by Alice Reeds
Our room was on the third floor. The lighting was cold and dull. Two sets of iron bunk beds stood to the right and left, and a small window with milky glass rested between them. A shabby rug covered the floor. There was no bathroom. The walls were mostly bare except for a cheap-looking picture hanging on one of the walls.
“It’ll have to do,” Miles mumbled, more to himself than to me as we walked in.
“Do you think we’ll ever get back home?” I asked after we’d split up into our respective beds, me in the top one and Miles below, to rest and think. The room was too quiet, suffocating, despite the fact that trains were passing through the station next door every few minutes—squeaking brakes, blaring warning signals and closing doors, trains moving away and people calling out to each other, ringing phones and honking cars.
“I hope so,” he said, but he didn’t sound too convinced by his own words. “In three weeks, when the internship should be over and your parents realize you didn’t come home, they’ll call the cops and make them look for you. They’ll file a missing person report for you. They will come and save you.”
“If we make it, considering how everything went downhill since we got here.”
“Of course we’ll make it,” he interrupted. “We’ll find a way. I don’t know how yet, but we will.”
I heard the unspoken words from him. He’d talked about my parents coming to look for me, but when it came to his own parents? Nothing. I thought again of that brief reference he’d made to his father. I was lucky to have parents who cared about me so much.
“Your dad will worry about you, too,” I said.
He stayed silent for a while, but eventually, halfheartedly, said: “Sure.”
…
Maybe an hour later, Miles got up and left to find the public bathrooms. No strangers had come, and the room still belonged to only us. A headache had made its way into my brain. I let my hair free from the ponytail I had it in and started massaging my scalp.
Back when I was a kid, around ten or so, my mom always used to do this. Somehow her head massages always freed me of the headaches within minutes.
I closed my eyes and blocked out our new reality. I thought about home, thought about my bed and how it would feel like to lie down on it. How it would feel to be back in my life, the one I’d always known, back to version 1.0 of Fiona and Miles. Enemies, not teammates. I thought back far enough to remember the look on Miles’s face when he came around a corner to find “asshole” written in red on his locker. The anger was painted across his face, fire burning in his eyes when he noticed me leaning against a wall on the other end of the hall with a smug smile on my face, my arms crossed in front of my chest, lipstick in hand.
I wanted to go back to that. I wanted to go back to hating Miles, to fighting with him because I refused to let him call me, or as much as see me as, pathetic, to make me feel like a peasant while he saw himself as king. But I couldn’t. We were stuck in version 2.0.
My trip down memory lane got interrupted as the door to our room opened and smashed against the wall. My eyes immediately darted toward the door. Miles stumbled into the room looking like he’d come straight out of hell.
I jumped down from my bed and crossed the few steps toward him. He was slightly bent over, his face obscured by his hair, his arms hugging his middle.
“Oh my God, Miles,” I said once he raised his head toward me. Blood dripped from his nose and there was a cut above his left eye. “What happened?” I led him to his bed and helped him sit down. He was limping slightly on his right leg. I reached up to my tote and pulled out the single shirt I’d taken with me just in case. I held his head as carefully as I could with my left hand while I had my shirt with the right, dabbing at the blood. Pain flickered through his eyes each time I touched him, erasing some of the red. I didn’t care about my shirt, barely registered that it was now stained with actual human blood—
I looked away from the window, to my other side. At Miles. I was sure there would be a bloody corpse. But no. No blood on his white button-down shirt that I could see. Which was good, but that didn’t mean anything. Not when he wasn’t moving—
What the hell?
I shook my head. The images had come out of nowhere, like my worst fear had punched me in the gut.
“There was this guy,” Miles was saying. “He came in after me, watched me strangely, so I asked him what his problem was. I thought that he was alone, went as far as wondering if maybe he was one of them, working with the other two guys following us. Turns out he wasn’t alone. They didn’t like me asking why they were staring at me and stuff. Before I even really realized what was happening, they advanced toward me. I had no chance.”
“What did they do, besides the obvious?” There was a hint of panic and fear in my voice, which I disliked but couldn’t stop. New blood trickled out of the cut. As carefully as I could, I pressed a clean spot of the shirt against it. He pulled a pain-slashed grimace that hurt my heart despite our history.
“They took everything,” Miles continued. His voice sounded broken, raspy and hushed, different than it usually did. I didn’t like it. Didn’t like any of it. “My phone, my wallet, my portion of the money, my credit cards, my ID, everything. It’s all…gone.” He looked away then, like he was ashamed.
I was speechless. What could I say in that moment? If only he knew how to fight—
“Let’s start with the most basic thing: form a fist.” I watched as he did just that. I stepped closer to him, took his right hand into mine and pulled his thumb out and placed it on the outside of his fist.
I shook my head once again, and the image disappeared.
“We have to do something about your wounds,” I finally said, trying to focus. “We need to stop the bleeding, disinfect the cuts, and put a bandage on them.”
“I’m so sorry,” he whispered.
