Frustrated, he threw rocks into the water, knowing even as he did so that it was useless.
Finally, in desperation, he fashioned a makeshift net, looping the strands of Gabriel’s blanket around a curved stick.
After countless tries, the net yielded two flopping silvery fish.
Methodically Jonas hacked them to pieces with a sharp rock and fed the raw shreds to himself and to Gabriel.
They ate some berries, and tried without success to catch a bird.
At night, while Gabriel slept beside him, Jonas lay awake, tortured by hunger,
and remembered his life in the community where meals were delivered to each dwelling every day.
He tried to use the flagging power of his memory to recreate meals, and managed brief, tantalizing fragments:
banquets with huge roasted meats; birthday parties with thick-frosted cakes;
and lush fruits picked and eaten, sun-warmed and dripping, from trees.
But when the memory glimpses subsided, he was left with the gnawing, painful emptiness.
Jonas remembered, suddenly and grimly, the time in his childhood when he had been chastised for misusing a word.
전체재생
다음페이지
문장검색