by Hart, Alana
With that, the bear turned toward the other side of the dirt road and hunkered into the darkness, the underbrush crashing beneath it as it went.
Catherine stood there shaking, watching the tree line as though it too was alive and hoping to eat her. John stood his ground a moment. He called after the animal one more time, then turned back to her and lunged for her just in time to catch her from collapsing in the dirt.
“Hey now, stay up. Come on, Catie. Come on. You’re alright.”
She took hold of his shoulders, letting him hold her while her knees found purchase beneath her.
“Come on, sweetheart. Let’s go back to camp, alright? You’re alright.”
“We can’t. You can’t run. You don’t run from a bear! We can’t move. What if he’s watching and we turn our backs? What if it comes to camp? It could come to camp. It’s gonna come to camp!”
“Shh. Shh, Catie. Shh. Look at me.”
She couldn’t take her eyes from the tree line, hissing her every word as though the leaves overhead were listening to her, conspiring against her.
“Look at me,” he said again.
She did as he asked, finding his blue eyes clear even in the darkness.
“Nothing is going to happen to you. You’re safe. He’s not gonna come to camp. He’s as afraid of you as you are of him. Shh, you’re alright.”
“You don’t know that!”
John took hold of her shoulders, wrapping his arm around her as he turned her and pulled her down the gravel path. “I got you. You’re alright. You’re safe.”
She felt trapped, held there by this solid man, and trapped in the woods of Maine with nowhere to run to. She couldn’t go to the Calhoun house at this hour – just show up on the doorstep and ask for a place to stay – indefinitely, and she sure as shit couldn’t go home. She was helpless. She felt like the bait a hunter leaves out on August 1st.
“Yeah, but this was in the middle of the summer. It wasn’t rough weather, or rough trails season. It was a bright, blue skied, sunny day when they set off on an easy section of the hike and never reached the other side.”
Paul was still telling his story when they returned, everyone too enthralled by the conversation to notice John approaching with a shaking leaf version of Catherine in his arms.
Everyone save for Jean. “You guys alright?”
They all turned, startled. Catherine could hear John explaining what happened, could see their reactions, but the sound was tinny, as though coming through an old gramophone.
John turned back to her after a moment.
“Ah, shit,” he said. “Catie, come on hon. Come sit by the fire.”
She shook her head. This wasn’t time to sit by the fire. This was time to pack up the trucks and run for their lives. Get as far away from Maine as a person could get. How were they so calm?
He reached out for her, but she couldn’t move. She felt so cold.
“Come on, right here darling. Sit right here with me.”
Catherine felt her body moving as John led her over to the fire, holding onto her as he lowered her down to her seat. She heard the words, ‘she’s in shock,’ before he took her hands in his, rubbing them to keep them warm.
The conversation continued, Paul regaling them all with his exact thoughts on Falkirk Seat’s ‘no bear hunting’ regulations – that if he’d brought his gun, he’d go hunt the fucker right now. Catherine couldn’t respond. Their voices sounded more like Charlie Brown adults than drunken Mainers.
“Hey, Catherine. Can you tell me a story? Come on, hun. Why don’t you tell me something?” Deacon asked.
Deacon appeared at her side, wrapping his unzipped sleeping bag around her shoulders. Paul tried to hand her a bottle of cider, which she reached for mindlessly, but Deacon blocked it, glaring at Paul like he’d offered to shave her head.
“Why don’t you lie down, hon. Here, just lie back,” Deacon said as he and John leaned her onto a stretch grass and sleeping bag. “Raise her feet for me, will you Benny?”
Bennett moved quickly, settling at her ankles and propping them into his own lap. Catherine protested the strangeness of this interaction, but she didn’t have the wherewithal to argue.
“We can’t just stay here. We should go. Let me up,” she said, but her words were weak, hardly sensible. John sat at her shoulder, rubbing her hands between his.
Deacon held her wrist a moment, glancing at his watch.
“What the hell are you doing, Deac-head?” She asked.
John and his brother both laughed.
