The Bitching Tree

by Scott Hungerford

  At least an hour passed and Cobb dozed off more than once, leaving him in the grip of nonsensical dreams. Waking up as the boat jounced over a rough patch of water, he felt stiff and sore. Torvo was navigating the curve around a wide patch of river, heading toward a bank with a—

  Dock?

  There was a little dock sticking out into the water, just downriver from a jut of land that gave the wooden pilings safe harbor from floating snags. Beyond the dock was a wooden staircase, and beyond the staircase was a grassy yard and a two-story house with white-trimmed windows looking over the riverfront. There were even two chimneys, one at either end of the structure, though neither were casting smoke.

  “Sit still,” Torvo told him as they came up to the dock, “because if you spill this boat, I’ll put you in the drink and let you go out to sea with the rest of my stuff.”

  Cobb did as he was told, excitedly looking at the house as Torvo idled in and tied the anchor ropes to the pilings. When Torvo felt the boat was secure, the old man stepped up onto a low-floating dock platform at the water’s edge—then stepped up again onto the solid dock itself, his boots making a hollow clunking sound on the wood.

  “Now you can get up,” Torvo said. “But be careful and don’t hurt yourself.” Cobb did as Torvo asked, looking up only once into the dizzying torrent of afternoon snow spiraling down from the heavens. Then he was up and up and up, then standing in the yard by Torvo’s side, looking at the house.

  “This is your winter camp?” Cobb was waiting for the trick, for the revelation that this was just some strange stopover on the way to somewhere far more uncomfortable.

  “This is it,” Torvo said. “I’ve had this place for years, ever since one of my first students bought it for me as a gift. Good tub, hot showers, good roof, two bedrooms, and a big work space down below.”

  “Then why do you hate it so much?”

  “Because when the snow comes there’s nothing to do—not even my favorite rocker to sit in. It’s all just making fires and watching television and waiting for the winter to end. I love the river. I hate television.”

  Leaving the boat in place, Torvo led Cobb across the lawn and around the side of the house, past a pair of garage doors. Leaving two sets of footprints behind in the slush, they tromped up the side wooden stairs to a scuffed door leading into the kitchen. Opening it with a key, Torvo let them inside, the interior of the house just warm enough to take off the chill. As Cobb started to look around, Torvo turned on the furnace at the thermostat, causing a rush of dusty air to flow up through all the vents in the house.

  The kitchen walls were wallpapered with yellow flowers, and the appliances looked older than the ones Cobb had seen in his human’s apartment. The living room had a sparse scattering of furniture, just a couch and a pair of overstuffed chairs facing an empty fireplace. At the other end of the house, down a long hall past the kitchen, were two small bedrooms facing one another, as well as a bathroom and a tiny laundry room. At the very end of the hall was a little library room that Cobb immediately fell in love with. Stocked with books all along one wall, the smaller fireplace by the window was complemented by a good-sized television set up on a rickety metal stand.

  “The guest room on the right is yours,” Torvo indicated. “My room is on the left. You don’t go in my room, you understand me?”

  Cobb nodded enthusiastically. “I understand you. How do I get downstairs?”

  “There’s a door in the kitchen that opens to the cellar stairs. Don’t whack your head though—and be sure to tug on the light string before you go down.”

  Cobb, scampering back up the hallway, quickly found the kitchen broom closet, then found the correct door leading down into the cellar. After tugging on the string to light the bulb over the stairs, he was a little disappointed to find that the basement was just a big room with a furnace at one end, garage doors at the other, and rows of metal shelving in between covered with cans, tools, boxes, bags, and all kinds of foodstuffs. The space smelled a lot like oil and dust. The battered old rowboat in the corner was interesting, but within a few minutes Cobb was back upstairs, bored with the cellar, now nosing around the kitchen looking for something to eat.

  “Come on,” Torvo told him, slapping Cobb’s hand as he sniffed a jar of sugar packets from one of the cupboards. “Let’s unload the boat before the weather gets any worse.”

  “What’s this?” Cobb asked, picking up a jar full of lumpy brown lozenges.

