Alone Page 2

  I could head into the jungle; at least it will be cooler in there and perhaps I’ll find food and shelter and the mosquitoes won’t follow me. But then again I could get lost pretty quickly and after last night, the idea of spending a night deep in the dark jungle is too horrible to bear. And anyway, surely by now the non-arrival of our plane has been reported and search parties dispatched. If so they will be tracing the plane’s flight path, looking for wreckage and if I leave the river and head into the jungle, there’s no way a helicopter or plane could spot me. No. My best chance of being seen is if I stay by the river.

  I could head upriver to look for the plane. With any luck most of it could still be intact and if I can reach the crash site then I stand a far better chance of being found. And finding Dad.

  Plus my phone is on the plane, in my rucksack, along with chewing gum and chocolate and even if I can’t get a signal, the plane’s radio might still be working and there will be other stuff I can use, like signal flares and perhaps even matches to light a fire. I could so do with a fire. As well as the light and warmth it would provide, the smoke would act as a signal to the search teams and keep the mosquitoes at bay. But then I stare at the thick, dark jungle pressed up against the edge of the river and decide against it. It’s too risky. Chances are the plane burnt up and sank. And even if it’s still partially intact, I have no idea how long it might take to find it. It could be days away and the truth is I’m too frightened, not just of what might be lurking in the jungle, but of what I might discover in the wreckage if I do find it.

  No. I have fresh water here, and shade. Dad and the rescue party will know how to find me. The only sensible thing for me to do is to stay where I am. Like Dad told me to.

  By mid-morning the heat and humidity have risen drastically and my clothes are soaked through. But at least the mosquitoes have gone. My gurgling stomach keeps reminding me how hungry I am, and I really should search for food but it’s just too hot, and the only way I can escape the heat is to stay in the shade. Or wade into the river. Both options suck. The shade is full of scurrying, biting insects hiding from the sun, and although the river is cool I’m sure I felt something brush against my leg the last time I entered the water. So for now I have reluctantly decided that the bugs are the least dangerous option and I’m sticking to dry land. I yawn, and stretch my arms high above my head. I’m exhausted after yesterday’s climb and a sleepless night, and despite the heat and my hunger I soon doze off.

  When I wake, the air is noticeably cooler and the sun much lower in the sky. I hurry to the stream to drink and bathe my arms, and as I reach the end of the sandspit a black bird skims across the river, hooking a fat fish with its bill, and I glower at it. It’s been two days since I last ate – a bar of Galaxy on the plane. I close my eyes and lick my cracked lips and then for the hundredth time I check my pockets for a stray piece of chewing gum or even a peanut, but all I find is fluff and tiny balls of tissue.

  I kick out at the picked-clean white bones which is all the ants have left of the dead fish, and decide it’s now cool enough for me to explore the rest of the sandspit.

  Bits of wood, stones and a few strange-looking snail shells litter the shore but nothing that looks remotely edible. But then right at the far end I find a leafy branch snagged between two rocks and when I flick it over I uncover two roundish green fruit that look like some sort of fig. They’re weird and alien-looking. But there is nothing else so reluctantly I return to my tree.

  After another hour or so spent chewing my nails and trying to ignore the pangs of hunger cramping my stomach I head back to the figs. I still don’t like the look of them but it’ll soon be dark and I’m too hungry to care. I twist the fruit off the branch, tear the skin away and hesitantly nibble the green insides. The flesh is hard, and bitter, and I spit it out and hurl the fig into the river. It lands with a loud plop only a few metres from the far bank. I rip the second one from the branch and I’m about to see if I can clear the river with this one when something appears in the water close to where the fig landed. A brown whiskered face, like a seal’s. No, more like a cat’s. Staring at me. Then I hear a whistling sound, coming from upriver. I turn and peer in the direction of the sound and can just about see some sort of creature lying on a rock further up the opposite side of the river. At first I presume it’s a caiman but in the dim evening light it’s impossible to tell. Curious, I take a step towards it. But as soon as I do, the creature slips into the water and when I look back, the brown whiskered face has vanished too.

