My Name is Judas

I’ve been stuck in this island for three days now and I don’t think all the coconuts in this island could keep me alive.

If you’re asking as to how this happened, my answer to you is: Divine Retribution.

I went out the seas on a clear day, I got on my father’s yacht and like I always do once a month, I went on sailing and fishing. It clears my mind. It was what my dad, my brother and I used to do years ago. Now that my dad is too old and too sick to do it and my brother is with a family, I do it by myself, but it still feels like they’re around. I still look back to those days as if they were yesterday.

It was a hot summer day and for a while, I was fishing. I let the breeze of the sea soothe my skin and I just took in the peaceful getaway that I’ve always loved. Then all of a sudden clouds started to form around my vicinity. The waves started to crash into my father’s yacht and before I knew it I was in the open seas.

The mainland was nowhere to be found. The wind picked up their pace and the yacht was swinging violently.

I picked my walkie-talkie and called for mayday. No one responded. I didn’t realize that I was already too far out into the seas.

I checked the GPS and my trajectory and I was already too far off, but not too far to go back to mainland. I started the engine and headed for that general direction. That was when the clouds started to turn black. It’s not your normal grey clouds that would let out gentle and kind wind. It’s the darkest clouds I’ve ever seen and their purpose is ill-content: to spray rain and lighting around me. The wind bellowed towards the opposite direction of the mainland. I had to follow its current and be patient if I wanted my father’s yacht to stay intact. As the yacht crashed and swung around the sea, all I could think about was that weather man.

That stupid idiotic weatherman. He had told that the seas would be calm today and yet my position showed the entire opposite.

But I kept calm on the face of danger. My dad had taught me that. I was her only girl and her only girl learned how to take care of herself.

I followed the current for as long as I could. The GPS started to turn haywire and I was stuck in the middle of a raging monster and it would still be a long matter of time before he seizes. Then that’s when I saw it. A silhouette of an island just a couple of miles away. The current was heading towards the island but I needed to be fast. I’m only going to have only a brief moment, a split second opportunity, to get myself there.

I took the opportunity. It was instinctual thinking that took control and I had to take the risk because the yacht could only take the bully of the monstrous currents for only so long.

I had to take the brief window of turning against the tides and aim for the current that heads toward the island itself. That is, if the current does exist. I had to feel it, the singular momentum shift of the helm, but I wasn’t experienced enough for that.

Instead I made the wrong move and crashed into a huge bellowing current opposite of me. It had hit the side of yacht and it got it fumbling around. The yacht was going to sink and I had to get out before that happens. I grabbed a life jacket and the life buoy. I wore the jacket and held the life buoy tight and jumped out of the yacht.

As I hit the waters, I was submerging then floating back into the surface continuously. I was drinking seawater and my body was being thrown like a ragdoll. I had to hold on tight. It wasn’t the best decision but it was better than sinking with the yacht.

I held on, trying to control my breathing and trying not to take too much sea water inside me.

After what felt like an hour the sea started to calm. I took that chance and swam into the island’s silhouette. Somehow I wasn’t dragged away by the raging current and I consider that as a life-saving miracle more than anything else. The arduous sound of thunder was still in the distance when I had reached the island and it’s not like I had enough time to actually tell where the storm went off when I reached the island, because when I felt the grain of its beach under my feet, my consciousness faded away.

I woke up the next day. I felt parched and thirsty.

I had basic survival training. My dad can’t help but train me like a man, it’s not that I didn’t want him to, I even asked him to do so, because I was competitive with my older brother. I had survival training with my brother. That one week course was hell and it smelled like it too (we didn’t take a bath until the last day) and I never thought that it would ever help me in life, but at that moment, I was stuck in the middle of nowhere with nothing but my life experiences to guide me through.

Considerably enough, the island was full of edible fruits, but coconuts aren’t really the best sign for someone who lived in the upper western hemisphere of the world, because that would mean you’re too damn far away from where you’re from.

