“Hope you slept well.” Parth said as he crouched out of the cave and streched himself. It was late morning time. He saw Brian looking at the waterfalls, avoiding looking at Parth.
“Any problem?” Parth asked.
Brian looked at him and said, “Oh! The deaf has woken up? Tell me, CAN YOU HEAR ME?”
Parth stood there, hands at his hip, looking at Brian and then went inside the cave laughing.
“What are you laughing for?” Brian shouted back.
Parth came back after a while, holding his backpack in his shoulders and then walked towards Brian. “Now, listen,
we can’t stay here forever, so we move past the waterfall, through those woods,” he pointed forward, and sure enough past the flow of water that the falls brought were trees, “and then after we cross the trees, we find them.” He said as he went behind Brian, cutting his ropes.
“Find who? And why the hell are we going there? Just... please leave me. I have a job to do. And...” he hesitated, he didn’t want to tell him about his sister. Parth, he thought, will just ignore it fact and see his as a killing machine.
‘I have to escape before it is too late. Have to find a way to leave today.’ He thought as the grip binding him to the tree loosened. ‘This is the time!’ he thought and waited as the grip kept getting loose and loose and finally he made a run for it.
Running a few feets away from the tree was all he could accomplish before falling head first on the ground. He heard Parth laughing behind him and strangely found himself laughing too, in frustration and irritation.
“Hey, are you okay?” Parth said, holding the rope which was tied to Brian’s leg.
“Brian.” He said as he bend down.
Brian got up and held Parth’s head and rolled him down towards him amd pushed him into the ground. Brian, looking at the opportunity got up and started racing back towards the cave when Parth crawled up and reached out for the rope and pulled it. Brian's reflexes weren't back and he fell head first again.
Parth, now the rope in a knot around his palm jumped towards him. Parth thinking Brain can't escape me. Well, he soon found himself rolling down the ground with him. Brain had pulled the rope and held on to him. The world spinned around them as they held on to each other; Brian holding Parth’s clothes and Parth holding Brian’s wrists.
Before the idea to actually let go of each other and stop rolling came to them, they felt their whole body splashed into the water.
Parth removed his hands but Brian still clinched on to Parth’s shirt.
“Calm down!” Parth shouted as he took heavy breaths, in and out. Their feet found their way above the pebbles. But they had bigger problems.
One look at the edge and they realised they were being pulled down a waterfall.
“Get out! Let’s get out!” Brian shouted trying to pull Parth towards him.
“Argghhhh!” Shouted Parth and then, “Noooo!” shouted Brian as they felt their eyes closing, pebbles vanishing, water leaving, air rushing, body doing mid-air stunts, the grip on each other’s clothes tightening, and then SPLASH!, felt exactly like falling on a solid ground but with chances of drowning too.
Somehow, they just floated.
It was half past two in afternoon when Parth’s eyes opened. He tried to sit straight and get a hang of the surrounding and the miracle. His head still spinned and he still felt like sliding on the water. He forced his eyes shut. After taking several deep breaths and calling in the origin of his headache he opened his eyes.
There in front of him laid the creek, though now they were going in a slow pace, leaves flowing above the water surface.
He laid leaned on near the trunk of a big thick tree, and like many near him, the tree’s shade blocking the sunlight and a cool breeze with the smell of fresh leaves made its way to him. He turned to look for Brian and saw him leaning against the same tree he was in, his hands above his kness and head hung low between them. Clothes wet, water dripping and blood spilling out, exactly like Parth. The rope which was tied around Brian’s leg curved lifelessly on the ground near Brian’s feet.
“Brian... listen...” Parth stumbled as he tried to get up.
“Shut up,” Brian called out, “rest for now. I won’t kill you – yet.” Parth didn’t need to be told twice. He felt like putting up a fight but his body was too weak, full with a dozen cuts and his arm felt like it was the first to feel the splashing of the water as it felt numb. Couldn’t feel anything and too weak to raise it.
He closed his eyes, pushed his head against the trunk and dozed off.
His dream:
“You just are too young, go home.”
“Yeah. Who is it?”
“One of those small kids from the village...”
“Hey!” He turned back to hear on old voice. “Don’t ever go away without telling me!”
“But...”
“NO! You are too small...”
“Yes kid. Go play with your friends, you’ll probably get killed here.”
“I won’t”
A slap to his face as he woke up.
