FORTY-ONE

Sobbing, I pushed myself away from Dutchie’s body and stumbled to where Omar lay facedown in a shallow eddy. I turned him over and held him in my arms, the river lapping gently at my back. His open eyes saw nothing. I screamed his name, screamed for my heart, my love, till my voice was gone.

Only the sullen silence of the jungle answered me, the patter of the rain on my head and shoulders, women’s rain, the kind that never ends.

I dropped my head down on his motionless chest, pulled his body close, as part of me fell away. I ached to go wherever he had gone, thought, I can’t live through this.

I’m not sure how much time passed.

Cradling him, I walked toward shore. Grappling with him by his armpits, I dragged his body up on the wet sand, stopping to rest, cry, look at him; to give up, start over and give up again, finally getting all of him out of the water and laying him down on his back. As if I were getting into bed with him, I got my own cumbersome body down on the wet sand, fitting myself next to him on my side. I inhaled his gorgeous Omar smell, present even in the early minutes of death. I traced the contours of his face, felt the subtle cleft of bone under his handsome cheeks. I muttered words of love, shutting each eye before combing his hair back from his forehead with my fingers.

The baby’s foot kicked near my heart, as if he was trying to resuscitate me.

I pushed myself to one elbow, all awareness, every cell firing. Dutchie’s gun lay nearby; I scrambled over to it and flipped open the magazine; all bullets fired. I pushed myself to my feet, blinking back nausea, dizziness, pain.

There was nothing of use in Dutchie’s canoe. I peered out over the churning brown water. His body had caught itself in a bony snag of fallen logs several yards away, one arm and leg lifted up against it and held there by the current, as if he were trying to climb over it. I waded out to him. Tried to shut out the ridiculous idea that he might still be alive. Squeezing my eyes shut, I felt along his back for his belt. The second my hand landed on Omar’s knife, I grabbed it and launched myself away from him.

On shore, I rescued Omar’s assignment from a thicket of ferns where it had landed, and read the last few lines:

. . . your stomach is full from your own cleverness. Learn every day. No knowledge is beneath you. Respect your elders. Hold on to your little flame of self, because the world wants to blow it out, my beloved son. With a sharp cry I fell to my knees, tucking the note to my chest.

Acknowledging that it would be close to impossible to keep the paper dry, I wrapped it in a palm leaf and put in my string bag. The jungle would come for Omar no matter what I did, but it crushed me to leave him on the sand. It took all my strength to drag his body to Dutchie’s canoe. I gathered a few dozen big leaves, heliconia flowers, and some giant white lilies floating near the bank, creating a soft, fragrant bed in the canoe. Bit by bit, I rolled his body in, the jungle above me a cathedral of sorrow. I took his glasses from his back pocket, wrapped his fingers around them. I kissed him one last time, lips already cold, then covered him with the rest of the palms and flowers, trying to remember what the Tatinga had placed in their death canoe for Benicio. Plants, flowers, his slingshot and toys, and a set of his little clothes. I had no such talismans for the father of my child. I told him that I was sorry, that I would have to keep his knife, and my blowgun and darts, and smiled to myself as I imagined him saying, Don’t be a fool. Take everything you need to survive; I’m already in another jungle . . .

Parting wheel-sized water plants, I waded out waist-deep with the canoe. Before I let myself think, I let go of the battered gunwale. The river took him with a kind of elegance, turning him just once, as if granting a benediction, then carried him off so fast I couldn’t bear it. I hadn’t said enough goodbyes, as if there is ever enough time to say all there is to say to someone we love.

I got to my feet and yanked at the rusted chain attached to the nine-horsepower motor on our canoe. Nothing. I sat a moment, attempted to gather my wits. Got up and tried again. It sputtered to silence. Was I flooding it? What would Omar do? I eased back down on the seat, closed my eyes, and saw my own death; a green, swollen body under circling vultures. Got up and tried again, harder, wrenching a muscle in my shoulder. Still nothing. I checked the gas. A third full, was that enough? Fourth try, I pulled harder than I thought possible. It caught with a snorting sort of rumble—such a beautiful sound. The muddy brown water foamed at the bow as I nosed out into the flow, passing Dutchie’s body still held fast against the snarl of river detritus.

