Maurice & Friends

Shane arrived bright and early for his first day of work in the presidential office. Ralph had moved down the hall to another office in his role as advisor and President Emeritus. I was already there arranging the day’s schedule. I hated to tell him that Maude Hyena was first on the agenda with some complaint or other. We had spoken of me handling mundane business but Shane had chosen to do as Ralph Lyon and address the topics of less importance himself. “I want to keep my paw on the pulse especially in the Mara,” he had said. I waited, with real interest, as Maude entered his office for her audience. I was anxious to see this young lion’s style. Maude entered; Shane stood and shook paws with her, offered her hot tea and had her sit in the chair before his desk. I sat, ears perked with interest.

“President Simba, I want to address an issue with you. It’s one of compensation. We have been informed that Carolyn Cape Buffalo is heading a case of compensation for buffalo killed by you lions. The dik diks, zebra and wildebeest are considering doing the same. We feel that we hyenas are due some,” announced Maude, with pursed lips and a bureaucratic expression plastered across her less than attractive face.

“Mrs. Hyena, I don’t believe lions did a great deal of killing of hyenas. You weren’t exactly on our list of choice cuts. Not enough meat on your asses.”

Maude’s face morphed into a moue of prissiness. I sensed Shane’s body as it tensed. Even with the new Kenya, lions and hyenas were still on edge with one another. They had been age old competitors and adversaries. I also noticed his formal approach. Ralph would have sweet-talked and cajoled, calling her Maude.

“Oh no, Mr. President, we seek compensation for all the kills you lions took from us in the past,” said Maude, daintily touching a hanky to her lips.

“That was yesterday and today is a new one in Kenya, Mrs. Hyena. Why would you seek compensation? You and your husband are making a mint with your junk food at McDonalds. I believe lions are the most frequent patrons of your unhealthy fare. Certainly, that’s reparation enough. If you think otherwise, Mrs. Hyena, you can file a claim in court. That will take years probably and much money. If I were you, I’d be content with the status quo. And as for lions taking your kills, my great grandmother was killed by a pack of hyenas that ripped off her evening meal along with her throat. Will there be anything else, Mrs. Hyena?”

I was greatly amused. This was an entirely different approach than the hail fellow, well met Ralph but it worked equally well. Maude sat there stunned for a few moments but managed to gather her wits about her once more.

“No, Mr. President. I appreciate your time this morning,” she said getting up.

Shane stood too.

“Anytime, Mrs. Hyena, the steward will see you out.”

When she cleared the room, Shane swiveled his desk chair and looked at me with an amused expression.

“Was that up to snuff, Maurice?” he asked.

“Top notch, absolutely perfect,” I laughed.

We spent the rest of the day working on details of the change. I asked Shane what he wanted the official planes to be named. They were, at the moment, Ralph One and two. Shane wanted them to remain that way but Ralph was having none of it.

“This young chap is president now and deserves his own day in the sun. I am very appreciative of the thought but tell him no,” roared Ralph over the phone. He and Mildred were heading out for a day of golf with Bernard and Sylvia Cougar.

Ralph One and Two turned into Simba One and Two. Ralph didn’t want the official yacht named for him any longer. It also ended up as Simba.

I went to lunch with Shane so we could discuss further details. During that day, he began to call me Maury which felt good. We were working quite well together. When we finished our lunch, I walked down the hall to what had been Mildred’s office. Betty was sitting there with Bernice Bear, crying. I was taken aback. Bernice gave me a helpless look.

“I’m afraid I’m going to fail him, Maurice,” she wept, clutching a tissue that had almost been decimated by her restless, wringing hands.

“This is quite absurd, Betty. This is not the real you. You are a ballsy, gutsy female who will be just great,” I told her, with a hint of annoyance in my voice. She looked up suddenly, her deep brown eyes trying to fathom my mood.

“I know nothing about AIDS,” she wept.

“Mildred and Lisa have AIDS covered, Betts. Your strong forte is culture and the arts. Now get with the ticket and stop sniveling.”

Bernice, that efficient and plucky grizzly, shot me a very appreciative look.

