Surviving Bear Island

by Paul Greci

  I hit the clearing with the rocks and veered left, hoping the bear was still busy. The raincoat that I carried the fish in had loosened up some and was sagging in the back but it was still around my waist.

  The top of the middle pillar towered about ten feet off the ground. I dropped my bowl, stuffed a few rocks in my pocket, grabbed onto some brush and climbed up there.

  If I could climb this, then so could the bear, but at least I’d be above it if it tried. I stood on top of the pillar and looked upslope. I took tiny breaths to lessen the pain in my side, but even those jabbed me.

  I watched as the bear finished the salmon. It kept licking the ground and sniffing around. I was hoping it’d just go back the way it’d come, but then it headed toward me and the pillars.

  I crouched down, trying to make myself as small as possible, to become part of the rock. As it came closer I could see that it was a skinny, ragged bear. I didn’t know what I’d do if the bear stopped at the pillars, but was hoping for an idea when the time came to act.

  Noise hadn’t worked with this bear if it was the same one that threatened me at Silver Camp. Banging on a bowl and shouting had brought it closer. And back on the ridge-top it hadn’t even looked up when I’d shouted.

  Rocks had helped. I wished I had more. And, I really wished I had a big fire between me and the bear. But I didn’t.

  I couldn’t die now. Not by the claws and jaws of some old, deaf bear that probably wouldn’t even last the winter. Not after surviving this long and being this close to the Sentinels.

  Every nerve ending in my body was on red-alert survival mode sending messages to my brain. Instinct told me to run or hide or fight. And the reasoning part of my brain took this information in and sat with it, waiting to act until the time was right.

  Alert but calm, I thought. Alert but calm.

  The bear advanced, almost leisurely, seeming intent on following the scent trail. It stopped and sniffed around where I had fallen. Twice more, I saw it stop, rise up and sniff the air. But in the end, it kept coming.

  Be the rock, I thought. Just be the rock. I was still crouched and my knees were starting to ache but I didn’t want to move, couldn’t move, not now. And my side throbbed with every tiny breath. I felt a tug at the back the raincoat carrying the fish and heard little plopping noises and my heart sank. I knew what had just happened. The fish. My fish. I’m not sure how much of it—maybe all of it—had just tumbled down the rocks onto the ground below. I didn’t want to turn my head to look because movement was the last thing I wanted the bear to sense.

  At the base of the pillars the bear paused, flared its nostrils, then sniffed the ground, and circled the rock formation. Behind me I could hear licking and chewing as it devoured the fish that had fallen from my raincoat. It circled around and stopped just shy of the base of the middle pillar. It pawed at my bowl, then let out a low growl as it sniffed the air again. Twice, the bear slunk away from the pillars and circled back.

  All the while I crouched, motionless.

  Don’t come up here. Don’t. I willed my thoughts onto the bear. You stay down there. I’ll stay up here. Just leave.

  Leave.

  Leave.

  Leave.

  The bear turned away from the pillars and I rose, a rock in one hand, my spear in the other, and stood absolutely still, like a statue. An extension of the rock. I could feel the raincoat hanging free. It was empty. Completely empty.

  The bear shuffled back as before but seemed more agitated, like maybe it sensed a change. I wished I hadn’t moved, but I needed to be ready.

  It approached the middle pillar, and then backed off, uttering a low growl. And I just stood there. I knew if I did anything now, the fight was on. And I didn’t want to fight a bear. Especially an old bear that wasn’t hibernating. A desperate bear who might do desperate things.

  It advanced again, remaining on all four legs and lifting its head as it came forward all the way to the middle pillar. The bear started to rise up on its hind legs.

  I cocked my arm and let the fist-sized stone fly, pain searing my side. A dead-center shot to the snout. The bear growled, then stood all the way up and kept coming, its big paws and jaws closing the distance.

  I thrust my spear, jabbing the bear in the eye and twisting with both arms as hard as I could. The bear made some kind of horrible screaming sound and pulled back. I held on to the spear with the bear twisting its head and shaking it. I was losing my footing, being drawn off the rock, and my side was exploding with pain like there was a demon hatching out of it.

