Dream Again

Day 375 - 511

We have no words and no hope anymore. Feral is the wrong word when I quote Shakespeare to pass the time, and she sings me old lullabies and love songs she was saving for a future we'll never see.
The island is haunted. And we're two of the ghosts. We see signs of other camps, fire pits, skins, the like. But never people. Some did survive but we don't know who.
It doesn't matter.
Nothing matters.
We swim in the ocean out to the sandbars and stare back at the island pretending to be free. We sing and dance on the beach, while we're freezing and trying to stay warm. We hide out in the sea caves if we hear nosies in the night. And we fish and harvest fruit. We can't bring ourselves to kill anymore birds.
Time passes in a smooth unyielding melody. Our hair grows. We cut it short as we can manage. Our clothes are all but in tatters, we keep them on anyway. Levi's jeans survive our shirts are nearly useless.
There is nothing sensual in any capacity in our nakedness. Nor in our constant coopearation. No our transition from strangers to old lovers is entirely complete. We lean on each other when tired. She lays against me. In the night if it's cold i hold her in the dark and we stay warm together. We've seen the other's bodies countless times there is no appeal nor surprise. We don't know if we like each other after all this time we're just used to the other. She knows my every scar. I've cut her hair. We pick bugs off the other's skin. We try to keep each other sane in the solitude.
I sign her dancing Queen when we guess her seventeenth birthday should be. She asks how old I am.
"How come I've never asked you?"
"I dont' really know why youv'e never asked me."
"I'm holding a knife," River says. She's gutting a fish. I'm trying to start our fire. She said I should learn and stop making her always do it.
"I should be eighteen, or am already," I say, quietly.
"You said you were seveteen when we crashed."
"I probably did."
"Why?" She's frowns at me.
"Why what?"
"Why do you lie like that?" She asks.
"Force of habit. I don't know. I probably had a reason then," I say.
"I jsut—I feel like sometimes I don't know anything about you," she says.
"I don't know anything about you really."
"Bitch. You could probalby find my house on my street, if I dropped you in Cleveland. I told you abut the Bradford pear in the front yard. And the crack in the sidewalk I'd make my Barbie's pretend was a river. And the color of our mailbox," she says.
I do know all that.  I shut up.
"James," she sighs.
"I wasn't a very good person, before I met you. And I didn't have a brilliant life. I've told what you'd want to know. I cut school a lot. My sister's dead, I don't have any family," I say, coolly running through all the words I've said. I'd tell ehr the truth but I can't have her leave me now. Not because I wouldn't survive. But because I can be some good in this world yet if I can protect her a little longer. She gets cold at night. And it's easier to fish with two. And I dont' want her to hate me. I get that don't I? I just don't want her to hate me.
"You said your sister had kidney disease," she says.
"End Stage Renal Diesaes, it's caused by something else," I correct.
"And you gave her yours," she says, gesturing to the scar on my belly.
I nod.
"Is that like a congenital thing that happens?"
"No."
"What were you doing in Australia?"
"Vacation."
She stares at me.
"What?" I ask.
She sighs, "What wouldn't I want to know?"
"What do you want me to tell you? We all have things. Moments we wished hadn't happened. Should I tell you about the time I turned six I wanted a dictionary for my birthday so I could memorize it? And everyone laughed. Should I tell you I used to sit up and wait for my mother to come home and she wasn't coming home at all? Should I tell you about the first time I had coke, I was four and someone left it out and I put my hands in it. They had to take me to the hospital. But the whole time I was thinking it was the most beautiful the world had ever felt. And I knew then that it had to be wrong. Because I never deserved to feel that perfect. And I never touched drugs again. Because I didn't think I deserved to feel happiness. There you go that's me. The worst reason to be clean in the world," I say.
She stares at me. Like finally seeing my face when I'm not lying. Really seeing the difference. None of that whole speech was a like.
"Shit," she sighs.
"Don't say you're sorry. You had every right to ask," I say.
"How'd you get to be so smart, with that fucked up of a home?" She asks.
"I like to give a lot of credit to the Internet, honestly."
