by Steph Matuku
Devin shivered and experimentally puffed out her breath. Not cold enough for it to turn to steam, but cold enough. The fire was nearly out but the embers were still hot, and after a few minutes of blowing and fanning and feeding it with little dry sticks, it burst into life again.
Her stomach rumbled. They had shared the apple and muesli bar the night before, but it wasn’t enough to satisfy one teenage appetite, let alone three. She stood up, stretched and tiptoed around the pile of driftwood to pee before the others woke up. She couldn’t think of anything more embarrassing than Rocky Rewiti knowing she was going to the toilet.
Her stomach rumbled again and she thought of her father and his talent for finding food almost anywhere. The kind-hearted would call her dad a ‘real character’. Everyone else reckoned he was nuts. He’d done his best by Devin, bringing her up by himself, even though he had no idea about parenting and even less about girls. If Devin needed information about anything remotely feminine, she googled it.
What she had learned from her father were lots of random practical skills. His enthusiasm for taking up a new activity was matched only by his enthusiasm for abandoning it completely a few weeks later. Devin’s weekends had been spent doing everything from carpentry and fixing car engines to bone carving and cake decorating.
Her dad’s greatest joy, however, was saving a dollar. If he could buy it second-hand, he’d haggle for it. If he could recycle it, he would. And if they could catch it or grow it rather than buy it from the supermarket, they invariably did.
Devin remembered her dad accidentally running over a hedgehog in the ute, roasting it on the back of a spade over a fire in the backyard and feeding it to her for dinner. When she cheerfully told the class about it the next day, the school had given her dad the hard word, telling him that hedgehogs were riddled with germs and TB, and pointedly referring to Social Welfare. Her dad hadn’t served hedgehog for dinner again, but the kids had never forgotten.
All this self-sufficiency, however mortifying, had made an impact, which was why she didn’t ignore the dark, shadowy places under the riverbank’s overhanging ferns – she got naked.
She wriggled out of her clothes, now stained and torn and smelling of wood smoke, and, after a moment or two straining to hear any movement from behind the pile of driftwood, tugged off her undies and bra. She left her clothes in a tidy pile (the underwear hidden at the bottom) and went down to the stream, stubbing her toes painfully on a rock but not daring to make a sound in case the others woke and saw her.
Devin slid into the water, gasped at the cold and duck-dived. Her skin smarted painfully before numbing over. She broke the surface and side swam along the bank for a few metres. Drawing a breath, she ducked her head under the water and was rewarded almost immediately by the sight of a long, curving shape resting on the rocks.
She’d never captured an eel by hand before. She knew the theory, just as she knew how to set a rabbit snare, skin a possum, and starve a snail so that its tender flesh wasn’t spoiled by poo. Her dad had a wealth of random knowledge, and YouTube even more so.
Stealthily, she approached the resting eel. Something big and silvery darted out from the rocks and she jerked back, startled. It was only a fish, of course. A fish! How could she catch it with no rod, no net? But there was loads of wood. She could spear one, maybe. Much like eeling, she hadn’t actually done it before, but she knew the theory.
It was the smell that woke Rocky, a delicious smell, a cooking smell, and as he inhaled deeply, his eyes still closed, he knew he was dreaming. Delirious probably, from the pain in his leg. He stirred, and the pain was like being whacked with a sack of kina.
His eyes flew open and he saw Devin, stick in hand, poking at a long, curved piece of meat sizzling on flat rocks laid in the hot embers.
‘Smells good,’ he said, his voice coming out all croaky and early morning-ish. ‘What is it?’
‘I caught an eel!’ She was radiant, excited and proud. He’d never seen Devin look like that before.
‘True?’
‘Uh huh. Just round there. I just kinda went up behind it and grabbed it by the gills. The hardest bit was getting it back up on the bank. It was really slimy and wriggled heaps.’
Killing it had been hard too. Devin had muttered a heartfelt ‘sorry’ before closing her eyes and bashing its spine and tail with a large rock. She’d only ever killed fish before, and somehow an eel had more personality than a fish. When the eel had finally stopped moving, she’d cleaned off the slime, gutted it with a sharp-edged rock and thrown it on the fire, trusting that her classmates’ gnawing hunger wouldn’t make them too fussy.
