Page 64 of Delirium

“Errr…yes. I think so.” I could feel my cheeks flushing, having no idea how Nash would take this information. He and James weren’t on the greatest of terms, and I didn’t want to be the reason their foundation shattered completely. “It’s not like he did anything, though. He just thought it was real, and…”

Nash held up a hand, shaking his curls out of his eyes. “James. Had a sex dream. About you. And told you about it?”

I glared at him, while a sly grin spread across his face. “Nash, if you laugh at a sick man, I’m going to smother you in your sleep.”

The laugh he was trying so hard to contain bubbled out. “I’m sorry, darling, I really am. It’s just the idea of James, first of all evenhavinga sex dream, and then being so certain it was real is just a lot for me to wrap my brain around. It’s just not very James-like.”

“No shit!” I rolled my eyes. “Do you think something is wrong with him though? Should we be worried?”

Nash sobered immediately. “Something being wrong with him is definitely a possibility. I can show you where I keep the first aid stuff, and if you’re comfortable, you can take his temperature and the like. If he’s running a fever, we should probably bypass the cave and head right into the village, get him to a doctor. Let me get the engine warmed up first. She’s giving me some trouble this morning.”

I nodded, crossing my arms across my chest. Nash disappeared back under the panel of knobs and switches. “What do you think could be wrong with him?”

“Could be any number of things this time of year.” Nash’s voice was muffled from beneath the console. “Dengue. Yellow Fever. Malaria. Lots of nasty stuff goes around in the rainy season.”

None of those sounded pleasant. I didn’t think any of them were contagious, but I was suddenly all too aware of the chill racing down my back, even in the heat.A mind game. That’s all it was. A trick of the mind. That’s all this entire goddamn trip seemed to be.

Nash stuck his hand out, head still under the panel. “Hey, can you do me a favor and hand me the orange screwdriver next to the wheel?”

I leaned over, grabbing the screwdriver and passing it over. Nash started using it as a hammer, banging against something with a fury.

“I’m not sure screwdrivers are meant to be used as hammers.”

Nash crawled out from beneath the dash, hair mussed, giving me the crooked grin I’d become all too fond of. “Darling, it’s the rainforest. Anything goes.”

“As I’m learning,” I murmured. A headache sprouted behind my temple, pulsing furiously as I pressed my fingertips into my eyelids, willing it to go away. “Is everything okay with the boat?”

“Of course. Why wouldn’t she be okay?” Nash rushed around the panel again, flipping the switches, and giving the key a turn. The motor groaned to life.

“Well, you were just hitting something pretty hard with a screwdriver, so it’s a fair question.”

“She’s fine. She’s just an old girl with a few quirks, no different than anyone else.”

Considering the way he tapped on the wheel, I didn’t quite believe him. I believed him even less when the motor began to make that awful metal on metal sound again. “Nash?”

“Give her a second.” The drumming of his fingers intensified. “Come on, baby. Don’t do this to me now. Not today. Gimme one more good run. One more.”

For a moment, I thought the boat had actually heard him. The shuddering and smashing stopped, and Nash breathed a sigh of relief.

Only to follow up with the worst sound I’d ever heard. The boat beneath us bellowed like the world was being torn in two, ripping itself apart between my feet. A thousand nails scraped on a thousand chalkboards, and I clapped my hands over my ears to make it stop.

Silence fell. Silence made even more painful by Nash’s lack of breathing, and his quick stream of cursing. “Mother-fucking-shit-fucking-luck-piece-of-shit-boat-crapping-out-on-me-today-of-all-fucking-days-mother-fucker!”

The chill was back, racing down my spine, twice as fast, twice as cold. “Nash?”

He looked over to me with wild eyes, running a hand through his hair that just made it stand up in an even worse way. “So, uh, we might have a small problem.”

My blood froze along with my chill. “What kind of problem?”

I didn’t need to ask, but I did. I already knew what kind of problem. Nothing mechanical made that kind of sound without something being horribly wrong. Yet, I still needed to hear it spoken aloud, to confirm my suspicions were true.

Nash’s words came as no surprise to me. “The engine just died. Kaput. Done-zo.Fuck!” He grabbed a fistful of his hair, tugging it, as if doing so could fix all the problems with the engine. “You have to be fucking kidding me.”

Nash’s personality wasn’t the kind that lent itself to anger, so watching him throw a similar fit to the one James threw during the trek would’ve been humorous, had the situation not been so dire.

I did my best to focus on my breathing. In and out. In and out. Steady. Easy. Problems had solutions. Problems were fixable. You just had to figure out the solution.

“What can we do?” I asked. “There has to be a quick fix, right? Something to at least get us down the river?”

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