‘Morning, guys,’ Andrew said, taking a seat on a bench. ‘Listen, before we get down to breakfast I think we ought to revisit what we were talking about yesterday. Obviously there’s a need for rationing – are we all agreed on that?’
I nodded. Everyone else did as well. I ignored Duncan, who was ignoring me just as studiously.
‘Right, so, are we all agreed that cutting out one meal a day is the best thing, or, are we saying we’ll reduce all meals by a third to make the supplies last?’ Andrew looked around the group. ‘Votes for ditching dinner, raise your hands.’
Only Maxine voted for smaller meals all round. I threw my vote behind the majority. One fight in twenty-four hours was enough for me. I had also decided not to mention foraging again. Andrew had other ideas.
‘With the foraging,’ he began, and I felt all eyes turn to me. ‘What if you go before work party in the mornings and then we’ll have the stuff for breakfast and lunch? And in the afternoon you can help someone else out with their work.’
It was clear I had a choice to make. Either I could stir shit up all over again and cause another fight, or I could accept the olive branch being thrown at me. Not that it felt like much of one.
‘Sure,’ I said. ‘No problem.’
With everything decided we were finally allowed to have breakfast. Andrew unlocked the rations with Gill. Shaun made watery porridge with nut butter and some raisins. Afterwards we trooped off to the worksite to get on with building the cabin. I noticed that for the first time in over a week Gill was with us.
I wasted no time in getting to work, hacking the branches off of felled pines with my hand axe. After a while Zoe came over to join me. Her dark hair was held back by one of her seemingly endless supply of colourful silk scarves.
‘You OK?’
I shrugged, annoyed by her overly sympathetic tone. ‘I’m fine.’
‘Duncan got a bit aggro, didn’t he?’ Zoe said quietly.
‘Yeah … I kind of wish someone else had said something,’ I said.
‘Not really to do with me though, is it? I mean, what do I know about all the food side of things? He stresses me out anyway. Can’t be doing with it.’
‘But you’ll talk to me about it,’ I said, a little more forcefully than I’d meant to.
Zoe looked a bit taken aback. ‘Did I do something to upset you?’
I took a breath. If I wanted to talk the talk, I should walk the walk. I couldn’t tell her to voice her feelings if I hid my own.
‘Maxine told me what you said about me, to Shaun.’
Zoe’s eyes sharpened. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’
It was very clear that she was lying. That hurt me more than her words had.
‘It’s not a big deal, it just upset me a bit, that you guys were talking about me behind my back.’
‘Like Maxine talks to you about me, you mean?’ Zoe said. ‘She’s just a bitter old cow. You shouldn’t listen to her.’
I shrugged, not wanting to get in another argument by calling her a liar. I think she knew I didn’t believe her, because she dropped it as well.
We carried on with our work. Occasionally Zoe would make a crack about Duncan or Andrew, both of whom were working on the cabin proper. I didn’t reciprocate. I wasn’t in the joking mood. As the morning dragged on Zoe finally nudged me and nodded her head to the other side of the clearing.
‘Have you seen what Gill’s doing?’
I glanced over and fought not to roll my eyes. Gill was with Andrew and Duncan by the cabin site. As I watched she handed a chisel to Andrew, then went back to leaning against the log pile, chatting. There were plenty of trees to strip and plenty of logs to move, but Gill was passing tools three feet. Clearly a great use of her time.
‘Sort of takes the piss, doesn’t it?’ Zoe muttered.
I hummed in agreement, but went back to my work. Gill was an adult. We were all adults. I had raised the issue and been shot down. I’d attempted to mollify Maxine and she’d turned to Gill. I had tried to confront Zoe and she’d lied to my face. I had tried. The only person I had control over was myself. I wasn’t going to be the one constantly coming down on people for their shitty behaviour. Not if no one was going to stand with me.
At around noon we went back to camp. My grumbling stomach was eagerly awaiting a decent lunch. Shaun took charge of things once again, making instant-potato cakes with the rest of yesterday’s mushrooms fried and dumped on top. With that put away I filled my metal flask with straw-coloured ‘coffee’ and went on my way, bag in hand.
