Page 47 of Lost In Kakadu

He looked at her until their eyes met. “I’m not going anywhere.” He removed the pan from the heat, stabbed one of the mushrooms with his stick and blew on it.

“Here goes.” He slipped the meaty fungus into his mouth. The warm mushroom had softened with cooking. It tasted similar to an ordinary field mushroom and the sauce from the flower was sweet.

Rodney would love this.

His heart constricted at the thought. Mushrooms were one of Rodney’s favourite vegetables and the realisation that Rodney was gone hit him with brutal clarity. His throat closed in, breathing grew difficult.

Why did Rodney die? He was a good man.

Rodney never hurt anyone. In fact, he’d dedicated his life to helping people. Mackenzie swallowed hard, determined not to cry right now. The time for crying would be after Rodney was buried.

“How is it?” Abigail’s voice snapped him back.

“It’s fine.” He swallowed another mushroom along with a great lump of guilt, knowing Rodney would’ve wanted him to live. Spearing another one from the pan, he ate it like a shish-kebab. Deciding to risk just one more he stabbed the largest, which was about the size of his palm. “So now we just wait and see.” Rubbing his thighs, he leanedforward to stretch his lower back. “We need to keep digging the graves. Are you ready?”

“No.”

“Me neither. But we have no choice.” He got to his feet, tossed the remainder of the mushrooms into the bushes and before he could procrastinate any longer, he picked up their makeshift shovel and stepped into the hole.

For hours he laboured in the dirt and the hole gradually increased in size and depth. He took off his shirt when rivers of dirt-laden sweat trickled down his arms and legs. But he had no intention of stopping until the grave was finished. Every part of him begged to stop but he couldn’t bear the thought of waking up to the hideous task tomorrow.

A rumble in his stomach concerned him, but he couldn’t decide if it was hunger pains or something worse. He carried on regardless, blocking it out as he pounded the earth, digging to a morbid rhythm, riding a wave of emotions—fury over their situation, fear of dying, grief over Rodney’s death, hunger, tiredness and most of all, his intense desire to survive. His body trembled from sheer exhaustion, and he crumbled into a shattered heap on the edge of the grave.

To his surprise, Abigail picked up the tool, stepped into the hole and dug into the compacted earth. She didn’t complain as her movements stiffened with each shovelful. Her clenched jaw failed to mask the pain on her face, and he fetched a water bottle. When she paused to accept it, she wiped her forehead leaving a dirty brown streak in its path. Her hands were shaking.

Mackenzie reached for her, and her eyes were numb from emotion, as if everything she’d felt before she stepped into the hole had been sucked into the pit.

He helped her from the ground, and with his arm around her waist guided her to a spot by the fire. She sat down, drew her legs up and wrapped her arms around them with her chin on her knees.

Mackenzie knelt beside her. “Are you okay?”

Her chin quivered as she shook her head slowly.

He placed his hand on her cheek and when one of her tears trickled from her eyelashes, he wiped it away.

The dam burst and Abigail sobbed.

Mackenzie wrapped his arms around her, and she hugged him andas they embraced, each with their chins on the others shoulder, he inhaled the sweet scent of her hair as her damp tears fell upon his back.

They cried together for what seemed like an eternity.

Mackenzie couldn’t cry anymore, but he still held onto Abigail until her breathing returned to normal. When she finally pulled back, he looked at the wet eyelashes that lined her red eyes and for the first time he noticed a spattering of freckles across her nose.

He liked them. It gave her a sense of naturalness.

“Are you okay now?” He rubbed her upper arm.

She sucked in a shaky breath and nodded.

“You stay here. I’m going to finish it. Okay?”

“Okay.”

He stood and although he was exhausted, he was also determined.

He returned to the grave and stepped into the hole.

Eventually the pit grew to a one metre by two metre rectangle that was barely one metre deep. The ground was simply too hard to dig the hole any deeper. They had no alternative but to lay the bodies on top of each other.

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