by BJ Bourg
Charlie reached behind his seat and handed me a smooth slab of stone. “It’s not fine china, but it’ll have to do.”
“You thought of everything, didn’t you?”
“I ordered up two Cokes, but they didn’t get here yet, so I don’t know what we’re going to drink.”
We had fire, but nothing to boil the water in. I shrugged. “I’d rather get sick than die of thirst.”
“I’d rather have the Coke,” Charlie said.
I retrieved the two empty water bottles we’d been carrying and filled them in the river. I held the bottles up to the sunlight. They looked crystal clear. “Looks fine,” I said and handed Charlie a bottle.
Charlie had divided the rabbit into equal portions. I grabbed what was mine and began eating the slivers of meat. It seemed like forever since I’d eaten hot food. Although it wasn’t flavored, I was positive it was the best meat I’d ever eaten. While the rabbit had seemed huge when I killed it, the amount of meat it produced wasn’t indicative of its size, and I wondered if it would be enough to fill our bellies. Between bites of rabbit, I ate the pears I’d stuffed into my pockets earlier. Before long, I could no longer feel hunger pangs and I even felt a little stuffed.
“God, that was good,” I said.
Charlie was finishing his and nodded. “Worst rabbit I ever ate, but it tasted better than the best rabbit I ever ate.”
I slid off the rock and sat flat on the ground, using the rock as a backrest. I stretched my legs and allowed my eyes to slip shut for a minute. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think we were living the dream.”
“I don’t even care if we’re never found now,” Charlie said. “We have food, water, shelter, fire, and a beautiful backyard. What more could a man ask for?”
I opened my eyes and stiffened up. “And pets.”
Charlie turned to where I was looking. A monster black bear was making his way across the river, walking straight for us. He would take a couple of steps, pause as the rushing water sprayed foam against his jet black fur, test the wind with his nostrils, and then continue toward us. He didn’t look scared of us or the fire. Before I could do anything Charlie had sprung up and made a mad dash for the deepest recesses of the cave.
“Get in here, Abe,” Charlie yelled. “That bear means business.”
Remembering what I’d read, I stood on top of the rock and waved my arms high into the air and let out a war cry. It was so loud I even scared myself a little, but the bear didn’t hesitate. He continued coming toward me like he’d been commanded to do so. Everything I’d read told me to stand my ground, so I snatched up my spear and screamed as loud as I could. My throat ached from the strain. The bear was only a dozen feet away—and closing fast—when I stabbed at it with the edge of my spear. The tip of the spear poked the left side of his shoulder, but he didn’t even flinch. He walked right through it and pawed angrily at my leg.
My heart raced. I jumped off the rock and backed away. My body trembled. A wooden arrow shot right passed me and ricocheted off the bear’s furry shoulder. The bear made grunting noises and continued forward.
Desperate, I screamed and swung the spear at his head, but the stick glanced off his thick skull. Letting out a terrifying growl, the bear lunged forward. I jumped back, tripped on a loose rock, and landed hard on my left shoulder. I scrambled to my feet. I don’t know when I drew her, but Jezebel seemed to just appear in my hand. The bear swatted at my face with his left paw. I covered up with my right forearm and took the full brunt of the blow on the arm. Although the paw hadn’t hit my head, the sheer force of the blow was enough to rattle my teeth and send me flying to the side. I scrambled backward on my butt, eyes wide, focused on the bear. I continued moving until my back smashed into a tree and stopped me dead in my tracks. I gasped. The bear was stalking straight for me. This was it—I was dead.
I dragged myself to my feet and leaned against the tree. I held Jezebel out in front of me for one last stand. From the corner of my eye, I saw Charlie approaching stealthily from the bear’s right flank, spear in hand. He was too far away. The bear would be on me before Charlie could get within striking distance. I could almost smell its breath and braced myself for what was about to happen, ready to plunge Jezebel deep into the beast’s throat. If only I could hold it off long enough—
All of a sudden, the bear stopped and dropped his head, almost at my feet. There, spread all over the dry leaves and branches, were the entrails and what was left of the rabbit carcass. The bear began wolfing it down as though I didn’t even exist. I almost wet my pants as I crept around to the opposite side of the tree. I then backed deeper into the forest and gave the bear a wide berth as I made my way back to the cave. Once there, I collapsed to my knees near the fire, shaking. I kept a close watch on the bear as I knelt there.
Charlie’s eyes were wide. His mouth opened and closed several times, but nothing came out. He pointed down at my arm, gulped, and finally got out, “You…you’re bleeding.”
