Chapter 17 | The Place Where it Rains, But You Don't Get Wet

The rain’s coming down hard and fast, big drops the size of your face, running off leaves that are even bigger, making a sound so loud it could drown out a tiger. There's thunder and lightning and the midday darkness of clouds and overhanging foliage. It's always raining here, always warm and wet, sideways from the rest of the world, difficult to get to, impossible to leave. Red-headed Mike ran as long and as hard as he could, clutching his stolen slingshot and a pocketful of darts he'd grabbed from the assailant’s satchel back at the clearing. At one point, he'd hidden inside a hollowed out tree trunk, and he could feel the assailant’s eyes and breath mere inches from his neck. But Mike knew all about hiding from grownups, and the assailant never realized he was here. Mike waited for what seemed like two and a half days before emerging from his shelter. So many places to hide here, and if you moved just right, you wouldn't get wet. The important thing, his dad always told him, was to just keep on moving. But Mike was tired of all the moving. Fourteen times in his sweet, short life. He used to think that's what everybody did till his family moved to Sketchtown. Once in Sketchtown, always in Sketchtown.

Here in the jungle, nobody would ever find him, and he could stay forever if he wanted to, live on bugs and lizards, an occasional snake or bird. Lots to eat, and lots to do, he almost forgot about the assailant trying to catch him. Crouched on the jungle floor, Mike stretched out flat on his belly in the mud and slithered forward slowly and deliberately, eyes scanning back and forth in search of the enemy. He rolled onto his back to look up to where the sky would be if not for all the cover. The coast was clear. He rose slowly and began to move forward, suddenly scared by a screeching bird. The roar of the jungle was subsiding as Mike’s brain began to filter the crucial from the chatter. At the very edge of earshot, he could make out faint radio signal and voices, sideways from the direction he came. He kept to a line leading perpendicular to the signal noise, deeper into the rainy woods, still miraculously dry as he walked and jumped and hopped towards the night.

Days are long in these parts, but only barely lit through the deep green shade casting shadows overhead. The signal noise subsides the deeper you go. You wouldn't be surprised to find a whale swimming by, suspended by air thick with moisture and gravity. Mike’s eyes are wide with the discovery of strange jungle creatures attached like barnacles to sprawling trees. Birds with ten foot wingspans circle high above, patiently.

Mike sits down on a rock to stare at a long cut on his hand, unsure how it got there. Directly ahead, a fer de lance is coiled in the vegetation. Mike picks up a stick to poke at it, but changes his mind at the last possible moment. The snake’s not moving, but it's definitely alive, and Mike can feel its subtle breath travel through the ground and up his leg. Still not moving. And Mike holding his breath, suddenly afraid, but not crying. No idea how to get back to where he came from, paralyzed by the venom of fright coursing through his veins.

The radio chatter and voices are closer now. The whomp whomp whomp of chopper blades in search of a landing zone. Men in face paint and blood, desperately seeking a clearing that’s supposed to be here, but isn’t.

Mike closes his eyes and covers his face, waiting for the snake’s next move.