The Raft: A Novel (12 page)

As usual.

The slope grew steeper and you reached for tree trunks to haul yourself up. The orange light of the low setting sun cut through the trees, tracing jagged silhouettes on the bark. Apart from the crackle of twigs and leaves there was no sound, no wind.

But there
was
another sound, wasn’t there?

It brought you to a stop. You first thought it was an animal of some kind, but then you heard it again. A human voice. A woman.

You edged around a tree and saw a man on his knees. There was a woman lying on her back, her bare legs arched upwards. A man knelt between her legs. You moved closer. He was helping her deliver a baby.

A twig cracked and his head snapped towards you. His eyes were wide with sudden panic. You told him not to worry; you wouldn’t tell anyone. He said nothing and continued attending to her. You asked if you could help. He ordered you to grab the canteen beside the tree and give her water. You did as he asked. There was a thin strip of white cloth hanging over the canteen and you used it to wipe the sweat from her forehead. There was a blanket on the woman’s chest and he told you to spread it underneath her. You followed this instruction without question.

The man was a few years younger than you. His long hair was swept back and there were deep lines in his forehead. He seemed to know what he was doing.

And the woman?

The soon-to-be mother was a young woman named Jai-Li. You had seen her before. She’d stood out on the beach, not only because of her pregnancy, but also because of her striking physical features: leaf-green eyes, pale white skin and long sleek hair so impossibly dark it occasionally glimmered blue in the moonlight. You hadn’t met the father of her child (you were quite sure she’d arrived pregnant), but could have been mistaken. For all you knew, the man at her side was the father.

Okay, okay,
he encouraged her,
almost there.

She strained to push, lifting her head, clamping her jaw and gritting her teeth fiercely.

Breathe and count back. Breathe and count, Jai-Li.

A slick bulge began to appear, and the mother screamed as the sides of her cervix stretched around the infant’s body. The man guided the child out, cradling its head with one hand, working the delicate body out with the other. Minutes later he held the child in his arms. The mother’s pain subsided and she threw her head back and exhaled deeply, exhausted.

A boy. Perfect. Ready to simply be.

Startlingly, upon first sight of the child, its entire future flashed before you: every yet unknown pain and joy. Every scraped knee and stolen kiss, each moment of heartache and laughter, triumph and disappointment. And the questions too—all of the many, many questions to come. Your projections made you feel as if you were staring down on him from somewhere high above, an ancient eye in the sky. He would never know you, but you could somehow see him—and all of his years—in a way he could not yet see for himself.

The man removed a thin membranous film from the new-born’s face, allowing the passages to be opened. He asked you to take two short pieces of string from a small wooden bowl beside him and tighten one of the threads around the umbilical cord. Next you tightened the second piece, a notch up from the first, creating an air-locked segment. Finally you took a pair of scissors from the bowl and cut through the sealed section of the cord.

The newborn breathed in and then, as if exposed to the alien atmosphere of an alien planet, he gasped and cried out in alarm.

What happened after that?

You stayed in the woods. You helped the man pitch a tent and guide Jai-Li into it.

You sat against a tree.

The man sat opposite you, his knees drawn up. He said his name was Theunis, and he thanked you. His face was soft and warm, his eyes creased by crow’s feet and underscored by deep blue shadows.

On the slope of the mountain beside you, Jai-Li and her child slept in the tent.

Theunis was willing to speak to you, but his choice of words and careful tone made it clear that he wasn’t going to give away too much, say the wrong thing. He told you he’d met Jai-Li less than a month ago. Before that he had known nothing about her but she’d asked for his help.
When a pregnant woman asks for help there’s not much more you need to know,
he said.

What kind of help?
you asked.

An escape
, he said.
She’s leaving the beach, the commune, and I’m going to help her.

She had no intention of returning. If she didn’t leave immediately after her child was born, the baby would be delivered to some unknown guardian in some unknown location …

You couldn’t help feeling doubtful, could you? After all, people
had
tried to escape in the past.

You asked what made her think she’d get away with it. Theunis didn’t reply. He stood and said again that when a pregnant woman asks for help, there’s not much more you need to know. He walked over to her tent and pulled back the flap to check on Jai-Li and her child.

How did they plan to escape, you wanted to know.

A rowboat
, he said.
She needs a second oar and I haven’t even begun working on it. When it’s ready, I’ll take them down to the cove and then … well, then they’re on their own. Jai-Li hasn’t mentioned where she plans to go
…

He seemed anxious to end the conversation, so you didn’t ask him anything more. He said he was glad you had come, but stressed the importance of keeping everything a secret.

I’m going back
, he said,
for food and water. You stay here and keep an eye.

You thought it was a good idea. Jai-Li would probably sleep all night and you would make a small fire for warmth, and to keep the baboons away.

Quite suddenly, he clasped you by the shoulders.
The only thing left to be in this world is a martyr
, he said in a rush, as if he couldn’t hold the thought in any longer.
One day we’ll look back and be forced to ask ourselves what good we’ve ever been to anyone.
He nodded quickly but said nothing more. Then he took his hands off your shoulders and made his way down the slope, towards the beach.

You gathered twigs and dried branches and prepared a small fire beside the tent. Then you sat against the tree and watched the small flames flicker.

(
The only thing left to be in this world is a martyr. One day we’ll look back and be forced to ask ourselves what good we’ve ever been to anyone
)

Theunis’s words lingered. It was difficult to fathom why you’d been so ready to help. You felt as if you’d been swept away by the hope of accomplishing something, anything at all. On that beach, in that commune, purpose itself was the desired end. You’d arrived at the beach hoping to come to an understanding of your new place in a meaningless world, but contrary to every new idea and belief The Body had encouraged you to espouse, it was only then—safeguarding that mother and her child—that you felt any semblance of the long-promised “meaning.” But there was more to it, you knew. More than the hope of your own worth in a world that no longer saw the merits of worthiness itself.

