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Last night Maria and I stayed up late after drinking a purifying tea. We giggled by the fire and under a full moon, surmising they gave us the wrong brew. Jennifer and Felix were in Canaima for the night. A deserved break.
The moon’s beauty didn’t last in our thoughts as it encourages creatures to hunt.
Only the sounds we heard were not animals.
I’m still struggling to comprehend what happened.
We heard the Spanish tones coming out of the darkness. My heart is still racing as I relive the past night’s happenings.
Maria sensed evil, she grabbed my hand, and we took off to our hut. She insisted I pack my belongings. I told her not to panic, for these men had threatened us before. In my mind, it had been months since their last visit, and I assumed Dr. Leon could threaten them enough to deter them.
An important factor I’d forgotten was Maria spoke Spanish and understood the words yelled from a distance. She pushed my back, urging me to hurry, almost forcing me out the door before I managed to grab everything.
“Leave it,” she said. “If you don’t need it to survive, then just go.” She yanked the netting from my hammock and rolled it into a ball before tucking it under her arm.
I had my passport and papers. A little cash. Some toiletries and a few clothes I stuffed in my bag. My suitcase needed to remain here. I opened it and grabbed my pearls. I did not know why I even packed them, but I wanted to keep them with me for luck. Then I found my brush and mirror, not that I bothered brushing my hair every day. It had become wilder with time, and now I was about to hide out like an escapee from prison.
Maria stood in the open doorway, peering out into the darkness, listening. She pressed a finger to her lips and then took my hand. We crept around the furthest side of the camp and reached the river as shouting broke out in the village. We ran, pushing past vines for a few hundred yards. She stopped and listened. Pressing long grass aside, she revealed a dugout canoe. Under the moonlight, I could make out the weathered wood. It contained two rows of seats, not large at all, and two wooden paddles.
“This is here for emergencies. Take it. Go.”
Her words keep playing over in my head.
I couldn’t help it.
I began to cry.
She helped push it into the water before throwing the netting aboard. She then hugged me and said, “Look after yourself, Ivy.” I can still picture her bleak expression.
I asked her where I should go and when I should come back.
She told me to find my Ularan friend since I’d be safer there than here.
The place where she emphasized I was lucky not to leave without an arrow in my back.
She hugged me again then pushed my canoe away from the embankment.
She told me to stay close to the river’s edge, then she dashed into the night toward the sound of gunfire.
I sailed throughout the night.
Part of me wanted to wake up from a horrible dream, the other part of my mind wanted to believe I was hallucinating from the tea.
This was no hallucination.
At night the river felt eerie, and I felt trapped, only to be catapulted onto the set of a horror movie.
Tree and vine shadows overhung close to the water’s edge.
I stayed my distance in case something lurked near the shore. Yet close enough not to get caught up in the force of the current near the middle of the river.
I sailed through the fork leading me along the river toward Ulara.
Closer to where I ascertained the village to be, I found an embankment and went ashore to a small clearing beyond the sand. Then I went back and lugged the front of the canoe ashore as best I could so at least it wouldn’t get washed away.
Light was breaking above the treetops.
Dawn was almost upon me.
