These Nameless Things

by Shawn Smucker

  Miho shook her head, still staring into the fire.

  “I’m just along for the ride,” Adam said.

  “Our options have not changed much.” Abe smiled. “They are, in many ways, what they have always been. We can stay. We can go back into the mountain, this time to find Lucia. Or we can go east.”

  “We?” Adam asked.

  Abe shrugged. “I think, at this point, the best thing we can do is stick together.”

  I weighed the options. I could try to go back and get Lucia, but that seemed impossible. I had used up everything I had to get Adam. I had nothing left. Going east felt equally as difficult, and I didn’t know the path or what was at the end of it. Staying seemed the easiest thing to do yet the least feasible.

  “How far can we get without food?” Miho asked, and I assumed she meant east.

  “I didn’t say we are entirely without food,” Abe said.

  “I’m not going back in the mountain,” Adam said, and there was a lining of panic in his voice. “I wish I could. I wish I could go back for the girl. But I don’t have it in me.” His words came out in short thrusts.

  Miho shook her head sympathetically.

  “Honestly?” I said. “I don’t think I could do it either.”

  “So we just leave her over there?” Miho asked.

  “She fell into the river,” I replied. “Under the ice.”

  “So we just leave her over there?” Miho repeated, her voice swelling.

  Our words at a deadlock, we looked to Abe.

  “This is what I think,” he said gently, shifting his tone. “This is what I would like to see. I would like the four of us to rest here today, tonight, maybe one more day, until you’re ready. Then I’d like to pack up the food we have and any supplies that might be helpful, and head east.”

  Miho started speaking again but, uncharacteristically, Abe held up his hand to stop her. “I will bear responsibility for Lucia. I will make sure that anything that can be done will be done.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Miho said, and it was the harshest tone I’d ever heard her use with Abe.

  He looked her full in the face, and there was nothing but love in his eyes. He said it again, this time somehow both quieter and firmer. “I will bear responsibility for Lucia.”

  I started to speak, to say that wasn’t fair, that Lucia’s fate was my responsibility. I wanted to argue with him, to tell him they should all go on while I went back for her. But I didn’t have the strength. I had to let him assume that burden, and I had to admit, it was a relief. When he said those words, it was the closest I’d felt to free in a long, long time.

  Miho stood up and paced back and forth. She stopped beside Adam and put her hand on his shoulder. “Abe’s right,” she admitted.

  Was she talking to Adam? To me? To all of us? I couldn’t tell. But in that moment, it was decided. The air in the house held still. Outside, the wind stopped and the snow on the plains glittered. I felt an aching sense of relief now that the burden of those lies had been scattered.

  We would go east.

  I DON’T KNOW who decided that we should keep track of how many trees we passed, but at some point between the fourth and fifth tree, it was decided that I should use the charred end of a piece of kindling and mark one tally inside the front cover of the only book I had brought with me. I had pulled it from the shelves before we left and looked at Miho. “Not for firewood,” I had said, not even knowing what was behind my need to say it. Was it to make her feel guilty for all the volumes she had burned? Was it an attempt at humor? Whatever the case, she had given me a sad smile as I nestled the book in the knapsack that Sarah and Karon had given me.

  Would I find them again sometime in the east? Or had they vanished into some in-between place in the canyon or here on the plains?

  I took the book out, clumsily held the crooked stick with the black end, and marked five long straight lines on the page inside the hardback book. I blew the black dust away and stared at those five lines for an extra moment before putting everything back in the knapsack and following Abe, Adam, and Miho. Their forms were almost indiscernible, wrapped as they were in the bulky garments of other people’s clothes, so many layers that their appendages were unnaturally short and plump compared to the hulk of their wrapped bodies. We were like astronauts.

  They forged ahead in the snow, and already it had become shallower the farther we walked from the remains of our village. I did not hurry to catch up, content to place my feet where theirs had gone and watch from a distance.

