“That’s what love is, Kayla. If you’re not frustrated you’re doing it wrong.”
“I’ve never thought of it that way.”
“I’d rather you didn’t tell anyone about this.” I really didn’t want to explain why I did it. I’d cared enough to drive two dead girls up from Bondy Lake, but I’d never even bothered to ask where the Tremblays had chosen to bury Marc.
“Don’t you think they’ll notice?” she asked.
“Just don’t tell them for now, okay? Let them find out another day.”
“Okay.”
“Thank you, Kayla.” I gave her a kiss on the forehead.
She giggled. “That means you love me,” she said.
That made me smile. “Yeah… that means I love you.”
We walked back together. And when Sara asked, Kayla told her that she’d found me out on a walk.
I doubt Sara has any idea what I was doing out there near Ant’s stand of sugar maples.
She didn’t ask me.
Today was the day for limbing and splitting the birchwood.
We’d cut down around two dozen birch trees during the late summer, while there were still enough leaves to suck moisture out of the wood. Now it was time to revisit the fallen trees and turn them into firewood. We also have around twenty balsam firs on the ground just off the road, but they’ll have to wait for sometime next week, after we’ve sobered up from New Year’s.
When we first moved into the cottage at McCartney Lake, we’d run our stove off of hastily-cut fir and whatever pre-split bundles of firewood we could find. Some of it was too green but we made it work. Graham had done his best to tell us about hardwoods versus soft, and how his father used to swear by Pacific Madrones for their firewood, which didn’t mesh well with them living in central Illinois. Based on his advice we made sure to cut some birch as well that summer, piling it on the metal racks to season for the following winter.
Now we’re hooked on birch, and it’s been easy enough to find; you just go to wherever there was a forest fire ten to twenty years ago and there you’ll find your firewood. We’ve seen colonies of young birch trees all over the district now, but it’s the older trees we need, the ones where the bark has already turned white, and the closest acreage of firewood-ready birch is on the far side of the lake. That’s where our fallen trees were waiting.
One of the only good things about the breakdown of society is that for the first few months there was plenty of equipment sitting around, waiting for you to take it all home; that’s made the job a whole lot smoother.
After being up all night, all I really wanted to do was sneak upstairs and go to sleep, but I had to set an example, or at least make sure Matt didn’t look better than me. Ant was gone, so someone needed to take his slot.
So five of us piled onto our three tracked ATVs, leaving Kayla and Fiona back home with the dogs and a shotgun, and headed off to our woodlot. Sara and I pulled the utility trailer while Graham and Lisa dragged the splitter behind them. It took three times as long with snow on the ground, the trailer and splitter wheels getting stuck in a few patches of powder on the way.
I would have liked to bring Des and Juju with us, but I wasn’t comfortable leaving just two people back at the cottage without some kind of backup. If someone came along we’d be able to hear the barking echoing out over the lake.
As expected, it was Lisa and Graham who worked the hardest out there, taking the bucked logs and setting them up on the splitter. Matt did his best on limbing with one of the chainsaws, but as always his coordination was a little off. Sara loaded the split logs onto the trailer while I did a little of everything.
I just couldn’t keep up with Lisa and Graham; I wanted to, but there’s no way my heart would be able to take it, even if I’d had a full night’s sleep. As hard as it was to do, I made sure to take a break every five minutes or so. As much as I was glad to have brought the defibrillator along in the trailer, I wasn’t hoping for a chance to use it.
We heard the dogs barking just before lunchtime. We all stopped working and listened. No gunshots, no screams, just the dogs. I was sure it was just a local pest running through the yard, maybe a squirrel or a Tremblay. But we still needed to be sure, so Lisa and I hopped on an ATV and headed back to the cottage to check, while Graham stood watch at the woodlot.
As we reached the back of the cottage, we could hear voices. We climbed off and readied our guns, Lisa with the shotgun and me with my pistol.
“Baptiste!” a man’s voice called out. “Your girls won’t let us come inside.”
I came around the corner to see a black half-ton, with Ryan Stems standing in front. He didn’t seem to be armed, or that’s what he wanted me to think, but a man standing by the passenger side door had a shotgun aimed right at me.
I was way too tired for that shit.
I didn’t have my vest and I didn’t have my helmet. There was no way I could take them both out before they got me. And I knew there’d be a third man somewhere. Maybe crouched around the corner of the porch… maybe up in the loft…
I pointed my gun at the man by the truck. I noticed that Lisa had done the same.
Kayla and Fiona were behind the screen of the front porch; despite what she’d told me before, Kayla was holding the shotgun like someone who didn’t know how to use it.
I turned to Kayla and Fiona. “Are you two okay?” I asked. They both nodded. Kayla kept the gun up and aimed, her arms shaking.
“I didn’t mean to frighten anyone,” Stems said.
“Bullshit,” Lisa said. She started to angle her barrel towards him.
“Why did you come here?” I asked him.
“I wanted to tell you in person. There are going to be some changes around here..”
“You’re leaving? Have a good trip.”
“Fucking hilarious, Baptiste.” Stems shook his head. “After what’s happened the last few weeks… this can’t go on. You need to stay on this side of the river.”
“Like a time out?”
“There are too many guns in Cochrane District. Too many guns and too many murders.”
“Don’t forget the explosion,” I said.
“This isn’t a joke. I don’t find dead bodies as funny as you do. I guess you laughed like a hyena when you found the Girards.”
“What happened to the Girards?”
“Don’t screw around, Baptiste. Detour Lake. Running around and pretending they’re me, remember? You know they killed those two girls because of you. And the rest of ’em, I guess. And I’m not willing to see the same thing happen to the Walkers or the Marchands. Or to your people.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“We’re taking over. From the North Driftwood River to the Abitibi, from James Bay to Timmins. And our borders are closed.”
“I don’t think we can agree to that,” I said.
“We don’t need you to agree. We have more guns than you.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“I know you like playing the heavy. But try to remember who you’re talking to.”
“Who am I talking to? Some idiot from Minnesota who thinks he’s tough because he was stupid enough to join the US Army?”
“I’m the only reason you’re still alive, Baptiste. Remember that.”
“I don’t have a problem with shooting you in the head. Try to remember that.”
“Someday you may get your chance.”
“I do hope so.”