“Man, I haven’t heard anyone but John call me that in a long ass time,” Deacon said, smiling down at her. “I’m checking you out. Making sure we don’t need to haul your ass to the clinic.”
Catherine crinkled her nose at him, suspiciously.
Bennett patted her legs. “Deac’s an EMT, Catie.”
Catherine’s eyes went wide. “You are? But you were always such a jackass.”
It felt as though any alcohol she’d drank that night was compounded now, making her words as slippery as her thoughts.
The brothers laughed again, and Deacon smiled. “Oh, I still am. I’m just a well-trained jackass now.”
Deacon conferred with John, deciding that she would be fine if they kept her warm and comfortable. And she was – strangely comfortable. Sure, there was a good chance they’d all be eaten by morning, but the piles of sleeping bags beneath her were so soft and satiny against her skin, and Bennett had started rubbing her feet, as well.
Damn, should go into shock more often, she thought.
The return to the real world took a while, but soon, Catherine was sitting upright, watching the sparks dance from the dying fire. John was off at his truck, and Deacon was still at her side, doing what he could to get her chatting. She’d told a few stories – how she met Jean – at the ticketing booth of the Cougar Mountain Haunted Hay Ride; how she got the scar on her collar bone – angry cat, clawing her way to safety when an errant Maltese came after her beloved Mr. Fribble. They’d even asked what brought her up to Blackrock again. Luckily, Catherine was with it enough to stop that story before it started.
“You ready for bed, then?”
Catherine glanced around, her company having thinned by three.
It was Deacon speaking, standing over her as he offered her a hand to help her stand up.
“Looks like you’ll be sleeping on your own tonight,” he said, giving her one more gentle inspection before loosing his hands from her shoulders.
“What, in a tent? There’s a fucking bear in the woods. I can’t sleep in a tent. Alone? Did Jean already go to bed?”
Catherine sounded as frantic as she felt. She could just imagine the smell of the bear drifting through the canvas walls of her tent seconds before teeth crunched down on her skull. “Oh god, did she go to bed with Bennett?”
“Nope.” Catherine turned to find Bennett heading over from his own tent. He looked a little dejected. “She’s already in bed alright, but not with me.”
Catherine glanced over at the small group of tents. “Well, then where is she?”
“She’s in Paul’s tent.”
Catherine’s eyes went wide. “No! Oh my god, I’m sorry Benny. Where’s Jason going to sleep then?”
Bennett gave a half laugh. “Oh, he’s in there, too.”
Deacon coughed softly and turned away from them, politely avoiding the conversation.
Catherine stared at her cousin, realizing how Jean was spending her evening. “Holy shit. What the hell? I never get any action, now she’s getting double -”
“Believe me, what she’s getting isn’t action,” John said, appearing at her shoulder. “If you’re ready for bed, I’ve set up the truck for you.”
Catherine stopped, glancing back at John. “What do you mean?”
He didn’t answer, but instead took her hand and led her toward his Dodge pickup truck. The back of the truck had a h
ard top on it, the tailgate and window open in the back. Catherine stepped forward as Deacon pulled a rolled up sleeping bag from the back. She glanced in.
The interior of the pickup was filled with blankets, pillows, sleeping pads, and a half-filled air mattress. She turned to John shaking her head. “I couldn’t. That wouldn’t be right!”
John shook his head. “Please, I insist. Any bear that comes along, you’ll be tucked away nice and safe.”
She swallowed. Yeah, with a perfect view of the slaughter of all her friends right outside the window, she thought.
“Isn’t that where you were going to sleep?”
John glanced in and shrugged. “Naw, I was planning to crash in a tent with Deac. You’re not putting me out at all.”
She glanced in again, counting at least three sleeping bags and two pillows. If it wasn’t John that was losing out on his sleeping gear, somebody was.
She swallowed and prepared to speak, but then remembered the image of teeth and claws tearing through tent canvas to the sound of screams. She stilled her protests before they began. “Are you sure?”
