Refracted

The husband straightened up and addressed us. I felt very proud of him. Under other circumstances I probably would have applauded him. Look, he said, I am going to have to run and get help. My aunt and I looked at him as if he had gone mad. It’s the only way, he insisted. No one is going to come and look for us. With that, he removed his flip-flops and plunged off bare-foot down the dirt road and was gone. I wondered if I would ever see him again. Visions of him being eaten by wild dogs or hyenas with vultures pecking out his eyeballs played out in technicolour in my mind.  Pictures of him dying of dehydration in the middle of nowhere floated before my eyes. Meanwhile the resourceful Aunt was apportioning the water and trying to see how many days supply of water we had per person. “I told you we should have brought spare underwear,” she said. She then started scavenging around in the river bed to see if there were any ants or other creatures which would be possible food sources.

What seemed like a few days passed by with the children disconsolately scuffing up the sand and dust and drawing with sticks in the sand. It was actually half an hour. The heat was terrible. I looked at my Aunt. I could see she was seriously stressing.

-         Do you think it’s likely that any lions could come this way? She ventured. Maybe we should build a fire around the car to warn them off?

This side of my Aunt with this need to make fires was something new to me. I thought people in the fire service were trained to put fires out, I muttered but the thought of spending the night in the complete pitch darkness in the middle of Nowhere was rather terrifying. Another hour went by and we all moved up on to the bank of the river into the mottled shade of a sprawling acacia.

It occurred to me how good the children were all being. They were sitting in a little circle playing some made-up game in the sand. The youngest had by now shed all her clothing apart from her nappy and sunhat and the sweat was trickling down her chubby little shoulder blades.   Oh God, I thought, what if we all perish here? What if , what if.. Auntie was obviously thinking similar thoughts because she rose suddenly and marched off in a very determined fashion towards the 4X4 and yanked the side mirror off. She then proceeded to angle and tilt it towards the sun and flick it away with a grim look on her face.

- What on earth are you trying to do? I asked trying not to laugh.