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Picture by Timothy Morris
Laura didn't sleep well that night.
It wasn't that Mr. Grumbles cried. He certainly wasn't violent or aggressive. He didn't even move around much. He explored Laura's suite during her tea party with the Vitrifer grandmother, then curled up on the couch in apparent contentment and went to sleep. The problem was that he only slept for two hours at a time.
Laura's bedroom had a door, and the door had a chair wedged under it. It was only when Laura installed the chair that she realized what a stupid idea it was for her to be the one to house Mr. Grumbles. Koen was out with General Graa, but what about Mark? He was a man, wasn't he? He should be the one on night-duty.
The thought reoccurred when the timid scratching came at her door.
The first time, Laura took Mr. Grumbles to the bathroom. He seemed to know what to do when aimed at the toilet. After that, she got him a snack. The third time, she woke to find him sniffing around the refrigerator. He cringed when she looked at him, and hurried back to the couch, in front of which he squatted.
Of course, Laura worried. It was only a chair under that door. Mr. Grumbles had shown no more sexual interest in Laura than might a dog or a toddler, but dogs and toddlers weren't that strong. She didn't know what he'd do, and that thought kept Laura up even when Mr. Grumbles was sleeping.
At five in the morning, Laura woke again to find Mr. Grumbles pressing his face into the corner of her living room. That couldn't be normal.
"How does General Graa usually put you to bed?" she caught herself asking, as if the domesticated erectus was a child on his first night without grandma. The creature only looked at her, incapable of comprehension.
Laura collapsed onto her couch. What would she do? Sunrise was in an hour, and even if she managed to get back to sleep, Mr. Grumbles would just wake her up again. How would she deal with her duties, not to mention the political fallout of this stupid prank she'd somehow—no.
Laura cut her hand through the air and severed the pointless thread of self-pity. She'd gone before with less sleep than this. She could layer makeup onto her lower eyelids and do it again. Better to rip the band-aid off. Chew the bitter medicine. Pay for tomorrow's ease with today's pain. She could already feel the headache forming.
Mr. Grumbles edged closer. He didn't sit on the couch like a human, but remained squatted on his haunches. He shuffled sideways until he was pressed up against Laura's leg, his back resting on the front of the couch. This close, Mr Grumbles had a definite odor, like sweat and metal filings. Oddly industrial. His head was right where she could scratch it.
Allogrooming, the cleaning and maintenance of the appearance of other individuals, is common to primates. Some species spend up to four hours a day running their fingers through eachother's fur.1 As primates themselves, human scientists all presumably know that the proximate reason for this behavior is that it feels nice. The question is why.
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Why did monkeys that liked grooming breed more successfully than those that didn't? Perhaps combed fur is warmer than matted fur.2 Parasite removal is a good theory, since some spots are hard to reach by one's self.3 But if grooming was only hygienic, one would expect smaller animals to clean each other less often than large ones (more surface area to keep clean). However, time spent grooming others correlates not with body size, but with the size of the troop and the number of one's social connections.4 Primates spend time on each other as a way of soothing hurt feelings, demonstrating affection, and building trust. Spending more time on the ground also seems to require more grooming.5
Interestingly, humans spend less time grooming each other than would be expected for primates of their size, sociability, and terrestriality.6 The reason for this may be because of their hairlessness, although if one defines spoken conversation as "social grooming" and adds it to the count, the amount grooming time number falls back into the expected range.7
The fur on Mr. Grumble's head was coarse and wiry. Like the stuff that grew on the rest of his body, it had reached a length of about five centimeters, then stopped growing. Otherwise, it looked good. No split ends, only a few tangles. Did the Pick comb it? After a long day of screeching at people, did General Graa settle down with his pet for a nice, calm grooming session?
Her head rocked forward. Laura leaned into Mr. Grumbles, who leaned back.
But she couldn't fall asleep here. What if someone found out?
Laura's heavy, warm fingers resumed scratching. What was that noise? It wasn't exactly the sound a cat would make. More like a friendly cartoon bear. Less a purr than a contented sort of…grumble. Laura suddenly had to take a deep breath, and she didn't know why.
She sniffed to clear her nose and stood. Dislodged, Mr. Grumbles blinked up at her.
"Er?"
Laura sniffed again. Her left calf was still warm from where the creature's back had pressed into it. "You stink," she told him. "Alright. Here's what we'll do if you won't sleep. Into the shower with you."
Mr. Grumbles had no way of knowing what she was telling him. He followed Laura because he was obedient. And because he had never seen a shower before.
1Lehmann J, Korstjens AH, Dunbar RIM. Group size, grooming and social cohesion in primates. Anim Behav. 2007;74:1617–1629.
2Mcfarland R et al. Thermal consequences of increased pelt loft infer an additional utilitarian function for grooming. Am J Primatol. 2015:1–6. doi.org/10.1002/ajp.22519
3Barton, Robert (1 October 1985). "Grooming site preferences in primates and their functional implications". International Journal of Primatology. 6 (5): 519–532. doi:10.1007/BF02735574.
4Dunbar, Robin (1 January 1991). "Functional Significance of Social Grooming in Primates". Folia Primatologica. 57 (3): 121–131. doi:10.1159/000156574.
5Grueter CC, et al. Grooming and group cohesion in primates : implications for the evolution of language. Evol Hum Behav. 2013;34:61–68.
6Jaeggi AV et al. Human grooming in comparative perspective: People in six small-scale societies groom less but socialize just as much as expected for a typical primate. Am J Phys Anthropol. 2017 Apr;162(4):810-816. doi: 10.1002/ajpa.23164.
7About an hour. See Jaeggi AV et al.