Page 50

And after a three to one vote in favor of our pineapple adventure, we set off. First, we stop to fill all our water canteens and grab a little jerky for the road. Then Zee leads us down a path I’ve never seen before, overgrown and nearly hidden beneath tangled vines and leaves.

After two hours of walking we take a break to eat and drink. Zee sits in front of me and I notice how muddy she is again.

“We really need to get you some shoes, Tink.”

She shrugs, as if it isn’t a bother to be traipsing through the jungle barefoot. “I’m used to it. I can’t even remember what it feels like to wear shoes anymore.”

I give her a tight smile, but inside my stomach knots. I hate that she’s been out here so long she doesn’t remember something as simple as wearing shoes. Something you’d do everyday back at home.

Home.

What the hell is taking Reece so long, anyway? I suppose the storm would have kept him away, but he must be closing in on us now, right?

I can’t wait to take a real shower, sleep in a real bed and eat a nice big juicy cheeseburger.

But more than that, I want to get Zee off of this damn island.

Every day here is a day too long. Every day here is a day she could be back at our home enjoying life the way she should have been all this time.

West suggests we get going, so I try to shake my thoughts free as I get to my feet, helping Zee up even though she doesn’t need it. She smiles up at me though, and that helps to cut a little bit of the sadness that’s starting to penetrate my usual bubble of happiness.

I don’t usually let things bother me. I know Reece will find us. I know we‘ll get out of here. But Zee brings something new to the equation. Caring so much for another person leaves me feeling vulnerable and on edge. Though I wouldn’t change it for the world.

I love having her in my life, she doesn’t make it harder, she makes it better, bigger.

We march forward, and I decide to take the lead, hoping it will help clear my head. We go through some parts that are extra muddy and have to slow our pace to get through them without losing a shoe.

I start to wonder if we perhaps chose a bad day for this when Zee suddenly yells, “Bower, look out!”

But it’s too late, my foot lands heavily in a puddle of mud. Except it’s not a puddle, it’s fucking quicksand, and I immediately sink into it, right up to my armpits.

“Fuck!” I yell, trying to claw my way out. They try to reach out to me, but somehow I’m out of reach of any of their outstretched hands.

“Stop moving! You’ll sink faster!” Zee yells in a panic. With only my head, shoulders, and arms out of the water, I look up at their panicked faces.

“What do I do?” I ask, trying to stay calm, but internally freaking the fuck out.

“Hold on, we’ll toss you some vines!” West yells, and they all scramble to cut some down. It doesn’t take more than thirty seconds for them to toss me a vine, and I luckily haven’t sunk any further. I wrap the vine around my knuckles and the three of them pull.

“Ahh! Stop!” I yell. “It’s not working, it feels like it’s gonna rip my fingers off!” I unwind it, breathing heavily as we try again with just my grip to hold on, but it keeps slipping through my fingers.

“It needs to go around your waist,” King tells me .

“Okay, I’ll try.” I don’t feel good about putting my arms underneath the mud, but I lower them anyway, and as soon as my elbows touch it, I start to sink faster. Everyone yells for me to stop and I lift my arms back out. But I’ve clearly sunk another two inches. “Fuck.”

“Stay still, Bower,” West calls, watching me intently. “We’ll get something for leverage to lay across the pit.”

“Okay, try to hurry though, I’m… not sure how long I can stay above it. I can feel myself sinking.”

“Hold tight, we’ll get you out of there,” he says with a determined tone. I watch as he and King start looking for downed branches or trees, but nothing they grab seems long enough.

Where’s Zee?

I slowly move my head, trying to see where she’s gone, and catch her in a tree to the side, cutting down handfuls of vines. Then she jumps to the ground and begins to braid two long vines.

What is she doing?

I decide not to bother asking, she seems frantic and we don’t have time for explanations right now.

“Shit, they’re all too short!” King yells in frustration. His panicked eyes meet mine, and the fear I see there has me realizing that I’m probably not getting out of this.

I swallow the lump in my throat. “Take care of them,” I say, just loud enough for him to hear me.

His eyes go wide with fear, then he narrows his gaze and points angrily.

“You do not fucking give up on me right now. We are getting you out of there! You need to stay positive, I can’t deal with your defeat on top of your rescue.

You will stay alive so we can get home to Reece.

You can’t leave him. It’d destroy him. You hear me, brother? ”

I nod my head, trying to stop myself from panicking even further. King and Reece have been my best friends for most of my life, I couldn't imagine losing them, either.

