“What are our chances of being saved by the rescue effort?” I asked before pooling more water into my hands and scrubbing the stray grains of sand off my face.
“Under normal circumstances,” Tommy responded, “I’d say pretty high. We couldn’t have gotten that far away from the camp considering the time we spent outside after the storm hit and how long we spent walking after we woke up in the desert. The sun was rising when we reached the arroyo and setting when we left it, but … we were disoriented during our walk, and my compass isn’t working, so honestly I have no idea where we are and why the sun seemed to change direction while we were on the move.”
“I was hoping for a percentage-type response.” After seeing his blank stare, I added, “You know, like our chance of survival is seventy percent, or something along those lines.”
“You should be a lot more freaked out, Alif,” said Minh, who’d listened to Tommy’s monologue with growing unease on her face. Still, she popped blueberries one after another into her mouth and chewed mechanically. Her lips and tongue were tainted purple. “As a matter of fact, all of us should be a lot more freaked out. But the pear-devouring unholy trinity over there by the stream seem to be as relaxed as ever.”
“Maybe that’s because we were dying in the desert one moment and the next we were saved and now we are super chill as a way of showing appreciation for being alive?” Luke answered from his spot on the grass, not bothering to look at us or even open his eyes when he spoke.
Stirred by Luke’s words, Lori lifted herself up on one elbow and singled me out when she spoke. “I say we stay here until your dad comes to rescue us. All agree?”
“We’re going to run out of food pretty quickly,” I said. “Tommy is right—we need to ration our fruit.” Those dots of yellow and red fruit scattered throughout the steady greenery were now slightly diminished compared to when we’d first entered our sanctuary.
“But we haven’t explored this place at all,” Luke said, following a few long seconds of collective silence. “There may be more fruit-bearing trees. This place seems huge, and…”
“This place is huge.” Tommy spoke over Luke, annoyance showing through his measured tone. “We’ve all seen exactly how huge it was from the desert. But this clearing right here may be it in terms of hospitable conditions, food, and water. Haven’t you noticed how it’s different from the rest?” He moved a hand to indicate the dark, tight clusters of palms guarding our clearing from the rest of the oasis—or maybe guarding what was out there from us.
Luke scoffed.
Rowen sat up next to Lori and placed a hand around her waist. “Luke’s right,” he said. “Surely, if there’s food and water in here, there must be other spots like this one? I guess what I’m saying is, before we start counting apples and rationing blueberries, we should explore, you know, to really gauge the size of this place. We might be stuck here for a while, so we need to know what we’re dealing with.”
Rowen’s words rang true. This little clearing we were using as our resting ground was at the very edge of the desert. If I twisted my head a little, I could see the beginning of the sand dunes. My mind could paint the rest of the picture—desert extending as far as the eye could see, a sea of sun-bleached gold. But the beauty of it all was now lost on me; sand meant death. However, when I turned my back to the desert and looked deeper into the oasis, there was also that scary dark mass of green and shadows.
“Should we do it now?” I wondered out loud. “Go explore? While we can still catch some light? Anyway, we’ll need a better place for a shelter than this in case another sandstorm hits.”
No one opposed me, but, as if the sun heard me, its blood-orange disc rushed to vanish beyond the treetops, allowing darkness to fall around us. We had to postpone the exploration of the oasis till morning and focus instead on building a proper shelter out of the sturdier vines and palm fronds. In addition to my Man vs. Wild marathons, our combined knowledge of survivalist techniques came from Survivor. To everyone’s utter shock, Lori demonstrated a proper technique to tie the vines, making them hold the weight of leaves placed above them. But still, we couldn’t do much to get a quality shelter large enough for all of us to huddle under. Though as long as another sandstorm didn’t hit us, the surrounding trees provided enough protection from the elements. Our legs wobbly with exhaustion, we soon gave up on our shelter-building endeavor and just sort of huddled on the ground to keep one another warm. Luke ended up next to me, pushing Tommy to the side. I faced Minh, while Luke pressed his back against mine.
And we slept. Most of us, at least.
WHATEVER’S NECESSARY
Sleep mostly evaded me. In those brief instances when my agitated mind slipped and fell into some dull imitation of slumber, no dreams perforated my drowsiness, which was thick as fog and just as suffocating. It didn’t help that my mind kept wandering, jumping from memory to memory, from thought to thought. I took measured breaths to calm down while studying the nightscape above and around me. With the endless sky stretching overhead, holding more stars than I’d ever seen in my life, all of it seemed way too real. Tears pressed against my eyes but never made their way out.
I grew too warm, so I quietly untangled myself from Minh and Luke and left our sleeping ground. I didn’t have a particular plan, but the coolness of the night’s darker corners beckoned me. I walked toward the shapes of the taller palm trees bulking ahead. Like giants looking down at me, the palms seemed to be touching the sky, bushy heads nodding in unison. Whispers and snakelike hisses permeated the space all around me. Somewhere too close a nocturnal bird sang its mournful song. I’d seen no wildlife during the day, but it was nice to know we weren’t completely alone in here.
