Gabe shook out of his trance and climbed in, trying to catch the other pig, whilst Damian was tying the other one up. Both pigs squealing murder when Gabe caught the other one.
Almost dropping it, it was kicking so hard. “Ouch! Fuck!” Holding it tight, letting Damian tie it up too.
They were heaving by the end, but the piglets were all tied up, snorting, their eyes wide a bit. Damian grinned. “Ok, let’s check what they are.” He looked at their bellies, raising an eyebrow. “This one might have a dick. Is that a dick?”
Gabe looked and shrugged. “I guess…”
Damian grinned and checked the other piglet. “This one doesn’t have what the other one… so we’re in luck?”
“Wow…”
“Ok, let’s haul them up on our backs.” He helped to tie one to Gabe’s back, and Gabe did the same, leaving back to their camp, so hungry, their stomachs kept rumbling.
Damian pulled a face. “Let’s just eat them… I am starving.”
“No. We need baby pigs, remember?”
Damian sighed, turning to him. “The fuck…”
Gabe grinned. “You would have failed the marshmallow test as a kid.”
“What marshmallow test?”
“You know. When they put a marshmallow in front of kids and ask them to wait, and if they don’t eat it, they get two more.”
“Yeah… ok. So?”
“So you would eat the piglets now instead of waiting to have more.”
“I’m hungry.”
Gabe just laughed, readjusting that warm piglet on his back. “It will be worth the wait.”
Damian just pulled a face, weaving between the trees back to their camp. A long walk, still, through that damp heat. He blew a breath, willing himself not to pay attention to his aching stomach.Piglets. Fuck.
Home, they let the piglets loose in the pen, watching as they ran around, testing the fence with their tiny noses. Gabe brought a basin and filled it with water, watching them drink straight away. A warm feeling in him. “The boy could be Walter and the girl Gisele.”
Damian looked at him, noticing that soft light in his hazel eyes. “Don’t you fucking name them.”
“Why?”
“Because we might need to kill them if they don’t fall in love, and naming them will make it impossible for you to eat even a bite of their tender flesh.”
Gabe swallowed, tears edging in his eyes. “But… they might be with us for a while. They need a name. How are we going to call them over?”
“Jesus…” He raked his hair, trying not to burst. That rage softening at Gabe’s sorrow. “Ok, fuck it. Fine. They’re your pigs, right? What did you say? Walter?”
Gabe smiled. “And Gisele.”
Damian’s eyes went to the pigs who were eating that dried seaweed. “Walter… fuck me.”
How does time fly? Days and nights rolling like tide, that blue sky filled with sun, that dark sky filled with lightning, those ink nights when only the stars shone. If they were lucky, the moon, that silver light on that landscape, which had become familiar. A life built out of rubble and nature, out of that deep love blooming on their solitude. Their bodies morphing into something unknown, primal, muscles sculpted like stone, lean, rock-hard, bronze skin stretched on them, hardened by sun and sea. Finding their skills again, skills they never thought they had. Climbing trees with ease, running for long stretches, walking for hours without tiring, swimming, diving, not needing to come up for air all the time. Making tools out of bones, stone, and wood. Knives, axes, spears. Hunting, fishing, foraging. Building their campsite, that place which had become home. That tree trunk filled with scratches. Weeks. Months. Years. Two years. The tree trunk full, from where he could stretch to the bottom. Starting on another tree.
Watching Damian sit at the foot of a tree, sharpening a spear. “You need something?”
His steel eyes went to him, a large pig’s head laying on his thighs. “You…” Smiling.
“You already have company.”
