Enjoy Your Stay (11 page)

I finally make it to the waterfall, and it’s as beautiful as I remembered it. My mum and I camped here once, before she got really sick. It took us close to an hour to make it down here, and another two before we made it back to our tent. Apparently, her and Aunty Alice had come here with my grandparents once upon a time, and Mum had wanted to see it again before she got too sick to travel.

I make my way over to the pool where there’s a huge rock jutting out of the ground. I sit on the top of it and down half of the contents of my water bottle at once. It’s damn hot, and the sweat is running down my back so I take off my shirt and boots, climb down the rocks, and ease into the water. It’s freezing, and skates over my skin like ice, but it’s such a welcome relief from the stifling heat of the rainforest.

I swim over to the falls, and duck my head under the spray. It needles at my flesh, but it seems to be relieving some of the tension in my shoulders, so I lean back and spread my arms out against the rock and stay there until the sting makes my shoulders numb.

I think about my mum, and how she’d be happy to see me here again, even though she’d likely slap me upside the head for speaking to Holly the way I did. And on her birthday, no less.

Fuck!
What am I doing?

I gotta go talk to her, even if Cade and Ana have to play mediator. I have to talk to her, and figure out what the hell she wants from me, and what I want from her in return. I swim over to the water’s edge. I clamber up the rock face, pull on my shirt and jeans, and shove my wet feet into my boots. Then I head up the walking track, as if I’m a man on a mission. Ten minutes into my walk, and I’m thinking about all the stupid, impossible shit I’m going to say to Holly when the bushes up ahead begin rustling, and a fat ball of brown fur comes waddling out.

It’s that bastard rabid wombat. It has to be the same one, because that thing was as massive and mangy looking as this guy, and the shit of a thing looks like he’s got a score to settle. He lowers his head, and charges.

“Hey!” I start hollering, and clap my hands above my head to ward it off, but the ballsy little fucker keeps coming and charges right into my shin. For the second time in two days I start to go down like a brick shithouse, but I flail my arms in the air, and break my fall by grabbing hold of the branches of a white gum. The wombat charges again, exposing its rodent teeth, and trying to take a chunk out of my leg, I boot the bastard, and he shrieks, and goes running off the way he came. I hang tight to the branch, like a little pansy-arse girl, and take a minute to catch my breath. And then a searing pain shoots through my forearm.

It’s like a fire has been lit beneath my skin. I glance down, and see what looks like a fucking funnel-web spider rearing back from my wrist. Its fangs are dripping with venom.

I snatch my arm away in a hurry, and cry out. It burns like a motherfucker. In fact, it’s not just the bite that has me practically rolling on the floor and crying for my mamma. The pain shoots up my arm, across my chest, and down towards my heart. It’s fucking agony.

I’m sweating and shaking, almost immediately. My muscles twitch. I yank off my shirt with one arm, holding my injured one by my side. The bite stings like a bitch when I slide my T-shirt over it. I tremble from head to toe as I attempt to make a tourniquet over the wound with one hand and tie it off with the help of my chattering teeth. My heart’s racing faster than I’ve ever felt it. I’m covered in goosebumps, and I’m trying real hard to forget the fact that I know I’ve got about fifteen minutes before this shit starts to get really fucking real.

I don’t wanna die here in my middle of nowhere, and though I know I’m supposed to keep still so that the venom doesn’t spread at an elevated rate, I run. I put one foot in front of the other, and I sprint as far and as fast as I can before I feel like collapsing. My arm hurts like hell, my chest hurts, my head’s fucking splitting open, but I push on at a clipped pace, holding my arm close to my chest in an effort to keep it still. By the time I make it back to the camp, I’m staggering, gasping for breath. White hot pain lances through my chest. I can’t breathe, whether it’s from the venom or the running I don’t know. All I care about is getting to safety. Living.
Holly
.

She’s the first to see me come stumbling through the clearing. I must really look like shit, because within seconds she races to my side, throwing her arms around me. I curl my good arm around her head, even though my whole body is just begging to stop, to give up.

“What the hell happened to you?”

“Funnel-web,” I croak. My lips and tongue are tingling, my eyes water like crazy, and my muscles spasm as I try to catch my breath.

Holly pulls back, and stares at me in horror, “What?”

“Tree, funnel-web, bastard bit me.”

I can see Cade and Ana running towards us.
Good. I’m glad Cade’s here, and not off doing my cousin
,
because I’m going down.

I fall at Holly’s feet.

I’
M TWENTY
minutes outside of town, and I’m flying around corners I should be taking at around 30km/h but I don’t care. The only thing that matters is getting Jack to a hospital. The battery in my phone died last night, after I uploaded the video of Jack to YouTube, and Ana and Elijah didn’t bother bringing theirs. Even if we had a phone, there’s no guarantee that he’d make it long enough for an ambulance to get to us.

Elijah and Ana had lifted him up and shoved him in the car. They didn’t like the idea of me driving, but I wasn’t having any of it. I jumped in the driver’s seat, slammed the keys in the ignition and took off, shouting for them to follow us on the bike.

Jackson had been out cold for a good twenty minutes. Long enough to have me worrying that his big stupid arse had up and died, so I’d shoved at his shoulder to wake him up. I might have forgotten it was the arm that the bite was on, and he woke, swinging, and almost knocked me out.

