Whakahapa, 16. (Final)

(Had to add a bit to part 1 too. Been typing all night!)

Next day dawned. Again, Jeroboam was awake before Amos stirred but he didn't wake him, he lay quietly, patiently waiting until Amos sat up and smiled at him.

“Good morning, Good Looking.”

“Good morning to you. Amos, I'm dying for a leak!”

“A leak? Oh, you want to pee.”

“I need to pee, badly need to. Have you got the bottle?:”

“Yes, right here. Let's do it then.”

They took care of things. Amos took the bottle into the bathroom and attended to his own business while he was there. He returned to their room and opened the drapes. Jeroboam craned his neck but couldn't see more than the tops of some buildings, hills and grey sky.

“Is the weather improving?”

“It's a lot better than yesterday. Still cloudy but not raining. Not right now anyway. There's not even much wind out there.”

“That's good. Doesn't make much difference to me anyway, but you and Esther can go out if you want to.”

“I don't want to. I'm staying here with you, but Esther's going out. She's going looking for a water-heater, a generator and electrical tools and stuff. We might have hot water and power by tonight.”

“That'd be good.”

“It would, it'd be excellent!”

Esther left quite early on her foraging expedition so the boys were left alone together for most of the day. There were some things that Amos would've liked to go out and look for and he was keen to explore the big empty city. From what he could see from the windows, it was a fascinating place. But he wouldn't go out and leave Jeroboam alone there; that was not going to happen.

He never strayed far from his bedside all day, not even when he was sleeping, which he seemed to do all too much of. He did have to leave him though, in the late afternoon, when Esther returned with a full load of gear. She wanted help to carry it all up from the street.

Jeroboam said that he felt guillty just lying there while the others were working. Esther told him to grin and bear it.

“What are you going to do anyway, you can't even walk down the stairs.”

“That's right,” said Amos. “Your job is to lie there and get well. Once you've done that, then we'll work you.”

“Okay, I know but I still wish I could help.”

“You will, one day when you're better.”

They didn't get any power connected or water heated that day, it was far too late. However, by the end of the next day , they had both – water heated in a gas califont and jury-rigged electric lights and appliances. They'd even be able to iron their clothes, if they ever ran out of new ones.

The radio and television picked-up no signals at all, of course, but now they could play pre-recorded music, films and other programmes. They'd never be bored now and it was so good to have some background noise to smother the oppresive silence.

Days passed, one by one, and each one brought new discoveries. Jeroboam recovered, slowly but surely; even his leg did. It wasn't broken, it was gangrenous, it was just twisted and spectacularly bruised. The bruises faded, the swelling receded and he got better. They were lucky. Things could've been much worse, especially considering that there were no doctors to turn to.

The time came when he was able to, slowly, walk down the stairs and out into the street. He sat in a wheelchair, Amos pushed him and they went exploring. They didn't go too far though, only through the Civic Center to the waterfront, then they agreed they'd rather be back indoors. It wasn't that nice a day.

Back at the hotel, with rests, Jeroboam walked up three flights of stairs and they moved into the Bridal Suite which had bigger rooms, a better view and, most importantly, a bigger bed. It was a huge bed, the biggest either of them had ever seen, even bigger than their parents' family beds back at home. Esther said that it was a King Size. They'd never seen a king – they must be big men!

The bed was theirs now so Amos had no excuse not to share it with him. He said that he was comfortable enough down on the floor, but Jeroboam didn't like him sleeping down there, it wasn't right. Now he could come up and sleep with him, there was lots of room.

Amos wanted to, but he didn't. He hadn't slept with anyone since his parents turned him out when he was 3 years old. Jeroboam said, “Well neither have I, but now I want to sleep with you.”

“We can't do any of that sex stuff, not yet anyway.”

“I know that, but one day we will. We can cuddle, can't we?”

“I suppose so – carefully.”

“Sounds like you don't want to.”

“I do want to, but I don't want to hurt you in my sleep. What if I kick your leg or something?”

“I don't want that either! Trust me, if you do the whole world will hear me screaming! Please share the bed with me.”

“Okay, yes please!”

“Good, we'll do that.”

They slept together that night and every night from then on. They didn't need all the room in the bed, they only used a small part of it. They started sharing the bath when Jeroboam could bathe. It was better than wasting hot water also, it was fun.

It was a bit embarrassing telling Esther they were sharing the bed, but she said, “Hey, if that's what you want, you go for it. You don't need my permission, I'm not your mother. As long as you don't impinge on my space, you do what you like.”

She spent time each day just driving around, looking at her city and searching for signs of people, but never found any. Sometimes they went with her, but usually didn't. They were happy staying in the hotel, watching movies. They had hundreds and hundreds to watch, it was a whole new world for them.

The only films they'd ever seen were educational and exhorting ones. Musical comedies were much more enjoyable. They couldn't get enough of those.

There came the day when Esther said it was time for her to go. She'd found a suitable micro-light and even done a couple of test flights. Winter would be coming soon, it would be too bloody cold for flying then. She was anxious to explore before it was too late.

Jeroboam was all-but recovered, he'd soon be as good as new. They didn't need her to nursemaid them, they could look after themslves and each other.

Before she left a decision had to be made and they agreed that they'd stay there in the Academy Hotel. It was centrally located, new and comfortable. The only change they made was to move up to the penthouse suite on the 12th floor.

They didn't have power to work the lifts, unfortunately, but the stairs worked. There were great views up there, and it was more easily defensible – not that they seen anything to defend themselves from, but Amos still worried. He was good at worrying.

With cables and pulley-wheels, they jacked-up flying foxes down to the rooves of several adjacent buildings. Launching themselves off the roof and flying over the concrete canyon and the far-below street was scary but fun. It was all part of their defences and emergency escape routes. Hopefully, they'd never need them, but it was still fun.

They went with Esther to the airfield, wished her luck and waved goodbye as she flew away. She didn't know how long she'd be gone, maybe a long time.

It was a bit sad watching her go, but not sad enough to cry about it. They looked at each other, shrugged, grinned and went home.

If there was anyone out there, hopefully, Esther would find them.

Somehow they knew there was a world somewhere that continued without them. Workers worked, farmers farmed, mothers mothered and fathers fathered and all the multiple threads of millions of lives went on, coming together, drawing apart, laying the course of the future and making history.

Somewhere there was a world that didn't die; a world where doctors, physicians and psychologists, pondered the rapid eye movements and the continued brain activity of patients deep in barbiturate-sustained, pathological comas and they speculated on what kind of world they inhabited.

One night, exhausted after a busy day, Amos dreamt of flying in the night on the flying fox. Somehow it no longer needed the cable and instead of just crossing the street he flew all around, high above the city. Wind was blowing, rain was falling and it was cold. His fingers were numb, his grip slipped and he fell through the air.

The pull of the earth took hold of his spine and his limbs spread over space. There was a fearful moment of falling, spiralling down with the air pressing hard, then it let go. Still falling, but up not down. Falling up???

Light split his eyes open, brilliant, painful, enormous light. Silence pulsed, it expanded and it shrunk. All of the world shrunk into nothingness and back again.

Amos woke alone and stretched. He rolled on to his back, yawned vigorously and flung his arms out wide in the big bed as he stretched and yawned again.

Whakahapa, 15

(Here we go. Don't know when i'll get the next bit done - school holidays again, already, and we're about to be infested by rug-rats. 4 boys so far & more to come).

Amos woke in the morning, sat up and grinned. Jeroboam was grinning back at him.

“Morning,” he smiled.

“Hi, Amos. Am I allowed out of bed? I need to pee and, if I don't do it soon, I'll wet the bed instead.”

“I, umm, I'll ask Esther. We're allowed to do anything, but I'm not sure if it's safe and don't know how to go about it. We don't want you to hurt yourself.”

“I don't want that either, but I have to pee!”

“Wait. Hold on to it!” He rushed out and across the hall.

“Esther? Esther!”

“Yeah, Boy. What now?”

“Jeroboam's awake and he needs to pee, like now! What do we do? He can't walk to the bathroom.”

