by J. D. Palmer
Isolation.
An exhalation let out into the frosty world. An inconsequential breath, so much less important than that which is taking place in the cabins.
A crunch. A stumble. Another dozen steps.
I knew she’d come.
I turn, a hand up, ready to say the sad words I’d need to say. But it’s Sheila, still only partially clothed, a bottle in hand and a scowl on her face.
“Sheila?”
She doesn’t say anything until she gets close to me. A pull on the bottle that she hands to me before, “the fuck’s your problem?”
I sip. “What do you mean?”
She takes the bottle back from me. “You disrespect me with another lie I’ll take your head off. Got me?”
I nod. I’ve heard this tone of voice with her only twice. So yes, I do what she says.
“So… The fuck’s your problem?”
I sigh. “It’s complicated, I have—”
“A child. And someone you think you love.” It rankles me the way she says ‘think.’
She takes a swig and then passes the bottle back to me. Then ups the end with hard fingers until I actually drink.
“What is betrayal?” She asks. I don’t answer. I can’t. I don’t want to say. “There’s many kinds. There’s cheating,” she says, and she spreads her arms out wide so that the blazer slips off her breasts. A laugh when I look away, followed by a heavy sigh. Then a tone from her I’ve never heard before. “You’ve murdered, Har. Killed.”
“Yeah, so fucking what?”
She stares at me like I’m an idiot. “But you pretend like you don’t love this bitch. It’s happened. Same as the people that have died. That you’ve killed. Life happens. To pretend otherwise if fucked up. And sad. Cause both of you need to get laid.”
“But…”
She waits. The worst kind of derision from Sheila. But after a minute she takes the bottle back, a form of relenting. “Mickey loved someone else. Before me. During me. Would I trade a minute with him? Never. There was time before all of this to worry about such stupid shit. To make a big deal out of everything, to find other people who cared about such fucking bullshit. But now… Now we have a responsibility to be better than that.”
“What do you mean?”
A hand grabs my face. Makes me look at her. “You’ve already committed the crime. It was there when I met you and it’s third degree now. Tomorrow you might die, or she will. Stop living in the past. Embrace this, for fuck’s sake.”
I listen. And then drink again. And then we both stand in silence. Both thinking back on the words and how they pertain to each of us. It’s almost funny, getting this kind of pep talk from Sheila. Almost. But if anyone knows anything about holding onto things that are beyond you or your control, I suppose it would be her.
A crunch of snow. Two forms walk toward us, a giant and a wisp.
“You guys okay?”
Sheila laughs at Theo’s question. “Yeah, we’re just looking for a good place to go sledding.”
“Really?”
She grabs his arm and starts to lead him back up to the house. “Yeah, but then we found out we don’t have a sled, and we’re out of whiskey…”
Beryl and I stand alone. A new tension between us. Hesitancy and expectation and guilt filling the ten foot gap between us.
“You’re so beautiful.” And it’s true. Even now, a heavy coat over her red dress and the hat pulled low over her ears, she’s gorgeous.
“You’re not so bad yourself.”
And we smile small smiles and she comes and stands next to me, small snowflakes dusting our faces and dancing across eyelids.
I put my arms around her and hold her. The way I held her when we made our first escape from Camelot. An embrace that borders on desperate. And it’s returned, her hands gripping my back with strength and intensity, her body shaking from maybe something more than the frigid air.
A cold nose on my ear. Her breath, warm, on the hollow of my neck. And then my head is drooping, cheek sliding on cheek as our mouths find each other.
Chapped, dry lips from too many days in the cold. Nervous energy. Jitters. As if this was not just our first kiss but the first kiss ever.
Perfect.
We draw closer together, her hands coiling in my hair as I draw her in by the small of her back. A gentleness that is slowly escalating into something more. Breath coming in gasps. Bodies melding together, pressing more and more tightly.
Then she takes a step back. “Harlan.”
I know what she wants to know. Is this going to be something I regret? Is this something I don’t want to do?
