“You brought champagne?” I squeal and clap my hands.
“First time bringing champagne on a hunting trip, that’s for sure.”
“You’re so sweet.”
“It’ll be a great weekend, baby.”
Yes, it definitely will.
The rest of the drive takes fifteen minutes, though I don’t think we move more than two miles. The dirt road is deeply pitted and we bounce in and out of potholes until we finally turn off onto an even narrower path. The evergreens above us form a tunnel, and it occurs to me that Steven is moving through the large intestine of life now, heading right for the inglorious end.
Good. It’s exactly what a shit like him deserves. I don’t want to risk the life I’ve built for myself, but I’ll stay strong for Meg. It’s all she asked of me.
The cabin finally appears, and it’s an anticlimactic sight. Just one room, I think, dwarfed by the giant trees that loom over the tiny wooden structure. It looks like the perfect place to make a man disappear.
“You’ll need to wipe down the kitchen when we get inside. It’s just one counter. There’s a pump for water.”
“Is that an outhouse?”
“Yeah, this isn’t glamping,” he says, sounding happy with my shock. “You said you wanted to go hunting.”
“I did. I do.”
“This is what it’s like.”
“It’s great!” I lie, and he laughs. He wants me to hate it so he can tell me how soft I am. How inferior. He wants me to mince around in my high-heeled boots and scream over every spider I see. But I’m the spider here. And I’ve never minced.
Steven digs a key from under one of the stumps that circle a fire pit. The air smells like earth, as if there’s no divide between land and sky. The whole place is a grave full of dead and dying plants and animals.
Here it doesn’t matter if I have a soul or not. This dirt would absorb my flesh as easily as anyone else’s. We’re all portions for foxes, as the old Bible saying goes. Death rots all the soft parts of people away, and corpses don’t have souls. In a hundred years no one will remember any of us or be able to tell our bones apart. I like that.
It seems the forest makes me morbid.
Steven unlocks the door and lets me step inside first, probably hoping I’ll find it creepy. The windows are all shuttered and I hear a skittering sound in a corner.
There are two couches near a stone fireplace and two full-size beds against the other wall. This must be some cozy bro time when they come here in big packs.
“I’ll bring in the bags,” Steven says.
As instructed, I head for the wooden countertop that makes up the kitchen. There are some shelves above it and a metal sink with a drain. In place of the faucet, there’s a pump. Under the sink, hidden behind a recycled calico curtain, I find cleaning spray and paper towels.
I wipe down the countertop and even the shelves above it.
“Thanks, babe,” he says as he delivers a bag of groceries, and I glow with pride. “Here’s the cooler.” He slides it under the counter. “There’s a block of ice in there, so it should stay cold all weekend. I’ll keep the beer outside, since it’s only supposed to get to forty-eight today. That should be cold enough.”
I put the eggs, bacon, and hot dogs in the cooler along with the champagne. There are already condiments and snacks inside. Steven pops open a beer. “Once you finish unpacking, I’ll teach you about the rifle.”
If he gets drunk enough, maybe he’ll just shoot himself. A girl can dream.
As I get the rest of the supplies unpacked, Steven starts a fire in the fireplace. I’m hoping the space will warm up quickly. I don’t relish parading around in my see-through nightie in this freezing room.
He tells me to put on some real boots and meet him outside. I add another log to the fire as soon as he leaves, then switch out my cute boots for my used boots and tug on my big jacket and knit cap.
I bounce out the door, excited and a little scared about shooting my first gun.
Another lie, of course. I grew up in rural Oklahoma. My family weren’t hunters, but there sure were a lot of varmints to shoot on the back side of our trailer. I’ve killed plenty of prairie dogs and field rats in my life. I’m not a dead shot, but I’m good enough. Deer offer a much larger target. So will Steven.
This is the beginning of the end for him, and as I take the rifle from his hand, I marvel that he’s simply handing it over to me.
Steven gives me a bare-bones safety lecture, showing me how to unload the semiautomatic rifle and make sure the chamber is empty. Always treat it as if it’s loaded. Never point it at others. Blah, blah, blah.