“You're right, he can't. Okay, I'm coming. Go back and sit him up again.”

He carefully hauled Jeroboam upright, stuffing pillows behind him. Esther came in and rummaged through the pile of gear that they'd brought up from the hospital and the ambulance.

“I'm sure there was one here somewhere. Ah yes, here we go!”

She stood and showed the strangely shaped, wide-mouthed, stainless-steel bottle with a handle on its side. “Know what this is? No? Well, I'll tell you. It's a peeing bottle. You poke your willy in there and let go!”

“Poke my willy?”

“You don't know what a willy is? It's your penis, Kid. How else are you going to piss in the bottle? Help him, Amos. I need to go and pee myself.”

She left the room and they looked and blushed at each other.

“Amos, I have to go! We've just got to do it.”

“We do. We'll get used to it, I suppose. The first time must be the worst time.”

“It'll be even more embarrassing if I wet the bed.”

Amos pulled the covers down, almost all the way to his feet. Jeroboam was startlingly naked, apart from the bandages, and his 'willy' was semi-erect, (and beautiful!) He took hold of it (!), between his thumb and 2 fingers, and put it into the mouth of the bottle, then looked the other way.

It took a few seconds before he was able to relax and let go and when he did, he peed and peed and they were both starting to worry that he was going to fill and overflow the bottle.

But he didn't, which was a relief. He was greatly relieved all around and smiled widely when Amos, carefully, removed the bottle and covered him up again. “Oh, that's ever so much better! Thanks Amos.”

“Not a problem. It will be easier next time. I've got to go and pee myself now. Don't go away and I'll be back soon.”

They had toasted crumpets with cereal and reconstituted powdered milk with canned peaches for breakfast. Jeroboam thanked them both and said that they had never eaten so well, but he could get used to it.

It was a horrible wet and windy day outside. The teeming rain made a strange hissing noise on the concrete-block buildings and the quiet street out there. Amos opened the drapes to let the gray daylight in and opened a window for some fresh air.

“Is that okay, Esther?”

“Yes, sure it is. It's not cold and not too drafty. You're right, we do need some air in here. I don't think that any of us will be going far today, but I do want to go back to the hospital later.”

“The hospital? Is there something else we need?”

“There is. We need a wheelchair, one of those special ones for taking people to the toilet. Peeing in the bottle will only take us so far, he can't dump in it.”

“Dump?” said Jeroboam. “Oh! Right. I can't do that.”

“Don't hospitals have bed-pans for that?” Amos queried.

“They do, but Eww! Plus, if we can put him in a chair, we can shower him as well.

Speaking of which, we need to get to a plumbing supplies store so we can rig-up a water-heater. I doubt if there'll be one in the central city, I'll drive out to a suburban shopping centre to find one tomorrow. For today, we'll heat some water in a pan and give him a bed-bath.”

“A bed-bath? Like, washing him all over? Oh, wow! That will be my job. I'll do that!”

“I'm sure you will,” Esther laughed. “Won't be much of a chore at all, will it? There's not much else to do on a wet day. We'll rest and talk, I guess.. When we get a generator, also tomorrow, we'll be able to power-up a TV.”

“But will there be any programmes being broadcast.”

“Telecast. No, there won't but there are thousands of old movies we can watch. There's a shop right across the street and it's full of DVD's. Who wants coffee?”

Only Esther had coffee. The boys had a soda.

Amos put some water on to heat on the gas cooker and cleaned and tidied the 'kitchen' set-up in a spare bedroom. (There were LOTS of spare bedrooms). He opened the widows in there to air that out as well. He found towels, face-cloths and little packets of soap in a bathroom cupboard and took them, and the hot water, in to where Jeroboam lay.

Esther announced that she did NOT want to watch this, so she went to explore the hotel while she waited. As she left she told them to behave themselves and remember that Jeroboam was not fit and healthy – as if they'd forget.

Amos was very excited about all of this and, when he peeled the covers down, he could see that Jeroboam was as well. But they were very controlled and they did behave themselves – the last thing he wanted to do was to open up any of his wounds, Jeroboam didn't want that either!

He did take the time to gently wash and dry his genitals. The erection actually made that easier to do.Amos was careful to keep his hand covered with the soapy cloth and then with the towel. Jeroboam lay back with his eyes clenched shut and they competed to see who could blush brightest.

Amos was kind-of disappointed, but also relieved, when he had to pull the covers up again and straighten them. He had never in his wildest dreams ever imagined that he would get to do anything so intimate. That would've been fun if not for the injuries.

He went and got them both tall glasses of fruit juice. It wasn't refrigerated, of course, but was still cool and refreshing. They both kind-of needed that.

“You, umm, you said that Elder Bethuel had photographs of us?”

“He did – dirty ones. He had naked photos of us, and a whole lot of other kids in his album in his room.”

“He's a creepy old man!”

“He was, by the looks of it. There's no other reason for him to have them.”

“Funny!”

“What's funny?”

“It's creepy and it makes me feel unclean knowing that, but I don't mind you looking at a picture of me. That's different. I wish that I had one of you.”

“We could arrange that, but not now. I'm not looking my best right now.”

“I guess not, but you still look good to me. Jeroboam, did I tell you that I'm ever so glad that you're here?”

“I think you did. I'm glad that you're here too, very glad.”

“That's good. What about those Elders?”

“Yes, what about them? Lying, thieving bastards!”

“Jeroboam, I'm shocked! I didn't know you could talk like that. I was shocked too, at how they were living up there. Everyone was supposed to be equal and they were stealing from the rest of us and that's not right!”

“Definitely not right. I wish now that i'd set fire to the place.”

“Yeah? Well, I think I did better than that.”

“What did you do?”

“Turned on the taps on all of the hand-basins up there and flooded the place. By the next morning water was running down the stairs and out the front door. I dammed it and sent it through the hall into the kitchens.”

“Oh, that's good!”

“Yesh. If no-one's stopped it, it will all be a soggy, stinking mess by now.”

“Serves them right.”

“Serves who right?” Esther came back in with a bottle of wine – a big bottle. It was early in the day to be drinking, but she didn't care. What else was there to do?

The boys had a small drink each. Well, you have to try it and a little is meant to be medicinal, wasn't it? One was all they had. It was sickly sweet, too much even for their tastes, and too much would not be a good thing. They drank soda.

The three of them sat around talking, sharing experiences and trying to puzzle out what had happened to their world. Esther said it'd be interesting if a ship from Earth, or one of the other colony planets, was to arrive. They were the only survivors so everything on New Salem was theirs legally as well as in fact.

Amos spoke again about how he remembered two different things – falling into the fireplace, hitting his head and dying in Elder Stephanas' rooms, and also waking in the motel in Engaddi. “It's like I've got a split personality and each one has its own memories! Weird.”

Jeroboam said, “That is weird and I'll tell you something even weirder – I've got dual memories too.”

Esther said, “Yeah? What do you remember?”

“I woke up in my own bed in the dormitory and everyone had gone and I was all alone. But I also died too. I stole a whole lot of pills, went up the hill at the back of the Community and I swallowed them all. I lay down and – well, I should be dead. I don't know how I got back to my bed.”

“No you didn't!” Amos protested. “You're here and you're going to be fine.”

“I hope I am – now I do.”

Esther said, “But you remember lying down up on the hill? This is really strange. I'm not sure, but I think I remember something similar. That is weird!”

“You too? What do you remember, Esther? This could explain everything!”

“I don't see how. But first, Jeroboam, finish your story. Why did you take the pills?”

“Because, because of Amos, becase he was dead. Told you it was strange, it's got to be a dream.”

“You wanted to die because you thought that I had?”

“I did. I didn't want to live any more, not without you. I couldn't, so I did it.”

“You died, and then you woke up, like Amos did?”

“Yes, just like me!”

