Fire Girl, Forest Boy

by Chloe Daykin

  Carlos starts the engine and show us how the controls work. The air fills with diesel fumes. ‘Don’t sit at the back or you might fall on the propeller and …’ He slices a finger across his neck.

  We nod.

  He shows us the levers, which are pretty straightforward actually.

  ‘You got it?’ Carlos looks like he doesn’t believe us.

  Yes, yes, we nod. We get it.

  He spreads out a map of the river moving a finger over our journey. It looks so beautiful drawn out. I can’t believe we’re actually going to sail up the Amazon. He draws arrows on it with a pencil. ‘Make the food last,’ he says. ‘Use the rest of the cash for the bus and for petrol. You take a bus from Yurimaguas to Cerro de Pasco. Then there’ll be a car waiting for you.’ He taps the cross on the map. ‘By then I’ll have one ready,’ he says. ‘I hope.’

  Matias gets comfy at the controls and scratches his backside in the seat. He turns the engine over and waves Carlos away.

  Carlos pats our shoulders to wish us luck, then backs off down the gangway and waves at us from the shore.

  We wind the gangway in and tie it up with ropes and wave back.

  I think of his family and feel like the weight of everything pressing on my shoulders is so heavy I might fall straight through the floor.

  The boat vibrates and we pull away into the wild cappuccino water and branches scrape along the roof.

  Raul

  ‘Wouldn’t we be better in the middle?’ Maya points to the centre of the river with no trees.

  ‘If you stick to the edges you don’t get swept away in the current,’ I say and lean over so the wind flaps my hair in my face.

  ‘Right.’ She pulls at her hair and we cruise past snakes hanging off branches and trees stooping low into the water. I use the galley to cook meat and rice wrapped in banana leaves. I tie the tops together in parcels and hand them out like Dad taught me. Maya tries to smile but looks so worried her mouth doesn’t move much.

  The light starts to fade. Me and Maya transform the wrinkly bags of fabric into hammocks that we string across the hooks on the top deck. At dusk I keep my eye out for a small wooden jetty I know is here somewhere and yell at Matias. We stop. The boat doesn’t have lights so we can’t go on. Matias switches the engine off and the silence shivers round us.

  ‘This is the place, right?’ I look at Matias. He nods.

  ‘For what?’ Maya looks at me sideways.

  ‘There’s a hot springs here.’ I smile. ‘Where the earth heats the water. It’s a special place. Carlos reckons we needed it.’

  ‘He has a point.’ She sniffs her armpit and smiles a little too.

  I think about the hot steaming water in the worn smooth rocks. I came here with Dad on a fishing trip when the river rose and the water washed us further downstream than we planned. It took a long time to row back up. We stopped off here to bathe. The heat eased out all my muscles. I remember slipping into the hot water like an egg into a pan. I could’ve stayed there all day.

  ‘Will we get there in time?’ Maya frowns.

  I think how fast a plane goes. How slow we are. ‘We’ll go at dawn,’ I say. ‘We can’t continue without light. Go too close to the shore and the boat’ll ground – and there’s rocks, ones you can’t see in the dark. It’s dangerous.’

  ‘What if they’re coming?’ Maya rubs her elbows. ‘What if Charles and Rosa are after us?’

  I wonder what they’ll do if they catch us. I try to push the thoughts away. ‘They won’t.’

  Me and Matias crank down the anchor and tie the boat to two trees to be really secure. We all peer into the dark and get out torches and shine them on to the bank. Two sets of eyes catch the light and run.

  Maya points the torch at the water. ‘Can’t we just bathe here?’

  ‘In the river?’

  She nods.

  ‘Not really.’ A dragonfly lands on my arm and I brush it off. ‘Unless you want to get eaten by an anaconda.’ We take out the towels we bought at the market and roll them under our arms.

  Matias stares at me. ‘We shouldn’t all go together,’ he says. ‘Someone needs to guard the boat.’

  ‘OK. I’ll take Maya. You stay here, then we’ll swap.’

  ‘What if I go first?’ He picks up his towel and squares up to me.