He demonstrates how to load a magazine, then takes aim at some old cans already pockmarked from bullets and set on top of a boulder. His form isn’t bad, but his first shot misses.
I jump at the loud report, then clap my hands over my ears and scream.
“Come on, now. You’re throwing me off.”
“It’s so loud!”
“It’s a gun, Jane. It’s going to make a loud noise.”
It’s going to make a big hole in your gut too, I think, but I mutter an apology and keep my hands over my ears for the second shot.
This time one of the cans goes flying and he grins, then fires again and again. Once all the cans are gone, he walks out and resets them on the boulder. “That’s how you do it.”
“Can I try now?”
He scoffs at my request but hands over the rifle. When I turn toward the cans, the barrel grazes right by him. For a moment he’s in my sights.
“Hey! Don’t point it at me! That’s the first damn rule! How fucking stupid are you?”
“I’m sorry!”
“Jesus Christ. Is your finger on the trigger?”
Yes, it definitely is. “Oh, I’m really sorry, sweetie. I wasn’t thinking.”
“Well, use that worthless brain for once.”
“Don’t be mean.”
“Mean? You just almost shot me! Don’t you think that was a little fucking mean? I’ve only told you three goddamn things about shooting, and you can’t even get those right!”
I raise my voice to a higher pitch, making my words tremble with panic. “I’m sorry, okay? I’m really sorry! I didn’t mean it!” I can’t shoot him here at the cabin, but the next time he turns his back, I’ll point it right at him just for fun.
He rolls his eyes. “Yeah. All right. Don’t do it again. And there’s no crying on hunting trips, okay?”
I sniff and nod. “Okay. Don’t be mad.”
“I’m not mad. But pay attention. This isn’t one of your ridiculous books. This is real life with real consequences.”
It certainly is.
I nod and pretend I don’t mind being talked to like a child. I remember how often Meg would tell me that she was just as bad as he was. I say mean things too. I start arguments. I’m not innocent here.
No. No one is innocent. But Steven escalates a thoughtless moment into deliberate cruelty every time. That was how he’d learned to respond to hurt: Accidentally bump into my emotions and I will punch you as hard as I can. It makes his pain go away, maybe. At the very least, he can feel as if he’s won the interaction, and, boy, does he like winning. He needs to feel powerful to feel safe. Hey, I can understand that but I can’t sympathize. That’s not an emotion I can tap into.
He comes in close behind me to help me position the rifle correctly. His groin is pushed right up against my butt, of course. “You’re not going to be able to cover your ears, you know.”
“I know.”
“I’ll hold on and keep you safe,” he murmurs, sliding his hands to my waist.
I sight through the scope and deliberately miss, letting the stock smack into my shoulder as the shot rings out. “Ow!”
“You need to keep it braced tightly against your shoulder or it’s going to kick back. Try again.”
“I don’t think I want to.”
“You have to try at least one more time, ba
by. I brought you all the way up here.”
I sigh and shoot again, keeping it snug to my shoulder this time but purposely missing the can. “Steven! I did it!”
“Well, you shot a round, that’s for sure.”
“I think I got real close.”
“How does it feel?”
“Fun.” That’s the truth. Maybe I’ll find a shooting range in Malaysia and make this a hobby.
His hands slide a little higher, until he’s grazing the bottoms of my breasts through the coat. “It’s hot watching you shoot.”
“Stop it.” The words leave my mouth too sharply, but he doesn’t notice. He just chuckles and I shoot once more, aiming a little closer. On the fourth shot I hit a can and whoop with joy. “I did it! I did it!”
“Good job, babe. But that doesn’t mean you can hit a moving animal.”
“No, but I can hit one that’s not moving!”
“It’ll be moving pretty fast by the time you get that fourth shot off.”
“I just need to practice.”
“Sure.” He takes the rifle from me and loads a new magazine. “There you go. Try again.”
