What Have I Done

Kala sprinted through the jungle back to the tree house. She quickly met her mother when nearing their treetop home. "Kala? What's the hurry? Where's Henry?"

"Oh, you mean the chauvinist imbecile? He's back at the waterfall to my knowledge," she choked back the tears. Jane took Kala in her arms, doing her best to comfort the younger woman.

"Darling, what happened?" She stroked strands of hair out of the girl's face.

"First he called me a 'little jungle girl', implying that I was ignorant. Then he said women are too busy with housework for legal squabbles. He then went on to say that women are only good in the kitchen and in bed. And then he informed me that I wasn't meant to have a formal education."

Jane huffed a puff of air. "I'm not going to tell you you're wrong in being upset. I would've been just as angry. What you do need to understand is that that is the culture that he was raised in. Women are viewed as inferior to men in England, which is why so many of my exploits are so legendary and well known. I broke through barriers that had previously been hardly questioned. I can't promise that you'll break through to him anytime soon, but you brought him out here because you saw something in him that you just couldn't leave behind. I felt the same thing when I decided to stay here. If I wasn't confident your father and I would work through thick and thin, you wouldn't be here. I feel like if he stays here and learns what life is like out here, he will turn the other leaf. I don't know how long it'll take, but he'll come around."

"But Mother, he called me stupid. No more than a housewife who doesn't know her place. A… a…"

"A woman as known in English society. Dear, I know that he sounds like an absolute baboon to you, but that was the way he was raised. You were most likely much smarter than a majority of those girls in your class. That much you should not be concerned about. You shouldn't base your worth on how well you can pour a cup of tea, and neither should he. Rather base it on your vast knowledge of science, mathematics and culture. Your ability to carry on an intelligent conversation with the most knowledgeable men and women you would ever meet. Lord knows you carry that much." Her tone intensified with each statement. "You're no ignorant jungle girl, you are an intelligent, strong, sophisticated young woman who knows what she wants. If nothing else, I did make sure of that much. Don't let one man change that. Okay?" Her tone began to calm once more. "I will talk to him when he gets back. Until then, why don't you go see what your brother's up to."

"Thank you, Mother," she sniffled.

As Kala was leaving, Tarzan was swinging in. "Where is she going? Where's Henry?"

"She is going to find Jonathan. She and Henry had a bit of a spat earlier and she left him at the waterfall. Would you be a dear and go get him?" Tarzan leaped into the trees, soon returning with the young man in question. "Tarzan, why don't you go check on the children. I need to have a little chat with Mr. Wesson. Henry, come with me," she sighed, leading him up into the tree house. She pulled two chairs closer together by the table, signaling for him to sit in one while she sat opposite of him. "Kala told me what was said. To be quite frank, I expected more from you."

"Mrs. Porter, I told her repeatedly how sorry I was. I never meant for it to sound as bad as it did."

Jane put her index finger to his lips, quieting him. "Henry, you must understand that as you were raised into fine British society, Kala was raised with only bits and pieces of that instilled. She can cook and clean and act like a lady when necessary, but the jungle doesn't allow for the finer things of England to be part of the norm. It doesn't allow for the perfect ignorant housewife as you may have grown accustomed to. Our norm consists of swinging from vines and communicating with wildlife and alternating the chores. You can't expect her to bend to your every whim. Everyone does everything. Even Tarzan takes his turn. I didn't know what my children would have in their future, so I wanted both of them prepared for anything. Kala was raised to be a strong, independent woman because in the jungle you can't always rely on others. Tarzan and I agreed that with so many people coming to the port, we wanted her to have an education and be cultured so not to be the ignorant savage as Tarzan was when I had first arrived. That girl has acquired enough knowledge to have her own theories and experiments and can recite pieces of the Magna Carta. And as far as it sounding as bad as it did, you have to realize that she is not accustomed to comments. Flirtatious has of course been tackled before. Complete and utter demeaning is something else entirely that hasn't had to be talked about. She has lived here her entire life where we empowered her to do whatever her heart desired, whether that be hunting with Tarzan or studying biological tendencies with me and my father. We wanted her to be well rounded so no matter what happened or where she'd be, she would be ok. So far that has worked out. What surprises me is that we've had fewer issues with the random men who come here to reap us of resources than the man who had supposedly gotten to know her and came all the way to Africa for her."

