by Sky Curtis
She yelled at the top of her lungs, “A bear. Watch out!”
I raced after the bear—not too close, I’m not stupid—to the top of the hillock I had just climbed over until, like Cindy, I had a bird’s-eye view of the scene. It was terrifying. I was watching an enormous bear charging at a group of unsuspecting people.
All of the cops’ heads lifted in unison to look questioningly at Cindy sitting high in the tree and then followed her pointing finger, like a well-orchestrated dance. They stood mesmerized, staring at the charging hulk. It seemed to be heading straight for Niemchuk who was standing stock-still off to the right, halfway up a small rise in the ground by the dead man’s head. He still held in his hand the plastic bag containing the arm bone and there was a small piece of bone in his gloved left. Probably a bit of neck. A vertebrae. Amazing how miniscule details zip through a mind in the face of impending danger.
I yelled, “Niemchuk. Stand tall. Wave your arms. Shout. Jump up and down.”
He looked at me dumbly. The bear was now fifty yards away from the group and growling, mouth open, fangs shining white.
I repeated my instructions. “Niemchuk, jump up and down. Drop the bag and the bones. Shout.”
He looked at the objects in his hands, then at the bear. He was welded to the ground.
A shot pierced the air. Then another. And another. Where had they come from? Oh. Andrechuk. The bear took as much notice of the bullets as it did of mosquitoes and rushed non-stop at the group.
Niemchuk, his brown eyes wide with fear and his mouth a red slash against his pale face, was jolted out of his stupor and finally moved. Like an out of control puppet, he waved his arms spasmodically while his feet danced jerkily. The bear was now about twenty yards away from him. It had been slowed down slightly by the vexing onslaught of bullets from Andrechuk’s gun, but even that had not deterred the bear from its certain intention to get Niemchuk.
By now, the bear was moving so quickly it was hard to get a good shot at it. I saw a new difficulty looming. The closer the bear got to Niemchuk, the more likely Niemchuk would be hit by a slug. I watched from a distance, helpless as the tragedy unfolded, my heart pounding so hard in my chest I wondered if it was going to break a rib. I could hear my blood thundering in my ears like an approaching tornado.
I glanced up into the tree and saw Cindy watching the scene intently from her aerial view. As my eyes focused on her way up high in the branches, I could see she was reaching into her back pocket with one hand, while curling the other around the tree trunk so she wouldn’t fall. She pulled out her phone and started shooting pictures of the bear charging Niemchuk. I couldn’t believe it. Here we were, on the edge of witnessing a man being mauled to death by a bear, and she was taking photos. Always a journalist, our Cindy. She was risking her life for the sake of capturing some newsworthy images? She leaned forward and balanced precariously on the branch so that she could follow the bear’s movement. Paralyzing fear crept up my spine. I couldn’t watch Cindy’s balancing act any longer and looked back down at the drama.
Andrechuk’s weapon was now empty and she was busy reloading. Her face was red with exertion and panic, but her fingers looked steady and sure. It dawned on me that she had been shooting to frighten, not to kill. I admired her morals, being the animal lover that I was. But the bear was closing in on Niemchuk.
My moral compass shook as it shimmied around to point in a different direction. Now the story was different. The bear had to be killed. Despite Andrechuk’s efforts to scare the bear away, it had not turned tail and taken off into the woods. If anything, it was more focused on Niemchuk, more determined in its attack, more frenzied as it crashed through the bush toward him. I was convinced that this was the same bear that had attacked Jacket Man. Not many bears behaved with such madness, such crazed focus to kill. This had to be the same bear. The air throbbed with frenetic energy. If the massive beast wasn’t stopped quickly and now, it would certainly kill Niemchuk.
From the top of the hill that had previously hidden me from the group, I could see that Kowalchuk, slightly lower than everyone else as he stood by the jacket, was pulling his gun. His gargantuan body was moving with coordinated precision and skill. He planted his elephant-sized legs wide apart as he raised his police-issued pistol to eye level. This was the first good close look I’ve ever had of a gun in my life. Details flew in and out of my brain like frightened birds. Long. Black. Shining. Metal.
