Dream Again

Day 62

I wake up with sand in my eyes, sand on my face, the morning sun beating in a bright and cheery dawn.
We've been here at least two months. Time is painful to keep track as one day bleeds into the next, a steady rhythm of pure survival. Getting water. Tending fish traps. Hunting birds for variety. Odd chores to keep us sane like gathering fire wood and drying meat.
We've built a make shift shelter on the beach, out of sticks and layered brush. It says up if you don't look at it or breath in it's direction I am not an engineer. It's down on the beach, so we can hear any rescue planes that may come. None are coming.. But we wait anyway.
We've heard rustling in the woods at night. Likely boar. But we see a shape now and then. The creature, whatever it is, appears to only watch us. So long as we're not bothering it all seems fine. But it does haunt the woods.
The society on the other beach gives us no trouble. We don't contact them. We spy on them that's different. A few of them have dove to find the wreck of the plane and I think got some more basic supplies. They and we keep signal fires going.
Time feels strangely like it doesn't matter. One day things will change. One day there will be rescue. It's more pleasant to pretend it's only been a few weeks. Theyr'e still looking for us.
But it hasn't been a few weeks. And no one is lookign for us. A six month pregnancy looks far different than four, and Miranda's swollen belly is a stark reminder of how long we've been here. Despite our inadequate diet she's put on weight and the baby is growing and moving, healthy so far as we can tell which is not really at all.
""You ever think about having one of your own? I mean before," Miranda asks me, as we sit gutting fish. A rotten chore we both took today to let Luke and River have the more pleasant task of fetching water. We have coconuts that we finally split. Well all right no a crab split them that's not the point. We didn't get what was in them but they're good to store fresh water.
"A fucking baby?" I ask, glancing over at her, "Yeah. No. I never thought I'd live that long."
"Me either," she says, smiling a ltitle, "I swore I was going to give it a good life. Like I didn't have. Get to be happy."
"Like I said. Didn't think I'd live that long. Look I was right," I say, dryly.
"You've never asked me about the father," she says.
"No ring. When you got on the plane that night you had bruises on your neck. You said you were going home to have it. I took it he's not in the picture," I say.
"He's not—he didn't know. I didn't tell him. I guess that's wrong. But he didn't know how to treat me right," she says.
"Sounds about right for mankind," I say.
She laughs a little, cupping a hand to her belly. Uncomfortable I'd imagine. She's active, and was slim, besides which fact we're all eating so little she's probably malnourished. The body will redirect any extra nutrients to the growing baby.
And I should talk to her. I know the point of the conversation was I don't talk much.
"I wonder sometimes if our parents, or anyone who failed—if—I guess I wonder if there was a moment that my mother really loved me. If I could ask her one thing that'd be it. When was that. And where did it all go wrong? Was she happy when someone told her she had a son? Was it me, was it meeting me that did it? It's okay if it was but I'd like to know," I say, looking back down at my filthy hands. I'm gutting a fish with a broken stone on a desolate beach. And I'm wondering if there was ever a moment she could have loved me.
"If she didn't—that wasn't you," Miranda says, moving as though to touch me but her hands are filthy too, "I'm just going to be different. My baby—no matter where we are—my baby doesn't feel alone."
"You will, you'll be a good mum," I say, gently.  I wouldn't know about that. "I don't think I'm different. That's the thing. I feel like my mother's sins acted out again."
"Well I don't think you. I think you're pretty cool. And this baby needs a godfather, to look after him, and that is going to be you. So ten years from now you get to be very embarrassing, and sweaty, and pick it up from school in a cool car, okay?" Miranda asks, smiling.
"Deal, and teach it how to swear and watch late night television, while you go snorkeling," I say.
"What is late night television to you?"
"Animal planet."
She laughs.
'Serioulsy, best stuff, stupid narration, videos of animals, complete crowd pleasure," I say.
She laughs again. And it's worth it for once. We'll talk about what we'll do in a world that's normal again. Ignoring that gutting fish and waiting for the tide to come in is now normal. Sand on our feet and in our hair.  River comes back and leans against me and I pretend that I'm not at all alone. Later we'll go and Check the trap and maybe splash each other water. Luke will laugh now and then if we do that.
Then I'll tell him the plot of mature movies heavily edited to make him go to sleep, and Miranda and River will try to guess the movie.
"And then Tom Cruise graduates from school despite previously flunking and the blonde likes him, unironically. His friend gets out of the hospital and they are all fine," I say, eyes closed, listening to the water.
"That is not the plot of Top Gun," Miranda laughs.
"It is if you're stoned when you watch it, and drunk," I say.
"That is not, it's like my favorite movie," Miranda says.
"Why? I have not seen it, because I'm. Not old," River says.
"It's because I watched it first in college and I was really stressed and the soundtrack and just—I don't know it wound up being soothing," Miranda says.
"Okay that's fair, I do that with Star is Born," river says.
"What's that?" Luke asks.
And we laugh and tell him the plot of a movie he'll never get to see. And we tell it badly. But it's stories we have so we tell it anyway, watching our fire. It can't go out.
We could go home someday.