“Can’t sleep?” I recognized Tommy’s voice even as a half whisper. My heart sped up in response, forcing me to take a long breath in hopes that when I answered, my words wouldn’t sound rushed. Tommy went on. “Me too. Luke’s not the greatest snuggle buddy. You might think otherwise, I guess.”
I thanked the night for concealing my face, which was reddening. “It’s not what you think. Luke and me.” The words carried louder than intended. A small distance away, someone in our sleeping group groaned. Tommy chuckled, an odd noise in the dark. Peculiar, but in an intimate way. My skin rippled with goose bumps. It was chilly here among the trees.
Leaving me alone with my thoughts, Tommy headed into one of those darker parts of the oasis that made the spot between my shoulder blades itch. I watched the shadows consume him. Despite my better judgment, I followed him along a sand-laid pathway that twisted and turned between the palm trees, leading us away from the spring’s whispers in the dark and from our sleeping friends.
Here, away from everyone, Tommy said, his voice back to its normal volume, “It’s none of my business what you do with Luke. But if it was your father who caught you instead of me, he’d have a much more … engaged reaction.”
“Nothing’s up with me and Luke,” I repeated stubbornly. Though the absurdity of discussing my love life in our present circumstances wasn’t lost on me, I still wanted Tommy to know that what he’d witnessed was a moment of weakness. I changed my mind before more defensive words spilled out though. He was right. It was none of his business.
At least I was no longer suffering from the case of lost breaths and extensive blushing. I don’t know whether it was my prolonged exposure to Tommy or the cool warmth of this part of the oasis, but I was now calm and composed. Mostly. I could still feel his body heat in the air, and it made me shiver.
“I was thinking about what we should do next,” I started to say, wanting the words to fill the charged space between us. “If we could think of a way to carry water and provisions, we could try to venture back out into the desert and retrace our steps. We could go a bit farther out every time while still being able to return if we don’t find … people.”
There was a prolonged moment of silence before Tommy replied, “That’s a better plan than sitting around and eatin
g through our finite supply of bananas. But first, we should explore the oasis. I hate to agree with Luke, but we need to know how big this place is and how much food and water we actually have before we decide on our next steps.”
I was about to respond, but a shimmer of silver wings in the dark spooked me. My hands flew up protectively, covering my face. I heard Tommy’s subdued laugh and watched in embarrassment as the white splash of a bird landed in the bushes to my right. Then came a series of low reverberating coos—one, two, three. Hush. One, two … The pauses in between the cooing sounds felt significant somehow. “Is that a white pigeon?” I stared into the dark where the white blur was hiding. “Why isn’t it scared of us?”
“Either because it’s so used to humans that it doesn’t care anymore or…”
I finished Tommy’s flow of logic, “Or because it’s never seen a human in its entire bird life.” Meaning we were so far away from anything resembling a human settlement that we were totally and completely screwed.
“Let’s go back?” Tommy’s voice was low and stripped of energy; the pigeon’s ongoing coos were a thunder in comparison. “Tomorrow’s going to be a big day. We need all the rest we can get.”
We walked back, feet shuffling against the grass and sand. We stopped when we reached the line of four bodies curled up on the ground. The gap where I fitted between Luke and Minh was now so narrow there was no way I could squeeze back in, not without waking everyone up. I avoided looking at Tommy directly, though I could feel his eyes on me as I knelt down at the end of the line and lay down on my side. I was facing Luke’s back, looking away from where Tommy stood. When I heard Tommy settle down behind me, far enough to avoid touching me but close enough for me to sense his body heat, I exiled a long, shuddering breath.
* * *
I had a bad dream. A ball of sentient fire came down from the heavens, bursting before it touched the ground, white sparks flying everywhere. For a moment, the desert was illuminated, alive with unearthly colors. All the sparks had fallen. They faded away, all but one. This one spark was alive. Separated from its big fiery home, it was alone, and it was hungry. Its need was pulsing and burning like it was my own. Together, we screamed and screamed and screamed, reshaping the desert to fulfill our need.
Next, an army of invisible hands captured me, fingers digging into my flesh, talon-like nails decorating my skin with bloodred half moons. I was brought into a white-walled castle and thrown at the foot of a throne made of human bones and possessions. The throne room had no ceiling, and I could see the gunmetal clouds covering the sky, indifferent stars invisible but present.
On the throne sat the Queen of Giants—oh, how the lonely spark has grown, its evolution driven by its hunger—so tall she was, her head disappearing into the clouds. I knew she could see me from above because I could see myself through her eyes. She followed my every move. I willed my face and body into stillness.
“Speak!” the Queen of Giants commanded.
I asked, “What do you want with me?”
She laughed, and it was the roar of thunder, the screech of the desert storm, so terrible that the clouds hiding her head started to burst, unleashing cold rain upon the throne room. It rained and rained and rained. Soon the rainwater was reaching my ankles, then my knees. I repeated my question.
“You already know the answer.” The Queen of Giants had a voice melodic and sweet, just like my mother’s when she crooned me to sleep with lullabies, the very same ones her mother sang to her in Arabic. “But I have questions for you too,” the Queen of Giants continued. “What do you want? And what are you willing to do to get it?”
