Find

*

Find

  5 minute drill
  30 July, 2013

Rachael:

"There's nothing to find here darling - this bed's been took already..." He moved down the hall, the sweet smell of opium, of sweat, filled his senses. He wanted to find a bit of something, someone to share his brandy with. He could care less if she talked. He just wanted to look into someone's eyes to make sure, absolutely sure, he was still alive. Ten long months on a ship, and he had money to spend. He knew he wasn't going home; there was nothing to be found in those dreams. Yet he wept when he dreamed in his native tongue, thinking about finding her waiting beside the gate. "Nothing to find here..." It resonated in his head, over and over. He sipped his brandy, leaning against a stone wall, watching the others who paid to find comfort, making their way to wherever, whatever they find in the darkest hours of the night.

Michael:

"The trick is to find your way without getting hurt," the burly man said matter of factly, as if he had done this a million times before, held a thousand maps tightly in his grip, on nights like this, when the moon played behind the clouds, bringing the shadows to life like monsters lurking in wait. "The trick is not to get caught by some wild animal," he said, several hours later, when the breathing behind us was getting louder. "The trick is to know when to give up," I was thinking to myself... "when to decide that enough is enough..." The man who had given us the map - hastily drawn in a last ditch attempt to give us something, anything that might make us choose to spare his life - had been lying, of course. He hadn't been smart enough to figure that in that moment he had made himself more valuable dead than living. We were not going to find a damn thing out here. That was the real trick of it all.

***