“I love you Berly.”
“I love you, too. But…”
I shake my head. “I can’t keep living with what ifs. It’s not fair. It’s not… right.”
The crime has already been committed.
“I don’t know what the future holds. But… I want you in it. And I don’t… What?”
She is smiling at me. A shy smile. And in the darkness I don’t see the tears, but I see a hand brush her cheek, and then she grabs my hand. Holds it in silence.
And we stand there with nothing but the stars and the north wind for witness. The darkness holding us still as the words sink into us, as we imagine what this decision will do to our future.
Our future.
Then she takes me up by the main house, stopping to pick up a couple sticks of firewood that she stacks into my arms. Then she leads me to the bunkhouse. Unused all winter. Shuttered and closed off. But unlocked.
The place is dusty. And cold. And small. And full of a musty smell of pine and wool and stale air. We fumble around the dark room, kneeling together in front of the fireplace. A slow process, this fire. A curling of old newspaper and the sparks catching the small kindling slowly fed from one hand or another. It starts to die out before it has even begun, and only by gentle breaths is Beryl able to coax the flame to stick around.
A crackle. Sticks popping. And suddenly the room is awash with a dim light. Beryl stands and leaves the room. I hear drawers being open in what must be the bedroom. I gaze around our sparse quarters. Two chairs facing the fireplace. A dresser. A table. No pictures. I guess that they would let the campers adorn the cabin in their own way. Comforting, in a way, that this place has no history to it. Or at least at first glance.
She returns with a stack of blankets that she arranges on the floor in front of the fire.
“Like our first night… Out.” I say. And she smiles and nods. I’m glad that bringing up the past is okay. Better than okay. It’s nice to sit next to her and slowly let the fire warm us, thinking on that day so long ago when we slept on the floor of a hotel rather than in a bed.
Nothing has changed, and so much.
We sit close. And hold hands. And occasionally I kiss the tips of her fingers until warmth has finally returned to them. And then we stretch out. Lying on our sides facing each other. Slowly tracing the lines of her chin as her fingers trace the swirl of scars on my neck. A pause as she looks into my eyes, one last moment in which she seeks permission to trespass. Her fingers push the top button of my shirt open.
Come here.
It’s a slow, almost tortuous process of removing each other’s clothes. The urge to rip them off, tear them to shreds, only held back by the desire to relish each moment. To not rush this tenuous act.
I unzip the back of her dress, but I don’t take it off. She does. She sits up and peels the dress up and over her head, a proud, stubborn smile on her face as she stands above me. I pull her back down into the blankets. Hands exploring each others bodies with no boundaries, no hesitations. The fire between us burning twice as hot because it’s not only fueled by love, by lust, but by this final victory over that which has almost destroyed us. We fully open ourselves up to each other, embracing this moment in time for what it is.
BERYL | 32
IT’S DARK IN the room. But lit, somehow, for I can see Jessica’s face. Shadowed though,
only a glint of eyes and straw-colored hair and the set of a mouth. Everything else is…dim. Blurred. Seen but not seen. I can see the pride, the resolve in her, though I cannot see any features. I feel it.
There is a sense of urgency. I feel the need to look behind me. I feel like there is a door open, somewhere, that I desperately need to close.
“There is no other way?” She asks me.
I look down at the knife in my hand. I shake my head. What am I doing here?
She gives a laugh. A laugh of someone who laughs at most things because… why not? “It’s okay. We have to do what we have to do.”
We do.
I turn around, scan the room behind me. A wall, with no door. No opening. But I heard footsteps. I’m positive I heard footsteps.
“You had better hurry.”
I turn around and then I’m above her. Knife cold in my hand. So cold. An icicle dagger that is hard to grip. Hurry. Hurry up. I raise it above my head.
I wake up. A jolt that twitches my whole body. Harlan stirs next to me and I instinctively freeze, hoping that he’ll slip back into slumber. He does.