"Mrs. Porter," his voice hushed, "I understand your concerns. I understood that she was much more educated than most English women. What I didn't realize is how much more proactive and bricky she is around here. That was what caught me off guard. I'm not accustomed to women, or anyone for that matter, swinging through the trees and wanting to be so active in her family's decisions."

"Dear, if you're going to live here, you'd better get used to it. And that still doesn't excuse the comments you made. That might be ok in England but I will not have it here. I have spent too long building her up for an ignorant man to tear her back down with a few comments."

"Not to criticize your parenting, Mrs. Porter, but I'd say she's not very stable if a few comments can rip her apart. Maybe it's about time for our young lady to face the facts. She is eighteen after all. Most people are thrust out into the cruel world by eighteen. I know I certainly was. Surely such a fine mind as yourself has spent plenty of time in the jungles of London. Why I hear you've been thrown to the lions of Cambridge. Why not show her what you learned from your experiences?"

"Because all that I learned is that most men are simply boisterous pigs."

Henry leaned back in his chair, cupping his hand over his mouth. He poked his mouth over the top of his hand. "I must say I've enjoyed your opinionated personality Mrs. Porter, but don't you have some cleaning to do? Not that Tarzan would know any better."

"Why I never!" She reached to slap the young man across his face.

He had narrowly caught her hand before it had reached its mark, pulling her out of her seat and closer into him. He also came out of his seat, meeting her face to face. "Or would you rather meet in bed first? You are a rather fine dish."

Jane jerked her hand from his grasp, going from moderately offended to infuriated. "You, young man are diving into shallow waters. Try not to hit your head. Everyone here will let you drown." Jane began to turn and walk away, only to be stopped by a hand gripping her jaw and jerking her back to him.

"Listen, wench,"

Jane tried to recoil back in disgust for the word. "I am no wench, you pompous fool!" She spat in his face.

"Mrs. Porter, you make that sound like a bad thing." He wiped the liquid from rolling down his face. "Might you forget that it was sex crazed war hawks that built the British Empire. It's only right to remain with what works." Henry brought her a little closer with each word.

"Name one."

"King Henry VIII. The man had six wives and was the father of the Royal Navy."

"The man wasn't sex crazed, only desperate for male heirs. Like most other monarchs of the time, he wasn't aware of the female competence for politics."

"Maybe, but the male heir would get it all anyway. That's the way it's always been, and always will be. Now, do you want to make this simple or difficult?"

"Nothing is ever simple in the jungle." She jerked her head side to side repeatedly trying to break free of his grasp.

Henry hiked one of her legs around his waist with his free hand laying her down on the wooden floor and went in to smash his lips against hers. He pinned her hands above her head, allowing his free hand to snake to the hem of where her blouse and skirt met. Henry looked down to see what his hand was revealing as it raised the clothing ever so little in its explorations of the peaks and valleys encompassing the much older woman's body. When he looked back up to continue his work, he instead received a forehead bashed into the bridge of his nose. His head kicked back, shifting him to his knees before keeling over in pain, both hands clinging to his nose, eyes welling up with tears. "God! Stupid girl!"

"You're not the first to think he could have his way with me. I find a good headshot is rather smashing in these situations." She grabbed a handful of his scalp and yanked his face up to see hers. "The boys will hear about this and so will Kala. You do not deserve her. You seemed like a nice young man, but not after this stunt. You are nothing but a podsnappery gal-sneaker. Unless you can prove to me otherwise, you will not be doing anything unsupervised in this jungle any time soon." She released him and walked out to the porch, leaving him to lick his wounds.

After several minutes, Henry joined Jane on the porch, leaning against the rail. "I'm sorry." His tone hushed and greatly humbled.

"I believe you've said that many a time, Mr. Wesson. You might try something different."

"What must I do to fix my undoings?"

"Well, you can start out by being honest and upfront with Kala and the rest of her family. Tell her what you've done and your honest thoughts. If she still wants you around, that is her decision to make. If it were up to me, you would be on the first ship back to London."

"I see."

"They should be coming back any minute for tea. If you don't tell them, I most certainly will." He only nodded in understanding.

Roughly half an hour later the whole family came swinging in from the same general direction. "Oh God, I thought I left you at the waterfall." Anger still seeped through Kala's voice as she entered the home.