The rain poured harder and harder, intensifying with each word leaving the queen’s mouth. She was going to flood the throne room and me in it. She was waiting for my answer. She was curious and hungry. Always hungry.
What did I want? I knew what I didn’t want. I didn’t want to die out here, in the oasis. I didn’t want to be here at all. I didn’t want my friends to suffer. And what was I willing to do to make my desires come true? “I’ll do whatever’s necessary!” I screamed as the water reached my chest, then my neck.
I was floating now, carried somewhere by the rising water. Because I could see myself through the queen’s eyes, I knew that my answer was the right one. It was then that my feet completely let go of the floor and the water carried me higher and higher. I was leaving the throne room behind, flying up, up, up into the clouds, where I faced the queen’s eyes, the same color as the desert but with centers made of alien fire.
It was up there, where the air was so rare and cold and thin that it froze my lungs from inside out, that the Queen of Giants told me what she wanted me to do. What I had to do to assuage her hunger.
* * *
I chose to believe that what happened next was the continuation of my weird dream about the Queen of Giants and the fireball and that otherworldly laughter of the lonely spark that made the sky rip apart and release all that water. My dream-logic was solid: The queen wanted to test me, to see if the words I said to her were true. Was I really willing to do whatever was necessary?
Half awake, I left the sleeping ground once more that night and, without looking back, headed for the thorny underbrush. There I picked some flowers and some yellow berries, one by one, careful not to damage their softness. Golden dewdrops. Beautiful. Dangerous. Like the desert itself. Each time I gathered a handful of the stuff, I’d release my catch and come back for more. And more and more. Until the queen was satisfied, until the lonely spark was hungry no more.
SABOTAGE?
“Don’t drink that!” It was the warning in Tommy’s voice that shook me awake.
Annoyed at having my hard-earned rest disturbed, I opened my eyes slowly, already tired to the bones. Not a great way to start the day.
I was still here, in the oasis. Also, while I was groggy, on a positive note, the pain in my strained shoulder had all but disappeared. It was replaced by another physical sensation—an unfamiliar kind of numbness in my fingertips.
“What the hell happened here?” Rowen’s question sounded like an accusation. Sitting up, I felt something slide off my side. It was Luke’s hand. Luke himself was snuggled next to me. I rushed to stand up and put some distance between us.
Tommy, Rowen, Lori, and Minh were all gathered by the spring, frowning at the spot where the stream narrowed before entering the wilder, darker parts of the oasis. Stifling a powerful yawn, I approached them, then stopped myself. One look at the spring was all it took to know it was all wrong. The water was dotted with yellow. The unmistakable berries of golden dewdrops, some sunken to the bottom of the spring but most still floating on the surface, were caught on rocks and tree roots in the water.
“Those are poisonous!” The words left my mouth at the same time as a partial memory of my dream set my mind on fire. I clenched my numb fingers into fists, afraid to see whether my strange act of sabotage had tainted my skin and nails.
“How could this happen?” Lori was kneeling by the spring. In silence, we all watched as she started on the arduous task of fishing out the bloated yellow globules. Her hands were shaking. “Who would do this? What kind of a monster would do this? Why?”
“It could’ve been the wind. Or an animal.” Minh didn’t sound convinced.
“You don’t believe that!” Lori exclaimed without looking up from her task. I joined her on the ground and stuck my hands into the spring. Soon, the pile of yellow was growing between us.
“How long before we can drink it?” Minh asked, croaky. Her sudden thirst was as visceral as my own.
It was Rowen who replied, “The spring’s current is weak, and we don’t know how long this stuff’s been soaking in there. So I’d give it at least an hour or two after we clean it up—to be safe?”
Without conferring, Tommy, Rowen, and Minh dropped on their knees along the length of the contaminated section of the spring and submerged their hands into the water. I joined them, but Luke, who had by now woken
up and come to stand over me, showed no intent of lending a hand. His shadow was blocking my light and messing with my work. But I didn’t want to engage with him, or anyone, worried I’d give myself away somehow. After observing me for a too-long moment, Luke shuffled back into the shadowed part of our sleeping ground and lay back down. He didn’t approach the spring again until much later, when Tommy braved taking a first sip of water and, after waiting a few minutes, declared it was now safe to drink.
And so commenced our second day in the oasis.
* * *
Most of the morning was lost to restoring our water source, so by the time we started to plan the rest of our day, the sun was already reaching its midday high. Venturing out into the desert in search of help was out of the question for now, but no one seemed eager to go exploring the depths of the oasis either. Maybe what I was feeling and seeing whenever I looked into the darkness coiling behind the trees was shared by the rest of our group. But if that was the case, no one was willing to admit it. However, as our food supplies were dwindling, it became clear that our time in the clearing was finite. Eventually, we agreed we had to explore the oasis.
“Maybe someone should stay put and keep an eye on things,” Lori said. “You know, in case more wind or wild animals or whatever it was decides to come and trash our only water source—or eat what’s left of our food.”
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