“Give us a minute, please,” Logan says to them. I feel his hand on my forehead, touching it gently. “Veronica. Someone is going to get rescue. If the helicopters can make it, they’ll come get you out. They’ll take you the hospital.”
I shake my head softly. “No,” I croak. “I think I’m…I’m fine. Just bruised.”
“Regardless,” Logan says, “you need to be checked out. You could have a concussion.” He pauses, his fingers trailing down my cheek. “Dammit. Dammit, I thought I fucking lost you. I am so sorry.”
His voice sounds so broken, so unlike him, that I open my eyes and peer up at him.
“Don’t be sorry,” I tell him. “I’m the one who wanted to come on the hike. And I did it because I wanted to annoy you. Seems like it worked.”
He’s not smiling. “I shouldn’t have let you cross. I saw the water levels, I saw the current, I should have stopped you.”
“I would have gone anyway,” I tell him. “You like the stubborn girls.”
He frowns at me for a moment, his gaze intensifying. Then he nods, licking his lips. “I do. I do like the stubborn girls.”
I was joking. It was a bad joke. But now he’s answering me seriously.
“Anyway,” I say, unsure how to go on. I’m shaking over what happened, my body torn by the thrill of being alive and the fright of almost dying.
“Anyway,” Logan says. He lets out a soft breath of air. “If the rescue team can’t get us, we’ll be stuck here overnight. Believe it or not, it happens all the time.”
I swallow hard at the thought. I just want to go back to the hotel. Even a hospital bed wouldn’t be that bad. After all that just happened, the last place I want to be is here, overnight in the wet, soggy, and endlessly dangerous wilderness.
“If it comes to that, I’ll make us a shelter. If someone here was doing the whole trail, they might be able to lend us a tent. There’s a real sense of camaraderie here when this kind of thing happens. We’ll be okay. I’ve got food in my backpack. It’s a bit wet but it will dry out.” He pauses. “The worst is over. I’ll take care of you.”
I’m not sure that the worst is over. But the fact that he said he’ll take care of me, that’s warming my chest, easing the shivers that have been rocking through my body ever since he pulled me ashore.
Eventually I find the strength to sit up, then stand up. With Logan’s arm on me at all times, he leads me back over to the crowd. Everyone is super friendly and concerned and preparing for a night at the beach. The stream is still raging, even higher than it was earlier, which means that the rains won’t let up for a while and there’s no way we could cross it on our own until tomorrow.
The hikers on the other side of the water are almost all gone except for Nikki and Daniel. When they see me alive and on my own two feet, they literally jump up and down, hugging each other, before they turn and head back on the trail to go back to the hotel and tell everyone what happened.
It’s not long after they leave that a couple of rescue workers and a lifeguard from Ke’e appear on the other side, but with the water still raging, they can’t cross. There’s a lot of yelling back and forth over the stream as they tell us that we have to stay put. The helicopters are having trouble in the weather and none of the zodiacs can brave the surf. Unless the wind and rain ease up before nightfall, we have to prepare for a long night.
Luckily there are a few hikers who had come back along the rest of the eleven-mile trail and have a few supplies. There are no tents for Logan and I, but they do have a small tarp for us to rig up somewhere to keep out of the rain, as well as an apple, trail mix, and packet of beef jerky. Not exactly dinner but at least we won’t starve to death. Besides, I’m pretty sure if either of us felt adventurous after all that, we could probably hike into the bush and grab some wild mangoes or papaya. I make a note of asking Logan later if he can climb up some coconut palms.
“Keeping dry is the most important,” Logan says as he grabs my hand, wrapping his fingers around mine. His palm is warm, his grip strong. He holds my hand like he means to save me.
He leads me up a small path, away from the stream and the rest of the group. “Even though it’s warm and humid, the constant rain here can make you nearly hypothermic. You’re already cold from being in all that rainwater in the stream.”
“So are you,” I tell him quietly as we walk further into the jungle, my hand still in his.
“I have chest hair,” he says. “I’m insulated.”
He stops and gestures to an area where the cliff walls come into the path and a large, broad-leafed tree acts as an arch over it. “Here. There’s dirt there that’s somewhat dry. We can hang the tarp from the tree. With the overhang from the cliff, it’ll create a bit of shelter. I’ll start a fire, and we’ll be dry in no time.”
He turns to walk away. “Just stay here, the path up there leads out of the valley, it’s wet and steep and dangerous.”
Like I’d go anywhere, I think as I sit down on the narrow patch of dry red dirt by the cliff wall. My hand feels bare without his, my skin tingling.
He disappears from sight and it’s only then that everything hits me. What happened, where we are, what’s next.
But it’s not even the ache in my muscles from the hike, the bruises that are popping up on my limbs from slamming into the rocks, the cold that’s starting to seep into my bones, despite the fact that the temperature is at least in the late 70’s.