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As we approached the rock wall, we saw an opening the size of a car twenty or thirty feet from the water's edge. In the dark it looked like a whale that was hoping to swallow us.
“There,” said Forest, breathing heavily. Smelling his breath made me feel guilty. Maybe I could have pushed myself more the last few minutes and not been such a burden. I pulled my arm away from him and managed the last few steps to the entrance of the cave on my own. The floor was dry, cool sand. The rock walls were dark with condensation, and small streams of water formed in different places.
“Right here,” said Forest. The sound of thunder rumbled in the distance and was moving closer. Instantly I collapsed, hitting the ground so hard it caused my ribs to convulse in a throbbing pain that I could feel to the tips of my fingers.
“Roll over on your side, Joey,” said Becca. Her voice was sweet, but I just wanted to be left alone. I shut my eyes and shook my head. There would be no sweet dreams tonight, only the faces of death and lost hope, like air being let out of a balloon.
“Joey,” she said.
“Shhh,” I snapped.
I felt Becca’s hand on my shoulder. There were no blankets, sheets, pillows or medicine, but her hand felt pretty awesome.
“We need you to roll over, Joey,” said Becca.
I tightened my face and gritted my teeth. My body throbbed like a migraine. I just wanted to sleep or die. That was it.
I felt her inspecting the ratty shirt tied around my ribs.
“Should we take this off?” asked Becca. “We have to clean his wound.”
“I can’t see shit.” said Forest. “Is he still bleeding?”
Becca ran her hand along my side. “I think so,” she said.
“Wait, I got a half roll of toilet paper,” said Forest, who started rummaging through his backpack.
“Okay. Anything else?” asked Becca.
“A couple of water bottles. That’s it.”
“Water?” she asked.
“No,” said Forest. “But I saw some pools in the rock above us. Has to be fresh.”
“Go get some,” said Becca.
“I can’t see anything. It will be morning soon,” said Forest.
Becca looked like she was about to slap him. He nodded and stood up.
“Joey,” said Becca. “I’m going to untie this.”
Man, what I would have done for her to just leave me alone. She pushed me over slightly, and it felt like a hundred needles shooting into my side.
“Let me just cut it,” said Forest.
Forest pulled out his knife to cut the shirt tied around my chest.
Becca slapped his hand, “Clean your knife, fool!” she said in a loud whisper. I caught a glimpse of the blade. It looked like it had been soaked in red paint that had partially dried.
Forest walked out of the cave.
He popped back in and said, “Saltwater,”
“What about it?”
“To put on his wounds,” he said.
“Hell no,” I grunted.
“I don’t know,” she said. “Let’s wait. Right now we need to get the bleeding to stop. Get him some water.”
Becca took the toilet paper and gently brushed my wound.
“What’s it look like?” I whispered.
“A long gash, deep,” she said.
“How long, how deep?”
“A foot long, two inches deep. I think. Maybe just an inch deep.”
I could feel Becca covering the wound with the toilet paper. I knew it was still bleeding from the drops streaming across my lower back and stomach.
“Im going to keep my arm on it to apply pressure,” she said.
“Ok.”
Becca laid down behind me and I felt her left arm wrapped around my ribs. My eyes grew heavy as I watched what I first thought was a giant spider, but was actually some kind of crab, crawl along a crack in the cave wall.
“Joey,” Becca whispered from behind me.
“Hm.”
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“Ok.”
Throughout the night Becca would occasionally wake me up and place a water bottle at my mouth. I drank, and it tasted fresh. Thunder cracked repeatedly, but we felt removed from the storm inside the cave. We were lucky to have a shelter. My body remained in agony, but I was so exhausted that I didn’t have any problem sleeping. I wished I could have stayed asleep. The entire night Becca kept her arm around my ribs. Occasionally I would open my eyes, half wondering if I was dead and half if I would spot another creature crawling on the cave wall.
The next morning I woke up to the sound of gentle waves and seagulls squawking. I immediately noticed I was alone. “Shit,” I whispered.
My head was pounding, and my body felt like it had been through a blender the day before. I lifted myself up slightly to look around, hoping there was some sign of Forest and Becca. Nothing. They could've left me, figured me for dead. Becca wouldn’t, but I didn’t know about Forest. He was a tough one to read.
I would die here. I tried to go back to sleep while I watched the enchanting blue water out of the opening in the cave. My mind started to believe it was a painting. It looked so bright out there. I closed my eyes, and the dark face taunted me. The image of the machete slicing halfway through his forearm. The knife on the man’s throat. I opened my eyes and watched a few drops of water forming on the cave ceiling ten feet above me. Why couldn’t they have left us alone?