I disentangle myself from him and the blankets and walk, naked, into the bathroom. It’s cold. The fire has long been gone. But I don’t wish to wrap up again. Don’t wish to put clothes on. Don’t wish to cover up. That would be a return to what was before, and I do not want that so soon.
A small window makes the room brightly lit, the glow from outside reflected off the large mirror on the wall and made to feel brighter by all the white porcelain.
I stare at myself. Blue threads of veins on skin so pale. So pale. Skin that hasn’t seen the sun in a long time. Years. A small pink strip of scar tissue on my wrist. A crescent moon of purple scarring on my thigh. The bristle of hair around the long scar on my head.
Scars everywhere.
But I look young. Younger than I thought I would. And I look… Happy.
Then where did that dream come from?
I have harbored a certain amount of jealousy, of dread, regarding Jessica. This is the first time it has manifested itself as violence. Violence, even if it was just a dream. Just a dream. It was just a dream.
I’m dreaming again, so much. Maybe that’s it. I don’t have my sanctuary, I don’t have a place to hide from the malignancies found in my head. Maybe this is natural. Maybe everyone here is troubled by the things offered to them by their subconscious in the night. Maybe that’s why we all have trouble sleeping.
Or maybe this is something worse.
I would never do that. Would I?
I stare at the woman in the mirror and know the answer, and am relieved. I pad back down the hall and crawl back under the covers, cuddling as close to him as I can. My hands are so cold.
Gifts are exchanged. It is a holiday after all. But we don’t sit together in the same room and watch each other tear the presents open. I don’t think most are wrapped, anyways. Besides, Josey can’t resist riling up Felicia. The new argument is whether this new year is year one, or if we continue to go from the old date.
Instead, gifts are either hidden for singular moments, or suddenly presented in a gleeful ambush.
Some of the presents are big. Sam, surprisingly, gives Josey a horse. I had known that they had kindled a friendship, even knew that Josey had found joy in working with the animals. But this… I don’t tell Har. Not yet. I don’t want to tell him that Josey won’t be coming with us, not until the right moment.
Theo gives me a pair of boots. Well, he gives me my boots back, ones that had gone missing a couple weeks ago. Apparently he enlisted the help of Cristen and they stitched a place for a knife into the inside of each, with a new one already sitting sheathed in the left.
Sheila gets a homemade pair of dog tags. Heated and beaten and reshaped from the lids off of canned goods, and uneven lettering spelling out her name. A simple chain. An idea spearheaded by Josey but something we all took part in.
She almost cries and I don’t think I’ve ever seen her so pissed. She wears them proudly. A little too proudly, most days, and I heard Momma Kay ask her to cover up a bit when Brody is around.
Pike gets overloaded with antlers and bones and bits of rope tied in knots. He puts them on his pile of blankets in the corner and proudly surveys his kingdom.
I have stones. Scavenged from the lee by the barn where the snow hasn’t yet drifted. Or from digging by the creek. Or in the shelter of the trees. And one bartered for, traded even though Momma Kay said she’d give it to me for free.
Stones for our pockets. Something in the story that Harlan told us about his dad resonated, I know, with all of us.
I thought it would be something simple, and nice. And I ignored the selfish part of me that thought about how they would always have something with them to remind them of me. To tether this family together.
We won’t be easily broken apart.
I’ve thought that before, though.
So there is a small white rock with a brown ring for Theo. And a rock that turns a dark shade of red when wet for Sheila. And a chunk of quartz for Josey.
But for Har… I had recognized it immediately. The cloudy green sphere. Bright, because of the color, but dim. As if the green had captured memories or thoughts and held them within. An emerald without the gleam.
A beryl.
I was able to get a simple leather thong from Sam, and I made a necklace. Straightforward. But reliable. Too many knots, probably. But I want to be sure. It’s going to hang by his heart, after all.
I knew Har didn’t have any gifts. Too long he had drifted in his fugue, his misery. Too long he had drifted from room to room, ignoring the goings on around him.
