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Back 3 a.m.
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  67. 3:46 a.m.

At 3:55 a.m., I tuck the fur coat under my head and lie down.

At 3:56 a.m., Lassie crawls onto my chest.

At 3:57 a.m., the boat begins to sink.

::::

“Where is all this water coming from?”

It started as a trickle. Now it rushes in at a feverish pace. Opik and I search the boat floor for the breach.

Meow.

“We are not abandoning ship!” I yell. “We need to find the hole and plug it.”

After thirty seconds, I find a small gurgling hole between two of the wooden boards. “Here it is!” I yell, stamping my foot down on the hole to impede the flow. There is a loud cracking, as my foot breaks through the bottom of the boat, leaving a giant gash.

The water pours in.

I pull my leg out, rip the paddle from Opik’s hands and turn the boat toward the riverbank. We are only fifty feet into the river.

I have less than a minute before I conk out.

I dig the paddle into the water.

“Grab Lassie!” I scream at Opik.

He looks at me confused.

“Pussi!”

He picks up Lassie.

We are halfway to shore. The river helps us out and after three more paddles, the nose of the boat sinks into the soft brush of the riverbank.

“Go!”

The boat is half underwater. It will sink any second.

Opik jumps into the brush with Lassie. I hand him the paddle, then the fur hat and coat. I double-check to make sure the map is tucked deep into my pocket, then I leap into the brush, pulling myself up with the long grass.

I look behind me just in time to see the last inches of the boat slide under the water.

:12

June 30th

Sunrise 3:23 a.m.

I wake up to the sound of whimpering.

I roll over and open my eyes.

Twenty feet away, huddled next to a tree, are Opik and Lassie.

I’d heard the whimpering a couple times before. It was the sound Lassie made when he was having a nightmare. Sometimes I would wake up and he would be on my chest, a soft, guttural cry, echoing from his throat. The sound was usually accompanied by a twitch of his front paws.

I amble over to the duo and peer down.

Lassie is fast asleep.

Opik’s head is buried between his knees, his body wracked in sobs.

How stupid am I? It didn’t even cross my mind that the sound could be coming from Opik. He had been so stoic in the face of such adversity, as though this was all fun for him — a big adventure in the wild — it never occurred to me he might be scared. It never dawned on me he had a mom, dad, brothers, and sisters he missed dearly.

I lower myself down next to him and put my hand softly on his back.

“Hey, buddy,” I say.

He sniffs.