The plants and the temperature around me were telling me that I was in the tropics. I was a thousand miles away from home and I don’t have a single clue or way to get back.

But I couldn’t complain either, because the island also had its own fresh water source. I can’t spear fish even if my life depended on it so I chose not to give it a try until I could literally feel myself die from hunger. And I found myself waiting. I had written a giant SOS on the beach and at night I would light up some fire in hopes of some rescue.

Three days had passed and the stink of coconut started to turn me off. Maybe it was my smell, maybe it was my pessimism, maybe it was the fact that I was going to die in a desolated island alone. I couldn’t really tell. I was getting really hungry and weak and on the third day so I decided that I was just going to wait on the shore of the island.

I know that the only ideology that could save you in the wild is optimism. I remember that god-awful smelling trainer of us, telling us that we have to be optimistic, that we have to think that help is going to come no matter what and that we are going to be saved.

“No one’s going to save us from his smell,” my brother used to joke around during the training. And it was true, the trainer’s smell haunted us for years. Maybe he used that to fend off bears or something.

But during my demise, I wished that I had plenty of optimism to come around, because come the third day I thought of just leaving the island myself. Which is against the main rule of survival which is, Never Leave your Safe Haven.

Survival’s key is sustainability and if you go out of your main zone, you risk of leading yourself to danger. The only time that you should leave is when you have exhausted all your resources and you can no longer sustain yourself. That wasn’t really the case for me. I know that I could live there for at least a week or so, aiming on just eating the various fruits that the tropical island could offer me. I could also try some spear fishing, because the fish are so close to the surface that I could practically see them. I could stay in the island for quite some time and wait for rescue because if the coast guard had intercepted my mayday then they would be searching for me. But I had also thought that if I’m all the way here in god-knows-where in some godforsaken island that could disappear overnight then how would they find me?

Optimism and hope are both valuable resources, but just like any resource, it’s bound to run out soon.

I can’t help but look back to my own family. My mother, my brother and my dearest father. I can’t help but think that they would know what to do. I can’t help but miss my family and my mother’s warmth which seemed to always be there for me.

But my brother would know what to do; my father would know what to do. That’s why I look up to them.

I just wished that they would all be around to help me out. My outstanding-over achieving and cheerful brother. My stoic and wise father. My lovely and warm mother.

But they can’t be where I am because my brother is with his loving family, working his way to create an amazing future for them. My father is on his bed waiting for the God-almighty’s blessing and my mother is right beside him, wishing and praying for that not to happen. And I’m in an island, losing all my hope away.

I can’t help but cry. It was noon and everything from me was being taken away. I cried and cried. Where else would I go? What other word could I verse out on my prayer to make it better? What sacrifice do I have to make? I have nothing. Literally nothing. All I have is my tears. So I cried. And when I was in my final peak of deciding to leave the island, that’s when I saw him.

That brown haired frazzled man with a long brown ungroomed beard and curled brown hair on his chest and brown torn shorts on his legs. He looked like a homeless man dragging his huge boat towards the island.

I couldn’t believe my eyes at first, but then I had realized that the man could be a frenzied man. A crazy man. He could be the devil himself.

He had noticed me. It was too late. He already smiled and waved at me before I could even move.

“Hey there!” He shouted gleefully. “Looks like you need help!”He added.

He came closer with his lifeboat which looked like something he stole from a cruise ship. When he came to the beach I was stapled in position. I didn’t know if I could trust him or not. I didn’t know if I could talk to him or not. He could be a figure of my imagination. He could be the devil himself.

“Hey,” he started. He was huffing and collecting his breath. The lifeboat was huge after all, and his stout body looks like needs more nutrition than I do

“The name is Judas.”

He was the devil himself and the devil was reaching out his hand to me with a huge grin from his yellow covered teeth. I guess he realized that I didn’t want to touch him so he retracted back his arm back to his side.

