Olivia Payne

Getting to Wilderness

We drove five hours trying to get to wilderness. After two on road, she leant over and pushed the wheel until I stopped fighting. For three after that we went over rocks and mud and fields and crops and tree roots. It was nothing, even when she pointed us into streams and forests. The car ate up the land. When we got back to tarmac and yards and parking lots she made me stop in the middle of a street. She told me I had to leave the keys.
We walked four hours trying to get to wilderness.
'We should have done this from the start, it hates cars.'
We went over rocks and mud and fields and crops and tree roots. I hurt my ankle. ​We spent about one hour of the four I counted resting. I sat, and she found me a large stick to lean on. It looked almost the same as the one that tripped me up.
She carried me three hours trying to get to wilderness, but with a lot of rests built-in. I would feel her hands slip, she’d lean forward trying to take all my weight on her back, but we’d still go down. When we reached the end of the land she put me on the stones and cried.
We swam two hours trying to get to wilderness. We went over water water and water. There might have been sand and fishes and kelp beneath us, but it was the water itself that tried to make us turn back. She did a front crawl, turning her head out of the salt-water every five strokes, forcing herself back down. I did breaststroke arms and kicky-legs behind. After two hours we could still see the shore. Her face was wet and red, maybe from crying, maybe from swimming. I couldn't be sure.
One hour we laid starfish-style on our backs, unable to move ourselves. The water drew us out and left left left. I didn't know if we were in wilderness because if I raised my head my body sank so I didn't. I had to look straight up, at the sky. At the end of an hour she poked my ribs.
'You're still wearing your watch?'
'It’s okay: waterproof.'
I couldn't stop her as she took it off and I don't know if it sank or stayed with us, going left left left. After a while, I wasn't sure if she was still with me, left left left, because I had to carry on looking straight up, with my ears underwater and my eyes on the sky, or else I would be lost.

Olivia Payne

Olivia Payne is a librarian working in London. She is an alumnus of the Faber Academy and proud member of the Write Like a Grrrl community. Olivia has previously had work published or forthcoming in places including Uncharted, The Amphibian Literary Journal, Cobra Milk, Ellipsis Zine, Corporeal, Alphabet Box, and Sonder Magazine.