Before I fell back asleep I heard footsteps and tried to turn my head to see. Becca was entering the cave with palm branches.
“This will be your bed,” she said. “I want to get you off the sand.”
She tore off the sharp edges and matted the palms down into a thick mat.
“Thanks,” I whispered in a scratchy voice. I thought they had assumed I would be dead by morning and left. I was glad I was wrong. Becca was wearing one of Forest’s black t-shirts with the sleeves cut off and her hair tied back. She looked focused on making the bed. I marveled at the beauty and mystery of that girl. I was glad I fought, even if I did die.
My mind frequently drifted back to the blood. I knew I didn’t have to kill him. The dark skinned man's deal was ruthless, but he did spare my life when he had the chance to kill me. If I could have started over without the rage, I would have hacked once or twice at his arms and let him run off. But seeing Becca on the ground like that had made it impossible. She didn’t belong there in the sand, in that position. Fuck them.
“Joey, can you roll over on your back?” asked Becca. She had pressed the bed of palm branches up underneath me. I nodded and started to slowly roll backwards, very slowly. It felt like I had acid eating away at my skin.
I moaned and truthfully wanted to cry like a baby it hurt so bad.
“I’m going to change out your bandage,” said Becca.
“You mean toilet paper,” I replied. She laughed, but I suppressed the urge to join her. If I did it would feel like my chest was about to explode.
She held a water bottle to my mouth, and I drank.
“Do we have much water?” I asked.
“It’s everywhere on the rocks. Where the waves don’t splash.”
“Where’s Forest?”
“Looking for food.”
Becca grabbed a sea grape from a pile they had made on a rock. She tried to hand me one, but I didn’t want to eat anything.
“Here,” she said.
I shook my head. “You have to eat, Joey.”
“No.”
Becca sighed and held up the sea grape between us. I looked at it and her blonde silhouette in the background. “Eat,” she whispered. I shook my head.
“Shhhhhh,” she said gently and slowly put the seagrape up to my mouth. I ate it out of her hand. As much as I didn’t want to eat, that was impossible to resist. I slowly chewed, and the sound of the waves and her presence lulled me back to sleep.
When I awoke again, I saw Forest bent down with his face close to a pile of sticks an
d a cigarette lighter in his hand. He was blowing into the bottom of the sticks, and I could see smoke rising slowly from the pile. It looked like it was evening, which seemed odd.
“Is it night again?” I asked. Forest turned to me.
“Becca! Joey’s up.” shouted Forest.
Becca came into my field of vision with something in her hand. A crab.
“One more,” she said and threw the crab in a bucket next to Forest.
Becca put the water bottle to my mouth, and I drank.
“Here,” she put a handful of sea grapes into my hand. I wished she would feed them to me. I still wasn’t hungry but ate two of them.
“Joey, check this out,” said Forest. He reached his hand out into the bucket and pulled out what looked like a big lobster.
“Damn,” I whispered. Forest laughed.
“How?” I asked.
“There’s a rock ledge out there in chest deep water. I could see its antennas sticking out.”
It almost looked like a giant bug the size of someone's head. It had the body of a lobster, but no claws. Instead there were two long antennas that had rows of spikes on them. It was like a medieval lobster.
Night began to fall, and the site of the small fire brought me comfort. Forest had ripped the tail off of the lobster and was roasting it over the fire with a stick. Becca was doing the same with two crabs. I hadn’t moved and was constantly in and out of sleep, mostly in.
“How do you feel, Joey?” asked Becca.
I shook my head. Not much to say. Like hell. Dying. I didn’t know.
Forest looked at me. “Try and hang on,” he said. “We have water, meat, and fruit now.”
Becca took a palm branch and made a plate. She put a small handful of lobster and crab meat in a pile with five or six seagrapes to the side. She placed the plate in front of me.
I reached out with my left hand and ate a piece of the lobster. It was delicious, but I just wasn’t hungry.
Becca and Forest sat on opposite sides of the fire, eating.
“Should we stay here?” asked Becca.
“We have to,” said Forest. “Joey needs time. We have food, water, shelter. When the police find out, if they haven’t already, they will be scrambling all over the island. We have to keep our heads down.”
I hated to tell them that I wasn’t getting any better. The more time passed, the worse I felt. My body felt hot and the wound even hotter. My eyes grew heavy again, and I welcomed more sleep. It felt like I was being slowly drained of life. Each time I drifted off, I wondered if it was my last.