My quarry for the day was amanita rubescens, the blusher. Without any meat or fish on the menu, mushrooms were the closest thing we had to a main course. I was looking forward to July, when more varieties would start popping up: ink caps, parasols and the large puffballs. I prowled the woods for a few hours, pondering over a cluster of what turned out to be amanita pantherina, the deadly panther cap, a ringer for the blusher. Mushrooms were tricky that way, pretending to be something they weren’t.
As I picked I tried to come up with interesting things to say for the camera around my chest, but everything I came up with sounded pompous or boring. I wasn’t a gifted speaker, even about things I was passionate about.
I was picking my way through the jagged rocks to the far west when I heard voices. Slowly, I knelt between two spars of rock, still clutching a clump of pepper dulse. What stopped me was not just the voices, but the smell of smoke. And meat.
‘Is that almost done?’ Andrew asked.
‘Nearly there, couple more minutes,’ Shaun said. ‘You sure no one knows we’ve been turning our cameras off?’
‘They’d have sent those camera blokes down if they were on to us,’ Duncan said. ‘Not sure I even care. No one came down to have a go when we had that whisky, and the cameras were on for that. Gill’s the one paranoid people’ll talk shit about her when this goes out on TV.’
‘I just don’t want us to look bad,’ Gill said.
‘Well, you were talking a lot of mad shit,’ Andrew put in. ‘But it was just a laugh.’
‘We’re not doing anything wrong,’ Duncan said. ‘And no one’s going to know anyway. Stop worrying.’
I heard shuffling, the scrape of enamelled tin plates. Something was poured, tea or coffee? Then Duncan sighed.
‘That smells so good, Shaun.’
‘Cheers. Got a nice fat one for once.’ He cleared his throat and I could imagine him doing that neck-scratch, shifty-eyed thing he did when he was nervous. ‘I feel a bit bad, not telling Zoe, like.’
‘She’s veggie though, right?’ Duncan said.
‘She’s a poser. Said she was vegan until she fancied some fish,’ Andrew said.
‘I know but … it feels a bit bad, keeping secrets.’
‘Well, if we didn’t keep it secret, we’d have to put this bunny in the hutch with the others. Or we’d have to share it between all eight of us and that’s what, a couple of bites? If that?’
‘I know but—’
‘I can hear Mad Maddy now, “That rabbit belongs to the collective”,’ said Andrew, in a shrill parody of my voice. I heard Gill laugh and Shaun snorted.
‘Besides, we’re the ones doing all the heavy lifting with the cabin,’ Duncan pointed out. ‘And blokes are meant to have more calories a day anyway. Ipso facto, we’re just doing what’s natural.’
‘It’s ready,’ Shaun said.
I crept away in the general scuffle of plates and the ripping of meat.
My mind was turning over what I’d heard as I picked my way along the beach in the direction of home. I was annoyed, of course. Mostly by the sheer unfairness of convincing the rest of us that dinner was unnecessary while they were eating rabbit. I was also astonished that I hadn’t seen it sooner. Shaun’s ‘bad luck’ with the trap was such a thin lie.
I had a choice. I could tell the rest of the camp, or I could keep it to myself.
If I told everyone there would be an argument. Feelings would be hurt,
grudges held and I would be even more disliked than I already was. And it was clear that Duncan and Andrew did dislike me. They were mocking me, pitting themselves against me over any issue. That much had become obvious over the past few weeks.
My other option was to say nothing. I had it on my camera after all. It would come out eventually. I could keep my head down and wait for everyone at home to see them stealing food from us on TV. OK, so it meant putting up with it for now. But why did it always have to be me that called him out? Why was everyone happy to let me be the bad guy? If I kept it to myself I at least wouldn’t have to deal with the arguments or the blowback.
I wasn’t ready to make a decision and go back to camp, so I started beachcombing my way along the shore. Not much to be had, just more washed-up rubbish.
By the time I hiked back to camp I was ravenous. I must have covered miles on my foraging walk. I was annoyed all over again when I saw Duncan, Andrew and Gill all happily chatting by the fire.
