Gaia

chapter 3, The River

part 2, installment 2

by Tala Bar

Installment 1 appears in this issue.

“It would be better if we kept calm and thought of some way and means of getting me out of this,” Dar replied, with an evident effort to control her voice. Both women fell silent for a while. Dar, for a change, was not thinking of anything practical; instead, a picture from her past rose before her eyes.

The three of them, Bard, herself, and her elder son Shell were on an outing. They had never actually left the City on such occasions, the best places of recreation were on the lake’s shore. They had gone to some length to find a site that would look less polluted than any other. Arriving at a place they had never been at before — and not likely ever to go back there again — they saw some withered trees growing out of the sand along the waterfront. The place, instead of being paved as usual, was a stretch of sand, displaying for the city folks a misleading appearance of pristine nature.

Shell, a four-year old child at the time, was allowed by his parents to take his shoes off and run around among the trees. With an aching heart Dar remembered him, laughing and enjoying himself. Suddenly, that sound changed into a scream of fright and a cry for help. Sitting with Bard, she recalled how she had barely recognizing Shell’s voice.

They rushed to him and found him sunk to his hips in a sandpit, catching him just in time before he vanished out of their sight. They had never returned to that area, warning all their friends against it; afterwards, they took to checking any new place they came to before letting any of their children loose in that manner, adding another limitation to their very limited possibilities of enjoying life.

Perhaps that was the moment that determined for Shell that there was never a moment to lose, that he should not waste time in doing anything in life but what he wanted most to do. That must have been why he chose art as occupation rather than a safe profession, as his father had done.

‘He was right,’ Dar thought, recalling her son’s happiness in doing just what he felt like. ‘They are all gone now… Shell, Bard, little Gin… never to be happy or unhappy in their lives…’ Her heart shrank, returning to the first moment of the catastrophe when she would have preferred to join them herself.

“Pity we did not think of taking a rope.” Nim’s voice interrupted Dar’s morbid reflections, bringing her back to the present. She had Nim to look after now, she could never leave the girl, to face danger and hardship by herself.

“I don’t remember seeing any on the way,” she replied; “but if you look around, you may find something like it...” Not quite believing it herself.

“There!” The girl exclaimed, shrugging off her backpack. “Here, Dar, you take hold of one strap, and I shall pull at the other.”

“Careful! Don’t come too close!” The woman called out as the girl stretched out her hand holding the sack. She grasped at one strap while Nim pulled at the other but, instead of getting Dar out of the mess, the girl was pulled toward the sinking woman, dragged half over the flashing bog. Dar, of course, was not only heavier and stronger than Nim, she was also well anchored in her place to be moved.

“No,” the physician cried, letting go of the strap, “you must find a stable hold to anchor yourself to. What about that big chunk over there, that seems strong enough. And see if you can’t open the straps so that they stretch a longer way.”

Nim crawled back and stood up, some of the colorful goo smeared on her clothes and bare arms. “Phoo!” She expressed her disgust. Looking about her, she saw the big slab of concrete sticking out of the mud. Following Dar’s advice, she released one end of each strap to make a longer stretch. Throwing one end toward Dar as far as she could, she held on to the other and went behind the slab, hugging its rough edges while ignoring the scratches they were leaving on her body. Then she called out to Dar to pick up the sack’s strap again.

“Hold hard, I am pulling!” She shouted.

“Concentrate!” Dar shouted back at her.

Nim held tight to the end of the strap, closed her eyes and pulled as hard as she could. After a few moments that felt like eternity, another ‘plonk’ was heard, and one of Dar’s feet popped out of the florid slime; she then pulled out the other, and was dragged along the tacky patch to the safety of hard ground.

“Oof,” she hissed, remaining lying at Nim’s feet for a few moments. “That was a close call...” Having the calamitous earth upturn around her, she had never thought she would be in danger of drowning in a bog of plastic. They stayed carefully off the gooey patch for the rest of the day, both needing their physical and mental vigor restored. They passed an uneventful night, waking up to a morning of bright sun and cloudless sky. The sparkling light played on the plastic sheet, creating an association to a magical mantle hiding deadly secrets underneath.

“Where shall we go now, then?” Asked Nim despondently, as they sat leaning at a block of debris, slowly munching their dry breakfast and sipping from the river’s water.

Dar looked around. The gaudy marsh had spread far along the river; the only place looking free from it was the river itself. ‘Perhaps the crows will come, show us the way as they have done before,’ she thought, unreasonably. She reflected, ‘Is that the reasonable way to think from now on?’ She felt it was not exactly reason that had been helping them up till now; or, at least, not reason on its own.

“Look!” She heard Nim calling out, waving her arm, “Here she is again!”

“Who? Where?”

“That fairy witch! She’s over there, beyond those channels, right on the… Look! She’s waving! I’m sure she’s waving to us!” Nim waved frantically, as if trying to catch the attention of that imaginary sight… the crows, as if answering her inner wish, were there also, flapping their wings, moving in a certain direction. And there, indeed, was the woman, quite visible.

“I think I see her, also…” she said slowly, reluctantly. I don’t think she’s waving, I think she’s beckoning…”

“Beckoning?” Nim dropped her arm as she turned to face Dar.

She’s directing us to go on the river; and that’s also the direction the crows are taking.”

“But didn’t you say we couldn’t go without a boat?”