  Then the spear popped free—without the hook. The momentum pitched me backwards and my feet caught only air. I reached my arms forward, still gripping the spear and it caught the top of the pillar and I pulled myself back up, then stood. Below me, threads of fishing line dangled from the bear’s bloody eye socket. I threw another rock, hammering the bear in the nose. My third throw missed the bear’s hind end by inches as it started to retreat.

  My heart beat in my throat and roared in my ears. I was wet—wet with sweat from head to toe.

  I sat on the pillar, my legs hanging over the edge, and watched the bear disappear over the ridge. Energy drained from me like water rushing down a river. I bowed my head, and pulled air into my lungs in short breaths. I covered my face with my hands.

  I sat and breathed—nothing else. I wished I could breathe my way home. I closed my eyes. Images of my mom, then my dad, flashed in my mind. Then I saw the salmon, the deer, the berries, the otters, the shelters I’d built. I felt the rise and fall of my chest, the steady burn in my side, and the warm air pushing past my hands after it left my nose.

  After a while, I started to shiver from lack of movement. All that sweat had cooled off.

  I’d need a fire soon. Maybe I’d just build one at the base of this rock; that way if the bear came back I could scramble up here again.

  I raised my head, and glanced at the end of the hookless spear darkened by the bear’s blood.

  I was alive, living.

  No matter what happens, I thought, no matter what, even if the bear comes back, everything will be okay.

  THE ACCIDENT

  When I surfaced, I spit water and sucked air. Pieces of red fiberglass bobbed in the water. I searched for the orange of my dad’s life vest but didn’t see it. Maybe he was just out of sight in the trough of a nearby wave, or maybe he’d started for shore. Then another wave pushed me under.

  CHAPTER 34

  THE NEXT day I hiked through the low notch at the back of the thumb-shaped bay and then through the muskeg above the Sentinels.

  Now, as I stood on the gravel beach, so finely ground that it was almost sand in places, with the big trees behind me, I let out a sigh. The water was glassy. I wished it was being carved up by a boat.

  Yeah, I’d made it this far, but thanks to the bear I had no fish and no more hooks. And my right side ached whenever I bent or twisted or reached, or if I took a deep breath. An ugly purple bruise the size and shape of a hotdog had popped up on my ribs right where I’d fallen on the bowl. And my lighter had sparked its last fire last night.

  I turned from the protected cove, crossed the most recent strand line, and walked into the trees. Smooth beach gravel covered the spit that housed the Sentinels—flat ground with little brush under a canopy of enormous trees. Trees my mom loved. Trees my dad loved.

  I looked toward the sky. And I waved.

  Yeah, waved.

  Just in case Mom could see me. And Dad, well, he wasn’t here.

  I walked to the spot where Dad and I had pitched our tent. Then the other spot where our kitchen tarp had been.

  Back then I hadn’t thought much about our possessions. The tent, the sleeping pads, the sleeping bags, the small cook-stove, the tarps, the store-bought food. There it was, food, again entering my mind.

  Without food this drop-dead beautiful place was a place to drop dead. A lonely place to die where birds and bears and bugs would pick me apart. It didn’
t really matter how much my parents loved this place or what they’d done here. What mattered was now. Right now.

  I tried to grasp the feeling of peace I’d experienced yesterday after I’d fought the bear, the feeling that no matter what happened everything would be okay, but it kept slipping from my mind.

  And I thought, maybe this is how it is. That sometimes you can feel like everything will be okay but you can’t feel like that all the time. And if you can just remember that you once felt that way, if you can just keep the idea alive, then maybe the feeling will come back again. Kind of like keeping a fire going just enough so there are always coals to restart it.

  I put my stuff at the base of the biggest Sentinel, planning to make my shelter there. I was really hoping I wouldn’t have to build another shelter. That I’d see my dad, or if not him, then meet some people and they’d take me back so I could start my new life as an orphan. It’d be easy to die here. But I didn’t want easy. I wanted life.

