by Ike Hamill
“And you rode until sunset?”
“Yeah, I rode until my bike conked out. Then I went in here.”
She turned the handle and pushed the door in. Robby followed her.
They both took deep breaths before they stepped inside. Corinna paused on the round rug just inside the door and stared down at her candle. After they had stood there for a few seconds, she let out her breath and tested an inhale. Robby did the same. Even after all these years, the house had a warm, old-person smell that he remember from his grandmother’s house. His mother used to say that if you cooked the same thing night after night in a house, eventually it would start to take on the odor of that food. Robby wondered what these people had cooked.
There were no keys in the bowl near the door. There were no glasses on the coasters between the chairs.
“The door was shut?”
“Yeah. How did you know?”
“They weren’t home. I bet they went to visit family for Thanksgiving—maybe went to see the grandkids.”
Corinna nodded. She moved toward the rear of the house.
“I was in here when it happened.”
Robby followed her.
“I sat down, started eating a pickle, and the candle went out. Then, I couldn’t breathe.”
She set the candle down on the kitchen counter.
“But before that the engine on the motorcycle stalled?”
“Yeah. I figured it was out of gas, but it wasn’t. It’s pretty hard to mistake a running engine for a stopped one.”
“Do you remember if the sun was in the same position when you went back out to the motorcycle?”
“How do you mean?”
“When you came in, you said that the motorcycle was stalled and the sun was coming in through the windows at a low angle, right? Then what?”
“The candle went out, I stumbled through the back door. I saw the candle was back on and I went around the house, through the bushes.”
“So, if you could see the candle, then the sun was already down past the house, right?”
“Yeah. Must have been. Why?” Corinna asked.
“I was just trying to figure out if maybe you backed up a couple of minutes in time when you were eating the pickle.”
“What kind of pickle would do that?” Corinna asked.
Robby furrowed his brow. It didn’t seem like her to joke at a time like this, but it sounded like a joke. She took in a deep breath and pointed. Just past the end of her finger, the candle flickered and went out.
Robby tried to take in a breath too, but he was too late. His chest felt tight, like there was a giant band compressing his chest. His legs were instantly weak and the world was starting to go dim. His vision was collapsing around the edges with darkness.
He saw Corinna move to catch him, but he didn’t feel her arms. The next thing he knew, they were stumbling through the back door, out to the deck, and then spilling down into the yard.
“You’re heavier than you used to be,” she said.
Robby panted in air.
“Thanks,” he said. “Shit, the kids.” He scrambled up to his feet.
Corinna pointed the direction that she had taken before, but Robby chose the other way. There were only tall weeds around the other side of the house and she admitted that the going was much easier. His heart slowed a little when he saw the idling truck with Jackson behind the wheel. He had turned it around so he could face downhill. Jackson and Jim appeared to be having a lively conversation.
“So, what have you put together?” Corinna asked.
“Hold on,” Robby said. He jogged over to the truck.
Jackson put the window down.
“Anything strange?”
“Nope. All normal here. What about inside?”
“Can’t breathe in there. If it weren’t for the motorcycle, I would assume it was just…”
Jackson’s eyes went down to the dash as the truck began to knock and rumble. The engine shook and the antenna sticking up picked up a sympathetic wobble. Jackson goosed the engine. It revved higher and then stalled out.
Jackson didn’t waste any time on talking. He jerked it into neutral and let it roll downhill as Robby took a step back.
As soon as he was a couple of truck-lengths down the hill, Jackson must have tried to crank the engine. Robby heard the starter motor churning as the truck picked up speed. A few feet later, it caught. The engine roared as Jackson gave it gas. The tires barked and the truck took off.
Corinna caught up to Robby.
For a moment, they both looked at the truck.
“Any problems breathing?” Robby asked.
“No. You?”
“Nope.”
Corinna was already moving toward the truck. Robby jogged and caught up. When Jackson slowed to a stop, the two of them climbed over the tailgate into the bed. Barely settled, Robby slid backwards when Jackson gunned the engine. They took off and Robby and Corinna crawled to the front of the bed.
Corinna leaned forward to shout through the sliding window.
“Slow down or you’re going to pitch us out of here.”
“Sorry,” Jackson yelled.
He slowed.
Jim turned around in his head, framing his face in the little window. “Dad, happened?”
“I don’t know,” he said with a shrug.
Chapter 47: Tim
“Go!” Ashley shouted.
Tim looked at the rocks. He could see a way up. If he could get Penny up onto the first rock, he thought that she could probably climb up with a little help. It was that first ledge that was going to be the issue. There was no telling how much time they had before the raft unstuck itself from the snag.
“No!” Lisa said. “It’s too dangerous. Penny won’t make it.”
Her opinion wrecked Tim’s temporary optimism. He gripped the rope tighter and hugged Penny to his side. A moment later, the raft lurched and then front end dove into the water. Tim was submerged and then tipped. Penny struggled in his grip. He prayed that she wouldn’t wriggle out of his grasp before they got back to the surface. Her claws scraped into his side and then she was still.
Tim pulled himself toward the highest corner of the raft and he broke the surface.