She starts to laugh.
"And books. But also the internet," I say, smiling a little, "and I'm not that smart. You just need to get out more."
"I'll do that James. I'll get out more. No seriously you are. What's the last book you read?"
"Peter Pan,' I say thinly.
"Huh. I probably read—oh we had to read the Great Gatsby for school," she says.
"You always look so cool," I say, flicking her cheek with one sandy finger.
She laughs, leaning away, "Get that fire started."
"Yes ma'am," I say, going back to striking the stones, "What did you do for fun? Like, if this were an evening in America what would you be doing?"
"Watching TV?or scrolling through instagram—or going for a run. I wanted a dog," she mutters the last part.
"Oh very hallmark channel of you."
"What? That's what I do. What do you do for fun?" She asks.
"Play cards."
"Oh right. Yeah you're good at that."
"Boring with two," I say.
"Yeah well," she comes over to lean on me.
"You stink like fish," I say, ignoring her.
"Come chase me in then," she says, pushing my shoulders.
Together we run into the surf. Naturally I tackle her in and she crawls on my shoulders to get out of it. We're both laughing in the cold dark water. And I let her wet body slip back into my arms, familiar and slim, against my own lean frame. We're both painfully thin I know. And I'm terrified I'm so used to her like this. That I know her body as well as my own and this is what it is.
We curl up together in front of the fire which she starts, and split the fish. There's more than enough it feels like our belly's will be full. And we fall asleep her curled up in my arms. Innocent as a pair of puppies, fully exhausted and ready to wake at dawn the next day.
We do and we swim out to a sand bar to stare back at our island. There could be sharks out here. We don't really care. Death hardly matters anymore. We're not being found. We're just not giving up because we have each other.
The island is beautiful set against the dark sea. And the water's cold. It doesn't feel like home just a prison. Yet I suppose even that can feel like home. It should to me. Idon't have anywhere else I'd rather be. Except lying on the floor of a shitty motel. Face in the carpet. Listening to a dial tone.  And waitingi for the next game. Cool pack of cards in my hand. A room that smells like years of smoke.
And instead I'm here. There's ways to figure how the clouds move. Or where the moon hangs in the sky. But I don't know any of them. And I don't know if this girl would talk to me at all if I told the truth for once. I'd like to try but I don't. There are days neither of us say anything at all.
"Do you think we would have hung out? Back at home?" River asks one day, "Like if we'd been at the same school. And all that."
"No. Because I stood in corners not talking to people and cutting class," I say.
"Okay good reason."
It's the only words I have to admit I was a ghost before any of this ever happened.
By now we know every song the other knows. Our favorite foods. I know her address. That she lives in the middle of the street. The color the leaves turn outside her mother's house. I know her parents phone numbers.
She knows I like driving fast and listening to bad country songs in old bars. She puts that down to being British. She doesn't know it's just being seventeen. What I was when we left. I don't feel any older. I certainly don't feel wiser just sadder.
Longest fourteen hours in the world.
We see the occasional life of other inhabitants of the island. We don't trust them at all. Ivan's cross has more strips of cloth on it, and once skin. So that means Max is alive and mourning his friend in the leather mentally healthy way possible.
The closest we get is to hear a faint whistling, singing hauntingly through the trees. That's all. And we hastily retreat. He can simply die off alone. Just get sick of living. Please. I hold no sympathy for him anymore after Luke's death. I can't bring myself to wish him ill as he does me. But I hold little sympathy when he shot knowingly at a fleeing boy. Me all right. I'd get wanting to kill me. Ivan and I were fighting. I don't know why we wound up to the death like that. Half the time I don't know anything at all, though. I don't care anymore. If I cared about one more thing I'd lose my mind.
River and I wonder who of us will die first.
"It doesn't have to be. We live till we're eighty. And then one day we walk off this cliff together," I say.
"We wait that long?" She asks, staring all the way down.
"With each other? Of coruse. Not for me. But if a plane were to come. Then I'd tell them what happened to the others. I have to tell Luke's mum. And Miranda's family. Whoever they are left by then. I owe them that," I say, "We figure it's been long enough or one of us is sick. We step off the cliff die at the exact same time. Neither of us has to watch death again."