You had held a baby in your arms, once upon a time. You had held your son. Your daughter.

You’d lifted them in the air and made them each a promise you were naive enough to believe you could keep. A promise of protection. A promise of love. Of never leaving. Never forgetting.

Night leaked across the sky.

The fire settled into itself, nibbling steadily on the wood. The glowing embers sputtered and sparked in the endless dark and your eyes grew heavier with each passing moment.

But just as your eyes were about to close completely, you saw something that shook you to wakefulness.

A tall dark figure emerged from the trees—a man standing behind the fire.

His long, black, buttoned-up trench coat hung to the forest floor and he looked as if he was drenched in oil and it was slopping over his feet. The sharp features of his pale face shimmered in the low light of the fire. He was not a
normal
man. You were not convinced he was human at all. He towered like the long crooked shadow of a bony giant, fixing his big white eyes on you. Long arms rose slowly at his sides. White hands appeared at the ends of drooping sleeves, then moved slowly to the centre of his coat. Skeletal fingers grasped the edges and parted the sides ceremoniously, like thick, dusty curtains drawing open on the stage of a grisly old theatre house.

An empty stage … As his coat opened you could see no body in that coat. Until, deep from the shadows of the hollow space, a young boy materialised. You stared as he took form in the brushstrokes of the fire’s light. He saw you sitting against that tree and stared dreamily back at you.

Andy.

The boy was about seven years old, maybe eight. He was wearing a striped t-shirt and khaki shorts. His thin hair, milky brown and soft, hung just below his eyes and curled around the ears. Andy, familiarly unkempt, the way he looked after spending a long summer day outdoors. The way he looks
whenever
you think of him.

He mouthed something.

I’m sorry, big guy
, you said.
I’m sorry, but I can’t understand.

He moved his lips again and the meaning of his muted words became clear:

Find me.

It wasn’t until a low whine from the tent shook you to consciousness that you realised you’d been dreaming. You looked over to the trees. The man in the black coat had vanished. Only sparks and faint wisps of smoke remained, drifting above glowing logs of wood.

Another faint cry, reminding you why you had woken. You made your way towards the tent and pulled back the flap. Jai-Li was sleeping on her back, her child in her arms. She was stuck in some nightmare and you could see the sheen of perspiration on her tightened face in the dim yellow light.

You touched her gently. She opened her eyes and looked around.

It’s okay
, you said.
You had a bad dream.

A moment later, reality settled in. She sighed and looked down at her child.

Finally, she said something. Your name.

Yes, I’m Kayle
, you said.

You explained that you’d helped Theunis, that he’d gone back to the beach.

You wondered then whether everything had gone according to plan. Theunis had been gone for a while. Perhaps he was lost, had been injured, or … perhaps something worse. Perhaps he’d been caught.

She asked if anyone had seen them, if there was any reason to think The Body knew about her being up in the woods, and you said you didn’t think so. No, they were fine. Everything was fine.

Are you okay?
you asked.

She said she was glad you were at her side, not one of the other communers. This took you by surprise. You knew each other, but not well. Nothing more than each other’s names. How could she be glad to have you, a near stranger, be the one person beside her?

She’d seen you on the beach, she said.
You can tell a lot about someone without exchanging a word. In fact, she said, conversations are full of lies anyway. People pretending to know things, not know things, to care or not care about one thing or another.

No, she’d seen you around. She had observed you, once asked someone your name. You were unusually quiet, she said. Private. Calm. Thoughtful. Not so much in a state of sadness as a kind of hopeless
emptying
, like water evaporating from a reservoir in a place with no sign of rain.

You were taken aback. Mostly you were surprised you had been singled out.

She rubbed her eyes.

You asked about her nightmare, if she remembered what she had been dreaming, but she said it was difficult to explain.

That’s when you told her:
I had two children … once. A girl and a boy. My girl died. She was hit by a car when she was five years old. We were on our way to a lodge. My son needed us to pull over, he had to pee. She climbed out of the back, wandered up to the road, and then I saw headlights. Like two glowing eyes. I saw the lights before I even heard the car. It came speeding around the corner, slid out, and hit her. Killed her on impact. And the driver … The driver just continued on. Didn’t even slow down. My boy … my boy’s somewhere else in the world right now. In some other commune, I suppose. I don’t know.

Here was a mother hiding in the woods with her child, and you barely had the courage to speak of your son. Your daughter was dead, but your son—he was alive. You no longer had the power to protect him, so you’d swaddled him in denial like a newborn sent down a river in a basket. You weren’t keeping him in your heart. You were letting him go, and the truth of your actions was poisoning you little by little, every day.

What were their names?
she asked.

My daughter’s name was Maggie. My son’s name is Andy.

When last did you see him?

I don’t know. I don’t remember. It’s been a while.

She smiled—the tender smile of the mother she had already become—and then she reached up to touch the side of your face.

Find him. Never give up. Find your boy and bring him back to you.

She said she now knew she needed to tell you her story. She couldn’t explain why, except that something told her it would guide you. The sense of her own story’s mysterious import on your life seemed to overcome her for a moment, like sunlight abruptly touching the cold bottom of a dried well.

Rest now
, you said.
Tell me later.

She shook her head.
No
, she said,
I need to tell you now.
You helped her sit up against the wall of the tent, slipped a pillow behind her back. She settled her child in her arms. He shifted and murmured and she stroked the ridge of his nose, just between his eyes. He quietened and she leaned back and exhaled.

That’s when Jai-Li, speaking in a low voice and holding her sleeping infant, told you her story.