I glanced down at my forearm. There were three deep gashes on the outside of my right arm. Blood gushed from the lacerations to drip on the rocky ground. I saw a thin line of yellow fat under the skin. I grimaced.
“I need to close those wounds before you bleed to death.” Charlie rushed to his bag and returned with his first aid kit.
I kept glancing toward the bear. He finished eating all the rabbit’s body parts and then polished the rocks with his tongue. When he was done, he turned and ambled away, crossing the river and disappearing into the forest as though he hadn’t just tried to kill someone.
I stood on uncertain legs, real fear gripping my chest and constricting my breathing. I stumbled forward until I was standing over where the rabbit’s body parts had been.
“Get back here,” Charlie said.
“You’ve got to see this, Charlie.”
Charlie exited the cave with the first aid kit in hand and walked to where I stood. “Come sit down so I can clean your—”
“Look at those rocks. There’s absolutely no evidence a rabbit was ever here. Not even a drop of blood.”
Charlie shrugged. “So? Maybe he was hungry.”
“If that bear kills us and eats us, they’ll never find any trace of us. No one would ever know what happened to us. We wouldn’t be able to tell them about Brett. We’d just be like the others—gone without a trace.”
“Let’s not worry about that now,” Charlie said. “You’re dripping blood all over the rocks and that’s liable to attract more bears.”
Charlie pressed a piece of white gauze against my forearm and held it in place while guiding me toward the campfire. I followed reluctantly and sat on one of the large rocks. Charlie twisted the cap off a small bottle of alcohol and held it over my cuts.
“Get ready,” he said. “This’ll burn like the devil.”
I gritted my teeth, nodded for him to deliver the pain. Giving no thought to waste, Charlie splashed a healthy dose of the alcohol onto my cuts. I inadvertently gasped when I felt the burn. Sweat appeared on my forehead. The pain was so deep and searing it felt like it had penetrated my bones. Having endured a great deal of pain already in my short life—from fighting three rounds with a broken hand to getting my broken nose beat on for four rounds to ripping a thumbnail off during a grappling session—I appreciated the intensity of the burn.
“Do you want me to blow on it?” Charlie asked.
I shook my head. “Let me savor it. As long as I can still feel the pain I know I’m alive.”
“Dude, you’re just sick with your pain stuff.” Charlie tossed the bottle of alcohol back in the kit and then grabbed a tube of antibiotic cream. After squirting a healthy dose of the cream over the cuts, he pulled out more gauze. “This won’t be enough to wrap half your cuts.”
“I have that sleeping bag—it’s more of a blanket. Get it and cut a strip about this long”—I held my hands about three feet apart—“and you can tie it off to try and stop the bleeding.”
Charlie pu
lled the sleeping bag from my rucksack and began cutting it into strips.
“Hey, you just need one,” I said.
“For now, but we’ll need to change the dressing often so you don’t get some kind of crazy infection.” Charlie was able to make a dozen strips of bandage. He stowed away eleven of them and returned to me with one. Using some of the stuffing he’d removed from the sleeping bag, he wiped away the blood and ordered me to hold it over the cuts and elevate my arm.
“How do you know so much about this kind of thing?” I asked, following his orders. “I didn’t know you were studying to be a nurse.”
“Remember when you used to take fourth-hour PE with all your football buddies?”
I nodded.
“Among the other useless electives I signed up for was first aid class.”
“First aid?” I asked. “Why on earth would you take that?”
“I figured it would be an easy A, and I thought I’d get to practice CPR on some hot chicks.”
I laughed hysterically. “You didn’t think you’d get to practice on a real live girl?”
His face red, Charlie nodded. “Yep, call me stupid, but I really thought that. In fact, I thought it right up until they brought those ridiculous-looking half-bodied dummies into the room. I had even partnered with that Hailey girl.”
“From choir?”
“Yep, her.”
“She agreed to be your partner?” I asked, a bit skeptical.
Charlie nodded. “I was about to ask her if she wanted to get down on her back first when the teacher broke out those plastic mouthpieces. I thought about bailing right then, but it was too late.”
As Charlie finished dressing my arm, I gave some thought to the way the bear had acted. “You know Charlie, that bear wasn’t one bit afraid of me.”
“Neither would I be if I was that much bigger than you,” he said.
I squeezed my fist to test Charlie’s wrapping job. Pain shot up my arm. “It had nothing to do with the bear’s size. Bears are naturally afraid of humans, but that bear didn’t appear to have an ounce of fear.”
“What’s your point?” Charlie asked.