  At every tree, we changed out the leader, and it was slow going. At the sixth tree, I made the mark in the book and then took the lead for the second time. On the first day, we only made it to tree number nine, but we hadn’t left until well after dawn, and we stopped while the light was still bright in the gray-white sky.

  We hollowed out a place in the snow, piling it up around us as a shelter from the wind that occasionally rose. There were plenty of fallen limbs under each tree we had passed now that we were so far from town, though they were covered in snow and challenging to light. But with enough care and attention, we were able to start an anemic, smoking fire. We huddled close.

  Miho seemed to be further inside of herself than usual. Adam, on the other hand, was coming alive, gaining health, and eager to help in any way that required movement or action. Abe seemed always to have a small smile on his face, as if he had finally received a long-sought-after gift.

  I felt like a clumsy butterfly only recently emerged from my chrysalis. Wings still bent and folded over. Walking with uncertainty and a kind of vague knowledge that there was another way. Confession had broken me free, but navigating the pain I had caused was no easy thing. And I sensed that whatever had existed between Miho and me could not be recovered.

  Although we were all close together, she seemed to always lean toward Adam. I felt a peace with this. It seemed a deserved, almost welcome penance for the lies I had hidden behind. I wanted to pay for what I had done. This seemed fair enough.

  “Any guesses on how many trees until the next mountain?” Adam asked as we huddled together in the dark.

  “One hundred and seventy-nine,” Miho said, and we all grinned. Adam groaned.

  “Did Lucia ever say how many?” I asked. As soon as I said her name, I could feel a heaviness descend on the group, and I wished I could retrieve those words and put them away.

  “No,” Abe replied.

  After a long period of silence, Adam ventured again. “Any other guesses? Closest one wins the prize.”

  “I’ll take two hundred,” Abe said. The fire grew in the midst of us, bringing with it a sense of home and comfort even though we were surrounded by snow and the dying evening light.

  “Two hundred and one,” I said, and Miho burst out a kind of one-syllable laugh, punching me in the shoulder.

  We sat there for so long, leaning against one another, that I thought everyone but me had fallen asleep. But then I heard Miho whisper, “What’s the prize?”

  No one answered. The cloudy shape of her words rose along with smoke from the dying fire. I reached into my knapsack, took out the book with the marks in it, and threw it onto the embers.

  WE STARTED PASSING other villages at about the thirtieth tree, which I found interesting. It meant people had left our village beside the mountain and, after walking for some time, decided to stop and create a new life in the plains. But every village was empty, and we found few supplies to gather up and take along with us.

  A few weeks later, our habit hadn’t changed. Wake with the light. Eat a small amount of our food, the supply dwindling. Walk east, changing leaders as we passed each tree, although since the shallow snow no longer required forging a path through drifts, the shift changes were mostly unnecessary and done out of habit. I no longer counted the trees.

  Abe was in the lead, moving ahead at his slow but steady pace, when he stopped. We nearly bumped into each other, so unaccustomed were we to stopping
between trees.

  “What?” Miho asked.

  The snow was not deep, only a few inches, and the air was warmer. I had shed a few layers that morning before leaving the last tree, laying my clothes at the base of it like an offering.

  “Look,” Abe said, and we peered around him, shading our eyes from the glare coming off the grass.

  There was a large crowd of people walking toward us, coming from the next tree—coming from the east.

  29 The Other Mountain

  “HOWDY, FRIENDS,” ABE said as the group stopped a few yards away from us.

  The leader was a man with a short beard, small eyes, and a mouth that wore a frown as its neutral position. He grunted some kind of a response.

  “Where’re you headed?” Abe asked in a nonchalant voice.

  “Back,” the man said, curiosity and skepticism making his tiny eyes even beadier.

  “Huh,” Abe said, as if the man’s response concerned him but he didn’t want to say why. “Mind if I ask where you’re coming from?”

  “The east.”

