Tears of the River

by Gordon L. Rottman

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  Published by The Hartwood Publishing Group, LLC,

  Hartwood Publishing, Phoenix, Arizona

  www.hartwoodpublishing.com

  Tears of the River

  Copyright © 2014 by Gordon Rottman

  Digital Release: June 2014

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination, or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  Tears of the River by Gordon L. Rottman

  Fifteen-year-old Karen Herber is exactly where she wants to be—in the Nicaraguan rainforest with a volunteer medical team. What she had not expected was a hurricane collapsing a bridge to wipe out her team and a mudslide burying a village. Only a Nicaraguan six-year-old girl and a forty-four-year-old woman with both arms broken survive the mudslide.

  Then she finds that Jaydon Bonner survived, a privileged, arrogant seventeen-year-old American tenderfoot. Academic and confidence concerns are already dragging Karen down and she was tagged a “weak leader” in Outward Bound School. Her doctor parents are pushing her into a medical career, of which she’s uncertain.

  Less than fluent in Spanish, but an experienced backpacker, the reluctant leader is challenged by Nature, animals, desperate men, and her fellow survivors’ mistrust and cultural differences. Their only path to salvation is a risky boat trip down a rainforest river, 150 miles to the mysterious Mosquito Coast.

  Karen soon finds her companions’ experiences, so different from her own, invaluable with each deadly encounter forging a closer bond between them. Through all the danger, “Jay” is there and manages to come through.

  Other books By This Author:

  The Hardest Ride

  Western Fictioneers Peacemaker Award for Best Western Novel 2014

  Western Fictioneers Peacemaker Award Finalist for Best First Western Novel 2014

  Western Writers of America Spur Award Finalist for Best Traditional Western Novel for 2013

  Dedication

  To my family.

  Acknowledgements

  It is often said that writing is a lonely or one-person job. That’s true to a point, but there are so many others who influence, inspire, and lend support. The initial editing and advice provided by Beverly Rosenbaum, Roger Paulding, and Dotti Enderle were invaluable.

  First off, this book would not have been possible without CEO and Editor-in-Chief Georgia Woods, Executive Editor Lisa Dugan, cover artist Georgia Woods, line editor Molly Daniels, and the rest of the staff of Hartwood Publishing. Their help and innovative management created a great editorial environment.

  I am extremely grateful to my awesome critique group for their advice, support, and brutally honest and absolutely essential critiques: Stan Marshall, Linda Bromley, Heather Walters, and Roxanne Carr. A special thanks goes to the Houston Young Adult Writers Group and the knowledge and expertise they all so willingly shared in support of each other.

  Equally important to this story are the many wonderful folks I met and worked with in Nicaragua on medical and construction missions. A big thanks goes to the selfless women of the St. Francis of Assisi Association who sponsored our trips and the wonderful nuns of the Sisters of the Annunciation.

  A very special thanks goes to my cousin, Consuelo Garcia, for making certain the Spanish made sense. Of course my wife Enriqueta, all the kids, and our great family in Mexico were vital to this book’s creation. I am most grateful to the granddaughter and many nieces who inspired me, especially: Victoria, Christina, Cecilia, Elvia, Liliana, and Gabriel.

  Last, but not least, I wish to thank the readers of this book and hope they look forward to Karen’s coming adventures in Nicaragua and Alaska.

  Chapter One

  »»•««

  ∙•∙

  Karen Riley Herber’s head bounced against the side window with a hard thump. Stupid van. She couldn’t nap without getting her head banged.

  The next jolt bounced her against the seatbelt, and then back against the headrest. The old van’s engine chugged to pull the vehicle over the muddy, rutted road, which was little more than a goat trail.

  “Sorry ’bout that, kids,” the driver shouted over his shoulder. “It’s not going to get any better, but it’s not too much farther, I think.”

  “I hope you’re right, Johnny,” Karen muttered. “It’ll be easier to walk.”

  “In this mud? I don’t think sooo, deary,” said Jennifer the grouch. The blonde physician’s assistant was becoming a real pain in the butt. She seemed to have a negative or opposing comment every time Karen opened her mouth. And her insistence on calling her “deary” didn’t endear her to the younger girl.

  “At least it’s stopped raining,” she said, trying to deflect Jennifer’s snitty rebuff.

  “Well, we’ll see how long that’ll last with a hurricane blowing in,” was the snapped reply.

  Karen resolved to count to ten before saying anything more. Then she decided the heck with it. She’d just keep her mouth shut. She didn’t know what Jennifer’s problem was, other than disliking a fifteen year-old tagging along on this little expedition. Jennifer wasn’t exactly thrilled with the side trip anyway.

  The next jolt, followed by a sideways jerk, slammed Karen into the armrest.

  “Can’t you drive any better than that,” Jennifer shouted at Johnny.

  He turned and gave her a severe glare, then swung his eyes back to the almost-a-road.

  Johnny too, must have decided the best policy was to keep his mouth shut.

