When the old keeper forgot one latch, the 400-pound silverback reached through the steel

made when he bent to lift something heavy and the soft click of his tongue when he wanted Winston’s attention without making a command of it. Their relationship was not magical. It was repetition made intimate by time.

That was what frightened me.

If Winston was reacting to Tom’s illness, he was not doing it because he understood a diagnosis. He was continue reading …