You know those questions teachers will ask you on the first day of school, “If you were trapped on a deserted island, what is one thing you would have with you?” No one ever really thinks, Wow, that may happen to me sometime. Everyone just thinks of the funniest thing that comes to mind, such as, “Oh, I’ll have Walmart there with me” or “A magical backpack filled with food.”
Here’s what I would put now—Medication.
The plane ride started out okay until we started crossing the Atlantic. Then all hell broke loose and we started falling and falling and falling and falling.
And everyone was screaming and screaming and screaming and—then I blacked out.
It was a miracle when I woke up in the underbrush below thick foliage. The first thing I heard were birds and insects chirping and buzzing, but it was muffled as if I were wearing headphones. I opened my eyes hesitantly and stared up from the ground. The bright blue sky peeked through large green leaves and vines. My body felt numb all over, and I didn’t dare to move.
Until I felt something crawling on my leg.
My body flinched so violently that at first I didn’t feel the pain. I was sitting up before I knew it and smacking at my leg.
Then I screamed because it felt like someone was slicing off my right leg with a chainsaw and everything was burning and I just wanted to kill myself right then and there because I knew it was a terrible nightmare, and as soon as I died I would wake up in my bed at home.
But it wasn’t a nightmare. Obviously. I felt pain. Lots of pain. And there was blood, too.
Oh, and there had been something on my leg.
A huge tarantula just chilling there, staring at me with its eight glossy eyes. It didn’t last long before I smacked it and it went flying off into the underbrush.
And then I started screaming and crying harder than ever before. I’ve never broken a bone in my body, but I’m pretty sure I did.
I didn’t know what to do with my hands, either. My right hand was covered in blood, and I wanted to grasp my leg, but looking at it, I knew it would hurt even worse. So I sat there, trembling and sobbing, my fingers spread wide. Then my head started spinning so I fell back down in the grass… and I screamed again.
I’d never been in so much pain before. I couldn’t take it. I wished God would just take me away then. I didn’t care if I died. I wanted to die.
I lay there for hours, crying until my body went numb again. The pain was still there, of course, but my body just stilled. I didn’t understand why I was still breathing and alive. Nothing made sense anymore. I had just been on a plane, flying to Europe for the summer, but somehow something must have gone wrong because I was there in the jungle, laying on the ground underneath a canopy of green.
“Oh my gosh…”
My eyes opened to crusty slits, and the setting sun blared into my eyes. I heard the crunching of leaves and twigs, and foliage being pushed aside. The footsteps came closer and closer until a shadow fell over me, and a dark masculine figure stood in front of the sun. I stared up at him with eyes that didn’t want to remain open. I wanted to close my eyes and sleep for years, but at the same time, I wanted help. The figure stepped over to my side and knelt down by my right arm. The sun once again shown into my eyes, and I closed them. The intense rays of light had entered my eyes and shot into my brain. I felt my face scrunch up in anguish.
“Can you hear me?” his soft voice asked. He was young but mature at the same time. He was probably a little older than me, too.
I opened my mouth for the first time since I woke. I barely croaked out, “Yes” and then slammed my mouth shut because of the sharp sting in my throat.
“All right.” He hesitated for a moment, reaching out to touch my bloody leg. Then he stopped himself. “Sorry… Okay, I’m going to pick you up now. Don’t freak out. I—uh—I have shelter just through the jungle and across a river. Is that okay?”
I really did not want to open my mouth again. So I nodded instead. That hurt, too, though.
Carefully, he slid his arms under my back and my knees, and he hoisted me into his arms. I let out a sharp and squealing whimper.
“Sorry,” he says. “It’s not a long walk. You’ll be all right. I promise.”
My head rested against his chest, under his chin. He was warm. His shirt was torn here and there on his shoulder, but it was still put together enough to be considered a shirt. The arm that carried me under my leg was careful with my bloody leg. Every now and then he would look down at me, and I would blink up at him slowly. I still couldn’t see him very well, but all I knew was that he had blonde-brown hair that the sun reflected off of. His face had a friendly but determined expression. I could see his jaw set when we came upon the river. The sun had finally fallen.
“Okay, I’m going to hold you a little tighter across the river, but if I hurt you, make some kind of noise or something.”
I wanted to say, “All right”, but no sound would come out when I opened my mouth.
He carried me through the rushing water, and when my foot touched the water (I hadn’t realized until just then that both my shoes were gone, and I honestly did not want to know why).
The river wasn’t as deep as I feared it would be. Eventually we emerged on the other side, and my rescuer said, “I have a cavern to myself over by the waterfall downstream a little ways. It’ll take two minutes, I promise.”
He made a lot of promises. I hoped he could keep them.
We made it to a huge rock wall. By this time it was getting a lot darker. Everything was bathed in deep blue. He looked down at me again. “I’m Tanner, by the way.”
I opened my mouth to tell him my name, too, but he cut me off. “Don’t. You can tell me when you feel better.” He flashes me a sincere smile.
The definite sound of a waterfall filled my ears, and I wanted to turn and look, but I couldn’t move, of course. A murkier shadow overcame us both as we came closer to the rock wall. He stopped and suddenly bent down, me still in his arms, and shifted his weight underneath a small arched opening. When he stood up straight again, everything was near black except for the little bit that the moonlight was able to touch, and that wasn’t much.
He walked further into the black of the cave, and turned an unexpected corner. I closed my eyes so I wouldn’t be able to think whether or not we were about to crash into a wall because I didn’t understand exactly how he knew where to go. Unless he knew this place very well.
After a series of twists and turns, I started to hear flowing water, but it echoed louder and louder as we came closer to wherever we were heading.
“Don’t worry about anything,” he told me. “You’re safe now. I’ll take care of you.”