“Just like me too,” Esther nodded. “I think the same thing happened to me. I was flying a light plane in a storm, I collided with another one, spiralled down and crashed in flames. I remember the heat, so very searing hot. I couldn't breathe, the air was burning, and I was gone. Next thing I knew, I woke in a stranger's house in another town. There was no-one there and i don't know how I got there. There was no-one anywhere until I found you two. How's that for weird?”

“Yes, how's that? That's a hat-trick!”

They chewed that over for an hour, but couldn't make any sense of it and were getting nowhere, so they moved on to other topics. The day went really fast. It was cosy sitting there safely out of the horrible weather outside and no-one was bored at all.

Esther went out in the afternoon and returned with a wheelchair. It was a special one, just a toilet seat on a wheeled frame that could be manouvered over a toilet. They didn't use it, yet. They would when they had to, but weren't looking forward to that – gross!

Jeroboam used the pee-bottle a couple of times in the day. They were probably drinking too much, but that was okay. Amos helped him each time. He probably could've managed it on his own, but didn't want to. Amos didn't mind either.

They ate a light meal. No-one was very hungry (!) They hadn't done much all day. Jeroboam used the bottle again, and then they went to sleep early. Tomorrow would be another day.

Whakahapa, 14

(Pronounced - 'Foka-har-par')

“Jeroboam!!” Amos flew to his side. He was there, leaning over him, before Esther even got out of her chair. “You're awake! How long have you been awake? Are you hurting? Where does it hurt? You must be hungry – we've got this stuff, a meal in a drink. Do you want some now? Does it hurt? Oh Shit! You're bloody awake, at last!”

Jeroboam smiled up at him. “Hello, Amos. Since when do you use swear words?”

“Since now. Esther taught me, she knows lots of swear words – bloody good ones too. This is Esther. She's been looking after you real good. I'd be useless!”

“Yes, I think you would. Out of the way, Boy. Let me have a look at him.”

“Don't go far,” Jeroboam smiled.

“I won't. I'll be here. What can I do, Esther?”

“You can stand down at the end of the bed. Now, Mister Jeroboam, how does that head feel?”

Amos stood quietly watching, feeling more and more useless while Esther checked Jeroboam over, cleaned him and changed his dressings. She seemed to sense this because she tried to get him involved, passing bandages, ointments and cloths etc., but he held back and she had to do it all herself. He smiled to himself, he knew what she was trying to do, it was fairly obvious, but he was shy all of a sudden so he didn't play along. Esther might talk rough and tough, but she had a good heart really.

“Okay.” She finished at last. “You're not too bad. We'll have you up and about soon. We were lucky.”

“We?” Jeroboam queried. “I don't feel lucky.”

“You were, you're not dead and, yes, we – you got hit and it was me that hit you.”

“Oh, that. It was my fault. I was sleeping in a car. I woke up and heard you coming and I was afraid that I was going to miss you, that you wouldn't see me and you'd be gone. I ran out on the road in front of you. I should have been more careful.”

“Yes, you should've, and so should I. It's amazing how fast you get used to racing around on empty roads. I just learnt they might not be totally empty.”

“You might be right,” he grinned. “What's your prognosis, Doctor? Will I live?”

“I'm no doctor, but I think you might. You look pretty good to me, much better than you did. There's just one thing worries me a little – that leg doesn't look good at all. I don't think there's a fracture, I hope I'm not wrong. But it's swollen and that's some really bad bruising. Maybe you're bleeding on the inside. How does it feel to you?”

“It's, ah, I don't know. It's so swollen it is really, really tight and just numb. Everything feels tight.”

“Yeah?” She held his foot and bent and straightened his knee a couple of times. “No screaming, so it's not broken. In the bad old days, they would've put leeches on you to suck the blood out and release the pressure. I'm not sure if that did any good or not, but we can't try it anyway because the leeches will be all gone. We'll cut it if we have to.”

“I hope not!” he cringed. “Everything has gone, all the people, all the animals, everything!”

“Almost everything. If he ever finds his tongue again, Amos can fill you in on that. Do you think you can try eating something?”

His serious face lit-up with a smile. “I thought you'd never ask! I'm starving here.”

“Of course you are,” she nodded. “It's all part of the teenage condition, isn't it? All you kids think about is your bellies and what hangs off them.”

“No, it's not,” he mumbled and blushed as brightly as only a fair-skinned blond can blush.

“Oh but it is,” Esther grinned. “Amos, My Sweet, we need to get him, at least, semi-upright so he can eat and drink. We'll need pillows, lots of pillows to prop him up. Go get us 12 or 20 pillows from the other rooms.”

“I will. I'll do that.” Amos rushed out of the room.

“Gone quiet, hasn't he?” said Jeroboam. “I'm starting to think he's not happy to see me.”

“Don't you believe it!” Esther snorted. “He's not just happy, he's absolutely delighted to see you. He's been hanging out for you to wake up. Now you have, he doesn't know what to say and he's gone all whakama. You be nice to him.

Amos is a damm nice kid and he really likes you. You could very easily hurt him and, if you do you'll answer to me!”

“You think he likes me?”

“I know he does, he likes you a lot.”

“Could've fooled me. We used to be friends when we were little. He was my best friend ever. Then we got older and he didn't want to know me and always stayed as far away as he could.”

“He did, but not because he didn't like you, quite the opposite. What about you, do you still like him?”

“Oh yes, very much! It hurt when he left me, but I never stopped loving him. Since whatever it was happened, I've been searching everywhere for him. I came here, to Hebron, because I thought that anyone left would come here to the capital, but it's so big it's scary when you're all on your own! Now Amos is here, and that's good, I think.”

“Oh boy! You, Kid, and the Boy, need to talk. You need to talk a lot and be honest with it.”

“I will, I do, I do need to talk.”

“Good, good. I don't know how much you've figured out, as far as we know, we three may be the only people left in the world. There could be others, but we haven't found them yet. There's not many in any case. The old world, with all its rubbish, has gone and the old rules and laws don't apply anymore. The law is now what we say it is and everything is there for us to use. Remember that.”

“I suppose we could just keep the 10 Commandments, everyone said they are all the law a society needs.”

“Maybe, but a lot of them don't apply now. Like the one about not coveting your neighbour's ass, that's his donkey, not his arse. What donkey? What neighbour? Covet whatever you like, you can't steal, it belongs to no-one.”

“Oh. We might have to rewrite the Commandments!”

“That's not allowed – adding to or subtracting from the bible is expressly forbidden. Don't tell me you're another one who hasn't read the book for himself.”

“I won't tell you then.”

“Yeah? You're all right, Kid. You be nice to the Boy and everything will be sweet.”

“I, ah – yeah.”

Amos hurried back in with all the pillows he could carry, cutting their conversation short, and he stopped staring at the boy on the bed who stared back at him.

“All right then!”Esther took charge, again. Somebody had to and it obviously wasn't going to be either of these two young loons. She peeled the covers forward from his chest and shoulders. “Turn on to your back, Kid. I'm going to hold you under the shoulders and sit you up. If it hurts, say so! We don't want to damage you. Amos, you get behind him and pack the pillows in to support him.”

They got him upright with no protests and he sank back into the pillows, pale in the face and sweating a little, but he assured her that he felt fine.

“All right, as long as you're sure. I'm going to go and rustle-up some food. Anything you fancy?”

“Anything!”

“Yes, I thought so. Amos, you stay here. Give him a bottle of the food drink and, for goodness sake, talk to him! This is your friend, remember?”

She left and Amos silently offered the bottle, complete with a drinking straw. Jeroboam took it in his unbandaged hand, had a sip, and then paused and said, “I remember. It was a long time ago, but I remember when we were friends. Why did you turn away from me, Amos?”

“I had to. I didn't want to but I had to stop being around you.”

“But why did you?”

“It doesn't matter now, does it? Everything has changed.”

“You can say that again! So we can be friends now?”

“If you want to, we can..”

“Of course I want to, I've always wanted to and that hasn't changed. I love you.”

“You would. It's your Christian duty to love everyone.”

“Not everyone, just you and I don't think it's agape I'm feeling. Not totally anyway.” It's more like philos with a good helping of eros mixed in too.”