Niemchuk was sandwiched between Kowalchuk and the bear, which was now about five yards away from his victim. Niemchuk’s horrible screams pierced the forest and the air felt like it was swirling around me. Birds shrieked wildly and scattered high to the treetops. Could Kowalchuk make the shot without wounding Niemchuk? The situation looked impossible to me.
Kowalchuk was standing below Niemchuk, which meant that a bullet from his gun would have to travel through Niemchuk to hit the bear. Plus, Niemchuk was jumping up and down, in constant movement. It would be extremely difficult for Kowalchuk to time his shot so that it would hit the bear when Niemchuk was on his way down, and would thus be lower than the bear’s head. It would be a risky shot, but Kowalchuk had no choice but to try.
I watched the detective steady one hand with the other as he sighted down the barrel. In the chaos of the moment, my ability to distinguish left from right had flown out the window. Why was I even thinking about this? Niemchuk had only moments to live. I was witnessing terrible violence. Again, I marvelled at how the mind got stuck in a loop of tiny details when coping with enormous fear. Maybe it was a survival instinct, a distraction so the brain would shy away from trauma. I could see that Niemchuk was going to be killed. It would either be by the bear, or by a bullet. I was certain Niemchuk was dead meat. He was waving his arms frantically and leaping up and down to make himself appear bigger. The bear was not frightened off.
Kowalchuk fired a shot just as Niemchuk’s feet were heading back down to the ground. The bullet whistled not even an inch over his head and then hit the bear between the eyes. I had never seen anything like this in my life. Not even on TV. The timing and marksmanship were superlative. I couldn’t believe the bullet had hit its target. The animal staggered two steps forward and then crashed face-first to the ground, only a few feet from where Niemchuk had stood. He too had fallen, his body a collapsed heap lying motionless in the leaves. Had he been hit? No, of course not. The bear had been hit. There had only been one gunshot. I could still hear it reverberating through the forest.
And then, suddenly, the air was deathly quiet. I felt like I was in a vacuum. There was no air, just a hollow absence of where it had been. Everything moved in slow motion. A bird soared soundlessly into the sky, its beak open. Was it cawing? It must have been a crow. A low hum reverberated in my eardrums underneath the sound of my pulsing heart. A leaf rustled in the silence, sounding as loud as a motorcycle on a summer’s night. A shout echoed roundly in the air. Kowalchuk. I had no idea what he’d said; the words swam by in an alien language. Niemchuk lifted his head and yelled back in the same bizarre gibberish. I watched dumbly as figures moved as if in a silent movie.
And then I felt like I was floating in an underwater nightmare. Bursting bubbles of air snapped and zapped at my skin. I slowly dove down to the bottom of the sea around me. The trees at the edges of my vision dissolved into waving seaweed as darkness rolled in from the deep. The last thing I heard was a shout in barely audible acoustics. Perhaps it was my name.
11.
I SWAM UP FROM MY underwater nightmare. Where was I? On the ground? I could smell earth. So, on the ground. I slowly took stock of my body. Was I okay? Were all my bits functioning? Whatever had happened, at least I was alive. I was alive and breathing. I moved my head a fraction and a leaf crackled by my ear. It sounded like a gunshot. Something very bad had happened, but I didn’t know what. I was paralyzed into a stillness, curled in a fetal position. I scanned my body for problems from the head down.
Eyes were shut. Ears could hear. A small stick was jutting into my rib cage. My feet felt tingly yet very hot. I cautiously moved my fingers and toes. Nothing broken. Nervous system intact. But I was on the ground. How had that happened? I gathered together all my courage and opened my eyes.
Copper-coloured leaves. Dark, damp earth. A small, light-green shoot. Was it a budding maple key? Cindy’s hiking boots. About a foot away from my face. Beige suede trim. Blue breathable uppers. Frayed laces with the plastic thingies on both ends missing. I turned my head slowly, registering the feel of dirt on my skin. Smelling it. My eyes followed Cindy’s very long legs up her body. She was holding a plastic zipper bag containing a long white bone in her hand. My eyes climbed over her blue hoodie until they reached the red halo of her head. She was staring down at me, a look of concern playing around her eyes.
“Hey, Robin. How you doing?”
Her voice sounded far-off, as if it were bouncing around in a distant steel tunnel.