He touched his cheek absentmintedly; the slap aging back to fifteen years ago still hurt. The laughing voices of the men and the embarrassment kicking its way in his mind.
He recalled his dream:
The outline of the hills, the overlook view of his whole village, the scene was in the outskirts of the village, somewhere near the starting of the mountains; a place not many people knew, a place he hated. He didn’t recall the people present in there; he knew them but had learned to shut his mind to them. The image of his mother came before him as he opened his eyes to distract himself.
Funny, he thought, how memories can judge a beautiful place of its madness and an ugly place of its beauty.
“Hope YOU slept well!” He noticed Brian sitting in front of him, hands held over the knees and rocking back and front, “Had a bad dream?
Parth kept quiet.
“You were... sweating and your expressions showed a nightmare. I too have nightmares, recently only I talked with a kid named –"
“Yeah, thanks.” Parth interrupted him, “but, uh, can we find out how we survived first?"
“You are not taking the dreams seriously, you may pay –"
“I am actually taking them very seriously; you have no idea.” He said as fast as he can, he didn’t want his mind to go back there. Probably won’t even bother to sleep now, he said to himself.
“I woke up to see us flowing like those lifeless leaves on here,” Brain pointed to the water flowing in front of them, “and so dragged both of us out of it. Mind you were throwing water out of your mouth the whole time. I cut the ropes, if only you would have let me do what I did here back at the cave, we would have saved ourselves a Death experience!”
"Well, you live you learn.” Parth said carelessly, his mind blank.
“Oh yeah? 1) Smashing into some big rock and then puff, dead! 2) Drowning! 3) Falling down from that!” his finger on the top of the falls, “want any more or got the idea?”
Parth nodded and then after a second of deep breaths said, “Okay then, but where are we?”
“That,” Said Brian, a smile spreading over his face as he leaned ahead and asked, “is a question, right? Where are we? Um... From what I saw since the last thirty minutes, in which you were sleeping, we are at least... very away from the cave. Like we were, I think, floating for thirty minutes.”
“So, you are saying...” Parth, seeing Brian’s eyes getting widened,
“That we are lost? Yes!” Brian exclaimed, throwing his arms up in the air, “isn’t it wonderful? That’s what you wanted right?”
“What? No!” Parth snapped.
“Yes!”
“Which idiot wants to be lost?” Said Parth, trying to get up.
“Let me guess,” Brian said as he placed his fingers in his chin and his eyes fixed on the sky. The burbling of the creek water against the forest-floor echoed, filling in the silence, “I know one such idiot, you want to take a guess?”
“Come on man, please.”
“Guess?”
“Me.”
“Yes! You!” Said Brian and then walked past Parth to where he was resting and picking up his belongings: wet cloth, a locket and Parth’s knife.
“Hey! That is my...” Parth said trying to reach it but Brian showed it to Parth saying, “Listen, there are things happening here more important than you, and I know. So just stop. Stop and stay quiet. Keep your head down and you may live.”
“What do you mean? I'm not afraid of you! I saved you. And we are going back to find the cave?” Parth said, his numb arm hanging lifelessly in his lap.
“What? No. I have better things to do, better places to go and better things to find.” Brian said as he pocketed the knife and bend down to pick up his locket.
“So, you are leaving me!?” Said Parth, finally being able to stand up.
“Oh, no, no, no, no. You, my friend, are going to help me!” Brian said as he took a step closer to Parth.
“Help?”
“You are going to help me get out of this maze! This jungle or whatever this is. And fast. I don’t have enough time.”
“And why should I,” Parth said as he started walking near the creek, the setting sun’s golden rays making the leaves shine above the blue cloud-reflected water, “help you?”
“Because...” Brian too stood near the creek now, looking ahead, “if not, I will kill you. And if you help, I’ll reward you.”
“Reward?” Parth said, acting casual and smelling the great green grass’s scent. He was not afraid.
“Reward.” Repeated Brian.
“Reward like you'll give me some land?” Asked Parth, now looking at Brian.
“Reward like gold. Think about it!” Brian said as he hung the locket around his neck.
“Okay.”
He accepted for many reasons. One being in the hope of finding his group.
Second, not accepting the offer was to be alone.
Brian requested for many reasons. One being in the hope of finding the group. And second was of not being lost alone and again.
‘Hold on a little more, girl.’ Brian told the afternoon sky.