  Scattered high clouds were invading the blue sky. A slight breeze blew from the south.

  I noticed a dark spot just above the strand line and walked over to it. I reached down and ran my hand across the rocks and it came back coated with gray.

  Ash.

  Ash from a fire. My heart did a little dance.

  There were older strand lines above the ash-covered rocks so this spot would eventually get wiped clean. I saw some little dents in the gravel. Footprints that would be erased by a higher tide. I stared at the fire-darkened patch of gravel, like it had a secret to tell me.

  “Whoever made this, who are you? Where are you? When will you be back?”

  The tides, what did I know about the tides? They cycled with the moon, like a monthly cycle. So, at certain parts of the cycle the tide would come in higher than during other parts of the cycle. So, probably this fire was made within the last month. Maybe two days ago. Maybe two weeks ago. And it’d probably be gone after this cycle’s highest tide.

  But someone had been here. And twisted up, just above the strand line behind the fire was something gray. I walked a few steps, crouched down and scooped up a thin piece of cloth. An old-looking gray, salt-hardened bandana.

  My heart pounded in my head.

  My dad’s face invaded my brain. He always carried a bandana, used it as a handkerchief. And he had a bunch of different colored ones. I pictured him sitting here. I cradled the bandana in both hands.

  “Dad. Is this yours?” I held the bandana up to the sky. “Is it?” I shouted.

  I waited for his voice, but was met with silence.

  It could be anyone’s. But, it could be his.

  I pictured a boat coming and rescuing him. And him being so excited that he forgot he’d left his bandana on the beach.

  But then wouldn’t he be searching the coast for me? I’d spent most of my time at the back of Hidden Bay and then tucked into Deer Camp and Silver Camp. And I’d had to walk inland many times to avoid cliffs, so a searching boat could’ve missed me easily. But they would’ve seen the yellow spray skirt I’d tied to the top of the stick. And surely they’d come back here. And they’d see the word ‘Sentinels’ I’d left in rocks at Fish Camp and Silver Camp. I was so depressed when I left Deer Camp that I didn’t leave a sign.

  I started to cool down from lack of movement, so I stuffed the bandana into my pocket and walked through the trees to a trickle of a stream I remembered using as a water source.

  I rinsed the bandana with fresh water and rung it out. Then I filled my bowl and was making my way back to my gear when I saw the junk pile bumping up from the forest floor.

  Used to be a sauna, I remembered.

  I set the bowl down and walked over to the pile. Images of me and Dad standing on this site filled my brain. I shook my head, tried to clear my thoughts. I needed to focus on the present if I wanted any chance of having a future.

  I grabbed a moss-covered board and tossed it aside. I grabbed another one and it broke apart in my hands. So I just started grabbing the spongy boards one at a time, and if they didn’t break apart, I set them aside. At first a knife stabbed my side every time I reached or pulled, but over time it turned into an ache that was just there, like the knife was just stuck in me for good.

  I salvaged eleven two-by-fours, each about eight feet long. I hauled these to the biggest Sentinel, and then went back to the pile.

  What was left was so rotten I couldn’t even tell where one board started and another ended. Using my feet, I pushed the wood mush aside. Then my boot slid on something firm.

  I stooped down, pushed the rest of the mush away with my hands and saw ridged metal.

  “The roof,” I said, “Part of the roof of the sauna.”

  The junk pile also turned up half a dozen plastic five-gallon buckets, but the metal roofing, a single four-by-eight-foot sheet peppered with holes, was by far the most valuable item.

  I leaned two ten-foot-long deadfall poles against the big tree starting about six feet up the trunk, spaced about three feet apart.

  I used the last of my rope to lash a two-by-four to the poles four feet down from the big tree. Then I put the metal roofing between the two-by-four and the tree and used the rest of the two-by-fours to complete the roof.

  I covered the roof and floor with spruce boughs, lined the base of the shelter opposite the tree with rocks and built fire rings on both ends of the shelter, which was about eight feet long and six feet tall at its tallest point against the tree.