“You fainted. You’ve been out about five minutes, maybe less. Barely long enough for me to get down from the tree.”
The tree. What tree? Right. On our walk. She had climbed up a tree and I couldn’t find her. Then I was worried she’d fall out of the tree. But wait. I was the one lying on the ground. She wasn’t. Had I fallen out of a tree? No, she meant a different tree. She had a bone in her hand. I didn’t want to remember. I couldn’t seem to find my voice and looked dumbly up at my friend. I shifted one leg and my foot dug into the wet earth. The smell of earth filled my mouth and I swallowed its rich nutrients. It was time to stand up. The dampness of the loam was seeping through my clothes.
“Can you stand up? Do you think you can do that?”
She extended a hand wearing a ripped latex glove. A glove? She had a glove on her hand and was carrying a bone. She had scrambled down a tree to get to me. What was going on? My upper body wouldn’t bend. It was impossible to move. Suddenly, a kaleidoscope of sepia-coloured images jerked and jumped across the screen behind my eyes. It was all coming back to me like an old-fashioned movie that had been slowed down by an unseen hand on the reel. A bear had attacked a police officer. I whispered, “Niemchuk?”
“He’s fine and so are you. The bear was shot by a cop. They are helping Niemchuk now. And taking pictures of the dead bear. Time for us to move on. Get over ourselves. The bear is dead. C’mon. Get up.” She held out her hand, waiting for me to take it. She shook her fingers impatiently. Shredded latex flapped.
Cindy had lots of practice dealing with terrible events. Shootings, knifings, bombs, suicides. She was a crime reporter, after all. I wrote about bamboo-filled pillows. What had happened was, way above my pay grade. I shut my eyes, trying to block out where I was and why I was lying on the ground. But my mind’s eye began replaying the bear barging at Niemchuk, its shiny brown fur undulating with every step. A dark veil crept up from the back of my brain and floated over my eyes. Curtains. Room darkening. Fuck. I felt giddy.
“Don’t do that rolling your eyes into the back of your head thing with me.” I could hear Cindy’s discombobulated voice piercing the dark recesses of my brain. “Open your eyes. Let’s go. It’s time to split this pop stand.”
When I opened my eyes again the world seemed to shimmer. I wondered if I’d hit my head on the way down to the ground. I felt my stomach contract and bile filled my mouth. Not this again. I took a few deep breaths and willed myself to not throw up. I had to sit up. No way was I going to pull on Cindy’s hand and stagger to my feet. Way too embarrassing for her to know how heavy I was.
Funny what we think of when the chips were down. Chips. I could use a bowl of chips. And a drink. Or ten. That’s why I was so heavy. Whatever. Ralph didn’t seem to care. Ralph liked to drink too. Wait. Why was I realizing this just now? Or was it old news? I repeated it in my mind. Ralph drank. This was not good. The two of us had to quit. But wait. Ralph. I should call Ralph. No, we were in a fight. No, we weren’t. He was working. Was he? I had to call him. I needed him. Shit. What was that about? I didn’t need anyone.
Cindy got down on her haunches and stared into my eyes, her green ones worried. “Look, it’s time to go. You’re getting eaten alive by blackflies. You have to get up now. You okay to do that?”
I lugged myself out of my twilight zone. “I think so. Look, I’m sitting up.” I brushed a leaf off my sleeve and ventured a smile. My mouth felt a little quivery, but I knew I would be up on my feet in a minute or two. Cindy bent over me and picked a twig out of my hair.
“You’re not cut out for this,” she said.
“No guff.”
“No one says ‘no guff’ anymore,” she said, making fun of how I had corrected her earlier. “But, if you still want to be a crime reporter, you’ll catch on. It takes a little practice.”
“Let’s go home,” I said. All the Buddhist practice in the world wouldn’t have prepared me for this kind of stuff.
“I’m not sure the police will let us leave. We were witnesses to a police shooting, and now there’ll be all kind of paperwork.”
I eased myself up, got my legs under me, and brushed off the bits of dirt the best I could. Fragments of leaves were embedded in the fabric of my socks. I picked at them. Bending over was always a challenge. I would diet after dinner. “Not my problem,” I said.