Now he rocks back and forth in the passenger seat in a cold sweat. His breath is coming too fast, too hard, and he’s alternating between crying out in agony, and muttering something under his breath.

“You okay, big guy? You’re looking like you just took one hell of an acid trip.” I tease, but even I hear how much my voice is trembling.

He nods, or at least I think it’s a nod. He’s shivering so badly it’s kinda hard to tell. His teeth are slamming together with shock. “I’m … I’m sssorry.”

“Shut up. We’re not talking about this now.”

“Hhhols—”

“I said, no! Just don’t fucking die on me, because I owe you an arse rimming for this morning.”

“I … I …”

“What?”

Jack takes a sharp breath in, and begins again. “I w … want more.”

“You want more what, Jack?”

“Y … you. Us … This morning.”

I feel my heart slam against my chest. In fact, I feel like all of my organs have just gone into convulsions. I meet his gaze for a beat. It’s long enough to see the sincerity in his eyes. Long enough for my heart to sink into my chest in both fear and longing. Long enough to swerve into oncoming traffic, clip the side of a semitrailer, and bounce back into our lane, crashing right through the guardrail.

And then we’re airborne, and all I can think of is that the life inside me is too tiny to survive such trauma, and that Jack won’t get the anti-venom he desperately needs. As I brace for the moment of impact, I cradle my arms tightly over my belly. Jackson’s arm—the one with the excruciating bite—flies across my stomach in a protective gesture, too.

We hit the embankment so hard that the front of the Ute crumples like aluminium foil. The windscreen shatters, and glass rains down all over us. I’m thrown forward against my belt, my head thwacking off the driver’s side door, and then I slam back into the leather seat. From the road, I can hear the screech of rubber, and sounds of panicked voices. I think I hear Ana screaming, and Jack whisper that he’s sorry, and then I hear nothing.

I see nothing.

Feel nothing.

I wake to fluorescent lights overhead, to a splitting headache, and cramping in my lower abdomen. A nurse is holding a mask over my face as I’m wheeled down a corridor. Someone is talking at me—a nurse, judging by the lack of a white coat, and the no nonsense expression on her face. She’s pretty, and has the same honey-wheat-coloured hair as Jack.

Jack.

“The funnel-web,” I mutter, though the mask covering my mouth means they can’t hear me properly.
I need to tell them about Jack’s bite
.

“Shh, just lay still. You’re in the hospital. We’re rushing you through to the labour ward to check on the baby, just lie still.”

I struggle against her hand, and rip the mask off my face. “I know I’m in the hospital, you stupid wench. Jack, the man I was in the car with, he was bitten by a funnel-web spider. He needs anti—”A wave of nausea rolls through me, and I flop back against the gurney. The mega-bitch nurse takes the opportunity to slap the mask back over my face, and then I black out again.

This time when I wake, I’m aching from head to toe. I’m also strapped to the fucking bed.
That whore.
I yank at my restraints.

“She’s awake.” Ana rushes over to my side, and squeezes my hand. “Hols, do you know where you are?”

I screw my nose up at the blue hospital gown. There’s a weird contraption strapped to my belly that’s not only cutting off my circulation, but also connected to a machine that makes a lot of annoying, staticky, whooshing sounds. I stare up at Ana’s concerned face.

“I swear to God, if one more person asks me that, I’m going to shank them. I know I’m in the fucking hospital. It’s not like I’d choose willingly to walk around looking like a goddamned Smurf,” I mutter through my raspy throat. “Where’s Jack?”

Elijah gets to his feet. He and Ana share a loaded glance and then he heads towards the door. “I’ll go let the nurse know that the dragon has awoken.”

“Where’s Jack? And why the hell am I in a delivery room?”

“They want to monitor you overnight. The baby’s okay, but you had what’s called a minor placental abruption. The restraints are so you didn’t hurt yourself trying to sit up.” She lets go of my hand, and drags a chair over to the bed. She picks up exactly where she left off. “There’s a small amount of bleeding within your womb, and the more you move, the worse it’s going to be for the baby. You’re to take it easy for the next few days. Plus, you may have a concussion. This camping thing was a really bad idea. Holly I’m so sorry.”

“Ana, why are you avoiding the question?”

“Jack’s okay.”

“Where is he?”

She glances down at her hands. My whole body turns to ice. I’m no longer sure I want her to answer the question. “He’s in intensive care, Hols.”

“Why? Didn’t they give him the anti-venom?” Tears slide down my cheeks. It seems like all I do lately is cry. I shift my head to wipe them away on the pillow.

“Hols, this kind of stress isn’t good for you, or the baby. You need to focus on getting the two of you better.”

“Ana, I am two seconds away from losing my shit here. Why is he in intensive care? They should have been able to just pop that sucker in his vein, and he should be the one standing here getting a lecture from me right now.”

“He didn’t look too badly injured from the crash: a bruised and bloodied face, a couple of lacerations on his forearm. He was even lucid enough to talk to Elijah before the paramedics arrived. I told them he’d been bitten. I told them you’re pregnant, and they removed you from the car first. They administered the anti-venom, but his blood pressure was already so low, and he had some swelling on the brain. I’m sorry, Hols. Jack’s in an induced coma.”