"Kala, would you please sit down and talk to me?"

"Why? So you can call me some other demeaning insult?"

Jane looked up from her tea set, "No, because I asked you to. Now, sit down. Listen to what the boy has to say." Jane refused to let the word "man" slip through her lips.

They all found seats, ready to listen intently to the new developments that Henry stood to present. "I know I made mistakes. I called you many things that you obviously are not. And I tried to take a flyer with your mother."

Kala's jaw dropped for a moment. "You tried to have sex with my mother?!"

"Gross!" Jonathan called. "Kala ok, but Mother? You really need to raise your standards."

"Jonathan!"

"What? He's what? Twenty? You're like 50."

"43, thank you very much." Jane droned.

Tarzan just sat in silence, both fists curled tight, nostrils flared, jaw clenched as tight as his fists. "You're not saying much."

Tarzan tackled the younger man to the floor. He rose from his position atop Henry, drumming on his chest with a groan. He continued to the porch and leaped to the ground.

"Um, I'm confused."

"It's a gorilla thing. Tarzan is interpreting this as you challenging him."

"Challenging? What the blazes for?"

"For me. And on a different level Kala. You see, if you can beat Tarzan in a fight, you can have your run of the place and whatever mate you want. You will be the alpha. If not, Tarzan will remain alpha and heaven help you. There's a reason he has survived and remained Lord of the Jungle this long. You should count yourself lucky. Ten years ago, he would've just finished you right here." Jane practically shoved Henry out the door.

"Um. Well then. I-I-I don't suppose we can t-t-talk this out? C-c-c-can we?" Henry stuttered out climbing down the tree. He was answered by being tackled to the ground. Henry flipped Tarzan over top of him, both shooting back to their feet in fighting stances. Tarzan's resembled more of a wrestling stance while Henry's was more boxing. "Alright. I will warn you, I trained several years in boxing."

"I'm afraid boxing won't help you here, Mr. Wesson," Jane called down from the porch. "Tarzan has fought everything from apes to leopards. Oh, and knocked out One Punch Mulligan if you'd remember."

They proceeded to circle each other, each waiting for the other to attack. Henry shuffled in and threw a jab. Tarzan dodged the punch, going straight in under it and driving his knee into the boy's chest repeatedly. After a few repetitions, Tarzan shifted behind the young man, placing him into a choke hold and dragging him backward so as not to get his footing. Henry would bite the older man's arm, gaining his freedom. He let loose another series of punches. Tarzan swept one of Henry's feet out from under him, throwing him face first to the ground in the process. Henry jerked his leg towards himself, bringing Tarzan close enough to get kicked by the opposite foot. Henry scrambled back to his feet only to be taken up like a sack of flour, his back slammed into Tarzan's knee, and tossed to the jungle floor. Henry let out a painful howl in too much pain to bounce back up like he had previously. Tarzan took his opportunity to finish the young man, driving both fists into Henry's chest repeatedly. Henry could feel his sternum and ribs cracking under the constant impacts and winced in pain with each new blow.

Jane, Kala, and Jonathan all came down from their birds-eye-view of the fight. "Tarzan! Tarzan, Darling, he's down! He's done!" Jane and Kala practically pried Tarzan from his victim. Henry struggled to breathe, remaining in his defenseless position.

Tarzan burst from his would-be restraints. "I never want to see you in this jungle again."

"Please, don't just leave me here," he coughed.

"Why shouldn't I? You touched Jane. I am not going to just stand by, I don't care how close you think you are to Kala."

"No this is a big misunderstanding!"

Jane intervened, "No, Mr. Wesson. That is not how we operate here. And if this is how you must learn, then so be it."

"Mother, you couldn't possibly be thinking of being so cruel. He wouldn't last one night."

"If the jungle wants him, he will survive," Tarzan continued. "No man who thinks he can speak the way he did to you and then do what he did to your mother will be allowed in my home anytime soon."

Kala looked from her father to Henry and back. She clenched her eyes shut and pursed her lips in painful thought. "I'm sorry Henry. Father's right." Very little remorse could be heard creaking into her voice. Kala stood as tall as she could muster, leaving her abuser behind.

"Kala! Don't leave me here! Please! I'm sorry! Please, just don't leave me here!" At first, he tried to follow them, soon losing the little strength he had left, pounding the ground with his fist in anger.