Steven Gould - Jumper:Griffin _s Story

Hands lifted me, helping me to sit. I managed a wheezing breath without coughing and opened my eyes. Sand. Gravel.

The Empty Quarter. I touched my forehead-there was a ragged gash, crusted, above my right eyebrow. I dropped farther and felt the side of my neck. There was a scab, like a rug burn. It tugged when I turned my head to see who was helping me to sit up.

"Mas comodo?" a rough voice asked. White teeth flashed in a salt-and-pepper beard. I shifted back slightly. He wore a straw hat and a blinding white button-down shirt, worn khaki shorts. His eyes were hidden behind mirrored aviator shades. His skin was brown but he didn't look Hispanic. Tanned.

"Excuse me?" I managed.

"Oh," he said. "More water?" He offered me the plastic bottle.

I accepted it and sipped cautiously, trying not to breathe it again.

"What happened, kid?"

I blinked. What had happened? Something at home, the woman who said she was from the school district…?

I think I screamed then. I know I jerked upright and surged to my feet and my vision dimmed.

Not sure how much time passed, but I was lying down again, on my back. Someone was holding something over me, which shaded my face from the sun. It was a black umbrella and I could see the sun shining through the black cloth and the spokes, spotted with rust. The hand holding it was thin and wrinkled. I followed the arm to a woman with jet black hair, wrinkled brown skin, and dark eyes like still pools of night.

She saw me watching her and said something in Spanish, to the side. I started to sit up again and a hand, not hers, pressed me back down.

"Let's not and say we did." It was the bearded man from before. "Unless you want to pass out again. There's a nice puddle of dried blood here. Didn't see it before-you were lying on it, but I'd say you're better off lying down, okay?"

The wracking sobs came then. I remembered it all, every bit, flashing over and over, from Mum screaming "Go!" to the blood and the motionless eyes staring into nothing.

I think I passed out again.

The light was different-the sun had shifted halfway across the sky and the wind had picked up. Instead of an umbrella, a blue plastic tarp shaded my entire body, flapping gently in the slight breeze. A clear plastic bag half filled with fluid twisted and bounced with the movement of the tarp. A tube dropped from the bag and I watched it for several minutes before realizing it was running into my arm.

Crunching footsteps crossing the gravel came closer and then the light changed again as someone stuck his head into the shelter.

"Estas despierto?" It was the woman from before, the one with the umbrella. She watched my face for some sign of comprehension, then tried, "You okay?"

"Okay? Yes, uh, si. No hablo espanol."

"Okay. Good. Okay." She pointed to a plastic bottle lying beside me, mostly full of water. She mimed tilting a bottle up to her mouth. "Okay?"

"Right. Uh, okay."

I tried to sit up but she shook her head. "No. Descanza. Estate quietecito."

I dropped back. My head spun from the slight effort to sit up. I explored my side and found a mass of gauze and tape on my hip. I found a smaller bandage on my forehead, running up into my hair, the tape tugging painfully when I touched it. I wasn't on the ground, I realized, but lying on a stretcher, one of those canvas things with two poles locked apart. Turning my head without lifting it, I realized we were no longer in my gully but on some raised hillside. I could see miles across desert, over gullies and low hills.

They'd moved me.

Driven me? Carried me?

I thought about the night before and it was as if I were stuck, frozen. My mind just stopped working. I didn't pass out but I lay there staring at the ceiling trying to think but it was too much-my mind was just shying away from it. I knew it had happened. It was the gauze on my head. My brain was wrapped in gauze-white, fuzzy gauze-and it was hard to feel stuff through it.

I heard someone shout from far away, "Hey, Consuelo! Un poco ayuda!" The woman sitting beside me patted me again on the shoulder and ducked out under the edge of the tarp.

As soon as she was standing upright I heard her footsteps go from a walk to a jogging run. After a minute footsteps returned, more than two, but there was a dragging sound, too, and then the bearded man and Consuelo were back, a man supported between them. His face was bloody and swollen and though his limbs twitched as if to help support him, he was helpless as a baby.

The bearded man glanced at me, watching, and said, "Hey, pardner, think you can get out of that stretcher? Got someone here who needs it worse."

I blinked, then sat up carefully. The bandages at my hip tugged and my head swam just a bit but my vision didn't dim like it had before. I edged off the stretcher away from the newcomer, then slid the stretcher toward them, holding it steady as they put the newcomer down.

There was a rapid exchange in Spanish of which the only word I understood was "banditos" and they were working as they talked. Consuelo was wiping blood off the man's face as the bearded man hung another bag of liquid from the same line that supported mine. He cleaned a spot on the inside of the man's elbow with a wipe from a tear-open packet and then slid a needle into the skin.

I winced and looked away. When I turned back, the needle was connected to the tube hanging down from the bag. The wind died for a moment, then shifted around, and I could smell him. He smelled awful, like one of the dirtier homeless guys around Balboa Park-rancid sweat and a whiff of urine.

"Uh, need a loo… bathroom." My voice was a rasping croak but understandable.

The bearded guy was putting a foam collar around the neck of the man on the stretcher. He looked up at me. "Really? That's a good sign." He reached over and pinched the back of my hand.

I jerked it away. "Hey!"

He shook his head, chuckling. "Pinch the skin on the back of your hand and let go. Where I can see."

"Why?"

"Dehydration. The longer the skin stays tented, the more dehydrated you are."

"Oh." I held my hand up, palm down, and did what he asked. The skin pulled back flat pretty much as soon as I let go.

"Hold still," he said. I froze and he peeled back the strip of tape securing my drip needle, then pulled it out, one quick, smooth movement. I felt a tug and then there was a red dot welling up. He handed me an antiseptic wipe. "Put pressure on it with that-hold it high. While you're peeing you can close your elbow over it." He put his own finger over the inside of his elbow and pinned it by folding his arm up.

"Where's the loo-uh, toilet?"

He laughed. "Pick a rock."

I ducked gingerly out from under the tarp. My head spun and I bent over for a moment, bracing my hands on my thighs. After another moment things settled and I straightened carefully.

There was a battered four-wheel-drive pickup parked between two boulders, so dusty I couldn't tell what color the paint job was. A large pair of binoculars and a battered orange-and-white ice chest sat on the tailgate. Two camp chairs sat in the partial shade of a mesquite bush.

The pressure in my bladder reminded me why I was standing. I took limping steps in the direction of the largest rock down the hill and peed behind it.

It took me longer to walk up the hill than down. It wasn't just gravity. Without the full bladder I didn't have the motivation, the need, and the gravel hurt my bare feet. It was hard not to just lie down on the ground right where I was and curl up in a ball.

The bearded man ducked out of the tarp and glanced at me. "You okay?"

No! I thought, but I nodded and resumed my painful limp up the hill.

He motioned toward the camp chair. "I'm Sam," he said. "You got a name?"