  She placed her hand on her stomach and felt them squirming.  She heard the engines of the helicopter, the whirring blades cutting the air and realized it was Shane arriving from Kitale.  She got up slowly and went to the balcony where she could see him.  The blades slowed and stopped.  The door of the plane opened and there he was, tall and handsome, waving to the assembled group.  The last rays of the sun glinted on his thick mane as he bounded down the steps of the plane.  He made his way to the mansion instead of the State House as he usually did.  In a matter of minutes, she heard the elevator door open and the laughter of Solly as he greeted his father.  Then the door opened to their room.  She got up from the bed and tried to sit but a stabbing pain ran through her and she fell back again.  Shane sat on the side of the bed and held her hand. 

“What is it, Fifi?”

“I felt some pain but it’s passed now,” she said, her face beaded with perspiration. 

“There will be no more trips until the cubs arrive.  I will go nowhere until I see them safely born and you well again.”

“Thank you, darling,” she said weakly. 

“Don’t thank me, Fifi.  It’s the least I can do for you.”

The President arrives at the State House....

“When I see him my knees buckle and I am a helpless mess, Cate.”

“Then don’t look at him, Betty.”

This was Betty’s second visit to her new psychiatrist. 

”I can’t help myself.”

“Betty, I cut my teeth on your books.  They were all marvelous and your journalism was profound.  You are a brilliant female.  Too brilliant to be enmeshed in this obsession for a male, even if he is your husband,” Cate told her.

“I loved Shane Simba from the moment I laid eyes on him and heard him speak.  Something snapped inside me at the sight of him.  I was married to his litter mate at the time.  I met him at one of my mother-in-law’s Sunday brunches.  He had just come from England and his studies.  I will never forget my first sight of him or the way I felt.”

There was such sorrow in Betty’s voice that Cate found herself tearing up.  She quickly pulled herself together. 

“Is there hope of you regaining his love?”

“Oh, Shane loves me.  It is just not the way he loves my rival.  It’s more of a sense of gratitude that I pulled his children into a family group when he returned from Botswana.”

“Your husband is too savvy for that, Betty.  I believe it was much more than that.  I believe you can rekindle the flame once the twins are born.”

“Oh God, if I only thought it was so,” she cried. 

            Georgy Simba was in a whiny mood.  She was afraid that her mother, Caitlin Cougar, was going to marry Homer Leo.  She had been moping around her father’s bush house all weekend, sending her stepmother, Caroline Cheetah Simba, into stitches of nervousness.  Sloane had tried to reason with his young daughter, reminding her that he was remarried again and her mother deserved the right to marry the male of her choice.  Caroline was not accustomed to whiny kids.  Her one cub, Sunny, was just that – happy and good humored at all times.  One could wonder how this happened being that Georgy was the doted upon legitimate daughter of her parents, whereas Sunny was illegitimate and not precisely doted on except for the brief time he had spent in the home of his adopted father, Leland Leoparde.  These days things were brighter for the young cub.  Sloane Simba, his stepfather, was in actuality his uncle.  Moreover, Sloane loved Sunny, treating him in the same way he cared for his own beloved Georgy. 

“Why are you coddling her on this issue, Sloane?  Caitlin needs a life as much as you do. Georgy, you should be ashamed of yourself for being so selfish,” snarled Caroline. 

At this pronouncement, Georgy’s wails grew louder, sending Caroline to the veranda with a fresh pack of cigarettes and a martini.   

            The truth of the matter was that Caitlin Cougar was using her children as an excuse not to commit to Homer Leo.  It wasn’t the fact that Caitlin didn’t love Homer but merely a matter of the cougar female realizing early on that she didn’t work well in a relationship.  After loving and marrying Sloane Simba and having him bow out twice, the pretty and very talented Caitlin prized heading her own household.  The catch-22 was that she also loved sex and that required a male – all the better if he was steady.  Feline AIDS was rampant now.  A male like Homer Leo, from a highly respectable pride, would probably not be a bearer of that particular disease.   She was not at all sure about the Simba males with their highly touted libidos.

            Another truth lay a few miles away at the Baboon-Simba Studios.  Bop Boon had threatened to sue if she wasn’t given the film roles promised in her contract.  The role of the aging Blanche Dubois had been played to perfection by Chloe Cougar on stage and would have probably washed as well on screen.  However, for the aging and nutty Bop, A Streetcar Named Desire was the perfect vehicle.  A blowsy, long in the tooth, nutcase was what Roy Lee and Bertram had long ago deemed the feral baboon actress.  So, a very satisfied and rather smug Bop Boon showed up for the signing and her script at the studio.  Micah Mbube, who was slated to recreate the role of Stanley Kowalski on screen, didn’t have a clue as to what he was in for.  He had never worked with the tempestuous Bop.  Later in the day, Roy Lee offered Chloe the role of Stella, Stanley’s wife.  It was a definite supporting role and Chloe slammed down the phone on her ex-husband, refusing to answer.  He assumed it was NO.