  “Homemade laxatives. Don’t eat those.” Cobb nodded, acknowledging. He didn’t really know what a laxative was, but his human self seemed to recoil at the idea of eating too many of them. He put the jar back on the shelf and carefully closed the cupboard door.

  Within an hour they had unloaded the boat, even as the snow started to come down harder, now forming patches on the ground and on the grass. As the two of them trudged back and forth from the boat to the basement with boxes, Cobb was soon soaked with sweat even with all the snow coming down around them. When everything was safely stowed in the cellar, Torvo closed the garage doors and latched and locked them up tight.

  “Aren’t we going back for the tent and the stove tonight?” Cobb asked.

  “It’s too nasty out there. I don’t want to be on the water when the full brunt of the storm hits. When I was younger this trip would only take half a day. Now that I’m older it seems like the job takes longer every damned time.”

  “I’m sorry if I slowed you down.”

  “You didn’t. You helped out and carried your part of the load. Even with Judy’s arrival, I’d hoped we would have at least a week or two before we had to bug out. I’m just glad we were there when Hawna called with the weather report.” Torvo gestured toward the steps leading up the kitchen. “Now let’s get upstairs and change. I could really use a shower and a hot cup of coffee before we start to do a summer’s worth of laundry.”

  Over the next few hours they settled in, and Cobb started to learn how to take care of the house the same way that Torvo had taught him how to take care of the camp on the rock. After being shown the huge mountain of split wood tucked up safely by the outside kitchen steps, he followed Torvo’s instructions to get fires going in both fireplaces to drive out the damp. After that, they each took a long hot shower, draining the tank in the basement all the way down to cold. After a hearty dinner of canned goods involving three pans instead of one, Torvo went into his bedroom to talk to Hawna behind closed doors while Cobb relaxed in front of the television watching whatever he could find by randomly pressing the buttons on the remote control.

  Alone, safe and warm, Cobb was mostly content. While he wanted to talk to Hawna and was kind of put out that Torvo was keeping her all to himself, he could easily rationalize why the radio was in Torvo’s room and not somewhere else in the house.

  Outside the windows, the snow was starting to come down harder now, blanketing the trees and ground with two inches of white. Wind occasionally rattled along the side of the house, blowing powdery accumulations off the steep roof with each fierce gust. Leaving the television for a moment, Cobb wandered through the house from room to room, now looking more in-depth at the place. Despite its comforts, it didn’t feel like anyone lived here. There were candles and matches here, lanterns and magazines there. All the things that his teacher would need for survival were here, but there was little in the way of pleasantries. While there were pictures on the walls, they were mostly landscapes and forest scenes in wood frames. There were no family photos, no friends, no pets. No clutter, no mess. No real signs of life. There was no phone either, Cobb realized. But knowing Torvo, that made sense to him somehow, as he was all about his own privacy, his own schedule.

  Letting himself out onto the kitchen porch, Cobb stood at the railing for a moment, the wet wood cold beneath his bare feet. He could smell the snow on the wind, the wet and wild tang of nature coming at him with everything it had to bring. At Cobb’s feet was a rusted can half-filled with old cigarette butts. By his side w
as a small broom that Torvo probably used to sweep the steps clean.

  Not yet chilly in his bare feet, he went ahead and swept the snow off the stairs, then went down to the side of the house by the woodpile, feet crunching on the icy grass. Looking beyond the warm light cast from the windows onto the snow, the forest beyond the house’s yard was impossibly dense and dark, a wall where the feeling of safety abruptly ended. The gap where the dirt driveway went off into the trees was noticeable in the gloom, but barely so.

  His toes were finally getting cold, so Cobb hopped up the stairs two at a time, glad to get back inside the kitchen and close and bolt the door. It was odd how his perception of time was already changing just by being here. Out on the rock when night came, it just came and you adapted to it. Here in a human home, he already felt bored, restless, trapped. He had his first inkling of why Torvo didn’t like this place, and how the next few months were going to be quite strange.

