A scary Jump #1

Waterfall of Valor

"Once in a lifetime opportunity", his parents had told him when they dropped him at the airport. He had to make them proud, they had given everything for him to take part to this unique experience. But the purpose of this summer camp was not clear to Jonathan: two months far from home on an island ruled by teenagers only? He knew he had trouble making friends and talking all together with other people, but it seemed a little bit extreme… He had only accepted because he was fed up with feeling the pitiful look of his parents over his shoulders. They thought that the only purpose of life is to be socially happy and knew that Jonathan was lonely. Even though he had told them he was doing just fine in the worlds of his books, they just did not understand. They could not, they were too down-to-earth and seriously lacked the imagination Jonathan was gifted with. He liked to imagine that during his birth he stole all their creative powers, it was always better than thinking that they never were capable of creativity.

After a week filled with heated arguments, he had accepted, and was now in the plane, next to a girl whose name was Julie. She had been babbling on since the first second on the plane, Jonathan’s head felt like exploding: he instantly regretted taking only one book in his backpack. Once the book finished, he no longer had an excuse and had to listen to her gibberish. She had a funny accent which made it even harder to follow and was mostly winning about how she will miss the comfort of her – if you believe what she was describing – castle.

Looking around the other passengers, he noticed that they mostly kept to themselves, bad luck, he sighed… He started counting: one hundred and twenty-eight in the plane, one hundred and three teenagers… The probability of Jonathan making a friend had never been so high, “Yeay” he thought hopelessly. Suddenly, he noticed a pair of green eyes staring at him, very pretty eyes, but he blinked, and they were gone back into hiding. He sat back on his seat, Julie was now complaining about how she had left her polaroid camera on her desk and continued to knowingly ignore the fact that Jonathan could not care less about that.

When the plane finally landed, it only took two seconds for him to lose her, hopefully he would never have to listen to her in like for ever. They were put into groups of five and dispatched into helicopters. Jonathan was lucky enough to leave with the first batch. As he was waking towards his group, he felt a cruel sentiment of satisfaction when he saw Julie joining one of the last batches and felt sorry for the boy standing next to her looking like he could use an escape.

Jonathan’s luck was on a roll as he got to sit next to the pilot, therefore having the best view of the island. The flight was short, but he had time to admire the beauty of the ocean, the beaches with white sand and turquoise water, and the jungle beneath him felt so alive with bright green colours. He noticed that he could not see any village or hotel of any kind. “The camp is hidden by the jungle, but don’t worry you will be in good hands” said the pilot, after Jonathan had asked the question. He did not feel reassured by the answer: living in a jungle was not something he had considered, and he was not to keen on the idea of sharing his bed with whatever lived in there.

Once the helicopter had landed, the group was approached by a tall boy who did not look five years older than them. He thanked the pilot and urged them to follow him. They walked towards a military styled jeep and before they hopped in it, the boy started talking: “Hi everyone! My name is Henry and I hope that you have enjoyed your travel, I am happy to welcome you to the Seosha Island! Just you wait this experience is one of a kind, I have personally lived it a couple of years ago and as you can see, I loved it so much that I am still here! Let me just check that you are all here and we will get going in no time! Sophie Abney?” A very young girl raised her hand, she had short blond hair and was carrying a stuffed rabbit with a carrot in its paw. Then there was Felix Hickory who looked like he could break if you tapped him on the shoulder. The two last person in the group were Lucie and Paul Lambert, they seemed lost and were reassuring each other in a language that Jonathan could not understand. He later learned that they were French and had been sent here by their on-the-verge-of-divorcing parents. Jonathan liked them instantly, weirdly enough he had a good feeling about them.

They arrived at the camp an hour later which was very long considering how small the island had seemed from the helicopter. As they came down of the jeep, they could admire the complexity of the wooden structures. Jonathan was reminded of the wood elves’ houses in the Lord of the rings series and thought that he was bound to be extremely comfortable.

“Those are the rooms of the elders; you will be staying over there.” He pointed his finger towards a field where green tents were aligned. “I’ll show you to your tents; they are made for three people, but you’ll have to squeeze for a while as you will be five to begin with.” The little group did a tour of the camp dropping of everyone to their tents. Jonathan was the last one to reach his tent, nobody else was there yet, so he was able to organise his stuff without anyone complaining. He observed the camp as more and more little groups arrived. Half an hour later everyone had arrived, he noticed with horror that Julie was in the tent right next to his, he heard that she was already explaining to everyone who would listen that she had already been camping but sleeping in such conditions was unbelievable. The kids in Jonathan’s tent seemed very shy, there was Alexandre, Mary, Sofia, and Steven. Even though, Jonathan tried a couple of times to make contact with them, none of them felt like talking at all. He started to feel like his efforts were hopeless and stepped aside a new book in his hand.

He was free for a couple of hours, but was interrupted when someone started shouting. It was dinner time, so everyone followed the voice talking happily, the snack on the plane was now a long-gone memory. They ended up walking for at least a couple of hours and arrived on top of a waterfall, a very big waterfall. Everyone was looking at the waterfall with a mix of admiration and fright. Why were they here? They could not see anything to eat and started to think that dinner was not for just yet. Henry, the boy who took them to their tents hushed them to silence even though only a couple people were chattering and stood on a rock.

“Hi again everyone! I bet you all are starting to feel the hunger so I will make it quick for you! Jump and get dinner, don’t and wait another day empty stomached.” Jonathan and the others look at him as though he was making a joke and was going to add something afterwards, but nothing came out. Henry just came down the rock and with no hesitation whatsoever ran and jumped into the void. “You heard him,” yelled another youngster apparently in charge now, “Jump, jump, jump!” A kid, that Jonathan recognised to be Steven, muttered: “this is nonsense…” and followed Henry without even looking back. Minutes later, half of them had already jumped. Not long after, only Jonathan was still there, he had not move one bit. His head was fuming with wild thoughts and questions. It felt quite bizarre that, in a teenager camp, the first ever task was to jump from that high. What if his parents had sent him here to die? He felt as if his thoughts had taken control of his whole body: he was stuck in his own mind, unable to move and to snap out of it.

“Come on, we’re starving here!” The scream had come from down there and did the trick Jonathan was back in control, water running from his forehead, he approached the edge of the waterfall. The group of shadows he could now see had started chanting "Coward", as if it would suddenly remind him not to be one. They were getting impatient. He looked down at his feet, he could see his white shoelaces and nothing else. The darkness was calling to him and he started to think. Everyone else had done it and they were fine apart from Felix who was crying on the side, one among a hundred, statistically this was anything but risky. Jonathan swallowed nervously and said a little prayer: "if there is a God up there, please help me, please". “Just jump,” said the guy in charge with a roll of the eyes.

He closed his eyes and jumped. The last thought that came to his mind were those pretty green eyes. He suddenly wished he had seen them one last time…