Survivor
By Jam Jovir

Our trip started smoothly — or so we thought … I remembered the last moment of that gruesome flight — the blinding white light and the deafening sonic boom that followed and then darkness …

It’s been three days since I was awakened by faint murmurs and Jenny’s painful slap on my face. It seems the three of us survived a dance with death just to wake up marooned in a small island which only God knows where.

Why did I drag myself and my Jenny into this mess? The picture of Macau and paradise just looks so vivid and promising that I did not hesitate to accept stupid Frank’s offer for free tickets and accommodation to Sinampeng. My God what have I done? If only I had cancelled this trip, we would have been better off at home with delicious food and a warm and cozy bed.

Food … that’s all there is to it. I can feel my body tremble just at the thought of it, but Frank ate up the last coconut two days ago. I cannot go fishing as the inlet is now lined up with hungry Tiger sharks spying for their next meal.

All that I can see on the horizon is just an endless sea and not even a speck of anything that can rescue us from this torture.

I think I’m hearing voices now, weird … they sound like voices off from a hotel commercial urging me to eat Frank to survive, but I think I’d rather die of hunger than to live with the thought that I ate my friend or my girlfriend just to survive.

Just then, I heard Jenny cursing Frank for eating up all the coconuts instead of sharing a ration for us to pull through until we get rescued, and Frank was aiming to hit my girl! Luckily, I managed to get in between the two and managed to jab Frank right in the face for him to realize what he has done.

I saw him walk away to the water’s edge and Jenny teary-eyed took a hard look at me and went away. I figured I’d doze off and erase the day’s tension away …

Is this a dream? Strange … I think I heard Jenny screamed or was it just the wind, but I can smell something cooking and man I woke up drooling.

I sat up to Frank’s calls for me to eat, but mindful as ever took it a notion to find Jenny and have her eat with us. I looked around the water’s edge but to no avail. I ran straight up to Frank and asked him but he only shrugged off and said that she’s maybe off swimming as the sharks have already left. He handed me a bowl which I think he got from the plane’s wreckage. I helped myself to that really wonderful stew, which tasted strangely but nevertheless wonderful. Somehow I can feel an eerie stillness in Frank which makes me uneasy. He took a few moments off to walk to and fro in my back and then he suddenly leaned to me and said in my ear, “Fred, I have a confession to make, I killed Jenny. She was a nuisance and I could not help my hunger so I thought it best to kill her for the two of us to survive. That delicious stew is her.”

I dropped my bowl, gave a deep sigh. With a sudden grasp, I grabbed Frank’s neck and muttered my last words, “You’ve really done it this time Frank, you’ll pay with your life! You’re wrong for only one of us will walk away and it is only me … me I tell you! Ha ha ha!”

Strange … I can feel cold tears falling.


The Hunger
By Monster Paperbag

I stood numb on the sand. I stared hard at Frank, probing his beautiful and tantalizing eyes for some trace of sense.

But he didn’t stare back for long but took a step back, turned around and collapsed slowly on the ground, facing the other way.

“Why?” I asked loudly, almost shouting. He made no reply and no movement. His back, deliciously tanned and bronzed and gracefully adorned with sensual and fully-developed trapezius and latissimus dorsi muscles, seemed to taunt me with a mysterious and seductive ambivalence.

“Why, Frank?” I shouted this time.

He turned his head sideways while his slender neck glinted as the sun slowly caressed its surface, reflecting fervent beads of sweat trickling down his smooth and elegant spine. His hair swayed with the ocean breeze, partially obscuring his delicate forehead where amorous strands of hair met and slapped his dainty brow.

“I was hungry,” he whispered, his voice trailing away. His lips danced when they moved and for a second, I caught a glimpse of his long and lovely tongue as he momentarily opened his mouth.

For a moment there, I wanted to refuse his explanation. I have lost the love of my life but the fleeting mourning gave in to fancy yearning. It has been so long since I’ve changed my old ways but Frank, that bastard Frank, that vile Frank, my buddy Frank, challenged all things that I have led myself to believe in.

I took one long stare at the murderer of my mate. This time he stood, faced towards me and stared back. “I need a dip,” he whispered as he took off everything.

It has been so long since I’ve changed my ways. But it was all coming back to me, now. It has been so long since the last time. I felt feverish as I continued to gaze at his bare torso, at his flawlessly defined six pack and navel, at his exposed thighs, at his curvy backside, at the way he carried his huge, and lusciously long … stride.

At that moment, I realized I was hungry, too. Forgive me, Jenny.


These connected short stories originally appeared in Paperbag Origami as a creative writing exercise done in tandem by Jam Jovir and Monster Paperbag.