“Oh wow. You were paying attention in classes. You always were a good scholar, weren't you?”

“Oh yes, I was always the good little everything wasn't I? What a load of bull!”

“What? What do you mean? You were always perfect.”

“But I wasn't! It was an act, Amos. It was always an act and it was a lie.”

“A lie? You couldn't tell a lie.”

“Is that what you think? It was all a lie, my whole life was. I acted the good boy because I was scared not to and I didn't know what else to do. If you'd been with me, I might have been able to stand-up to them, but alone I couldn't do it.”

“Really??”

“Really. You have to believe me. For once in my life I'm telling the truth. We can do that now, we don't have to pretend anymore.”

“We really don't, do we? I have always pretended too. I think I've spent my whole life in a mild state of terror, always afraid of everybody and afraid to just be me.”

“We both have. Do you like me at all, Amos?”

“Like you? No, I don't. You are my better-than-a-brother and I love you. I always have and I always will and if that means I'm going to Hell, then I'm going to Hell.”

“I think we've already been to Hell. I think we were born and bred there. If God is like the Elders, then I don't want to go to the other place. If you love me, show me!”

“How can I show you I love you?”

“Kiss me.”

“You think I should?” Amos leant towards him.”

“I think you should.” Jeroboam cupped his hand behind his head, reeled him in and he kissed him. They embraced, carefully and gently, and cried on each other's shoulders.

They broke apart when Esther brought some food in, (omelettes). She said nothing, just grinned at their teary faces, offered the dishes, and then went back for her own.

Next time she came back, she said that she was pleased to see them sorting themselves out. She asked Jeroboam if he could cook, and when he said only very basically, she snorted and said that they were two of a kind! They agreed and said that they were, in many ways.

They sat and talked for a while, but not for long. Jeroboam was still tired and he needed sleep. He knew no more about what was going on than they did. Maybe the planet was fighting back against colonialisation in ways that they couldn't understand?

Jeroboam had woken-up one day and everyone had gone. Like Amos had, he went up to the top floor of the Community Building and was shocked at what he saw there. That was when he realised that he wasn't the only one who was living a lie. Maybe everybody was?

Elder Bethuel even had an album full of photographs of naked boys, mostly taken in the shower rooms. Had Amos seen that? No, he'd missed that one. Jeroboam said that there were photos of himself in there, and one of Amos – he'd pinched that one, it must be still in the car. Both boys grinned and blushed.

He knew that Amos had, for some reason, been sent to Elder Stephanas for correction and that he'd gone on retreat, so he stole a car and went to look for him. The Community always used the same lakeside resort town for their retreats, Engaddi, so that was where he went, but he found no trace of anyone there.

He figured that anyone living would probably head to Hebron, so he bought some food, (yes, he left money), and he'd came here looking for Amos. And here they all were!

“Indeed we are.” Esther stood up. “Unlikely survivors too, the three of us. It's time for bed. You can stay in here, Amos, but no talking! This Kid needs to sleep to recover, so you let him. If I hear any noise, I'll be back and I won't be happy!”

Whakahapa, 13

He slumped forward at some time during the night because when he woke in the morning his bum was still on the chair and his head was on the bed. He hauled himself upright, stood and stretched, feeling stiff in every joint. What a dumb way to sleep!

Jeroboam was still sleeping, he didn't look like he'd moved all night. Amos didn't know if that was a good thing or not.

The lamp was out, as in not going, and the room ponged of kerosene. He hadn't turned it off so it must have run out of fuel some time in the night. They'd put up with the smell, opening windows might make the room too cold.

He sat down again to have another, closer, look at the boy he adored. It was so strange that, of all the people in the world, there seemed to be just Jeroboam, Esther and himself left and everyone else had gone. What made them so special? Did they have something that nobody else did?

He didn't know. Life always was a mystery, it seemed to be getting worse. Or, maybe it was getting better? Who knew?

What woke him up? He didn't know but he knew that something had. Then he did know, at at least he thought he did. Something changed in Jeroboam's breathing, some interuption to the regular pattern. His face was still still, but it twitched and twitched again like dreams were running below the placid surface.

He almost missed it because he was leaning forward studying the face, but then he couldn't miss it – Jeroboam's hands, his arms, on top of the duvets, began moving feverishly in small, jerky circular movements.

Amos grabbed his wrists and held them still but he pulled them away and the face frowned and tightened. He grabbed again and held them still. Jeroboam struggled, then stopped and then his legs started moving like he was running. Damm.

Asmos held both of the wrists in one hand and used the other, plus his right knee, to hold the legs still until he settled down again. He relaxed all of a sudden and went on sleeping, so Amos relaxed too. He let go, warily but safely and nothing else happened.

Everything was quiet and he almost dozed off again but snapped awake at a noise from the bed. Jeroboam moaned in his sleep and his head rolled from side to side. It looked like he was trying to speak.

“Oh, oh!” Asmos felt so helpless, he didn't know what to do. Esther! Esther would know; he needed her now.

He went out, across the hall and knocked on the closed door there. “Esther! Are you in there?”

“I'm here,” she groaned a reply. “What's wrong, Boy?”

“Jeroboam. I think he's waking up. He's making moaning noises and I don't know what to do!”

“Okay, I'm coming. Go back and sit with him.”

When she came stumbling in he was sitting by the bed holding both of Jeroboam's hands and trying to keep them still. She came over, felt his temperature, felt his pulse and pulled his eyes open to look at them. They stayed open, full of fear (?), staring at her.

“Okay, My Friend. I think the best we can do is to put you back to sleep for a while. Hold him still, Amos.”

She loaded a hypodermic, lifted it to test for air-bubbles, and then swabbed a vein on Jeroboam's inner forearm with antiseptic. She tossed the cotton-wool away and sunk the needle in. Amos looked the other way. He knew that it was a good thing that she was doing, but he couldn't watch. He almost felt the needle himself.

The patient sighed and relaxed back into a deep sleep. Whatever she gave him was powerful stuff. What did she give him? No, he didn't want to know. It worked, that's all that mattered.

“How long is he going to sleep now?”

“Don't know. Maybe 12 hours, maybe longer. It'll be a while anyway, so we can start sorting what we need to sort.”

“He's going to be starving! Could we fix-up one of those IVF things, to feed him that way? You know, with a bottle and a tube into his veins.”

“I don't think so!” she laughed. “Sorry, Boy, but that's funny. He's not a girl you know.”

“I know that, I've always known that.”

“IVF would do him no good at all then would it? It stands for 'In Vitro Fertilisation' – making babies by fertilising eggs with sperm outside of the body, and I think your church doesn't approve? It's a different thing anyway. What you're thinking of is an IV Drip – an intravenous drip.”

“Yeah, okay. Don't laugh at me. Couldn't we do that then?”

“I'd rather not. We'll try it if we have to, but I'd sooner avoid it if possible. An ordinary injection is one thing, a drip is a bit more complicated and I've never done it, have you?”

“I haven't, but he'll be hungry!”

“You're a typical, teenage, walking stomach. Amos, he's not going to starve. It's not even 12 hours since we found him. When he wakes, if he wakes, we'll give him some of this.”

She picked up a small bottle and read from the label. “An easily digested, high-energy, nutritionally complete, milk-shake style, food supplement for special medical purposes.”

“Eh?” he puzzled.

“It's food in a drink, a complete meal in a bottle. We'll get some of this into him and that's all he needs.”

“Are you sure it'd be enough?”

“It's enough. You could live on this stuff. It'd be a boring diet but you wouldn't need anything else.”

“Good then. Have we got plenty of it?”

“We've got a boxful and there's lots more at the hospital. There's no way we're going to run out.”

“Well good! That's really good.” He looked at Jeroboam and smiled. “But, I . . . I'm going to have a shower now. I haven't had one in ages and I must stink!”

“No, you don't stink, no worse than I do. Have we got water here?”

“There is. The taps are all running normally. There's no hot water though, just cold, so it will be a fast shower.”

