He wanted to oblige me. I said, Should I take the picture? (My own camera still moist and scarlet, so Id have to use his.) I knew he would refuse me. No, he said, theres the tripod and the timer. Ill do it that way.
He set up under the giant spread of a durian tree. Every delicate adjustment to his camera and the tripod a kind of mute tribute to me. An apology. I said a little prayer. Where did I direct it? I dont know.
Are you sure, Louis asked, that this is really the best possible angle?
I nodded. He blinked back his chauvinism. Because it wasnt the best angled shot, by any means. And he came to stand next to the flower. He reached out his arm to me. He wanted us shoulder to shoulder. Like comrades. I obliged him.
We both stared into the lens. Louis counted down, under his breath. Ten, nine, eight, he said, seven, six, five. We werent even propped and stilted and steadied yet when the fruit came down. The durian fruit. It falls in July and early August. A giant, spiky bomb of a fruit. A menace.
Phut!
It killed his camera. Yes! It killed it stone dead. And that, I told myself, is the law of this fucking jungle. M.
Twenty-One
Ronny was sick four times, Lily shouted, like she was proud of his achievement. Jim didnt answer. He was skulking in his bedroom, hiding. He couldnt face her. She busied herself around the prefab. She rescued the pie from the pan in the kitchen which was threatening to boil dry and then tried to invite herself to dinner. She craved a slice of something meaty.
Jim listened as Ronny ejected her. He did it so gently. He said her mother would be worried. He said it was getting late. He said he needed to rest a while. He played every stroke with such grace and finesse. Jim envied him. And Lily, in turn, wanted to nibble him all over. Her foot didnt even sting any more. This was a new reality, she told herself. This was a brand new world. She could step right into it. She could shed her old skin.
Ronny finally closed the door on her. He went and found Jim sitting on his bed. He had been upset by something. Ronny could tell. His eyes were red. He wore no hat. He was round-shouldered, diminutive, buff-headed. Guess what? Ronny was jovial.
What?
Kidney stones!
Really? Jim didnt brighten.
Kidney stones. They can be very painful. And hed been having these bad rumblings for ages but hed been too frightened to go and see anyone about it. He thought he was dying. Thats why he came here.
Jim shook his head at Lukes apparent weakness.
Sara gave me directions but stayed hiding in the car. I took him in. It worked out just fine in the end. I left the Volvo at the farm. You could pick it up tomorrow. Luke can get a cab home when hes ready.
So how do you feel? Jim said.
Me? Ronny was cheerful. Resolutely. Absolutely great.
Really?
Yes.
He glanced over his shoulder. I see youve got the fire burning.
Jim noticed that Ronnys hands were shaking. He quickly stood up. Would you like something to eat?
Uh Ronny nodded.
Jim went into the kitchen. He dished up the pie. He could hear the fire crackling in the other room. He picked up the plates and walked through. He stood in front of Ronny and offered him his plate. Ronny put out one hand to take the plate, then his other. Both hands. A battle took place, inside him, on his face. But he could not take the plate. He suddenly grew stiff. He froze. It was as though he was restraining something huge inside him. An uncertainty. A monstrous indecision. A blank-ness. He was paralysed.
Jim put down the plates.
Jim put down the plates.
Oh God, he said, I shouldnt have made you go. I knew it was wrong. I have a powerful instinct for survival. Thats all. Its my downfall. Its horrible.
Ronny tried to speak. He whispered something. Jim couldnt hear. He drew nearer. He put his ear close to Ronnys lips, then closer still until finally he heard him. Such a little voice.
Im lost. Im lost. Im lost.
Jim felt sick. No. Youre not lost.
Im lost. Im lost.
Jim grabbed hold of Ronnys hand. He had never held another persons hand before. His mothers hand, perhaps, when he was very small. He had been held himself, forcibly, but he had never held.
Help me, Jimmy, Ronny said.
Jim could see in Ronnys eyes that he was leaving. He was walking away. His pupils were big at first but then they grew smaller and smaller until they were almost only pin-pricks. Little black tadpoles drowning in a dense, swampy green. He was far. He was further. Like his whole soul was vacating.
Jim wanted to speak, but what could he say? What did he have to say? Nothing. Nothing. He tried to reach inside himself for something concrete, but all he could find was Monica and her words. Monica and her world. Because Monica had a strength, a colour, a real solidity, but hidden inside an almost infinite uncertainty.
Jim started speaking. Randomly. Babbling.
Come back, he said, I have something to tell you. I have a friend, he said, called Monica. Shes far away too. Far away. And shes trying to find this missing ape. She calls it the oran-pendic. It lives in Sumatra. In the rain forests. They have volcanoes. And the worlds largest flower. She says in the summer the whole place reeks so violently of pepper that your nostrils feel fiery.
