A timid knock on the door wakes me to English roses on the walls. I blink, trying to adjust my memory to the surroundings. Tropical arrangements on all wooden surfaces. Ah. Yes.
I sit up, rubbing my eyes. “Come in?”
The door barely creaks open, and a girl my age with smooth skin and happy eyes peaks her head in through the crack.
“Akuntsa?” I ask, recognizing her. I scoot off the bed and narrow the distance between us. Her smile breeds contented streaks at the corner of her eyes.
“Yes, this is nice to meet you!” Akuntsa’s English is easier to understand than the hotel owner’s. I reach for her hand, but she squeezes me like we’re family. It’s rare for me to feel like a giant, but with my arms around this beautiful little waif, I do.
“Did you bring your cousin?” I ask.
She pulls back enough to show the confused furrow at her brow.
“You know, Levari? Is he here?”
She lights up and says, “He is! Come.” She waves me forward.
I slide into my flip-flops and give Akuntsa a one-sec warning with a finger in the air. Luka and I are only two days into our ten-week trip, but his presence already feels necessary. “My friend is asleep. I want him to meet you too.”
Her mouth forms an excited “Ah.”
Groggy, Luka rumbles, “Yep,” at my knock, and I open the door to find him on his back, lounging on top of the sheets with his hands under his head. When he sees that I’m not alone, he sits up. As he stands, smile growing slowly, Akuntsa makes a small sound in the back of her throat.
He too slips into his flip-flops and saunters toward us like he does. “I’ve heard a lot about you, Akuntsa,” he murmurs.
“So beautiful a man,” Akuntsa says now, grinning.
It could have been awkward if Luka’s smile wavered and he hadn’t simply replied, “Thank you. Did you come to see us alone?”
She shakes her head happily and points at the staircase. “He wait with chairs.”
“Okay, let’s go to the chairs,” I say and watch her clap.
On the first floor, I look around and only see another young woman. Light on her feet, she stands from the group of worn-out armchairs and steps forward with her hand outstretched.
Luka and I exchange a glance.
“This is cousin Levari! He ready to work now.”
We take turns having our cheeks kissed, Luka bending even lower than he does with me. Once we’re upright again, standing in a small circle, I say, “We thought Levari was a man.”
“He? Man?” Akuntsa points at Levari, and they both giggle.
“I look like a man?” Levari asks. Dark with big eyes, she’s small and dainty.
Air puffs out of Luka, a nasal gust of humor. “No, no. It’s all clear to us now.”
“Oh good.” Levari winks and sets a hand playfully on her hip. I think she’s flirting with him, right here in front of her new employer, aka me. I can’t help laughing.
“They say ‘she,’ about us. ‘He’ is for men,” she explains to Akuntsa, who’s trying to absorb all our words. Levari switches to what must be Larengatu.
It’s pretty cute to watch Akuntsa’s face brighten in understanding. Then she giggles again, still finding it hilarious.
Luka lowers his voice and whispers exactly what I thought he would: “There goes your extra muscle for the jungle. See? You need me.”
“Whatever.” I elbow him, because goddammit, he’s right. Don’t you hate it when guys are right?
A day later, a small ferry carries us away from civilization. Levari and I stand by the banister. She points into the river’s murky depths each time she sees something we don’t. “Black caiman. Do you see the knobs of its back sticking out of the water?”
I shake my head, squinting. The sun is high over us, leaving its reflection on the surface.
“There. It’s sticking up again. The caiman bobs in and out of the water, looking like a tree trunk. There. See it now? Its spine is about three meters long. Look past the white hat and into the river.”
Said white hat covers the head of a retiree from Texas. He’s enjoying the view too, from ten feet down the long side of the ferry. Luka has already shared fictitious war stories with him, knowing full well his true stories would have given the poor man a heart attack.
And there’s the caiman, slithering against the surface, long and scary and marvelous. I see its eyes too, and squeal with excitement.
“You like that?” Luka’s voice has a smile in it.
“Yes!”
The banks of the river are so green the air seems to vibrate from them, and the tropical climate leaves the temperature in the mid-eighties year-round. The constant need for insect repellant will take some getting used to, but on an inhale, I realize there’s something missing that I don’t miss; my heart isn’t spasming with pain.
Wow. It’s surreal. I’m really here, in this place I’ve only ever read about. With heavy backpacks hoisted high, we trot into the wild, and I’m impressed at how easily Levari discerns a path through the shrubbery. She was so excited about the last stop of the ferry, because, “It used to take ages to get home.” Now, it’s “only” a three-hour walk.
