A baby.
God.
But it’s all a stark reminder of how temporary this all is, and I don’t want to think about that right now.
I put the container back in my bag and let it fuel me to be more determined than ever. We’re finding the last camera today. I’m not going to think about it. We will find it.
I stretch and look through my things once more. I’ve been as frugal as possible with my toiletries and razors, like a modern-day pioneer woman. I don’t need to wash my hair as often as I did at home, and I do a good coconut milk rinse a few times a week. But still. The thought of any kind of luxurious toiletry at my disposal once more… new razors, lotion, a fresh bottle full of shampoo… I close my eyes and swallow hard. I do fine when I don’t let myself think about the luxuries I had before, but now that I’ve let myself believe we’re so close…
But I’m still here. I need to focus on the present if I’m ever going to earn the future.
The rain continues while we eat, and it seems to come even harder as the day goes on. We wait for it to abate, but it doesn’t. We can’t even build a fire.
We’re sitting cross-legged in the shelter, eating some fruit we had tucked away. I’m anxious for the damn rain to stop.
“What do you miss? A luxury?” I ask him.
“A fucking hot shower,” he says, running his hands through his ragged hair. He had a mountain man kinda beard when I first arrived, but I helped him shave it off. Now he sports a sort of rugged scruff that’s sexy as hell, but he still has a wild, untamed look. We bathe regularly, and between the pools and toiletries that remain, we do alright. Still, we could both use a good, hot shower.
“God, don’t I know it,” I agree. “I want a hot shower, too.”
“Cold beer,” he says. “Frothy, cold, delicious beer.”
I smile. “Lemme guess. And a nice steak?”
He groans. “Okay, this game sucks. I don’t wanna think about showers and beer and steak when we’ve got tropical rain and a camera to find.”
I frown, the banter fading. “We can’t find it in the rain, can we?”
He shakes his head. There’s no point arguing this.
The rain goes on for four days straight, until I think I’m going mad. He works on the shelter and I work on braiding leaves into mats to sleep on and to put by the door. I’d be a shitty pioneer woman. This is so boring I’d rather watch paint dry.
We tell each other stories of things that happened before we came here. We eat, we sleep, and we revel in each other as we always do, lovemaking one of the more enjoyable ways to pass the time. He works out and I follow suit, using our body weight to do sit-ups, leg lefts, push-ups, and the like, until I collapse in exhaustion and welcome the burn in my muscles. My fitness level is one thing I can still control here.
And still it rains.
“Dude, I’m telling you, it’s like Biblical rain,” I tell him, flopping back on our bed on the fifth straight day it’s raining. “If this keeps up, we may need to build an ark.”
He snorts. “It’ll stop. Christ, I wonder if they heard us, though.”
“Who?” I ask.
“Whoever’s behind this,” he says pointedly. What if they made it rain because we’re looking for the camera? What if they heard us say we were going to look for it and you’re right, that’s where it is?”
His jaw tightens, as if he’s managed to convince himself this is exactly what’s happened.
“You can’t just make it rain or not rain,” I say, as if that explains anything. “You just… well, you can’t.”
He shakes his head. “You can do lots of fucking things.”
I shiver. I hate the idea that someone’s been listening in on us, but it would be foolish to think otherwise.
I sigh. It seems like it’s never going to stop raining, and I want to find the damn camera. He lays down beside me. I open my eyes when I feel his hand on my shoulder.
“Baby.”
“Yeah?”
He reaches for me and pulls me over to him, embracing me. I sigh, swallowing the tears that rise when I start to think it’s all hopeless again, and hug him back, resting my cheek on his chest.
“Don’t go all hopeless on me, Harper. Stay strong. The island won’t beat us, babe. We won’t let it.”
I shake my head. “We will not.”
“We’re going to win this.”
“We fucking will.”
“It’s one thing that brings down the strongest man or the bravest woman. Hopelessness. When you feel like you can’t, you can’t.”
And as I lay there on his chest, listening to his heartbeat, I imagine the rain begins to slow. He’s right, and I’m grateful for the reminder. Sometimes I’m the one that has to remind him not to give into the hopelessness that stands just right outside our door. Not to become despondent or go mad with desperation. And as we lay in the silence, I realize I’m not just imagining this.