  “I can see that,” Abe said, nearly letting out a chuckle.

  “The mountain in the east,” the man replied. I could tell by the tone of his voice he didn’t enjoy being laughed at. But if his first response had amused Abe, his second answer brought the seriousness back.

  “The mountain?” Abe asked, now in earnest. “The far mountain?”

  The man nodded, looking satisfied that he had finally said something that apparently wouldn’t be mocked.

  “So, it’s there.” Miho let her words out in a quiet wave of relief. Adam leaned closer to her, and she whispered something to him before speaking to the newcomers. “How far?”

  “Maybe twenty trees,” the man said. “Maybe less.”

  We were so close. I could feel the weight lift from my shoulders, but almost immediately it returned. Why were these people leaving the far mountain? It was supposed to be a good destination.

  Abe was thinking along the same lines. “What’s waiting for you in the west that you would go back?”

  The man hesitated, seemed unsure of himself, or perhaps didn’t know if he wanted to answer. “Nothing special about the east,” he mumbled.

  “Nothing special?” Abe said, not trying to hide his disbelief. “Did you even go up the mountain?”

  The man shrugged. It was clear he had not. A few of the people behind him sat down on the wet ground. I was ready to do the same, wondering how long Abe and this man would keep talking.

  Abe took a few steps toward the man and held out his hand. “Abe,” he said. “You?”

  The man paused. “Jed.”

  “Jed,” Abe echoed. “Jed. Forgive me if I keep coming back to this. I just find it hard to believe someone would walk all the way to the mountain in the east and then turn around.”

  “She told us the truth,” a voice shouted from the back of the pack.

  “She?” Abe asked, his eyes narrowing.

  “Black-haired woman,” Jed said. “She explained what was actually waiting for us up in the mountain. Nothing better or worse than what we’ve always had. She said the old place was cleaned out and ready for anyone who wanted to return.”

  “We’ve come from back there,” I blurted out. “Look at me. Does it look to you like a good place to be?”

  I could feel their eyes on me, feasting on me, taking in my gaunt frame, my scabbed face. I could feel Miho look at me.

  “Snow gets deeper too.” Adam shrugged, acting as if he didn’t care whether or not they believed him. “You can go if you want. Gets pretty cold over that way. You’ll need something to get through the snow. And warmer clothes than what you’ve got on.”

  “And our village is burned,” Abe said. “Yours might be too.”

  “What?” Jed asked, looking confused, doubting us.

  “She did it,” I said. “That woman. She’s destroyed everything. And now she’s trying to get you to go back.”

  We all stood there in the silence, taking each other in. Beyond them, I could see the next tree. Beyond that, on the horizon, a narrow purple strip the width of a thread. Was that an illusion? Or the eastern mountain range?

  “Is that the mountain?” I asked. “Can you see it from here?”

  Jed turned around, moving so that he could see through the crowd behind him. He looked at me again, and I could tell he was weighing my appearance with the promises Kathy must have made about how good it was back there.

  “If you can see it from here,” he said, “you’ve got good eyes.”

  I turned to the others. “You all ready? I’m not going back. Not for anything in the world.”

  Miho nodded, and for the first time I felt a softening in her toward me. Adam, too, seemed inspired by my action.

  “Fair enough,” Abe said. “Wait a minute.”

  I had already taken a few steps forward, so now I was even with Abe, could see his face, and it emanated peace and goodwill.

  “Don’t believe her,” Abe said to Jed. “Come back with us. I’ll show you the way into the mountain. Please.” He finished by nodding a kind sort of greeting, something he gave each and every person who made eye contact with him as we made our way through their midst.

  “Abe?” I heard someone ask. “Did he say his name is Abe? Is that Abe from the first village?”

  Soon the crowd was behind us, and still we walked on, now with a clear view of the tree. Thinking about them going back into the old mountain nearly had me in tears. The dust. The bog. The cold. I wished I could tell them. I wished they would believe me, but I knew the way Kathy’s words could whisper to you.