Twice, she stops, raising a hand in warning behind her. We remain frozen until a thick bushmaster snake has slithered across in front of us. The second time, it’s a howler monkey, only this one is the leader of his tribe and louder than all of them. We don’t want to mess with him, she says. I’m not about to object.
But then we’re there, in a small opening in the green, green jungle, where leaves and branches wave above dirt-toned huts. Curious Lara’ men peer at us, and my heart skips a beat over being here, right here with them.
With long hair tied back in a ponytail, dressed like me, and in jungle-worthy shoes, Levari stands out from her own. The Lara’ people view clothing as optional, and more an adornment than a necessity.
A man steps forward. He speaks rapidly, chopping his sounds into short, sing-song syllables that suit the forest. Levari nods. She twists toward us and extends an open hand. She pronounces our names slowly for the man who bobs his head.
“This is Paparanya, the chief of Lara’ Nation. We call him Pap.” She smiles and motions us forward. I nod, swallowing my awe to give room for a smile. He’s been the leader of the Lara’ for a long time, a generous host for anthropological teams before me.
Pap engulfs my hand in both of his and performs a quick handshake in the true meaning of the word. I feel the muscles of my upper arm loosen from the small but quick thrusts. Levari translates over his staccato explanation that since we’re to live among them, we’re being renamed.
“You are Eva, and Luka is Luck.”
“Does he know what Luck means?” Luka asks.
“Oh yes,” Levari says, smiling. “He thinks you need it.”
It’s incredible to experience firsthand what you’ve only studied from afar. I knew the jungle night isn’t quiet, but I had no idea how loud it really is until darkness falls, blackening the surroundings completely.
Luka and I have been given a small hut with a hard-packed, dirt floor. The Amazon hosts one third of all living species in the world, and it seems half of them are nocturnal. I hear buzzing of wings—insects, bugs, large and small. Flapping of feathers. High-pitched calls. It turns out that slithering is distinguishable to the human ear if you’re wide awake and hold your breath.
I thought I had prepared myself for this experience, studying the flora and the fauna as well, but when howls reach us from afar, there’s no way to tell if they’re human or some animal’s. There’s a deep growl too, and that makes me sit up fast. It sounds like it’s right outside our door.
“Shh,” Luka whispers and pulls me down beside him. “Don’t be scared.”
Before bedtime, he suggested, mischievous grin in place, that we zip together our sleeping bags. I told him that we could definitely do that—in his dreams.
“That was a growl though,” I explain in case he missed it.
“Yes, but do you hear anyone stirring? It’s completely quiet out there.”
“Oh my god,” I start, but he cuts in, mouth against my ear.
“No, not oh-my-god. Oh-my-god would have been if the Lara’ were freaking out. Since they’re not, it means they’re not concerned.”
My head thumps back on the sweater I’m using as a pillow. “That’s true, huh?”
“Yep.”
He lays down again too, and we wait, breathing together. Luka’s arm touches the length of mine.
“Lots of sounds out there,” I murmur. “It doesn’t scare you at all?”
He turns toward me and strokes my cheek. A section of his hair falls over mine on the yoga-mat-like mattress. “Have you ever used sleep apps on your phone?”
“Sure, why?”
“It drowns out the sounds around you. So now we’re in the middle of a live sleep app production.”
My laughter creaks out through my nose. “What an urban thing to say.”
“Hey, call it what you want. Makes sense though, doesn’t it?”
I turn too, feeling closer to this man; there’s something about being alone together in the middle of a nowhere that’s green and fragrant and wet.
When I was little, I learned that it doesn’t matter how dark the world around you is. If you stare long enough, you will distinguish shadows and light. Now, I stare toward the faint scent of shampoo and man. Toward the barely there breathing of someone who decided to put his life on hold to follow me into the wilderness.
Blunt fingertips stroke me again, pulling sections of hair away from my temple. I stop his movement with my hand. He halts under my grasp, but I don’t free myself of his touch. Instead I leave my hand there, keeping him close, and I watch him until the glint in his gaze becomes visible.
“Thank you,” I say. “You were right. I do need you here. Thank you for coming along on this trip.” It’s overwhelming to say out loud, because I’ve harbored resentment for so long. I’m glad he can’t see my throat bob as I suppress my emotions.