I felt a deep sting along my wound, and it caused me to slowly come out of the blackness and open my eyes.
“Joey!” said Becca.
“Yes,” I whispered.
“You’ve been asleep all night and day. You have to eat.”
“What are you doing?” I mumbled.
“Checking your wound,” said Becca.
I gnashed my teeth as she pulled away strips of toilet paper. I could hear Becca exhale loudly. “Forest, look,” she said.
“What is that? Is it better?” he asked.
“No, it’s infected,” she said.
“Shit,” said Forest.
“Joey,” she said with her hand on my shoulder. “We have to take you to a doctor.”
“No,” I groaned and got up a bit more strength, “No!” I shouted.
I faded again into the dark. Time passed, but I didn’t know how much. Becca would occasionally pour water into my mouth, but at times I thought it was only prolonging my agony. I was losing my will to live and just wanted to sleep with the hope that I wouldn’t wake up.
I opened my eyes and felt piss dripping down my legs. I noticed Becca and it freaked me out, embarrassed. She had a bucket of water and was wiping it off me.
“Becca,” I grumbled. “No. I’m sorry. No, you don’t need to.”
“Shhhh,” she whispered.
I lacked the strength to fight her, and I faded out again. The smile of the dark skinned man turned to blood and haunted me in my dreams.
Hours or days later, something jolted me out of a deep sleep, and I opened my eyes to see the cave wall above me. I was still here, still breathing. I heard crying. I tilted my head to the side to look. It was Becca, sitting in the sand and leaned up against the cave wall. Her eyes closed, tears streaming down her face.
“What’s wrong?” I whispered.
She looked at me. Even, in my daze I still marveled at her. She possessed so much beauty, toughness, and compassion. Damn.
“I’m afraid you’re dying. You stopped drinking water. You won’t let us take you to a doctor,” she said.
“No.”
“Why?” she asked.
“You and your brother still have a chance. Just let me sleep. You don’t need to help me anymore.”
I put my head back and started to close my eyes.
“Joey,” whispered Becca. She seemed close.
I opened my eyes and saw her silhouette now above me. The brightness from the outer layers of her blonde hair glowing in the sun made me squint. Her face was slowly getting closer to mine. What the hell was she doing? She was getting closer, closer, closer.
I felt her lips on mine, and electricity surged through my body. For a moment I was frozen in shock. Then instinct took over, and I started moving my lips the same way she moved hers. The tip of her tongue reached to mine, and my eyes shot wide open. I couldn’t die now, no way in hell.
It was the first time I had ever kissed a girl. I didn’t remember how long we kissed. We had left time behind. In the cave I was even less conscious of it. Surely it was an hour or more. I knew I might still die, but now I would die fighting. Afterwards, she made me drink water. We didn’t talk. Talk felt cheap. A light wind blew from the south, a smile eased over my face, and I fell asleep.
I wasn’t sure how long I slept, but I was awakened by Becca’s smooth lips once again. I opened my eyes and could tell it was early morning. We had been in the cave for days, maybe even a week. I wasn’t sure.
Becca took her lips away and said, “You need to eat.”
“Ok, I’ll try.”
“Can you sit up?” she asked.
I was sure that I couldn’t. “I’ll try.”
I lifted my head and chest forward and pushed myself up with my right elbow. The pain shot like thousands of arrows inside of my body. My face tightened, and I shrieked. I collapsed back down to the bed of palms, breathed deeply, and waited for the pain to subside. I could see Becca from the corner of my eye. She had both her hands through her hair, pressed against her head.
She leaned over me and said, “We’ll try again later.”
She bent down and kissed me for a third time. Nothing could take my mind away from the pain like her lips. It was like another world that I wanted to stay in, but the sound of footsteps rattled me, and my eyes shot open. Becca continued kissing me. Oh shit, it was Forest.
“What are you doing?” he asked. I knew this wouldn’t be good.
Becca sat up and turned toward him.
“I’m kissing Joey. Is that a problem?” she snapped.
Forest rested his makeshift spear on the wall of the cave.
“No. No it’s not,” he answered.
“How is he?” he asked.
“He’s hanging in there,” she said.
Forest looked me over. “He looks really bad, Becca.”
She turned to me and back to him. I could see her eyes tearing up.
“Can you try and find medicine? Anything that might help him, anything?” asked Becca.
“Ok. Now?” he asked.
“Yes,” answered Becca.