“Cold water? Better than nothing, I guess. We'll see if we can't jack-up a water-heating system. Shouldn't be hard. Also, with a generator or two, we can have electricity in here.”

“That would be great! You're very clever, Esther.”

“Yeah, bloody brilliant, except when I'm crash landing. I don't know what you'd do without me.”

“Neither do I. I really don't and thank you for everything, especially thank you for taking care of Jeroboam.”

“Ah! Don't get soppy on me. We do what what we can – it was me who ran him over, remember?”

“It was an accident!”

They spent the day cleaning up and improving their bivouac, going out 'shopping' one at a time. Jeroboam just slept but he was never left alone.

Mid-afternoon, Esther came back in, said that she'd started a car out in the street, she would take that now to the hospital and exchange it for her ute. She'd be back in an hour or so and would Amos be okay here?

He hoped he would and told her to be sure to hurry back.

“I'll be back,” she sighed. “Don't trust me, do you? Do you trust any girls?”

“Of course I do. Your being a girl has got nothing to do with it, I'm just worried, that's all. He really, really needs you. If it was just me he'd probably die.”

“I see. Nothing to do with my being a girl then?”

“Of course not! My mother's name is Esther, did I tell you that?”

“I don't think you did. But I'm not your mother.”

“I know that. I used to rely on her too, when I was little. You are my friend, aren't you?”

“I guess so. I'm your friend, for now. Don't get too dependent on me because I'm still going to fly away one of these days. Once our patient is stabilised and recovering, I'll be gone.”

“But you said you're coming back. You are still going to come back, aren't you?”

“I am, if I can. Who knows what will happen? I might crash-land again.”

“Let's hope not. Elder Bethuel, he was our schoolmaster, he always said, 'Once is a learning experience, twice is an error and culpable'.”

“I'll try not to make an error then. I won't be going for a day or two yet. I'm going to the hospital now, for my ute. Don't you dare shoot at me when I come back.”

“I won't. I promise.”

She wasn't gone long but he worried anyway. Jeroboam kept sleeping, that was good, wasn't it? Amos sat by him, smoothing his hair and dabbing his face with a wet towel.

Outside, the weather was turning sour again. Gray/white clouds covered the sky and were reflected in the broken surface of the harbour. The wind was getting up, it was going to be a rough night. Good that they were safely indoors. Where was Esther?

Shouldn't she be back by now? It had been well over an hour, hadn't it?

She returned and she was so happy he forgot to growl like he was going to. She'd recovered her ute and been to a library and found some great, detailed, maps of the city and of the whole country too!

Soon she'd go to the airfield and select another microlight, but probably not until both boys could go with her. Also, she'd seen some more pigeons flying around. “Trust the bloody pigeons to survive.”

Amos was hereby appointed chief cook and bottle washer for tonight. She'd sit and study the maps while she was waiting for her meal to be served. Amos said, sure he'd cook and she should remember that he was not as good at it as she was. Esther shrugged and told him that he needed more practice then.

He cooked – spam, scrambled eggs and broccoli. An unlikely combination, but good enough. After eating they sat and talked. Esther had a glass of wine, Amos had fruit juice.

“I wish he'd wake up.” Amos looked at their sleeping patient.

“You sure about that? He might be hurting when he does.”

“Well, no I don't want that. But we could give him some more pain-killers.”

“And knock him out again? We'll see how he is when he wakes.”

“All things considered, he feels pretty good really,” said a quiet voice at the other side of the room.

Whakahapa, 12

Esther got back into her ute, pulled away from the safety rail with a grinding of metal and a screech from the tyres and drove, at speed, away up the road into the city.

Amos sat and watched anxiously as she disappeared into the concrete jungle. She said that Hebron was her home, but it was such a big place, the biggest he'd ever seen. He hoped that she knew where to go, how to get there and back again without getting lost. He'd get lost in 5 minutes, how would she be? He didn't know, she didn't say.

There was a rug and a couple of duvets in his ute. He rummaged through all of the gear, found them and pulled them out. Jeroboam was lying on the concrete roadway, that couldn't be helped, he wasn't moving him to get something under him. He opened the covers and spread them over him.

A pillow, he needed a pillow. Anything would be better than concrete under his head. There was one in the ute somewhere, he thought, but he couldn't find it. The first car next to him had nothing in it. The next one had several small cushions along the back window. The doors were locked, so he smashed a side window to open a door and get the cushions.

Red blood, Jeroboam's life blood was trickling from his nose and running down the side of his face – his gorgeous face. His skin was a candlewaxy white, paler than he'd ever seen it, so pale that it made the blood look dark.

The eyes were closed now. When did that happen? Still breathing? Yes! (he checked).

“Oh, Damm, Jeroboam. You keep on breathing, don't you stop. Please don't stop. We'll help you, we can fix you. Esther, she's good at everything, she knows what she's doing. There'll be an ambulance here for you soon.

Fuckit, Jeroboam! What are you doing here? Why did you run out? Please don't die. I love you.”

Whoah! He'd never said that to him before. He'd always loved him but never dared telling him so. He didn't mean to now, it just slipped out because he was upset. But, it was true anyway. He loved him.

He gently, ever so carefully, lifted Jeroboam's head and slipped a cushion under it. There. Better.

Had the blood stopped, or was it still running from his nose? Who knew? Was he warm enough now? There might be rugs in some of the cars. No, what was on him would be plenty, he didn't want to cook him.

Amos got a bottle of water from the ute, saturated the corner of a hand-towel and gently, carefully, lovingly, washed the blood from his beautiful face. Even broken, Jeroboam was like an angel.

The flow of blood had stopped. So that was good, wasn't it? Yes, it had to be good. Where the hell was Esther? How far was that hospital anyway? She didn't say, he didn't know.

Everything depended on Esther now. What would he do if she didn't come back for some reason? He could build some sort of shelter out of bits and pieces. There was a tarpaulin in the ute, he could stretch that over top of him, like a tent. Then what? He didn't know.

Maybe he'd lie down and die next to him. But, Esther would be back, wouldn't she? She bloody better be! They needed her.

Still breathing? Yes. That was good.

“Breathe, Jeroboam. Rest and breathe. It's going to be all right, you're going to be fine. Esther will help us. What were you doing on the motorway? You dumb kid!

He sat holding his hand. It is not very warm, soft, limp and unresponsive. He bent and kissed it and tried, not very sucessfully, not to cry while he sat waiting – forever!

Clouds were sliding in from the sea, blotting out the sun and making the day darker. It wasn't going to rain, was it? He hoped not. That'd be the last thing they needed.

“Don't die. Please don't die,” he whispered, leaning down so close he could feel his breath on his cheek. He could kiss him, like he'd always dreamed of doing, but he would not – that'd be like taking advantage.

“Esther! Where the fuck are you??”

He looked up and got his answer – an ambulance was coming out of the city. Wouldn't it be great if she didn't see and ran over them? He got up, stood over the recumbent form, waved frantically and was greatly relieved when she answered with a flick of the headlights. It was going to be all right.

+++++++++++++++++

They installed Jeroboam in a second-floor room of the Academy Hotel. Amos didn't see why they didn't go to the hospital, but Esther said there was no point, they weren't doctors and there was no-one there. He wasn't arguing with her, as long as she was helping he'd go along with whatever she said.

At first they lit candles to light the room, but they didn't seem right so he got 3 kerosene lamps going. They made plenty of light.

Esther had brought some supplies from the hospital, so, along with what was in the ambulance, they had bandages, plasters, cotton wool and splints, a breathing mask and cylinders of oxygen, nitrous oxide and chloroform, penicillin, sleeping pills, morphine, valium, librium and hypodermics, anitseptics and more – like they had their own surgery or whatever.

They probably wouldn't use most of it, it was just nice to have it if they needed it. There was no heater for the room but, as long as they kept him well covered, the windows and door closed and the lamps going, the room would warm-up, hopefully.

They stripped Jeroboam naked, cutting his clothes off him. Amos would've found that very exciting and interesting at another time and place, but not now, he was too worried.

