The old wall stood like a rough, gray spine cutting across the edge of the village, its stones cracked and worn by years of sun and rain. Moss crept across its surface, and here and there, little plants found life in its crevices. A mother monkey, lean and restless, had chosen to climb this wall with her baby clinging tightly to her stomach. She was hungry, searching for scraps, and danger often trailed close to hunger.
The afternoon air was heavy and hot. The cries of birds echoed above, and in the distance, human voices rose and fell like a tide. The mother monkey’s fingers pressed against the rough stone, her nails scraping as she pulled herself up. Her baby’s small hands dug into her fur, trembling, trusting that her mother’s strength was enough. But nature is not always kind, and strength, however great, can falter at a single slip.
She moved quickly, desperate, climbing higher and higher. Each push of her arm was a test of her balance. Her tail swayed, curling against the wall for support. The baby monkey whimpered softly, sensing unease, but too small to understand the scale of danger.
Halfway up the wall, the mother’s body tensed. Her left arm slid against the stone, grazing over slick moss. For a split second she tried to correct her grip, her right hand clawing harder into the rough surface. But her body jerked. Her shoulder twisted awkwardly, her arm slipped further, and the delicate balance broke.
The baby’s small body was jolted. Fingers loosened. The little one’s cry pierced the air—a thin, desperate sound—as his grip failed. His tiny hand clutched once more at his mother’s fur, pulling, scratching, but the force of gravity was stronger. The mother’s other hand reached down in frantic motion, but too late. The baby slipped away.
Time seemed to stretch into a cruel eternity as the little body fell. Down past the stones, down through the still, scorching air. His eyes wide, his mouth open in a silent scream, the fall lasted only seconds but carved scars that would never heal.
Then came the sound. A dull, final thud against the hard ground below. The sound of life breaking, fragile bones meeting unyielding earth. The cry ended. Silence, heavy and merciless, filled the space where hope had been.
The mother monkey froze on the wall, her body trembling violently. She peered downward, her breath rapid, chest heaving. Her baby lay twisted, limp, unmoving on the dirt. The soft pink of his skin peeked through thin fur, dust clinging to his tiny frame. His eyes, once so bright, were half-open but vacant, staring at nothing.
The mother let out a cry—raw, guttural, filled with pain that cut deeper than any wound. She scrambled down the wall, no longer caring about balance or danger. Stones cut her skin as she rushed, slipping, tumbling until she reached the ground. She fell beside the small body, her arms wrapping around him, lifting him gently as though touch might undo the fall.
She pressed her nose into his chest, nudging, urging him to breathe again. Her hands shook as she turned him, licked at the dust on his fur, whispered her grief in desperate cries. But the little body was cold, lifeless, no breath to rise, no heart to beat.
She rocked back and forth, clutching him close, her wails echoing against the village wall. The sound was haunting, the sound of a mother breaking. Other monkeys, hearing her cries, crept closer. They sat in silence, their eyes wide, watching but not daring to touch. Even they seemed to understand the sacredness of her grief.
The mother carried her baby, pacing in circles, refusing to let go. She licked his tiny face again and again, hoping for warmth to return. She lifted his hand and pressed it to her cheek, but it only drooped lifelessly. She screamed at the sky, as if accusing it of stealing her child.
Time crawled. The sun dipped lower, shadows stretching long and dark across the ground. Still she held him, her arms tight, unwilling to accept what was already true. Grief had no measure for her; only an endless wave crashing again and again.
As night approached, the air cooled, but the fire of her mourning burned hotter. The baby’s body grew stiffer, heavier, but still she refused to leave him. She curled herself around him, lying against the earth, protecting him even in death as she had in life.
The village grew quiet. The wall loomed above her, the place where life had been stolen. She did not look at it again. Her world had collapsed in those few seconds of a slip, a fall, a sound that would haunt her forever.
The mother monkey’s cries softened into low whimpers, exhausted, broken. She pressed her lips to her baby’s head one final time, breathing him in, memorizing what little warmth was left. The stars blinked awake above, indifferent to her sorrow, cold witnesses to her loss.
Nature moved forward as it always did, but for the mother, time had stopped at the moment her arm slid, at the moment her baby slipped through her grasp. Hunger, fear, survival—none of it mattered anymore. What mattered lay still in her arms, gone beyond return.
And so she sat in the shadow of the wall, a grieving mother holding her lifeless baby, her heart shattering with every passing second. The night swallowed her cries, but the pain lingered, carved deep into the stones, into the ground, into the silence that followed.
