The Wild Lands

by Paul Greci

  All my dad wanted was to live a simple life on the land, but the land took too much abuse in too short of a time to make that possible. I remember what Max said—that the land would heal and that someday she would go back. I wonder if the genetically engineered maples will keep marching northward and cover the land all the way to the Yukon, or if the native birches and spruce will reclaim the wilderness like they used to after a fire.

  I didn’t notice any maples in the fissure. In some ways that fissure is a window into the past. And the seeds blowing upward from it—maybe they’ll sprout in the ash and help create the future.

  The sun is sinking behind a ridge. One more day, I think, and we’ll be at the top of the pass.

  Cars and trucks used to drive through here on a paved road. A massive pipeline used to move hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil a day the entire length of the state—eight hundred miles. I see the pictures in my mind, the ones I’d seen in the history books and videos. Alaska’s heyday, from 1980 until 2040, that’s what it’d been coined. Not that we’re officially counting the years anymore. Well, maybe someone is. Another five and we’ll be into the next century, even though the way we’re living, it seems like we’ve gone back a hundred years from the heyday instead of forward.

  A few years ago the government couldn’t even sell Alaska for the original price of three cents an acre. Instead, they had to abandon most of it. But if you are power hungry, why buy anything in this world when, if you have the power and the desire, you could just take it? Like whatever those gas-tent people did to kill everyone in that commune. I guess they wanted the gold in the mine. They took it because they had the power. And in Stan’s compound, women who could have children were forced to stay and get married.

  I just hope whoever we find at the coast treats people—all people—with respect.

  I can see up ahead where the willows peter out. We decide to head off the road to make camp while we still have willows for cooking fuel. We follow a small creek downstream, moving away from the road a quarter mile or so before stopping.

  “We’re close,” I say. “Maybe tomorrow we’ll be there.” My arm still aches from the gunshot wound, but it hasn’t gotten any worse. And my shoulder that I hurt on my descent into the fissure is pretty much back to normal.

  “I wonder if they still call the place Valdez,” Max says.

  “And I wonder,” Tam says, “if it’s still part of the United States. That is, if the USA still exists.”

  “I hope they like dogs,” Jess says. She takes Chena’s head between her hands and says, “Good girl.”

  “Me too,” I say. And it’s true. I don’t want Jess to have to part with Chena. That’s something we just can’t predict. But if we had to abandon Chena, Jess would survive.

  “If Valdez didn’t burn,” Max says, “maybe it’s still like a real town or something, just hard to get to from the north. Maybe ships still come into port. We’re so cut off, it’s hard to believe that tomorrow we might learn something about what’s going on in the rest of the world.”

  I haven’t thought much about that, or about Valdez being connected. Maybe there’re phones and computers and electricity. Maybe. We just don’t know.

  I do know that after the pipeline closed and the fishing industry collapsed, the town decreased in size by two-thirds. And when was that, forty or fifty years ago? And after that, they had to abandon part of the town because of the rising sea level. And then there was a big earthquake and a lot of the land right around sea level sank, so more of the town ended up underwater. Maybe nothing is there. Maybe that’s why my parents said to head toward Anchorage.

  At one time, more than half the state lived in Anchorage. And when people had been forced out of the villages because of lack of services, most of them had gone to Anchorage. Trusting Dylan’s map more than my parents’ words made sense at the time we made that decision, but right now I’m not so sure. Valdez was tiny during its heyday. It could be a ghost town now.

  CHAPTER

  76

  WE TOPPED THE PASS A little while ago and are winding down the old road. Right now we’re in a narrow canyon. Waterfalls, fifty or sixty feet high, spill over the cliff tops on both sides of the road. There’s so little water flowing in one of the falls that when an updraft catches the water, it blows the whole thing right into the cliffs.

  “Can’t be much farther now,” Max says. “And this road, isn’t it in a lot better shape since we came through the pass?”

  “It’s rockier here in the canyon,” I say. “Maybe the plants can’t take over as fast.”

