Stolen

by Lucy Christopher

“Gemma, don’t do this,” you were shouting, your voice firm and commanding. “You can’t do this.”

  I swerved, but you didn’t loosen your grip. You pulled at the door handle, and the door opened a bit. I reached around and slammed the lock down. You thumped your hand against the window in frustration. I pressed on the accelerator again, and you started running beside the car, still grasping on to the mirror. You pulled at it, as if you thought you could stop the whole vehicle with just your strength. I put my foot flat to the floor. That was enough. With a shout, you tumbled back into the dirt, leaving the side mirror hanging by some wires, bashing against the car. I heard you screaming behind me, your voice hoarse and desperate.

  And then there was wide, open space in front of me. I turned the wheel and headed toward the shadowy hills on the horizon, the car skidding as I spun. The engine was screaming, struggling to get through the sand.

  “Please,” I whispered. “Please don’t get stuck.”

  I revved the engine to compensate. I checked the rearview mirror. You were standing, still shouting, your arms raised toward me. Then you started running after the car, punching the air like a lunatic.

  “No!” you shouted. “You’ll regret this, Gemma!” You took your hat off and threw it at the car; then you leaned down and picked up rocks and sticks and whatever you could find and started hurling them, too. I felt the thump as some of the rocks smashed against the trunk. Your shouts were savage, like a wild animal … like you’d lost all control. I gritted my teeth and kept pressing the pedal. Then a rock pinged off one of the tires and the car started to swerve. I glanced in the mirror. Your body was crouched as you threw, aiming for the tires directly, as if you were trying to burst them. But I just kept my foot flat to the floor, swerving away from you.

  I wouldn’t let you stop me.

  The car bounced over the land, hitting rocks and bushes. Somehow I managed to keep it straight, heading toward those distant shadows that I thought were the mine site. I should have changed gears, but I didn’t trust myself. I needed to wait until those buildings were far, far behind me first; then I could do anything. The car strained and moaned. You must have heard it, too; each desperate whine of the clutch must have torn you apart.

  The cluster of buildings got smaller as I drove, and eventually I couldn’t even see your figure in the mirror anymore. I started to scream then, but God knows what I was saying. I’d done it! I was out there, alone … without you. Without anyone. I was free. I screamed with the car, whizzing across the land. I was driving into nothingness … driving toward everything.

  A few times the wheels churned up the sand too much, and the car started to slow. I revved the engine hard, doing what I’d seen you do to get it moving again. Each time the car was strong enough to pull itself out. I changed gears when I smelled the engine burning. It was like the world’s quickest crash course in learning to drive. Dad would have had a heart attack if he’d been in the car with me. I looked at the gas gauge. It was half-full, dot on the middle—half-empty, too. The temperature gauge didn’t look too healthy, either; it was bouncing back and forth, edging farther toward the red section. I guess that meant the engine was overheating. One thing I did know, I was really fucking up your car.

  I tried to ignore what was happening on the dashboard, and kept driving. I looked straight ahead, focusing on those shadows shimmering on the horizon. The land stretched on and on, never ending. No tracks. No telegraph lines. There was nothing to say that humans had ever been there. Only me.

  I got to the shadows eventually. Only they weren’t the mine site like I’d hoped, or even a range of fertile hills. They were long, tall rolls of sand. Sand dunes, sculpted by the wind and held together with patches of vegetation. I’d realized this a long time before the car reached them, but I kept the vehicle pointed at them anyway. I don’t know why. I guess I thought it was better than heading into the flatness of everywhere else. I thought there’d be something on the other side of them. As I got closer, the dunes began to tower above me. I couldn’t drive over them. The car was already spinning and groaning, threatening to bog at any moment. I would have to drive around. I wiped my arm across my face, but it only added to the dampness. Every part of me felt hot and clammy, despite having the window open. The back of my T-shirt was as wet as if I’d jumped into a pool.