Rocky looked impressed. ‘No kidding? We used to go eeling when I was little, me and my brothers, down the creek with hīnaki traps and stuff.’
Devin didn’t know what to say. She wasn’t used to talking to one of the hottest guys in school. All her possible responses seemed stupid. Finally she blurted, ‘It’s not very big.’ She fell silent, wondering why it was she kept saying dumb things, and busied herself looking for spiky sticks to use as forks.
Rocky tried to change position, hoisting himself up on his hands and then falling back with a grunt of pain. The sodden bandage couldn’t contain the blood, and it ran freely down his leg.
‘I’ll have a look, shall I?’
Rocky winced at the thought of it. ‘I dunno.’
‘Here.’ Devin went over to the hot rocks, hacked off a piece of eel, and speared a chunk with a stick. ‘Take your mind off it. Watch the bones.’
Rocky lay back against the boulder and gingerly tore off a piece of hot flesh. He popped it in his mouth and swallowed. He savoured the muddy, smoky, fishy flavour, tongued out a couple of spiky bones, popped another piece in his mouth … and let out an anguished howl as Devin tugged the last piece of bandage from his torn skin.
Eva woke with a start, her cheek imprinted with the pattern of Mandy’s pink cardy. ‘Holy crap!’ She looked around and flopped down again, shutting her eyes. ‘I was hoping it was a bad dream.’
Rocky groaned. ‘It’s bad all right.’
Devin inspected the gash, biting her lip. The wound gaped like a wet mouth and was surrounded by red and purple bruising that extended up to his knee.
‘You need stitches or else it won’t hold together.’
‘Tie it back up,’ Rocky said, with an air of desperate hope. ‘It’ll be fine.’
Devin shook her head. ‘It won’t work. You need stitches.’
‘Well, that’s not going to happen, is it?’ Rocky exploded. ‘Just tie it back up!’
Devin drew back in alarm.
Rocky sucked in a deep breath, got control of himself. ‘Sorry. It just … really, really hurts.’
‘It’s okay. I just think … well …’
She reached for the backpack, unzipped it and rummaged around inside.
‘Oh no,’ Rocky groaned. ‘No way. Don’t even think about it.’
Devin held up Mandy’s little sewing kit. ‘What colour d’you want?’
10
Before Jahmin even opened his eyes, he knew he was alone. A tūī chiming in the treetops made the silence under the lower canopy even more oppressive. He struggled upright.
‘Liam?’
The timid call was swallowed up by the shifting leaves, the spiralling ferns against the sky, the thick supplejack vines tangled all around like jail cell bars. He could feel the bush, the endless, overwhelming, suffocating green closing in on him, and he scrambled to his feet in a panic. ‘Liam!’
There was the sound of footsteps crunching on undergrowth and then Liam was sliding down next to him, grinning. ‘Chill man, just went for a wazz.’
‘I thought something had got you.’
‘What thing?’
‘That thing you were banging on about last night!’
‘Right. The demon possum. Wooooh!’ Liam waggled his fingers in Jahmin’s face, and Jahmin pushed him away in amused disgust. ‘Sorry, sorry. I was hearing things.
Just a bit … you know, freaked about everything.’ Liam’s stomach gave a long, loud gurgle, and he groaned. ‘What do you reckon the time is? I’m starving.’
Jahmin shook his wrist disconsolately. ‘Watch is dead. Cost a fortune. Solar power, waterproof, shockproof, you name it, kaput. You think I’ll get my money back?’
Liam squinted at it without much interest. ‘You don’t know anything about bush survival, do you?’
‘Yeah, heaps. First rule – don’t go in there.’
‘Funny.’
‘Live in the city.’
‘Ha.’
‘Don’t go on school camp, like, ever.’
‘No kidding. Well, I know a bit from Dad. There’s plants we can eat – if we can find them. How d’you feel about huhu grubs?’
Jahmin groaned. ‘Those white caterpillar things? Gross. Mind you, ask me in a few hours and I won’t say no.’
‘They’re not so bad. Better cooked. Taste like peanut butter. I ate a live one once. Bit my tongue and man, it hurt! There’s a lesson there. Bite its head off before it can bite you.’
