Pounding filled her ears. Like drums, like water. Finally it slowed. Her knees hurt. She liked how the pain kept her there. She pressed her face to the ground.

Here she was, in the kind of world her parents had waited for their whole lives. With a woman who made her feel like she’d never felt. And everything was shattered.

Then she heard the crash and the scream.

20

Relief.

Mara was ashamed to admit it. But her first feeling was relief. Relief that there was anything else in the world strong enough to grab her, to distract her. Something else she could do and be.

By the time she got to the clearing, Bullfrog had cracked a glow stick, and the whole scene was lit yellow. Kyle panting on the ground, one foot twisted beneath him. A patch of raw flesh. Blood gleaming in the moonlight.

I am good in a crisis, thought Mara. I am good.

It was heaven, the way her worries disappeared. The way each second was its own action, and the seconds came in order, like marching soldiers. Ashley showed up behind her. “Boil water,” Mara told her, and kept her gaze on Kyle. His eyes seemed unfocused.

“He was almost down,” said Bullfrog. “Almost to the ground.”

“How’d he land?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Kyle,” said Mara. “How’s your back?”

It took a long time for the words to reach him. Finally they did. “I think it’s okay.”

She felt down his body, patting his neck and ribs and gut and thighs. Touched his bent foot. It was shiny with blood. “Can you feel this?”

He shook his head.

“Can you wiggle your toes?”

There was no movement, no pulse.

“We should get him back to the shelter. Keep him warm.”

Bullfrog nodded. They lifted Kyle between them, and he hopped on his right leg. With each movement, he screamed. He had been thin at the start of the challenge, and now he couldn’t have weighed more than 130 pounds. But even with adrenaline and the past days’ food, Mara had to stop twice on the short walk to catch her breath. Her ears ringing. Finally they reached the shelter and laid him down on a grass mat.

The walls reflected the light of the fire, the unearthly neon of the glow stick, and she could see better now. Kyle’s right leg was scraped from the thigh down, perhaps where he had slid against the trunk. His left foot was twisted, and the skin split like an overripe fruit. Blood dripped down his foot in thick lines.

“Hurts like a bitch, huh?” said Bullfrog.

“Yes,” said Kyle. “It does.”

There were splinters around the wound. Mara got the first aid kit. It was a white plastic case the size of a paperback book. The kind that were sold ready-made at gas stations and grocery stores, and which Mara had always assumed were designed for liability protection more than anything else. See? People could say. Don’t blame us; we had a first aid kit. We were prepared.