Dry Lands, Chapter One
When the helicopter made an emergency landing in the wide forest pit, Milo was still sleeping. The panicked pilot ordered us to exit immediately, but my husband, Felipe, refused to leave. I held Milo outside in the stale air, bouncing him against my breast, waiting for Felipe. I was anxious for my husband to tell me we were safe; I waited for him as long as I could. But the rotor blades weren’t slowing down quick enough. It was too much for Milo. Chaotic. I stayed far away from the helicopter, stopping at the edge of the woods.
“Mama?” Milo groaned. He quickly placed his head on my shoulder, as though we were simply walking from the rocking chair back to the bed in the dead of night. As though we were home. But we weren’t home. Home was gone. Nonexistent. Our journey had been long. He was exhausted and in need of sleep. His head grew heavy against my face. His legs dangled at my hips. Behind me, the copter’s blades began to slow down. Felipe and the pilot were still in the helicopter, assessing the source of the gas leak alert that caused the pilot to suddenly land. I urged Felipe to exit the helicopter with me and Milo, but he refused. “It’s probably just something electrical,” he insisted. “I’ll be right there.” Felipe was a talented electrician by trade; no problem was too challenging for him to tackle. I trusted his intuition.
Soon, the blades came to a pause. The forest was still. I heard Felipe’s voice echo from the helicopter far behind us, and it set my nerves at ease. At last, we could finally figure out our next steps together. To reassess our plan. Luckily, Milo was limp enough for me to set him down in a cool bed of grass, with my diaper bag as a pillow. I shook my arms out. They’d held a toddler tightly since the start of our journey, since we first stepped onto the helicopter. I tucked a loose hair behind Milo’s ear as he slept among nature.
When the helicopter burst into flames, Milo’s head jolted from the explosion. My first thought was not of Felipe still in the helicopter but of our food supply. Felipe was strong. Felipe could survive anything. Food could not. I was not thinking straight. But as I turned to the flames, I realized no one was exiting the copter. Not the pilot. Not Felipe. I placed my sweater over Milo before running wildly toward the blaze, where Felipe was either being swallowed by flames or stumbling deliriously off the burning craft. Why couldn’t he just let the pilot figure things out? Why did he always have to be so damn helpful? My heart pounded through my chest as I ran to reach my husband.
I tried to see past the fire and black molten smoke, to identify where Felipe could be. Maybe he was in the tail of the copter, collecting our luggage. Or maybe he was in the cockpit, trying to rescue the buckled pilot. I came as close as I possibly could. My face became singed. Smoke poured into my throat. The flames grew bolder and louder. I tried to march right into the belly of fire, but what good would it do for Milo to lose both parents on the same night? I screamed for Felipe until my voice broke. This was a battle I could not win even if I were a god. There was nothing I could do.
Nothing.
The fire covered the helicopter and crept into the nearby brush. The fire would come for me too if I wasn’t careful. No screams came from the helicopter. Only whooshing flames and crackling fire. I told myself that Felipe was taken from the world instantly. The explosion – the gas leak that was definitely not an electrical issue – claimed him without struggle. He was at peace. He wouldn’t want me to stand around and ponder his death, to pontificate on his pain. He would want me to take Milo to a safe place and keep us both alive. I ran from the flames toward the woods.
The night beyond the flames was a darkness I’d only heard about in stories. Like being lost inside a dripping cave, miles beneath the earth. I found a fallen tree to lean against as I held Milo with quivering hands. I didn’t stray far from the flames – our source of light. There was nothing I could do but sit idly by, holding my son, keeping him warm while he slept through this nightmare. I wept until I didn’t know who I was anymore.
It did not escape me that the flames that killed Felipe were the same flames keeping Milo warm that night, as the temperature began to dip. Milo slept as I watched the helicopter burn from a safe distance. I didn’t want to sleep, but I couldn’t fight it much longer. The exhaustion overpowered me. Foolishly, I imagined telling Felipe all about this in the morning. Like this would be any other event in our lives. In my sleep, I dreamt that Milo woke me with a soft hand and led me to a lukewarm river to drink.
In the silence of early dawn, the environment began to make itself known. A lush forest with wet rocks beneath my boots, the smell of a nearby creek, which reminded me of the bay back home. The soft scent of rain. Mushy leaves beneath my feet. A moisture in the air that opened my airways and mingled with the ducts of my eyes, making me unsure whether I was crying tears or creek water. With Milo tucked safely inside my Sea Isle sweater, I rose and left the sleeping boy on the wild grass. I walked toward the craft, which still crackled. I stepped over burnt ground toward the charred helicopter. I couldn’t make out much from the craft. I didn’t feel safe entering either. And I didn’t want to see Felipe burnt. Not yet.
A growl came from behind me. A bear raised its head from a boulder just beyond and stared at my sleeping boy with predatory eyes and a mouth full of teeth. The bear lifted its beastly head as if to bask in the scent of a fresh human boy. As it hovered there, furry and huge, I felt murder rising in my bones. Felipe’s gun. There was no time to ransack the still-burning craft for it. I grabbed the nearest piece of helicopter debris and marched toward my boy. I stood over him, holding the wreckage over my head, hungry for the bear to try me. The bear cowered and growled an understanding sigh before disappearing into the woods.
When Milo woke up, he said, “What happened?” and pointed toward the wreck.
“An accident,” I said.
“I wanna see.”
“No. Danger.”
I wondered about food for him. As for me, I could not eat. But I wondered if our food survived the explosion. It was packed in a fire-resistant box. Did it work? It had been Felipe’s idea to get the box. I scolded him about it at the time. “We don’t have time for that!” I had yelled.
I wondered about that bear.
I wondered about Felipe. His body, his wishes. I could not function without him. My heart could not function without him.
My husband was dead.
Felipe, dead. God.
Our journey had come to a tragic stop.
Milo pulled my shirt up and began to nurse. This was one thing to cross off the list. In the empty woods, no one was around to tell me to stop nursing a three-year-old. And yet, the silent, shrill voice of judgment still found its way to me somehow. Milo placed his hand on my stomach, twisting his finger around in my belly button. For some reason, his vulnerability made me cry. When he pulled away, he asked about the helicopter again. He watched the lingering flames and he looked at the woods where the bear had disappeared just moments earlier. I could not speak. I didn’t know how to explain anything.
Milo pulled my shirt back down for me. Then he sat up.
“Mama,” he said in his sweet morning voice. “We at BeezBo’s house now?”
“No, this is not your Bisavó’s house.”
“Oh. Mama?”
“Yes.”
“Mama, where’s Dada?”
“I don’t know, Milo.”
My hands shook.
“Oh. Mama?”
“Yes.”
“Mama sad?”
“Yes, Milo. I’m sad. Very sad.”
“Mama?”
“Yes.”
“I make you better.”
The boy gave me a peck on the cheek and waited a long, long while for me to stand up.
