CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Many months passed for the fallout left by Mimbeck to dissipate from his tribe.
He’d spent many long hours meeting with the men Mimbeck had convinced to join his faction, trying to help them see reason, shoring up their relational ties and creating safety and harmony once more.
He was still fighting two wars. The conflict between Makia was put on hold for now, until he was able to patch up the destruction his uncle had caused from within.
Jahnu was patient. The love for his people was often the only thing keeping him from tossing the whole lot of them out of the tribe forever, and thankfully, they eventually came to an understanding.
With Mimbeck gone, the shift of unchallenged power fell back on Jahnu’s shoulders. Though the burden of chiefdom was wearisome, it was as it was meant to be. The camaraderie he now shared with those men who had once betrayed him was worth the time spent seeking resolution.
He continued to learn new things. When it is fought for, intimacy has the chance to grow deeper after conflict.
The relational dispute Jahnu had worked hard to mend kept thoughts of Sidney at a distance. But in truth, she was always there, circling the outer rim of his thoughts, just out of reach like the moon orbiting the earth. He couldn’t allow himself to dwell on thoughts of her—though sometimes he did.
Sometimes in the darkness when sleep eluded him, he would think of how she always seemed to jump into the action of whatever was happening.
He liked that about her. She jumped first, thought later.
He liked the way she connected with the young women in the tribe, and even how she tried to cover her emotions, although he always saw right through her.
He thought of her lips and how she had tasted like the cool, sweet river water.
The texture of her smooth skin against the roughness of his hands caused desire to send shock waves into his body until he had to dunk himself in that same river—just to quell the restless longing she had awakened.
He ached for her.
She had been an impossibility from the start and he only wished he hadn’t allowed himself to get drawn into her love. But he had, and it would take him years not to feel the pain of yet another love ripped away prematurely.
With his tribe once again united, he rejoined the peace talks with Makia. He, along with Shemu and his other uncles from the neighboring Hundi tribes, entered the meeting of the counsel. They threw down the guns they had confiscated from the men Greg had brought with him in his raid.
Fiery words were shared over the rules of conflict within the tribes, and though intimacy wasn’t achieved, a cease-fire and reparations were agreed upon.
The payout would not replace the loved ones lost in the fire, but it would compensate for the loss of land. Some still thought Jahnu had settled by giving up the piece of land this whole conflict had started, but he tried to lead with the bigger picture in mind.
Hundi would benefit a percentage from the capital made by the palm oil plantation.
Money wasn’t held in high regard in the day-to-day survival of their tribe, but Jahnu was thinking of the future.
He wanted to build a school and a clinic for their dispersed tribe and knew he needed the compensation to make it happen.
If change and progress was inevitable, as Sidney had told him, he would make it work in their favor.
He just hoped the shaky peace between Makia and Hundi would continue, but he knew the nature of jungle life is that conflict was likely to happen again.
If the tribes weren’t careful, they could be back to fighting, killing each other, and seeking revenge due to minor incidents that would fester into bitterness and rage.
But he refused to prophesy a negative future.
The peace they had now was enough, and he planned to take it one day at a time. It was all he could do anyway.
The dry season came and went. Now, the wet season was quickly coming to a close, and peace prevailed. He was thankful. They had spent enough time in a heightened sense of apprehension due to the conflict. They were due a few years of calm.
He sat among his tribe as they took the evening meal together.
The chatter around him filled him with gratitude.
There was a palpable relief under the canopy now.
The heavy blanket of dread they’d worn for so long had evaporated like the fog over the mountains in morning sun.
In its place returned laughter, dancing, singing, and story-telling.
The nights lasted longer during the wet season, and the aura of this time of year reminded him of when Sidney was here in his tribe, just a year ago.
Seasons did that. They had a way of awakening memories inside him simply because the lighting and temperature were similar to when defining moments had happened.
The anniversary of losing his father and Alupa was the same, though it was becoming less so with time.
The memories surrounding the fire, losing Talmu, the conflict with Makia, and Sidney were still fresh since there had only been one wet season. One year.
He thought it strange the memories would make him feel so sick. He didn’t have much appetite lately and there was a heaviness in his shoulders and stiffness about his neck that held on for days.
Sali observed him one evening as they said goodnight and made their way to their beds.
“Why do you look at me like that, woman?” Jahnu asked in their native tongue. He still taught the children English, occasionally, but since Sidney left, he barely spoke it. He’d lost his desire.
“You are not right, Jahnu. Are you feeling ok?”
“I am fine,” he said tersely, but the old woman was not put off by his tone. She reached a scrawny arm to touch his forehead.
“You are fevered!”
As if her pronouncement made it so, Jahnu faltered in his step, feeling the effects of the fever and the heaviness in his body, and the old woman closed in against him, propping him up against her tiny frame.
Tiny, though she was, there was a strength that rose in her that allowed her to maneuver Jahnu’s larger body to his hut.
“I just need to sleep,” he said in a daze as he collapsed onto his lumpy mattress.
The room twirled and the voices in his mind rose unbidden, echoing through the chasm as he drifted in and out of sleep.
You are chief now. Keep the tribe together. His father’s voice.
Take care of our son. Alupa whispered from within.
Daddy! Daddy! Little Talmu ran to him, his little brown arms outstretched.
Make me yours. Sidney said. I love you, too.
Sensations came to him among the memories. Something cool and wet on his forehead, and then the feel of his fingers tracing the slope of Sidney’s thigh. Talmu’s laughter. Light came and went, the color bright behind his closed eyes, but he lost count of how many times it changed.
Fire licked across his mind and his dreams morphed into grotesque monsters.
Mount Giluwe and Mount Ialibu rose up against each other, and the clanging of their weapons sent sparks flying in the jungle.
Those sparks ignited and fire spread. Jahnu ran toward the fire trying to save his people, trying to save Sidney, but he couldn’t reach her—he couldn’t reach her.
Hands were on him. They lifted him from his sweat soaked mattress and took him somewhere.
There, it was light and it was dark and then it was hot.
The steam rose around him in a suffocating surge of hot air and he continued to sweat as liquid was forced into his mouth.
Weak and ailing, when they took him back to his bed he tried to speak, but the words were slurred and he didn’t know if anyone was even there.
Sali’s cold, bony hand grasped his, an anchor in the molten sea of his consciousness.
“Sickness?” Jahnu asked, thankful the old woman could halfway read his mind.
“No, only you.”
He sighed, momentarily relieved. They’d had one year without incident. If his sickness or death—he thought consigned to the possibility—was the next trial they must face, he was glad it was confined to his own suffering.
He opened his eyes enough to see the darkness from the small square cut out of his hut, and the flickering light of a lantern. Jahnu reached for the small green Bible he kept on his bedside table.
“Read,” he managed to croak out, and he heard the woman rifle through the tiny pages, the sound of it giving him comfort. She began, but he shook his head.
“Twenty-second Psalm,” he said in a sigh.
She found the right one and began to read, her English rusty with disuse.
I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint: my heart is like wax; it is melted in the midst of my bowels. My strength is dried up like a potsherd; and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws; and thou hast brought me into the dust of death.
The tears at the corners of Jahnu’s eyes trickled slowly past his temples and into his ears, and he surrendered.