Withering Hope

"Tristan, come look at this."

He narrows his eyes as he inspects it. "No insects on it," he murmurs.

"Exactly."

In unison, we both look at the ground. There are some plants growing around the tree, but not nearly as many as usual. The sap of the tree must be poisonous. Very.

"Let's collect this. It might just be what we need.” Watching me, he adds, “I'll take you back to the plane and then come back to do it."

"Don't be ridiculous. It’ll be quicker with the two of us. Let's just get it over with."

I dig my knife into the tree before Tristan starts protesting. His overprotectiveness is moving but also worrying. He's putting himself at risk by being preoccupied looking after me instead of looking where he steps. The best thing I could do is stay inside the plane and let him come back to the forest alone. I wouldn’t be of any use in case of an attack, quite the contrary. But I can't bring myself to leave him out of my sight.

We spend the next hour cutting into the bark and collecting the sap in two small baskets I weave together on the spot. I make sure to keep my distance from Tristan while we do it. Touching him, even by accident, still sets my skin ablaze. Worse, it makes me tingle in places I have no business tingling. Since I don't know what to make of that, I concentrate on the guilt; which follows me permanently. It's strongest at night when I sleep next to him, and there is no escape from his touch. The guilt isn't from the tingling I feel at his touch. It's from craving it.

As much as I dread it, I'm also looking forward to the moment when he asks me to spend the night next to him. Last night was the first time I stayed at his side without him asking me first. He recounted his nightmare numerous times, each time adding more gruesome details, until his words painted images so real they terrified me almost as much as they terrified him. I came to understand why this particular event, of all the horrors he witnessed, marked him. He made it out alive, but none of the civilians he was supposed to protect did. Survivor guilt. Talking about it seems to help. He's making progress. Real progress. His nightmares are shorter, and it's easier to wake him up. That's why I have to stay by his side. To help him.

Or so I'm telling myself.

When we're back at the plane, Tristan dips the points of two arrows in the liquid we collected and starts looking for a victim to try it on. He finds a bird sitting on a lower branch, picking around at its plumage. Tristan sets the arrow inside the bow and positions himself for a shot. My stomach pulls together until I'm positive it's the size of a nut when he releases the arrow. In less than a fraction of a second the poor bird drops dead. I swing forward, puking.

"Aimee!"

"I'm fine. Go away."

I usually turn away when he shoots something, but I wasn't quick enough. I go sit at our makeshift eating place. Tristan sits in front of me a while later, handing me a can of heated water. I rinse my mouth until it's clean.

"Well, we've found our poison," he says.

"I kind of got that." I hope we won’t have to use it. We’ve been here for two months and one week and haven’t needed it so far.

"I’ll make us some small pouches so we can carry the poison with us in case we need it."

I frown. "Why not just dip the arrows in the poison and carry them around like that?" My shot is still lame, but I'd feel safer if we did that.

"It's dangerous. If we were to accidentally stab ourselves…"

"Oh, yeah. You're right."

"I’ll make us dinner from the fruit we gathered."

"I’m not sure I can manage to eat tonight, but you can make something for yourself. I still want to finish washing the pile of clothes we were washing before we headed into the forest."

We wash our clothes with a regularity that is almost maniacal, but they still have an unpleasant smell. Not sweat. Tristan and I shower three or four times a day, because of the heat and humidity. I suspect the clothes smell because we're washing them with nothing more than water since the shower gel is gone. I almost fall asleep twice while washing, so I give up before I finish the pile, telling Tristan that I'm going to bed early. It's almost dark anyway. Tristan enters the cabin just after I finish changing. He changes in the cockpit, returning when I'm about lie down.

Tristan sits on the edge of his seat. "Aimee?" There is a hesitancy in his voice that unsettles me.

"Yes."

"Umm, what would you say to sleeping next to me right from the start?"

"Huh?"

"You come over here afterward anyway. Maybe I won't have nightmares at all if you're here when I fall asleep."

Logically, his suggestion makes sense. I always end up spending the entire night beside him anyway. But even though I agree, something tells me it's not okay. I just can't pinpoint what isn't right about it.

I slide next to him. It's impossible to avoid skin-to-skin contact, and his touch burns me as intensely as ever. Neither of us says anything; we just face the ceiling. In this silence, it clicks. It feels wrong because it's so intimate.