  I lower my arm and only then do I notice that this fruit is different from the first. It’s redder and softer, like a tomato. I turn it over and peel back the skin, which comes away more easily than the first one and this time the flesh is amber-coloured, a bit like a peach. I raise the fruit to my lips and take a bite. A glutinous substance oozes out, bulging with tiny black seeds. The pulp doesn’t really taste of anything and the seeds have a sharp peppery taste, but I’m too hungry to care and I swallow them anyway. I scrape every last scrap of flesh from the skin and suck my fingers dry. One fig barely makes a dent in my hunger and I scan around for more.

  No more than two or three minutes later the first stomach cramps hit. I double up in agony and fall to my knees, clutching my stomach, which starts to make horrible noises. I just about manage to step out of my jeans and kick my pants off before my bowels empty with a whoosh, and yellowy brown liquid oozes down my legs and pools on the sand. The stench is disgusting, to me at least. But the flies seem to love it as they quickly zero in on the mess and crawl across my bum. I can’t bear their prickly feet on my skin and I pull my pants and jeans back on and writhe on the sand.

  I don’t know how long I lie there, stinking and sobbing, shivering and soaked with sweat. But I do know I’m dying. I’m sure of it. What a pathetic, stupid way to die! But at least the pain will be over soon.

  To my surprise I’m still alive when dusk falls, and the cramps have eased enough for me to be able to crawl back to my tree. I should be grateful I’m still alive. But I’m not. I’m feeling too sorry for myself, and too miserable at the thought of spending another sleepless night alone, scared, cold and hungry. And covered in my own crap.

  FOUR

  My stomach has never been so empty. Or my mind so obsessed with food.

  I’m starving. I used to say that all the time, without thinking, but now for the first time in my life I know what the word means. What total fear and desperation feels like. The stomach cramps. The headaches. The twisting, burning feeling in my guts. The shivering and clammy skin. And I will do anything to stop this pain.

  I lift my shoe. My lips curl in disgust as I stare down at a blurry white creature writhing on the ground. It’s a fat grub the size of my thumb.

  A large part of me cannot believe I am even considering doing what I am about to. But the stomach cramps are unbearable and I have seen enough Bear Grylls episodes to know that this revolting package is full of protein and might just save my life. And I have to do it now, while it’s getting dark and I’m not confronted with its bulging podgy body and bulbous glossy brown head.

  I pick the grub up and it thrashes between my fingers, struggling to escape. I breathe deeply a few times, trying to settle the nausea rising in my throat. Decision time. Do I bite the head off or do I swallow it whole? The thought of gulping it down whole is the least repulsive option, but then again what if it survives in my stomach and crawls around my guts, gorging on my organs? My mind is made up. I raise the grub to my lips, insert its hideous head in my mouth, close my eyes, and bite.

  As soon as the tips of my teeth touch its skin the grub tenses and whips its body to and fro. I tighten my grip and bite down hard. The skin bursts and a snot-like substance fills my mouth, a revolting gob of warm goo, like a heavy cold, but worse, and tasting more disgusting than all the things I detest rolled into one – celery, liver and mushy peas. My body instantly rejects it and I throw up, just like I did when I tried to eat a snail I found bene
ath a rock in the river. It’s no good. I can’t help it. Starving or not, I don’t have the stomach for this.

  I wipe my mouth on my wet T-shirt, and for the hundredth time since sunset, I hug my knees and close my eyes and try to sleep. Only when I sleep do I forget how hungry I am. How scared. How alone. But sleep won’t come. I’m too hungry. Too cold and wet and itchy. Too miserable. Too tired.

  I used to long for more ‘alone’ time. To wish Mum would just leave me by myself and not pester me every five minutes. But now I realise I’ve never really been alone before. Not like this. Even in my room, with the door locked and no one else in the house, there was always my phone or the computer. Always a way to contact someone when I wanted to. Well, that’s all gone now and for the first time in my life I am truly on my own, completely alone.

  At last dawn comes, its arrival announced by the usual annoying racket of birds and monkeys, and a multitude of other animals I have no desire to even attempt to identify. I sit up and cough, and try not to retch as I pick bits of fig and grub skin from between my furry teeth. I need a drink and to wash my mouth out, but I’ll wait until I’m warmer, and really thirsty. It’s the only way I can bear the mosquitoes.