‘I hope I never have to use that lesson, ever.’
‘Knowledge is power, man.’
Jahmin scrambled out of the hollow and went behind some bushes to pee. When he came back, he pulled on the rest of his clothes. They were just as wet as they’d been the day before.
‘Okay, as far as I see it, we’ve got two choices,’ he said. ‘Either we go downriver and look for the bus, or we go back to where it went in. Someone’s got to be looking for us. They’ll start with where we went off the cliff. And we might find … I dunno … bags and food and stuff on the way. Survivors, maybe.’
For Liam it was an easy decision. He couldn’t get the image of Eugene, hand outstretched and eyes pleading, out of his head. Was that murder or manslaughter?
‘Not downriver. We’d have to go down the waterfall. The bus could be miles away by now. Or sunk.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yeah.’
‘It’ll be a long walk back with no food.’
‘Or music.’
‘Or a car.’
They grinned at each other. The sunlight filtered through the branches. The cicadas were humming. It was going to be another beautiful day.
11
Eva lay with her eyes closed, the charm bracelet held tight in her hand. The mouth-watering smell of cooked eel and the musky scent of marijuana lurked at the edge of her consciousness, as did Rocky’s yelps as Devin inexpertly sewed up his leg with black cotton, the colour of the All Blacks. Eva blotted it all out, focused on where she wished she could be.
And there she was. Back wagging afternoon school with Mandy. A warm spring day, mild and sunny. Hot salty chips in a white paper parcel, the best kind – yellowy crisp on the outside, feathery soft in the middle. They were in the local playground, perched on the kids’ swings, pushing off with their toes in the hollowed dirt, laughing and chatting. It was Mandy’s smile that Eva lingered over, warm and sweet, and the way she’d reached out and held Eva’s hand right there in public as though it didn’t matter at all. Which of course it did, otherwise she would’ve told her mum all about Eva.
Eva sighed. Her bladder was prickling dangerously. Reluctantly, she opened her eyes in time to see Rocky jerk back his head in pain, yelping as his skull struck the boulder he was leaning against.
Devin sat back on her haunches, her forehead covered with sweat and her fingers stained with blood. She looked shaken, but her voice was light as she said, ‘All done.’
Rocky sucked in deep breaths and then popped the remnants of the joint in his mouth, chewed and swallowed. Devin fumbled in Mandy’s toilet bag and took out the little box of painkillers, her bloody fingers leaving prints on the plastic.
‘Can’t you wash your hands?’ Eva cried. ‘You’re getting crap all over everything.’
Devin spun around, spilling the contents of the bag everywhere. ‘Sorry. I was just getting the pills. Sorry.’
She dropped the pills on Rocky’s lap and quickly backed off down to the river.
Eva gathered up the spilled things, Mandy’s things, and replaced them gently in the bag, wiping Devin’s prints away with her shirt. She returned the toilet bag to the backpack and carefully tucked the charm bracelet back in its special pocket.
Rocky was glaring at her.
‘What?’ Eva said, belligerently.
‘Don’t speak to her like that.’
Eva was taken aback. ‘What?’
‘You heard.’
‘It’s just Dozy Devin. Who cares?’
Rocky fumbled for a stick and threw it at her, fast and hard. It whipped through the air and stung her across the leg. She gasped, partly in pain, partly in disbelief.
‘Dozy Devin,’ he said, through gritted teeth, ‘saved me from drowning, got you across the stream, built a fire, caught breakfast and has just finished sewing up my leg. Dozy Devin deserves a little more respect.’
‘This is Mandy’s stuff,’ Eva said, her voice breaking a little. ‘She was messing up Mandy’s stuff.’
‘So?’ Rocky said. ‘Mandy’s not stupid. She’d want us to use it. Besides, she’s probably dead anyway.’
Eva’s mouth trembled. ‘I hate you.’
‘Oh, piss off,’ Rocky said, closing his eyes.
Devin returned, wiping her wet hands on her trackpants. Eva retrieved the toilet bag and slammed it into Devin’s chest. Devin stumbled back a few steps, her eyes wide and hurt.
