Total pages in book: 67
Estimated words: 67263 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 336(@200wpm)___ 269(@250wpm)___ 224(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 67263 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 336(@200wpm)___ 269(@250wpm)___ 224(@300wpm)
"Hey!" I wiped the water off my face. "Everyone be quiet and. . .think. We have to figure out a solution. Never accept death. Always keep fighting."
Yet, doubt moved in my mind like a dark cloud and it was hard to see any solution ahead of me. The options seemed bleak and uninviting. I felt like I was wandering in the dark, without a map or a compass to guide me. But then Em's face flashed in my head. She was pregnant. The baby and her would need me.
Little Max Jr. I've got to be there for him.
Chapter 6
The Hole
F
or what felt like hours, the freezing rain hammered into us, seeping through our clothes and numbing our skin. It was cold and cruel. Puddles of water rose over my legs. Carried by the rushing water, pebbles and plant debris swirled around my feet.
It wasn’t that the rain was only filling the hole. Water spilled in from the sides of the opening, creating a small waterfall. Jean-Pierre was right, the hole was at the bottom of small hill.
How are we going to get out of here?
We sat in the dimly lit hole, enveloped in muddy misery. The scent of death and wet earth filled my nose.
I studied the two skeletons slumped against the mud wall--white and brittle. Bits of clothing clung to the bones. One skeleton was missing its lower jaw. The other appeared to have broken its spine. Nothing lay within their chest cavities, not a heart, lungs, or soul. It all had rotted away long ago.
But wild flowers grew around their ankles. Roots and weeds entangled along their rotted hip bones.
No one had come to gather their bones for a burial. They were lost, abandoned, and forgotten.
How long had they been there? Did Timur know them? Had they been his enemies? Or did they just happen to be walking along and fell?
I shuddered as I faced my own mortality.
All the shit in my life. All the things I tried to do to. . .be somebody. . .
I closed my eyes.
Will I just end up as old, rotted bones in this pit? Nameless. No story. No one to mourn me?
I opened my eyes and watched the other men.
Jean-Pierre stared at one of the dirt walls like he was watching television. His hands lay on his puddled lap. His fingers were clenched into fists so tight that his knuckles were white. So many expressions played on his face--anger and sadness, terror and despair.
What is going on in his head?
I turned my view to Boris. He rubbed his hurt wet ankle over and over.
How much pain is he in?
I would have spoken to them, but I had nothing to say.
All we could do was remain silent and take the rain’s beating.
Sometimes, I caught them staring up at the hole, and I would look up too, hoping for someone to save us.
Minutes passed.
The storm continued. It was constant freezing water and frigid wind, hitting us over and over. Each gust of wind was like an ice pick piercing my skin and stabbing deeper and deeper. Penetrating me down to my core.
Surely, my soul froze.
I wrapped my arms over my body, protecting it from the bitter wind that pierced through me. I’d never been this cold in my life. The chilling wind fought against the warmth of my body, greedily pulling it from me.
Please, God. . .help us.
Did Boris and Jean-Pierre pray in their heads too?
All I could do was talk to God in my mind the whole time, begging Him for shelter and help, pleading with Him to give me another chance.
Please, God. Please.
The storm fell in sheets of water. A continuous rush, washing over us. Soaking. Almost drowning.
And then the water rose up over my hips.
The skeletons legs lifted and swayed with the water.
Wanting something to do, I checked my jacket for my silver joint case. It was too wet to smoke. I just needed the comfort of the case. But, when I checked it was gone.
“No!” I frantically rubbed my hands under my jacket. “God, no! Please, God! No!”
Jean-Pierre widened his eyes. “What’s wrong? Where you shot?”
Boris’s voice thickened with worry. “Are you injured?”
My eyes watered as I tried to hold onto my little bit of sanity. “My case of weed is gone.”
Boris frowned and looked away.
Jean-Pierre muttered several things in French.
“Em got that case for me and it had my last bit of Special Queen. 50/50. Skunk and Power Bud. Perfect cherry flavor on the tongue. I was saving it for a rainy day.” I raised my hands to the sky and fisted them. “Why, God!?”
My mind split after that. I spiraled into darkness, not even trying to grasp for hope. I kept talking to God in my head.
There was one point where I doubted God could hear me in my head, so I started whispering through the pounding rain, hoping my words lifted up to the heavens.