I went home from my first day as the press secretary of our second lion president. Ralph Lyon had not shone his face at the State House all day, but then that was what retirement was all about. I walked in my home to find Lachlan puttering in the kitchen. He has a key now and comes to my house when he leaves the mental health center. He had steaks marinating and had managed to master a very good recipe for Vine and Mountain Fig Salad, my absolute favorite. He poured me a glass of one of his impeccable wines that he picks up at Margaux’s wine and fine food shop which is now located in the Lewis Lyon Mall. We went to my back porch to enjoy the mild and lovely evening. There is absolutely nothing like a Masai Mara sunset – at least in my opinion.

“How was it?” were the first words out of his mouth.

“Very, very good. His approach is different from Ralph’s but quite excellent; we had a wonderful first day working together.”

“I’m so glad. I was afraid that you would miss Ralph too much. I think you have always been half in love with him the reason you worked so well with him.”

I snapped to attention at this bit of intuitive genius.

“I had never even thought of that, Lachlan. Leave it to a shrink to point it out,” I giggled. “You may be right.”

“I usually am,” he laughed, giving me a hearty slap to my back which almost sent my wine glass flying.

Betty and Shane were edgy from their first day on the job. It didn’t help matters that Caroline Cheetah continued to harass the telephone operators at both the State House and the Mansion. She was determined to get her fair shot at visits with young Shane Simba, Jr., nicknamed by his father’s family – Sonny. When the steward handed Shane the fourteen messages from Caroline, he was quite gloomy.

“Betty, I think we should turn Sonny over to Caroline if she’s drug free and going to make a good home for him.”

“What can you be thinking, Shane? She’s a terrible female,” yelped a stressed Betty.

“I’m thinking that she’s his mother, Betty. I don’t like taking kids away from their birth mothers. I didn’t get that trait, like Sam. If she’s a decent mother to him, she is where he belongs.”

“Shane, the courts gave him to us for a year.”

“Betty, I don’t want Caroline all over the place, bitching and carping about not seeing him. If she’s drug free - and the courts will make sure she is - I think he should be with her. I can get visiting rights easily.”

“Don’t you love him?” wailed Betty, who had already had a trying and frustrating first day as consort to his president.

“Yes, of course I do. That’s not the point. Caroline is going to harass the hell out of us. Sefu has told me that she is drug free after each week’s test and working again. I’m just uneasy about this owning him totally. I don’t have time for Caroline’s shit these days.”

“He’s your son, Shane,” sobbed Betty, who was growing more wrought by the moment.

“Yes, he is, Betty. But he’s not yours – get it? I have a son and daughter who are motherless. Focus your madness for my offspring on them. They are the ones that need it.”

Betty ran from the room, weeping. She went to their room and closed the door. The houseboy (one of fifteen who staffed the mansion) asked if he could get her anything. She requested a cognac. She took a Valium and undressed for bed. The cognac arrived. With the stiff drink and the Valium, Betty fell into a troubled sleep. Shane ate dinner with Staci and Sean, who asked where Betty was. Shane reported that she was tired from a long day at her office. They had participated in their first big argument in their new residence.

Caroline Cheetah, as it happens, is doing rather well. Her show has again been increased to two hours with Irving Impala being very pleased with her these days. Caroline had prepared her son’s nursery in her Lyon Towers apartment. Shane called his brother, Sefu, and told him that if Caroline was behaving herself, he was okay with the idea of her taking Sonny on a trial basis with him having two weekends a month visiting rights. Caroline came by the mansion and picked her son up. Neither Shane nor Betty was present. Betty and Staci were unhappy with this turn of events. Young Sean Simba wasn’t. With baby Sonny gone, Betty would once more be all his. Arlon Lyon had left a terrific gap in the lives of his mother and step sister when he departed for school in England. Staci, Betty and Sean grew even closer. Caroline, having been put in her place by both parent’s, decided to clean up her act. She loved flaunting the President’s love child at every opportunity. In the process of taking him out and about, she fell in love with the appealing little cub. It was to be the saving grace for the troubled cheetah single mom. Caroline would write at night while Sonny would be sleeping in his bassinet near her computer. She didn’t like the name Sonny. To her he was Shane, Jr.. When she wanted a bit of sexual activity, she would ring up Sloane Simba, who was in a muddle over having been divorced by his wife, Caitlin. Sloane would arrive with his stash of Trojans and they would indulge in quiet sexual antics, Caroline shushing anything that might wake her son.

