Metaphor Daze: A Friend in Need is Inconvenient

They say a person can live for 30 days without food, 3 days without water and 3 minutes without air. For Charlie and Tom, neither air nor food was a problem. At first glance, water wouldn’t appear to be an issue either. They were surrounded by it. But the crystal clear water that surrounded their island was salt water. They were stranded. They had some food they had taken from their wrecked plane before it sank. But they only salvaged a small bottle of water that had only lasted them one day. Now they were in day four and Charlie was weak from dehydration.

Charlie suggested, “Why don’t we drink some of the sea water? It’ll taste nasty but at least its liquid!” Tom answered the suggestion the same way he had answered all the other times Charlie had offered it. “It will kill you. You will get nauseous, throw up and be more dehydrated than you were before you drank it. And I don’t want to have to watch you puke your guts out again.” Charlie knew Tom was right because he had tried it on day two. He could still taste the vomit and feel the gut wrenching dry heaves. But two more parched days had passed and he was trying to rationalize that his body could get used to drinking the stuff.

The whole time he was getting sick, he thought how stupid it was to drink salt water. He knew better but it looked so refreshing. At first he just waded out into the tropical blue water to cool down. Next he splashed a little on his face. Then, without his mind giving permission, his hands were cupped and he began to lift the clear water to his mouth. He had gulped down maybe a quart before his stomach began to rebel. Maybe that was why he seemed so much weaker than Tom. Or maybe it was because Tom didn’t sweat as much. Whatever the reason, Tom didn’t show any effects of dehydration at all.

They had been stranded for four days. Charlie was sitting in the shade of a small palm tree. He was too weak to stand up. He had been slipping in and out of consciousness. Each time he felt himself dozing off, he wondered if he would ever wake up again. He hoped for a rescue boat or plane. It puzzled him that Tom seemed so much stronger. But Tom had not let himself drink the sea water.

In what would be Charlie’s last waking moments, he looked over at Tom and immediately assumed that he was hallucinating. Sitting a few feet from Charlie, Tom appeared to have a liter of bottled water. As Charlie watched, Tom took a long drink. Tom looked over and saw that Charlie was awake and looking at him. “Sorry buddy” Tom said. “I thought you were already gone or I wouldn’t have been drinking in front of you. I managed to salvage a case of water from the plane. I figured it would either keep me alive for a month or the two of us alive for two weeks. Actually, the way you sweat, it may not have lasted a week.”

A series of emotions paraded through Charlie’s mind as it dimmed. Betrayal; his best friend was watching him die while hoarding what he needed for survival. Anger; he had accepted chastisement for drinking sea water from a guy who had never experienced thirst. Charlie’s final thoughts were questions for which he would never get answers.