Odd really, he couldn't do it, so Esther felt all around the boy's body, his torso, neck and head and all of his limbs. The right leg was swollen and badly bruised below the knee, but as far as she could tell, there were no broken bones, probably.

“I think I hit him with a glancing blow but he hit the road pretty hard. I don't know, there could be internal injuries. Time will tell, I guess.”

“Could we take him to the hospital and xray him?”

“No. The less he's moved the better. Xray machines need electricity and people who know how to work them. That is not us. We wouldn't know how to read them either. No, we'll wait and see. I don't think his skull is broken, but he's had a good knock.”

“Is he? Will he? Esther, is he going to get better?”

“Sorry, Sweet. I wish I could say yes, but I really don't know.”

“Oh. Should he be sleeping all this time?”

“That's good, I think. The temperature is a bit high but his pulse is normal. I think he's resting and sleeping normally, and he probably needs to. While he's sleeping he's not hurting.

We'll wash his wounds with antiseptic, bandage him up and leave him alone.”

“We're not going to wake him?”

“We're not. He seems peaceful enough as he is.”

He didn't want to, but she insisted that he go down and unload his ute and bring all of his food and gear upstairs to set-up in the next room. (There were plenty of rooms to choose from). Esther sat and watched their patient while he did that, and then he sat and watched him while she went and cooked their evening meal – curry in a can with fries.

She took one of the lamps with her. She said that there was too much light in there for a sick-room and she needed it. Sitting there, thinking about that, he decided that she was probably right and he doused one of the other lamps as well. They didn't need a lot of light to watch Jeroboam sleeping.

There were a lot of rooms here, he'd go out and get some more lamps sometime. For now, all that he wanted to do was to sit and watch and wait for Jeroboam to wake up. He would wake up, wouldn't he? Yes, of course he would.

Funny, he didn't feel at all like praying for him. Anyway, if he did, Esther would probably tell him that it was a waste of time and effort and quote some bible passage to back her up. He sat quietly watching their patient; he'd happily sit there all night looking at him.

Esther brought their meals in and they sat and ate together.

“Good meal. Thanks, Esther.”

“You're welcome, but it was no big deal, just heat and eat.”

“Jeroboam's going to be starving when he wakes up. If he wakes up.”

“He'll wake up when he's ready. Of course he will. Stop worrying; worrying never did anybody any good.”

“Would praying for him do any good?”

“Amos! Shouldn't I be asking you that? If it makes you feel better, you go for it. I'm not telling you what to think.”

“Just what to do,” Amos nodded.

“Shut up!” she grinned. “We do what we have to. Now I'm going to bed. Don't sit here all night, you need your sleep too.”

“I'm not going anywhere.”

“Don't then. Make up a bed for yourself in here. I'll be across the hall, call me if you need me and don't burn the place down.”

“I'll try not to. Goodnight, Esther and thank you.”

“Thank me for what?”

“For looking after Jeroboam.”

“Well of course! G'night, Boy. I'll see you in the morning and I hope not before then.”

He was going to, honestly, he was – but he didn't. He dragged a mattress through from the next room, dumped the covers and pillows on top of it, and then he sat down again to watch Jeroboam.

He could sit there like that, close to him, forever and not be bored. He wasn't too hot was he? No. He felt his forehead, (again!), and he seemed to be okay. What would he know anyway? Not much, but he thought that he was all right. He hoped so.

He went to sleep sitting in the chair next to the bed.

Whakahapa, 11

They sat and ate quietly until Amos had to make a quick dash to the bathroom down the hall. He felt like puking all the way, but managed to control himself. As there was no water and the toilets wouldn't flush, it was pretty disgusting in there when he'd finished – he'd use a different bathroom next time!

He came back into the room dragging the mattress that he'd been sleeping on. Esther looked up and frowned. “What ARE you doing?”

“Putting this back where we found it. We are going to clean up before we go, aren't we?”

“Why would you want to do that?”

“It seems like the right thing to do. We're not paying for staying here.”

“We're not. Amos, it doesn't matter, it just doesn't matter. We're leaving and there's no-one else here. Quite possibly, no-one may ever come into this room, this hotel or this whole town, ever again. Leave it, it doesn't matter.”

“Well . . . Yeah, you're probably right. I'll leave a note anyway, just in case someone does come in here one day.”

“A note? What are you going to say? 'Sorry about the mess, have a nice day.'?”

“No,” he grinned. “Not that. I'll say that we stayed here and now we're going to Hebron.”

“Okay, can't do any harm I guess. Take care of that, we'll take what we're taking and load it in the vehicles, and then we'll hit the road.”

“Not literally, I hope.”

“Not literally, Silly!”

They took the gear down and loaded it in Esther's vehicle, because that was the emptier one. They started the engines, reversed, turned and started off out of town. He thought that she'd forgotten the painkillers, (which he really, really needed!), but she hadn't. She stopped and went into a chemist's shop on the way.

He stood outside, avoiding the direct sunshine and with his eyes resting closed, moving gently and breathing carefully. He was starting to feel better. Maybe. A bit. At this rate, by next week, he should feel fine.

Esther came out, carrying a bag full of stuff. She took a packet of pills from the top of the bag and tossed them to him. “Take a couple of those and you'll feel a lot better.”

“Thanks. I will.”

He recovered the packet from where it had fallen on the path behind him and, only shaking a little bit, ripped it open. The pills, encased in plastic bubbles, were brown, cylindrical and quite large.

“I, umm, I'll need a drink so I can swallow them.”

“You would. Well then,” Esther swung her wrecking bar and loudly shattered the glass door of the shop next door, “the Dairy is open. Help yourself to a drink.”

“Yeah. I will,” he tried to smile, carefully. He stepped through, yet another, broken door and crunched over the bits of glass.

If there was a day of reckoning coming up, there was an awful lot of stuff going to have to be paid for. But, he couldn't afford to worry about that and he did need a drink.

It was dark inside the shop after the glaring sunshine outside. His eyes soon adjusted and he found the drinks cabinet and selected the one he wanted. He took it back out to where Esther waited and put it on the outdoor picnic table while he extracted two pills from their bubbles.

“What sort of drink do you call that?” Esther picked up the bottle for a closer look. “This is blue!”

“Yes, sure it is. It is mineral water, fortified and flavoured. Blueberry, I think.”

“You think?”

“I do. I like it anyway.”

“Enjoy it then. I think it looks, and sounds, disgusting.”

“No it's not! It's just different, that's all.”

“Very different. Come on then, take a couple of your pills and we'll get going.”

“A couple? Way I feel, I might need to take the whole box!”

“You do not. The packet says the dosage is 2 pills, followed by another one in 4 hours and don't exceed the recommended dosage. Too much wouldn't help. It might even make you sicker.”

“Sicker? Yuck!”

“Don't do it then. Hurry up.”

He swallowed a couple of the log-like pills, washed them down with the mineral water, and then offered the bottle to Esther. “Do you want to try it?”

“I do not! Don't know about you, but where I come from we didn't share drink bottles. Keep your germs to yourself. And, it still looks disgusting.”

“It does not,” Amos grinned. “Are we ready to go?”

“Yes, it's about time. We'll have to move it if we're going to get there and find somewhere to hole-up before dark. I'll go first and you follow, but not too close. I might have to brake suddenly for a tree or something.”

“Okay, but how come you lead the way?”

“For a hundred reasons Let's just say that I can see better than you can right now.”

“Okay. Lay on MacDuff.”

They drove through the day, their twin vehicles ripping noise through the quiet countryside. At each small town they passed through, they stopped, sounded the vehicles' horns and looked around, but they saw no signs of life anywhere.

They stopped and ate lunch in a small riverside park in the centre of TAIHAPE (?). Bees buzzed in the flower gardens there. That was a welcome sight. Even more welcome were a couple of pigeons flying noisily overhead.

Well, Amos was delighted to see them. Esther smacked her lips in an exaggerated and comic fashion and said, “Yummy! Pigeon pie and honey. We won't go hungry.”

“Esther!” he protested. “Can't you just be glad to see something that is alive? There's plenty to eat without killing the last pigeons in the world.”

