Out of Captivity : Surviving 1,967 Days in the Colombian Jungle

104 OUT OF CAPTIVITYFor the first few nights of our imprisonment, each of us had hadthe same nightmare—what we called the marching dream. They werethe most vivid nightmares and each of us could hear the others movingall around their beds. We were dreaming of marching, and ourbodies were acting it out as we lay sleeping. We each reported wakingfrom it and being completely surprised that we hadn’t moved out ofthe hooch.We’d been sitting there, turning over the dreams for a bit, when theFrenchman came in. Normally he stayed out of camp, leaving the dayto-daymonitoring to the other guards and only doing an occasionalwalk by to check on us. The fact that he was coming into our hooch letus know something was up. He pulled Tom aside and I saw Tom’s facego pale. Tom licked his lips and came back toward Keith and me.“We’re going to be separated,” he began. “We’re not to speak to oneanother, either. If we do, they’ll move us even farther apart and wewon’t ever see one another again.”I’d spent the previous thirty-four days thinking of all the possibleterrible things the FARC could do to us, but I hadn’t considered thisone. This was going to hurt. All we had was one another, and now theywanted to take that from us.Even as Tom was speaking, I flashed to a conversation the two of ushad a few days before. We were both lying in our hammocks lookingup at the treetops. The sunlight reflected off the top of them, and thatimage reminded me of home. Tom was talking about going to work ata Toyota car dealership when we got back. Selling cars seemed prettysafe, he told me. As silly as that conversation sounded, it had takenus out of this place. Being in his own head all day every day was notsomething that any of us was looking forward to, but it seemed we hadno choice.A few minutes after the Frenchman left, the other guards started toset up our new arrangements. Tom remained in the hooch and Keithand I were once again back in a coleta underneath nylon tent tops hung