by David Haynes
After another thirty minutes they branched right, descending once again into the Sitka forest. The trail they used was largely made by their own feet and those of the previous occupiers. It wasn’t exactly an asphalt highway, but even after heavy snow they knew every bump and boulder on it. In some cases, intimately.
From above, the cabin was hidden beneath the giant canopies of the Sitka spruce, and from below it disappeared in flickering shadows cast by the trees. Not that anyone came this way. The nearest town – Big Six – was thirty miles away by canoe on the Tanana, or an arduous and terrible fifty-mile hike. It meant that when the river froze, the isolation was complete.
They dropped into the clearing, their shed’s timber flank appearing first.
“Home sweet home,” Lisa called out, pushing past the sled team.
Jonesy guided the sled to the shed and unfastened the harness from himself and then Lad. There was no need for anything further to be said. They both knew what they had to do next. Lisa had already gone inside the cabin and would be building the fire in the burner. At this time of year they allowed it to go out when they were away, but soon they would keep it burning day and night. One side of the shed, the sheltered part, was full of seasoned timber ready for just that task. Another lesson learned the hard way last year.
Lad stretched, yawned and lay down in the corner of the shed. Only when the weather was at its absolute worst would he spend more than a few seconds in the cabin. He put his nose into his tail and curled around, keeping his eyes fixed on Jonesy and the meat.
Jonesy untied the first sack and lifted the carcass onto one of the hooks he had boiled clean that morning. He hung it from the rafters and set to work butchering the animal. Field dressing and then preparing the meat had been one of the most important lessons taught to him in their first season here. He was still no expert, their hunting skills weren’t that great, but he had butchered enough to know what lay ahead.
He smiled as he used his knife to separate the meat from the bone. There was no better feeling than this. The clarity of purpose that came from the simple principle of trying to stay alive was invigorating and deeply satisfying. Nothing could be taken for granted. That knowledge, that reality, was beautiful and horrific. In equal measures.
*
Lad ate his meal with as much grace as usual. It took him less than ten seconds to see off a portion of raw meat mixed with the last of his dried food. Although he attempted to show only a passing interest in the preparation of the carcass, he had not once taken his eyes off Jonesy as he worked.
“You could have at least tasted it, you ingrate,” Jonesy said.
He had worked slowly, ensuring all of the meat was harvested. Once it was butchered, he took it to the cache in stages. Lad followed him on each leg. Over the next few days Lisa would start processing it, deciding which pieces to brine, to fat-cap or to smoke.
The cache was no more than a shed on stilts. To keep the bears from climbing up and into the store, he had wrapped the wooden legs in shiny aluminum siding. That modification was installed following another harsh lesson last year. A grizzly, a lone boar, had come in and out of camp last year and despite Jonesy’s best efforts he had been unable to deter it. It had been unafraid of him. Its presence should have served as a warning to Jonesy, to protect their food supply. That was all the bear wanted – food – and the cache was an easier target than the humans.
Grizzlies weren’t the best climbers but they were perfectly capable if they needed to. The boar had climbed halfway up the stilts and simply used its massive weight to push the cache over. Everything they had hunted, preserved and pickled had spilled onto the ground for the bear to take. It had cleared them out of food overnight. That act was as devastating as the consequences it wrought. Jonesy still felt a wave of guilt whenever he went inside the cache. It was his fault the bear had been able to take their food.
By the time he finished and walked inside, the cabin dusk was giving way to night and the temperature was plummeting. He barely noticed it. He had the tenderloin in his hands. He held it above his head like a trophy.
“I got meat,” he announced. “I got real meaty meat.”
Lisa looked up, smiling. The cabin was warm and the glow from the stove cast her in bronze. She had chopped the mushrooms and a pan of potatoes bubbled away on the top.
“My hero,” she said, shaking her head. “Did you forget who shot it, Mr Jones?”
He had already rinsed the meat in a bucket of fresh water outside and now he placed it on a waiting plate beside the stove. Lisa was a better shot than he was but it had taken a very long time before he conceded the fact.
“Just give me the pretense of being a man, for a while at least, huh?”
She pushed a good-sized log into the flames and closed the door. “You’ll always be a man, Mr Jones. My man.” She stood up and pulled him toward her. “Now kiss me, you...you man.”
He smiled and held her close. He had always known she was a strong woman, but just how strong had never been truly revealed until they came out here.
She pulled away, picking something out of his beard with her fingers. She held it out between them. “Caribou?” she said.
He moved his head back. A small piece of bloody tissue hung from her forefinger. He leaned forward and licked it off.
“Tasty,” he said.
“A couple of years ago, I probably would have hurled at that,” she said. “Now, it just makes me hungry.”
Jonesy laughed and put the pan on the top of the stove. He seasoned the tenderloin with salt and plenty of black pepper, rubbing rendered-down fat into the flesh before putting it into the pan. He added home-grown garlic, a handful of chives from the plot and the mushrooms. The tenderloin sizzled as it hit the pan, leaking blood and juice into the sauce. He waited a few seconds, allowing a crust to form, and then turned it. It had taken a while but Lisa had finally learned to enjoy the taste of rare meat as much as he did. It was no small feat given that she had been a vegetarian for most of her life.