  Parrots stream from the trees, hundreds of them, flashing blue and red and squawking happily as they head out to fill their bellies, and I hate them. I hate them for their freedom to fly high above the trees and go wherever they want to. I hate them for having a chance to escape.

  Picking up a stick, I turn my back on the parrots and decide to make a list of the things I miss most. The first one is easy. But then, with the stick’s tip resting on the ground, I pause, and decide to write my second choice first.

  FOOD. Chocolate. Crisps. Chips. Cheese, tuna, ham, and sausage sandwiches. Bacon and eggs. Fish fingers. Baked beans. Ice cream. And much to my surprise – peas and carrots.

  DRINKS. A chilled pint of fizzing Coke. Fresh milk straight from the fridge. A strawberry and banana smoothie. Hot chocolate at night-time.

  MY BED!

  DRY comes next: dry clothes – a clean and dry, sweet-smelling T-shirt that doesn’t feel like a crusty dishcloth. Warm and dry cotton socks that don’t itch and stink. Pants. Soft, clean ones that don’t chafe my sore bum like sandpaper; which leads me straight to TOILET PAPER and OINTMENT.

  A TOOTHBRUSH and paste, so my mouth doesn’t taste like it’s full of fur and grit.

  VOICES. Boy, how I miss conversation! I had no idea how noisy my life was before. How many times the sounds of voices filled my ears. The TV. The radio. Skype. Friends blabbering on the phone. Then before I realise it I have scratched the first letter of the word I intended to write first but couldn’t bring myself to. I’ve written an ‘M’.

  The stick falls from my hand. I can write no more. Like all my ideas, this was a stupid one. I grab my stick and destroy my childish scribbling, digging and gouging until no letters remain.

  I’m really annoyed now, and angry enough to try to burst the boil on my nose again, the one which appeared yesterday evening, and has sprouted to the size of a Malteser. I squeeze the base of the boil as hard as I can between my forefingers and this time the skin splits and to my horror a ribbon of wriggling white worms spews from the wound and dribbles onto my lips. Pus and blood would have been bad enough but this is beyond disgusting! I scream, and spit, and raise my hand to wipe the worms away, but as I do so I see the dull red blur of a mosquito perched on the peak of one knuckle, guzzling my blood, and I snap.

  Howling and jumping to my feet I slap my knuckle as hard as I can, over and over, splattering the mosquito, and I keep slapping long after its mangled body is spread across the back of my hand and my sore knuckles are stained red from the pummelling.

  I am consumed with hatred for the jungle. And everything in it, and everything about it. I hate the unrelenting heat and humidity. I detest the cold and sleepless nights. The rain. I loathe the blood-stealing mosquitoes, ticks and leeches. The spiders, flies and worms. I hate every single thing that scurries or scuttles or slithers or crawls in this hell.

  It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Not according to Gran and the stack of National Geographics she left me and which I read from cover to cover, over and over again. Or the documentaries I devoured, and the countless hours I spent online. The jungle was meant to be exotic and beautiful, thrilling and wonderful. Well, the magazines lied. So did the TV and the Internet. And so did Gran.

  There’s nothing exotic about starvation, stomach cramps and sleepless, terrifying nights. Nothing beautiful about skin-blistering sunburn, blinding headaches and puking up grubs. Nothing thrilling about worms spewing from your face, mosquitoes, boils and blisters. Nothing wonderful about digging ticks out of your pubic hair and trying to live with chronic diarrhoea and a cracked and bleeding arse.

  No. It was a lie. The truth is the jungle is a bitch. The jungle is a bully.

  Black flies land on the raw skin of my weeping nose. With a layer of skin removed it feels like their tiny clawed feet are tugging directly on my nerve endings. They’re too infuriating to ignore and every few seconds I scream and brush them from my nose. I can’t take this! Time for a drink, and to wash off the flies and worms.