  Months. He shook his head at the thought, and walked down to the tiny nook at the end of the kitchen, big enough for him and Torvo to sit and eat. He wanted more than anything to be out there fighting the Red Crow, but he knew that he wasn’t ready. He’d learned a lot over the last few—how long had it been? Weeks? A month? The dates and lessons were all a blur, and the yellowed two-years-out-of-date calendar tacked to the kitchen wall didn’t help any. He’d learned a lot from Torvo about what it meant to be human, to be Cobb. But he felt that there was a lot more he would need to know. Weapons. A warrior’s skills. The things he would need to save his people from slavery.

  By the time he got back to the television, another set of commercials had come on. Sitting down in his chair, irritated at how the people on the box kept pestering him for money even though he didn’t have any, he flipped through the channels until he found a game show that seemed familiar. He settled in, having no idea how the game was actually played, but enjoyed it all the same.

  The storm blew out by the following morning, but the skies threatened new snow. Torvo went back upriver to the rock, then returned in the late afternoon with all the bundled-up tent pieces in the boat. Just before nightfall they got everything put away in the garage, including the heavy boat motor. The boat itself Cobb was able to tug up the shallow bank next to the dock and get it flipped over without Torvo’s help. Back inside, they both took showers again and then ate some more food in the nook. With a few words, Torvo showed Cobb how to put the dishes away in the right places, then excused himself and went to bed.

  Cobb, again sitting in front of the television, was already bored with the channels he was able to flip through. However, scouring the library shelves had revealed a series of interesting books with blue bindings, about two brothers being detectives. Keeping the television on for company, he started to read the stories aloud to himself, measuring out the words and the chapters for an audience of one. He kept hoping that Torvo would open his door and come out to listen, but he could hear him snoring like a chainsaw. Cobb wondered what it was like to be up here in winter all alone, with just the trees and wind for company. Why wouldn’t Torvo live closer to town in the harder months, closer to Hawna? He knew that he certainly would, if he had the chance.

  Cobb read the adventures out loud to himself until he couldn’t stay awake any more. Tucked under a blanket with the television off, he put the book down on his chest and listened to the snow patter against the windows. Finally, he reached up and turned off the small table lamp beside him, then nestled to sleep with only the treasured book for company.

  The next morning Torvo was up early, earlier than normal, even before the sun had started to rise. Though Cobb grumbled and turned over in his makeshift bed, the smell of bacon cooking in the kitchen eventually roused him. After breakfast came daylight, bright and crisp through the windows, the sun beaming down from a curious color of blue sky that no painter could ever match.

  While Torvo showered and dressed, Cobb took some of the paper placemats he found in the kitchen and doodled on them in long strokes with a ballpoint pen, trying to get the angle and perspective on the snow-covered dock just right. Within four tries he felt he had something recognizable, something that the human Cobb might have actually liked.

  “That’s the dock,” Torvo said from behind him, standing with his coat already on and zipped up.

  “It’s your dock,” Cobb replied.

  “Pictures have power,” Torvo said. “You don’t draw me unless I ask. Got it?”

  “Got it,” Cobb nodded. “Is there anything else I shouldn’t draw?”

  “Nothing comes to mind. Get your gear on and I’ll meet you in the cellar.”

  “Are you feeling alright today? You were tired last night.”

  “Never better. Now move it, as I have a lot of stuff to put into your head today.”

  The cellar revealed an old friend, the battered yellow chainsaw. Together they tuned it up and gave it the special mixture of oil and gas that would help it work in the cold. With his goggles on his forehead and the chainsaw in hand, Cobb followed Torvo out through the side cellar door into the yard. Crunching through a crusty half foot of new-fallen snow, they headed toward the trees on the upriver side of the property.

  “Are we cutting more firewood today?” Cobb asked.

  “I don’t need any more firewood,” Torvo replied. “I’ve got enough for the whole winter under the eaves. But there is something I want you to see.”

  “Alright,” Cobb said, following his teacher as he veered toward the water, heading upriver from the dock.

