It didn’t make me glow, though. I felt more like I was fading away, like the world had forgotten me. As I stared at the glinting sand, I wondered if my disappearance was making the news. Was anyone still interested? I knew papers dropped stories when there wasn’t anything new to report. And what could be new about my story, when the only thing that ever changed was the way the wind blew?
I’d been in your house for more than a month. Was anyone still searching for me? Just how dedicated were my parents anyway? They’d always been shrewd. “Good business sense” are the three most popular words in Dad’s vocabulary. And maybe he was asking the question—was looking for me good business sense anymore? Was I a good investment? Right then, I don’t think I would have put any money into my search.
You gave me a plate of small yellow fruits. You took one and showed me how to dig my nails in and eat it, sucking out the insides. I tried it. It was sour at first, but the taste became a little sweeter as I chewed. The seeds got stuck in my teeth and gums. You sucked on another one, before you spoke.
“You met the guys in the shed, then?” you asked.
I remembered all those eyes staring back at me, all those scales and legs. I shuddered. “Why do you have them?”
“To keep us alive.” You reached for another of the yellow fruits. I gave you the plate. My stomach was too queasy for any more, even though I wanted it. You smacked your lips through the sour part, then picked the seeds from your teeth. “They’re going to help me make antivenom.”
I shook my head. “You don’t get antivenom from a snake, you just get poison.”
The corner of your mouth turned up. “You’re just as clever as you look, smarty-pants,” you said. “I knew it all along.” You looked at me like you were almost proud. “You’re right, though,” you said, spitting seeds onto the floor. “Those guys are all poisonous. And antivenom comes from collecting an immune reaction to the poison … another reason why we need the camel. Soon I’ll milk those creatures, inject their poison into the camel, then collect her antibodies, her immune reaction. I’ll filter all that and make antivenoms … at least that’s the plan. It’ll take awhile, and I still don’t know if I can do it, but I’m going to try anyway. That way we’ll always have a fresh supply.”
I frowned. “Won’t the camel get sick?”
“Nah, she’s immune, like lots of things out here. Us humans are the weak ones.” You tore at the skin of another fruit, nibbling off the fleshy bits. “But what we should do first, before any of this, is start to desensitize you. If we inject a little of those creatures’ poisons into your system, you can build up your own immunity.”
“You’re not injecting anything into me.”
You shrugged. “You can do it yourself; it’s not hard. Just prick your skin and put a little of the venom inside. I do it all the time.”
“And if I don’t want to?”
“Then you run the risk.”
“Of what?”
“Dying, being paralyzed … poison’s not much fun, you know?” You looked me over, one side of your mouth curling up. “But then, I suppose you know that already … what with all the rum you had last night. That was a year’s supply, that bottle.”
I avoided your gaze. It was the first time you’d mentioned the rum. I braced myself, waiting for you to be angry about me riffling through your supplies. But you just shrugged it off.
“With any environment, there’s risks, I s’pose,” you murmured. “It’s all the same, really: poisons, injuries, sickness … just different triggers. The difference is that in the city they’re caused by people, and out here it’s just the land. I know which one I’d prefer.”
My head was starting to spin again. I kept picturing those creatures in their cages, waiting with their poison to kill me, or to save me.
“How long have they been there?” I asked. “In those cages?”
You put the fruit down and wiped your hands on your knees. “I’ve been catching them since we got here. I’ve found most of them now, but some of them are bastards to find … still need a couple, actually.”
“And they’re all poisonous?”
You nodded. “Course. I wouldn’t have them otherwise. Not all of them are deadly, but you still wouldn’t want a little nip.”
“Why haven’t you been bitten?”
“I have. Nothing serious, though. I guess I’ve just learned to handle them; I know what makes them tick. Creatures aren’t so dangerous when you understand them.”
Again, you pushed the fruit toward me. “Come on, eat up.” You grinned. “Anyone would think you’ve got a hangover.”
You were nice to me after that. I mean, really nice. You kept the cold cloths coming and you fussed over me in a way that Mum would never have dreamed of. You even made me food you thought I’d like … or you tried to, anyway. (I guess it’s hard to rustle up ice cream when the nearest freezer is hundreds of miles away.) But you watched me, too, all the time. It was as if you were constantly assessing me, gauging what was acceptable, what you could say or do that wouldn’t upset me too much. I soon caught on to it. I started testing how far I could push you. And you let me push.
The next day I fed the chickens. You came with me, saying you needed to check the spring. When we reached the entrance to the camel pen, I slowed down and let you catch up. I let you walk in step. You glanced at me, checking if it was all right that you were there.
“You must really hate me,” I said.
“What do you mean?”
“You must hate me so much that you don’t care if I die … otherwise you’d just let me go.”
You swung around to me quickly, so quickly that you stumbled on a rock. “That’s the opposite of how I feel.”
“Then why not let me go? You know it’s what I want.”
You were silent for four or five steps. “But I did let you go,” you said quietly. “You almost died.”
“That’s because your car’s a piece of crap and I don’t know how to get anywhere out here. You do, though. If you really didn’t hate me, you’d take me back to a town. You’d let me go.”
