Hello everyone I know this chapter has taken a while to come along I have been really busy with school and have taken longer to write this chapter since everyone wants longer chapters. More importantly, for those of you who have been keeping up with this story I changed one person's name in this story, Amar, to Ali, which is now updated in the previous chapters. If you are new, then just enjoy. I will update the other chapters with this name so hopefully everything is a smooth transition. I appreciate everyone that has followed this story and it is FAR from finished!
Enjoy
Ali woke up to the sounds of the ocean and he rolled over on his back. Clearing his eyes away of sleep debris, he looked around the room and saw no one. Standing up he made his way to the door way, then stopped as he heard hushed voices.
"Senoritas, we should at least tell him we are leaving. It is wrong to just pack up and leave him here by himself. What if he comes looking for us?" Luis asked, his voice uncertain.
"Trust me, he will be fine. His ego will keep him company. We need to be proactive and stop running everything we do by him," Jasmine replied her voice dripping with disdain.
Ali's blood began to boil and he stormed out the hut over to the others. Bianca and Luis looked up and looked away while they continued packing up their things. Jasmine refused to meet his eye and continued talking as if he wasn't there.
"Bianca, make sure you grab the extra cotton we make yesterday and have all the berries in our bag," Jasmine said as she walked past Ali, barely brushing against him.
Ali's hand snaked out and grabbed her arm, pulling her around to see him.
"So you're just going to leave, just like that?" he asked, his voice hoarse.
Luis and Bianca stopped packing and watched them, as if waiting for an argument to begin.
"You don't get to make all the rules, sergent, and I told you yesterday we're going inside this island,"
Ali stared at her, his eyes slowly going down her body, caressing her in his mind as she blushed.
"I'm coming as well. And don't act like you don't see me in the morning when you wanted to fuck me last night," he whispered as he pulled her close to him.
Jasmine gasped aloud and he let her go, walking inside the hut to pack his things. Ali came out the hut 5 minutes later and walked with the group into the island.
"Just asking, but how are we going to do this, and when are we coming back?" Ali began looking at Jasmine's face under his eyelids. Jasmine refused to meet his eye and kept silent to his question.
Bianca answered, "Its morning right now. We're going to fill up with water at our watering hole then walk through the jungle in a straight line to the east. If we don't find water by the time the sun is halfway in the sky we agreed to come back."
Jasmine looked up and threw Ali an unreadable glace for a moment then she looked away. They began walking into the jungle, Jasmine and Bianca walking in back, with Ali and Luis in front. There was an uneasy awkward silence as they set out.
4 hours later
Ali sat on the ground slowly chewing on his berries as he surveyed his surroundings. They sat in a circle underneath the shade of trees, birds calling to one another in the midday sun. Ali quickly glanced up at Bianca and Jasmine, who were in deep conversation. Bianca whispered in Jasmine's ear and Jasmine made a face of disgust and embarrassment by what Bianca had told her. She glanced in Luis's direction as she stood and he smiled at her. Rolling her eyes she stomped away towards the shallow body of water they had just found.
Feeling compelled to follow her he stood, and walked by her as she splashed water on her sweaty face. Out of the corner of her eye she seen him and jumped.
"You scared me. Why do you always follow me?" she asked her voice guarded.
"I do not always follow you," Ali responded with irritation in his voice.
"Yes you do. You did just now when I wanted a moment alone, and you did last night," she mumbled just loud enough for him to hear her.
Unwilling to answer that he changed the subject, "What did Bianca say to make you so mad?"
Her brown skin flushed slightly and she curtly replied, "It's nothing, she's just being stupid as usual."
"Are you sure that's all, it seemed like it was more than that," he said recalling the look she shared with Luis that made his gut churn.
Jasmine hesitated before replying, "She....she seen us watching her and Luis last night. Luis doesn't know we were there but she knows Luis wants me so she said I could've.... joined them."
Ali stared at her hard as he pictured her in the orgy. His breathing tightened with the images from last night.
"She wants Luis to herself, yet she thinks that if she brings me to him he'll really want her. That's why I fucking hate females sometimes. I'm trying to survive on this island and all she's worried about is who Luis gets hard for," Jasmine vented, almost forgetting Ali's presence.
Ali cleared his throat and said, "Do you want Luis?"
Jasmine's head snapped up, her face incredulous. "Why do you care so much? All you want to do is undermine my intelligence then occasionally feel me up when you're horny,"
"That's not true," he replied his voice quiet.
"Oh really, then what do you want, huh? For once just say that you want me as much as I want you. I'm done with the games and the pretending bullshit. Is it that hard to say you lust for a black girl, is that it?" jasmine asked.
"No that's not the issue...,"
"Then what?" she cut him off, frustration in her voice.