As I walked past Duncan said something to Gill and she yipped with laughter, half-heartedly smothering it with her hand. I ignored them and went inside to the food store. There wasn’t much in the way of space, so I hung my foraging bag on a protruding stump of branch. With some spruce in hand I went to the fire to make some tea.
I sensed eyes on me as I was steeping the green needles and struggled to remain casual. I intended to take my tea and retire to my bedroll to mull over my decision on the rabbit. My stomach was grumbling and though it wouldn’t provide much in terms of calories, the tea would at least fill me up.
‘What’ve you got there?’ Andrew asked.
‘Tea,’ I said, not looking up.
‘You not sharing?’ he said, and I sensed his smirk, shared with the others. What was it they’d said on the beach? Ah yes – the spruce ‘belonged to the collective’. I had no idea where that had come from.
I waved a hand towards the towering trees around us. ‘Take all you want.’
Shaun came over to join them then, hand in hand with Zoe.
‘What’s up?’ he said cheerfully.
‘Maddy’s just helping herself to a snack,’ Gill said.
Shaun’s smile shrank a little and he looked uneasy, glancing at my mug of greens and water. ‘Doesn’t look like much of a snack. Y’all right, Maddy?’
‘Fine,’ I said, levelly. ‘Catch anything over the woods today?’
A blush crept along his cheekbones. ‘Nah … It’s a bit quiet over there.’
I nodded thoughtfully. ‘Well … I thought I might take the trap over there tomorrow afternoon – see if my beginner’s luck holds up.’
Shaun swallowed. ‘Right, sure. Uh … won’t you be …’ He glanced at Andrew as if for help, but Andrew was looking at me, a steady, assessing gaze.
‘Oh, I’m foraging in the morning now, my afternoons are wide open for rabbit trapping,’ I said sweetly. ‘Can’t have your butchering skills going to waste.’
‘Yeah.’ Shaun stuttered a laugh. ‘Yeah, sweet, well … Hope you catch something.’
‘Hopefully. I do like doing my bit “for the collective”,’ I echoed, then raised my cup. ‘Anyway, long day and an early start tomorrow. I’ll see you guys at breakfast.’
I went to the hut and sat down on my bedroll, balancing the cup on my bed as I opened Andrew’s SAS guidebook. It was appropriate reading material. So far I’d tried to come at problems head-on, have discussions out in the open. But clearly that wasn’t what we were doing anymore. Now was not the time of community, it was the time of politics and outmanoeuvring one’s opponent. Guerrilla warfare. And I’d just won my first skirmish. The trap and the rabbits were mine now. No more secret feasts.
Chapter 12
‘What was it that made you realise, this is it? The gloves are off – I’m in real trouble here?’ Rosie asks.
It makes me smile. She sounds like she’s asking me about a business deal gone sour. Some kind of technical hiccup. She might as well ask when I threw up my hands, said, ‘Oh bother’ and really had to ‘rethink things’.
She can’t possibly understand that it wasn’t just one thing. I can’t pinpoint the beginning of that subtle shift, the slide towards full-out war between us.
I know where it ended though. It ended with them coming for me in the night.
I still find myself back there in my nightmares. In the thick, black dark it can only be without electricity, without streetlamps and glowing windows. The fire still etched on my eyelids as I run. Their fire.
Days of rain and snow melt had made the ground a slurry of mud, the moss sloughing off it like burnt skin. I slid and slipped, my heart in my throat. That kind of dream running where you try and try but can’t get anywhere.
There are voices behind me.
‘Maaaaaddy! Where aaaaaare yooooou?’
‘Maddy! Get back here!’
I run headlong through the trees. If I stop, if they find me, they will rip me apart. I’ve no doubt that they will kill me right there in the woods, with their bare hands.
Then my foot hits air, instead of mud. In the dream, this sends my stomach plummeting. Heart racing. It seems like I fall for ever.
Then I smack onto the ground, hard. Winded and seized with pain.
I hear footsteps, right on top of me.
That is when I wake up, usually. Jerking awake in my bed. Only that night it had all been real. There was no waking up from it. I lived in that nightmare. My life hanging by a thread.
Chapter 13
I tried my best. I woke before dawn each day, then picked mushrooms, woodland greens and seaweed until the sun was fully up. I chopped wood with the others and then, in the afternoons, I trapped rabbits, working until the sun went down.