He grinned. “Of course I am, lady. You know I am.”
He patted a hand on the tailgate and gestured for her to climb in.
The truck bed smelled of cedar wood mixed with a hint of tire rubber, but it was warm and bug free, a gentle breeze drifting through the screened windows. She settled onto the mound of air mattress and sleeping bags as John shut the tailgate, shutting her in her little cave. She listened to the rest of the camp settling in for the night. There was a strange rhythmic whimpering in the distance, and she cringed, remembering how her new friend Jean had decided to spend her evening.
Gross, she thought.
She wrapped the sleeping bags around her, trying to burrow in, as though burying herself would protect her from bears, and if not bears, at least it might drown out the sound of Jean’s ongoing threesome. The memory of the bear kept resurfacing, causing her to twitch and jerk as though she might fight the thoughts off with a well-placed kick.
It wasn’t working.
Then the memory of John’s solid shape stepping between her and the bear came to mind, of the way he held her behind him, overlooking his own safety in lieu of hers. He’d felt like stone then. The thought of it was the only thing that calmed her.
A few more exchanges passed outside and John appeared outside the window, smiling in as he spotted her awake.
“Sorry,” he whispered. “Deacon forgot his pillow.”
John unlatched the tailgate and rummaged through a bag by her feet. She watched him, willing herself brave enough to say what she wanted to say.
Catherine, suck it up. He was your best friend for years - more than your best friend. Just ask, damn it. Catherine, just ask!
John shot her a look, and a little bit of a side eye, then tossed the bag back inside and disappeared with the pillow. He’d left the tail gate open.
Catherine swallowed, willing herself brave. She didn’t want to sleep alone. She couldn’t sleep alone. Something would come in the night and tear her to pieces, tear the truck to pieces and there would be no pillar of stone between her and her demise this time. Just damn well ask!
John appeared at the tail gate and hopped up into the truck bed. He latched the tail gate behind him, tossing his own pillow onto the mattress beside her. She startled, watching him as he crawled across the truck bed and plopped down on the mattress beside her. She furrowed her brow at him in confusion.
“Were you not going to ask me to sleep with you?”
She exhaled in a startled laugh and smiled, almost tearful from relief. “Sleep with me? No! I’m not that kind of -”
“Slow down, Rambo. I meant sleep. Just sleep. I can go if you’re all set -”
He sat up, scooting back toward the tailgate.
Catherine grabbed at his sleeve. “No! No. Sorry, I’m sorry. Yes. I was going to ask.”
John nodded, padded his pillow on the mattress and plopped down onto it, making a point of fluffing it up as he kicked off his boots. With that, he crossed her arms and closed his eyes.
They lay there in silence a moment, Catherine watching his familiar face. “How’d – how did you know?”
John Fenn cracked an eyelid to look at her and smirked. “You never had a great poker face, Calhoun.”
CHAPTER THREE
“Storm’s coming.”
No one believed her when the winds kicked up that morning, turning every leaf on the trees upside down.
“Naw, weather said clear skies all weekend,” Paul Merlotte assured her.
Yet, Catherine stared up at the trees as another gust picked up. This was one of the many lessons she learned from her father, Philip, before he passed when she was twelve years old – if the wind turns up the leaves, the weather’s about to shift. Sometimes you have a day to prepare, other times, the sky rips open and gives you what for.
This was one of those days.
She didn’t even have a chance to say a proper goodbye to John as their camp disbanded and Bennett piled her into his truck to head for home.
John called to her as they pulled out. “Don’t be a stranger, alright?”
She’d smiled wider than she would have liked at this.
Catherine sat in the passenger seat of Bennett’s truck, soaked to the bone from the deluge that instantly put out their fire and soaked their breakfast. She’d scrambled to tuck in the tent poles, but the storm kicked up quick.
“What are you smiling about, girl? You look like a drowned rat.”
Bennett was in a bit of a sour mood. Not only had Jean decided on a wild night with Jason and Paul, she’d also opted to catch a ride with them that afternoon, heading down to Bangor to hit the casino before heading further south.
