Life at the Speed of Us

by Heather Sappenfield

  I slid the amulet bag under my T-shirt and felt it settle against my chest, right above my thudding heart. I rose on wobbly legs and pulled spoons from the kitchen’s only drawer.

  “I’ve heard of trees blowing down in summer near mountain bikers, but never something like that in winter. Thing is, it wasn’t a windy day.”

  I thought of the snow whirlwind that had rocked me onto my heels, ejecting me toward that Shangri-La spruce. It hadn’t been windy till that moment either.

  “I investigated that tree my first day back,” Dad said. “The crew had already removed the part on Pride early the next morning, of course, but with the vandalism that’s been going on, I needed to see the stump. To be sure it wasn’t premeditated. There weren’t any footprints, or axe or saw marks, or any signs of foul play. The stump looked healthy too. A tree in the prime of its life.”

  I tried not to show that my pulse had accelerated.

  “You know,” he said. “I’m glad it fell.”

  I paused from setting spoons on napkins to look at his broken wrist and the stiff way he stood. He couldn’t write, couldn’t even drive a snowmobile. Just now, he’d limped over from patrol’s headquarters on City Center’s far side instead of taking the snowmobile like he used to.

  “We’re so stubborn, Sov. I’m not sure anything else would have shoved us out of our funk.”

  I snorted.

  Dad saw my blush and kindly turned away.

  It was true, though. Nothing but that tree would have changed us, and somehow it had been right there, at the right moment. Both trees that day.

  Bookmark:

  Newton’s Law of Gravity

  Isaac Newton

  All objects attract each other with gravitational force. The masses of both objects determine this force,

  and it is inversely proportional to the square

  of the distance between their centers.

  12

  After Dad returned to work, I went to the library’s website and found Stephen Hawking’s recorded books. There were several, but I chose The Universe in a Nutshell and downloaded it onto my phone. I tugged on my long underwear and snow pants and pulled on my snow boots, slow with just one hand. I hated hats, but chose a blue-patterned one Mom had given Dad from a box by the door. Over that went the headphones. I had a long walk ahead, down Sunset Ridge, then left before Emerald West and out to Last Chance.

  I stepped off the deck onto the groomed swath left by Tara’s snowcat last night. I strapped on my snowshoes with my one hand, no easy feat with my sling arm zipped inside my parka. I pressed play for Hawking’s book. This hour-long trek would take ten minutes on my snowboard, but the doc had said no snowboarding. Breaking rules = hurting Dad. I was on a mission not to hurt Dad.

  The air had warmed to 25°F, and the afternoon sun warmed my face as I descended Sunset Ridge. Skiers and boarders winged past. A hawk circled overhead, its circumference widening with each rotation. The British narrator filled my ears. Before me lay Phantom Peak, surrounded by the spines of mountain after mountain, miniature worlds in each of their valleys. From my memory Mom’s voice said, M is for mountain.

  I focused on those mountains to anchor me because I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. The narrator was explaining that quantum scientists had figured out the world might be made of microscopic harmonic strings, each having their own vibrations. Each of these strings was connected to a membrane surrounding our universe. There were potentially infinite universes out there, surrounded by these soap-bubble membranes. M-theory. Math had proved it. M was for math or membrane or M-theory. I focused on the peaks.

  Someone slowed beside me: Sarge, his squat body in a big snowplow. “Hey, Sov. Good to have you back in the neighborhood!”

  I paused the book, pulled down the headphones, and nodded. My ski-patrol family had grown used to my silence, so Sarge dove right into filling the empty space. “Settled in?”

  I shrugged.

  “I’m headed to a meeting at Emerald West. Out for a stroll?”

  I nodded.

  “I was thinking last night, you’ve grown an inch since Thanksgiving.”

  That made me smile. He’d been teasing me about my height ever since seventh grade, when mine had surpassed his.

  He saluted, his way of saying goodbye or hello or whatever. He pulled his heels parallel and sped off. Sarge was the fastest skier I’d ever seen.

