Vicious Memories

Chapter 36

I watched the setting sun grow more beautiful as it cycled through its death throes. Gouts of scarlet, molten orange, and even luminous green battled in the sky. To the east the sky expanded, bruised purple night marching across the field. Haughty stars winked into existence.

Mads had refused Bev's advice and practically dared anyone in the village to come between her and cooking dinner. The smell still lingered in the air - freshly cooked boar and rabbit, a creamy sauce I couldn't identify, sautéed carrots. The last were especially delicious as they were exceedingly precious; they had to be cultivated with care on the farm because they didn't grow in the wild in any meaningful amounts. They were a rare treat that transported all of us off the island for a short while.

"I am sorry I was away," Mads said simply. "But I am back now."

One hand subconsciously moved to her stomach. After a moment she realized what she was doing and busied herself retying the red kerchief around her hair.

"I'm happy you're back," was all I said.

"Mois aussie."

Most of the village went to bed. Alice, Neema, Bev, and Gabriel were already seated by the bonfire when I walked up.

We were trying to retain some sense of unity as our problems closed in like a line of suffocating black curtains - a finale for the small island civilization these people had built right here on top of this hill. Bev handed me a well-worn aluminum water bottle. Out of the entire group, she alone looked untroubled, as if she had figured out the secret to stuffing her emotions deep inside and never letting them out.

"Guava juice," she said, her eyes fixed on the fire.

I took a swig.

"Oh god," I said, coughing. "It's all pulp."

She laughed softly, accepting the bottle back. There, in that laugh, the sadness in her found an escape; I could finally hear it.

She shook her head and took a defiant gulp. "If you close your eyes you can pretend it's beer."

"Disgusting, skunked, warm beer. Sure."

A ferris wheel of jewels spun through the sky above us. The night turned chilly and I was glad for the warmth of the fire. It took time for our conversation to find a rhythm; we kept starting and stopping, sputtering over our words, like a car engine in desperate need of an oil change. After a few tries the words began to slip into their proper channels.

"...you know it. I know it. Everyone knows it."

"I'm not sure," Bev said. She picked at a loose thread in her pants. "It seems a bit wild."

"Oh," Neema said drily, holding her hands up. "And none of the rest of it is wild? This island isn't wild? Losing our memories? Being attacked by savages?"

"Okay, fine. I understand your point. But I'm not religious or superstitious or anything else. I'm just being a realist. I see what's in front of me, I fix what I can, and I try to be a good person. That's it."

"God knows you've fixed me up enough times, Bev. I'm just asking how you can possibly ignore how wrong all of this is." Neema patted her scarred leg and raised her eyebrows. "It makes my scar tingle and itch every time I think about it. This all has to be for a purpose. A build up to something. Or a test."

Bev shook her head and flipped her braid from her left to her right shoulder. She glanced at me and shrugged - how am I supposed to argue with someone as smart as her? - then turned back to Neema.

"And who are we being tested by?"

"Ahhh." Neema clapped her hands in delight. "Now you're asking the right questions."

A large beetle dove into the bonfire, lighting up in a brief flash of brilliance before falling to the burning logs below. I watched as it began its brief metamorphosis into ash.

"I feel it, Neema," Alice said, surprising everyone. Her freckles shimmered in the orange light. "I feel it. But if this is all for some purpose, what happens once we come out on the other side?"

"Then," Neema said quietly, "we'll be free."

"Do you ever wonder," Gabriel rumbled quietly, his voice thrumming in harmony with the bugs around us, "if we're all just finally starting to go crazy?"

Flanking him on either side, both Neema and Alice tensed. I followed suit. Bev looked at the dark sky above us, her eyes narrowed. Hearing uncertainty from Gabriel's mouth was an unwelcome and disquieting thing, like a dog who spends years viciously and single-mindedly barking at the mailman, only to sit down one day and let out a calm "Meow".

Unbidden, the words from earlier returned. Lunatic scribblings in a tree trunk, the message had taken on a slightly demented and nightmarish aura in my mind, growing larger and more insistent. Ollie, it's your fault, you know, don't you? Ollie, it's your fault, you know, don't you?

"Yes, I do wonder that sometimes," I said, surprising even myself. I thought about what had happened to Cooper just two days ago, to me a week ago, and to the rest of the village two years ago. "How can we know what's real and what isn't when our memories can be completely lost in the blink of an eye?"

Silence.

Only the crickets called out to me in response, voicing their agreement from the long grass around the clearing.