‘There,’ Eva said viciously. ‘Take it. Enjoy it. I hope you choke on it.’
She turned away and went off to the end of the beach where she sank to the ground in a crumpled heap.
The sound of her sobs floated back to Devin and Rocky.
Rocky opened one eye. ‘Hey, Devin. Thanks. I mean it.’
Devin ducked her head, blushed. It was the first time she’d ever heard him say her name.
12
Theo opened his eyes and gave a hoarse gasp. A gargoyle was staring down at him, a twisted approximation of a human face, the features melting like hot, runny plastic. It was a couple of moments before he realised that it was a real face, upside down with strips of shadow flickering across it. It was the thieving girl, a calculating expression on her pretty face. He struggled to sit up. In the time he’d been out of it, a large tent had been erected, and the corpses were nowhere in sight.
‘About time,’ she said, making no move to help him. ‘I didn’t think you were ever going to wake up.’
He cleared his throat. The grit inside barely moved. He must have been lying there for hours. The sun was in the wrong place. His saliva was gluey, his tongue too big for his mouth.
‘Thirsty.’
‘You’re in luck! You’ve got a whole damn river down there.’
She gestured expansively, and he saw the gleam of a gold bangle on her wrist, the one she’d taken from one of the bodies. He remembered her name too. Idelle. Some of the kids had warned him about her.
He tried to get to his feet, but the world swam dizzily, and he sank back, alarmed at how weak he felt. She chuckled and waggled a bottle of water at him. ‘Or you could just have this.’
She dropped it into his lap. He fumbled with the lid. She tut-tutted, unscrewed it for him and held the bottle to his lips. He drank greedily, feeling the water spill over his chin and splash down his chest. She didn’t take the bottle away until, half choked, he pushed at her arm.
‘Whoops,’ she said. She didn’t sound particularly sorry.
Theo sank back and closed his eyes. The glare of the sun hitting the shards of metal on the slope were making his head ache.
‘Hey,’ said Idelle, a note of panic in her voice. ‘You’re not going to die, are you?’
Theo opened his eyes again, almost smiled. ‘I don’t think so. Not yet.’
The relief in Idelle’s voice was unmistakeable. ‘Good. I need a geek to get me out of here.’
Idelle dropped all the electr
onic equipment she had salvaged onto the dirt. It was mostly mobile phones, but there was also a vintage Game Boy, a couple of tablets, an old transistor radio and a few triple A batteries, all smuggled onto the trip against the express instructions of Mrs Harlow. Theo eyed it all with incomprehension.
‘Well?’ said Idelle impatiently. ‘That’s all there was. Will they do?’
‘Do for what?’
Idelle shrugged. ‘I don’t know. To make a … walkie talkie or a radio thing to talk to the police.’
Theo wasn’t quite sure if she was joking or not. He picked up a phone and held it close to his face to see the screen. It was blank. In fact, all the phones were dead and so were the tablets and Game Boy. The radio emitted a loud scratchy hum as he twirled the dial. It wasn’t even proper static.
He looked up at her. ‘None of it works.’
Idelle sighed impatiently. ‘Well, duh. But you’re the computer geek. You can fix them, right?’
Theo shook his head, and a stab of pain shot through his skull. A universe of green stars floated briefly in front of his eyes. He made a mental note not to do that again.
‘I don’t know anything about computers.’
Idelle snorted. ‘Liar.’
Theo dropped the radio back onto the pile of rather expensive but now useless junk. ‘Just apps. Games.’
Idelle’s face turned an ugly, mottled red. ‘Liar!’
Theo drew back, realisation dawning that perhaps Idelle was more than a little unhinged.
Idelle kicked out at the equipment in a fury, scattering pieces far and wide. ‘You’re the one with your big nose in a book all the damn time. You must know how to make all this stuff go!’
‘No, no …’ Theo said, holding up his hands in an effort to placate her. ‘It’s murder mysteries.’
‘What?’
Idelle decided she hated every single thing about Theo. His stupid curly hair all stiff with blood, his thin wrists, his timid voice, his ridiculous clothes that were slightly too small for his lanky body. A feral look came into her narrowed eyes, a look that Devin would have recognised as a signal to run like hell.