Four of us, four shovels.
“Do you think burying him today is a good idea?” he asked quietly, changing the subject.
“It’s what, about sixty-five, seventy degrees out today, right?” I asked him.
“Yeah, about that...”
“So,” I asked, “let’s say you shot a deer. How long would you leave it hanging before you decided to process it with these kind of temps?”
“Uh, I’d start processing it today,” he said.
“Ok, why?” I asked him, trying to let the anger out of my voice.
“Because the meat would start to spoil right away…”
His words trailed off and he nodded. In two or three days, Bill might be a little bit on the ripe side.
“Tell you what, let’s dig the hole, and we’ll wait a day or so, just in case they do send somebody,” Brian suggested.
“I’m ok with that. Listen, man, I’m sorry,” I said and I realized I was. “We’re a thousand miles from home, with no way to contact the outside world, and I’m in a cabin with my two best friends and an ex-wife I hate. I don’t mean to…”
Something clicked in my chest and I sat down, putting my hand on the handle of one of the shovels as I leaned forward. I stared at my feet until I felt my emotions coming back into a semi-controlled state.
“How do you stay so calm through all of this?” I asked him.
“What do you mean?”
“Being stuck here, the EMP, pulling Bill out of the drink… I can’t believe you did that, you crazy son of a bitch.”
He chuckled a second and then said, “I don’t know if I really have bought into the idea of an EMP, but my watch and emergency radio are dead. Maybe it was a solar flare or just something that happened right here. I’m not going to worry and buy trouble until I know there’s something I need to worry about.”
“You don’t think having no plane to fly us back, a dead pilot and a thousand or more miles from your own house isn’t a reason to panic?”
“Nope,” he said and walked away.
I realized that he was compartmentalizing everything. Dealing with it one section at a time. Maybe I should do that as well.
“Need a hand?” Jordan asked me, coming up from somewhere in the direction of the outhouse.
“Sure,” I said and handed him a shovel.
* * *
For the next day and a half, we didn’t do much more than catch what we needed for food so we wouldn’t have to dig into our stash. The mosquitos were bad, but it was the black flies that were the worst. They swarmed all over the place, and we ended up wrapping Bill in a blue tarp I’d found in the shed to try to prevent maggots. We’d dug the hole a little further back than the shed, in a soft loamy spot near some pine trees, and dragged Bill to there.
I was sitting on the dock, looking out at nothing when I felt somebody walk up behind me. Probably Jordan coming out to try his hand at some lake trout. He’d mentioned that earlier, but I’d been brooding. Waiting for something to happen. In all the classes, YouTube videos, and my own experiences, I wasn’t prepared for the reality of waiting. There was nothing that could train your mind for when the shit actually did hit the fan and you felt like you had to be doing something, but you had to wait.
If they didn’t get us, how long would it take to walk 1,000 miles? It would probably be more in the end as it wasn’t a straight shot and there was water to cross and all sorts of other things. I did some mental math, having no idea what would be realistic. But say I could walk ten miles a day, that would be like 100 days of walking, over three months. I didn’t have three months’ worth of supplies, nor could I carry three months’ worth of supplies.
I could see if we could drag one of the boats to one of the numerous rivers… But many of them led to other lakes or even one of the bigger bodies of water eventually. Not where you want to be with an 18’ rowboat. The only other place I could think of was the reservation. The only reason I’d noticed it was I pulled up a Google earth map showing the topography to see how far out in BFE Pringle Lake was. It was pretty far out because I had to hit the zoom button half a dozen times, but the first thing I’d seen was the reservation to the northwest of the lake. I didn’t know exactly where it was, nor did I know how far it was.
In essence, I was beginning to conclude that we were fucked.
“Penny for your thoughts?” Tracy said sitting down next to me on the dock.
Shit.
“You’d have made about half a cent then,” I told her and stared off into the distance.
“No, not you. You’re thinking, planning. It's why you’re more upset than everyone else here,” she said softly.
“Well, you’re about 70 percent of the reason I’m upset,” I admitted. “If you weren’t here I’d have about 2/3’s less to gripe about,” and then wondered if I’d actually said that out loud or thought it.
“I’m sorry,” she said simply.
“For what?”
“For whatever it is you’re blaming me for. I’m sorry, all right?” Her voice was almost pleading.
“You cheated on me,” I told her.
It was the one thing that I’d never been able to tell Brian, why I hated his wife so much. He’d bugged me on more than one occasion why, other than I used to be married to her, and I just… didn’t tell him. As much as I disliked her, I didn’t want him to look at her the same way I did. With suspicion and disgust.
“We were twenty. I’ve changed. You’ve changed,” she told me.
“I haven’t changed all that much, honestly.”
“So why come up here if you hate me so much?” There was something in her voice that I couldn’t put my finger on… maybe hurt?
“Actually, I wasn’t going to. Jordan talked me into coming. When I found out Brian was going to bring you, I tried to get a refund.”
“You know what? You’re still the same sad, immature boy who never grew up,” she said, standing.
