make it a fight that nasty thing would never forget. That ugly monster would be telling his ugly grandkids about Jak someday. Jak figured he had balls big enough to make at least a hundred ugly kids as sick smelling as himself. He laughed crazy-like, spinning as the huge pig rushed him again.
Jak went the other way quickly, but he didn’t move fast enough this time. As he threw his body forward, his foot caught on a tree root and he went down hard, the wind knocked from his lungs again as pain rattled his bones. He cried out, the hurt making him curl into himself as the pig head-butted him where he lay, the edge of its tusk slicing down his arm. Jak grabbed the beast, squeezing big handfuls of hairy meat as the animal shrieked, its heaviness coming down on top of Jak, crushing him, his air whooshing from his lungs.
He wrestled with the animal, fighting with all his leaving strength. I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe, was the only thought rushing through his dying mind. The forest around him blinked out for a second, dark spots coming in front of his eyes as the stink of the animal filled his nose.
I’m going to die.
His head fell to the side as the pig kept up his shriek, its hoofs digging into Jak’s body, its tusks scraping across his flesh, the wounds he’d opened gushing blood. Jak opened his eyes to see the glint of shininess. He was still holding the pocketknife loosely in his fist.
The dark-eyed boy from that very first night showed up in his mind like he was right there beside him.
Why are you here? Jak asked, and the boy didn’t answer, but he looked down at the pocketknife still held barely in Jak’s hand as the boar continued to tear at his body. What happened to you? Jak wondered. The boy looked down at the knife again as if to say, I gave you that knife. My dying gift. Use it.
Jak’s final boom of strength came from nowhere, from everywhere, from the memory of that other boy and the way he’d held his hand, and Jak had told him to live. Jak raised his hand, and with the last of his might, he let out a battle cry and swiped the knife across the pig’s throat.
Later, he would remember only feeling nothingness as he dragged that dead pig body through the wilderness, his wounds tied with torn pieces of his clothing, but still leaving drops of red in the melting snow. The gaping one at his side burning like fire.
Driscoll was outside when Jak turned the bend, and he stared at him with wide eyes, his jaw loose. When Jak made it to where he stood, dropping the dead boar at Driscoll’s feet, Driscoll threw his head back and laughed. He’s as crazy as that pig.
Jak tilted to the side, catching himself and pressing his fingers to the gaping tear at his side. “Iwantmybowandarrow,” he said, the words running all together.
“Oh, you shall have it,” Driscoll said. And with that, Jak turned and walked away.
The next while was spent somewhere between life and death. The dark-eyed boy did not come to him again, but his baka did, telling him he was strong boy and not to give up. Jak wanted to give up. He was tired of living. Tired of fighting. Tired of surviving. And most of all, he was tired of the never-stopping empty aloneness.
But Jak’s body didn’t agree that he should give up. It kept on fighting, even though his spirit did not. There were no whispers inside, no deep-down life. Only silence. His soul had died. Along with Pup. He cleaned his wounds and laid clean cloth on them, changing through the pieces he had, washing them in water from the pump behind his house and drying them in the warming wind, to go back inside to sleep again. He woke only to gulp down water from the pump, clean his wounds, and eat the small bit of food he had.
**********
Many, many days passed. He didn’t know the number, but on one morning, he woke, noticing he felt better, less sore, less achy. For many minutes he lay there, staring at the wood ceiling, a beam of sunlight from the window, dancing and sparkling before his eyes. Maybe I am dead, he thought. Maybe those dancing lights are tiny angels, and I’m in heaven.
A twist of hurt in his side spoke up,