  Karen looked out the window to the left. Nothing but scrub brush and scrawny trees covered the ridge side. Not much of a jungle. When told months ago they were going into the Nicaraguan jungle, she pictured an exotic rainforest overflowing with birds of unimagined species, monkeys, jaguars, strange creatures, and a towering canopy of forest. Instead, northeast Nicaragua was flat brush land, scattered scrub trees, swamps, and a few low hills. The scenery was boring, really boring. This ride was just as boring, despite the turbulence surprises.

  The turmoil generated by Jennifer didn’t make it any easier. Karen reminded herself she was there to help out unfortunate people, and that was worth it all.

  She looked out the right window past the inert Cristino. It was more of the same, low brush land, except that a couple of hundred feet above the flatlands, stretching off to the horizon, was endless wet green blandness. From Managua it had taken two days to get to the village, Concepción Del Norte, which they’d left two hours and sixteen miles earlier. Once they’d left hilly central Nicaragua, the scenery had been the same the whole boring trip.

  Cristino—Cris—was bundled up in a protective ball, dozing. He was eighteen, three years older than Karen. She liked the interpreter. He was always showing her something interesting and telling her about his country. She’d made it clear she wanted to learn, see, and do things. The university student accommodated her, especially when others in the group didn’t really seem to care about this strange land. Oh sure, they wanted t
o help-the-people…

  Help-the-people…how often had she heard that? She too wanted to help-the-people, but she wanted to learn too. Some of the others went to all the trouble and expense to come down here and not try to learn about everything around them.

  She looked at the back of Jennifer’s blonde head done up in a French twist. Karen wondered for the umpthteenth time why the woman was here. All she did was complain about the sanitation, the heat and humidity, and the crummy food.

  Concepción Del Norte could barely be called an “outpost of civilization” and the place they were bound for was said to be even more primitive. Jennifer complained too of how the Nicas did things differently, which meant “wrong” in her eyes.

  Nicas, that bugged Karen. Nicaraguans called themselves that, but it didn’t seem right for gringos to call them Nicas. The Americans jokingly called themselves gringos, but she’d not heard a single Nicaraguan call them gringos, they called them Americanos instead. Calling the locals Nicas seemed disrespectful. Now that she thought about it, Jennifer was the only one calling their hosts Nicas. She was oh so PC about everything else. It seemed like maybe she didn’t really respect them.

  “About time,” Jennifer muttered.

  Ahead was yet another rickety bridge.

  “They said the fifth bridge was two kilometers from the farmstead,” Jennifer announced.

  Johnny stopped short of the one-lane bridge. “I’m checking it out first,” he said opening the door. “Better safe than sorry.”

  “Probably crap-built like everything else here.” Of course, leave it to Jennifer.

  Cris got out too. He was more practically checking out the underside and the supporting beams while Johnny stomped on the rough wooden deck.

  “We there yet?” Jay Bonner muttered from the backseat.

  Karen groaned to herself. He’s awake. “It’s still your nap time. We’re calling ahead to make sure your welcoming committee’s ready.”

  “Tell them to make certain the champagne’s cold.” He stretched back out on the seat.

  Snob, she thought. As if Jennifer wasn’t irritating enough, she had to put up with a stuck up junior from the oh so posh Wayfern Preparatory Academy. As with Jennifer, why Jay was here she didn’t know. Maybe to see how close to dirt he could get without getting any under his nails.

  Karen crawled out to stretch her legs. Looking into the gorge, the steep sides were walls of mud. Bushes and clumps of grass had slid down the sides into the brown tumbling water flowing off the plateau. The gorge was almost forty feet deep and the bridge forty feet long.

  “Hay mucho lodo” —Too much mud, Cris said.

  “Do you think it’s safe to drive across?” asked Johnny.

  This comment caused Jennifer to open the other door and force herself out into the elements.

  I’m sure we couldn’t do a thing without hearing her opinion, Karen thought.

  Jennifer peered into the chasm for a while and then announced, “I give it a two-star rating. You can drive across, Johnny. We’ll walk.”

  “Oh, thanks,” said Johnny. He laughed grimly.

  Karen thought Jennifer was serious, though. It was okay for him to risk his life while she stands on the sidelines. It’s either safe or it’s not.

  “Bueno. Eet ees good, safe,” said Cris.

  Karen climbed in as Johnny did and she stared through the windshield at Jennifer. Cris came in and sat down. Jennifer, not looking too happy, got in as Johnny slipped the white van into gear. She gave Karen a hard glare. Jay was already dreaming of five-star hotels.

  “Dale despacio”—Go slow, said Cris.

  The van crept onto the bridge. Karen noticed no one had fastened their seatbelts. As though we could pile out fast enough if the worst happened, she thought. Johnny paused for a couple of seconds after the front tires rolled onto the bridge. Satisfied there was no creaking, they rolled on. It was forty feet, twice the length of the van. It took forever.

  What would it be like if the bridge dropped? Karen faulted herself with too active an imagination. A straight drop down ten times faster than an elevator, a sickening drop, and a shattering crash? Or would it feel different?