“Okay. Yeah I know it’s not the best name ever. But trust me, I mean no harm.” He said. “Unless your name is Jesus.” He added and laughed. I couldn’t even laugh out of my fear from the man. I was clearly scared.

“Okay I get it.” He said. “Not funny. But seriously though, I won’t hurt you Miss. More than anything, I’m here to save you.”

“You’re insane.” I said.

“I’m not insane. I really am here to save you. This boat,” he tapped his trusty life boat for good measure, “is going to save you. Trust me, this boat has gotten me out of tighter situations than this. I like to think of it as a miracle of God or something, although I can’t really think as to why He would consider of doing such a thing.”

One thing is for sure, the man does talk a lot.

“What are you doing here? And how did you get here?” I asked.

“I knew you were here from your prayers,” he waved both his hands before me, “now I know that sounds like pure utter bullshit but you have to trust me on this. God has sent me to save you and He does work in mysterious ways.”

“Bullshit.” I muttered.

“I wish that I have some ID to show you, I’ve asked the old man to do that but hey, he’s busy curing cancer or something.” He said. He is really insane. “Look I’m not Moses, and I can’t split the oceans to show you that I’m real life messiah or something. Being saved nowadays requires faith and that’s something I’m asking from you. Now if you don’t believe in God, surely you wouldn’t believe someone like me,” he explained and the bastard even smiled at his stupid joke. “But believe in yourself and your will in getting back.” He grinned once again. “Plus there’s food here.”

I was hesitant. I thought of the facts first. First fact: He looks crazy. Second fact: His boat looks sturdy, but there’s no way we could go anywhere with it, there’s no way it could survive the open seas. Third and last fact: I don’t want to die alone in an island.

“It’s either you come with me or end up getting washed away in this island.” He said as if reading my mind. “There are better ways to go.”

“And dying on that boat with you is better?” I said, backing away slowly from him.

“I’m not saying that it’s better...” he said, I was losing confidence in him. “But I promise you that’s not going to happen.” He said and somehow that’s enough to stop me from going away from him.

“And what makes you say that?” I asked.

“As much as human beings have free will, there are some things in their life that’s pre-determined. Call it divine intervention or something.” He said.

“So what you’re trying to say is that it’s pre-determined that I will die then? Well fuck you too.” I muttered.

“No, Christ, that’s not what I meant. What I meant is that you’re going to live through this no matter what.”

I kind of feel sorry for him. He was around to save people and yet he got the shortest straw by choosing to save me. The pickiest person to be saved. To be honest, I imagined that a hot looking dude with abs was going to save me. Or a helicopter coming from up above. Not some homeless looking dude with yellow teeth claiming that he’s Judas as if it was some kind of parody in the Bible.

“Look, I didn’t choose my name. It was given to me, alright? Hell, I would rather be named John and live a simple life than have my name right now and have people to distrust me.” He explained. He looked genuinely sad. “It’s some kind of joke you know? Sometimes living entails you to do shitty things and make shitty choices so that you’ll be able to redeem yourself and to do your given purpose. I didn’t choose to have a name that says that I betrayed the known Messiah, who in their right mind would like to do that? But my purpose required me to do so. Now, I walk the world with no one being able to trust me.”

I felt really sorry for him. What if he’s actually a genuinely nice guy? What if he’s really around to save me? What if he’s Jesus Christ himself but named Judas instead? So I decided to give him a chance.

“Alright,” I said. I took a deep breath. “I’ll come with you.”

I saw him smile. A huge genuine smile.

“Oh thank God! You won’t regret this, I swear. You’ll be back to your place before you even know about it!”

He climbed up his lifeboat and then helped me up. It was spacious and he was right, there was an entire box of supplies on it. I stayed on back of the boat while he stayed on the front, where the box of supplies was. He grabbed his paddle and paddling. That was then I realized that it was going to be a long way back home.