  A narrow path snaked its way through a small stand of young trees, forcing the two men to brush through waist-high bushes packed with snow. When they came out at the open end of the stand, Cobb saw that they were on a lip elevated about eight feet above the river. Down below was a horseshoe-shaped stone enclosure half-filled with river water, with the opening between the two prongs of rock facing upstream at an angle. To Cobb’s shock, the swimming hole–like enclosure was filled with hundreds of floating pieces of cut firewood—including his old cutting stump!

  “What?!” Cobb yelled excitedly. “You’ve got to be kidding me!” To him, it looked like more than half of the wood in the giant piles had ended up here, miles and miles downstream.

  “I told you that you’ve just got to be smarter than the river,” Torvo said with a knowing smile.

  “How did this get here? By magic?”

  “The river did this all by itself. When I first started to live here, I thought this little stone hook was kind of odd. Stuff cluttered it up all the time, and it got filled with little sticks and snarls because the angle of the mouth keeps most of the big logs out. When I was up at camp the following summer I lost an empty plastic bottle into the water—and I found it down in here in the gap when I came home a few months later. So I started dropping bottles into the water when the river started to rise at the end of fall, as a kind of test.” He grinned, saving the best part for last. “Three of the five bottles ended up in my corral.”

  “So, the firewood I cut … it’s here?”

  “Most of it. It will take most of the spring and summer for it to dry out again, but it will be enough for another winter.”

  “That’s amazing!” Cobb said. “I thought all my work was lost forever.”

  “It usually is,” Torvo replied. “Most things that humans do are lost. But if you think a few steps ahead, you can keep things longer than most folks think they can. To me, that’s the mark of a successful life. Firewood or not.”

  “Don’t we have to get it out of there?” Cobb asked. “Is it going to float off?”

  “No, it’s not going anywhere,” Torvo said. “When the water goes down again next summer I can pick it up easy as it dries out. Now come on. You have work to do.”

  Lugging the heavy chainsaw, Cobb followed Torvo back through the bushes into the yard, then cut back again into the wall of trees to their right. Within a few dozen steps there was no snow on the ground, as the forest floor hadn’t been claimed
yet by the winter storms. Above them, the branches of the old trees shook and waved in the chill wind, filling the air with tiny creaks.

  At the far end of the grove lay a clearing with a giant fallen tree dividing it right down the center. The tree was at least five feet around, and Cobb imagined the monster had lorded over the river for many, many years.

  “You want me to cut that up?” Cobb asked, gesturing at the fallen tree with the tool.

  “No. I want you to cut down a living tree. An upright one that is still filled with sap and vigor.”

  Cobb swallowed. He didn’t like the sound of that. But he would do what his teacher told him to, especially on a day where Torvo had made breakfast.

  Goggles and gloves securely on, Torvo took a few minutes to talk Cobb through what it took to cut down a standing tree, a young fir that was a good fifteen or twenty feet high. He told him to look which way it leaned and whether there were any branches above that looked like they might come down when he started to cut. Cobb made his best guess that the tree would want to fall away from the river and started sizing up where he would have to stand in order to safely take it down.

  At Torvo’s instruction, Cobb put the chainsaw down on the ground, braced himself, then gave the starting cord a good yank—and the freshly primed engine kicked in right away. His pulse hammering in his ears, Cobb picked up the tool, comfortably cautious of the noisy thing rather than terrified.

  The first cut he made was a horizontal one, cutting into the tree about the width of a blade and a half. The second cut he made was at an angle to the first cut, chopping out a thick wedge. Even though this only involved a few cuts so far, lifting the chainsaw up higher was hard work and Cobb feared that the blade might get stuck and rip him a good one. But he bit his lip and kept on with it until Torvo was satisfied with the depth of the slice.

  Moving to the other side of the tree, Torvo instructed him to cut another horizontal slice, just a few inches above the cut on the far side. Then Cobb started to cut his way around, spraying a fountain of wood chips, trying to listen and feel for when the tree was finally going to come down. After he completed his cut, the entire ground shook as the tree started to go down—and the two of them scampered back out of the danger zone. As the fir struck the ground, Cobb killed the chainsaw’s engine, amazed by how silent the forest suddenly sounded without the engine noise, with only a rain of displaced needles and leaves falling down around them.