He could have done what he’s good at: rub it in, saying he was right and what took me so long. He could have gone the tepid polite route too and said “No problem. I needed a break from my studies,” like he did at home. But he does neither of those things. Instead Luka’s tone is humble when he says, “I’m where I want to be.”
When the rain starts to tickle the forest roof above us, lending more sound than humidity, I feel a sigh press out of me. “They’ve got their camp set up nicely, don’t they?”
“Yeah, they do. The trees are so thick, so full of leaves, I bet they can fend off even the wet season here.” Luka touches the dirt at the base of the wall behind me. I study his arm extended over us on its way back, the lines of muscle and joints shadowing the darkness of our new home.
“I like the sound of rain,” I breathe, my heart speeding up a little.
“It’s natural, you know.”
I don’t reply. I just wait for him to continue, and he does.
“It’s white noise, like in a mother’s womb. People talk about it being peaceful in there before you’re born, and it might be, but it sure isn’t quiet.”
“Why isn’t it quiet?”
“The mother’s intestines are loud when they work. Our intestines always work, digesting food, and so forth.”
“Eww.”
He breathes a low chuckle at my response.
It’s easier to be forgiving of mistakes and lifestyles when you share a home with someone in the wild. So when Luka traces my lip with a finger, I let him. When he kisses my lips chastely, softly, I let him.
It takes us a few weeks to adapt to the slow rhythm of the jungle. When Luka and I arrived here, we didn’t bring what we had shipped to Tacua. The plan was to see how we would manage with only our backpacks filled with the essentials for my studies, our first-aid kit, and the small handheld camera we brought to document my encounters. It has worked so far, but it’s nice to know we have backup.
Most of the day among the Lara’ consists of house chores if you’re a woman, and hunting or fishing if you’re a man. A small river streams quietly beyond the clearing, and with scouts on the lookout for predators, we bathe there and wash our clothes.
Children splash water at each other, shouting and laughing. Raka, a young newlywed with a baby on her hip, teaches me how to scrub my clothes. Her eyes seem to reflect the sun whether it’s there or not, narrowing with humor over mistakes only she sees in my technique. Her husband, Tujy, is the only warrior visiting us at the riverbank. Sinewy and bright-eyed like his wife, he’s generous with kisses to his baby’s head and Raka’s lips. The two of them make me feel light inside.
Lara’ Nation has a shaman, Kumunja, who communicates mystically with the age-old jaguar Syriyu, a large male that has watched over the village for generations.
Kumunja explains that if they don’t share their grilled deer and parrots with the king jaguar, the Lara’ people’s luck will run out. He doesn’t believe their new large, very white mascot, Luck, can alter this fact. He side-eyes Luka impishly while Levari translates.
For now, there has been no sign of grief in women or men. Their sense of humor is infectious, and the little ones love to spy on Luka and me. Whenever there’s an especially delicious meal to be had, we’re called to the bonfire and get to be second, after Chief Pap, to taste it. On these occasions, the little Lara’ women sit clustered together, watching Luka savagely bite through his chunks with little to no fear of the unknown.
I used to despise how he ate, but after three weeks with the Lara’, I understand the rapt admiration from the cooks. I see his ardor with their eyes. They press their hands together over necklace-adorned breasts and grin while he devours their treats. I’ve seen them fight to get to Luka first and be the one hand-delivering their offerings. Playful, Luka bows his head to them, and later, he laughs as he wipes his glistening mouth with the back of his hand.
“The jungle isn’t so bad,” he murmurs lazily from the hammock he built himself the other day. “I’m thinking I’ll stay here when you leave.”
“Yeah, right.” I laugh, patting his stomach. “If they keep feeding you like that, you’ll end up with an old-man gut.”
“Yeah?” He tenses his stomach, displaying heart-stopping ridges. “I guess I’ll have to be careful then.”
Hysterical wails reach us from the forest behind the head warrior’s hut. In a flash, all women within eyesight drop what they’re doing and rush to the edge of the clearing. Children stumble after their mothers and grandmothers, cries and howls increasing and multiplying. I don’t need an interpreter for this feeling, because this, this is how Lara’ Nation speaks disaster.
It’s why I’m here, in the jungle, but my heart can’t accept it.
“Oh no,” I hiss, while Luka jumps out of the hammock and latches onto my hand. For a split second, I glance down at our grimy fingers. They entwine us hard. There’s poetry in it, in our hands—
Until we run toward tragedy.