Uncivilized (Uncivilized 1)

The village was quiet, as I knew the other warriors had gone on a tapir hunt that would last a few days. I didn't go with them because Paraila wasn't feeling good, and I didn't want to venture too far away. Over the years, my skill as a hunter had surpassed most of the other tribe members, and I gradually started to become accepted, even making strong, bonded friendships with some of the men. After I went on my first raid with them at the age of seventeen, and put my life on the line for our tribe, I was then fully accepted as a real member of the Caraicans by everyone, except for S'amair'a, who hated practically every person.

"Paraila... I'm back," I called out as I approached his hut. There were no walls... just a steepled roof of thick palm to keep out the down-pouring rain. I had a much smaller hut right beside his, so close that I could lay in my hammock while he laid in his, and we could carrying on a conversation.

I didn't see S'amair'a around, and I assumed she was tending to the crops. Paraila lay in his hammock, his tired eyes smiling at me in welcome.

"What did you bring an old man this day?" he asked me in Portuguese. While the Caraicans had their own language, it was mostly dead, as they had started taking up the Portuguese dialect almost seventy years ago. Some words were still revered and used, and Paraila had taught me many of them, but for the most part, we spoke in Brazil's native tongue.

"Two small boas... are you hungry? I'll prepare it."

"No, my cor'dairo... we'll let S'amair'a cook our meal. You rest as you have hunted all day."

My heart warmed over his use of the word 'cor'dairo'. It was something he had called me since adopting me.

I dropped the palm basket near the dying fire and sat on the dirt next to Paraila's hammock. He was getting so old that he spent a lot of time there, and it burdened my heart.

Speaking softly in Portuguese, I asked, "How are you feeling today, Father? Can I get you something?"

His hand reached out and patted me on my head. "You make me happy, Zacharias. I need for nothing and you provide for me and S'amair'a well, even if she is too much of a shrew to admit it."

I laughed softly and he responded in kind, sharing in a private joke at her expense that we would not have dared to voice if she was standing here. S'amair'a tolerated me and grudgingly accepted my food gifts to her, but she made Paraila suffer under her sharp tongue because of his love for me.

"We need to talk man to man," Paraila said. "Father Gaul should be returning soon, and there is something I need to tell you before he gets here."

My heart leapt with excitement because Father Gaul was an interesting man. He started coming to our village when I was fourteen... on the verge of becoming a man in the Caraican world. He and Paraila taught me what being a man means--Paraila from the Caraican point of view, and Father Gaul from a modern, religious view.

For example, when I reached fifteen, I would be allowed to take a woman. Paraila taught me all about how this was done within their customs and which women were available to me. Father Gaul taught me about abstinence and unwanted pregnancy, but I scoffed at him. Paraila assured me that the women who were available for sex drank a vile brew of a certain tree bark that would prevent a baby from forming. Father Gaul scoffed at that and told me it was better to abstain.

I laughed behind his back and, the first time I had sex, I soon realized it was the best feeling in the world. I wasn't about to stop. I never told Father Gaul that, though.

"Father Gaul has been gone a long time," I mused. While the Caraicans were slightly more open to the prospect of conversion to the Christian word, they still worshipped their own spirits and deities. Father Gaul would come and spend a few months with us, and then he'd move on to another tribe. He single-handedly kept me up on my English-speaking skills, as he was the only one that spoke my native language that we ever saw. He also brought me books to read and taught me how to do basic math. He taught me history and geography of both the old and new worlds. He told me I would probably need it one day, but I wasn't sure why. I had everything I needed to know to live my peaceful but sometimes solitary life.

"Yes... he had to make a trip back to the United States on an important matter," Paraila said.

"I'll make sure to hunt something good for his arrival," I replied as I leaned back on the dirt ground and rested my head on my hands.

"He's bringing some other people with him," Paraila said, and his voice sounded hesitant.

Shrugging my shoulders, I responded, "No matter. I will provide plenty of meat for his guests."

"These people are coming for you," Paraila said and his voice was so soft, I'm sure I didn't hear him right.

Pushing up from the ground, I looked him in the eye and saw fear, sadness, and regret.

"What do you mean coming for me?" I asked with my own level of fear about ready to cause my heart to jump out of my chest.

Paraila reached his hand out again and patted my head. Then he dropped it to my shoulder, giving me a squeeze. His eyes were sorrowful but determined. "It's time for you to go back home... to where you belong."

/> Blinking my eyes, I look at Moira's sweet face and try to draw upon the rage and hurt I felt when Paraila told me I had to leave.

It's gone. Absolutely gone. I can't pull up even a shred of bitterness within me. There are other emotions still there. Longing for my home and a deep and abiding love for Paraila. Those won't ever go away, but I suddenly realize... I am actually grateful now that I have come here and experienced this journey.

As Moira's green eyes watch me with curiosity, I realize... it's due solely to her.

Chapter 20

Moira

"So what did you think?" I ask Zach as we get back into the black Range Rover that Randall loaned us for the length of our stay here. He has several cars that just sit in a huge, climate-controlled garage detached from his mansion.

"It was interesting. But I don't feel any affinity toward it," Zach says as he buckles his seatbelt.

We had just exited the church I had chosen to take Zach to for a Wednesday evening worship service. We were both dressed casually in jeans and had eaten at a pizzeria close by for dinner before it started.

"You sound a little bit disgruntled," I observe.

Zach shrugs his shoulders. "I didn't know what to expect, but it just seems foreign to me. I mean... I remember some of what my parents taught me about Christ, and I listened to Father Gaul's teachings, but I just don't have any real connection to it."

"It's understandable," I tell him as I reach over to squeeze his hand before I start the car. "I think faith takes practice and you really haven't had that."

"It's just not my type of faith," he asserts.

As I pull out onto the highway I ask him, "What is your faith then? What do you believe in?"

Zach is quiet for a moment as he stares out the car window. Finally, he says, "I believe in myself, and I believe in my tribe."

My heart sinks a bit hearing this because those are clearly Zach's two main loyalties. Every day that goes by, I fall further under his spell. I want desperately for him to stay here because I've become fiercely attached to him in the short time we've been together. It's not just the unbelievable sex, and the sad realization that when he goes, I'll never have something so amazing ever again. It's because as I've gotten to know Zach, I've come to understand the purity of his soul and appreciate the courage with which he has faced this new life of his. He's kind, patient, and curious. His laugh comes easily now, and when those blue eyes turn my way, whether it's in lust or levity, I immediately fall slave to the power he holds over me.