“You’ve become quite the mommy, haven’t you?” observed Sloane in his usual terse manner, edged with sarcasm.

“Yes, I have. I think you should be practicing. Isn’t Caitlin pregnant?”

“Yes, and I have visiting rights. Maybe I should practice on my nephew in there.”

“He’s only your half nephew. You and Shane aren’t full brothers.”

“That’s knit picking, Caroline, and only a matter of semantics. We share the same father and our mothers are sisters.”

“I heard that lion males in a pride mate with all the lionesses and that they can have a litter where each cub is from a different father,” she laughed, lighting a Marlboro and blowing the smoke at him.

“Quite the leonine scholar, aren’t you, Caroline?” he snapped, his voice rife with the annoyance he felt at having his heritage impugned. “All the pride males were brothers, so it still amounts to more or less the same.”

“God, what incestuous bastards you lions are,” she laughed, jumping from the bed and heading for the kitchen.

He followed her there. She poured Scotch for both of them.

“You certainly worked at having a lion cub, didn’t you? This son of yours could easily end up looking like a cheetah or a combination. He could be quite peculiar looking. Are you prepared for that?”

“You are a real shit, Sloane Simba.”

“So I’ve been told. I’ve also been told that it’s part of my charm,” he said.

He put his drink down and pulled her toward him kissing her roughly. She put her legs around his waist. They returned to the bed for another round. This one was even livelier.

As for the pregnant Caitlin Cougar Simba, who had dropped the Simba from her name, she was settled happily in the house built by Lawrence Leoparde on the street named for his family. She sculpted and sold through the gallery at the arts center. If she got lonely she would go next door to her uncle, Bernard Cougar’s home and visit with them. She wrote her columns for the Masai Mara Daily and visited her friend, Jane, the lioness reporter. Sometimes Jane and her steady, Luke Leoparde would visit her in the evenings. She took no calls from her ex-husband even though he tried steadily to get in touch with her. She got her first sonogram which revealed a single male cub. She grew excited at the prospect of motherhood.

“What in the hell is wrong with Betty, Maurice?” asked a truly alarmed Bertram during one of our lunches at OKAPI’S.

“I think she’s a bit overwhelmed by being first lady,” I commented.

“She called me wailing like a banshee last night. It was something about Shane’s child by Caroline Cheetah. She says that Shane has returned him to his mother. Dear God, she was as drunk as a road lizard, Maurice. She’s got her image to maintain these days. Shane was in the Turkana District on an overnighter.”

“He had to resolve a farmer vs. cattlemen dispute there. I saw him off. Betty needs to get her act together. I hope she doesn’t blow this whole thing that she has wanted for so long.”

“Oh, as do I!” he yelped, placing a cheese filled cracker in his mouth and munching loudly.

When Shane returned to the State House in the presidential helicopter the next day, Betty was in her office working on plans for a cultural center. She ran to the lawn to greet him. He hugged her to him.

“Drinks are waiting on us at home,” she whispered to him.

She got to the mansion early and was waiting for him, Scotch in hand, when he walked out of the elevator to their main family room. He hugged her again before sitting on the couch and pulling her with him.

“What did you accomplish today, Fifi? I guess this is what we will be about for a while – accomplishments,” he laughed, lighting a cigarette.

“I mapped out a plan to have a cultural center in the Mara. It won’t compete with Maurice’s art center. It will be about local Kenyan culture of all the tribes and will include species areas for the entire range of indigenous animals in this country. How does that sound, darling?”

“Wonderful, Fifi! Are you over your pout with me sending Sonny to his mother?”

“I miss him, Shane. He is so adorable. But so are Sean and Staci. I guess I can just see him when he visits us. He is due to visit next weekend. So are Jason and Josh. The house will be ready in the bush. We can go there.”