“We can wade in, and maybe swim a little,” Dar said, deciding that if the woman was not a figment of their collective imagination (as was the Amazon forest), then she must have been an answer to an unpronounced hope.

Circumnavigating the edge of the plastic spread, and climbing up and down over fallen masonry, the two women found their way to the water. ‘Good thing it’s not real autumn yet, and the weather is warm enough,’ Dar reflected, as they plunged in. The water was not really warm, but not too cold to prevent dipping in.

“Look at these crumbly, colorful shards,” Nim said, picking them up from the water.

“It must be that plastic thing. It seems to harden in water,” Dar explained. They continued wading, going toward the stirp of partially dry land, which lay beyond the first channel. The water in it did not get higher than their waist.

“Lucky these sacks are waterproof,” Nim commented as they climbed on the pebbly ground. Once there, they continued on their way down the stream. It did not really matter in which direction they went, but they had come from upstream and where there was no point in going back there.

There was nothing for them to look for in that direction, and Dar thought they would best continue to look for new vistas. ‘I doubt it could as bad as what we’ve already been through,’ she reflected.

They walked until the sun went down and stayed the night on that strip of land. The ground was level, and lying on the blanket was a little more comfortable than their nights in the industrial zone. The sound of the water lapping at the edge of the land created a soft lullaby in their ears.

For a moment Dar was afraid they might be too close to it, but there was nothing else they could actually do, there would be no sense in crossing back to shore.

The danger came closer to them when they woke up in the morning and found one edge of the strip of land assaulted by raging water. Having risen, they remained standing, staring at the river threatening to swallow their place of refuge.

“We have no choice, you know,” Dar said, quietly. “We’ll have to swim to the next strip of land. Can you see it, over there?” Dar said.

Nim did not answer for a while, and the physician turned to look at her. The girl was shaking her head, her face reddening. “I can’t swim,” she whispered. “I never had the chance to learn.

Dar hugged her. The girl’s difficulties certainly had not been her fault.

“Never mind,” she conforted her, not quite sure of herself, “we’ll find a way.”

They took of their walking boots and put them in the sacks. They had not done that before wading in the first channel because Dar there might be something dangerous at the bottom of the river. But for swimming they would be better off barefooted.

“It shouldn’t be too difficult, swimming down river,” Dar commented, “all you have to do is try to float with the flow without sinking. You just spread your arms and legs as you lie on the water, let the current carry you. And I’ll support you and direct your floating the right way. Don’t worry, I won’t let you drown.”

Nim was hesitating, and Dar tried not to show she noticed it. Carefully, they stepped into the water. The riverbed was uneven. In places, it was shallow enough for them to put their feet on the ground; from time to time, though, the ground dropped from under their feet. When it happened, Dar would make Nim float on the water, and she would swim by her side, guarding her direction.

Losing sight of the shore in those times, Dar noticed the crows appearing from nowhere, flying over her head in the direction she had to go. Mysteriously, they seemed to be carrying the image of the mysterious woman among them, as if showing her they were not acting on their own. Dar could not stop to ponder the meaning of all that, too busy keeping herself and Nim safe on the water. It took the great part of the day. When she noticed the reflection of golden rays hitting her eyes from the slanting sun behind them, she began to fear they would have to stay the night in the water. That would be the greatest hardship they had met up till then, because she was sure they could not do it and stay alive.

In a few moments, though, her feet hit firm ground, and the next she knew they were climbing on to another strip of land. Turning to look westward, she saw the sun touching the water. It was a glorious sight in glowing colors of yellow, pink and orange both in the sky and on the waves, but the women were too busy to pay too much attention. They stripped their wet clothes and spread them on the ground, trying to get them dry for tomorrow. ‘Perhaps we can go back to shore in the morning,’ Dar mused sadly. She never thought swimming would be so much harder than walking, but the mere staying in water had prevented them for proper rest during the day. She did not think they would be able to take much more of that experience.

There was nothing to make fire with, and they sat in their dry clothes huddled together, warming themselves with each other’s body heat.

“Who do you think that fairy woman is, Dar? You don’t think she’s another survivor, do you? Because she could’ve joined us instead of staying where she was.” Evidently, Nim had not seen her among the crows in the sky, Dar thought, not knowing what to make of it all.

“I have no answer at all, Nim,” she answered, candidly. Her own rational mind had taken a bad jolt, and she was not yet ready to expound on the idea that was beginning to sprout in her mind. “Let’s leave it at the fact that she is trying to help us, that she’s already helped us in trouble. Maybe one day…”

They spent an uneventful though not very comfortable night, sharing vague, troubled thoughts that disturb their sleep. In the morning, the crows appeared again and this time Dar pointed them out to Nim. “We’d better follow their direction,” she said, “I think they are sent to us by Her.” The strip of land was nothing but a tiny island on the river, and they had to go back into the water and swim on.

“But you said you didn’t know who ‘Her’ is?” Nim stopped on her way to the water.

“I have my suspicions,” Dar replied, dryly, “but let’s go. The sooner we start, the sooner we’ll be over it.”

This time, however, they were in luck. Instead of going down river again, the crows were flying back toward the shore. After a short swim, they were on firm land, getting away from the water, which they were glad to do. It was completely clear of all signs of plastic.

To be continued...

Gaia began in issue 88.