"I can't want you alright! Jesus every time I fucking turn around I see you in your skimpy little jungle outfit and your wild hair and I just want to fuck you all day but I can't," he said his voice cracking with emotion.
Jasmine, sensing something, asked him gently, "Why can't you? There's nothing wrong with wanting someone, that's part of being human?"
Ali didn't answer for a while, just stared off into the forest. Without turning to her he said, "I love my wife. I've loved her since the day we met and I haven't stopped even though she's been dead for over a year," Jasmine gasped aloud.
"Do you know that the night I found out she had died I tried to bargain with God? I told him that we didn't need our child, that he could just bring her back to me and keep our child if I could just have her. I would pray that when I would wake up she would be here and it never happened, but he could keep the child instead. What kind of person attempts to sacrifice an unborn infant, hmm?!" he turned to her his eyes red and shiny with unshed tears. His tortured gaze stared at her until she looked away.
"The funniest thing is that the drunk driver who killed her and our unborn baby is about to go on parole soon. He plead not guilty by reason of insanity and said he drank because he has PTSD from being in Afghanistan," Ali laughed cruelly.
"I served this country since I was 19 and the thanks I get is a fucked up war vet who runs over my family because he thinks they were about to kill him with a bomb! Yes Jasmine, I want to make love to you, but tell me what happens next! I won't ever feel anything for you because I'm bitter and fucked up on the inside and have been since I put my pregnant wife in the ground, And don't you fucking pity me because I'm going to leave this godforsaken island soon and go home to my house by my wife's grave,"
Jasmine wiped the tears that were streaming down her face and reached to touch his arm. Ali flinched away.
"Don't touch me, please," he pleaded, his voice cracking on the last word.
She grabbed him anyway and pulled him towards her shoulder where he laid his head in silent misery. Jasmine's heart broke, almost wishing he would cry aloud as his silence spoke volumes of his torture.
"Ali I'm so sorry, I didn't know," Jasmine began her voice choked up.
"It's not your fault you wanted your wife back and God is not punishing you. You loved your wife and had not yet bonded with your child. But your wife would not want you to live such a half existence. I'm not asking for your affection, I haven't even asked for you physically. But do not think you can live your life like this shutting out all human contact because you can't," she finished passionately.
Ali looked up and gazed into her beautiful eyes, almost about to say something. He shook his head and stood.
"Come on its time for us to keep moving so we can eventually head back," he said not meeting her eyes as he walked away. Ali continued walking until Jasmine eventually caught up and they walked in silence. Ali felt oddly comforted now that their feelings were out in the open and that someone understood his burden. Yet he knew that nothing could work between him and Jasmine, because despite how closed off from reality they were on this island, once they left they would go their separate ways. He would go back to his miserable existence of hating his life and she would continue on with her medical careers and live that life he could never seem to catch. In his mind, he pictured Jasmine with someone who wasn't so fucked up emotionally and who not only wanted her physically, but could handle her passionate soul, for he knew he had nothing to offer her.
*************
By late afternoon they reached a clearing of a large body of water with a large cove behind it. A waterfall 20ft high threw water from its height, where it splashed violently down upon the rocks. Jasmine stared I wonder at the beauty of the scene transfixed by the almost life like water and the blue green depths of the cove. She dropped her sack and jumped in, cooled off by the chilled water. The others soon joined her and she swam closer to the waterfall, until she realized there was an opening behind it.
"Hey guys, there's a cave over here! Come look," she called as she swam closer.
They swam towards her and she stepped upon the rocks out of the water and slowly walked towards the waterfall. Cautious of the forceful torrents falling from above, she walked behind the curtain of water into the dimly lit cave. Unable to see she walked back out towards the group.
"It's dark in there, yet it's dry and slightly warm," she said as she swam back to the shore.
"We can make a torch and go inside," Luis said, hopping behind her.
He walked towards the edge of the trees and grabbed a handful of thick sticks and dry grass stalks. He tied the dried stalks together then wove them around the ends of the bundle of sticks. He and Jasmine swam back to Ali and Bianca carrying the torch high above the water to not get it wet. Jasmine and Ali climbed upon the rocks and walked into the cave, with Bianca and Luis following. They stood in darkness while Luis fumbled with his satchel to grab his flint rock. Lighting the fire, Luis waved it in the air and illuminated the cave.
The group was immediately blinded by bright light as the fire shone upon glassy surfaces all around them. Once their eyes adjusted they noticed the crystals covering the walls and ceilings in all arrays of colors. Their sharp edges and jagged side contrasted harshly with the beauty of their colors. From the glossamer shine of butterfly wings to the iridescence of the aura borealis the crystals covered almost every surface of the cave.