  Tam and Jess and Chena are walking about ten feet in front of us.

  Max nods. “Could be.”

  We walk in silence for a while, keeping our eyes and ears alert for any sign of life. The canyon widens, and the waters from the falls merge to form a small river cut up by sand and gravel bars, each covered in a blaze of yellow from the willows crowding onto them. Countless channels come together, then separate because of all the little islands. The road clearly stays on the right side of the river, and beyond the floodplain the land rises steeply. It’s forested mostly with big evergreens, but some birches and a scattering of maples as well. Not the spindly maples choking the land on the other side of the pass, these look like normal trees even though they are probably escapees from the same genetically engineered stock. And the land under the trees is covered in a thick blanket of moss.

  Chena stops to lap water out of the nearest river channel, and we catch up with Tam and Jess.

  Jess looks at me. “Do you think we’ll be there today?”

  “I don’t know,” I say. “But with every step we’re a little closer.” I have this raw feeling in my chest. What if there’s nothing there? Or people as whacked-out as Stan and his followers? I look at Max, then at Tam.

  I don’t want to burst Jess’s bubble, but I don’t want her to be let down either. The only thing I really know is that we have one meager meal worth of beans left in the pack I’m carrying. And that dog is looking more and more like a food source by the minute.

  “What is it?” Jess says. I guess my face must’ve given away my worry.

  I feel my eyes getting hot. “Jess,” I say. “I’m not sure what we’ll find at the end of the road. So when I said with every step we’re one step closer, what I meant was we’re one step closer to finding out if anyone is there.”

  Jess nods. Her hand reaches out and settles onto Chena’s head.

  “You know,” I say, “we’re not on the road Mom and Dad told us to take.”

  Jess keeps her hand on Chena’s head. “We wouldn’t have found Chena if we’d gone the other way.”

  We keep walking down the road with me and Jess and Chena in front, followed by Tam and Max.

  I take Jess’s hand as we walk. I say, “I miss Mom and Dad.” Jess’s grip gets a little tighter. “And I’ll probably always miss them. But that’s okay. It’s painful, but it’s okay.”

  Jess nods as we keep walking hand-in-hand, and I say, “Whenever you want to talk about it”—I pause—“about them, I’m here.” I’m not going to press her to speak right now, but I hope what I’ve said lets her know that I know she misses them.

  Jess stays silent but keeps a grip on my hand.

  The floodplain narrows, and the forest closes in on the road. I drop Jess’s hand. We have to climb over tangles of fallen trees and cross small streams that have cut through the road.

  The road makes a big turn to the west, and we see our first evidence of people. The partial skeleton of an old house stands off the road in what used to be a clearing, which is now blanketed with chest-high evergreens. Two bare walls—nothing but studs—slant outward.

  We work our way through the thick field of saplings and stand in front of the walls. Moss covers what used to be the floor of the house. It’s sunk deeper than the surrounding land, like there had been a basement or a crawl space at one time.

  Chena’s sniffing around the outside of the wal
ls right where they meet. She squats and marks the spot.

  “This place must’ve been abandoned a long time ago,” Tam says. “There’s not even a trail between here and the road.”

  On the other side of the mountains I would’ve been relieved by no signs of people. But not over here.

  Back on the road, we keep walking. I think the isolated feeling of that place has knocked us all down a notch. Even Chena’s tail is flying at half-mast. We pass the long-abandoned remains of a couple more places.

  We round another bend and the water comes into view in the distance. Maybe it’s the overcast sky and how late in the day it is, but the expanse of water just looks gray and stagnant. My first glimpse of the ocean, ever, and it’s not the blue waves rolling up a white sand beach like I’d imagined. We still have some miles to cover before we’ll actually be standing next to salt water.

  I put my hand over my forehead to help cut the glare. I’m looking for buildings, boats, smoke. Anything.