“It’s not your fault.” He couldn’t have done anything. Even I, with years of training and extensive skills, probably wouldn’t have stood a chance against a group of guys, though I certainly would have tried.
“This feels like such a déjà vu,” Miles said absentmindedly.
I snapped to attention. “What’re you talking about? A déjà vu of what?”
“I’ve been having these dreams or whatever lately,” he said and flinched ever so slightly as I moved my hand a little. My heart felt like it slowed down with every word he said. “In the first one we were in a similar situation to this, me a wreck after we crashed on some island and you having to be the brave one.”
“I’m always the brave one,” I murmured. Like I was repeating something I’d heard before. “But this is crazy.”
“Why?”
“Because I’ve had that dream, too. More of them every night, a crash and the jungle.”
Miles eyes widened a little the more I spoke, his shock mirroring what I felt. This was impossible in every way.
“So we’ve been dreaming the same thing?” he asked, incredulous.
“Two people can’t dream the exact same thing, can they?” I was so confused. How was any of this possible? Though, after everything that happened in Berlin, the two of us dreaming the same thing seemed like the least shocking and definitely the most harmless thing of it all.
“And yet here we are.”
It made no sense, none of it. There was no logical explanation for this no matter how I looked at it. But, there was at least one silver lining in it, a tiny one compared to all the awful things that were happening, but I took what I could get. Miles couldn’t be making that up. There was no way for him to know that I’d been having those dreams, even less what they were about, which gave me the last and most powerful piece of evidence that he really was my ally and not my enemy. He could’ve pretended everything else, but not this.
“Déjà vu or not, we need to do something about your injuries,” I said firmly. “Since you can’t go get a first aid kit or something yourself, I will. It’ll be quick and easy.”
“Like
hell you will,” he argued, his voice sounding firmer now, though with an obvious strain in it, his hand wrapping around my free wrist. It was easy to see that arguing robbed him of any energy he had left, a fact that would hopefully work in my favor. Why did he have to be so stubborn? “You can’t go, no. What if they attack you, too? No fucking way, Fiona.”
Once he was sitting inside, I turned toward the jungle. Cracked my neck. Quietly groaned.
I so didn’t sign up for any of this.
“Just do it,” he said. “The quicker you go, the sooner you’ll find the pilot, radio for help, and we’ll be out of here. I’ll be fine.” Groan. “Just get it done.”
“You can’t tell me what to do. Besides, on that island in our dreams you basically made me go into the jungle on my own and there was a bear in there, so really, how much worse can a quick pharmacy run really be?”
“You can’t seriously compare real life to a dream,” he said, looking straight at me, his eyes hard. “Are you really foolish enough to go out there and potentially get yourself into the same trouble? What will you do then? What will we do?”
I sighed lightly and pressed my lips into a straight line, silence filling the room around us for just a moment. “Miles, shut up, will you?” I finally said, my tone of voice emulating the way my father spoke when he forbade me from doing something or scolded me. It was a tone that left no room for arguing and sent a shiver down my spine despite the fact that I was the one who’d used it. “I have years of training under my belt, a ton of achievements to back up my argument, I know how to protect myself, okay? The safest place for you is right here.”
Before he could try and argue any further, I twisted my arm out of his grip and then took his hand and raised it up to the shirt I held against his head. I made sure he was holding it, and then I got to my feet, took my wallet, and left. Using that dream as an argument was dumb, I knew it, but what else was I supposed to do?
Quickly I made my way downstairs, wondering if I should ask the receptionist if they had a first aid kit or if he could tell me where the closest pharmacy was. I didn’t have much time, so the quicker I got what we needed, the better. Rounding a corner, I stopped dead in my tracks as my eyes landed on two figures that’d just come in through the door across the room. I could just make out their faces above the sea of tourists crowding the space and trying to check in, their suitcases practically blocking the way in and out.
I backed away and pressed my back against the wall, hoping and praying that they hadn’t seen me.
This couldn’t be happening. This wasn’t possible. Despite how hard we tried, the hassle we’d gone through and the complicated route we’d taken, the place to stay we’d chosen that should’ve been the least obvious one, they’d still found us. I was tempted to look again, but I knew I couldn’t. I was sure it was them even without it.
Any hope I’d had up until that moment shattered like a piece of glass, leaving behind a million broken shards.
Chapter Twenty-One
The Island
“What makes you think the pilot has a lighter?”
“I remember the stench, the reek of death and the distinct smell of smoke, cigarette smoke,” I said and wrinkled my nose at the memory, something I would never forget no matter how much I tried.
“So, you’re basically suggesting that we dig him up and look through his pockets in hopes of finding a lighter?” Miles looked like he more than just hoped that I wasn’t suggesting that. I wished I wasn’t.
Before I could change my mind, I took his wrist and pulled him away from the cockpit. “I hate this plan as much as you do, but we don’t have another choice.”
We looked through the metal pieces lying around until we found two that seemed like they could act as shovels. It was either the metal or our hands, the latter an option I didn’t want to consider for a second time.