“Don’t start this again, please.”
“But it’s true, isn’t it? You could let me go if you wanted to; you just don’t want to. So that means you must hate me.”
I plowed through a small shrub, my boots crushing its leaves. You stopped to straighten them.
“Things aren’t that simple.”
“They can be.”
I stopped, too. You finished straightening the plant and stepped around it. You took a hesitant step toward me.
“Just give it a bit of time, please, Gemma. A few months more and you’ll learn to appreciate all this, then …”
“Then what? Then you’ll let me go? I don’t believe you.”
“Believe me, please. Just for once.” You raised your arms toward me, almost begging.
“What will you do?” My hands were on my hips and I was trying to make myself look taller than I was. Even so, my head didn’t go past your shoulders. You sighed.
“OK,” you whispered finally. “Give it six months. Just six months. That’s all you’ll need. Then if you still hate all this, after that, then I’ll take you back. I promise. I’ll even take you to a town.”
“I still don’t believe you.”
“Try me.”
I kept staring at you. After a moment you looked down, putting your hands into your pockets. “I’m serious,” you said, your voice breaking a little. “What’s six months to you now anyway? What have you got to lose?”
You kicked the dirt. That dull thud of your boots was the only sound out there. I wiped the sweat from my forehead. I still wasn’t sure I could trust you. I mean, who believes a kidnapper about anything? What had you ever done to make me believe in you?
“Even if you are serious,” I challenged, “even if you do take me back, what’s to stop you from doing all this again to some other girl?”
You ran your hand through your hair. “Ther
e is no other girl. Without you, I’ll live here alone.”
“You’re disgusting.” You flinched. I stepped toward you. “You’re just trying to flatter me, trying to get me to do what you want. You can’t help yourself. There’s always another girl. What do they say about dogs? Once they’ve got the taste for it—killing …”
“I’m not a killer.”
“You’re a dog, though.”
You looked at me, your eyes huge. You were like a dog then, waiting for me to throw you a bone … waiting for something I could never give you.
“I love you,” you said, simple as anything. You didn’t blink. You waited for what you’d said to soak in. It didn’t. It just bounced off. I refused to think about it at all.
“You’re a bastard,” I said.
I started walking. You spoke to my back, raising your voice as I marched farther ahead.
“The land wants you here. I want you here,” you called. “Don’t you care about that at all?”
I turned, incredulous. “You think I could care for you after what you’ve done? Are you really that crazy?”
“We need you.”
“You don’t need anything but help.”
You gaped at me. As I watched, your eyes became wet, drowning as they looked back at mine. I shook my head, refusing to be sucked in.
“This is screwed up,” I said. I spoke quietly, more to myself than you. You tried to speak, but I kept on, regardless, no longer scared. “You’re seriously messed up, aren’t you? And out here, I’m never going to get away from you. Not unless you take me back to a town.”
“I don’t want that.”
“It’s what I want.”
You flinched away from my words as if I were physically harming you with them. You avoided my gaze, clearly embarrassed by your reaction.
“You’re not so tough now, though,” I said quietly.
I turned and walked fast toward the Separates. I could feel myself starting to shake. I was fragile then, almost in as many pieces as you were. I didn’t want you to see. You didn’t follow me; just stood, motionless, your head down to the dirt. I stumbled through the rocks, glad you weren’t there. I could almost handle you when you were tough; I knew what to expect. But like that? I didn’t know what to think.
You were quiet that night, more thoughtful. You soaked cloths for my burns, infusing them with a plant mixture that made them smell like hospitals. After dinner you stood at the kitchen sink, looking out at the darkness. Your body was taut, like a hunter standing in wait. The lantern light made shadows on your skin. I cleared the plates from the table and took them to you. You turned and grabbed my wrist, almost making me drop everything.
“I was serious, you know,” you began. “What I said today … I meant it. Just give this place six months, please. Can you wait that long?”
I stepped back, disentangling my wrist. I left the plates on the bench. A deep line formed on your forehead, creasing your skin like a gorge. Your blue eyes were bright underneath.
“Can you?” you whispered.
There was that familiar intensity about you, that seriousness. I could, almost, believe you. If you’d been anyone else, I wouldn’t have hesitated. I moved my head. It wasn’t a nod, but I wasn’t shaking it, either.
“Three months,” I said.
“Four.” Your face twitched. “Just please don’t try to escape again,” you said. “Not by yourself, not until I can take you. You don’t know this place yet.” You took the plates, stopping to unwind the bandage that was still wrapped around your right hand before turning on the water. “It’s just … to survive this land, you need to love it. And that takes time. Right now, you need me.”
“I know.”
You stared at me, as surprised as I was by those two words. But I did need you, didn’t I? I’d tried escaping by myself, and it hadn’t worked.
You sighed as you turned back to the dark window. “After four months, if you still want to go, I’ll take you to the edge of a town. Just don’t make me go in with you.”
“I wouldn’t want you to,” I said. I frowned. As if I could make you do anything you didn’t want to do.