It doesn’t matter.
He is my gift.
His eyes narrow when I hand it to him, and he doesn’t quite know what to say.
“It’s… really beautiful.”
And he smiles at me, perplexed because he is empty handed.
“Stop it, you idiot.” I don’t have to say more.
“What… What kind of stone is it?”
“It’s beryl,” I say, and I emphasize the pronunciation.
He looks up at me, a confused smile on his face. “That’s kind of like your name.”
“It’s what I apparently was named after.”
I can’t help but laugh at the shock and worry that cascades across his face.
“Wait, I’ve been pronouncing your name wrong? This whole time? Why didn’t you say anything? Why didn’t—”
I kiss him to shut him up. Something that, just weeks ago, I wouldn’t have been able to do. Wouldn’t have dared to do. Couldn’t do.
“I’m Beryl, the way you say it. That… That is your gift to me.”
He looks pleased and ashamed, and so happy that I have to help him put it on. I tell him it’s also a stone to take with him everywhere. “Like your dad always did.”
We just hug for a long time after that.
Two weeks later CD passes away. It’s not surprising to anyone. He had been failing in one capacity or another all winter. Only his spirits rising higher, even as his memory deserted him and his stamina was sapped away by the cold.
He is found in his rocking chair, looking out his favorite window, a smile on his face.
With all the deaths that have taken place in this downfall, his hurts the least.
His body is wrapped in canvas and put in the loft of the barn to be buried once the ground has thawed. And we sit around the fire and our group listens to the crying, and the laughing, and the stories of this man that clearly meant so much to this place.
Brody has a lot of questions. I think explaining a death brought about by age and hardship is, in a way, more difficult to understand than everyone “getting sick.” He wants to know why he didn’t see it happening. He asks why for everything. Truth and a new religion aren’t covering it. Not in his head.
Felicia says some bullshit. And so does Momma Kay. Which is surprising. But it’s Sheila who takes him o
ut for a walk that ends in the barn. It’s Sheila who strips everything of its protective covering, and its she who sits with him as he cries. And hugs him, as she does. Before looking for someone else to take over.
And Brody is better for it. And everyone is surprised, most of all Sheila, how often he seeks her out. Truth, harsh that it is, is what we crave.
Most of us.
I see it. And I share it. But the weather is getting warmer. The time for traveling will be here before we know it. Before I am ready. So even though I desperately want to know what hard truth waits for us at the end of our journey, I spend my nights wishing winter would never end.
BERYL | 33
PIKE CAPERS AROUND the yard, stick held high in the air and feet high-stepping, the silver of the whistle at his throat flashing in the few rays of sun rebellious enough to make themselves known. I pretend to make a move for him and he races away, shaking the stick back and forth vigorously before slipping on a patch of ice and wiping out. I laugh and, embarrassed, Pike races down the hill, appearing moments later from the other side of the house, still in a dead sprint. He nips at me as he goes by, chastising me for laughing, before returning to his stick.
I always wanted a dog. I had a foster family when I was eight that lived in Orange County, and they had a yard that was the envy of the neighborhood. It might as well have been a small park. Perfectly manicured with a small rock path that made a trail around ash trees and along perfectly trimmed hedges. Two Jacaranda trees next to the road that erupted in beautiful purple blossoms that fell in a ticker-tape parade for whomever happened to be walking by. Landscapers came by twice a week to weed, and sculpt, and mow, and check for beetles.
“A dog would ruin the yard.”
That was the response the first time, and every time I asked for a pet after that. But that wasn’t the only reason. The irony, I suppose, of an orphan thinking she had the knowledge to care for another creature… And they already had their hands full with me.
In a lot of ways I felt like the yard. Pampered and cleaned. Made to look pretty. My teeth cleaned as often as the hedges were trimmed. Hair scissored away while the grass was cut. And neighbors would say how good we looked. How wholesome.