“Smells like heaven,” she said, looking over his shoulder. “I’ll fix these.” She grabbed the pan of potatoes and drained them outside.
The cabin had two levels. The stove was to one side of the downstairs room. It served as their only form of heating and on its wide, flat top they cooked all of their food and made coffee. Facing it were two easy chairs and a couch that creaked and complained every time Jonesy looked at it. It was a good place to watch the fire though, and flames beat a TV for entertainment every time. It never showed a re-run, for one thing. A small wooden table on the other side with four mismatched chairs completed the room. Up above was the mezzanine where they slept on a bed that at least four people could find room in. It was homemade, not by Jonesy but by the previous owner, just like the cabin that housed it.
He took the meat out and put it to one side before adding a splash of Lisa’s broth and a dash of bourbon to the pan. He could feel his mouth watering.
“What say we open a bottle of that...that...brew we got from town?” he asked. What it was exactly, Jonesy couldn’t say, but it tasted vaguely of apples and smelled of pine. Each mouthful clawed its way down your throat like it didn’t want to be swallowed.
Lisa shrugged. “If you want, but don’t blame me when you need to go outside in the night. Snow’s coming down heavier than ever.”
He looked out of the window. He could see nothing except his own flickering reflection cast by the kerosene lamp. Beyond that was a vague, sparkling grayness. Or was that the flecks of silver in his beard? He looked away. He might look older than he ever had but he felt younger.
He sliced the meat into portions and plated up. It was like butter. Lisa took the lamp and put it on the table between them.
“Thank you, caribou,” she said, raising a glass of apple juice.
Jonesy raised his cup of moonshine and took a small sip. It stung his lips. The sensation was a contrast to the meat. The first bite was almost orgasmic. He chewed slowly
, savoring each and every drop of juice that ran down his throat. A few years ago, a steak would have been a common occurrence, eaten maybe twice a week. It had been just over a month since he had last tasted meat as fresh as this.
The silence stretched, leaving them with just the sound of the elements outside and the wood spitting in the stove.
Lisa put her fork down, taking a break from eating. “You want to take a trip into town tomorrow? Pick up the satphone?” she asked.
He looked up and shrugged. “Sure, Lad needs more food too.” He swallowed a mouthful. “That’s all we need, I reckon.”
Lisa shook her head. “I’ll make a list. I don’t want to run out of anything.”
He laughed, almost choking on his food. “Run out? Have you seen the cache?”
“I’ve seen it but a couple of sacks of rice, some canned beans and corned beef won’t go amiss. Don’t you need some batteries for the flashlights too? And what about...”
He held his hands up. He didn’t want to argue the fact. There was more than enough food to last them, but if it gave Lisa a sense of security to have those things then a trip into town was a small price to pay. He owed her that, and more.
The way winter charged toward them like a hungry bear made her anxious. She tried not to show it but he knew what her little nervous cough meant. The heavier the snow fell, the more she coughed. He also knew her anxiety was his fault. His bad planning, his lack of preparation last year. His naivety. The word ‘unequipped’ was a good fit for him back then in almost every single way, and it cost them.
“Okay, make a list and I’ll take the pelts and antlers in for trade. You coming along?”
He would need Lad and the sled to bring the provisions back from Big Six. He knew Lisa despised going into town. Last spring, facing each other had been tough; facing anyone else, even now, was still too much.
She put her fork down. For the most part she looked the same as she always had. The dark chestnut hair was still the same shade, no trace of silver, unlike his own. She had always been lithe but there was a new strength in her body, a firmness that had developed in eighteen months living in the bush.
“I’ll stay,” she said. “I want to re-chink around the door and check the roof.”
He nodded. The cabin had been chinked in the summer with clay dug from the river bank and hauled up in three heavy loads. The roof was as strong as it had ever been. But he knew they were just excuses so she wouldn’t have to go with him.
“I can leave Lad,” he said. “I’ll leave the gear on the bank, come back up and we can go...”
She frowned at him. “It’s fine, Mark. If you leave him here, he’ll be bored. He needs the exercise. I’ll be fine.”
Calling him by his first name was a signal, the second fine was dismissive. That was the end of the matter as far as she was concerned. He sometimes had to remind himself that she wasn’t the same woman who held his hand as they left their apartment eighteen months ago with tears rolling down her cheeks. She had her own rifle and was a better hunter than he would ever be. She had a head-start, of course. Her father took the whole family on hunting trips when she was a little girl, but Jonesy had no idea how good she actually was. They probably would have lived their whole life in the cities of America without it ever coming up.
When he watched her work, or lay beside her on the snow as she stared down the sight of her Winchester, he thought how much easier it appeared for her than it did for him. It had been more than twenty years since she looked down a rifle sight but some skills were not easily forgotten.
He stabbed a piece of meat and held it up to the light. “Good, huh?”
She nodded and closed her eyes. “The best.”
3
Lad took the sled on his own this time. They crossed the spring, walked across the plateau and then edged down through the Sitka toward the river.
More snow had fallen overnight and any tracks made yesterday had been obliterated. On the sled were three caribou pelts and three sets of antlers to go with them. It would be enough to get them everything they needed.
