Chapter 2 BEE #2
Three of them are toppled onto others, a barely balancing pyramid of dented plastic. Four are crushed under the weight of the stampede. One is a ramp leaning against a parked, ruined van. The rest are metres away.
I don’t know which one to start with.
Tesni tugs away, her fingers slipping from mine.
She darts for the bodies sprinkled over the dirt but doesn’t pause to check their faces. Her gaze is sweeping over the bodies, the outfits, checking for anything familiar, like the hot pink cowboy hat.
I take a different strategy, and bring my hands to my face. I cup my mouth, as though it’ll increase the volume of my incoming shout—
But I suck in a large, chest-filling inhale before I pause.
A loud groan comes from the pyramid of portaloos.
I jerk at the sound.
Tess is further up the way now, trying the handles of the portables.
I turn my gaze up at the pyramid. “Hello?”
I don’t know what caused the groaning sound. If it’s the unsteady stack threatening to fall, or the bowing of plastic setting in… or someone stirring within one, trapped, not yet sure it’s safe to come out.
I drop my hands. “Louise?” I inch towards the trio of toppled portables. “Ruby? Ramona…?”
The door rattles.
I loosen a ragged breath—and drag my gaze up to the third portaloo, the one toppled on the two others, the peak of the pyramid, the one out of my reach, that’s the one with the rattling doors.
There’s a choked grunt, like a sudden release of oxygen and a hissed, “Get the fuck off me, I can’t breathe,” that sounds so much like Louise, but at the exact same moment, Ramona’s voice calls out, “We’re in here! Bee! The door’s stuck—ow, that’s my foot, bitch!”
I scramble for the pile of cubicles and, in a blink, I’m scrambling up them. The plastic groans under my weight, the pyramid trembles, but that doesn’t stop me.
“Tess!” I shout as I hoist myself up. “They’re in here!”
The raining thuds of bootsteps is quick to follow.
But before Tess reaches us, I’ve scaled to the top—and I see what’s trapping the girls in there.
On the door, is another one. Another door from another cubicle. Well, a piece of it at least, and it’s wedged into the handle on one side, and the other end is crammed into the gap between two loos.
“Well…fuck.” A huff sags me. “I see it!” My shout is chased by the thuds of boots climbing the plastic pyramid. “We’ll get you out of there, it’ll take a minute.”
I glance back at Tesni.
She’s crouched down at the bottom of the spare door, eyeing it over. “We’ll have to lift it first, then slide it out of the wedge.”
I squint against the sun turned up at full dial.
The heat is scorching me again, and I almost wish for the return of the flocks just to ease some of the burn.
I sigh something weak and exhausted, then flex my grip on the edge of the door as best as I can with clammy hands.
“Ready?” Tesni shouts up at me. “Lift!”
The background noise is a hum and murmur from inside the cubicle before I hear the familiar hiss of Louise’s chiding, “Just stop stepping on my fucking knee. I swear you’ve bruised my ribs already!” and Ramona’s snarled response, “Bitch, I was blacked out—give me a fucking break.”
My chin tugs with a grimace.
I’d hate to be in there with them.
Probably all toppled and turned around, upside-down and sideways in a literal shitbox.
“Slide!” Tesni’s shout snaps me back. “To the right, pull it to the right!”
My fingers are gripped onto the door so tight that red and white blotches appear on my knuckles. My skin squeaks, too sweaty, over the thick plastic.
Tesni’s grunt is quick to turn into a shout as she angles her measly weight into it. She’s not ridiculously small or slight, but the girl has no muscle mass at all.
I might be doing all the work.
My shout is too gravelled, too exhausted, “Bet you wish you’d come to the gym with me now.”
Tesni’s mouth is twisted into a bared-teeth look at up me. “Never in my life.”
Before I can retort, the door jolts out of the gap, and my boots slip over the plastic.
“Bee!” Tesni’s charged shout follows me as I fall back. I hit the bottom cubicle, hard. “Fuck, fuck—Bee? Bee, are you ok?”
A grunt catches in my chest. “I’m alright, I’m alright.”
The thunder of bootsteps rattles the pyramid.
I blink up at the glare of the sun above, still scorching us, merciless.
A shadow bobs into the bright light.
