The Dreaming: Dark Star (Book 5)

The bridge, part 2

         

No one said anything and so I did the next thing I could—I told the children near me to give me their pants. "Hold on, Lyle. Just a moment and we'll get this sorted."

Lyle nodded and turned back to concentrate on his task.

The children were reluctant to give their clothing, so I taught by example and took off my pants, exposing my watery thighs and butt, marbled with excessive varicose veins.

A boy beside me did the same—and shocked me with his lack of underwear. And slowly, one by one, we created a length of clothing.

"Hurry!" Lyle screamed. His whole body was shaking.

"Here, hold this end and don't let go!" I told the group of children, and I went forward carefully and threw the makeshift rope over him and peered down.

There was a chain, which started with Lyle, ended with Tee-Jay, with I assumed was Ari being stretched in the middle.

Tee-jay was dangling clear and holding on for dear life. He didn't seem to notice the pants now dangling beside him.

"Tee-Jay," I yelled. "Take the pants."

Tee-Jay opened his teary eyes and saw the pants. He shook his head. "I can't let go," he screamed.

"You must let go, Tee-Jay. You need to grab the pants before Lyle drops both of you."

"I can't," he countered.

"You must. If you don't then you are going to die. Lyle can't hold you for much longer. You can do this, Tee-Jay, and you must."

Teejay didn't respond, which I took as a good sigh. He was probably thinking it over.

"I'm going to count to five, Teejay. And when I get to the number five, we're going to hold onto this rope for dear life and you're going to grab it. Got it?"

Teejay didn't respond, so I started counting. "One-two-get ready," I said to the kids, "Three—get ready Teejay-four...and finally I screamed, "Five! Jump Teejay!"

And the rope made of pants went taught and the children holding it lurched forward under Teejay's weight. And I screamed as I heard something rip... and I was certain Teejay would end up in the water below. But somehow, magically, the rope held.

"Lyle—I get up!" I yelled.

"I can't move," he whimpered. His arms had been extended for so long that he couldn't contract them.

"Lyle!" I screamed. "Move your fat ass!"

Lyle started crying, half in frustration and half in anger, it seemed.

"I can't," he cried out. "I can't fucking feel my arms, nevermind move them.

I leaned over to look at the two dangling children, one dangling from some old pants, and one dangling from Lyle's dead arms.

"Ari—," I called down.

The child had his eyes closed and didn't respond—he was holding onto Lyle's outstretched arms fiercely.

"Ari," I yelled. "Look at me!"

No response.

"Ari, you little bastard—you better look at me or I'm going to find a stick and push you into the water!"

Ari finally looked up, tears running down his face.

"Good kid. Look, I know you're scared. This is really scary."

Ari nodded.

"Look Ari, Lyle can't pull you up. You're going to need to pull yourself up. You need to climb up Lyle. You're light, you're strong. You can do this. I'm going to find something to help you.

Meanwhile, Teejay saw what he was meant to do, and he started to climb up the rope made of clothes.

"Good, exactly, Teejay. You see that Ari—you're going to do exactly what he's doing.

"Okay," Ari relented as he watched Teejay climb.

Teejay neared me and I got down on my stomach next to Lycle, exposing the children behind me to my derrier. I reached out and Teejay too my hand and some other children laid down and reached out as well and togehter we pulled him up, over the ledge.

As soon as he was on the bridge, he fell to his knees and hugged himself.

I looked down at Ari, "Now it's your turn, Ari."

Ari reached out with his feet and grabbed the rope between his legs. Whether by instinct or experience or from watching Teejay, he seemed to know what he was doing. When he'd wrapped the rope around his leg, he finally let go of Lyle with one hand and took hold of the rope.

Lyle sight audibly and shook his flabby arm. This was probably more exercise than he'd had in years. I regretted deeply that I had no pants on. It was one thing to expose yourself to a bunch of children, and another to expose yourself to a fully grown man.

Ari lithely climbed up the rope like he'd been doing it for ages. It helped that he weighed no more than twenty kilo. He was a scrawny kit with lots of pep. I swear he even had a smile on his face when he took my hand. I hauled him up with difficulty and when he got up, he jumped into the air with a scream of victory.

Lyle and I remained hanging there, staring at each other with looks of exhausted optimism.

"Okay, from now on, I go first and we take our time," Lyle said.

"Agreed. These children are reckless animals. They're not our responsibility, but we can't exactly let them all die, can we?"

"Not exactly," he replied, and we both laughed.

January 25, 2017

After the ordeal with Teejay and Ari, we took a break to regroup. We sent a few kids to find ropes and while we waited, we discussed a plan for the day.

"You should lead the group," I told Lyle. "Take your time, test each foot before you place it and we'll hopefully get there in tact.

"Okay," Lyle agreed. He didn't look excited thought.

It was a few hours later when we finally started again. Everyone was hungry and no one really wanted to continue, but we did.

It was much slower going with Lyle in the lead. True to his word, eh tested each step and was quick to order us to backtrack, which grew tedious, so we developed a habit of waiting until he made up his mind, which was fine with me.

The sun was setting as we reached the end of the bridge—it was a strange sight—all these children with the backdrop of an amazing, colourful sunset. The children and the bridge around us turned to contrasting shadowy profiles.

We reached the other side none too soon, as it was almost dark. Miraculously no one was seriously injured besides some bumps and scrapes.

We set up a makeshift camp in the foyer of an old condo, and Lyle dished out some food that he'd packed with him. It would have been enough for ten-fifteen people, but being forty-seven exactly (I'd counted during the break), it was barely enough to stave off hunger pains.

I went to sleep that night exhausted, and don't remember falling asleep.