Down River

by Karen Harper

  "Four fairly small ones, but any one could put you in that cold, rough river," Spike said, still walking. "Mrs. Bonner, as soon as I contact the police and park rangers, I'll take you up on that offer to fly with me for an air search."

  "But with these rapids--and the falls--you think they can survive all that?" she asked, tears in her eyes and her hand clutched at her throat. "They are both very dear to us."

  "Gotta try."

  "Mitchell should have known better," Christine heard Mrs. Bonner mutter as the couple fell behind and she and Spike hurried into the lodge to make the calls. "Graham, it just shows you they are both a bit foolhardy yet, just when you think they'd learned to stay apart and away from all that past pain."

  Christine stood next to Spike while he used the kitchen phone. She wrapped her arms around herself tight, as if to hold herself up. She shook all over and blinked back tears. If she lost Mitch, she lost her future. Mrs. Bonner was right. Mitch knew better than to risk the river, no matter what the reason. But she kept hearing Mrs. Bonner's last words: You think they'd stay apart and away from all that past pain...

  She and Clay should have stayed apart. She should have left him--fled--but Yup'ik women were loyal and tenacious. She bit her lower lip hard, trying to stop the jagged memories of the lawyers picking apart her testimony about being beaten black and blue...all that pain...but she stayed with him too long....

  But now--far worse--she knew Mitch had been gone on that devil of a river far too long.

  Lisa hurt all over, as if she'd been beaten by someone's fists. Her skin, what she had seen of it before donning the wet suit earlier, was turning black and blue, even greenish in spots. A new fashion statement in an eco-conscious world--green blotches to complement her green eyes. She was so exhausted she thought she could fall flat on her face and drown in this shallow, spongy-bottom muskeg they traversed. But she went on, step after painful step, behind Mitch as he made a wobbly path for them around thickets and through grass and sedge in about one foot of water.

  "How are those Mitchell Andrew Braxton designer shoes holding up?" he asked. He sounded and looked exhausted, too, plodding under the burden of that pack like some old, worn-out Santa Claus.

  "They're a bit buoyant so I'm almost walking on this water."

  "When we were first dating, I used to think you could walk on water."

  "I know you keep talking just to keep me going, but I can't even concentrate--can't go on."

  "You can because I see tundra instead of this muskeg ahead of us, and, I think, some berry bushes. It's about time for blueberries but that might be lingonberries, something like cranberries."

  "I just want to lie down."

  "We will, soon as we hit dry ground. By the way, in case an airplane should fly over, looking for us or not, raising two hands means we need help. Raising one means we're okay."

  "I don't have the strength to raise one, let alone two."

  "You know what? It looks like a patch of blueberries, so I hope the bears have left us some."

  "Bears?"

  "They love them. Come on, Lisa Marie!"

  "I told you a long time ago not to call me that, even if it is my name. I hate my middle name. It reminds me of Elvis's daughter, who married Michael Jackson, no less. Married Michael Jackson!"

  "Yeah, but they didn't last long. You know, it sounds like you're awake enough to be mad at me and at Michael Jackson, Lisa Marie."

  "You're just trying to get me riled so I keep going to spite you."

  "Riled? Now, isn't that a good frontier word? As it says on the state's license plates--The Last Frontier."

  "Yeah, I'm starting to get that picture. And you're starting to sound like a travel brochure."

  But she had to admit, as he'd said earlier, the sunset never ended. It was still glorious, a rainbow of hues that didn't just hang in the west but covered the entire sky. Mitch turned back to help her up to higher, dry ground. She didn't care what he said, if he insulted her or praised her. She sank down where she was, surrounded by some sort of spiky pink flowers. He dropped his pack beside her with a thud.

  "I'll be right back," he said, jolting her alert again.

  "Right back from where?" she blurted, getting to her knees to rise until she realized he might have to relieve himself. They'd both managed some privacy for that, on and off the ledge, but she seemed to have sweated all her hydration out now.

  "I see a birch tree, and I'm going to use my knife to cut you some of the inner bark to chew. It's what the Inuit use for aspirin. I know you've got to be hurting."