“Ashley!” Lisa screamed.
The girl was trapped under the rushing water. Tim looked at Penny. Two conflicting thoughts raced through his brain in an instant. On one hand, he had to let the dog go and help Ashley. Penny could swim pretty well, and there was a chance that she would be okay. On the other hand, Ashley was an adult who had decided to risk her life. Penny was innocent—he had to help the dog.
He couldn’t weigh the dog’s life against Ashley’s though. Penny had already lived a long time for a dog and Ashley was only at the beginning of her potential. He started to loosen his grip when he saw Lisa fighting her way over to Ashley. Tim stayed put, holding onto Penny, knowing that Lisa would do everything she could.
It didn’t matter.
The next moment, they were all fighting to hold on as the raft bucked and dislodged itself from the tree. Something snapped and Tim fell over onto his side. Penny flipped over him and slipped free from his arm.
Panicked, Tim let go of the rope and reached out with both hand to grab for the dog before she was swept away by the current. He was untethered, staying with the raft just out of momentum. His foot caught on a snag and the raft kept going. Tim was turned into a rag doll, dangling at the end of his tether while Penny and the raft disappeared.
The river bucked him up and down in a rhythm that Tim picked up. The second time his face breached the surface, he dragged in mostly air into his tired lungs. His knee felt like it was about to be pulled apart by the force of the water.
Tim got his arms down to his waist and then tried to climb them upstream to his foot to find the source of the snag. The extra drag caused by his bent over body tore him free. The next stop consisted of smashing into an exposed rock.
His head was above water. For
a full second, he was stuck there, looking up at the climbable rock ledge to the north. If he could only get through the stretch of impossibly fast current, dry land was only ten feet away.
The dream didn’t last long. Another surge of water blasted over him and Tim tumbled over the rock and back into the rushing current.
Once, for a class reunion, Tim had gone whitewater rafting. Decked out in lifejackets, the guide had told everyone what to do if they were dislodged from the raft.
“Head up, feet up, and swim to the raft,” the guide had said.
That, of course, had assumed that the lifejacket would do the work of keeping his head above water.
Tim got his feet up, away from the rocks and snags. His head dipped below the water and he paddled frantically to get it back up. The river wasn’t dropping here. He was being swirled in angry eddies and there were more falls up ahead. Tim scooped water with both hands, trying to pull himself backwards toward the shore. He was just about to turn over and seriously swim for it when he pulled himself into another swift current. The falls came at him fast. Tim barely got his feet back up in time.
When his tailbone hit the rock, he counted himself lucky. He bounced off and didn’t snag.
He thought about the whitewater rafting again. The whole time, he had been terrified at the idea of falling off the raft. The fear had ruined the trip for him. While everyone else had been laughing and shouting, getting splashed by the frothy rapids, Tim had squeezed his legs into the inflatable raft so hard that they were sore for a week afterwards.
Now that he was in the water, it wasn’t as frightening.
His arms were burning from paddling to stay afloat. Tim lowered his legs and began kicking while he was between the rocks. Immediately, his right foot hit the bottom. It twisted and jammed into a crevice. Tim was back underwater once more, fighting to get his foot free. His foot pulled loose and he was battered against another set of rocks.
As the river pulled him along, Tim was just below the surface, looking up at the sky through a lens of water. He had lost everything—the raft, Penny, and his friends. If the idea of drowning weren’t so terrifying, he would have gladly given up right then. He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t surrender to the rushing water.
Tim struggled back to the air.
He had been treading water for so long, that by the time the water was calm enough for him to swim to the shore, he almost didn’t have the energy. Tim floated on his back, pulling himself with slow strokes until his arm caught on a submerged branch. Slowly, he crawled up through the limbs and mud and collapsed on the flooded shore.
His feet were still in the water. Remembering the fish, as soon as he had enough power in his arms, he dragged himself farther up the bank.
Tim flopped over onto his back, looking up at the sky.
He didn’t know how long he had been in the water. He had no idea how long he had until dark. All he wanted to do was shut his eyes and fall asleep, but he couldn’t. The river hadn’t managed to kill him, but that didn’t mean his fight was over.
With a deep breath, Tim broke into a coughing fit. When his head stopped spinning, he pushed his way up to a seated position.
His hiking pants were all but destroyed. Below the knee of his left leg, the pants had been torn into ribbons. Tim pulled a soggy knife from his pocket and trimmed the fabric while he inspected his leg. The ankle was a puffy mess. The sole of his shoe had been pulled away at the toe. His right leg was worse. There was a slit in the thigh of his pants. Peeking through it, he saw a gash in his leg with puffy, white skin at the edges. His flesh was so waterlogged that it wasn’t even bleeding.
Tim stood slowly in the mud, reaching out to a tree trunk to steady himself. With another deep breath, he managed to yell.
“Penny? Lisa? Ashley?”
For a moment, he listened.
“Hello?” he yelled.
His voice came back from the rocks on the far side of the river. Here, the river was a wide pane of rippled glass, reflecting the blue sky. It looked almost tranquil. Tim wanted to get far away from the water.