The boat began to turn in sickening circles. I reached back and grabbed the till as I’d seen Omar do—he’d used the motor as a ­rudder—and lay back against the damp leather bags. Eyes shut tight, I breathed the peaty smell of the leaves, asking them to heal my heart as well as my skin; where was my strength, where was my bravery, where was my self? How could I survive this? As I inhaled the sickly jungle-sweet air, a thousand images flashed by, a gallery of scenes from my short, strange life: the cameo-sized photo of my foster mother Tia at her sewing machine, smiling up at me from her nest of threads and bobbins; of a hundred doors slamming behind me as I ran from group homes, into rain, into snow, into blazing sun, on buses, on trains, on foot, away from what was never good enough; I sat laughing and drinking with Britta and Molly at the bar in Cochabamba; I followed Omar under the string of Christmas lights as he led me to the smiling sloth; I watched Tuti make me a comb out of palm fronds; there was Anna swirling in the new burlap dress I’d sewn her; Dona Antonia handing me the sacred fire, the small nod of Splitfoot’s head telling me I believe you are a shaman, or I believe you enough to give you this plant that might save you, so that you will do something good for our tribe.

An hour passed, maybe two, as I hugged the bank, where the current was weaker, to make the most of what diesel remained. My eyes rested on the shore and the wall of jungle passing by, all that sameness along with the sound of the motor chugging along lulling me into a torpor. One hand on the tiller, I lay on my side tasting the breath of a billion plants exhaling. Above me, the great heavy sky passed sullenly, crossed by barbets, tanagers, and jacamars—small birds—all of them bright, quick flashes of color. Much higher up, dun-colored raptors floated, their claws weighted with prey. Vultures threaded in lazy figure eights through the canopy; I would not let myself think what had brought them there. The death of Omar was just a shadow passing, met with a sigh of apathy from the jungle, meaningless to everything here but myself.

With a jolt, I remembered what he had said to me just days before. You don’t wake up alive in the jungle because you were smarter or trickier. You stay alive here because you paid attention.

I pushed myself up to my elbows, as close to a seated position as I could manage. In those hours of nonfunctional grief, I had veered out toward the center of the river, where the current was strongest. My progress was pitiful. I watched the shape of the bank closely; I was bumping along at a standstill. Leaning on the rudder—the force of the river resisting my every move—I aimed the bow of the canoe toward shore.

Too fast. I fishtailed; the boat spun. Jumping a sunken tree, the stern yawed into the current, slamming me into a tangled mass of broken tree limbs, sluicing me with a soaking spray. I cut the motor. Chastened, determined, I spent several minutes pushing myself away from the outcropping.

Free of the bony snag, I yanked on the motor’s chain, dizzy with relief when it caught and rumbled to life on the first try. My arm ached from the pull of the rudder as I forced the boat to follow along the bank once again. Behind thin clouds, the sun grew swollen and turned sickly white, burning through the haze and baking my head and shoulders. The poultice dried and flaked off in chunks that fell in the river and were swept swiftly away behind me.

Think, I told myself. What was the route we had taken?

From Ayachero, Omar had veered off into two different tributaries to arrive at the river I motored on now. I had a memory of always turning right, but that had been from my position lying down in the boat, facing . . . which way? I mentally lay down, head under the thatch. Saw Omar’s intense face as he leaned down to me, saying, Sit up, Lily, pay attention . . .

It was a right. It had to be. I had to make two right turns. And I would not stop to sleep.

A glowering red sun dropped behind the wall of green as macaws, paired by color—turquoise, crimson, yellow—soared high above, squawking at one another like old married couples. Banks of pink mimosa and purple tonka bean throbbed with a chorus of frogs. Now and then, to either side of the boat, a gulping sound, as a whiskered rubbery mouth popped to the surface, then disappeared. Both hands clutching the tiller, I puttered along into the night river, knowing the moment I ran out of diesel would be the end of everything.

Darkness closed like a door, the trees looming giants, their big faces gaping down. I held on to the putt-putt of the motor like it was Omar’s heartbeat, Omar’s love for me, carrying me home. Night clouds slipped across a fingernail of moon. Mist spiraled off the river in fairy twists. A large fish jumped out of the water and came belly-flopping down. I motored on, my skin dry and pinching. Chambers of cool, wet air wafted by me, through me.

A warm wetness spread out beneath me, soaking my dress. Had I peed? I reached down over my belly and felt myself, smelled my hand; no urine smell. More liquid gushed out of me. My water had broken.

The baby was coming.