  Got to be hurting. When had she not? Actually, as sore as she was, as many aches and pains that plagued her right now, she knew from experience that this physical agony was nothing next to that of the heart and spirit.

  She closed her eyes. Did she doze off?

  "Chew this," Mitch said, already chomping on a piece of bark when he came back and offered her a short, white strip. "Honestly, it will help. Then, take my knife and cut some of these fireweed greens for us. They make good salad greens, even though I don't have a variety of salad dressings to offer. I'm going to get the backpack full of berries, and we're going to have a feast before we go to sleep."

  "Sleep right here? Will it be safe?"

  "You said you couldn't go on and neither can I."

  They ate the last of their smoked salmon, gorged themselves on plump blueberries--the best she had ever tasted--and chewed fireweed washed down by river water. Mitch had made stoppers for the soda cans with plugs of neoprene so it wouldn't spill out. Neither of them said much, until she watched him spread out their tent, lie down and gesture for her to come into his arms.

  "We can't sleep the way we did before," she protested. "Both in there, I mean."

  Looking exasperated, he shrugged. "Suit yourself, but after being hypothermic, I'd think you'd want to keep warm. This cover is fine for two and, once again, we'll need the body heat. Nothing personal, Ms. Vaughn. Besides, I'm expecting some voracious females tonight, if I'm not covered up."

  "What?"

  "Mosquitoes. The females of the breed are vampires, you know, but I think we'll be safe from everything else."

  "I've got this wet suit on under my clothes, and I'll put your backpack over my head. I'll be fine."

  He snuggled into the canvas tent, and his voice came to her, muffled. "I thought you were exhausted. Say your prayers but quit talking."

  She lay down about four feet from him. At least he could have let her use the tent he made a big deal of wrapping tighter about himself like a cuddly cocoon. Facing him, she curled up on her side and pulled her knees up nearly to her chest. What if a bear came by after those blueberries? She heard the high-pitched whine of a mosquito, and she swatted at it. But she was so tired, nothing would make a difference now, nothing....

  She drifted away--away on the foam where her mother beckoned to her through the whirling white water.

  "Well?" Christine said to Spike when he hung up after the second call to the authorities. "Can they help?"

  "Yeah, but they wanted to know why he'd be crazy enough to kayak that part of the river. They said he had permission only to put rafts or kayaks in six miles to the west of here which is a good mile before all the rapids get dangerous."

  "He knew that. I--I can't understand it either. Unless--"

  "Unless what?" he said, turning to her. He looked into her teary face--he had never seen her cry--and put his hands on her shoulders. Big, warm hands when she was shaking all over. She lifted her hands to clasp his wrists.

  "I don't know. Unless he was showing her something about the kayak, and it just took off with them in it."

  "Not like him. Too crazy," he said, then leaned against the counter. He pulled her into his arms and held her tight.

  For once she didn't flinch when a man so much as touched her. Her head found a perfect fit under his chin. Mitch always smelled of pine and fresh air, while Spike emanated Lava soap, gasoline, motor oil and his precious sled dogs. Bu
t she didn't care. She needed his strength right now, maybe more than that. She sniffed hard, then, instead of just standing stiffly in the circle of his arms, hugged him back hard, her arms around his waist.

  "I don't think of you this way--crying and needy," he murmured, his lips moving in her hair atop her head. "You're always so strong, even...with everything. Hell, honey, got to get going," he said, setting her back and avoiding her eyes now as if he'd seen something there that scared him.

  "You and Ginger stay near the two-way. I'm gonna go get the plane and fill it up, then take Mrs. Bonner up with me. Hard to believe it, but that little lady knows cockpits, loves to fly. Keep the home fires burning now," he added as he made for the door, nearly running into his sister as she came into the kitchen.

  "Spike!" Christine called to him, and he turned back. "If you go right now, you'll have the sun in your eyes over Denali and the top of the gorge. You may have trouble seeing anyone. Just be careful...."