“I know that. Relax, I was just joking. We've already agreed that we're not going to starve and, yes, it's good to see them. Really good.”

“It is,” he smiled and nodded. “It's like – hope.”

“Yeah, if you like, it's hopeful. Signs of life.

They looked, but saw nothing else there apart from a couple of trout drifting lazily down the river. But that was nothing new, they already knew that the fish had survived. Amos was feeling much better by then. He swallowed another pill to feel better still.

There were more and more, bigger and bigger towns as they neared the capital city. They stopped stopping and just tooted and looked as they drove slowly through them all.

Finally, late afternoon, they were coming around the bay and could see Hebron in the distance ahead of them. Multiple railway lines, with electric overhead gantries, ran parallel to the left of the motorway with the sea beyond them. Green hills reared up on their right – bush-clad hills with thousands of, mostly white, little houses strung along them, all quiet in the afternoon sunshine.

Directly ahead, white/grey motorway ramps licked up into the center of the city, like frozen rivers, curving out of sight in the concrete jungle, shaded below the towering blocks of offices, banks and businesses. Ranks of windows reflected empty sky or other, blind windows. The Capital, Hebron. Their destination.

They stopped on the motorway, among some still and abandoned vehicles, (all with the seat-belts fastened!), stood and looked. The silence was huge.

“There it is,” Esher swept an all-encompassing gesture. “The pride of New Salem, Hebron, the Capital and the only real city we've got. Or, had, I suppose. Welcome to my hometown. Feeling better now, are you?”

“Much better, thanks. I'm still a bit tired, but the headache has gone and that's good.”

“That's always good. So you'll be ready for more bottles of wine tonight?”

“I don't think so! Not tonight and not any other nights either.”

“Yeah, right! I've heard that story before.”

“But it's true! Anyway, all I want to do is to lie down and sleep for a week.”

“Which you can, once we've found somewhere to sleep. I think an upmarket downtown hotel will do the trick.”

“Another hotel? Aren't we going to your home?”

“Not likely. It's not there anymore. The apartment block where I lived has burnt to the ground. Don't ask! We'll go the the Academy, that's about the newest and flashest pub that I know of. We'll live it up.”

“Up in a high-rise! But, not tonight. I just want to sleep and sleep.”

“Sure, but a bit of luxury will be nice. Follow me, it's getting late already. At least there's no rush-hour traffic to slow us down.”

Speeding into the city, sweeping too fast, along the empty motorway, Esther suddenly braked ahead of him, there was a heavy 'thud' and her ute skidded to a screeching stop in a wide curve and slammed into the safety rail, facing back where she'd been.

Amos stopped quickly, though not as fast as she had, and reversed back. Shaken, he leapt out to accuse her. “What in Salem are you doing?”

She stood and pointed. He turned and looked and a rag-doll figure lay sprawled in a twist on the far side of the road. One leg was splayed out awkwardly, the head facing up, eyes open and blood starting from various cuts and grazes.

It was a boy, a long-limbed youth lying there, tendrils of blond hair flicking around in the breeze off the sea. He was dressed in blue – light-blue, long-sleeved shirt, now twisted and torn, dark-blue trousers and tie with black shoes.

It was the uniform that Amos knew well, the same clothes that he wore, all day, every day, when he lived at home.

Esther bent over, retching, muttering and cursing to herself. “Oh God, No! Nothing I could do. He was just there, ran out – I couldn't. God, no! What've I done?”

“I, umm.” Amos looked backwards and forwards, feeling so useless. What could he do? “You, ah, you know what we've done.”

He turned from her and staggered across the road to where the figure lay. He approached and stared, shocked, at the blue eyes. It couldn't be, could it? It couldn't possibly be – but it was – Him!

“Jer . . . Jeroboam? Jeroboam!!!”

He dropped to his knees on the hard concrete roadway, which was just as well because the next thing that happened was that his eyes rolled up and he fainted.

He woke again when someone slapped his face – Esther, of course. She was red-faced and crying too as she bent over him. “Come on, Boy! Wake up! I need you here – wake up.”

“Esther?” He shook his head, then whipped around. “It is. Jeroboam!”

“You know this boy?”

“I love this boy.”

“This is the one that you got yourself into trouble over?”

“Yes! What's he doing here? Did we kill him?”

“I don't know what he's doing here and, no, we didn't kill him. Didn't do him any good, but he's not dead. I hit him, you had nothing to do with it. I hit him.”

“We were driving in convoy. If I wasn't there, you might've been going slower.”

“Or, I might've been going faster, who knows? Regardless, now we've got a mess to fix. Get some blankets, coats, sleeping bags, whatever you can find. Cover him up and keep him warm but don't move him yet. Smash your way into some of these cars if you have to, see what you can find.

I'll be back as soon as I can. I'll go to the Public Hospital and I'll get an ambulance.”

“An ambulance? What for?”

“What do you think for? Use your head, Boy! We can't leave him here and we can't move him in the utes, he might have broken bones. An ambulance will have all the gear we need, stretchers and straps, sedatives, pain-killers and stuff.'

“But he's already unconscious!”

“And that's good, I think.”

“Where are we going to take him to?”

“Don't know. Somewhere where we can clean him up and where he'll be comfortable. The hospital, maybe? I'll think about it while I'm gone. We'll sort something out.”

“Okay, thank you, Esther. I can't do it by myself, but we have to fix him, we just have to!”

“We'll try. Don't worry, we'll do what we can. Look after him and keep him warm, I'll be back soon.”

Whakahapa, 10

“Okay! He was Jeroboam and he was wonderful. Really, really nice.”

“And?”

“Jeroboam was a boy, my age, in the community where we grew up. Ever since separating from our parents' family rooms we've slept in the same dormitory, but in separate cubicles of course.

We started school together on the same day and I think I loved him even then. No, I know that I did. I've always loved him, ever since I can remember. We were close friends when we were little, but grew apart as we grew older.

No, that's not right either. We didn't just grow apart, I pulled back and withdrew from him, and then he got more distant with me.”

“Why did you withdraw if you loved him?”

“It was because I loved him that I had to. I had to stay away, to not go near him and to have as little to do with him as I could – I just had to!”

“But why did you have to?”

“Because Jeroboam was a good boy. He was blond and beautiful and just very, very good. And pure. He was like an angel living amongst us. I yearned, I ached for him, but I couldn't do anything that might corrupt him, not to Jeroboam. He wouldn't want to anyway.

It was not a good love that I had for him. It was a bad love, a bad, evil, sinful love and he was so good. He'd be disgusted if he knew what I thought when I looked at him, so I stayed away – as much as I could. It was a small community and we all lived together.”

“What made him so special that it was him you loved and not somebody else? I presume there were other boys your age there.”

“There was, lots of them. I don't know why I fell in love with him, but I did. I couldn't help it, I guess I'm just evil.”

“You're not evil! You were IN love? There's a difference you know.”

“I know. I loved him when we were little and it grew as we grew and one day I knew that I was in love with him and I wanted to be with him like a man is with his wife, and that is so wrong!”

“Who says it's wrong?”

“Everybody. Well, they did. The prophets said it, the Bible said it and the Elders said it. It is wrong for a boy to love another boy, so it is a bad love. Bad, sinful and evil.”

“Damm!” She said. “Amos, that is pure and utter bullshit. There is no such thing as bad love; that's just some rubbish that your church has dreamed up. There is love and that is all. Love is all good and it can't be bad.”

“It can't? But . . . how can you say that?”

“Because it's true. Listen to this.” She closed her eyes and concentrated as she recited, “Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, endures all things. Love never fails.”

She opened her eyes and looked at him. “There is more, but that's enough. Heard that before?”

“Yes. It's in the Bible.”

“It is, that and more. Anything in there about bad love?”

“Well, no, not there.”

“Not anywhere. Dammit, Amos, there is no bad love.”

“Yes there is. What about lust and greed and coveting and stuff?”

“What about them? They're not love, they are lust and greeds and coveting. They're not patient and kind and all the rest of it. Amos do you believe that God made you?”

