The drive to the village was a long one, and Jackie spent the entire trip there intermittently dozing and staring out at the passing sights.
"Is it safe here?" She asked Eric at one point. "I mean, are there robbers or thieves or ax-wielding madmen around here?"
Eric barked out a short laugh. "Well," he glanced over at her, wondering how much to tell.
She looked back at him curiously. "Well, what?"
He shrugged. "I was kinda mugged by three men when I first got here. And uh, by 'men', I really mean 12 year-old boys. But it's hard to think of them as well, boys, you know. They're really more like men in boys' bodies." He paused, lost in thought for a while, then sighed. "Life here, it forces you to grow up real quick."
"What did they want, Eric?"
"Money. Cash. The clothes off my back. They came up to me just off the airport and pointed a gun in my face."
Jackie stared at him wide-eyed. "Oh my God, Eric!"
He grimaced. "Yeah," he said and rubbed the back of his neck. "I swear I almost wet my pants. I thought they needed help with something, y'know. They were just boys. I figured they were lost or something... Needed help finding their family... Thankfully though, airport security noticed them tailing me a while back and decided to follow me to see if I was in any trouble."
The car sped on and he stared at the road ahead. "I grew up real quick after that. The desperation in their eyes. They would have done it too. Shot me just to make off with what? A couple of hundred dollars and a lousy shirt my mom got me in 9th grade? Yeah well, apparently it's an American shirt so, it would have fetched them a couple of dollars in resale value."
"A couple of dollars!"
Eric gave a sad smile. "Yeah Jackie, a couple of dollars would have fed their families for an entire week."
Life in Africa was hard, the climate was harsh, the land was unyielding and the sun was unforgiving. The people here were exposed to hardship on a daily basis and they accepted it as part of life. There was no complaining, no whining, no railing against God or the fates or whatever higher power they believed in for casting them this lot in life.
Eric had done a lot of reflecting, and his troubles in America, his relationship with Donna, his struggle for acceptance with Red, his desire to stop being a mama's boy, all seemed so insignificant when compared to the wall of difficulties that these people had to scale every day. Out here, problems were a matter of life and death. And well things such as his feelings, which he once lived and breathed by, or were ruled by, seemed so trivial in the great struggle of life that seemed so tangible here.
Jackie didn't know what to say. And to be honest, there really wasn't anything to say.
She looked at Eric again. Really looked at him. She saw lines in his young face that were never there before. The slightly harder set of his mouth.
He had grown up, she realized. In the year and a half that she and the rest of the basement gang had been off living the drama of their lives in relative ignorance of what true suffering was, Eric had gone off and made himself a man. And with that thought came another one: Red would be proud of him.
Yes, Red would be proud. But at what cost? Jackie found herself thinking, still staring at him. It hit her again, that same feeling that she had gotten in Point Place, that something was off and not quite right. Something that was very, very different about him. He seemed… Detached. Restrained.
And there was something in his eyes that bothered her.
The sudden inexplicable feeling of sadness that assailed her was staggering. Eric had lost his wide-eyed innocence, once so much part of his boyish geeky charm, to something that was far darker and grimmer than she could possibly understand at that moment.
"Oh, Eric."
She moved a little towards him and laid her hand on his arm. He seemed to tense involuntarily at her touch, then relaxed. And despite everything, she couldn't help but smile. "Wow, you've really filled out some. And no more slender wrists I see."
Amusement tugged at his lips. "Come now, Jackie, don't look so surprised. I do more than just teach you know." A pause, and then, "Like got bitten by an African spider that gave me these new special muscles."
Jackie snorted.
Another slight grin. And, "Fine, I help out at the crop fields or the men with the building and stuff that comes with living in a village. It's hard work. In turn, they share their food and water with me. And for four hours every day, I teach."
She nodded, absorbing his words, and looked out the window again.
"Eric… Eric, I wanna thank you for having me out here." She took a deep breath. "And you know, I want to help too. I want to do what it is you do in the village. I want to see what your life is like here."
He took his eyes off the road to stare at her for a moment. God she was so beautiful. How had he never noticed before?
It had been easy to spot her among the throng at the airport, and he had seen her long before she had noticed him. He had dreamed about her, longed for her, wanted her for months, but when he had made to go to her, he found that he could not move. An onslaught of emotions had surged through him. It had been a year, maybe more, since he had felt anything like that mere glance of Jackie had roused in him, and like a blind man who had just been gifted with sight, he found himself yearning for more.
On the outside though, there was no way anyone could have guessed that from looking at him. Sitting beside her in the car, he looked into her eyes, and saw nothing but an earnestness that moved him. He kept his eyes on the road but took his right hand off the wheel and reached over to take her much smaller one in his.
"Yeah? I would like nothing better."
She was surprised at the spark of electricity that shot up her arm from where their hands were joined. She stared at their intertwined fingers and looked up at his strong profile, trying to place that spark she felt.
He stroked the soft skin at the base of her thumb with his, and shot her a sweet smile. "I'm glad you're here, Jackie."
They drove the remainder of the journey in comfortable silence. And she was content to let her hand remain in his.