  The land stretching to the ocean is flat and pocked with puddles and small ponds, separated by reeds and tall grasses. The remains of the road skirt the marsh. I remember on the map that the road ends at the town. Maybe it’s still there, beyond the marsh, out of sight. We can see trees in the distance where the land is higher. Maybe the buildings are hidden behind the trees or are around another point.

  We need to keep going, but it’s going to be dark soon.

  “I don’t see anything,” Jess says. “Nothing.”

  “There might not be anything,” I say.

  Tam shrugs but is silent. She’s got this far-off look in her eyes.

  “There’ll be life by the ocean,” Max says. “I can feel it. And smell it in the air.”

  Chena sticks her nose up straight and sniffs.

  I don’t know if Max really believes what she’s saying or if she’s just trying to comfort Jess. I point across the road opposite the marsh. “We can build a fire in that patch of trees and then keep going in the morning.”

  After finishing off the beans and having some tea, we build the fire up. Max and Jess lie down, sharing one of the old man’s blankets, and Tam and I sit shoulder to shoulder with the other blanket draped over us, keeping watch. For what feels like a long time neither of us says anything.

  Just tell her, I think. Tell her that you like her. I take a breath. You finally have a moment.

  Right now.

  Just do it.

  But before I can say anything, Tam turns to me and starts talking.

  “Travis,” Tam whispers, “after I got sent to the group home for injuring my foster brother”—she pauses and licks her lips—“and then watching him get to leave on the bus, I was so angry. Not just at him, but at, you know, guys. All guys. I mean, his macho attitude and actions resulted in me being left behind.” Tam takes a slow breath and exhales. “Then I met Jason and Patrick, and they were so into each other, it didn’t really matter to me that they were guys, because they didn’t act like they wanted to take something from me.” Tam shoves another stick toward the fire. “I guess what I’m trying to say is, I never thought I’d like a guy from that day forward when the buses left without me. Guys were the enemy, the spoilers of everything good. Those first two years, with the exception of Jason and Patrick, all we did was fight guys to survive. Mean guys. Greedy guys. Guys who thought of us as objects to control. To violate.”

  She pauses and shakes her head. “But then you came along. At first, when you had that gun pointed at us, I thought you were like everyone else we’d met. I was so ready to kill you. To eliminate another threat. And then you invited Mike and Dylan to join us without knowing anything about them, and for a while I wanted to kill you even more.” She pauses and licks her lips again. “But as time went on”—she shakes her head—“I realized that I didn’t hate you. And when we got separated at the river, I actually missed you. You never tried to take anything from me. And even though I still basically hate all guys”—she pauses—“I like you.”

  Her open palm comes to rest on my cheek, and I feel the heat from her hand through my beard. My entire body is humming. I put my hand on her cheek and take another breath and I just stare at her face in the firelight.

  “I like you, too.” I swallow once and whisper, “Can I kiss you?”

  Tam nods and says softly, “You’ll be the first.”

  She tilts her head toward me. Her warm breath brushes my lips. I lean in and our lips meet. Her warm tongue slides into my mouth, and we share one long kiss.

  * * *

  The next morning a foggy mist hangs in the sky. When we start down the road, we can’t even see the ocean. The moisture works its way through my thin clothing and covers my skin.

  We all keep moving, knowing that’s the best way to stay warm. Plus, we have to see what’s at the end of this road. If there’s nothing, well, then there’s nothing. I keep hoping to catch a whiff of smoke or hear some loud noise, some machinery or something, but everything is as still as still can be.

  When I was little, I used to look at the moon through my bedroom window and try to imagine what it would be like to be there. How alone and far away it would feel. How I could walk and walk and walk and never come across anyone or anything. And I’d wonder how all that space—that nothingness—could be there with no people, no animals, and no plants.

  There are plenty of plants here, but we still haven’t seen any animals. Not even birds singing. Maybe when we finally get to the water, we’ll see something.