It was a sunny day and I could feel the sun pierce through my skin. I was parched and hungry and we were already in the middle of sea with no land in sight. Judas grabbed something from the supplies box.

“Here’s some ration crackers.” He said as he handed them from me, “I wish I could tell you that they’re the bread of life but then I’d be lying. They’re just some crackers made somewhere in Texas and I don’t think any godly thing comes out from there.”

I can’t help but take the cracker and eat it. He smiled at me as I do it. He grabbed a water bottle from the box and handed it to me.

“Let me guess, not the life saving blood either.” I muttered

“Sadly no.” He smiled

“Gosh what I’d do for a bottle of wine right now.” I said and he laughed.

“You’re really getting with the program!” He said and laughed.

“You better not rape me or I swear I will gut you right where you stand.” I said. I had to let that out.

“Holy shit woman! I wouldn’t even dare to touch you.” He said as he continued to paddle.

The first day at sea came by a breeze. The clear sky was replaced by a billion stars and the heat was replaced by the shearing cold. I decided that I wanted to get some sleep but I couldn’t because I was shivering to the bones. Once again, Judas grabbed something from the box. He handed over to me a thermal blanket.

“How about you?” I asked.

“Don’t need it.” He said as he continued to paddle. We were lucky that the seas were calm for the most part of the day.

“It seems that box has everything.” I muttered. “Can I get some steak please?”

He smirked.

“I’m sorry but the box is not a five-star restaurant. You’ll have to settle with winning a lifetime supply of ration crackers that taste like cardboard and bottled water.”

I smiled at him.

“Those crackers are probably cardboard.” I said. He smiled at me.

“Get some sleep. We still have a long way to go.”

I nodded.

“Good night, Judas.” I said and closed my eyes. With that my consciousness faded away.

The next day was quite a repeat of the previous one. There was still no land in sight and it felt like we were going nowhere. Judas decided to take a rest and sat in front of me. We both ate our crackers in silence until I realized something.

“You know, you really don’t look like a Judas to me.”

He looked at me questioningly.

“What do I look like then?” He asked eagerly.

“You look like a Noah.” I replied with a smirk on my face.

“Oh I get it. The beard and the boat and all. Right.” He said as he took another bite of his ration.

“Well, that just shows that our names don’t really tell who we are.” I explained.

“Yeah, it’s us who tell who we are.” He added. “People—anyone really—has no right to give us purpose. To hell with them if they think I’m the bad guy just because my name says so, but my actions say otherwise. It’s a mistake to think that people are who you think they are, because they’re not. They’re so much more.”

“Cheers to that.” I said and gave him my bottle of water. He smiled at me. It was a genuine smile from a man who looked like he was alone his whole life.

“You know, I wouldn’t choose to betray, but sometimes, we’re meant to do the wrong things in life without having a say about it. Sometimes your purpose overrides your thoughts and you just have to trust God that he’ll give you a way out.” He said and stood up. I couldn’t see the look in his face as he said those words, but I knew there’s a senses of regret and rationality in it and last time I checked insane people don’t have neither of those things. I started to think that I’m in some kind of dream with the real being known as Judas. I started to wish that it was a dream and I would wake up back in my house with my parents. I pinched myself and it hurt. It wasn’t a dream at all.

He went back to paddling the giant lifeboat into god knows where. I didn’t really mind that I didn’t exactly know where we were going. In fact, I don’t even think he knew where we were going; all that matters is that we were going somewhere as opposed to staying and waiting.

So why do you want to head back?” He said while paddling and facing the distant horizon.

“Excuse me?” I replied defensively.

“Sorry. I guess what I meant to ask is what’s driving you to live? To get back home?” He was looking at me then.

“I guess, my reason is the same like everyone else’s.” I replied. That wasn’t really true.

“So you’re telling me that you’re pushing through just for yourself?” He said. “Lady, if the whole world is like that then we wouldn’t be humanity, would we?”

