“Yeah, here,” said Doyle. “That thing’s so dead it doesn’t even stink.”
“It stinks,” said Alex, but quietly, so that the wind swallowed his words.
“Get the tents up. If you’re afraid of ghosts, you may as well slit your throat and get it over with, Wyszkowski. Maybe you haven’t noticed, but we’re up to our asses in them.”
They moved a few yards away from the body and got busy. The area was relatively sheltered; nevertheless, the wind made frustrating work of pitching camp. Alex grappled with each billowing tent while Garrett pounded stakes into the stony earth.
Doyle dug a proper fire pit, making it deep enough to shelter their small stove, with a tall surrounding berm added as a windbreak. Dinner wasn’t much. They were getting down to dried jerky, crackers, and reconstituted soup mix that was full of chewy bits of dehydrated peas and carrots. There was a lightness to their conversation that night, though, a sense of celebratory anticipation. Russell radiated a solid certainty that they’d apprehend the old woman the next day.
Once the rough meal was eaten and their dishes cleaned, they crawled into their bucking, bending shelters, eager to get some meager relief from the wind.
Garret held back, making slow work of wiping up his mess kit and digging through his things for a knit cap. When everyone else had crawled into his bedroll, he stepped into the trees for a piss.
The moon rose over the edge of the nearest hills. Its light crashed through the heavy canopy and landed in shards on the forest floor. It was a moving mosaic, set in motion by the wind-whipped branches. He listened to the caterwauling overhead din and considered the man who died here, alone, the rough bark of a Douglas fir at his back. Perhaps it had been a comfort to him to know his son was in their home, a roof overhead, not sick—or not sick yet.
His own family had died at home, all of them. When he’d struck out from there, looking for other survivors, it had been a small relief to know that his mother, brother, and two sisters were tucked into their beds when they passed. His father had died out in the east pasture, pulling fence. Garrett had loved is dad enough to leave him right there.
As he worked his way back to the tents, he gathered fallen branches. He dropped the wood next to the dead man, made a mental calculation, and then snapped off a few low-slung limbs to add to the pile. Once he judged it sufficient, he began covering the body, crisscrossing the boughs, working carefully until it was covered. When he was done, a bristling mound marked the spot, like a rough basket turned upside down.
Garrett crawled into the tent beside Alex, who slept silently, no doubt cuddling his new sheath knife like a beloved puppy. He yanked off his boots and got into his sleeping bag fully dressed. The walls of the tent heaved in and out in the wind like a breathing thing. Garret lay on his back, only his face showing. Shadows staggered back and forth across the blue nylon, and he watched them, pondering the man’s crumpled note and waiting in vain for sleep to descend.
December 2050
The Webbs are dead. All of them.
As soon as I got close, I knew. Chickens and goats were locked in, making a hell of a noise. Let them out. Udder on the doe was swollen up so bad she could barely walk, in pain. Made it real—that jacked-up milk goat. Sarah Webb wouldn’t do her animals that way if she was alive to help it.
Truth: I could smell them from out in the yard. The family.
Had to go in, though. What if the shoe was on the other foot?
Pretty sure Merry was the last one alive. Everyone else was tucked in, the big boys in their own beds and the two littles in with Brandon and Sarah. But Merry sitting in a chair by the fireplace. She had Sarah’s new baby tucked into the crook of her arm.
Can’t remember the baby’s name. God, I hope she died first—can’t stand thinking she was the last to go, and no one to soothe her but a dead sister. Fuck.
No way I could bury them. Wanted to put Merry and the baby in bed like the others, but I couldn’t touch her. Couldn’t make myself. Asshole. Just closed the door and got the hell out.
Only thought was, get back to Kory.
But take this crap home?
Can’t do it.
Cold out here now but skin’s on fire. Head pounding like a mother and joints killing me. My knees feel full of broken glass.
Kory be ok buddy
The walkie-talkie in Doyle’s pack was near to hand, but it was lying on its face under a rolled thermal shirt. When its screen lit blue, the little ghost light was barely noticeable—certainly not enough to wake the two men sleeping there. Thanks to the wind rampaging around them, Gilch and Doyle snored on, even when the handset clicked and a man’s voice spoke into the muffled dark.
“Anybody out there?”
click
“Hit me back if you can hear me.”
click
“Hello.”
-14-
SHE STOOD IN THE CENTER of an archipelago of supplies. Both sofas and the fireplace hearth and the dining table were stacked with food and an array of household odds and ends Arie and Curran had pulled—and were still pulling—from every cupboard, drawer, and hidey-hole they could find in the downstairs. Renna’s job was to sort the surplus, but she could barely keep up with them. They were in risible high spirits, exclaiming over the bounty to each other and laughing at the embarrassment of riches.
Renna was considerably less enthusiastic. It was stunning, all the supplies piling up around her, but rather than sharing Curran and Arie’s giddy pleasure, she was almost nauseated. Her sleep the night before had been threadbare, and now her limp was acting up in a way it hadn’t for weeks, worse even than when they were stuck for days in a damp rock-shelter out in the woods.
Everything was moving too fast. They’d only just gotten here, had only three nights of rest between sheets. Hot meals. Clean, dry clothes. It was repellent, the idea of being on the run again, all of them wet, cold, hungry, exposed. She picked through several kitchen knives, setting aside two that could be easily carried as weapons or tools. Then she frowned over a stack of dishtowels—clean rags, perhaps. Or bandages.
The cabin’s door stood open, allowing mid-morning sun to paint the wide floorboards with a yellow wedge of light. The weather was mild, ridiculously pleasant after last night’s howler. Hectic birdsong erupted from the forest canopy, particularly the raspy wek-wek-wek of blue jays. If not for a massive litter of twigs and small branches, dead leaves and conifer needles heaped and strewn over the clearing, it seemed to Renna the storm might never have happened.
Her eyes lingered on Handy. He was out on the top step with Kory, side by side, their shoulders almost touching. They were bent over a project, something involving pocketknives and wood. With their identical postures of concentration they could easily have been taken for father and son. Handy hadn’t yet tied his hair back; it fell over his shoulders in light brown waves, glinting almost blond in the sun. As Renna watched, he turned to Kory and gestured at the piece of wood the boy was working on, saying something too quietly for her to hear. Kory nodded and continued his work.
It gave her a pang, watching the two of them, so alike in manner. How sweet would it be to stay here, just Handy, Kory, and her? God, there were enough provisions to keep them going for years. She went back to sorting through the heaps, silently nursing this ridiculous fantasy—playing house in the woods, Arie and Curran magically subtracted, no outside threat, no reason to run.
“He might come back.”
Kory’s voice was so quiet Handy wasn’t sure he’d heard correctly. They were in the middle of fashioning slingshot handles. It was steady, simple work, and pleasant there on the steps. Talus sat at their feet, calm and watchful, blinking in the sunshine but not drowsing.