"Okay," River says, laying her head on my shoulder.
Neither of us believe we'll make it that long. We don't believe we'll be rescued either. I think we think we'll be seveteen for several hundreds years. Time doesn't mean much of anything anyway.
If we get depressed we cheer each other up. If it's dark enough we dance in the faded firelight. Our skin smells like saltwater, and theres sand in our hair. I hold her close like well be torn apart one day. We don't trust Death not to claim us.
And we keep out of the woods. Since that night in the cave the monster doesn't truly ever show itself. Twice I see red eyes in the forest. Just watching us. I don't fear the monster. I have mens blood on my hands too. Nothing that haunts the woods can possibly be more terrible than the nightmares that haunt me at night. Luke's little body at the bottom of a pit I dug. His father dying so slowly in my arms. A pair of boots and a broken promise. My sister's voice ringing in my ears. Saying that she hates me. And Iwas going to give my life to save her anyway. I wish I had. I often feel like anyone would make more of a difference. And all this is a waste of time and flesh. I cannot rationalize a point to existing when there's nothing to live for but messages from the dead.
"If we go home I'll call myself Hermes. Messenger of the dead. That's all I'll have," I say, tracing my fingers through the sand.
"We could do that. Just. Travel to all the different families of people who died," River frowns, "That's a good idea."
"I don't know. What else is there? We can't forget this. And we don't know how long it'll be. Odds are a ship will pass by. Or a plane fly low enough. Or some picture on a sattelite reveal to children stranded on a beach," I say.
"Really?" She asks.
"What?" I frown.
"No, like, really? It'll happen. Like you know the odds I know you know that stuff," she says, coming to lie half over my back. I pat her arm idly, white raised scars. I know the cause of every one.
"Yeah, I mean. It's lowered by being in the middle of the pacific. And being off the flight path. But, even so. A fishing ship, or someone in a prop plane. In theory there's other islands, maybe inahbitated, just over the horizon."
"We just can't get there," she says, quietly.
"Yeah. Yeah we just get there," I say, "If we had a raft—and knew how to steer it—two things that aren't true. We'd still have no way of knowing which way was best. And we'd drown."
"Okay," she sighs, putting her face into my shoulder.
We're slowly getting malnutrition. Fish and fruit we find isn't a complete diet, not one we're used to anyway. People in different parts of the world are adapted ot different thigns we are not from islands and we're definitely not fishing and harvesting appropriately in order to survive. We don't know how. We don't know far far too much.
We've long since given up on signal fires. It's not worth it. And we don't want to be found by anyone else on the island. Sometimes we get bold and try to follow tracks in the mud. It's two, maybe three people. All have boots still. We're both barefoot. Her shoes gave out and I never had any.
She doesn't ask me about that. She doesn't ask me about a lot of thigns I guesss she's realized she doesn't want an answer to. I don't know how she knows I don't know how to talk about any of it. Or how to make me laugh on a rainy day. And I don't think she knows I'd be dead without her. Not physically. Just my spirit. It's terrifying how one person can hold you back to earth. A single thread tying me back to the person I once wanted to be and a heart I thought was broken beyond repair. It probably is. But an invisible thread is holding most of me together. And none of that makes sense outloud. It might not have to.
"Favorite movie?"
"Easy A—what? I like a happy ending," River laughs, "Favorite play."
"Hmm, Hamlet," I say.
"Why?"
"Read it each time and I see something different. And I can't ever believe in a happy ending," I say.
"Is that the one you told to me—?"
"Two nights ago you fell asleep."
"Yeah it's not my fault you have a sexy english accent."
That's how our conversations go. Then we won't talk for hours. It's an easy silence. We can always say anything. Nothing matters. This is purgatory. We'll be plunged into heaven or to hell. And we'll lose our minds if we don't keep each other sane.
"Do you think if we'd met anywhere else we'd fall in love?" River asks me one night.