  I put the headphones back on. The scent of hamburgers and French fries rode the air as I neared Emerald West. I turned left, traversing Platinum Bowl on the road leading into it. Another road branched off it to the Platinum Club, a fancy reservation-only restaurant I’d never eaten at. I thought how bored Tara must be, hauling those diners down there instead of heading out on her nightly adventures. Now that I was living up here, I’d probably see Tara more.

  The road into the bowl spilled out on a steep run called Hungry Bob, which also led to the restaurant. I dug in my showshoe’s claws, my feet angled sideways, as I hoofed my way up across the run. In the trees again, the footing was easier, but the snow deep. I made for Platinum Bowl’s groomed ridge.

  Maybe when Tara was healed and back to her usual route, I’d ask to go with her one night, not just for her company, but to see my future. I pictured her black eye, and a shiver ran through me. Then I scolded myself. This was my mountain. My home. M was for my. Nothing was going to hurt me up here. Down below, life was brutal, but up here, all was good.

  I cut across an intermediate run called Sluice Box and crested the ridge adjacent the lifthouse. I paused where six days ago, tears soaking my goggles, I’d hit rock bottom. I heard myself shout, I hate tests! I swayed with remembered fury and craved a cigarette. I pressed my gloved palm against my parka till I felt the amulet bag touch my skin. No doubt I looked ridiculous, wearing those headphones, my one sleeve swaying in the breeze, and my other hand pressed to my heart in a left-handed “Pledge of Allegiance” to the view.

  Retracing my route from that day, I walked out the narrow catwalk along the ridge. I kept picturing Big John on that snowmobile, with me strapped down in the sled. As he’d heard what I’d done, he’d slumped, Wash’s comforting hand on his shoulder. I rubbed my hat, trying to smooth the furrows of guilt on my brow.

  Then the narrator talked about time.

  It had shape, he said, and he wondered if space-time could be warped. And if you warped it enough, was it possible to travel back in time?

  That halted me. Literally. I looked out on Phantom Peak, where the sun was starting to cast the shadow resembling a face. I considered the narrator’s words. Could this explain my visions? Could M be for Mom, me, and meet ? Maybe my future really could lie in my past.

  Bookmark:

  Space-Time

  Albert Einstein

  Space—length, width, and depth—and time are interwoven into a four-dimensional fabric. A planet is like a large ball pressing down on this taut fabric. Dropped in, a marble will spiral around the larger ball. This simulates a planet’s gravitational

  pull on objects in space.

  13

  Last Chance appeared. Navigating traffic, I retraced my route from the day of the accident. I bisected where that ski class had stood with their instructor, followed the yellow-black boundary ropes, and ducked under where I’d last crossed them. In Shangri-La, I estimated that day’s path.

  A fresh snowboard track curved through the snow. Gage? I shoved him from my mind. Sinking up to my knees in the deep snow despite snowshoes, I estimated the spot where that whirlwind had ejected me into the forest.

  My loud breaths hugged me. That moment’s terror surged through me. My fingers tingled. I veered right, held up my arms to push aside branches that matched the scratches on

  my cheeks, and beheld the spruce I’d hit. Majestic, full, blue-gray. It was a lunker. Two of me would just be able to join hands around its girth. It
was slim compared to a sequoia or redwood, but as spruce trees went, this one was a king.

  Beneath the tree’s shelter, only a thin layer of new snow covered the depression Dad, Wash, and Tucker had made as they’d maneuvered me out. A new trail cut straight from it toward Last Chance. Had Dad come back here? Or maybe risk management needed to investigate the site? The trail was narrow, as if the person had worn regular shoes. Why wouldn’t someone use skis, or a board, or snowshoes, or a snowmobile?

  I faced the spruce’s trunk, gray scaled with reddish brown underneath. I mentally traced its bruise perimeter along my ribs and arm. I looked up but saw no porcupine. I bit the fingertips of my glove with my teeth, pulled my hand out, and stuffed that glove in my parka’s pocket. I traced my palm’s lines with my eyes and thought, Why not?