  Part of me’s sick of being told what to do by Matias. It was easier when it was just me and Maya. ‘Ladies first, right?’ I say, and realise we’ve been talking in Spanish and Maya’s got no idea what’s going on. ‘Let’s go,’ I say in English.

  ‘You all right?’ She looks at Matias, at me, at Matias.

  ‘Yeah,’ I say, and we clank down the gangway and on to the small jetty someone made who knows when, and up the well-trodden track to the pools.

  Maya

  I don’t know what’s up with Raul and Matias. I hear my name though. I wonder if Matias just feels left out that me and Raul get on better. Raul gives off a prickly ‘don’t ask’ vibe, so I don’t.

  We walk up the path lit by the torches with the jungle buzzing and screeching at us and I’m glad I’m not doing this alone.

  ‘Matias not coming?’ I try to sound casual.

  Raul looks at the path. ‘No.’

  I think about the contract I CLICKed. I have to tell someone. I have to tell Raul.

  Even though it’s night, the temperature doesn’t show it. The air’s still thick and sticky. Sweat trickles down my legs.

  ‘How far is it?’

  ‘Not far,’ he says and slashes back two overhanging branches with his knife that he pulls out of his shorts.

  We walk and sweat up the hill to a ridge where the forest opens out and I see the steam before I see the pools. Round hollows with rocks piled round each one to mark them out and steam rising like jacuzzis. The torches mark out stripes of steam in the beams.

  They’re beautiful.

  Raul’s shoulders go down and he smiles.

  We just stand there for a minute.

  ‘It’s beautiful, isn’t it?’ he says, and I nod.

  I feel like I want to hug Raul right now. I want to hug away all the awfulness of seeing Dad. The guilt of running away that I try and push down like a letter under a pillow. The feeling of feeling sick and not knowing what all of this is about. It feels like he’d just get it.

  But I can’t. I don’t.

  I’m too freaked out to make that move. What if it messes up everything?

  So we just stand there. And I wonder if he guesses I’m tense ’cos he says, ‘It’s OK, we’ll go in separate pools.’

  And instead of saying all the things I want to say, and hugging him, I just say, ‘Yeah, sure.’

  Raul

  I hadn’t really thought about the awkwardness of me and Maya being here. Together. I just knew she’d love this place. I didn’t think it’d feel like that. It’s kind of embarrassing.

  ‘What do we do now?’ Maya says and we hover the torches over the pools and pick out two next to each other.

  I check over the pools, fishing a spotted water snake out of Maya’s that I don’t show her.

  ‘What is it?’ she looks over my shoulder.

  ‘Nothing,’ I say and chuck it in the trees and hope it slithers far away. ‘If we get changed behind the rocks we can stick our clothes on the top away from the ants and just slide in.’

  ‘If we keep the torches pointing up we’ll have the light but won’t see each other.’ Maya looks at the floor.

  ‘Right,’ I say.

  ‘Right,’ she says.

  We change and slip into the pools and the heat soaks all the dirt and stress of the past few days away. I hear Maya splashing about in hers. ‘Nice?’

  ‘Magic,’ she says.

  ‘I know.’

  We don’t say anything for a bit. And I think about the lake and Maya’s fire and I don’t know if she wants to talk about it or not, but I look at the torch beam and say, ‘What happened to your powers?’

  Sometimes ta
lking in the dark is easier. I remember that when I used to share with my family. It’s the time I’d find Mami or Papi when everyone else was asleep and they knew I wasn’t. I think about how we got cut off from each other with the walls and the room. Sometimes things that are meant to make life easier make it more complicated.

  ‘Dad,’ she says. ‘They don’t seem to happen when he’s around.’

  I don’t say I noticed.

  ‘Sorry,’ I say.

  ‘It’s OK,’ she says.

  But it’s not, is it. I try to think of something else to say. ‘You know, in Peru they have a village that has a rock-throwing festival, where two sides throw rocks at each other and dodge them.’

  ‘Don’t people die?’