  I hung my head out of the window and concentrated on keeping the car moving. The ground was getting softer. I revved the engine and the tires spun sand grains into my face. The car started to struggle, sand building up around the tires. I tried turning the wheel the other way, hoping there would be something to grip there, but that was a mistake. The tires hit the fresh sand at the edge of the track I’d made and stopped dead. I spun the wheel back, and tried again. No good. No matter how hard I pressed the accelerator, the car wouldn’t move forward any more. It just sank deeper into the sand. I kept revving until I smelled burning again. Then I got out and tried pushing. But the car was heavier than an elephant. I was stuck.

  The landscape began to blur in front of me, as though I was looking at it through water. The spinifex swirled like seaweed. I shut my eyes. But everything kept spinning. I leaned back into the hot panels of the car and slid down the door. My head was throbbing, my tongue thick and dry. I curled against the tire, my arms tingling from the warmth of the black rubber against my skin. The sun was scorching me, squeezing me. Drips of sweat ran over my face and onto the tire. I reached back to the darker space underneath the car. I wondered about crawling into it. I wanted to be a small insect, something that could dig through the hot sand and find somewhere cool below. I needed water.

  I threw up then, just a small dribble of nothing down the side of the tire. I wanted to do more, but it wouldn’t come. Everything spun and spun.

  When I opened my eyes, the sun had moved a little. My vision wasn’t so fuzzy. I focused on the trees near me; three of them. I could hear their dry leaves scratching against each other, and flies whining around their trunks.

  I dragged myself to the trunk. Before I opened it, I actually put my hands together and prayed. I never really believed in God, but right then I promised him everything. I was going to be the best God-lover in the world if only there was water and food inside that trunk, plus something to help me move the car out of the sand.

  “Please,” I whispered. “Please.”

  I felt for the clasp and popped it open. There was water. A two-liter plastic bottle of the stuff lay on its side in the middle. I grabbed it, fumbled the lid off, and poured the liquid down my throat. It was hot, but I gulped at it. Some of it spilled over my face and neck. I was like a sponge, soaking it all up. I had to force myself to stop, even though I wanted more. I’d already had nearly half.

  There wasn’t much else in the trunk. A towel. A tin can full of gasoline, by the smell of it. And one of your big animal-hide hats. There were some tools to fix the car with. But there was no food. Nothing that would help me move the car, either. I decided God didn’t exist after all.

  I got back in the car and started it again. But the wheels just spun deeper into the sand, bogging it further. I slammed my fists into the steering wheel. Then I thought of looking around the trees, maybe there were bits of wood I could put under the tires. If the car could get a grip on something, it might be enough to get it going. But those trees were tall, with branches too high up to reach. I pulled at the bark, but only small pieces came off.

  It was then I saw the blood. At least, that’s what I thought it was at first … hardened, ruby-red blood dripping down the bark of the trees. I glanced around quickly but there was nothing, and no one else, about. It was as if the trees themselves were bleeding. I picked at the blood with my fingernails, and it came off in crumbling shards, staining my fingers. I smelled them. Eucalyptus. It was sap after all.

  I climbed the dune. My feet dug into the soft sand, and my muscles strained. Creatures rustled in the bushes as I passed. I stopped at the top, shielding my eyes to look out. There was nothin
g any different on the other side. There was no mine site, no people. There was only more sand, more rocks, more trees, and again, more shadowy dunes in the distance. As far as I could see, I was the only person out there. I hugged my arms to my chest and breathed cool air onto my burning skin. If I died right there on that dune, no one would know about it. Not even you. I walked back to the car. I would sleep for a bit. It was too hot to think right then.

  The moon was out when I woke. I lay on the backseat and looked up at it through the window. It was plump and yellow, like the big, round cheeses Dad got from his office every Christmas. I traced out the man’s face in it: two gouged-out eyes, then, below that the lazy smile, the craters that looked a little like beard stubble. It was a friendly moon, but so far away. The sky around it was a deep and clear lake. If there’d been an astronaut on the moon right then, I’m sure I could have seen him. Perhaps he could have looked down and seen me, too … the only one who could.

