“When a jaguar feeds on something big, like a human, it won’t feed again for three or four days. And they’re territorial—one jaguar protects its area from others, so, I’m just saying you might have to wait.”

There was a pause before her voice came back, barely a whisper, “You’re lying.”

“No, I’m not.” But he was making it up and in truth he had no idea about the hunting habits of jaguars, and he could still feel the hair bristling on the back of his neck with the sense that they were both being watched, even now. “But I want you to come back with me to the fire.”

“No. It’s… there’s…” Once again, the words dried up and fell away, and Tom knew he wasn’t cut out for this, because he’d been on the receiving end of enough well-meaning chats in his own life, usually from people who had no idea. In truth, his knowledge of the uselessness of all those words of comfort was the only thing he had.

“Look, Jess, when I was little my parents died.”

“I know.”

Even that was a revelation, that someone like Jess had known this most basic fact about his life.

“I was too small to understand what people were saying, but it didn’t stop them saying it, that I had to be strong for my mom and dad, that it didn’t look like it would ever get better but it would, that it was a wound but one day it would just be a scar. And you know what, it was all the biggest load of crap. It doesn’t get better. You lost someone you love and that never goes away. It changes who you are, the way you live your life. It never becomes good, it just becomes different.”

Briefly he was transported, remembering a book his mom had often read with him when he was little, a book with a rabbit on the cover though he couldn’t remember its name or even the story, in the same way that he failed to remember so many of the details from those years. And yet he’d loved that book and cherished even the fractured memory of it now, the memory of being enveloped in warmth, and the soothing sound of his mother’s voice. He could feel tears welling in his eyes, though he couldn’t remember the last time he’d cried, and suddenly standing there in the jungle he missed both of them more than he had in years.

“That’s what they kept telling me today, that I had to be strong, that it was what Freddie would’ve wanted.”