“Of course.”

“Of course. You think he made a mistake? God is love and love never fails – never! I'm getting tired of this. I'm the last person to be preaching at you. Love is good, full stop. You loved that boy. Did you want bad things to happen to him?”

“No, never!”

“Of course you didn't. You cut yourself off from him so you wouldn't lead him astray. That was a good thing to do – really stupid, but a good thing. You loved him and there's nothing wrong with that.”

“All right, thanks, Esther. Doesn't make any difference now anyway, does it?”

“Yes it does. What you've done, how you've lived, has helped form who you are and, despite what they might've told you, you're a good person.”

“Do you think so?”

“I know so.”

“The Elders didn't think that. They would have killed. . . they killed. . .”

He stopped in mid-sentence and sat staring at the floor in front of him, his mouth hanging open. Esther waited as long as she could, and then spoke up.

“Amos? What's wrong, Sweet?”

“They would,” he said, looking ahead and not at her. “He did. Elder Stephanas, he killed . . . ”

He sat still as a statue, looking down and thinking aloud. “They knew. They found out and he, Elder Stephanas, had the task . . . he was to correct and drive the evil out. It would not go and he, he beat and he beat. . . I fell into the stone fireplace. I struck my head. I died.

Esther, I died!!”

“You're not dead.”

“But I did. I remember. How can I have two different memories of the same correction? Am I insane?”

“No, you're not mad.”

“But how can I remember this and I remember that – waking in the motel in the resort town? How?”

“I – I, yi, yi . I don't know. You're here now. You must've dreamed about the other.”

“Did I? It seems so real.”

“It can't be real, you're here and not dead. It was a dream, it must've been a dream.”

“A dream?” He held a hand in front of his face and flexed and closed his fingers. “I am here. It must be a dream, a horrible nightmare. But it seems so real – I remember.”

“Yeah, well it was not real. You're just remembering a bad dream. The worst ones can seem like they're real.”

“You're right. You must be right, if I'm not mad.”

“You're not mad, Sweetie. You're just confused and that's understandable. The world we knew has gone and that's not easy to accept. I need a drink and I think that you need one too.”

She reached for one of the bottles and the plastic glasses in the Supermarket supplies. She poured out two glasses of the pinkish and bubbly wine. “Here,” she held a glass out to him. “Drink this. It will do you good. Well take it, Boy. I'm not feeding it to you!”

He took the glass and sat looking suspiciously at it. “What is in this?”

“There's nothing in it. It is the fruit of the vine – fermented grape juice - good wine. Drink it, it's good for you. It will settle you and help you get to sleep.”

“It will? But it is strong drink – alcohol.”

“It's just wine. Have you never had a glass?”

“I haven't. It is sinful to drink strong liquors.”

“Sinful to drink wine? Somebody should have told Jesus that. He drank wine and quite often too by the looks of things.”

“Did he?”

“He did. Drink it, Boy. Think of it as medicine – herbal medicine even.”

“I suppose it is, sort of herbal,” Amos grinned. He lifted the glass to his mouth, smelled it, tasted it, and then drank it all. “It's nice, very nice. I like it. The bubbles tickle my nose!”

“They'll do that; you get used to it.” She refilled his glass. “Have another one. Drink up, but slowly this time.”

He drained the glass again, looked at it and giggled. “You have to drink it down to drink it up. That's funny!”

“Yeah, bloody hysterical. We can't leave the bottle half full, it'll go flat. Do you want another?”

“Oh, yes! Thank you.”

They drank another glass, and then yet another, and then opened another bottle. And another.

Time passed as they sat and talked about this and that, nothing serious, and making vague plans for the next day. Esther could see him visibly relaxing, and that had to be good.

She matched him drink for drink but didn't think that she was enjoying it as much as he seemed to. His big, goofy grin faded when he couldn't shake any more out of the bottle.

“Empty! We've run out already,” he complained.

“We have and I think you've had enough, Boy.”

“Just one more. Pleeease! There's another bottle. And, I'm not a boy.”

“Oh, but you are. Okay, we'll have that bottle and then it's time for bed.”

“To bed! To sleep, counting sheep! I, I'm a poet you know it.
I write poems, I'll show you one day. They are very good.”

“Yeah, yeah. I'm sure they are.”

They finished the wine. Esther stood and shook her head as she watched him struggling to get up. He didn't look that bad when he was sitting down, as soon as he tried to stand his legs turned to rubber.

She took hold of his arms and hauled him to his feet. “Amos, you're drunk!”

“I, I, I'm not acksher – actual – not drunk. I'm just a bit pished.!”

“You certainly are. Just a bit. Come on, we'll get you to bed.”

He had to use the bathroom, of course, and she had to help him. That was not nice but served her right. She shouldn't have let him get drunk.

In the bedroom, he dived on to the mattress on the floor, and flaked. Esther knelt down, took his boots off and covered him up to sleep in his clothes. She got into her own bed, blew out the last candle and went to sleep.

If there were any noises in the night, they didn't hear them.

Esther woke in the morning and looked down at the boy sleeping, bum-up and face-down, on the mattress on the floor. A line of drool ran from his open mouth to the sheet below him.

'Oh Boy! You're not going to be a happy camper when you wake up.'

She slid out of bed and quietly left the room, softly closing the door behind her. First port of call was the bathroom, to empty her bladder, and then to the other room, for coffee to refill it. Her head was not too bad, she'd had worse. She'd had better too. Did those first-aid kits that they got have aspirins in them? She checked; they didn't. Damm.

It was going to be a good day outside. A good day for flying, if she had a microlight! There was no sign of an airfield around here, they were going to have to backtrack to Hebron, to the fields there, to get another plane.

While waiting for the water to boil, she got the inevitable Gideon's bible from the top drawer of the bedside cabinet and found the passage she was thinking of.

She was sitting savouring her first coffee of the day when a sorry sight came staggering in the door. Amos' clothes looked like they'd been slept in, which they had. His hair was all awry, his face a sickly white colour and his eyes were more closed than open.

“My head hurts! Oww.”

“Ah, you poor wee thing!” Esher actually felt, a bit, guilty for letting him get as drunk as he did, but she wasn't telling him that. “Get yourself a coffee.”

“I will. Have we got any painkillers?”

“Nope. Sorry. We should've got some yesterday, but didn't. We'll do that before we leave town.”

“We're still leaving today? Do we have to? I'm not well you know; I'm really sick and I feel awful.”

“It's just your first hangover, Boy. It won't kill you. Give it a couple of hours and you'll feel human again. Maybe next time you won't overindulge.”

“There won't be a next time! I am never going to drink that stuff again.”

“Yeah, yeah. That's what they all say, but you will.”

“I will not.”

“We'll see. Listen to this.” She picked up the book and read it to him. “Who has woe? Who has sorrow? Who has contentions? Who has babbling? Who has wounds without cause? Who has redness of eyes? They that tarry long at the wine; they that go to seek mixed wine.

Look not upon the wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the cup. At the last it bites like a serpent and stings like an adder . . . they have stricken me, you will say, and I was not sick; they have beaten me, and I didn't feel it; when will I wake up? I need another drink.”

“Is that really in the Bible?”

“Yep. In the Book of Proverbs.”

“Well they got that right! Would another drink help my head?”

“No, it wouldn't,” she laughed. “You'd just get drunk again. Drink your coffee.”

“Does coffee help?”

“Not really, but it will wake you up. I don't suppose you want fried eggs for breakfast?”

“I do not! I feel sick just thinking about it.”

“It'll get better.”

“Can't get much worse.”

“Oh but you could. I have, many times.”

“You have?”

“Yes, when I was young and stupid.”

“And now you're not so young.”

“And not so stupid too. You need some food in you. If not eggs, do you want to toast some more muffins?”

“That sounds better, thanks. I'll do that.”

“And I will let you do that. We'll eat, load up what we want to take with us, and then go to a chemists shop, for painkillers, before we leave town. Should be back in Hebron by tonight.”