Tesni has climbed to the top cubicle, and she peers over the edge, looking down at me. She seems to think I look unharmed enough, because, “What’s the matter?” she says. “Pissed that the gym didn’t save you from that?”
Sprawled on my back, I huff an annoyed sound, then flip her off.
The shadow of her head disappears.
There’s a rattle and a thud that comes from above before Tesni calls out, “The door’s dented. I’m gonna pull—and you kick from the inside, alright?”
There’s a chorus of groans from the cubicle.
“Wait,” I grunt and force myself back up. I scale the edge to join her at the top. “Door’s jammed?”
Tesni gestures to the lock, a handle that should be on the door, but isn’t.
It’s gone.
Must have been kicked out by a sharp hoof in the stampede.
“We force that door open,” I sigh, “and a whole lot of shit is coming our way. Literally.”
It doesn’t stink over here for no reason.
I don’t even want to think about the mess in there.
Tesni makes a face, her gaze swerving between me and the door. Then her boots backslide as she inches away.
I throw her a glare. “Are you fucking serious right now?”
Tesni gives a lame smile. “You’ve got this. I believe in you.”
A scoff jolts me before I grip the broken edges of the handle. “Ready? Now!”
I pull.
Instantly, my shoulders ache, like my muscles are stretching like toffee on a hot day. The strain reaches my twisting face.
The door shudders.
The kicks from the inside, the boots smacking hard on the plastic door, trembles and cracks the whole portable.
Tesni backsteps again, a retreat down to the next loo—
And her timing of self-preservation is impeccable, because just a heartbeat after, the door bursts open, so hard it smacks me on the head, and I’m thrown off the pyramid.
Hands clammer for me.
Tesni’s flailing attempt to catch me mid-fall is a failure. All she manages is to tumble with me, and we crash down to the dirt.
Gods, fuck, damnit.
Can’t breathe.
Can’t breathe.
My teeth grit against the cold ache springing up my back. Stars are dancing in my blurry vision, speckled over the black jeans cutting into my line of sight.
Tesni writhes beside me, her muttered cursing not nearly as winded as my whispery moan. The scrape of her jeans on dirt hisses at my ear as she forces herself to sit upright.
She cups her knee and rubs soothingly—then she stills and her stark, horrified gaze is aimed up at the top cubicle. “Holy fucking shit.”
I trace her gaze to the girls, clambering out of the portable.
Louise emerges first; she’s hitting back at the others, her crimson face alight with rage.
Then Ramona, fraught and trembling like a leaf in the winds.
And Ruby, her face streaked with tears, lips wobbling.
But each one of them is covered, and I mean covered, head-to-toe in shit.
The grimace Tesni makes is quickly hidden as she lifts the crook of her arm to her face. She hides from the stink.
It draws nearer as the girls climb down to the ground, getting too close for my liking.
Tesni’s thoughts are on the same track. “No you don’t,” she starts. “You stay right there.”
I hold a hand, a stop gesture and shake my head. “Please.”
Louise throws a wild look at me, her chest heaving with rage. The crimson of her face has darkened to an ugly purple.
Tesni throws fuel on her fire. “Rinse yourself off. Go. Go find water.”
“Seriously,” I add with a sudden severe nod, “if you don’t wash that off you might get sick.”
Ruby’s face tightens.
Ramona is hardly listening. Her hand is pressed firm to the bloody stain on her head—she must have knocked it hard in the stampede.
Tesni turns a disgusted look on me. “They are not getting in the camper like that.”
I choke on a half-hearted snort, then flop onto my back. My hands find my chest, thrumming with a racing heart, and I let myself just breathe.
Just breathe for a moment.
That’s all I need, a moment.
Perched on her folded legs, Tess eyes up the girls like they are walking plagues. “Guys, you really need to rinse that off—you’re gonna get sick if you don’t.”
I loosen a breath. “I’m certain that’s how you catch ebola.”
Tesni throws me a frowned look. “E.coli.”
“Oh.” I nod, but the correction doesn’t quite land. Not while I work through my breaths slowly easing the ache in my chest. “E.coli.”
Then I flinch—
Ramona shrieks a squealing sound, “Am I the only one who wants to know what the fuck just happened?”