Catherine couldn’t help, but smile. She’d woken up feeling warm and safe, her body wrapped in blankets and sleeping bags and the smell of cedar and fir. She’d also opened her eyes to find her cheek pressed into the chest of John Fenn. She’d pulled from him the instant she realized - she’d been asleep in his arms.
They’d driven much of the way in silence, coming into Porter Split Road as the storm broke, giving way to a constant rain.
“Glad somebody got some action, last night.”
Catherine startled at the comment. “Oh god, it’s not like that. He’s not like that.”
Bennett scoffed. “Bull shit. All men are like that.”
“Not John,” she said, and she knew it to be true. She and John had spent hundreds of hours together when they were young; holding hands, talking about their dreams and their crazy ideas – despite the raging thunder of hormones they were both suffering from, never once had John tried to have sex with her. In fact, he only finally kissed her the day they drove to Canada together.
She never found out if it would lead to more. That trip to Canada was the last straw. Her stepdad wouldn’t have her running off to other countries with a Fenn.
“You’re lucky he didn’t kill you,” had been her mother’s comment.
Bennett thrummed his fingers on the steering wheel. “Well, that might be a good thing. I’ve heard some crazy shit from the few girls he’s dated.”
“What?”
Yet, Bennett didn’t have time to answer her question as they rounded the last corner into the Calhoun family driveway.
Bennett took a deep breath, blowing out through pursed lips. “Alright, cuz. I’m gonna let you do the talking in here.”
“What? Why?”
Bennett shook his head. “You know my Dad.”
Catherine frowned. Though she’d never had any trouble with Uncle Bodie, she knew Bennett’s experience to be far different. Bodie was known for his temper, something even her mother mentioned from time to time. He apparently wasn’t the nicest big brother, either.
“You think he’s going to be mad?”
Bennett shrugged. “Let’s find out, yeah? In the end, it
is Grampy’s house, right?”
Catherine turned to look at the old house she’d once known so well. Despite over ten years since last she laid eyes on the old homestead, it was just as she remembered it – save for the landscaping Armageddon. The old shed was now overgrown with raspberry briars and high grasses, only slightly less so where the doors opened at the front side. She could already guess what was within its confines – an ATV, a kayak, a snowblower, and some Lobster traps. She’d bet her life on it.
Clearly, her grandmother’s absence was felt dearly in the gardening department.
Bennett shut down the truck, glanced her way, then gave her knee a squeeze. “Come on, cuz. It won’t be so bad.”
They walked into the kitchen to the familiar smells of woodstove fires and seaspray, long settled into every board and window frame. Catherine followed Bennett through the kitchen into the living room, where they were greeted by the two older gentlemen, legs up, feet clad in leather L.L. Bean slippers, fully ensconced in the football game.
“Pops. Gramps. Look who I brought in from the cold.”
Uncle Bodie glanced over his shoulder, laying eyes on her and then returning his attention to the TV. Not the friendliest of welcomes from the heavyset fellow that used to throw her and her brother into Parkhurst Lake when she was a kid. She hustled across the room, stepping over the folded over edge of an old braided rug her grandmother made. She bent down to her grandfather. “Hey Grampy. It’s nice to see you.”
Henry Calhoun startled at the sudden appearance of a person at his side. Then his eyes went wide, one of his shaking hands reaching for hers, squeezing it with a bit more fervor than she’d ever expected from her grumpy relative.
“Who – what are you doing here?” He asked as she kissed his cheek.
“Thought I’d come escape in the middle of nowhere for a bit,” she said smiling down at him. His seeming pleasure at her presence was so strange, she began to wonder what they’d done with her grandfather. He wasn’t a cruel man in his life – not ever. Still, he wasn’t a warm creature, either. Not until now.
H turned around, pinning his finger into his hearing aid to turn it up and look at her. “Well, give us a proper hug, then. Christ’s sake, you haven’t been here in ten years, I think I deserve that, at least.”
