Helpless

I was running down the hill from the front yard to the backyard when I saw a bundle of pink shapes in the rocks. I stopped playing, and crept closer. Four baby squirrels lay among the rock bedding. They were sitting out in the open, not even close to one of the small bushes that would have provided cover.

All of them were furless and tiny -- maybe the size of my eight-year-old thumb. Their eyes were closed, but looked like bulging dark berries on the sides of their heads. Needle-like claws were visible at the ends of their feet, all curled close to their bodies. Their tails were slim and hairless as well, and pulled tight next to their feet. They breathed so fast that it looked like they were shivering, despite the sunlight beaming down on them.

I ran back inside and found a shoebox, then used a glove to scoop the squirrels inside, and moved them to the shade. It seemed so strange that they were out in the open with no protection.

They were adorable, though. I sat and watched them for a long time. They looked happier to be in the shade, I thought, and resting on a softer surface. I wondered how soon they would grow fur and big, bushy tails. They looked fragile.

“Where do you think they came from?” I asked my mom. We were the only two in the house that afternoon.

“I don’t know,” she said, “but I found a squirrel that looked like a fox had gotten to it, yesterday. Maybe it was their mother.”

I hoped that wasn’t the case. On the one hand, I knew that foxes needed to eat too. But if the mother was dead, then I had to take care of the baby squirrels. And to take care of them, I first needed a way of feeding them.

We set a shallow dish with water inside the box, but they had no way to tell that it was there, and they probably couldn’t pull themselves over to it even if they had. First I tried tipping a spoon of water up to their mouths. None of them responded, and they just kept sniffing and shaking as their noses got a little wet. Next, I tried milk, but they didn’t respond to that either.

By now, it had been around an hour or two since I had found the baby squirrels. I was getting worried. We hadn’t found a nest, and I didn’t want to leave them in the open again. But I also didn’t know how to take care of them, and neither did my mother.

I watched the squirrels throughout the day, and my mom eventually pulled me aside.

“I don’t think there’s anything we can do,” she said. “Sometimes animals… just don’t make it. That’s sad, but that’s how nature works.”

I started to cry. Hours earlier, I thought I had discovered something wonderful. Now, I had no choice but to wait and watch it die. My mom hugged me, but I didn’t say anything.

For the rest of the day, I continued to check in on the squirrels in the box. It hurt to watch them, but it also hurt not to. My mom tried to feed them again, but still they wouldn’t eat or drink anything that she gave them.

When night came, I checked the box again. The squirrels weren’t moving. The tears returned to me, and I tried to swallow the lump at the back of my throat. I brought my mom down to see them, but we realized that they were still breathing. Somehow, that made it worse, because it meant there was still time to wait.

We set the baby squirrels back near the place I had found them, but we placed them beneath a bush this time. I went to bed in mourning. I hoped and prayed that their mother hadn’t died, and that she would return and take them back to their nest.

When I woke up the next day, my mom had already checked on the baby squirrels. They had died during the night. It broke my heart, but I felt relieved to know it was over.

That was the first time that I had encountered death up-close. I’d read about it and seen it on TV and in movies. But I’d never had to wait for it. That was the hardest part: waiting and knowing that there was nothing I could do.