I’d thought I’d scored a win when I’d stopped their secret barbeques. Yet it was only a week later that I noticed food missing from the locked storage box. It should not have surprised me. After all, Andrew and Gill were the ones with the keys to the stash. I had convinced myself that our food, the communal stock pile, would be off-limits. That was stupid of me.
Again, I deliberated over telling the others. The problem was that my only proof was my word, versus the testimony of Andrew, Gill and Duncan, perhaps Shaun too, who would all swear they hadn’t been near the box. They’d also probably turned their cameras off, so I’d end up looking paranoid to anyone watching the show. I was outnumbered.
A few weeks into the new arrangement I got back to the fire with my foraging to find no one there. Looking over to the cabin I saw them all hard at work already. Duncan was looking at me, the sun winking off his dark glasses.
I put my bag down and checked the pot, which was empty. They had eaten the remnants of yesterday’s lunch. For a moment I thought about going over and starting work on the cabin, but I was already shaky from the long hike on an empty stomach. I went about making myself some spruce tea and threaded mushrooms on a stick to cook over the embers. The food box was locked, so I made do. I took my time eating but inside I was seething.
Once I was finished I went over and started work with the others. Still there was this sense of a divide. They had risen together, eaten together and started work as one. I had arrived later, eaten alone; I felt their disapproval. I told myself it was just my imagination.
I noticed that Gill was not in her usual place chatting and holding a saw. Apparently even showing up for work detail was now beneath her. Perhaps she had one of her new ‘backaches’. These had seemingly come from nowhere. She never did enough work to strain her back. But it was a good excuse; everyone lapped it up.
Gill returned just in time for lunch, hair wet from a swim. Had she been in the sea for the hours we’d been working? We didn’t have the calories to spare for swimming. She caught me looking and looked away quickly, almost guiltily, as if she knew what she’d done was unfair. Perhaps she had a conscience after all.
That afternoon I made myself scarce. The silence around me felt tense and pointed, as if I’d done some-thing
wrong. I wasn’t sure what it was I was meant to be guilty of. Yet I did feel guilty, just through the coolness I was being treated with. I went to the allotment and sat down amidst the tall ferns and clumps of chickweed. There, shielded from view, I felt more relaxed. Aside from brief meals, this was the first time I’d sat down in hours.
For something to do I started pulling weeds, sorting them into piles of useless and edible. No weeding had been done for some time, that much was clear. The sprouts of our vegetables were almost hidden under grass, tangled weeds and ferns.
I noticed that there were gaps in the rows of young plants and small pebbles of rabbit shit. The fence was clearly not proving effective at keeping the buggers out. As we ate them, they were eating our crops.
I briefly entertained the idea of raising this at a group meeting. We needed to build a better fence and take care of the garden. Surely Maxine would agree with that, no matter her annoyance with me or her new closeness with Gill. But as I tugged weeds out of the soil my resolve weakened. It was obvious to anyone who cared to look that the allotment needed work. Yet no one else was talking about it or putting some time in on it. Even I’d not noticed until I needed a space to be by myself. I was just as guilty of shirking my responsibilities as they were. Calling attention to this would only start more arguments and that morning’s events had already shaken me enough.
I stayed in the allotment for most of the afternoon. The sun warmed my neck and aching shoulders as I sat on the ground and picked weeds. Occasionally I stopped, stretched and sat for a while to listen to the birds and the insects around me. For a while I stretched out on a patch of bare dirt and soaked up the sun, feeling it enter my bones like liquid fire. I think I even dozed a little.
For the next few days I kept the same routine. I woke, foraged, worked on the cabin and then retreated to the garden to weed in peace. I wasn’t working hard at it; I didn’t have the energy. But I reasoned that a little daily effort was better than nothing. It also kept me away from the others.
Clearly, I wasn’t the only one with a new routine. Over the following four days only once did I arrive at camp to find everyone around the fire, ready for breakfast. That was on the day I was on rota to prepare it. On the other three days they had already eaten when I returned. This really got to me. Zoe and Maxine had to be aware of what was going on, yet they were allowing it to continue.
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