Maybe I was. She left just as silently as she’d come out. I stared into the water, my thoughts dark. I knew we should be doing something, executing some plan. I was almost shaking with the urge to do something, anything. Should we go? Should we stay? The cabin was outfitted with two grills; one of them was a smoker, a little Coleman wood or charcoal fired. I thought about the fish in the lake, and I thought about the dark shapes I’d seen at the water’s edge a half a mile away that morning.
Moose, elk, caribou. I didn’t know what they were called up here, but I supposed it was a moose in all likelihood. It had been wading into the water, its head dipping underneath and pulling something up to eat. I’d been half tempted to go see what it was that it’d been going after, but I’d remembered Bill’s warning. The way my circular thinking went, I then remembered the next day was the day I was going to put Bill to rest, one way or another.
“Dude,” Jordan said, sitting down next to me.
Apparently I have this big neon sign on my head that says “Tom can fix your problems, come talk to me!” or something equally stupid.
“How you doing?” I asked him.
“This thing with you and Tracy, can you stop it man?” he asked me.
“I didn’t start it. I was sitting out here alone with my thoughts,” I answered him, turning to the side.
He’d brought out a stringer and his steelhead rod with a spoon already set on his swivel. He cast it out before answering and began his retrieve.
“You might not have started it, but she’s in there crying. Won’t tell Brian what it’s about. He’s about ready to come out here and kick your— “
He jerked the rod hard, and I heard an exhalation of breath as he set the hook and the water swirled about fifteen feet in front of me. I could see a flash of silver scales and watched as he played the fish until it tired. By the size of the fish, I knew I should have grabbed the landing net, but I didn’t feel like getting up. My feet were dangling, just touching the crystal clear water. Jordan leaned down, holding the rod up high in his left h
and and pulled out a Northern Pike by the gills. He smiled at me in triumph.
“Good, dinner is served,” I said dryly.
Both of us turned when we heard the screen door bang and a furious Brian came stomping in our direction. I just watched. Anger was etched into his features, but in the grand scheme of things, I didn’t start it. I wasn’t the one who cheated, and I wasn’t the one who’d left. Tracy was. If she wanted to be upset at me, that was fine. But I’d done nothing to her nor Brian.
“What did you say to my wife?” Brian fumed, his hands forming fists.
“My ex-wife wanted something I couldn’t give her,” I told him simply, pulling my feet out of the water and using my hands to push myself into a standing position.
Brian turned a furious shade of red and he clenched his fists again. He’s my buddy, not my best friend like Jordan is, but one thing I wouldn’t do was take a beating sitting down if that’s what he was wanting to dish out.
“Excuse me?” Brian hissed.
“Forgiveness,” I told him, pushing past him abruptly.
The move surprised him, but just as fast he was surprised I was already walking. I went past the outhouse and to the shed to see what other hand tools were in there. What other supplies. I’d kept it unlocked, and it still was when I went back to it. I dug through the scraps of plywood until I found the back wall where I’d seen other handles. I found a bow saw hanging on a nail and a small axe. It wasn’t a splitting axe, but if it came to that I figured I could make it work out.
I hefted the axe and right away saw the back side of it was flattened. I tossed that out the front door into the soft grass and was about to toss the bow saw out after it so I had room to work when the light was blocked by a figure in the doorway. I turned and saw it was Brian again.
“What?” I asked him.
“What did you say to my wife?” he repeated.
“It’s ancient history, man. Something that happened almost twenty years ago. It isn’t what you think,” I told him, not wanting to tell him the truth.
“It doesn’t look like ancient history when it has her bawling,” he said.
“She doesn’t bawl. She sniffles. She cries. She’s crying now obviously, so I dunno what to tell you, man.”
“There’s more to it; you’ve always hated her. I don’t get it, man.”
“You wouldn’t,” I answered.
He stood there in the doorway, blocking me in for a few more moments and then left with a disgusted sound. I tossed the bow saw out and kept rooting around until I found a splitting wedge. That’s why the back of the axe was mushroomed out a little bit; it’d been used as a sledge. The cabin already came equipped with campfire wood, and I was sure in the winter time it was outfitted with firewood on the inside to go along with the propane wall heaters.
Since it was late July, we hadn’t had to use any heat, but it did get cool at night. Much cooler than I’d expected.
“Want a hand?” Jordan asked as I was getting out of the doorway.
“Sure,” I told him.
“What are we doing?” he asked.
“Going to find some dead trees or some windfall then cut them up into chunks.”
“What for?” he asked.
“Firewood,” I told him, “and something to start smoking fish.”
“You know, man, you could be wrong. Somebody could come check on us this week.”
“What if I’m right?” I asked him.
He stood there for a moment and smiled. “Then it’s a good thing we’re cutting firewood.”
4
Jordan and I kept busy for the next few days. There was no airplane, and during one of our trips to gather firewood, Bill was buried by Tracy and Brian. The smell had become so rank and I was somewhat relieved, but I wasn’t relieved by the tension that had built up between Tracy, Brian, and I. We’d hardly talked, and I took two days for dishes and cooking, not talking to them once. I was glad that it hadn’t come to blows, and upon reflection, I’d probably done little to calm Brian down when he’d confronted me on the dock.