You started to wash the plates, your shoulders drooping. Your fingers darted about in the water. I saw the pulse in your neck beating fast, that tiny bit of life under your tough brown skin. There were freckles around it, scattering down onto your collarbone.
“I don’t have to turn you in, you know.” I started speaking without really meaning to. “If that’s what you’re worried about, I don’t have to turn you in. You could just let me go, then you could disappear, back into the desert. I could say I don’t remember, that I’ve got heatstroke or amnesia or something. I won’t even remember your name.”
Your eyes flicked up to mine, but they were filled up with sadness, ready to leak.
There was a wind that night. I heard it as I lay in bed, picking up grains of sand and chucking them against the wood and the windows, spattering them toward me like gunfire. Or rain. If I shut my eyes I could almost imagine the sound was English rain, pelting down around me as if it were the middle of winter, quenching the gardens and fields, filling the Thames and the gutters around my house. I had forgotten how comforting the sound of rain was against the windows, how safe it felt.
You’d gone to your room before me that night. You’d been so quiet, disillusioned by me, I think. This whole adventure of yours hadn’t turned out like you’d expected. Were you beginning to regret it? Were you thinking that you’d picked the wrong girl? Perhaps you’d only just realized for the first time that I was ordinary, no one special, just as much of a disappointment to you as I was to everyone else. I turned over and thumped the pillow, frustrated by still being awake, and by all those thoughts.
Then I heard you scream. The sound slashed through the silence, making me leap up in bed. It was a desperate, animal sound, as though it came from somewhere deep within you. It was the loudest thing I’d heard for days.
My first thought was that someone else was in the house. Someone had come to rescue me and was getting rid of you first. But that was a stupid thought. No one would rescue anyone like that, except in the movies. Certainly not in the desert. Out there, rescuers would come by plane and they would surround us with lights and noise first. We would have heard anyone else coming for miles.
Even so, I listened for sounds outside, steps on the veranda. But there were no bangs or bumps, nothing to suggest that anyone else was there. Only me. Only you. And the only thing I could hear were your screams.
You were yelling words as well as noises, but I couldn’t tell what they were. In between, it sounded like you were crying. I got out of bed. I took the knife. I walked to the door on the balls of my feet, slow and soundless. When you screamed again, I pushed the door handle down, using your noise to mask the creak. I stepped into the hallway. Your screams were louder there, echoing hoarsely around the house. Your door was open a little. I tilted my ear toward the crack, listened.
There was silence for a few seconds, maybe even a minute or two. My ears rang with it. Then I heard you sobbing. It built up pretty fast, until it was uncontrollable and desperate, the way a kid sobs sometimes. I peered through the crack and into the darkness. Something was shaking on your bed: you. There was no other movement. I pushed the door farther open.
“Ty?”
You kept sobbing. I took a step toward you. There was a slip of light from the window falling on your face. It shone on the wetness of your cheeks. Your eyes were closed, shut tight. I took another step.
“Ty? Are you awake?”
Your hands were in fists, kneading the rolled-up sweater you used as a pillow. Your sheet had slipped down, exposing your back against the bare mattress. Stretched out like that, you looked too big for the bed. You had such a long, straight back, long like a tree trunk. But right then it was shaking like a sapling.
I left the door wide open behind me and glanced around the room. The window was closed, and there was nothin
g to suggest that anyone else had been there. Whatever you had been screaming about, you’d been screaming in your sleep.
Your sobs subsided as your face buried into the sweater. I stood there watching. You were sobbing like I had sobbed when I’d first arrived, quietly and desperately, as though you’d never stop. It was weird; it almost made me want to start crying again, too. I shook my head. You were tough and strong and dangerous. Maybe this was just an act.
As I watched, you curled your legs to your chest. You started rocking. And then the screams began again. They pierced right into me. I had to bring my hands up to my ears. I stepped closer. I had to make it stop. Without thinking about what I was doing, I grabbed you around the shoulders. Shook you. Your skin was clammy. Hot.
Your eyes snapped open, but you didn’t see me straightaway. You saw someone else. You pushed me aside and dragged yourself backward along your mattress until you hit the wall. Your eyes were wild, moving from side to side as you tried to focus. Then you started murmuring words and sounds.
“Don’t take me,” you were saying. “Please, leave me.”
I tried to find your gaze, tried to keep your eyes on me. “It’s Gemma,” I said. “I’m not taking you anywhere. Just calm down.”
“Gemma?”
You spoke my name like it was something you only half remembered. You grabbed at the sheet, pulling it around you.
“You’re dreaming, Ty,” I said.
But you weren’t listening. You crawled forward and clawed at my T-shirt. I stepped back.
“Stop it, Ty!”
I slapped your hands, pushing your fingers away. But your face was desperate.
“Don’t take me,” you sobbed, your voice like a child’s. “Mamma was here, the trees, my stars … I don’t want to go.”
You grabbed my waist, throwing your arms around it. You sobbed into my stomach. Your eyes were open but they still weren’t seeing me. You were kneading my back with your fingers, pulling my shirt. I touched your hair, and your crying subsided a little.