myself.
“Guys,
stop
!” Sam said, standing up and holding out his hands. “This is ridiculous. We need to sleep so we can get started early in the morning. Look, I’ll take first watch, okay?”
I said nothing, but turned my back and walked away, trembling with anger. It would make more sense for me to take first watch; I knew I wasn’t going to sleep. My stomach was too empty and my brain was too full. We were all ticking time bombs, like kettles growing hotter and hotter with stress and fear.
I went back to the camp and told Sam to sleep, that I’d take the first watch. He didn’t argue, but I didn’t think he was sleeping either. None of them did, for a while.
It didn’t help at all that about an hour into the night, somewhere in the darkness a lion began to roar.
EIGHT
W e set out early the next morning but made it only a mile or two before the truck came to a full stop in the sand. Holding back curses, I climbed out and took stock of the situation.
The tires were half buried, all four of them sunk. It would take a while to dig the truck out, and from the look of the land ahead, it was just going to get worse. We were in an old dry stream bed; thousands of years ago, this area would have been a paradise of rivers and lakes and grass. All that remained of those golden days of the Kalahari were these dry depressions, like the skeletons of a lost world. The stream bed was a sort of natural road, leading us in the right direction with fewer bushes and trees to navigate around—but with the unfortunate side effect that it was composed of deep, soft sand that sucked at the wheels like mud.
I sighed and suggested that we begin scouting around for pieces of wood to lever the wheels out. Then I would have to drive out of the bed and follow it from above if possible.
A pair of stately giraffes watched me with disinterest as I beat through the bushes. The rest of the group spread out in all directions, halfheartedly searching, probably as distracted by hunger as I was.
When I returned to the truck a half hour later with an armload of logs and branches, everyone was sitting in the shade, close to Hank. Sam looked up apologetically. “We heard lions.”
I sighed and dropped my armload of wood.
“Where?”
The chances of them attacking us were about one in a thousand—if we were in the Cruiser. But if a pride got curious about us and decided to settle within sight, then we would be trapped in the vehicle.
Sam pointed in the direction they’d heard the pride, and I nodded.
“We have to be quick,” I said.
But it seemed the more we tried to dig Hank out of the sand, the deeper he sank. The wood we wedged under the tires simply snapped or was buried, and it wasn’t long before I heard the roar. One lion, from the sound of it. I thought of the mystery male who’d been following Dad and Theo, and I wondered if it could be the same one. Was it the white lion? The one who’d started all this mess?
We worked feverishly while Avani and Miranda took turns watching for the lion. I wasn’t too worried about it; if it was indeed a loner, it would almost certainly make a wide berth around us. I was familiar with three different prides in the area, and there was one male who roamed between each of them. He was skittish and shy, never giving us trouble, but if this loner was one of the younger males that had been pushed out by its mother, it might be desperate for a meal.
Still, I was more focused on getting the Cruiser unstuck, seeing it as our bigger problem.
That was my mistake.
“I think I saw it!” I heard Miranda call. Immediately Joey, Avani, and Miranda jumped into the Cruiser, and Kase whipped out his camera. Sam looked excited, and I didn’t blame him. This would be their first real wild African lion.
I stood on the top of the tailgate, held a hand up, shielding my eyes from the sun, and scanned the bush. The lion’s tawny hide was perfect camouflage in the yellow grass, so it could have been
“Guys,
stop
!” Sam said, standing up and holding out his hands. “This is ridiculous. We need to sleep so we can get started early in the morning. Look, I’ll take first watch, okay?”
I said nothing, but turned my back and walked away, trembling with anger. It would make more sense for me to take first watch; I knew I wasn’t going to sleep. My stomach was too empty and my brain was too full. We were all ticking time bombs, like kettles growing hotter and hotter with stress and fear.
I went back to the camp and told Sam to sleep, that I’d take the first watch. He didn’t argue, but I didn’t think he was sleeping either. None of them did, for a while.
It didn’t help at all that about an hour into the night, somewhere in the darkness a lion began to roar.
EIGHT
W e set out early the next morning but made it only a mile or two before the truck came to a full stop in the sand. Holding back curses, I climbed out and took stock of the situation.
The tires were half buried, all four of them sunk. It would take a while to dig the truck out, and from the look of the land ahead, it was just going to get worse. We were in an old dry stream bed; thousands of years ago, this area would have been a paradise of rivers and lakes and grass. All that remained of those golden days of the Kalahari were these dry depressions, like the skeletons of a lost world. The stream bed was a sort of natural road, leading us in the right direction with fewer bushes and trees to navigate around—but with the unfortunate side effect that it was composed of deep, soft sand that sucked at the wheels like mud.
I sighed and suggested that we begin scouting around for pieces of wood to lever the wheels out. Then I would have to drive out of the bed and follow it from above if possible.
A pair of stately giraffes watched me with disinterest as I beat through the bushes. The rest of the group spread out in all directions, halfheartedly searching, probably as distracted by hunger as I was.
When I returned to the truck a half hour later with an armload of logs and branches, everyone was sitting in the shade, close to Hank. Sam looked up apologetically. “We heard lions.”
I sighed and dropped my armload of wood.
“Where?”
The chances of them attacking us were about one in a thousand—if we were in the Cruiser. But if a pride got curious about us and decided to settle within sight, then we would be trapped in the vehicle.
Sam pointed in the direction they’d heard the pride, and I nodded.
“We have to be quick,” I said.
But it seemed the more we tried to dig Hank out of the sand, the deeper he sank. The wood we wedged under the tires simply snapped or was buried, and it wasn’t long before I heard the roar. One lion, from the sound of it. I thought of the mystery male who’d been following Dad and Theo, and I wondered if it could be the same one. Was it the white lion? The one who’d started all this mess?
We worked feverishly while Avani and Miranda took turns watching for the lion. I wasn’t too worried about it; if it was indeed a loner, it would almost certainly make a wide berth around us. I was familiar with three different prides in the area, and there was one male who roamed between each of them. He was skittish and shy, never giving us trouble, but if this loner was one of the younger males that had been pushed out by its mother, it might be desperate for a meal.
Still, I was more focused on getting the Cruiser unstuck, seeing it as our bigger problem.
That was my mistake.
“I think I saw it!” I heard Miranda call. Immediately Joey, Avani, and Miranda jumped into the Cruiser, and Kase whipped out his camera. Sam looked excited, and I didn’t blame him. This would be their first real wild African lion.
I stood on the top of the tailgate, held a hand up, shielding my eyes from the sun, and scanned the bush. The lion’s tawny hide was perfect camouflage in the yellow grass, so it could have been
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