“That will be fun, Fifi.”

They ate dinner with Staci and Sean. The conversation was lively. After, they had cognac sent to their bedroom where a fire crackled. They sat before the dying flames.

“Fifi, we have to take our first official trip together very soon. I have to go to England. Tony Blair can’t come here. He has too many war headaches at the moment.”

“I’ll be ready, darling,” she said, leaning down to kiss his brow which lay in her lap.

“We can see Arlon that week too, Betty.”

They made love for hours and fell asleep in each other’s arms.

Steven Simba’s progress level with Cameron Caracal was below his expectation levels. He was chomping at the bit. He had rejoined her evening aerobics class once more, hoping for further steam room action. His only reward for that was a renewal of his pained hamstring. During office hours at Lyon & Associates Attorneys, she ignored him unless she was directly involved with him in a case. His brother’s Alexander and Sloane had been putting out feelers for him to return to Simba Brothers but he ignored this invitation due to the strident Stuart Simba who had taken over the firm at the request of Sam, Shane and Sefu. So he stuck it out at Lyon since he could at least get a gander at Cameron during the day.

In another quarter, Sidney Simba, who had lost his license to practice law due to a drug bust, was falling, daily, into further disrepair. As an afterthought he decided to take Linda Cougar down the primrose path with him. She lost her job at Jackal Realty due to late morning arrivals and fuzzy concentration while there. She gave up her Watering Hole Condo and joined Sidney at the Simba Fuck Farm in the bush. The leopard drug dealer pedaled his wares day and night while Linda and Sidney went to the dogs on an fast train.

Luke Leoparde decided to try matrimony again. He had resisted the idea since his failed attempt with Simone Serval. He decided to pop the question to Jane, the lioness head of news at the Masai Mara Daily. He found Jane to be all he needed or wanted. An added plus was the fact that his kids adored her. He had his houseboy set the table at his bungalow in the safari club compound in the Mara. His request for a romantic setting was carried out nicely by the serving boy. When Jane arrived she was surprised at the ambience of the evening.

“How pretty, Luke,” she said, hugging and kissing him. “What are the candles about?”

Luke made drinks for them. They sat on the couch before a nicely laid fire.

“I’m going to propose tonight, Janie. That’s what they’re for.”

Jane sat up abruptly. It wasn’t the response Luke expected. She seemed tense.

“Excuse me, Jane. Did I say something wrong? I just asked you to marry me in so many words.”

“Luke, I love you and your cubs, but I don’t want to marry now. If I don’t marry a lion, my parent’s will never see me again.”

“Oh shit, Janie. That’s old fashioned as hell. No one marries the same species anymore. Look at our fucking president. He’s a lion and he married an ape and before her – a cheetah. Are you going to let your parents dictate to you about a matrimonial partner?”

“Yes, I am Luke. I love my parents with all their warts. When they die, I’ll marry.”

“How damned old are they?”

“They’re seven.”

“Shit, Jane, in the new order, they’ve got another twenty years or so.”

“Unless I marry a lion, I can’t marry until then.”

Luke was mind boggled. He walked about the room holding his head.

“Don’t you lions have biological clocks? Don’t you want kids?”

“Yes. But I’ve got time.”

“Will you move in with me?”

“No, I think that would just create a lot of problems and they would find out I’m living with a leopard.”

“Okay, Janie, let me meet them. I’ll take my multimillion dollar ass over there and woo them,” he snarled.

She began to laugh. She pulled him back onto the sofa.

“Okay, Luke. I will take you to meet them but you’ll be sorry. They are so old fashioned they didn’t even want to take a surname. That’s why I’m called simply, Jane the lioness. Poor Bob Bushbuck has to make out all my checks that way.”

“Next question, why don’t you marry a male lion and make your life simpler,” he asked, hoping she wouldn’t consider that an option.

“I hate male lions. They are such pricks. I would never marry one,” she giggled.

“Good girl, Janie. But you do like Ashley, don’t you? He’s my best buddy.”

“Yes, I do like Ashley Lyon. He’s quite nice.”