l a p s e

the mirage

When evening fell again, we spent a short amount of time searching for another clearing to sleep in. To me it seemed as if our endless schedule consisted only of walking, searching for a place to sleep and then sleeping.

Food was scarce, as was to be expected. For breakfast we had gone hungry, but for lunch the botanist stopped us in a thick section of brush so that we could feast on some wild berries, which the botanist described in detail. I don't remember a word of his explanation or the name of the plant, but I committed its appearance to memory just in case I stumbled upon it again.

I doubted we would find anything for dinner, but when we reached the clearing the professor immediately spotted something growing on a tree. The botanist hurried over to look, and after several long moments of examination the botanist pronounced the strange plant edible. Beefsteak fungus, he said. Good and meaty when cooked.

I studied the fungus. It was like a thick, brown tongue protruding from the bark. I poked it with a stick. It seemed tough but moist, and something about it unsettled me. I felt like the tree had a mouth and was trying to speak.

We settled down there. The lawyer's cough was worsening, and we found a pad of moss for her to use as a handkerchief. I sat straight on the mulchy ground – getting my clothes dirty was the last thing on my mind – and lifted up the edge of my shirt. The wound was still there, red and pulsing. For some reason I had expected it to disappear without a trace. It felt like a phantom, albeit a painful one.

From the blue suitcase I drew out one of the luxurious shawls. It seemed a waste but there was nothing we really needed the shawls for. It was mid-summer, hot and sticky during the day. The shawls were of no use.

They were, however, highly absorbent. I bound one around my waist directly on the wound. It throbbed when I pulled the knot tight, and the strange pain only disappeared later that night when I was too deeply asleep to feel it.

The problem with beefsteak fungus is that it must be cooked before it can be eaten. We were at a dilemma. Any wood or tinder we could find around us was too moist to light. There was no flint with which to create sparks, no sun to concentrate light from.

Then I remembered the small bulge in the pocket of my jeans. Before leaving I'd stashed a matchbox inside, just for the satisfaction of smuggling it through the airport security.

I'd completely forgotten about it. The paper of the box was damp, but the matches were thankfully, still dry. Striking them against the box would have proved futile, so we spent some time striking them against various surfaces.

Looking back this may not have been the best thing to do. We wasted several matches trying to find an appropriate lighter. By the time we got a fire going with some dried grass we had used up about one fifth of the box.

There was nothing to eat with the beefsteak, so we just tried to enjoy the painfully thick, fibrous fungus on its own. It was terrible, but there was really no other choice. I pretended it was Dad's beef jerky – the worst beef jerky I'd ever eaten – and that brought to mind previous summers during which my parents and I were one happy family.

The fire burned through the whole night. Its crackling roused me constantly, and each time I spent some time stoking it with a long branch. It looked like a hellion, fearsome and towering in the dark, its tongues licking the stagnant air.

In the morning it was a simple pile of ashes, still smoldering, smoke drifting up into the sky.