Eight months earlier
UNMAPPED
February 23rd, later
I step closer, the stench of your sweat and blood thick in my nostrils. Is this what death smells like? I try to keep my hand steady as I reach forward and touch your skin. It is on fire. But you are alive.
‘Ty?’ I whisper.
You don’t stir. I feel for the pulse in your neck and find it easily, racing, on fire too.
‘I’ll get water,’ I say.
I run back to the car, grab a couple of the bottles I bought from the petrol station. When I return, you haven’t moved. I am scared to turn you over. Shaking hard, I reach my fingers to your matted, bloodied hair. I did that. I did all this to you. I feel tears welling as I look.
‘Ty, I…I didn’t mean…’ I whisper again.
You remain motionless. I slip my fingers underneath your head to find your face. I feel for your breath, my fingertips brushing your blistered lips.
‘Can you turn?’
When I grip your shoulders to push you, you moan in pain, so I stop. But I’ve seen enough to know your front is much redder, much worse. I drip some water onto my fingertips andpress them to your lips. You close your mouth when I try to give you more. The weeping blisters across your shoulders need water too. I go back to the car for the cotton sheet, shake out the dust, then soak it. I don’t care if I’m using too much water. I return to lay it across your shoulders, down over your back and legs.
In the kitchen, I find a bucket and bowl under the sink. After sprinkling salt from the jar I brought in from the shed, and pouring in more of our precious water, I return to you. I try to dab away the blood dried down one side of your body, but there is so much of it. The water turns pink, then red, then brown.
‘Stop,’ you hiss.
At least, I think that’s what you say. I step away from you, and lean in the doorway. I wouldn’t want me helping either. If I can do all this to you, what else am I capable of? Soon, your breathing gets heavier, and I know you are sleeping. Is this where our story ends? You sleeping here, slipping away from me, burnt from the land and from what I did. I can’t deny that a part of me feels satisfied: I wanted to hurt you. And like this, you don’t talk back, no nasty comments, you’re not craving drugs. I can imagine you however I like.
But I almost killed you. And the feeling I have as I look at you is not relief or release. It’s fear. And it still isn’t enough.