He finally steps back and lets me shoot on my own. I take six more shots. On the last shots I’m really trying, and I hit the last two cans with no problem. If I do shoot Steven, he’ll likely be pretty close. I’m not concerned I’ll miss.
He takes the rifle from me and goes to set the cans again, apparently not trusting that I won’t kill him while he’s down there.
Smart move.
I could shoot him as soon as he gives the gun back to me and get this over with, but not here. A shooting accident in the woods would be better. I’m inexperienced and I saw movement and thought he was a deer.
If I just accidentally kill him standing right in front of me in this clearing, I could be charged with manslaughter or criminal negligence.
And if I’m going to bury his body somewhere and make him disappear, I can’t have his guts and blood all over the yard. Even I won’t be able to playact my way out of that one.
I fire off another ten shots or so, picturing Steven’s face as the cans. Then he wants a turn. His turn goes on for a while. I shoot another few rounds, but he gets bored with sharing and suggests we stop for lunch. “It’s almost noon already.”
“Yay, weenie roast!” I yell. His face spasms in irritation, but I laugh because, come on, it’s funny.
Steven makes a big show of cutting a couple of sticks off a nearby maple tree and whittling each end into a forked point using a pocketknife.
“Won’t these get tree stuff on our hot dogs?” I ask as he hands me my stick.
He rolls his eyes. I imagine poking the stick in them.
“They’re not, like, poisonous or anything?”
“No, Jane, they’re not poisonous. Didn’t any of the men your mom brought home ever take you camping?”
I shoot him a narrow look and he holds up his hands. “You know what I mean.”
“No,” I grumble as I stomp up the stairs to the cabin door, “they didn’t take me camping.”
“That’s why women shouldn’t have kids outside of marriage. Your real dad would have taught you this kind of stuff.”
“Maybe. But men have kids outside of marriage too, you know. That’s kind of how it works.”
“But women should know better. They’re the ones left with the children.” Lucky men and stupid, irresponsible women. A tale as old as time.
Steven has done his whittling work, so he grabs another beer and puts his feet up on a rough block of wood that sits between the couches. I get the hot dogs and buns and condiments and paper plates. The fire has warmed the place up, at least, and I shed my big coat and boots.
“There are potato chips too,” he calls out. I retrieve them, and he moves his feet so I can fit the chips on the makeshift table. Steven hands me his cooking stick. I kneel in front of the fire and cook our meal.
“This is nice,” he says.
“The first dinner I’ve made for you!”
He laughs and chugs his beer. I grin with happiness as my cheeks flush from the fire. A tiny flash of movement catches my eye. A spider drops frantically from a high hearthstone to escape the heat. But it’s hotter near the ground, unfortunately for the spider. It drops to the floor right in front of the flames, and I watch its legs curl in until it’s just a little ball of drying meat. I don’t squeal with fear once. I don’t even blink.
When the weenies are roasted, I slide them onto buns and serve one to my man. He eats it quickly and asks for one more, but he does get up to fetch himself a beer from the doorstep. He gets me one too. As soon as our meal is finished, he announces that he’s going out to get in a few hours of hunting before dusk.
“Hold on!” I cry. “Let me just get my coat and—”
“No. You stay here.”
“But, Steven—”
“Not today. I need some peace.”
He’s out the door before I can think, stomping down the steps with his gun in hand.
Damn it. I shove my feet into my boots and scramble into my coat, but as I run for the door, one of the overlarge boots slides off and trips me. I have to stop and tie them to keep them on, and by the time I burst out of the front door, Steven has vanished.
I sprint around the back of the cabin to see if he’s still somewhere here in the clearing, but he’s gone and I don’t spy any trailheads.
“Shit!” Maybe I’m not a jungle cat after all.
I walk down the dirt lane, one of my boots clomping sadly against the packed ground. I hope to find an obvious trail he might have taken, but all I see are a couple of narrow gaps in the trees. Even if I can make the right guess, it’s not a great idea to silently stalk an armed hunter through the woods. Shooting me might make his life miserable for a while, but that’s really not the way I want to go about it.
