Hat (part 2)

*Now when we last left Hat and Nivea, they were deep in the woods, lost and helpless.*

\*

Nivea bent down, reaching inside her stiff short pockets, and realised her cell phone was not with her anymore. 'Shoot,' she murmured. 'What could possibly be worse? Left alone with a hyper dog who just wants some food and nowhere to go.'

Hat wuffed, and ran away again. Nivea couldn't afford to lose him, so ran after. 'Come back, Hat!' she said. She started running the most fastest she could, and tripped over a hard stone. 'Ow!' she exclaimed, trying to get up, but realising she was bleeding a bit. A part of her shorts had teared, revealing a small bit of her legs. She shuffled in the shade of an Oak tree, laying down and breathing in the summer air of the tropical forest. She had lost her best friend. Now she had to find something to eat. She sighed, and then heard the padding of eager paws, and saw Hat sniffing around, and jumping on her, licking her face like mad. Then he turned around, and lay beside her, a fat piece of meat. Hat had killed a rabbit. Of course she wasn't eating that! She didn't even have matches to cook it. She took 2 rocks, as she had learned in her camp classes and also scouts, and hit them together. In scouts, she had been unsuccessful at this task, and had to redo it several times. But her scouts leader taught her over and over, until she could finally get it right. This time, after 4 tries, she got a fire burning straight and clear. She started cooking the rabbit. She had to turn away, because the smell was so good. She kept reminding herself that it was for Hat, not her.

After a while, she cooked the rabbit, meaty, flesh clinging on the bones. Hat started munching it up, staring at her with his brown eyes. She found a wild rowanberry tree growing, and picked a couple of berries for herself. She knew Hat wouldn't like them, but was enjoying his delicious rabbit. She was a bit afraid it would contain some disease but it was hopeless and near impossible to get something good and healthy for Hat here in the middle of nowhere. So she had to watch him tear up the creature, rip the sticky flesh apart from the bones, stuff it all in his mouth, and gobble it up. She tasted the sweet berries that had the most sweet taste and couldn't help but pick more. Perhaps it wasn't so bad here, after all. She didn't even have a blanket. After Hat had finished off the rabbit, Nivea lead him to a cosy place covered in warm grass, covered from predators with a green bush, and had plenty of place for both of them. Nivea happily found out she had a couple of dog treats in the left side of her shorts pocket, that she always carried around in case Hat would get hungry, or he ran away so she could bribe him with them. She also had a squeaky dog toy to keep him company. So she took about 2 dog treats and the dog toy, and lay it beside Hat. She didn't want to waste the treats. It wasn't getting dark, but she couldn't think of anything else to do, so she lay down, and closed her eyes, hugging Hat.

\*

The next day, Hat didn't kill a rabbit. He didn't have anything to eat. Nivea had the rowanberry tree near her, and tried giving him some berries, but he only sniffed it, and turned away in disgust. She spotted wild chickens walking around, but Hat didn't attack, and she didn't dare kill the innocent things. So she took out 2 more of the dog treats and put them beside Hat. He gobbled them up greedily, and looked at Nivea again, expecting for more. There was only 4 more dog treats left, and after that, Hat might not have anything else to eat. So she didn't give the rest, and wished she had something else. Now, looking around, she realised wild rabbits didn't just randomly walk about in plain sight with a dog near. They could hear predators from miles away with their long bunny-ears. There was no way Hat could catch one of them. He had been lucky yesterday. She sighed in frustration. They needed to go home, now! But what if they were going even deeper? And what if they lost the rowanberry tree, her only source of food (besides raw acorns)? So she took a handful of berries and stuffed them in her right shorts pocket, which was getting quite full by the minute. Hat gazed at her, his brown eyes locking into her's. She could feel the connection between them, how could she let her Best Friend down? She bent down, and whispered to Hat, 'You're gonna be OK. We both are going to be fine. We can find ourselves out, we just need skill and patience.' That was what she said, her voice struggling to keep steady, trembling every now and then, and breaking off.