Pepper? Ronnys voice, dazed, dead, an echo.
Pepper. From the plantationsbut theres tea and timber and coffee too. Its a kind of paradise. Fertile and steaming and opulent and lavish. The very opposite of this empty place.
Oran?
Pendic. Which means upright. Hes covered in a pale-coloured hair. He has no big toes. She says he walks the forest but hes so alone. He mistrusts. Hes full of fear. And she has no real evidence that he exists, just one brief sighting. Shes never even seen him but she loves him. She believes in him and thats enough. Its all instinct with Monica. Shes so Words failed him.
Ronny closed his eyes and saw a chasm. He gasped.
Intense, Jim said, thats it. Shes so intense. Theres this story she told me, Jim paused and then started off again, winding himself up like a clockwork mouse, a watch, a musical box, about the day she went to take a photo of the worlds largest flower. Rafflesia arnoldii. Shed been spending all her time in this bat cave and so she didnt want to go at first
Bat cave?
On Ronnys face, a flicker of recognition.
Yes, yesbat cave Jim pounced like a spider. The cave. The darkness. He started talking. And before he knew it he was weaving a yarn. He was spinning it and braiding it and twisting it. And Ronny was found and bound and reeled in. Slowly, surely, safely, soundly.
He was hooked.
Twenty-Two
Lily was invincible. She placed one foot in front of the other and that alone proved it. Legs are strange, she thought. Pink and stick-like and joined at the top but they work in a way that is truly extraordinary. She loved herself. She stared down the dark road.
These pale sticks, she told herself, will take me from here to there in no time at all. She wondered what distance consisted of and whether you could abuse it. Then she plotted her route via Ronnys sticky expulsions. She inspected the wide sky for meteors. She whistled.
Near home, soon enough, on the farms long driveway, close to the fence which ran along the boar pens, she hunted for Ronnys second ejaculation. She was counting down. She was dot-to-dotting. She had nothing better to do.
Three different places, she inspected, and in none of them did she find what she was looking for. Ahead she saw a shadow in the roadway, like a puddle. Thatll be it, she told herself, and drew closer. But then she stopped. It was not a liquid but a solid. A small thing. Hunched over. Engrossed. She held her breath. She skirted, tremulously.
But she could tell that he had good ears. He was a wild one. And he walked on little stumps, but not quickly. He shifted his position. He was not afraid of Lily although caution was inscribed deep within his genes. His giant head was domed. And his mouthparts, they were moving. He was licking. He was gobbling.
Lily edged, she pulled as wide as she could but she was hinged, somehow, on to this thing. It held her in. It plotted her perimeter. Needle-toothed. He chewed. He growled as he ate, unintentionally, breathing laboriously through his flat, misshapen nose. And what was he eating?
Oh God, she whispered, Youre eating Ronny! What are you doing?
But the creature did not respond. He remained stooped. He kept on scooping. And Lily kept on edging until she was past him. And then she walked and walked, in slow motion, feeling something ghastly at the back of her.
Sara had bathed. Her hair was coiled up in a towel. Her head was buzzy with regretfulness. A kind of sweet-bitter-sweetness.
Lily came in wiping her mouth. Like shed been kissing. She had mud on her nose and savage eyes. She smelled of bile. Sara tried to smile but there were miles between them. It was easier not to speak. And so much cleaner.
Twenty-Three
Ronny, darling.
Were still not speaking. Louis and me. Hes slow to forgive. It takes him a while. Each new situation leaves him spinning. He has to dig in his heels hard, hard, take a deep breath and then struggle to acclimatize.
So Im back in the cave. The bat cave. You understand these places, dont you, Ronny? These dark places with tough, rough walls. With each notch, each rocky dimple so staunch and reliable? And every single, individual breath and rustle and whisper and footfall I make is answered by the darks harsh leathery voice. The darkness attends. It never ignores. With its black eyes and soft grip it asks for nothing, it gives nothing.
And here I find a balance. Because if I were a scale Id be tipping, Ronny. Id be all lopsided. Id be tilting. I dont want to tilt. But I was despairing; walking in the forest, surrounded by brightness but not seeing. Understanding how every single natural thing here has its own special place except me. (And Louis, naturally, but he doesnt care less where he fits.)
I dont want to be the exception. I so want to merge. It was eating me up. I saw myself as an excrescence in the forests vivid walkways. I was pink and bald in the midst of its green. It was painful. I was squinting and gaping and scrabbling for shade. But then I found the cave. The bat cave. Its a giant. Its roof is all bat-fleshy, like suede. Upside down and dangling. These bats, they chatter. They shit. They blister. Their radar bounces. Ive been getting the feel of it in my jaw. I know it sounds crazy. Inside the soft parts of my mouth. The radar gets trapped, temporarily, and sparks from cheek to cheek like static electricity.