  They reached firm ground. “Act first and have second thoughts later.” Johnny grinned.

  Karen laughed. Jennifer grumbled. Cris chuckled. Jay was asleep.

  They rolled on. “About time,” muttered Jennifer again.

  Up ahead was their destination, a little farming community. They’d been told it wasn’t a village, only four fincas—homesteads—of dirt-poor families. It didn’t even have a name other than the residents calling it Los Manantial—Place of the Small Spring. At home Karen and her mom had “explored” the area on Google Earth and hadn’t noticed little Los Manantial. Johnny said the place is so remote it didn’t have GPS coordinates.

  Some bold adventurous farmers or pobladores—settlers. They had come from Managua, Nicaragua’s teeming capital, a place with fifty percent unemployment and rampant crime. Karen’s dad said they had guts to come out here on their own and work a living out of this wretched land. They had no support from the government other than rice, beans, and cooking oil doled out twice a month.

  Being city folks, they had to learn coffee and pepper farming from government pamphlets and by trial and error. They were there with no loans for equipment, no medical services with many opportunities for injuries and illness, no schools, and no guarantees they could make a living. It did get them away from the drugs, crime, predator gangs, and the certainty of perpetual hopelessness.

  Up ahead over the trees Karen could see a flock of vultures slowly turning in great circles as they drifted before the increasing winds. Do they know something we don’t?

  “Great. A really happy looking place…not,” grumbled Jennifer. Big raindrops splattered on the windshield, but stopped before Johnny turned on the wipers.

  They pulled up the muddy lane between the bamboo and thatch houses, three on the left upslope and one on the right. Shacks and outhouses were scattered among the pig and goat pens, and little gardens. Shrieking kids in ragged clothes ran out of the houses, all but tumbling down the steps. The small houses were on stilts four feet off the ground. For four families, there were sure a lot of kids. A joke among Nicaraguans was that the country did not produce much, other than kids. The team was supposed to take a census while there.

  The grinning adults came out almost as quickly as the kids shouting, “Adiós.” Karen couldn’t get used to the word for goodbye also meaning hello to Nicaraguans. They knew the Americanos were coming. A man had ridden a burro down to the Concepción two days before and told them they had an injured man and two sick children.

  Visitors must be rare. This was a big time deal for these folks. No electricity, no telephone, no TV, no nothing.

  The kids collected around Karen. She liked that, but didn’t know why they did it. She’d been told she wasn’t much of a leader, one of several things, too many things, bugging her.

  She felt like a total failure. Nothing she did seemed to work out. She wanted to give up trying. Maybe she could accomplish something worthwhile here.

  Doctor Brent, a Houston cardiologist and the medical aid group’s leader, when interviewing her for the trip, said, “You can’t change the world, but you can make a difference.”

  Karen sincerely hoped so, as much for herself as for those she might help.

  “Why do you want to go?” he had pointedly asked.

  She was nervous, like during an oral quiz and thought her answer would be too pedestrian, but said it anyway. “Huh…I want to help others, gain more medical experience, learn more Spanish…and, um, make myself a better person.”

  “Well…” The doctor had smiled and shook her hand. “Welcome aboard young lady, you’re on your way to the second poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.”

  Chapter Two

  As laughing kids collected around Karen, she handed out granola bars instead of the candy most in the medical group
passed out. They relished the bars as much as the Skittles and they were better for them. There sure were some cuties grinning up at her.

  The kids weren’t pushy and screaming like in most villages. Out here they seemed better mannered and their parents had more control over them. They had to pitch in for chores. Schools, while necessary, were breeding grounds for bad behavior. Listen to me, I sound like fuddy-duddy Mrs. Thornton next door. But, she did have her own experiences to go by. School was crazy sometimes. Sometimes you could test out of classes. I wish I could test out of the craziness.

  Jennifer didn’t waste any time with introductions, no connecting with folks so happy to see her or even chatting them up. She didn’t look at the kids except to step around them when one was in her way. Johnny was greeting everyone and Cris stayed with him translating.

  Jay emerged, looked around and then back at the van, like he wanted to hide inside. He wore khaki shorts and, of all things, a Hulk Hogan T-shirt—yellow with HULKAMANIA emblazoned across his chest in red.

  The farmers were obviously grateful they’d come. Johnny was a good guy and had taken to heart what Karen’s dad taught them about dealing with the folks they were here to help. Johnny was an EMT—emergency medical technician—for the Cypress Fire Department back in Texas. Karen thought he was doing more good than stuck-up Jennifer, even if she was a physician’s assistant—“almost a doctor” as she liked to describe herself.

  Karen knew what a PA was…one worked for her dad. They were both back in Concepción along with her mom, from which this happy little posse had left after breakfast. Karen’s dad was a general practitioner and there was plenty for him to “generally practice” he joked. Mom was a pediatrician; a baby doc. Jennifer was a PA for an orthopedic surgeon—bone doctor. There was plenty of work for her, but she seemed to think it a bother. She’s probably trying to make points with Dr. Schumer, her boss, back in Concepción.