Tim turned away from it and climbed.
With all its puffiness his left ankle felt okay. The swelling was like a cast around the joint and he could walk on it. The gash on his other thigh gave him a sharp pain whenever he flexed it and a dull ache the rest of the time.
It didn’t matter. He was still alive—that’s what mattered.
Tim moved roughly downriver, but mostly up the hill of the bank. The ground was muddy. The river had flooded high and then receded here, and there was nothing dry enough for him to start a fire with, so he climbed higher.
He found himself at a rocky ledge and had to backtrack to get to a place where he could ascend it. Once on top, he had a bit of a view. Upriver, he saw part of the hell that he had endured. Where the river emerged from the gap, he could see the end of the falls. At the end of that ordeal, he had barely been conscious, focused on nothing but keeping his head above water. It was possible that he had floated right past Lisa and Ashley, if they had managed to get the raft to shore. If that was true, he couldn’t see any sign of it.
They must have gone farther downstream.
On his side of the river, going farther west was going to be impossible. The rock ledge fell away at a terrible angle. Even if his legs were fine, he wouldn’t have dared the climb down. Across the river, beyond a marshy shore, the forest looked pretty thin and easy to navigate.
“Of course,” Tim said to himself. “Well, I can stay put and die here, try to climb the hill behind me, or go back into the damn water.”
He turned downstream and cupped his hands around his mouth.
“Hello! Lisa? Ashley?”
Tim shouted until he was hoarse. He didn’t hear a reply.
Setting up his camp that night, his two choices were wet or sloped. The only flat place that he could find was down where the flood had receded. There wasn’t a single dry place down there. He couldn’t sleep in his damp clothes. He needed a fire and a dry patch of ground. With his swollen ankle and aching thigh, he climbed until the dirt under his feet didn’t squish.
Tim dragged a bunch of wood into a pile and delicately pulled a match from his stash. The little plastic container had survived the flood, but it only had five matches in it. The rest were in his backpack, presumably somewhere down the river.
Tim struck the match against a rock and then nearly killed the flame when he shoved it under his tinder. It finally caught just as his fingers began to sting from the heat. Hovering over the wood, he protected his tiny fire until it was strong enough to survive the wind on its own.
He built his fire bigger and bigger, limping up the slope to find more wood and then dragging it to his campsite. When he could feel the heat against his skin, he removed his soggy clothes and propped them up on sticks in order to dry.
Tim sat against the hillside as the sun set behind the rocks to the west.
Almost lost in the crackling of the fire, Tim thought he heard a voice. He stood up, cocking his ear toward the river. It could have been a bird, or maybe nothing at all.
The forest was different here, on the side of the hill. The types of trees looked more familiar to him. Back in the jungle, all the leaves had been thick and glossy, like they belonged in a rainforest. Here, Tim looked up and saw the underside of tall pines, and he was sitting on a thick carpet of pine needles. It seemed he had crossed into a patch of woods that made sense for the geographic area.
He sighed. He couldn’t honestly say that he had any idea where he was. Once he had left the Outpost, he might as well have gone to another planet.
While the fire crackled and the sun set, Tim let his eyes drift shut.
He woke to a pain in his leg. The glow of the embers showed him a smear of blood and the carcass of a dead insect that he had slapped in his sleep. Tim’s whole body ached. His hiking clothes were pretty much dry. He put them on before he searched around for more wood for the fire.
On
ce he got the fire stoked back up, the smoke drove away the insects. Above him, there was a gap in the trees where he could see up to the stars. The sky was clear for a change. If Ashley were still alive, and if she still had her pack, maybe she was finally using her sextant to figure out the longitude.
He laughed at himself.
The longitude didn’t matter anymore. Back at the Outpost, he had a perfectly good house that he had walked away from. He was never going to see it again. Before he had left, he had said it out loud, just to acknowledge the truth.
It hadn’t seemed like a cold, hard fact until this moment. Alone, with nothing but a knife, a few matches, and some slightly damp clothes, it was now undeniable. There was no Outpost. His whole life up until that moment might as well have been a fever dream. All he had was the fire in front of him and a deep black sky above broken up by the branches of a few trees.
Tim unfolded the knife and looked at the reflection of the fire in the blade.
It was sharp enough, even though he had used it to strip bark, cut roots and vines, and slice up fruit. It was still sharp enough.
Contemplating the knife, his eyes drifted shut again.
He dreamt of Donnelly and the little clinic that he and Ty had run together.
Chapter 48: Lisa
To Ashley, she was Aunt Lisa. Honestly, she had always thought of herself as more than that. When Ashley’s mother had died, Lisa had stepped into the role. She was the girl’s surrogate mother, more than anything. Now, she was watching her surrogate daughter drowning, just a few feet away.
She would gladly die if it meant saving Ashley. Lisa let go of the raft and threw herself in that direction. The raft bucked and lurched underneath Lisa as the water swelled and pushed her away. Everything broke free at once.
The front of the raft plunged and the back rose. Just as Lisa was sure that she would be crushed when the raft flipped, it spun and straightened itself out. Tim and Penny were gone—they had been torn away by the current.