  I pressed my hand against the bark. The quills in the amulet bag vibrated against my chest, and that cello-string sound shimmered out my cheek, easily twice as strong as before, stealing my breath.

  Yellow sun. Hot earth’s scent.

  Spruce needles beneath my snowshoes.

  I crinkled my nose at the punky smell of layered sweat. Fine black strings lifted on the breeze and swept across my face. Hair? I glanced over my shoulder and tried not to panic. I pretzeled my left arm till, right shoulder pressing the trunk, I faced the other direction.

  A body leaned against the spruce. Close. The bare arms were muscled like a guy’s. His back was turned to me, and a bow rose over his shoulder and hung diagonally down next to a quiver of arrows, their fletching almost grazing my chin.

  His hair lifted on the breeze, tickling my cheeks. I turned my face to the side, leaning out and grimacing as strands caught in my lips. I noticed the tip of his ear, peeking out of his hair, just as his hand rose to his head. For some reason, in that pivotal moment, I kept my palm against that spruce.

  Then he lurched forward, spinning, his cocked bow aimed on me. A jay squawked to flight. Our loud breaths collided. Before me was the Ute I’d seen at the cabin when I was five. He wore the same sleeveless deerskin shirt, pants, and moccasins. For a moment I couldn’t move, but then I lifted my chin, hand stuck against that spruce, and mustered courage.

  His squinted eyes moved along my left arm to my palm. He lowered his bow yet kept the arrow drawn.

  An amulet bag, like mine but with a different design, rested against his chest. Another bigger bag rode his hip like a fringed purse. He wasn’t much taller than me, but he had those piercing dark eyes I remembered from my nightmares. Hooped earrings hung from both his ears. In movies, Native Americans were big-screen gorgeous, but not this guy. At first I thought it was his hair being longer than mine, his earrings being bigger than any I’d ever wear, or the purse at his hip—these womanly things. Yet the way he stood, muscles tensed, bow trained on me, was one-hundred percent male. And real.

  He took in my snowshoes, hat, snow pants, and parka with its empty sleeve. Frost still coated my hair. He frowned at my headphones, but I had no free hand to pull them off. His eyes seemed to question me, then click through answers. I thought I might crumble under the intensity of his gaze. Even though I could just lift my hand and disappear, I glanced instead at the trail to Last Chance.

  He watched me do this, snorted, and one side of his mouth quirked up. He said a foreign word.

  With no clue what to do, I just stood there like an idiot. Finally I said, “Sovern,” and tapped my chest with my sling hand before realizing it was zipped inside my jacket.

  He squinted at that moving nub. It must have looked like a heart gone psycho.

  “Sov-ern,” he said.

  I nodded.

  He pointed at his chest and said, “Súmáí.” It sounded like Sue-my.

  “Súmáí,” I repeated.

  He grinned. I grinned. Talk about relief.

  He slid his arrow into its quiver without looking, slung his bow over his shoulder, and stood, watching me like a hawk. His image yanked so hard on the place where I’d kept fear when I was little that I caught my breath. He stepped right into my personal space. I leaned back, but he touched my still-cold parka and rubbed my frozen hair between his finger and thumb. He studied the wetness on his fingers. He held up both hands, fingers pointing down, and moved them as if tracing a woman’s shape. I turned hot all over, but he did it again, and I realized he was mimicking a skier’s track.

  I nodded like a fool with relief. My mouth filled with questions. How were you there when I was little? What year is this? Is Mom here?

  He inched out his hand till he reached my parka. It took him a second to figure out the zipper, but then he unzipped it slowly and found the sling underneath. He studied my gray T-shirt, and I thanked God I’d put on a bra. He spotted the beaded strap of the amulet bag around my neck. He reached toward it, but I flinched back. My pulse ruled my ears.

  He watched me, brows pressed close. He opened his own amulet bag and tilted it until I could see quills within. Despite his sweat scent and greasy hair, I lifted my chin, and his fingers, warm against my skin, sent heat spiking to my toes. His fingernails’ smoothness intersected my collarbone. He drew my amulet bag from beneath my T-shirt.