  I could almost hear LF and RF starting to nag me. But the truth was, if I couldn’t get the flint to work, they wouldn’t exist. On the far sides of the fire rings I stacked piles of boughs waist high in semicircles and weighted them with rocks, hoping to keep the wind out.

  Dad would love my shelter. Love that I’d taken that pile of junk and turned it into something useful.

  But hunger gnawed at me, and lack of energy slowed my work.

  I pulled the flint from my pocket. Sparks. Sparks. Sparks. I knew it’d shoot sparks but I had to have the right material to transform those sparks into a fire. I wished the lighter still worked. If I could get one more flame from it that’s all I’d need, but I’d tried and tried—that puppy was dead.

  I looked up at the hemlock trees, focusing on branches that didn’t have any needles. I knew the tiny ends of those branches worked great when dry and touched to a flame but how could I get them to do their thing with just sparks? I ripped some dead branches from the trees and made a knee-high pile in front of my shelter. I broke the spindly ends off the branches and rubbed the tiny twigs between my hands. Little bits of brown and off-white wood particles sprinkled onto my dad’s old raincoat, which I’d spread below me for that very reason. I kept pulverizing the tiny twigs until I’d used them all. Then I took a branch about as big around as a paper-towel core and started shaving it, letting my blade barely touch it. I wanted shavings so thin that they’d crumble when I picked them up.

  “Thin. Thin. Thin. Thin.”

  Back at the wall tent I always thought things were so primitive, so basic. But not anymore. I mean, things were simple out there, but anything we wanted, we could just bring it from the house. Need some really dry fire-starting material? Just let it sit behind the wood stove for a few days, that’d suck the moisture out of it, or grab some dryer lint. They didn’t call it a dryer for nothing. It dried things. And dry things caught fire a lot easier than damp things, especially if you’re starting a fire from a spark.

  Curly shavings were piling up on the raincoat and mixing in with the pulverized bits from the twigs, all in the fading daylight. I scooped the shavings and wood bits up with two hands and packed them together like I was making a snowball. I set the ball down into the center of what I hoped would become RF. It sprung outward when I released my hands but still held its shape. I molded the mess back together, then stuck my finger straight down into it, making a little depression. This looked as close to a nest of dryer lint as I’d ever gotten.

  I stood up
and stretched my arms over my head and took a deep breath. And I was struck again by the fact that I was here—that I’d made it here on my own. I felt a shiver go up my spine, and then tingles at the back of my nose. Would anyone come? And, would they come in time?

  I knelt in front of the wood shavings, and positioned the flint so the tip rested in the depression I’d made.

  See the fire. Just see it happen. Believe it will happen.

  I closed my eyes and saw sparks, hundreds of sparks. Thousands. Like fireworks. Exploding from the flint. Raining everywhere. Starting fires everywhere. I heard the flames crackling and spitting.

  I opened my eyes and ran the knife up and down on the flint. At first a couple sparks fell and died in the wood-shaving nest. Then I got the angle right and I was getting a shower of sparks with every swipe of the blade. The nest started to part in the middle as the flint pressed into it, but I kept running the knife faster and faster.

  A thin wisp of smoke rose from the side of the nest and I dropped the flint leaned forward and blew gently. A red glow answered, followed by more smoke, then nothing.

  My shoulders collapsed forward. All those sparks for one tiny wisp of smoke that didn’t even turn into a fire. I cupped the shavings and wood particles in my hands, squeezed them into a ball, set them down and rained more sparks onto them.

  Come on, I thought. Just this one time. All I need is one flame. I closed my eyes and just kept running the knife up and down the flint. In my mind I saw sparks, or maybe I was seeing images of the real things through my eyelids. Part of me didn’t believe the flint would work, and part of me felt like I was failure because I had this fire-starting tool and couldn’t get it to work. And all the time I just kept running the knife on the flint, keeping my eyes closed. I could feel the wood shavings brushing my knuckles as my hand moved.

  “Fire, fire, fire,” I started singing.

  Light of life in my soul

  Warm me with flame

  Make me whole