“Don’t worry, I’ll get you guys home if it’s the last thing I do!” Zee yells. My eyes turn to her and I watch in absolute fear as stares at me with a determined glint in her eye, her legs bent as if ready to jump.

What on earth is she doing?!

“Zee! No!”

She takes one step then leaps into the air, landing right in front of me, as mud splatters across my face.

She’s already waist deep in the mud as I try to grab her. “Zee! What have you done?!” I say in a panic, trying to keep her up.

“Stop moving, you’re making it worse!”

“What are you doing?” I ask again.

“I’m getting you out of here.” It’s only now I notice she has one of the braided vines she made around her waist and another one in her hands.

I follow the other ends of them and see they’re tied to a tree near King and West. They seem to notice at the same time I do and quickly move over to them, getting ready to pull.

I watch in horror as she lowers her hands between us and the mud starts to swallow up the rest of her body. My hands shoot out to her neck, holding her head above the surface.

“Zee, stop! You’re going to go under!”

“I can do it. I just need to get this around your waist. I have to move closer.”

I don’t even think her arms can reach all the way around me.

What the hell is she thinking?

She pushes her body right up against mine, and I feel her arms moving around me as I try to keep her head up. Mud covers her where I’m holding her face and it makes the panic in my chest grow.

“You guys need to pull her out! She’s sinking!” I yell to King and West.

“No! Not yet, I can do it!” she yells back with a determined scowl on her face as her arms keep moving around me.

“Tink,” I whisper, making her look at me as she continues working. “Don't make me watch you drown here. I can’t handle that.” I shake my head as tears fill my eyes.

Her scowl softens and she gives me a pained smile that hits me hard in the chest. “You think I could handle watching you drown? Bower, you need to get out of this pit and get off this island. You have a whole life out there waiting for you. I’ve known for a long time that I was going to die on this island.

And if it’s my time now, at least I got a little bit of happiness in my final days, and get to die saving someone I love. ”

My eyes widen at her confession and as I open my mouth to respond, she yells, “Pull!”

Her chin starts to lift from the mud, and her eyes widen in fear, confusing me. “Not me! Pull the other one!” she yells. But they, thankfully , don’t listen. They keep pulling on the vine tethered to her waist, dragging her from the mud, one long drag at a time.

I watch in relief when they finally get her entire body safely on the ground. They kneel beside her and look her over. “Are you okay?” King asks as West grabs her face, making sure she’s breathing and awake.

“Yes, I’m fine,” she says, batting them away and getting to her feet. “We need to get Bower!” She moves to the end of the vine wrapped around me and they immediately place themselves in front of her, taking the brunt of my weight .

“Okay, together now, ready and heave!” West calls. I finally feel the hard tug of the vine Zee wrapped around my waist. The next time they pull, I move, just an inch, but it’s something.

“I think it’s working!” I yell. West keeps commanding their synchronized efforts, as I’m slowly pulled, inch by inch, towards the edge.

When my arms are close to reach, they drop the vine, and West and King run over to grab my arms, pulling the rest of me free.

They don’t let go until we are twenty feet back from the pit, then they both sink to the ground beside me, exhausted.

Before I can even catch my breath, Zee is on me, literally. She drops down onto my lap, straddling my outstretched legs, and wraps her arms tightly around my neck. I pull her close, relief flooding through me that she’s okay. That we’re okay.

We sit in heavy silence for a few minutes, the weight of what just happened pressing down on us. My mind races with a million thoughts; how close I came to dying, how Zee risked her life to save me, the terrifying idea of dying here, and the revelation that she loves me.

As my adrenaline starts to fade, I pull back and grip her face in my large mud covered hands. Her eyes are filled with tears, making my anger at her self sacrifice fade… just a fraction. “Tink, now isn’t the time, but you and I are going to have words about what you said out there.”

Her eyes widen slightly in fear, and I lean forward, gently pressing my lips to hers for a quick kiss.

“I don’t know why you think my life is worth more than yours, but that is not how this works.

The three of us,” I say, motioning to me and the other two guys, “aren’t leaving this island without you. ”

“But I— ”

“Shh.” I cut off her rebuttal, pressing my fingers to her lips. “Let’s talk about this later. Right now, I just want to get this mud off of me, what do you say we head back and go for a swim?”

Her shoulders sink in defeat and she nods. A squeak leaves her when West scoops her up from my lap, carrying her in his arms back the way we came.

King offers me his hand and helps me stand. He pulls me into a quick hug. “I’m glad you’re okay, man. You really scared me for a minute there.”

“I scared myself, too,” I admit, pulling back to give him a lopsided smile. Then we turn and follow West and Zee back to the safer part of the island.