  Had she called him back for that? He knew this area better than she did. Or was it that she just couldn't bear to let him out of her sight right now?

  "I'll be in touch," he said, and hurried out.

  In touch. She still felt his touch as she turned away from Ginger's probing gaze.

  Lisa heard herself crying in her grief, howling inside her head like an animal in pain. She felt so alone since Daddy ran off with some woman, with Mommy and Jani dead. Grandma Colleen took her in and loved her, but it wasn't the same, wasn't right. Nothing was right until she made friends she clung to and then Mitch...Mitch, let her down, down onto the next ledge.

  She dragged herself from the depths of sleep. Where was she? She saw strange colors overhead, more muted now.

  She jerked fully awake. She was sleeping in the Alaskan wilderness with the man who had ruined her life but then saved it.

  She saw he had moved a bit closer to her in the twilight. Yes, he'd said it never got dark this time of year. The sunset had faded to pale hues with cirrus clouds roped across the heavens. Mitch had been right--she was cold. But nothing compared to being in the river. Yet a chill snaked up her spine when she remembered that someone had shoved her in that river. Hadn't they? Jonas or Vanessa? Christine Tanaka knew where she was going and maybe knew that Mitch was running a bit late. Surely not the Bonners? Or could she have just stumbled and hit her head? No way had she been so drawn by that white water, felt so strange and guilty and then leaped toward it of her own accord.

  The howling, long, low and lonely, came again. What was it? How close? Surely that was not a bear.

  "Mitch. Mitch!"

  He stirred, then lifted his head. "What?"

  That horrible howling again. The hair prickled on the back of her neck, and her stomach cartwheeled.

  "Just wolves," he said.

  "Just? Then what are we doing here near them? They hunt in packs to eat big game, don't they?"

  "My guess is they have plenty to eat out here besides humans. That's probably their version of a love song to a mate. I think they avoid people."

  "You think they avoid people?"

  "Yeah. Bears do, too, if you make enough noise--unless they're protecting cubs. Are you warm enough?"

  "Not really."

  "Since you won't sleep with me--you know what I mean--you could take my knife and cut some more fireweed and make a kind of extra blanket for yourself."

  "I changed my mind. I want in the tent."

  He said nothing, but unwrapped and lifted the edge of it for her. She scooted close, put her back to him and rolled inside the warmth and safety of his arms. Her cheek was on his bicep, as hard as the ground had been, but so comforting. She felt his hot breath on the nape of her neck, and her bottom pressed against his thighs. What would it have been like to have a lifetime of closeness like this with him, not forced but chosen? A relationship not damaged and broken but healthy and whole?

  "When are we heading out?" she asked.

  "Let's give it a couple of hours unless those howls get closer. Blueberries and water for breakfast, then we'll head for the river below the falls. The Wild River's not so wild there, divides into four or five more shallow braided streams where we can walk across. There's a road on the other side. We can hike out on it or maybe even hitch a ride."

  "How long a trek?"

  "Never walked it before, only seen it from the air."

  He yawned, stretching a bit, flexing his muscles, then relaxing. She was panicked to realize she could feel his merest movement in the pit of her belly. Even in this tight wet suit, her breasts tingled. She had to get him talking, maybe really wake him up so they could push on now.

  "I'm sorry I ruined everything," she told him. "I mean at the lodge, where you had those bonding activities planned for everyone."

  "Yeah. The Bonners' bonding experiment."

  "It's not fair if this disqualifies me."

  "Maybe they'll see you as a survivor who can handle anything after this."

  "I'd like to pretend so--that this is all some sort of test, and they'll jump out of the berry bushes and say, 'Surprise! You were just on Candid Camera,' or something like that. Then the emcee will say, 'Here in the Alaska twilight, we have seen how a wimpy South Florida native was saved from the raging river and taught to survive in the wilderness by--'"

  "Shh!"

  "Sorry. I'll shut up and try to sl--"

  "Lisa, shut up! I think I hear a plane!"

