At some point we had walked beyond any sign of human habitation, and there was nothing but desert and ocean and sky. We walked up from the shore and out onto the road, so that we could get a good look at the desert. Gnarled trees no taller than a man dotted the horizon. Smaller bushes covered the sand as far as we could see. There was nothing promising about it.
Late in the afternoon, we stopped for a rest. Zeller reached into his pack and took out the fish. Santiago took out his bayonet and set about cleaning them.
Zeller and I searched for wood and kindling. We found some dried-out seaweed along the shore, and several dead trees. They were dry and brittle, and burned well once Santiago had a small fire going.
And then it started to rain. The water fell in huge drops, pregnant with filth. It wasn’t the rain of home. Zeller put on his raincoat. He had grabbed Cooper’s when we left the hotel, and now he gave it to Santiago. I pulled my poncho out and put it on.
“This might explain why there’s no traffic on the road,” Santiago said. “Probably won’t see anyone out here for a while.”
I set out my canteen cups and they filled quickly. The water smelled like rotten fish. I dropped a chlorine tablet in each of the cups, and handed one of them to Santiago. “We could get all kinds of diseases from this shit,” I said, pointing to the fish and the water. But then nearly everything around us was a potential source of disease and death.
He laughed. “That’s the least of my worries,” he said. He looked down at the water as if there was something there for him to read. “My neck is totally fucked and you’re worried about whether I should drink the water.” He put the cup down and dug in his pocket for a cigarette. “It’s insane,” he said, looking out at the ocean.
The fire quickly went out in the rain. We tried to relight it under the cover of a tree, but it was really pouring now and the wind had picked up as well.
I looked at the raw fillets that Santiago had prepared. The fish smelled awful, but my stomach grumbled with need.
“What kind of fish is this anyway?” I asked.
“Fuck if I know,” Santiago said. “It sure was ugly though.”
“They smell like shit,” added Zeller.
We stood there looking at the fish for some time, and then Santiago cut a small piece from one of the fillets. He held it under his nose for a moment, then extended his arm, breathed deeply, and shoved the chunk of fish in his mouth, swallowing it whole. Zeller and I stood there watching him.
“I’ve tasted worse,” he said.
He cut off another piece and repeated the approach, but this time he gagged afterward. Then he raised his hand to the filthy wound in his neck, as if he could hold back the pain. I couldn’t imagine anything worse than being wounded in that rain. The dirty water stinging the wound. The rot of everything it touched.
We had to eat to bolster our strength. I cut several small chunks off and swallowed them whole, washing them down with the foul water.
The rain and the wind kept up, and soon enough we were all shivering. I tied a T-shirt around my neck to keep the water off. My canteen cups were full again, so I poured the water into my canteen and dropped in another chlorine tablet.
Michael had said that it would rain for a month, and now I could imagine it. The aftertaste of fish and water was unbearable. Santiago handed us each a cigarette. We lit them in turn, cupping our hands so they wouldn’t get wet.
Then we were sick, one after another. It seemed to last forever. When the spasms finally stopped, I sat down beside the road, rinsed my mouth out, and tried to compose myself.
“Somebody doesn’t like us,” said Santiago, sitting down beside me.
Zeller collapsed on the other side of me.
It was impossible to be sure in these conditions, but it seemed as if the light of day was fading.
“We’ll stay here tonight,” Santiago said, offering another cigarette.
I took out my poncho liner and tried to cover myself for the night. There were soft, muddy clouds low over the calm ocean, and above them ominous clouds the color of a freshly plowed field. Between these two layers a thin strip of sunlight was visible.
As I succumbed to exhaustion, I couldn’t hear anything over the sound of the rain. I listened intently for helicopters, Humvees, or tanks, for any sign of our forces. But all I could hear was the rain.
I woke up during the night, my face wet with rain. For some reason I had a strong memory of a girl I’d kissed once as she cried. It was beautiful, her tears wet against my lips and my cheek. Softly, I spoke her name to myself, trying to recall the taste of her, trying to breathe it. Lura, Lura.
I turned to face the ocean. The wind was stale and rotten, and I knew there was no chance I’d get more sleep. My thoughts turned back to the grisly scene I’d witnessed the day before. To the mob and the pair of adulterers. And then there was the little girl, trying to hop after me as I ran away. How could anyone ever love me after something like that?
In the morning we stood and stretched in the rain. We sipped at the water in our canteens and joked about coffee and how it was Wednesday. “Hump day,” Zeller said.
We set off down the road this time, tracing the shoreline.
Walking was much easier on the paved surface. We were careful to avoid the muddy potholes, in case they held a land mine. But we didn’t want to lose sight of the ocean, so when the road turned
