But she never forgot Golden.
Sometimes, when the wind moved through the trees, she would glance toward the garden and smile.
“I wonder where he is now,” she would say.
My father always reminded her that she had done the right thing by cooperating with the wildlife officers.
And Grandma would answer, “I know. I just hope he has enough to eat.”
One afternoon, I visited her and found her sitting at the kitchen table, looking through photographs on her phone.
She had saved a still image from the security footage.
It showed the cougar stretched out on her porch, its massive paws crossed beneath its head, looking almost impossibly peaceful.
“Look at him,” she said, turning the screen toward me. “Isn’t he beautiful?”
I studied the photograph.
He was beautiful.
But he was also a wild animal whose strength could have ended the story very differently.
“Grandma,” I asked, “weren’t you ever frightened?”