  ‘Yes, but it’s an honour. Their death’s a gift to Pachamama. If someone dies, it brings luck to the village. If no one dies, it’s bad luck. When I was a kid I used to want to do it.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yeah, who doesn’t want to throw rocks?’

  We float in our pools and talk about all kinds of things, whatever comes into our heads. Our breath mingles with the steam and I think about how I’ve never really talked like that before. How I usually keep most stuff inside. In case it sounds stupid or wrong. I dunno. Anyway it just comes out and it feels good.

  And even though the pools keep us apart, it seems kinda close. In a feelings sort of way.

  And Maya says, ‘Raul?’

  And I say, ‘Yeah.’

  And she says, ‘When I was with my dad I saw the contract from JVF. I know what it says.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘I photographed it with my brain,’ she says. ‘I have a brain like a camera. I photograph things.’

  ‘Like what? Like me?’ I grin. She doesn’t. ‘You never mentioned that.’

  ‘It’s kind of embarrassing.’

  ‘It’s not embarrassing. It’s amazing.’

  ‘Anyway, I think it might be the key to everything.’ She pauses. ‘It’s in Spanish though. I need you to translate it.’

  Maya

  We dry and dress and walk back to the boat.

  I feel a bit dizzy from the heat of the water and slip going down the hill, but catch my balance. It’s amazing how good it feels to be clean again. And how churned up my stomach is. I want to know what the contract says, but I don’t. It’s like a horror film when you want to peek through your fingers and feel sick when you do.

  When we get back to the boat Matias is sitting in his hammock checking out stuff on his phone.

  ‘Took your time,’ he says and grins at Raul and slaps him with the towel.

  I don’t know whether to tell Matias. I guess I should. I guess we’re a team. I guess we wouldn’t be here without him. This affects him too.

  ‘Matias.’ I ball my hands up. ‘There’s something you need to know.’ I tell him about the contract and photographing it and how it needs translating. I think he might be angry or laugh at me, but he isn’t and he doesn’t.

  He walks away and unclasps his rucksack and takes out one of his precious notebooks. He rubs a hand on top as he passes it over. ‘Write it,’ he says and takes a pencil from behind his ear.

  ‘In your book?’

  ‘Write it,’ he says again, and swings the towel over his shoulder and heads off up the path.

  ‘See you in a bit,’ Raul yells after him.

  Matias waves the back of his hand and we watch the beam of his torch drift into the darkness and plink out like a candle.

  I look at Raul. And hold my breath.

  Raul

  Maya closes the book and passes it over. She looks tired and hazy, like she’s had to draw deep inside herself to get the words out. Her eyes are slitty.

  I read the words and don’t look at Maya. I just soak them in and wonder how to make them make sense. It’s funny about languages. Knowing two. How words translate into things and meanings and ideas.

  How you can know one and be shut out of another. How sometimes there are things that just can’t be said in other languages. They don’t translate. It’s weird.

  I think about all these things while my eyes pull the words off the page and my brain tries to make sense of them, changing them into something Maya’ll understand.

  Words are really a kind of magic code that reveals things or hides them.

  ‘So?’ she says.

  ‘So,’ I breathe out. ‘It says in return for …’

  ‘Cash?’ She flinches.

  I nod. ‘Your dad will endorse the project.’ I run my finger underneath, touching the paper. ‘Showing the environmental and biological benefits and significance the availability of light brings. Something like that.’ I shake my head. The words are long and hard to translate. My cheeks go pink.

  ‘Go on,’ she says. ‘It’s good.’

  ‘They’re offering your dad a deal.’ I look at the floor.

  ‘What kind of deal?’

  ‘Your dad signs the contract …’

  ‘And approves the project.’

  ‘Yeah.’ I nod. ‘And they release someone from jail. Someone called Rebecca Fergusson,’ I say. She looks away at the name. Her face looks strange. ‘Know her?’

  Maya

  ‘What?’ a voice says from behind.

  Matias is back.

  We both jump.

  ‘It says he’s doing it for—’ Raul tries to fill Matias in.

  ‘I heard.’ Matias takes the book and traces his fingers over the words.