  Grey fog blankets the river. The stream water is cool and refreshing and I drink as much as I can, hoping a full stomach will alleviate some of my hunger. But the sudden intake of so much fluid stirs something in my bowels and before I can clean my face properly I’m seized with cramps and an urgency to poo. I hitch up my jeans and shuffle towards the clump of bushes I’ve been using as a toilet. But as I approach the bushes the breeze changes direction and gusts into my face; I get a whiff of the area. It stinks. Absolutely reeks. Reluctantly I head around the bend.

  Hurriedly stepping out of my jeans and crusty pants, I squat, and a stream of pale green liquid streams onto the sand. My guts still feel uncomfortably clogged so I wait for a few minutes more but nothing else comes.

  Now pestered by flies and impatient to clean myself, I crawl towards the river. As I reach the water’s edge the fog lifts and I can see the seal-like creature I caught a glimpse of on the first day, lying on a rock. And then I realise that what at first sight looked like one animal is in fact two. And I know what they are. They’re not seals. Or cats. Or caimans. They’re otters! A mother and her pup. I gasp and drop to the sand.

  As my chest hits the wet sand the mother otter bolts upright, and stands erect on her hind feet, front paws bent, nose held high and whiskers twitching, sniffing the air. She’s so big! Taller than me! Far bigger than the otters in the zoo. Shimmering orange butterflies swarm around her head but she ignores them and continues to taste the breeze and stare in my direction, listening intently. I hold my breath and stay as still as I can, frightened she will see me and disappear.

  Fortunately the wind is blowing across the river from the otters to me, carrying my scent away from her, and after a short while she relaxes and drops back down onto the rock and licks the face of her pup, who hasn’t stopped chirping and tugging her fur, demanding attention. Then she barks and slides into the water. The pup lunges at her tail as she goes, then leaps high in the air trying to catch a butterfly.

  Staying still and silent I stare across the river, watching the pup play until his mother returns and bounds onto the rock with a round silver and red fish flapping in her jaws – a piranha! The pup makes a grab for the fish and his mother lets him take it before sliding back into the water and quickly returning with breakfast for herself, another plump piranha.

  Still lying on the wet sand, I enviously watch the otters eat, crunching through fish scales and bones with ease and gulping down strips of flesh, and for a second or two I think about swimming across the river and nicking one from them, until the mother yawns, jaws stretched wide, displaying a wicked set of curved, bone-crunching canines. Teeth… Piranhas… I stay where I am.

  It takes the mother no time at all to consume her fish, and when the pup has finished his as well they both enter the river
to wash. And play. Together.

  Owww! Sand flies have discovered my bare flesh and are starting to bite, but I resist the urge to swat them or risk creeping into the river. I’m too scared of frightening the otters away.

  Playtime over, the mother returns to the rock and stretches out to dry herself in the sun, but her pup won’t let her. He clambers all over her, tugging her whiskers and nipping her webbed feet until she’s had enough and lifts a paw to clout him. He squeaks with delight and dives into the water, bobbing close to the rock, impatiently watching Mum until she closes her eyes and he can creep slowly up onto the rock and pounce on her once more. This time she grabs him in a bear hug and they roll off the rock and into the water together. Mum lets the pup go and climbs back onto the rock and starts to clean herself, but instead of following her, the pup turns. He starts to swim away from the rock and his mother, directly towards me, and I press myself flat against the sand, worried he’s seen me. But just as he enters the strong midstream current his mother calls him back with a burst of loud barks and whistles. The pup stops and hesitates, peering in my direction. His mum barks again, more harshly this time, and he turns and slowly swims back to her, squeaking softly. I can tell he knows he’s in trouble for straying too far, and when he reaches Mum she jumps on him and gives him a nip and a cuff for being disobedient, and the pup squeals and squirms beneath her.

  His punishment isn’t exactly severe though, and within seconds of telling him off Mum’s licking the pup’s face, nibbling his head and grooming his velvety coat. The pup sighs and snuggles against his mother and she wraps her front paws around him and nuzzles his head, and suddenly I’m swamped by a sudden wave of envy. I want my mum to hug me, and kiss my head, and ruffle my hair. I want to feel like the pup: loved and safe.