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I didn’t want to venture into the jungle.
I curled up into a ball, wrapped the netting around me, and tried to sleep. Only my eyes opened with every crack of a stick and every unusual howl from a monkey, a warning to its family of danger lurking nearby.
Sleep is impossible, so I’m writing this entry to capture my fear.
I don’t know what will happen next.
There’s barely enough light to check my writing, although enough for me to feel safer so I might get a few more hours of sleep.
With the intrusion of sunlight blaring down on top of me, I came to. Then a figure blocked the light, and my vision cleared.
He was one of them.
I wrestled with the netting and sat up. Though my sudden movement unnerved him, he jumped back.
He walked away and found a fallen log and sat on it. He looked awfully like the same man I saw a few months ago.
I said hello several times and pointed to myself. “Ivy.”
He ignored me and continued to stare.
I was also busting to pee.
I climbed out of the canoe and headed downstream a little and away from the strange man. He began to follow until I held up my hand, insisting on privacy. He didn’t understand my words, yet the hand signal worked. He stopped when he realized what I was about to do, only he didn’t turn away. So, I peed in front of him on the edge of the river, and not at all ladylike. I zipped up my shorts and then washed my hands, along with my legs because I might be wild, but I want to keep my last shred of hygiene.
When I’m closer, I signaled to him for a drink. Then I rubbed my throat. After watching my charade, he then turned and assessed the bamboo behind him. He waved me over and cracked the bamboo, which I drank out of it like a long cup.
He yanked down an overhead branch full of dark purple berries. I ate one then I couldn’t stop.
I asked him if he was taking me to his people. He merely sat down again as though he was about to watch a show.
At this point, I knew he wasn’t a threat.
Maybe an assessment of whether I’m a threat, and he’d not take a risk for now. I also reminded myself how outsiders were not welcome in his village.
I walked back and gathered my bag then sat on another log in the shade and out of the sun.
With not much else to do, I’m writing this entry like a scientist.
I still don’t know if I can go back or what happened to my friends. Did Maria know they were looking specifically for me? I wasn’t worth anything for a ransom, although I guess they didn’t know anything except I was from another country, and as I learned from their theft, they were desperate people.
Now I’m the desperate one.
I left my son and husband, who love me, believing I was doing something valuable in the world.
Now I’m in a world where I don’t belong.
And every day will be a miracle from this time forward.
I’ll keep writing in this journal for as long as my two blue pens last.
It might be my only link to maintaining any sanity.
34
EDEN
Rose whimpers, and both Brenda and I glance up from the journal.
