Page 109 of Tiger's Curse
Ren followed along behind me somewhere quietly. I couldn’t hear him, but I knew he was there. I was acutely aware of his presence. I had an intangible connection with him, the man. It was almost as if he were walking next to me.Almost as if he were touching me.
I must have started walking down the wrong path because he trotted ahead, pointedly moving in a different direction. I muttered, “Show-off. I’ll walk the wrong way if I want to.” But, I still followed after him.
After a while, I made out the Jeep parked on the hill and saw Mr. Kadam waving at us.
I walked up to his camp, and he grabbed me in a brief hug. “Miss Kelsey! You’re back. Tell me what happened.”
I sighed, set down my backpack, and sat on the back bumper of the Jeep. “Well, I have to tell you, these past few days have been some of the worst of my life. There were monkeys, and Kappa, and rotted kissing corpses, and snakebites, and trees covered with needles, and—”
He held up a hand. “What do you mean a few days? You just left last night.”
Confused, I said, “No. We’ve been gone at least,” I counted on my fingers, “at least four or five days.”
“I’m sorry, Miss Kelsey, but you and Ren left me last night. In fact, I was going to say you should get some rest and then try again tomorrow night. You were really gone almost a week?”
“Well, I was asleep for two of the days. At least that’s what tiger boy over there told me.” I glared at Ren who stared back at me with an innocuous tiger expression while listening to our conversation.
Ren appeared to be sweet and attentive, as harmless as a little kitten. He was about as harmless as a Kappa. I, on the other hand, was like a porcupine. I was bristling. All of my quills were standing on end so I could defend my soft belly from being devoured by the predator who had taken an interest.
“Two days? My, my. Why don’t we return to the hotel and rest? We can try to get the fruit again tomorrow night.”
“But, Mr. Kadam,” I said and unzipped the backpack, “we don’t have to come back. We got Durga’s first gift, the Golden Fruit.” I pulled out my quilt and unfolded it, revealing the Golden Fruit nestled within.
He gently picked it up out of its cocoon. “Amazing!” he exclaimed.
“It’s a mango.” With a smirk, I added, “It only makes sense. After all, mangoes are very important to Indian culture and trade.”
Ren huffed at me and rolled onto his side in the grass.
“Indeed, it does make sense, Miss Kelsey.” He admired the fruit for another moment, and then carefully rewrapped it in my quilt. Mr. Kadam clapped his hands together. “This is very exciting! Let’s break camp then and head home. Or perhaps it would be better to go to a hotel so you can rest, Miss Kelsey.”
“Oh, it’s okay. I don’t mind getting back on the road. We can stay in a hotel tonight. How many days will it take for us to get home?”
“We will need to stay over two more nights in a hotel on our trip home.”
Momentarily alarmed, I glanced at Ren. “Okay. Umm, I was thinking that maybe this time if you don’t mind, we could check out one of those bigger hotels. You know, something that has more people around. With elevators and rooms that lock. Or even better, a nice high-rise hotel in a big city. Far, far,faraway from the jungle?”
Mr. Kadam chuckled. “I’ll see what I can do.”
I graced Mr. Kadam with a beatific smile. “Good! Could we please go now? I can’t wait to take a shower.” I opened the door to the passenger side then turned and hissed in a whisper aimed at Ren, “In my nice, upper-floor, inaccessible-to-tigers hotel room.”
He just looked at me with his innocent, blue-eyed tiger face again. I smiled wickedly at him and hopped in the Jeep, slamming the door behind me. My tiger just calmly trotted over to the back where Mr. Kadam was loading the last of his supplies and leapt up into the back seat. He leaned in the front, and before I could push him away, he gave me a big, wet, slobbery tiger kiss right on my face.
I sputtered, “Ren! That issodisgusting!”
I used my T-shirt to swipe the tiger saliva from my nose and cheek and turned to yell at him some more. He was already lying down in the back seat with his mouth hanging open, as if he were laughing. Before I could really lay into him, Mr. Kadam, who was the happiest I’d ever seen him, got into the Jeep, and we started the bumpy journey back to a civilized road.
Mr. Kadam wanted to ask me questions. I knew he was itching for information, but I was still fuming at Ren, so I lied. I asked him if he could hold off for a while so I could sleep. I yawned big for dramatic effect, and he immediately agreed to let me have some peace, which made me feel guilty. I really liked Mr. Kadam, and I hated lying to people. I excused my actions by mentally blaming Ren for this uncharacteristic behavior. Convincing myself that it was his fault was easy. I turned to the side and closed my eyes.
I slept for a while, and when I woke up, Mr. Kadam handed me a soda, a sandwich, and a banana. I raised my eyebrow at the banana and thought of several good monkey jokes I could annoy Ren with, but I kept quiet for Mr. Kadam’s sake. Instead, I immediately dug into my sandwich and drained my soda in one long drink.
Mr. Kadam laughed and handed me another one. “Are you ready to tell me about what happened, Miss Kelsey?”
“Sure, I guess so.”
It took the better part of two hours to tell him about the tunnel, the needle forest, the cave, the Kappa, and Kishkindha. I spent a long time talking about the golden tree and the monkeys coming to life. I ended with the Kappa attack and Fanindra biting me.
I never mentioned that Ren was a man the whole time. In fact, I downplayed his presence in Kishkindha altogether. Whenever Mr. Kadam asked me how this or that was accomplished, I answered vaguely, or said lucky we had Fanindra, or lucky we had thegada. That seemed to satisfy most of his questions.