My mind was elsewhere quite a bit, and after eating mostly fish for a few days, I decided that it was time to do some frogging to get a different flavor with the night’s meal, along with some of the food I packed with me. I didn’t open the final two buckets, but both of them had a ton of dried pack food in there. One of them was half full of freeze dried stuff, and I had plans on trying to make amends over dinner.
“More firewood?” Jordan asked me as I stood to stare out at the woods.
“I was thinking about catching some frogs later on tonight,” I told him. “But I also want to start up the smoker and see how good of a job it does.”
“You’re worried about us running out of food?” he asked, a small smile tugging the corners of his mouth.
“Yes,” I said, “although I’m getting the impression that nobody is taking me seriously,” I admitted.
“No, I think you’re right. I mean, I checked all the electronics we all brought. They’re all dead, I told you that.”
“Then why does nobody believe me?” I asked.
“I do, it’s just…”
“Yeah?” I asked him when his words trailed off.
“It’s a pretty grim outlook, and I haven’t had a chance to think about it. I mean, I am helping you lug firewood. Which reminds me, I need to do some swimming today, my back is killing me!”
I grimaced. I was probably in the poorest shape of all my friends, and if Jordan was calling uncle, I should too. Instead, I was trying to keep my shit together and figure out how to fix the uncomfortable silence that had fallen.
“My back’s killing me too. Did you bring any Tylenol or anything?” I asked him, curious as he was the medical professional.
“Yeah, I have a mini kit, though it’s nothing like your trauma kit. You bring stuff?”
I laughed and nodded.
“You really think we’re going to be stuck up here for a while, don’t you?”
“Yeah,” I said sobering, “I do.
* * *
I cooked up some beans and chopped up chunks of the pike and musky that Jordan and Brian had caught. Fish chili wasn’t all that hard; I’d soaked the dried beans for a couple hours, then boiled and did the water change like I normally would. Brian just watched me somewhat sullenly at first, and then with increasing interest. He seemed to be thawing out a bit and, when I fried the pike chunks and then poured the Chili over top of the big fillet pieces, he was almost drooling beside me.
“Listen, man,” I said, trying to start out the conversation.
“You know what man, can we just put it between us? Bury the hatchet? I get it now, I think. You and Tracy used to have a thing and every time you see her… you kind of go back in time when you two…”
“Yeah, I’d like to just forget the other day. I don’t want us all to fight, and if we don’t see a plane this week we need to start planning for the winter time,” I told him, starting to dish everyone’s portions out onto plates.
“What are we looking at?” he asked. “I know you studied this kind of stuff before.”
He was right, I had.
“I don’t know, man, I think we really need to start looking for food, firewood, and whatever we can to insulate this place. It’s barely seventy degrees outside and it’s July; I can’t imagine what winter is going to be like.”
He paused for a moment before speaking. “You think we’re going to die up here, don’t you?”
“I think we’re going to be extremely lucky to survive the winter,” I admitted. “But that’s just between us, man.”
“Trust me, I don’t want Tracy to get worked up… God, you know how she is, better than anyone.”
I couldn’t help it, a wry smile cracked my stoic features and I chuckled.
“She’s a good woman. We’ve all changed, and I think that’s what’s been… keeping me from seeing that in her. How much I’ve grown and changed. I mean, shit, it’s been like 20 yea
rs,” I told him.
“So what’s for dessert?” I heard Tracy ask from somewhere behind us.
“Chocolate cheesecake,” I said and grinned when her jaw dropped open.
“I take back every mean word I’ve ever said to you. Where is it?”
I’d brought the dehydrated ingredients with me. Sure, it wouldn’t taste as well as the real thing would fresh, but it beat out my earlier idea of pudding. I’d save that one for later.
“Jordan’s cooking it outside at the campfire. We set up a double boiler type contraption with the Dutch oven.”
Both of us were almost flung from our feet as Tracy went pushing past us. For once, she didn’t look like the devil to me, just a woman who wouldn’t be stopped when matters of life and death were at stake… or chocolate and cheesecake. Both interchangeable in equal parts I suppose.
“You did that on purpose…” Brian said slowly.
“I don’t know how else to fix things,” I said, “so I go with what I know best. Food,” I told him rubbing my stomach.
He smiled and clapped me on the shoulder and went to the door, holding it open as Jordan came inside. Jordan’s hands were wrapped in kitchen towels, holding the cast iron pan we’d made the cheesecake in.
“It has to cool down first,” he called over his shoulder.
Tracy was pulling what looked like a Swiss army knife out of her pocket and snapped open an attachment. A fork. I had to smile.
“It’s not ready for that, it has to cool. It’ll just be mush now.”
“It’s got chocolate…” she said, her voice low and raspy.
“Dude, you didn’t bring her PMS fixes?” I asked Brian, dumbfounded.
“I forgot,” he said in a quiet voice. “Besides, she hates camping and we were tight on weight…”
“God, I wish I could have brought more stuff,” Brian admitted, watching as his wife tried stabbing her Swiss army fork into the cheesecake as Jordan kept fumbling with it and trying to keep it away from her.
Northern Lights: A Scorched Earth Novel Page 3