  He yanked their canvas cover open and jumped up. She heard it now, too, a much better sound than wolves howling. She staggered to her feet as he ran back toward the bog, into more of a clearing than where they were with bushes and birch trees.

  "Damn!" he shouted, pointing back toward the river. "I think it might be Spike's plane, though there are lots of red ones. But it's over the gorge, heading west!"

  "Can we wave something? If we only had something for a signal!"

  "It may circle back if they're searching. If they've found evidence we put a kayak in the river, maybe they'll look below the falls, and that's where we're heading--right now. Come on. We'll sleep when we get back to the lodge. Let's pick some more blueberries and head out."

  She helped him gather their goods and stuff them in the tent that made his pack. The drone of the plane faded, but at least it wasn't dark, and Mitch's shouting seemed to have made the wolves move on. Now they had to move on, too.

  6

  "I

  t will take us an hour to hike around that lake up ahead!" Lisa cried after they'd walked about two hours. "How did the stream we've been following turn into a big body of water?" "Beavers dammed it up," Mitch said. "See them over there?"

  He pointed to a group of them. Each sleek, brown animal looked busy as a--Yes, an apt old adage, she thought. Every beaver she could see in or out of the water was either moving wood or gnawing at it, and their half-submerged, haphazardly piled homes were visible from here, a village of them.

  As they got closer, Lisa saw the mud-and-stick dams were also embedded with rocks and tree trunks. "Amazing," she said. "And look at their little humped houses."

  "They're called lodges. I own one Alaskan lodge, but they own a whole chain of them."

  The sleek furry heads made little waves through the water as the beavers ferried logs, propelling themselves with their large flat tails. Several of the animals were quite close by, gnawing at trees along the bank of the lake.

  "They're smooth in the water but clumsy on land," Lisa whispered, "but then we all have our own habitats." She thought of herself, a South Floridian, a fish--no, a beaver--out of water here in Alaska. And had she ever actually seen a beaver, even at a zoo? To be so close up, so intimate, was awe-inspiring. She could even see what appeared to be baby beavers, playing atop the dam, chewing leaves and twigs.

  "Do they actually eat wood?" she asked. "It looks like they're chewing on the sticks for food."

  "They eat the inner bark layer, something like the way we've been chewing on the inner birch bark."

  Fa
scinated despite her predicament, Lisa moved a bit closer to the fringe of the pond, until a big beaver, glaring at her, swam closer and smacked its tail, spraying water. The splash resounded, echoed. She expected to see the other beavers scatter, but they didn't. The defender flaunted his big square front teeth and smacked the water again.

  "Why don't the others hide if we're a danger to them?" she asked, despite the fact she could tell Mitch wanted to move on.

  "He wants to scare you away, not warn them. Come on. We're rocking their boat, so to speak, and we have a long way to go."

  "This place is starting to remind me of the Animal Planet cable channel, but close up and personal," she said as she turned reluctantly away.

  "You must watch one hell of a lot of TV these days--this last year," he said, flexing his back muscles. "You've mentioned a couple of shows since we've been walking, including that Survivor show--though I could see why--and something about that old movie, The Wizard of Oz. Staying home a lot lately?"

  That annoyed her. He was goading her, implying that since he'd left, she had no social life. Even out here, even if it was true, she wasn't going to let him get away with that.

  "Of course, now that you're helping others bond and build great relationships," she said, her voice dripping sarcasm, "you're too busy and fulfilled to waste your time on such plebian pastimes as television. You've probably been using sad illustrations of your own family and former fiancee to contrast how great you are at personal relationships. Everyone in your past has been shallow and selfish--except you, of course."

  He spun back to face her. "I came to a crisis in my life and thought I could count on the woman who said she loved me." He blocked the path and dropped his pack. "We've tiptoed around the big discussion we were supposed to have yesterday, but your sudden attack indicates the time and place is now." He crossed his arms over his chest. He looked big and forbidding, but so much had been building inside of her that she had to let it out.

  She thrust her fists to her hips to counterattack his body language. "I loved the Mitch I knew," she insisted, "the one I thought was being honest with me about his and our future when we got engaged!"