Alan Foster - Exceptions to Reality

When even the rugged, determined vehicle could advance no farther, Schneemann parked it on a rocky beach and broke out the packs. Covey struggled awkwardly with the shoulder straps and waist belt. Giant electric blue Ulysses and emerald-green Cairns Birdwing butterflies fluttered through the trees and over the stream. Each time one traversed a shaft of sunlight, a flash of unbelievable color exploded against his retinas. An effervescent column of soldier ants the color of key lime pie marched across the buttressing root of a nearby white cedar. A splotch of flaming orange skimmed the glassy surface of the stream, marking the quicksilver passage of a marauding kingfisher.

Covey could not remember when heavy sweat had coated his body. It mixed with the obligatory insect repellent to form a thin, stinking paste that clung to his hot, damp skin, smothering the pores. The German chose a direction seemingly at random and struck off, leaving the huffing, heavily perspiring Covey to follow as best he could.

The crowns of Alexandra palms burst overhead like frozen green fireworks, blotting out the sky. His hiking shoes kicked up leaf litter and mold, sending tiny black shapes with too many legs scrambling in search of fresh cover.

Schneemann paused by a patch of sunlight, his machete singling out a small, innocuous-looking plant with six-inch-wide, slightly pebbled leaves.

“Here is worst thing in the forest, my friend. Stinging tree. Those serrated leaves, they covered with glass spines. Glass! Each one is like a little hypodermic, verstehen ? All full of a powerful alkaloid poison. Once they get in your skin, they stay there because they silicate composition, not wood. Each time you rub, or splash on cold water, or walk into an air-conditioned room, they release a little bit more poison. The pain can last six months to two years.

“I hear of one guy got a bunch all in his face. He went mad and killed himself.”

The warning was wasted on Covey, who had resolved immediately upon leaving the Land Cruiser to avoid physical contact with everything in the forest, be it dead or alive.

It rained all that afternoon and through the night, a heavy warm vertical deluge that their tent shed with admirable efficiency. Sitting in a steady downpour while simultaneously perspiring heavily was an experience Covey would gladly have done without. It inspired nothing but colorful language.

They crossed two more ridges, scrambling up slick rock and mud only to stumble and slide down the far side. Covey didn’t dare grab a tree or branch for support for fear it would bite back.

This constant drizzle was only a prelude to what Schneemann referred to as the Big Wet, the real rainy season. That could begin any day now, he declared jovially. His announcement failed to inspire Covey to greater effort.

When he lost his footing for the hundredth time and slid twenty feet downhill on the waterlogged, torn, butt-end of his pants, he finally cast aside the unnatural enforced stoicism under which he had been laboring for days. By the time the German reached him, Covey had removed his pack and slung it to the ground.

“Fuck this, Boris! I thought you knew where the hell you were going. I thought you knew what you were doing. You’ve been leading me around in circles like a prize porker so you can scam as much per diem out of my hide as you think you can get away with! I’ve got fungus growing between my toes, an itch in my crotch that won’t go away, my clothes are starting to stink on my back, and I think all the goddamn rain’s starting to affect my hearing.” Bending over and breathing hard, he rested his mud-caked hands on his knees while he stared up at the impassive German.

“I’ve had it with this, mein führer . You understand? You ‘versteht’ or whatever the hell it is you do?”

Schneemann seemed not to hear. His thick black brows resembled mating caterpillars as he intently scanned the opposite hillside. Finally he shrugged. “We got enough supplies to go another week.”

Covey inhaled deeply, straightened. “Fuck that. And fuck this country, too. It is my fervent hope that they log it to the ground.” Turning to his left, he spat out an earthy mixture of soil, rainwater, and saliva. Angrily snatching his pack from the mud, he started forward.

A dark, hirsute mountain, the German blocked his path, smiling down at him.

“What the hell are you grinning at?” Covey snapped.

The guide held out an astonishingly clean hand. “You forget our contract, my friend. One-third when we start, another when we turn back, the last when I set you down, all nice and refreshed again, in your fancy hotel in Port Douglas.”

Covey gaped at him, blinking painful drizzle from his eyes. “You want money now ? Here?”

Schneemann twitched slightly. “It is the contract, yes?”

“Shit,” Covey mumbled. He dragged out his shrinking packet of traveler’s checks and signed several over. Schneemann fanned them like a poker hand and frowned.

“I know you are a writer, Michael Covey, and not an accountant. This is a little short. One hundred US dollars short.”

Covey took a step backward. “That was going to be your bonus if we found the women. We didn’t find them.”

“I say I take you to where they live.” He made a sweeping gesture with his free hand. “This is where they live.”

Covey pursed his lower lip. “I don’t see no women—mate.”

The German’s expression darkened. “Don’t joke with me, herr writer. Especially about money, don’t joke with me.”

“Believe me, humor’s the last thing on my mind. You’ve spent a week dragging me through God’s own puke-green shithouse and you’ve enjoyed every minute of it.” He smiled nastily. “Now it’s my turn to enjoy something.”

Schneemann took a step forward, halted. “I could make you sign another check, ya . But maybe you bring charges. All writers are crazy like that. So have it your way, my friend. Maybe I see you again in Port Douglas. Maybe not.”

Without another word he whirled and started off, ascending without effort the slope they had only recently clambered down.

Covey yelled imprecations in his wake. “Yeah, that’s right, go on and leave me here, jerkoff! I can find my own way back, you Teutonic asshole! You think I can’t? You think I can’t? Just watch me, man!”

Schneemann did not reply. In a very few minutes the forest had swallowed him up.

It began to rain harder.

Screw him, Covey thought furiously. It was more downhill than up all the way back. Just keep heading east and eventually he would hit the road and then the ocean. He had a week’s worth of supplies in his pack and he wasn’t sorry to see the departure of the sauna-like tent. What the hell, he was soaked through anyway. His light sleeping bag would do him. And he was ahead a hundred bucks, maybe more.

As for inspiration, he couldn’t wait to get home and write down an account of his crazy experiences. His agent would be intrigued. A horror novel would be an interesting departure for his client. He could call it A Stroll Through the Green Hell —or had that already been used?

He had learned that when the sun went down behind the rain it got dark fast in the rain forest. Selecting a spot between the meandering roots of a massive tree, he tore down some broad pandanus leaves and improvised a roof. Highly satisfied in his righteous anger, he settled down to await the arrival of the dawn.

It took him two days to admit that he was lost. He was reasonably certain he was still traveling east, but it might have been northwest, or southwest. Or maybe not. The permanent, oppressive cloud cover and constant rain made it difficult to guess direction. Everything looked the same: every tree, every slope, every mocking, crystal-clear rivulet and stream. Sometimes he would find himself confronting a sheer drop-off or impenetrable vegetation and have to backtrack. There were no landmarks; only rocks, mud, and claustrophobic verdure.