  ‘Why would he do that?’ I push my finger into the floor so hard it makes a little circle on the top. When I wrote the name I knew it though. The gap that’s been growing in our house. The thing no one talks about. The name is the piece of the puzzle that makes it all make sense. Suddenly the gap isn’t a gap any more. It’s a person. Rebecca. The name sticks in my stomach like a sheet of ice. I don’t tell them I know it. I don’t tell them what it means.

  ‘I guess the only way you’re going to find out is by looking it up.’ Matias gets out his phone. I try and snatch it away. I know what he’s going to find. I don’t want to see.

  He pulls his arm back. ‘What’s up with you?’ He keys the name in.

  I want to run.

  I shove my hands under my armpits and let my hair hang over my face.

  Matias stares at the phone. He looks at the phone. Looks at me. Looks at the phone like he’s playing spot the difference. I guess he’s got a photo. I guess the photo shows what I know.

  ‘Just pass the phone, man.’ Raul puts his hand out. ‘If it was your dad you’d want to know.’

  ‘It was my dad,’ Matias hisses. ‘And it’s hers that’s destroying everything he stood for.’

  No one says anything to that.

  Raul snatches it. He looks at the picture.

  He turns the screen to show me.

  And we look at a woman with the same wonky nose as mine.

  With fire hair. Like me.

  Raul nearly drops the phone on the floor. Matias catches it. ‘Easy,’ he says. ‘Easy.’

  I think I’m going to be sick.

  ‘My mother disappeared when I was three,’ I say. ‘Maybe now I know where she went.’

  Raul

  I look at the photo that looks like Maya. But older. At Maya’s mum.

  Her dad’s doing all this to get her mum back?

  That’s where she disappeared to.

  That’s where she went?

  Maya runs up the stairs and the sky cracks open and rain slams into the roof. It rains so hard it pours off the sides like a curtain separating us from the world outside. From each other.

  So hard none of us can talk. If we wanted to. Which we kinda don’t.

  I go after Maya, but she sits and swings in her hammock like she doesn’t want to see anyone. I back off and I sit on the stairs with my head in my hands.

  And a thought grows up from my stomach like a bad grub. I try to push it away, but it won’t go. Maya’s mum. That changes everything, right? I t
iptoe down to the galley and unclip my rucksack. I take out Aiko’s parcel and hold it in my hand. I can’t let it. I can’t.

  I stick it back in my pocket to keep it close and make Maya some tea with sugar I find in the galley. Sugar’s good for shock. I learned that from Dad. I pass it up and she says ‘thanks’ and doesn’t talk to me, and I don’t talk to her either. I have no idea what to say. The news puts a wedge between us like a brick.

  How can I ask her to keep doing this?

  The rain doesn’t stop. It carries on like a waterfall and we hang swaying in our hammocks like three separate islands. In a sea of rain with thoughts that pull us further and further apart. Till we wake up in the night to strange voices and yelling.

  Maya

  Thud. Thud. Thud. Strange sounds wake me up through the hiss and roar of the rain. Thuds like other boats banging into us. I climb out of the hammock and nudge Raul who’s already awake and leaning over the handrail.

  The moon is wide and full and lights up the water. And what’s floating down it.

  Thud. Thud. Thud. The boat takes more bangs to the side.

  The water is filled from shore to shore with shapes bobbing and jostling with each other for position, flowing and banging into the boat. It looks like a raft that someone split apart. A wild, loose one, rippling down the river, moving everything out of its way.

  It takes a minute to squint through the rain and realise it’s logs. The water’s full of logs. Dead slabs that used to be trees. Sliced and bouncing downstream. From bank to bank they buck and writhe. At the back, chasing them all down like a herd of cows is a boat. With two figures inside. Poking at the wood with long poles.

  ‘Traffickers?’

  Raul nods. ‘They cut the wood and wait for the river to rise, then chase it downstream.’

  A torchlight cuts across the dark. Lighting the logs, cutting straight across to the herding boat. The guys in the boat squint and block the light with their hands.