"No, because I don't know how to love things like I should. I always get it wrong. So I'd have gotten it wrong that time. And I never would have met someone like you," I say.
"What's someone like me?" She asks.
"Someone good."
"You're the best friend I ever had. And it's weird to think if the worst thing in the world hadnt' happened to us, I wouldn'T have gotten to have you," she says.
"We wouldn't be friends if we weren't here. You wouldn't like me. I don't think I liked me," I say.
"Yeah I think I would. I like you. Not—keeping us both alive or trauma bonded shit."
"It's called Stockholm syndrome. The island gave you Stockholm syndrome."
"Shut up," she hits my belly.
I smile.
"No. Shut up. I genuinely like you. And your stupid sexy accent. And your stupid quotes you have for everything and random facts for everything."
I smile, "You're the only friend I ever had. So. None to compare."
"Do you promise to stay with me?" River asks.
"Well. It's a pretty small island."
"Idiot."
"Look you're not going to want me when we get back. Trust me," I say, quietly, "Don't make me going into it. But you won't. I don't get better."
"I didn't ask you any of that. I said. Promise you'll stay with me. No one else will know. If we go home. And life goes on. I'll hear someone talk about a beach, or smell badly cooked fish, or someone will talk about flying on a plane. And I won't be okay again. And if we went home tomorrow—then in ten years it wouldn't make any sense to anyone else. And I wouldn't tell them. But you'd just know. And you don't have to fall in love with me. But I'd want you there so you could know. I can't give up someone who knows my thoughts the same time I do. And you're the only one who understands," she says.
"You're right I don't have to fall in love with you. I do love you. That's already there. I warn you I'm terrible at it. But I love you. And if we go home tomorrow. Then in twenty or thirty years you could have a husband and four children. And I'd still love you. Doesn't matter where either of us are," I say, holding her hand to my chest.
"If we go home tomorrow we wait. And in ten years if no one else still laughs at our jokes before we finish them, and knows when we're about to cry, then we just get married and we live together. And we spend the rest of our lives doing this but in front of a TV? And you're you being smart on a computer and neither of us watch whatever movie we fought over for twenty minutes? Because with you fights don't mean anything. I've never had that, and I can't give it up. And the only thing that scares me about going home is losing you," she says, looking over at me.
"You're not ever losing me. No matter what happens. I swear to you. Even if they separate us—for some reason I have no idea why they'd do that but—if they did. Then I'm still right there, loving you the same. Guessing what song you want to play, and hoping you're eating all the food we missed, and imagining the sound of your voice telling me to shut up," I say, smiling.
"Okay," she says, quietly, laying her head on my shoulder.
"Where did you want to get married? When you were like, whatever, ten and started thinking about that sort of thing? Assuming you'd get married and have a happy ending?" I ask.
"An island."
We both laugh so hard we nearly throw up.
"I thought it was romantic! People went off to Barbados or whatever," she says, "What about you?"
"Prison."
We laugh more.
"You didn't swear not to leave me," she says, when we're through.
"I swear it. I swear I will do everything I possibly can, to stay with you. So long as that's what you want," I say, lacing our fingers together.
"If they come in the morning I'll tell them I made you promise."
"Okay. If they come in the morning I'll say I need you. For medical reasons. It's true but you have to say medical reasons."
And I make her laugh like I knew I would.
We've lost track of how much time it's been. But it feels like an age. And we make the joke. If they come tomorrow. If they come to save us tomorrow. But they don't. They don't come tomorrow. No one is looking for two lost children who walk each night upon the beach. Who fall asleep side by side and go swim out to sand bars to pretend we've escaped.
Of course it can't go on forever. Something was always going to change. We didn't even want it to. Long days of swimming, finding food, making fires, and doing every chore to survive. We talk. We decide to explore another beach. We move camp so we aren't found. Our main pleasures are searching for shells, or swimming to sand bars and looking out at the water. I tell her every story of the stars I know. She sings love songs I've never heard. A kind of peace many long for, and it's hell on earth when there's a thousand places we'd rather be. But now that includes together. How can it not?
I'll tell you.