  I was lying under the towel I’d found in the trunk, but I was still so cold. I rubbed my arms. They were pink from the sun, my upper arms peeling. I was too cold to sleep any more so I crawled through the space between the front seats to sit in the driver’s seat. I reached back for the towel and covered my legs with it.

  I turned the key, enough so I could switch on the headlights. The sand stretched out gray and ghostlike and illuminated, a column of light leading forward. It was like something a dead person would see, a tunnel leading toward heaven. I saw some movement at the edge. There was a small, long-eared rodent digging at the roots of one of the trees. It stared at the light, momentarily blinded, then hopped away into the darkness.

  I turned the key fully until the car coughed back. I pumped on the accelerator until the cough turned into a roar. The noise was so loud in that silent night. Surely someone apart from me could hear it, too? I eased off the clutch, practically willing the car forward. And it did go, a little. For a second or two the wheels strained against the sand, almost getting a grip before falling back again into the churned up pit they’d created. I kicked the pedals.

  “Stupid thing!”

  My voice sounded so loud, it made me jump. I lay my head on the steering wheel and hummed a hymn we’d learned at school. But nothing hummed back. That silence sat hunched around me, menacing as a wolf. I wondered what was out there, in that blackness. My body started shaking and my eyes blurred. It took me awhile to realize I was crying.

  I gathered together all the vegetation I could find or pick without slashing my hands too much and stuck it under the tires, but still I couldn’t move the car. The wheels just ground the plants into the sand, unable to get a grip. I tried again, using small stones this time, but it got worse, the tires digging deeper. If I’d had someone else to push the car while I revved, then I might have done it, but with just me it was hopeless. I got out and kicked the tire a bit, but I knew it was a lost cause.

  By the time I set off it was already getting light. I carried the bottle of water and shoved your hat on my head. It flopped down over my eyes, a little big. I knew it would be hot, walking in the daylight, but I didn’t have much choice. I couldn’t stay with the car; no one would find me then. And anyway, it was early. Still cool.

  I trudged through the sand, keeping the dune to my right. I soon felt the strain in my upper thighs. I tried walking fast at first, trying to cover as much ground before the heat set in. But the heat came anyway. I noticed it when it became difficult to breathe deeply anymore and when each step felt like my boots were made of lead. I put my head down and focused on my feet … one foot forward, then the other. I was beginning to stink, my fresh sweat merging with the stale, dried sweat from yesterday. I sipped at the water. Each mouthful was never enough, but I wouldn’t let myself take more.

  I’d been walking for a while when I realized I couldn’t see a tree. Not one. The tallest thing to aim for in that rusty-brown landscape was a clump of spinifex. I stopped, turned around, and looked at the endlessness surrounding me. Nothing but sand everywhere. How did anyone find anything? I sat on its warmth. I curled into the tiniest ball and rocked. I cried, then hated myself for it … for wasting all that water on tears. Hard grains of sand stuck to my cheeks and scraped against them. Farther away I could hear the wind, stirring up the grains and swirling them around. Dust slipped into my mouth and stuck to my teeth and tongue. The land was beating me, wearing me down like it had worn down the rocks. I was going to die. I’d been stupid to even hope I’d get anywhere.

  But something wouldn’t let me give up. Not yet. Not then. I pulled myself to my feet. I kept walking. I tried thinking about home. I imagined Anna was walking beside me, urging me on. But every time I turned to look at her, she vanished. Her voice was there, though, swirling around me like the light wind.

  I sipped at the dregs of water. Then I licked around the top of the bottle, my tongue delving into the grooves. I chucked the empty bottle in the sand. I kept going. I was doing all right for a while. But then the sun moved higher and beat down right on top of me. I started to stumble. I fell down. I pushed myself back up. I stepped forward again, my toes dragging in the sand. I held my arms out in front and grabbed at the air, trying to pull myself on. The earth wanted me; it had arms waiting to grasp. I couldn’t hold out forever. I stumbled again. This time I couldn’t get up. I crawled forward on all fours.