I can’t help but smile at his remark. That was true. My answer was a lie.

“You got me.” I paused and think. I looked at the horizon but it gave me no answers. The answers were deep inside me. “I guess, truthfully, my answer is love for my family. I want to see my parents again, specifically my dad. He hasn’t been well lately.” I said without wanting to.

“I’m sorry to hear that.” He said and he looked genuinely concern.

“How about you? What’s your reason?” I asked. It was his turn.

“Mine is home. I’m going back for the reason that there is no place like home.”

He had this warm smile in him. A radiating heat that kind of told me that everything is going to be alright. But that’s not the case in every story isn’t it? Maybe in many others’ but not in mine. There must be destruction before I could rebuild. There must be lost before I can regain. There must be sacrifice before I could redeem myself.

I fell asleep on the afternoon of that day and I wished I hadn’t. I felt a violent rocking and swaying and when I came to consciousness it was clear that it was no dream. There were dark skies on top of us and a storm coming right towards us.

“Oh dear god.” I muttered. Judas stayed quiet, trying to keep the boat stabilized with his little paddle.

A wave crashed towards the side of the boat, almost pummeling both of us overboard.

“You’ll have to hang on!” He shouted.

“I am hanging on!” I shouted back. My heart was beating through my chest. I felt that my demise was going to come real soon.

The rain started to pour and it poured down hard. Every single sound was deafening, every single sound was a crash into my ever breaking will. I held the thermal blanket around my body and continued to stare at the frail man who was stabilizing our tiny little boat in a middle of a storm. He held on as we rocked back and forth. He was quiet for quite some time, as if he was communing for something, then he stood still as the skies poured endless droplets of rain at us. He stood still as lighting and thunder rummaged all around us. I was losing all hope and I thought the same was happening for him.

Then a voice came to me, clear from all the sound around us. Words that entered directly in my ears.

“There’s only one way out this storm.” He said

“What!?” I shouted, wishing that he could hear me from all the thunder and storms around us.

“Let go.” He muttered.

“What!? I don’t understand!” I shouted at him. I started to stand up, trying to gain my balance from all the shaking of the boat.

“Let go of your father.” He said.

“What!?” I shouted back at him even if I could hear him completely from all the sound around us. I walked towards him a big wave crashed unto the side of our boat and knocked me off balance. I was prone but still staring at his back.

How did he know?

How did he know that I can’t let go? All those times I spend alone, in that yacht of my father, wishing that we could have what we had before. All those times in where we had solace in those trips, fishing and swimming in the ocean. All those times when everything was better, they all came rushing back at me.

My father in his bed, dying. My father talking in gibberish. My father taking his last breath.

I can’t picture that. He can’t ask for something I can’t give.

“There’s a law abided in this world; If something is to be gained, something of an equal measure must be taken.” Even though he was merely whispering the words in the middle of the crazy storm, I could still hear him.

“My life is not equal that of my father!” I shouted with tears dropping from my cheeks. I stood up once again. I was standing against the storm that was around us, not realizing that there’s a bigger storm right inside me.

“That’s not what he thinks,” he responded. “He knows you so much more than you think and he knows that ever since your brother left you for his own family and him dying is something you can’t handle. He knows that you feel alone, that’s why you go on trips in his yacht, as if reliving those moments you had with him. He knows that you’re lost. His final wish is simply to lead you back home.” He explained. “So let go child, so you may find your way back home.”

“That doesn’t make any sense!” I shouted but I know it does. My words were only a shout to oblivion, because even I can’t accept it all.

“Nothing makes sense now but once you do what is asked from you then it will. Don’t worry child, don’t be scared, I will always be here for you.”

For a moment he looked like my father. For a moment he looked like what I perceived what God would look like.

“Hang on!” Judas shouted all of a sudden. A big wave was coming right towards us. He looked back towards me with a genuine smile. “Take a deep breath and please, try to find me once you get back home.”