  The sun starts to break through the mist around midday, creating a glare that makes us all squint. The fog still sits on the ground at what we guess is the shoreline, but we can see that we’re much closer.

  “You hear that?” Max says.

  We all stop. The sound of lapping water invades my ears. The rhythmic push of wave after wave meeting the shore. I know it doesn’t mean anything beyond the fact that we are close enough to hear the water. But still, I feel a shiver run up my spine.

  “Come on,” I say. I actually feel happy, though I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s because we’ve made it this far. Maybe it’s because I’m with my sister and two amazing girls who I would literally kill for. Maybe it’s because not only do I like Tam, but she likes me as well. Maybe it’s because if we are all there is, that’s better than facing the world alone. It’s better than being on the moon.

  The sun burns off the ground fog, and now we can see the shore. The marsh we’ve been skirting is coming to an end. We cover the final stretch of road, walk across a gravelly beach, and stand at the water’s edge. The mountains rise steeply on both sides of the inlet.

  “I think the road used to keep going,” I say. “What’s left of the old town is probably underwater.”

  Max puts her hand in the water, then brings it to her mouth and licks it. She smiles.

  The beach stretches toward a forested headland, about a mile away, I guess. In the other direction, way across the inlet, what look like giant, jagged, gray teeth poke up from the water.

  “Over there,” I say. “Way across the inlet.” I point in the opposite direction of the headland. “The remains from oil storage tanks at the end of the pipeline. That used to be dry ground, way back when.”

  “How do you know?” Jess asks.

  “School,” I say. “I’ve seen pictures. Plus, it’s on the old map we have.” We’re all staring across the inlet. And I’m imagining big tankers pulling up to the docks to load. I wonder if the docks are intact underwater. The remains of a huge industrial complex, buried by a combination of the rising sea and the ground sinking after an earthquake.

  “What now?” Jess asks.

  I let out a sigh. “I say we follow the shore over that headland.” I point in the direction opposite the industrial ruins.

  “I’ve never walked on a beach,” Tam says. She smiles at me and I remember our one kiss last night. And then just sitting next to each other, our knees touching, holding hands, and whispering. She still has a lot of anger
and distrust toward guys from her experiences, but she’s also starting to trust me. Slowly, she said to me last night. I need to do this, to try this, slowly.

  My mind jumps back to right now. The beans are gone, and we have enough tea for a couple more weak pots. I glance at Jess, her hand stroking Chena’s head, and I just can’t tell her that we might need Chena for the dinner pot. I’d hoped we wouldn’t have to kill Chena, but I know we will.

  We walk the beach in silence and Chena runs ahead. At the base of the headland, Chena is sniffing at some rocks. She whines once, then squats.

  I look back toward the road, hoping that we’ve missed something, that I’ll see some people waving at us and pointing. Or I’ll see a side road that I haven’t noticed before. But no, we’re alone. I pull out the map but it provides no further clues.

  Chena barks once, then sits down by the rocks she peed on.

  Jess walks over to Chena and runs her fingers across her head. I wish Jess wasn’t so attached to that dog. I don’t know what would be worse, having Jess starve and liking me, or killing Chena for food and having her hate me.

  “You guys,” she says, “look.” Jess is pointing down.

  Between the rocks lies what looks like the start of a faint foot trail leading up the headland at an angle.

  I think about Chena peeing on the rocks, about dogs marking their territories. I don’t want to say what I’m thinking because I don’t want to get anyone’s hopes up.

  “Okay,” I say. “How about we follow the trail Chena’s found?”

  I stuff the map into my pocket and let Chena lead, followed by Jess. The trail switchbacks up the headland gradually. At the top we hit thick forest, but the trail continues, cutting away from the point. I want to get to the water on the other side and see what the shore is like. Is it more cliffs or more beach? But I keep following Chena, who keeps following the trail back into the forest. I don’t like the closed-in feeling I get after walking on the beach—like we could get ambushed easily by a person or a bear. Then I remember that we haven’t seen any sign of people or animals.