Chapter 22

Had it really been nearly four weeks since the crash landing? I couldn’t be sure; the days all seemed to blend together in one huge horrific blur and it felt more like we’d been here forever. Time really didn’t have much meaning in the jungle; I only knew that we’d spent far too much time here!

We were down to our last bottle of water between the four of us, and there was probably only enough left for a couple of mouthful’s each; we were rationing it to try and make it last as long as possible. These last couple of days had been hard going though and with heat so intense, we were beginning to get dehydrated. Once again it seemed as if nothing was going our way.

Story of our lives lately.

“Dude, when we get home, I’m never eating another banana for as long as I live!” I kicked the ground in disgust as I peeled the fruit which now turned my stomach. We were all sick to death of bananas.

“If Nick…if…not when we get home” AJ reminded me. He was in a lousy mood and I couldn’t blame him; I think we all were.

“We’re going home, no ifs about it!” Brian retorted, a look of sheer determination on his face. I hoped his optimism would pay off.

“Whatever!” AJ replied, in no mood to argue with Brian.

I know four weeks isn’t a great deal of time in the great scheme of things, but when you are stranded in a Peruvian jungle with fuck all to eat and drink, then it becomes kind of a big deal. Not to mention the fact that five…no six guys had already died so far, then the odds weren’t exactly stacked in our favour for getting out of here.

I don’t think any of us were in the mood for anything. It was hard to stay motivated when it didn’t seem to get you anywhere. Why was it taking rescuers so damn long to find us? Why hadn’t we managed to find our way out by ourselves…we’d been walking for long enough! I felt as if maybe this was it for us, we were destined to spend forever in this friggin hell hole. I ran my hand over the scruffy itchy beard - which I couldn’t wait to get rid of – and sighed. Life was cruel.

~*~

Just to prove how cruel life could be, Howie took a turn for the worse later that day.

We’d all thought he’d got over the infection which had taken hold of him just a few days previously. He appeared to be on the mend following the surgery I’d performed. But now it seemed as if that had all been for nothing. I suppose it was inevitable really, we had no antibiotics or sterile equipment; I just prayed I hadn’t fucked him up even more. What if by cutting away at his leg I’d introduced some other bacteria into the wound along with the infection he already had? What if my actions caused him to die out here? What were we going to do now? Were we really going to have to amputate out here in the jungle?

I sat with my arms wrapped around my knees and cried for a long time.

Why? Why did Howie have to get sick again, especially so quickly? Why couldn’t a search party suddenly appear out of the trees and whisk us out of here? Even if we were found, would Howie’s leg be beyond saving? I felt disgusted with myself for moaning about the lack of food, water and showers. How could I be so selfish when one of my best friends was in such a bad way?

“Nick…” AJ placed his hand on my shoulder but couldn’t find any words to say.

“It’s alright” I sniffed back the last remaining tears and took a deep breath “let’s do this” I stood up and rolled my head from side to side to shake off the ache in my neck from sitting hunched over for so long.

“We could just leave it a while and see how it goes” AJ’s voice had a pleading sound to it.

“We could, but it’s not going to get any better is it?” Brian shook his head.

“Just chop it off” Howie writhed in pain “make the pain stop…please”

“Howie…” I began but he interrupted.

“Nick…Brian, please” he cried, looking to us with huge sad, pain-filled eyes.

“I’m scared” I admitted and choked back fresh tears. What if it went horribly wrong and he died because of my actions? Because let’s face it, it was going to be me who’d have to do this. Brian didn’t have the stomach for it, although he’d do his best. And AJ…well, he would prefer to stay in denial about Howie’s condition.

“Don’t be” Howie begged.

As much as I didn’t want to do this, I knew that this time I wouldn’t just be cutting away dead flesh; I’d have to take off the whole leg from the thigh down.

“Alright” I said in an almost whisper.

Just how I was going to do it was a mystery though. Did I just swing the machete and chop it off like a butcher would chop a leg of pork? Or should I take the smaller knife to it and saw my way through it slowly? I had no idea and neither appealed to me. The thought of it made me sick to the stomach.

As if reading my mind, Brian pulled me out of Howie’s hearing distance and said we should go for the fast option. I could sort of see his point. Imagine getting so far and not being able to carry on, leaving his leg dangling. I took a deep breath and put that image out of my mind.

“Aw man, you can’t be serious” AJ cried “we can’t cut his leg off”

“AJ, we have no other option, you can see for yourself how bad it looks and it’s only going to get worse” Brian explained.

“But it’s his fucking leg! He’ll never walk again” AJ sniffed back the tears.

“If we don’t do it soon, he’ll never do anything again” I agreed with Brian. Although I hated the thought of Howie with one leg, I hated the thought of no Howie at all even more.

“But…oh, I don’t know…” AJ was lost for words and threw his hands up in the air in exasperation.

We boiled up the last remains of the water to try and sterilize the machete. I wasn’t going to hack his leg off with a dirty weapon if I could avoid it. We’d worry about what to drink later.

Brian prepared Howie for the amputation by tying a makeshift tourniquet tightly around his thigh and giving him something to bite down on. This was going to be more painful that anything any of us had had to endure and I wished I could do something more to ease his suffering. I would gladly absorb his pain if I could.

“Wait, I think I heard something” AJ protested as I picked up the machete.

“AJ, we’ve gone over this, we have to do this” Brian said.

“Shhhhh” he held his finger to his lips to signal us to be quiet.

“What is that?” I queried, having heard something too.

We all waited patiently for the noise to become clearer, none of us wanting to get our hopes up in case it was another false alarm or a figment of our imaginations. But when it did get closer, we could’ve wept with joy.

It appeared our prayers were about to be answered. A helicopter hovered in the air high above us.

Collectively we screamed, waved and jumped around (apart from Howie of course) hoping that they could see us. Surely they had binoculars or something and would spot three lunatics dancing around and an injured man lying down in the dirt?

They did.

The helicopter stabilized in the air and a man in a bright orange jumpsuit was lowered on a winch. Slowly but surely, he made his way down to us on the ground. All four of us began crying with relief.

“We’d given up hope of finding you guys alive” he said as he unfastened the harness and strode towards us.

“Thank fucking god you‘re here now, any longer and we would be dead” AJ cried tears of happiness, as did we all.

“Someone must love you guys a lot, we were paid to fly by one more time to check for survivors. Thank god you were somewhere visible!” he said and took in the sight of Howie “let’s get him up first”.

“Guys?” Howie groaned in pain and confusion.

“It’s going to be alright Howie, we’re safe now” I told him, wiping away the tears on the backs of my hands.