The canoe was upturned where he had left it following his last trip into town. There was probably no reason to conceal it but he hid it anyway. Old city-dwelling habits were hard to forget where personal property was concerned. He dragged it out of the thicket and pushed it onto the gravel foreshore. Once he had checked it over to make sure no new holes had appeared, he loaded the pelts on board. He pushed the sled into the space vacated by the canoe and pulled dead branches over the top.
Lad jumped into the canoe and stood at the stern, watching the water for fish. He jerked his head from side to side and whined softly.
“No swimming!” Jonesy said, giving the canoe a shove and then jumping in. The Tanana flowed for over five hundred and eighty miles through the Alaskan wilderness. In the summer, the volume of water was at its height with numerous glaciers emptying into it. But by the early winter, the river became a wide and shallow stream. He had been forced to drag the canoe along the gravel when the water disappeared completely on other trips.
He paddled slowly upstream, eddy-hopping and ferry-gliding, using the river’s own power to propel him from one side of the river to the other. Tamarack, Sitka and birch grew in abundant clumps up the valley sides toward the pewter sky. It had stopped snowing about the same time he made coffee this morning but it wouldn’t stay away for long.
From experience he knew it would take nearly four hours of paddling before he reached the town. Apart from the occasional honking departure of geese and the slice of his paddle through the silty water, the world was silent. It seemed the fish had departed too for Lad soon sat back and watched the riverbank pass by. For brief moments, his nose elevated high in the air and he would emit grumbling whines at something neither of them could see.
Jonesy settled into the regular pattern of movement. When they left New York, a lot of their friends had asked – some tongue in cheek, others not so – what they were running away from. Why were they heading off to the middle of nowhere when they had everything they could possibly need right there on the doorstep?
He had told them, and himself, that he wasn’t running away from. He was running to. He’d always had itchy feet and moving state not once but four times in three years had only given him psoriasis, not satisfaction. The moves hadn’t dug deep enough. He needed more. Actually he needed less. Less stress, less traffic, less noise.
The vocalization of his perpetual state of unrest had given Lisa a headache. Quite why he felt the need to keep his feet moving, he didn’t know. He still didn’t know and he wasn’t convinced the itch had been well and truly vanquished. He knew he would have to stop sooner or later, put down real roots and let them crawl into the soil. But was this the place to do it? After last winter, it was a miracle they were still here at all. It was testament to their resolve, both of them, that they hadn’t packed up and gone back.
Was it resolve or was it something else? Embarrassment, fear maybe? No, that wasn’t it. Shame. Not of failure, not that, but of trying to face people knowing what they had gone through, what they had done.
A long meandering curve stretched out in front, giving a fleeting view of the snow-covered peaks of the Alaska Range. Being here made him feel more grounded than he had felt before. Just standing on the dirt in their clearing, feeling the unshakable strength of the earth penetrating the skin on the soles of his feet, was unlike any other sensation. It had taken a long time to appreciate it, to exist in that moment and breathe. Commuting more than two hours a day through heavy traffic hadn’t given him the opportunity to feel that before. It had given him only the opportunity to feel frustrated. Next, next, next, his mind would demand of him with a rasping, reptile hiss each and every day. It was the same for everyone but that didn’t mean he had to like it. It didn’t mean he didn’t feel guilty about getting away from it either. At least initially.
There was something else he felt guilty about too. Lisa. He hadn’t exactly
dragged her around the country by the hair. But then again, he hadn’t backed off when he saw that oh-so-familiar flash of here we go again in her eyes.
Lisa was a teacher, a good one, someone who thrived on the familiar, close engagement that being a permanent fixture brought. After a few years of moving from one state to another, she finally admitted defeat and went on a list of supply teachers. One day here, a few there. No consistency, no ownership or responsibility. Perfect for some. Not for her.
But that’s why she had done it. She’d gone on that list so she would never have to feel that disappointed abandonment that gnawed at her with a job half-finished. A kid struggling in math, a family on the verge of breakdown or a child with a spark for English, it was what she loved. It was what he had taken her away from with his selfish desire to keep moving, to never stand still. But she had gone with him each time. She had come to the middle of nowhere and given all that up and more. She had done it because she loved him.
The shingle beach at Big Six appeared through a hazy cloud that shrank back from the river. Lad put his front paws on the bow deck, whined and then looked back at Jonesy. The dog was eager to be on dry land again, to be working. It was as if strength and energy bubbled away inside him permanently, straining to be used. If the supply was exhaustible, Lad had never shown any clue that he was close to his limit.
Jonesy still woke in the night, listening to the panic in the irregular off-key symphony of his heartbeat. Anxiety caused by uncertainty. Those nights had grown rarer over the last year but they still came. Now they weren’t about how to fix the roof or make the windows watertight again. It wasn’t about the heavy, padded paws that sometimes prowled around the cabin either. It was about food. Phantom hunger pains stabbed at him in dreams, gnawing and sucking at the marrow in his bones. However cold it was outside, the dreams always woke him in a cold sweat. But the dreams were not as bad as the reality had been. Nothing could ever compare to that.