  I tore at my shirt, ripping it away from me, needing to do something, anything, to be cool. My boots came off next. I left them behind in the sand. And then my shorts. It was better crawling in my underwear. I even managed to stand and walk a few paces before I fell again. Then I lay on the sand, face up to the sun, trying to breathe. Everything was so bright and white. I turned over. I needed to keep moving. I stuck my fingers inside the elastic of my underpants and slipped them down over my legs. A few feet farther, I unhooked my bra.

  I crawled forward. The sand scratched my skin, but I could deal with that. I was cooler. I pulled myself up again until I was standing. I could do it, just. My body wavered, my head drawing circles in the air. A fly flew up my nostril, desperate for moisture. I felt him crawling farther in. Then more came. They swarmed and settled on my body as if I were a carcass already. They were in my ears and mouth, between the tops of my thighs. To brush them off would have used too much energy. I took a step instead. The world spun. For a moment the sky was red, the sand blue. I shut my eyes. I took another step. I concentrated on the feeling of grains on the soles of my feet: hot, but not sharp. I walked like this, naked and sightless and covered in flies, just feeling my way. I no longer knew where I was headed. I no longer knew very much. I just knew I was moving.

  Sometime later, I collapsed again. And that time, I knew I couldn’t get up, no matter what I did. I rolled against the sand, and thrust my face into it. I wanted to be an animal, burying deep, deep down. I dug, trying to pull my body under, trying to reach the cool. But all my strength had sweated out of me. Everything had drained away. The sand had absorbed it all. I lay there, half-buried in the grains. I closed my eyes against the sun and sank down.

  First my toes went, then my legs, my body, and finally my head … sinking down, down, deep beneath the sand. I fell through the grains. I kept going through earth and rock, past animal tunnels and tree roots and tiny digging insects, kept going until I reached the other side.

  I was lying on my bed, back home. My eyes were stuck shut, but I could hear people talking. My TV was on. I recognized the voice of one of the news anchors.

  “And today, London is getting hit by some incredible weather,” he was saying. “Another crazy heatwave.”

  My duvet was pulled up tight around my neck. I couldn’t push it down. It felt like it was sewn to my pillow, choking me with a blanket of heat. I could feel sweat pooling in the small of my back, sweat settling in my hair.

  I smelled something. Coffee. Mum was home. I listened for her. She was banging things about in the kitchen and humming some stupid tune. I wanted to go to her, but I couldn’t get my
legs out of the duvet. My feet just kept kicking against the side, trapped. And my eyes were still shut, as if my eyelids were glued there. I started screaming.

  “Mum! Come here!”

  But she didn’t. She just hummed louder. I knew she could hear me, though. The kitchen was the next room along and the walls were thin. I called again.

  “Mum! Help!”

  She stopped banging things for a moment, almost as if she were listening. Then she turned the radio on to something classical, blocking me out. I thrashed around, trying to pull myself up out of bed. But I couldn’t get a grip on anything. I kept screaming for Mum to help. But she only turned the radio up higher. And then, suddenly, I understood why she wasn’t coming. She’d sewn up my eyes and she’d sewn up my bed. She wanted to imprison me.

  Then I felt arms reaching up from my mattress. They came up either side, and wrapped around my stomach, clasping together in the middle. They were strong, brown arms, arms with scratches all the way down them. They pulled me through the mattress, pulled me away from the sewn-up sheets. They dragged me down through the stuffing and then through the floorboards of my room, down through the concrete foundations of the house, and to the soft, dark earth beneath. There they just hugged me, cradling me against the earth’s chest.

  When I woke, it was cool. Almost too cool. Cloths soaking with water were lying over my body. On each side of me, a fan was whirring. A washcloth was flat on my forehead, its water dripping down my cheeks. I turned a little. My body stung as I did, and one of the cloths fell off my arm. Beneath it, my skin was bright red and blotchy, blistered in places. My arm went hot again immediately. Your hand reached across, picked up the cloth, and put it back, squeezing its water gently onto my skin.