The wave consumed both of us and I felt my face and body being pummeled by a giant force. I felt my bones crack and my body going numb. Everything was cold and I thought that I was dead.

I woke up on a familiar shore. I woke up coughing water out of my lungs. I woke up on a boat that was old and rugged from all the time it was used.

I woke up.

I stood up and got out of the lifeboat which didn’t look like what it was when I was riding on it. It looked old and fragile and it looked like there was no way that it could survive being on the sea with all the damage it had.

I looked around me and I saw that I was in a familiar shore. There was a pier in the horizon and it was the pier in where my father would park his yacht. The yacht that was now gone.

“Madeline?” A child’s voice called out to me. I looked behind me and I saw a blonde girl with pigtails. It was my nephew. Behind her was an adult man wearing polo and brown shorts, running towards me, alongside him was a woman who was wearing a pink dress.

As they came closer I started to see who it was. It was my brother and his wife.

Tears ran from my face as their child, hugged me and before I knew it, my brother’s entire family was hugging me.

“I thought we lost you.” My brother muttered. I started to cry with them.

After a while, I demanded to see father even if I was still soaking wet. I demanded to see him even if they told me that I should rest and change my soaked clothes. My entire body and sanity wanted to see him. My entire existence wanted to see him, even if it was for one last time.

He was already dead when I left that shore with his yacht. He has already left and not a single part of me could accept it. So I went out to the sea, lying to myself and to everybody around me that I was only going fishing.

It wasn’t the weatherman’s fault, it wasn’t divine intervention that brought me to that horrible experience. It was me.

I knew about the storm, I knew about my befalling, I knew about my upcoming demise. And yet here I am, living.

I couldn’t handle the weight of my father dying, so I ran away. I couldn’t handle the weight of my existence without him so I took a boat and sailed towards somewhere I could never be found. I was lost and I was devastated. I felt that I had no one.

When I entered my family’s living room and saw my father’s white coffin, that’s when everything around me fell apart. Tears started to flow freely on my face and I started to scream and shout. My mother recognized me and ran towards me. She hugged me and I felt her warmth, but her warmth only made everything around feel real. I wanted to stay in my illusion in where my father was still alive. I wanted to stay in that yacht of his knowing that everything is going to alright. But instead, I was in the living room in where the heart of the house had died.

“We were looking everywhere for you.” My mother muttered from all her tears and sadness. She retracted from her hug and looked at me straight in the eyes. She started to wipe all the tears from my face even if they came in countless of numbers. She managed to pull out a smile even if she was still crying.

“But you know, I still knew you’ll come back. I knew that you will be here, back home.” She said and hugged me once again. We both cried freely then, not caring about everyone else around us.

After I saw his face on his coffin, everything was real. I tried to touch his face but I was met with glass. He was already out of reach. I had already lost him a long time ago. But now I know I found my way back and that he is with me, no matter what.

I somehow slept soundly that night. On the brink of dawn I walked the shore of our home. I looked for the boat that I was on when I woke up on the shore. It was no longer there. I guess they brought it somewhere or maybe God took it back alongside his servant.

“Judas, huh?” I muttered and I can’t help but smile. “What a name.”

Thank you.

Somewhere out there is a crazy man going around with some kind of lifeboat claiming that he’s there to save you. He would claim that his name is Judas but in all honesty it should be Noah. But even if he’s insane and acts like he’s completely crazy, trust him, because he will save you from your upcoming storm.

I don’t believe in God and I don’t think I’ll believe in him during the duration of my entire life. But there is something within me that exist that links me towards him: Faith.

Loving someone is faith. Living is faith. Going inside a boat with someone you don’t know, hoping that he’s going to save you is faith. Faith is generosity in God’s currency. It is a currency in places we don’t think exist. It is the one and true currency of living. And I guess I counted how much I had before I entered that boat, because I wouldn’t be here, right now, if I didn’t have enough.

"Come and I will make you fishers of men."