Okay, this is fine. I’ll talk him into taking me with him tomorrow morning and I’ll kill him the first chance I get.
But damn I hate making mistakes.
Don’t believe the movies about us. Being a sociopath doesn’t automatically make someone a genius at killing. I’m learning on the job here.
The good news is that I’ve made a decision. I’ve lost my chance to make this fast, so quickly making my way back to the city undetected will be too difficult. Option one is out. And option three—accidentally shooting my boyfriend in the woods—puts me under too much scrutiny and could result in charges.
It’s going to have to be option two: kill Steven in the woods, bury him deep in the forest, and then report that he went out hunting and never returned. It’s supposed to snow on Sunday night. I’ll wait until the storm starts before I drive down to the general store to call authorities for help.
Hunters and hikers go missing all the time. Wherever I bury him, I’ll tell them he set off from the cabin in the opposite direction. They’ll search far and wide in the wrong part of the forest, and they’ll find nothing. It will snow for half the week. He’ll be impossible to track. Days will go by. Then weeks. I’ll slowly fade out of the Hepsworth family’s life. The end.
Satisfied, I head back to the cabin to settle onto the couch with the new book I brought. It’s a sci-fi adventure packed with romance and war and intrigue. I love it.
When I look up again, fading sunlight is stretching across the plank floor from the back window, and I realize he’s been out in the woods a long time. At least four hours.
Maybe he’ll take care of this problem for me and never return, but I feel a sharp slash of irritation at the thought. I want to be the one to make him pay. I want to go to bed at night with the knowledge that I avenged Meg. That thought will keep me as warm and happy as my cat does.
I step outside and scan the woods around me. Gnats dance in shafts of sunlight. Birds scream at each other. There’s a soft cooing somewhere nearby that sounds strangely like pigeons. But there’s no Steven.
After a peek into the outhouse, I decide I’m bett
er off going in the bushes. Amazing to me that men can see where they’re aiming and what they’re aiming with and they still can’t hit the mark. The wood in there is soaked with old urine.
I walk into the trees and crouch. While I’m peeing, I catch movement from the corner of my eye. Steven has emerged from the other side of the woods and is walking toward the cabin. He can’t see me in the deepening shadows, and I watch as he passes only twenty feet away. I smile at his stupid vulnerability and feel a jolt of near-sexual pleasure as I finish urinating.
After wiping with a tissue from my pocket, I stand up, but I don’t head for the cabin. Instead I watch Steven go inside. I hear him talking to me as if I’m there. His eyes haven’t adjusted to the change in light yet. I feel like I’m invisible. Powerful. Like he’s a rat being run through a maze by a force he can’t fathom.
A few seconds later he steps outside, blinking. He frowns, his head turning left and right and left again. He’s lost me. Lost another one. Is he worried he’ll find me hanging in the woods nearby?
“Jane?” He moves slowly down the steps as if he’s not sure where he is. “Jane!”
I wish I had the gun. I can’t shoot him here, but I could watch him through the scope, watch his pulse flutter in his throat. I could aim it at that quick heartbeat and pretend to pull the trigger.
He turns and hurries toward the outhouse. “Jane?” When he opens the door, nothing greets him but the smell of old piss.
Steven backs away and then turns in a slow circle, his gaze passing right over me. His furrowed brow suggests anger, but his mouth hangs open in confusion. When he finds himself facing the truck, he marches over and cups his hands to his eyes to look inside. I’m not there.
“Jane?” he calls again, taking a few steps toward the dirt road. He slows, then stops, at a complete loss.
Grinning at this game, I pick up a rock from the forest floor and throw it as hard as I can toward the far side of the clearing. He spins and stares toward the sharp crack of the rock hitting a tree. The stone rustles through the underbrush as it falls to the ground. Steven stares into the woods, but he doesn’t move forward.
If I can get him to go out searching for me, I could kill him tonight. He left his rifle in the cabin, and I have my knife in my pocket. Sure, he’s bigger than I am, but you never expect your sweet new girlfriend to step out of the woods and stab you in the throat.
Jane Doe Page 18