Forest took a sip of water from his jug and left the cave. I drifted off to sleep. My dreams started changing from the dark skinned man to beautiful Becca. She was all I could think about. So smooth, so sweet. Hell, I looked forward to waking up. That soft, wet sensation on my hard, dry lips dulled the pain and sometimes almost made it disappea
r. I waited for her to gently pull me out of unconsciousness. Instead, I heard the unwelcome sound of a native voice.
“What have we here? Hello. Hello in there.”
I opened my eyes, it was around midday. Becca was across from me sleeping and starting to stir. Suddenly she shot up. I moved my head enough to see the wide entrance to the cave. There stood a man. He had on ragged shorts and no shirt. He had the darkest skin I had ever seen in my life. It made the white of his eyes look like light bulbs. He was old, maybe sixty or seventy, with long unkept dreadlocks and a missing front tooth. It looked like one of his cheekbones wasn’t there or was sunken into his face. Becca lunged for the knife that Forest had left at our camp. She tightened her right hand around the handle and stood between the two of us like a tiger ready to pounce. The old man raised up his hand.
“Is everything okay, miss?”
“Get the hell out of here,” she snapped.
He took a step back and tilted his head to the side to get a look at me.
“Your friend looks sick.”
“He’s fine,” she said.
He shifted his focus from her and the knife to me.
“Let me have a look at him, please,” said the old man. He took a step toward me.
“Do not take one more step,” said Becca, holding the knife up in a fighting stance. I could hear the sound of someone approaching. “Forest!” she yelled. The footsteps grew louder and faster.
Forest appeared at the cave entrance and quickly threw the intruder to the ground. The old man stood back up and dusted the sand off his face. Becca handed Forest the knife.
“Who the hell are you?” asked Forest.
“I live on the island. My name is Agwe.”
“Well get outta here. If you tell anyone you saw us, we’ll kill you.”
“But your friend is hurt.”
“That’s our problem, not yours,” said Forest. He pointed out of the cave entrance with his knife. The old man looked me over.
“I need to bring him to a doctor.” He stepped toward me. Forest clinched his knife tight.
“Stay back, old man. He doesn’t want to go to a doctor.”
The old man called Agwe stopped. He looked very small standing next to Forest.
“Ok. Then he can come to my house. I will help him. Young man, he will die here. I am going to help him. He is coming with me.” Agwe walked toward me. Forest moved in front of him.
“I swear,” said Forest. “You’re about to get your throat slit, old man. Joey, it’s your call. Just say the word and he’s dead.”
Agwe bent down next to me. “Hello, Joey,” he said in a thick Bohemian accent. I wasn’t sure what to do. He was one of the ugliest people I had ever seen. He would probably rat us out or worse. We looked at each other. I didn’t know what to make of him, and I didn’t understand why he was so damn insistent.
The old man put his elbows on his knees. He smiled and said,
“It’s okay. You need help. I don’t have much, but it looks like you have even less than me.”
I swallowed and slightly coughed. I felt like I should go with him. The only reason was because of his eyes. They were filled with kindness. I nodded, slowly.
“I’ll go with you,” I whispered.
“He isn’t going anywhere without me,” said Becca.
“Well you’re not going anywhere without me,” said Forest.
My eyes grew heavy, and I just wanted to be left alone to sleep. “All of us, please,” I whispered.
Agwe turned to Forest and Becca. “You are all welcome, but my home is very small,” he said.
“That’s okay,” said Becca. “Do you have medicine?”
Agwe bent down to inspect my wounds in more detail. “Not the kind you buy in stores,” he said.
“Then what?” asked Becca.
“He needs fish and coconut milk. Bugs for the wound,” said Agwe.
“What do you mean bugs?” she asked.
He looked at Becca. “Maggots. They will clean it.”
“Where do you live?” asked Forest.
“Around the point, two hundred feet past the southern tip. A mile or a little more.”
“How do we get there?” asked Becca. “He can’t walk. Do you have a boat?”
“Yes,” said Agwe. “No motor, but strong oars.”
I drifted to sleep but was quickly awoken by the shooting pains that spread across my ribs and my entire body. I opened my eyes for a moment and saw Forest holding both of my feet. Becca and Agwe each had an arm. I saw an old wooden rowboat on the beach in front of us with chipped white paint and aged wooden oars on each side. I continued to drift in and out of consciousness. Several times I opened my eyes to the bright sky, the sound of waves, and a creaking boat.
It was much warmer than the cave. The sun was directly overhead, and I felt the heat all over my body. Becca would occasionally kiss my forehead to get my attention and pour water down my throat. After that, I felt like I was in the land of dreams for a while. Days passed. I would semi-consciously swallow water, fish, fruit and quickly fall back to sleep.
The Less Fortunates Page 13