“No, you’re right,” said Kowalchuk. Where had he come from? “It’s my problem, along with many other problems. Let me take that bone from you, Cindy.” He gave her a fixed, cold stare. Daring her.
I hadn’t seen or heard him approach and wondered how such a huge man could move so silently over dried leaves.
She handed him the bag and slowly rolled the ripped latex glove off her hand like she was peeling off a condom, staring right back. “Sometimes these things break, especially when they come in contact with long, hard bones,” she said as she held Kowalchuk’s eye.
His eyebrow twitched. I wondered if this was his version of a belly laugh. I could see Andrechuk about twenty feet behind him, clamping her lips together to stop her from guffawing. The release of fear was turning us into comedians.
Suddenly, Cindy spun on her heel and took off into the forest, hips swaying, long legs striding. “Come on, Robin. Let’s hoof it.”
She was right. I felt an energy surge through my body. Must have been an adrenalin dump. There was nothing I wanted more than to get away from this crime scene. Did I say crime scene? Really? Is that what it was? Or was it a random bear having a random attack of insanity? Something felt way off to me.
I gave Kowalchuk an apologetic smile and carefully lifted one foot and then the other in the direction Cindy was flying. Well, look at that, I could move. My legs stomped robotically as I tramped through the woods in Cindy’s wake. She was making tracks. I guess she wanted to get her story written and submitted while it was still fresh in her mind. Time was of the essence; the afternoon was drawing to a close and the next issue’s deadline loomed large. But she wasn’t about to tap it out with one finger on her phone here in the woods and her iPad was back at the cottage.
I could hear Kowalchuk calling out to us, “Girls, wait.” Cindy’s back froze. She would not be called a “girl.”
Kowalchuk, as if sensing his politically incorrect statement, amended it to, “Ladies, wait. We will need statements from you.”
Of course, “ladies” was worse than “girls” to Cindy. She raised her right hand and flipped him the bird.
“Okay, no problem…,” Kowalchuk’s voice drifted off. “We’ll meet you back at the cottage.”
I hurried through the leaves and new undergrowth, trying to catch up to Cindy. I scanned the forest for dark beasts bashing through the trees. The whole bear incident was completely unbelievable, so unusual. I had never ever heard of a bear with the single-minded purpose of attacking one person. Sharks, maybe. I had heard of sharks going exclusively after women who
were on their monthly period, but Niemchuk was not female and a bear was not a shark. That bear was definitely going straight for him. All the other people were ignored. The bear wanted Niemchuk and Niemchuk alone. Poor guy. He must have been terrified, seeing that huge animal charging at him, fangs gleaming. He’d probably have night terrors for years. I was now on top of the knoll I had clambered over before I saw the bear crashing through the bush and stopped to look over my shoulder. In the distance, the police formed a desolate crowd, gathered around two brownish lumps on the ground, a headless torso and a dead bear.
Yes, they would have paperwork.
I briefly wondered what my editor, Shirley Hay Hair, would say about all of this. Should I call her? This was about as far away from a real estate deal as one could get. I plodded along and imagined myself in a face-to-face with her. I could see her, stubbing out her cigarette against the metal rim of her garbage can, bending over deeply so that her cleavage was visible for all to see and saying, “Oh-h-h-h, it sure is hot in here.” And I would, once again, grab her coffee mug and splash it on smouldering bits of paper. Sometimes it was hard to permeate through Shirley’s steaming sexuality. But I thought the dead bear and the headless torso might catch her attention before she flounced off to rub up against Doug, Cindy’s editor, to confer about what the two of us had stumbled into. No, I didn’t think I’d tell Shirley a thing. Not yet. I had to sort this out in my mind.
I was breathless as I chased after Cindy in the woods. She was practically skipping through the forest. That girl, okay, not a girl, loved a story. “Cindy,” I called. “Cindy! Wait up. Slow down. You’ll hurt yourself. Trip or something.” I was gasping. She glanced briefly over her shoulder and waved, smiled gaily, and continued on her mission. She reached the densest part of the woods, right at the beginning of the trail, and parted branches with hurried abandon, trying to get into the clearing, to a cell signal. Maybe she had been scared as well and couldn’t wait to get into the light. Naw, she just loved a story. I concentrated on where I was putting my feet, looking down, so I didn’t trip on a rock or root.