  He opened the flap, looked inside, and sipped air. He pinched a quill from my bag. He pinched a quill from his. He held them side-by-side, and they matched—black on one end, white on the other, that code in between. His gaze traveled up the spruce. The porcupine peered down at us. Súmáí and I looked at each other in a world of two words, yet we understood each other completely.

  “Sovern!”

  Súmáí leapt back—bow drawn faster than seemed possible—and scanned around.

  “Sovern!”

  Gage.

  Our two quills were still pinched between Súmáí’s thumb and forefinger as he aimed his ready bow.

  “Sovern! What the hell?”

  Hands yanked me back. My palm separated from the spruce as Súmáí rushed forward.

  Blue light. Cold white.

  Crisp air against my lungs.

  I slapped at Gage’s arms. “Get off !”

  “Chill! Fine! What the hell, Sovern? Could you even hear me through those things?”

  I pulled off the headphones and blinked down at my unzipped parka and open amulet bag. Up in the spruce, the porcupine glared down.

  “Are you all right?” Gage said.

  I longed to step back to the trunk and press my palm against it, but no way with Gage watching. I closed my bag and shoved it into my T-shirt, still feeling Súmáí’s fingertips against my collarbone.

  “What are you doing here, Gage?” I zipped up my parka.

  “What do you think? Boarding. I saw your tracks to this tree and followed them. You looked so ... weird.”

  Gage’s olive skin was pale and his eyes were pinpoints.

  “Are you all right?” I said.

  Gage took off his helmet and scratched the back of his head with his gloved hand. I considered the equation for his appearance because, for me, Gage = attraction.

  “I missed you. All right? I was out here because I miss you.”

  I rubbed my face and made this sound like a gear shearing off a bolt.

  “Hey!” he said.

  I turned to him, imprinting a star with my snowshoes. “Gage.” I sighed. “I can’t go back to who I was with you. I just can’t. For Dad. For you. For me. The last year, that wasn’t really me.”

  “How dumb do you think I am, Sovern? The whole time we were together, you think I didn’t know that?” He pressed his lips and looked out through the forest, swaying a little, and I fought an urge to steady him.

  “Sometimes,” he said, “your anger would let up, and there’d be this other look on your face. Softer, kinder, and so desperate—like a part of you—the good part—was trapped.” He looked down, embarrassed, but then back up, meeting my gaze. “I didn’t want t
o, but I fell in love with that part.”

  My mouth fell open.

  “I broke up with you because it seemed like you were trying to destroy that part, and it scared me, Sovern.”

  Was I really hearing this? Now? My name still hung in the air in Súmáí’s voice. My name in Gage’s voice weaved through it. I sipped a breath and listened to my pulse. I walked to him. Off his board, he’d sunk thigh deep in snow, while I floated two feet higher.

  “You loved me?”

  “Love.” He nodded sheepishly.

  I squatted down and kissed him. He tasted like toothpaste, not cigarettes.

  Bookmark:

  Relativity

  Albert Einstein

  There is no absolute time that exists for everyone

  in the universe. There is also no distance in space

  that everyone can agree on. Space and time are

  only relative to the person experiencing them.

  14

  Dad, Wash, and I lounged around the cabin after dinner. They watched a British Premier League soccer game, Wash shouting and thrusting his arms at the TV while Dad chuckled at him. Wash, being Irish, was a soccer fanatic and played league soccer all summer. On the coffee table lay the plate of Crispy’s lemon bars, half gone.

  At first I’d been dead-set against bringing a TV up here. We hadn’t had one when we lived here before, and I was trying to quit my movie addiction. Over the last year, Dad had glanced at me probably a thousand times: a furious lump on that couch, reeking of cigarettes and cast in the TV’s eerie glow. No wonder he’d retreated upstairs. Here at the cabin, I’d wanted to start fresh, but with Wash and Dad being sports fans, the TV seemed just right. Especially because soccer had no commercials.

  At the table, I opened my laptop and typed in the name Kenowitz had printed.

  Did you mean Stephen Hawking?