I led the way to the shallow grave. If I hadn’t been the one who’d dug it, I wouldn’t even notice that it was there. Somehow that made me feel bad, though not as bad as the fact that we had to exhume him and raid his pockets. All these things we had to do that I never thought I would be capable of. I wished I didn’t have to do them, wished that there was an easy escape route, like a safe word that would call the entire thing off, but of course there wasn’t. This wasn’t a game.
It had been a few days since I buried the pilot, which meant that his body would now be even further into the decaying process. He would smell way worse than last time. We didn’t have anything to shield us from the stench, my stomach turning at the mere thought. The only thing I could hope was that it would be over quick.
Digging the pilot up was the easy part of our plan, the most tiring, but still easier. Together it took us surely only half as much time to do the job than it took me on my own. Once we reached him and saw him lying in his pilot suit, covered in dirt, his skin bloated and awfully discolored, my stomach flipped once more. I’d already seen him, and four other corpses, but the sight was still just as harrowing.
“One of us needs to look in his pockets,” I said and looked at Miles. For a moment, all I saw on his face was disgust, but then it was replaced by determination.
“I will,” he said, his voice strong. “You should stand guard in case the damn bear decides to show itself again.”
“Are you sure?”
He nodded.
I walked away, just a few feet, not too far, so he could get it over with. Listening to the jungle around us, searching for any indication that the bear was coming or as much as nearby, my hand reaching absentmindedly for my bracelet, I still watched Miles take a deep breath with closed eyes. Once they were open again, he leaned forward and started to pat down the pilot.
I wanted to look away, and I did if only for a moment, letting my eyes wander over the edge of the clearing, but I didn’t see anything. After that, I couldn’t resist, I looked back toward Miles, watched as he worked, if you could even call it that.
Judging by the angle, it seemed like Miles had gone for the pockets on his chest first, the easiest ones, but quickly he let out some mildly annoyed noise telling me that he found nothing at all. Next, he moved down toward the front pockets of his pants. The left one was empty but there seemed to be something in the right one. Miles looked up for a moment, his eyes meeting mine as if he was searching for reassurance or something. I nodded at him and he nodded back. He leaned forward again and slowly reached into the pocket. A moment later he pulled something out of it, something silver that reflected the light of the sun, though I couldn’t quite make out what it was.
“A flask?” Miles asked, confused, and turned the flask over in his hand. “Our pilot was a drunk? Way to make your passengers feel safe.”
“Remember, though, the plane never flew.” I walked over to him and took the flask. It was heavy, entirely made of silver without any engravings or marks, just a polished surface. I could feel and hear liquid sloshing from one side to the other when I moved it. I opened it and held the flask under my nose to smell what was inside. “Definitely filled with alcohol, maybe even hard liquor.”
“It’ll be helpful when we try to light a fire,” Miles commented. “But that’s not what we’ve been looking for.”
“No,” I agreed, and put the flask into one of my pockets.
With collective force, we turned the man over so that Miles could check his back pockets. His body felt disgusting and the smell was starting to reach an unbearable level. Quickly I went back to my spot a few feet away, looked around the area once more, but still saw nothing except for some kind of bird taking flight across the clearing.
“Score!” Miles exclaimed.
I turned to see, afraid to get my hopes up that it was the lighter, but I also couldn’t imagine it being anything else.
My heart made a happy triple flip when I noticed the red plastic lighter in his hand. I jumped and screamed, unable to contain my excitement.
“Completely full, too,” Miles said. “For once, luck is on our�
��”
The bear’s roar and thunderous approach killed the otherwise peaceful quiet around us. I knew it; I simply knew it. We’d been too lucky already today, even with the snakes. We’d made it across the jungle while talking without the beast noticing us. It had simply been a question of time until it would come, our private nightmare racing toward us on all fours. We were so stupid. Why did we have to be so loud?
Just as I was about to suggest that we should run, leave the grave as it was, despite how awful of a thing that was to do, since we had what we needed, I noticed Miles look at the ground. His head turned left and right, his eyes roaming, searching for something, though I had no idea what.
“What do you think you’re doing?” I asked, alarmed, the beast roaring once more, even closer than before. We were running out of time, quickly.
“I have a theory.” He walked a few steps and then picked up a thick-looking stick off of the ground, held it up and inspected it, finally giving it an approving nod.
Had he lost his mind? “Unless you are a hundred percent sure this theory will work—”
“I’m not.”
“—then I suggest getting the fuck out of here.”
The sound of breaking branches and shrubbery turned louder, nature giving way to the bear. I turned my head at the sound, and just then it emerged into the clearing. The cockpit was blocking part of it, but I could still see its furry body, a massive leg and paw. I moved backward slowly, yelling at myself in my head to run, run, run, but I wouldn’t. Not without Miles. We made a rule—stick together.
Miles had taken off his shirt and wrapped it around the stick, the flask open in his hand. He poured a bit of its contents over his shirt and then handed the flask to me. With trembling fingers, I took it and screwed it shut again. Did he really think a measly torch would be enough to stop that gigantic bear? Snakes were one thing, small and nasty, but this, this was something else entirely.
