The Ritual

branches from his jacket. It was now torn under one arm. He could not remember the
undergrowth being that bad coming the other way. The constant hampering and snagging of the foliage, and his uncoordinated stumbling through it, made him hot and dizzy with a rage familiar to him,
and always unhealthy. He had cursed the wood, cursed Hutch, cursed Dom, cursed this world and his reduced position in it. He’d boiled. And every step of the way back to the others, his
thoughts had been dark with the image of the decrepit broken church in the dismal wet world.
    And when he found them again, he could not believe how slowly the other three had been moving, how little ground they had covered since he had been away. He felt as if he’d had to retrace
his steps all the way back to the same place where he had left them.
    Luke straightened up from where he had been bent over to catch his breath. ‘I thought I’d lost you.’
    ‘What happened?’ Hutch asked.
    ‘Eh?’
    ‘Your gear? Where is it?’
    ‘I dumped it. Was slowing me down.’
    Dom looked at Hutch and frowned, as if this act of madness confirmed a belief he had long held about Luke. ‘What the fuck you going to sleep in then?’
    ‘Not permanently. Just so’s I could get back to you guys faster.’
    ‘Why?’ Hutch said, with a nonchalance that annoyed Luke. ‘You find something?’
    ‘Because . . .’
    ‘Because what?’ Dom asked.
    What the hell was wrong with them, ambling down the path like this? Dom and Hutch had been smiling about something when he reappeared. He even thought he had heard them laughing from a distance.
‘Are you even taking this seriously?’ he asked and immediately wished he hadn’t when he saw Dom and Hutch’s surprised faces. Phil stood behind them. He had more colour in
his cheeks now, but looked at Luke with a mixture of disappointment and caution. The hood of his coat was half off his head and made him look ridiculous.
    ‘’Course we are, you silly arse,’ Dom barked. ‘Think I’m enjoying this?’
    Hutch said, ‘Dom,’ quietly. But there was something in that rebuke, something about Dom’s flat, stolid, scowling face; and something in Hutch’s supporting grin, that made
Luke think his vision had lightened, as if the terrible pressure of rage that suddenly filled his body again had forced the darkness out of his eyes. He felt weightless and could hear nothing but a
hot rushing through his ears. His voice seemed to originate from somewhere outside of his head. He didn’t recognize himself in his own voice, as if it was a recording played back to him, to
his embarrassment. ‘You call me that again and I’ll put you on your fucking arse.’
    He watched his own progress, as if disembodied, as he walked three steps up to Dom, whose face went pale and stiff as if he’d been forced to look at something unpleasant.
    A remote part of Luke remained conscious of what the other bigger part of himself was now doing on instinct. It was the rage he brought back to them from the trees; the endless wet trees that
would never let them go. And it demanded an eruption from him. ‘Did you hear me, bitch?’ he shouted into Dom’s face and watched a droplet of froth from his own shouting mouth hit
Dom’s cheekbone.
    ‘Luke!’ Hutch shouted from beside him. ‘Woah!’
    But he was not to be brought out of this trembling mad place until something snapped him out of it. With both hands, he shoved Dom backwards, hard. Dom lost his balance and dropped his weight
onto his bad knee and then fell sideways into the undergrowth. Something swished behind Luke and hard fingers clamped around his biceps. He was pulled back and away from Dom, his feet clearing the
ground at one point. All the strength seemed to leave his body for a moment. He scrabbled to find his feet when Hutch let him go a few feet down the trail.
    ‘You fuck!’ Dom struggled to his feet; all chubby arse, shirt pulled out, and clumsy stiff movements. Then Dom was coming at him, the limp gone. Hutch was knocked aside. The whites
of Dom’s eyes were going pink to red. His freckled knuckles moved slowly then made a wet slap sound against Luke’s mouth that he felt like a push, not a blow, but it made his top lip
instantly go numb. Is that it, he thought. Is that all a punch feels like?
    They seemed to stare at each other for a long time, until the idea that he had been struck mingled with the supporting notion that this was a contact that stated he should