Ricky edited the video of the zebras from earlier that day. The pair, Doruba and Kwame, had been strutting along the fence as usual when Doruba kicked his brother. Hard. Staggering, Kwame kicked him back. For the first time ever, Ricky backed away. The small spat escalated into a flurry of kicks and squeals that made guests stop and stare. In his year working at the Philly Zoo, Ricky had never witnessed such behavior from the benign grass-munchers.
       When Ricky tracked down their keeper and informed him of the fight, he expected the man to do something. Maybe write a report or temporarily separate the two. But the man only shrugged.

       “More common than you’d think,” he said. “Horseplay, that’s all.”
       Ricky blinked at him.

       He chuckled. “Oh yeah, zebras are real bastards. Did you know they’re second only to elephants in the number of zookeepers they’ve injured? Betcha didn’t.” Leaning in, the man whispered: “In the wild, if the males find a pregnant mare, they’ll rape her in an attempt to abort the fetus. And if the kid’s already out of the womb? No biggie. He’ll just drag it to the nearest body of water and–”
       Ricky blurted out a thank you and left.
       As he scrolled over the chunk of the footage containing the fight, the keeper’s words echoed in his head. Sick. Sick, to make up lies like that. He deleted the fight, leaving only footage of them strutting and chewing on straw.
       For the last half hour of his shift, he made two more sweeps of the zoo, starting at the spider monkey cage and ending at the hot air balloon launchpad. No trespassers; there never were any. Throughout the zoo, eyes glinted at him. From the savannah exhibit, a pair of marabou storks watched as he passed. Their unblinking eyes glared orange. Behind them loomed the monstrous shadows of the giraffes, all stock still. He speedwalked past them to the zebras. One last video for the day. Fishing out his phone, he aimed it through the fence and turned on the flashlight.
       Doruba stood there. Legs unnaturally long. Eyes gleaming malice. Snout twisted into a snarl. Jaws open, far too wide.
       His head snapped toward Ricky. Ricky gasped. He stumbled back, flashlight. clattering to the ground. Crouching, he snatched it and ran. Didn’t stop till he reached the gate. With trembling fingers he locked it then bolted to his truck.

       The next day he returned to the zoo. Usually he showed up before his shifts started. Not today. It took him a good hour to work up the nerve to revisit the zebra exhibit. Over and over he told himself that he’d seen nothing. He’d glanced at Doruba for less than a second. Plus it was dark; of course things looked a little strange, especially from a distance. Yet the image remained. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t replace it with the image of the Doruba he’d watched every day for a year. If he’d really seen something last night, it wasn’t his Doruba. It was something else. Had
to be. He wouldn’t believe otherwise.
       On the opposite side of the path he paced, peering through the fence at the zebras. Near Kwame and two other males stood Doruba. His lower jaw circled as he munched on a wad of straw. Nothing out of the ordinary. One by one the last guests of the day departed until only a handful of families remained. As the zoo emptied and still nothing happened, Ricky approached the enclosure’s fence. Later that night he would check on them one last time, just to be absolutely sure. But, for now, the animals had reverted back to the benign grass munchers he knew them to be. He started toward the zoo’s main gate so he could see the last guests out. For a split second he glanced back at the fence.
       And froze. There, just beyond the fence, stood Doruba. Watching him.
       When had he gotten so close? RIcky swallowed hard. From up the path, two families approached, eager to get an up-close look. They pressed themselves against the fence, squealing, trying to get Doruba’s attention. But Doruba stared straight past them, at Ricky.
       All around him, mothers cooed to their children.

       “Aww, he’s a sweetheart!”
       “He likes you!”
       “Look, kids, he’s saying hi!”