  I tried not to look back, but after two or three minutes, I couldn’t help it. I glanced over my shoulder.

  Every single one of them was following us.

  They weren’t the last group we met. In between nearly every one of those final trees, we crossed paths with a group that had been persuaded, always by Kathy, to leave and go back. Sometimes the groups were large, hundreds of people. At other times they came in twos and threes.

  And every single time, we were able to convince them to turn around.

  So it was that we finally arrived at the last tree, in plain view of the eastern mountain, with a crowd behind us that numbered in the thousands. As we got closer to the mountain, I could sense the difference between it and the range we had left behind. There was something calming about it, welcoming. It was bathed in a purplish hue as the light faded, and the trees were of every kind. There were maples and sycamores, oaks and birches. Farther up the mountain, where the rocky outcroppings became more dominant, evergreens swept the stone with their graceful boughs. And everywhere, flowers.

  At the base of the mountain, I saw a woman standing beside a fire.

  When we got closer I noticed that the mountainside was teeming with people. Soon the glow of a thousand fires lit the mountainside. There were more people there than I could have counted. The fires were like stars in the night sky.

  We walked up to the woman. It was Kathy.

  Abe turned to those behind us. “Go ahead,” he said. “Make your way up. We’ll join you soon.”

  It took a long, long time for all of them to file past. I could hear the sounds of reunifications on the mountainside, people calling out in loving surprise to returning friends or family. Names cried out with tears in their voices. Hugs. The pounding of backs. The rustling as people made more room around a fire.

  It was the sound of coming home.

  “You all go ahead as well,” Abe said solemnly to the three of us.

  “What? No,” Miho said. “We’re with you, Abe.”

  Abe looked at me when he spoke. “Thank you, Miho, but I have some unfinished business with Kathy. You all make your way up the mountain. I’ll sort it out.”

  We turned to walk away, and I heard his voice again. “Dan.”

  He held out his hand, the same way he would have reached for me if I was falling. “I’ll need that key to make sure
everything goes back where it belongs.”

  I walked over to him and dug deep in the knapsack. I pulled out the key and laid it in his palm.

  He nodded.

  That was it. We walked up into the trees, into the smell of a thousand fires, and I felt emotion clogging my throat.

  30 And We Begin Our Descent

  MIHO AND I remain at the back of the crowd, walking slowly through the trees, always farther up the mountain, farther in.

  We hike during the day, sleep on the warm ground at night. We walk for a long time, maybe weeks? Could it be months? It’s hard to say. But it’s very slow going. It didn’t take many days for the others from our village to find us, and now we walk together, a small cluster at the very back of this rustling sea of humanity. The old crew. We keep our distance from the rest, the way my house was always separated a bit from the rest of the town. John and Po, Miss B, Circe, and Misha. Miho and Adam. Me. Even Mary St. Clair. Together again. Everyone except Abe.

  He went back for her. A sob catches in my throat.

  No one walks at night, and at first it bothered me. I kept looking in the shadows, wondering if Kathy had somehow managed to trap Abe inside the mountain. If she did, I know she’ll come for us, and I don’t know if we have the fortitude to resist her without him. So I keep my eyes open most nights, as long as I can, waiting for her to emerge. What will I do if I see her? What will I do if she walks into camp and starts filling our heads with nonsense about the old mountain range, how things are better there? I don’t know. But if she does come back, I want to know the moment she arrives, so I keep my eyes open.

  It is night, and we are all sitting around the fire. John gathers wood and makes a large pile. He will sit there and tend the fire all night. It’s what he does. Po sits at the edge of the light, carving something, humming to himself. Our eyes meet through the dancing shadows, and his gaze is softer than I remember. There is nothing there but acceptance. He nearly smiles, then looks back at his carving. Adam sits beside him, watching, occasionally asking questions about all this time between what happened before and now. Miho comes over and sits beside him.