“Do you know when it is that bears lose their fear of humans?”
“When people start feeding them.”
“Exactly right. When people feed bears, it conditions the bears to associate humans with food. Instead of being afraid of people, they start seeking them out. In fact, most of the unprovoked bear attacks I’ve read about happened when a conditioned bear lost its fear of humans and some unsuspecting person got between him and his food.”
Charlie returned the first aid kit to his rucksack and threw several more logs on the fire. “What’s that got to do with your bear attack?”
“I think people have been feeding the bear.”
Charlie waved his arms around. “But who? We’re so deep in the backcountry there aren’t even any trails out here.” Charlie pointed to a footprint one of us had made earlier. “It’s probably the first time this patch of soft mud has ever seen the bottom of a human foot. I think a more likely theory is the bear never saw a human being before and he didn’t know he was supposed to be afraid of you.”
I shook my head. “Bears are born with a fear of humans. I’d be willing to bet our next three meals people have been feeding it. If I’m right, we’re closer to civilization than we thought.”
That immediately got Charlie’s attention. “You think so?”
“Based on how much noise he made walking through the rocks, I’m betting it’s the same bear we heard last night and this area is part of his home range.”
“But can’t a bear’s home range cover up to a hundred miles?”
“Not if the food source is abundant,” I said. “Out here, there’s so much food I’m betting he doesn’t wander more than five to ten miles.”
Charlie thought about this for a moment and his eyes lit up. “You think we’re five to ten miles away from civilization?”
I nodded.
Charlie walked out to the river. “Then why are we sitting here? Let’s get out there and find our way home.”
“One of us has to stay here and keep the fire going, just in case I’m wrong.” I joined Charlie and pointed across the river. “The bear came from there and then headed up river, so he must be getting food from one of those places.”
“But I thought you already scouted the area across the river?”
“I only went a mile-and-a-half. I’m betting if we take turns traveling five miles in all directions we’ll run into civilization.” I turned back toward the cave. “Let’s get a good night’s sleep and then I’ll take the first trip. I’ll head back across the—”
“You took the first trip today,” Charlie said. “I want to go next, but I want to head behind the cave. I feel like we’ll connect with some trails there.”
“Sounds good. While you’re gone, I’ll keep the fires going and do a little hunting close by.”
Charlie and I cleaned off the cooking area and the slabs of rock that served as our plates. Each time I picked up something with my right arm the ripped flesh would stretch and the pain would intensify. I couldn’t help but wonder if it would interfere with my aim tomorrow while hunting. If it did, we would be in trouble. I’d never practiced throwing left-handed, and Charlie couldn’t hit water with a knife if he dropped it in the ocean.
As though reading my mind, Charlie asked, “Hey, can you still hunt with your arm ripped in half like that?”
“Absolutely,” I said. “This is nothing but a scratch.”
When we were done cleaning up, we settled into the cave and made small talk while we waited for the sun to set. Just as night was falling, Charlie removed my old dressing by the light of the inside fire. “I want to clean it out to make sure it doesn’t get infected,” Charlie said.
“Yes, Mom.”
Charlie poured more alcohol on the deep cuts and it burned more than the first time. When the antibiotic cream had been applied and the new bandage was in place, we settled down for the night. Every now and then, one of us would get up and toss another log on the fire and then settle back on our rucksack. The orange glow cast eerie shadows around the cave.
“You know what would go good right now?” I asked, staring up at the ghosts dancing on the jagged ceiling.
“What’s that?”
“A horror story.” I went on to tell a story Dad had told me as a kid, but Charlie wouldn’t be outdone.
“I’ve got a story that’s scarier than that,” Charlie said. “And do you know why?”
“Why’s that?” I asked.
“Because it’s true.”
Charlie went on to tell the story about my earlier bear attack, except he inserted himself as the hero who killed the marauding bear and ate on it for a year. Somewhere along the way, as he went on to describe his many wild mountain adventures, I slipped into a deep slumber.
CHAPTER 14
I woke up early the next morning shivering. I looked over at the fires. Both of them had burned down to coals. I pushed off the ground and winced when the pain in my right arm reminded me about the bear attack. I tried to rub the cold out of my arms as I walked to the pile of firewood and fed both fires. The embers were so hot the branches burst into flames and immediately warmed the inside of the cave. I tossed a couple of big logs onto the fire and sat close, allowing the warmth to hug me like a loving mother who hadn’t seen her son in many days.
Charlie woke up soon after I did and pulled on his T-shirt and shoes. I grabbed a couple of pears from our stash and handed him one.
“Thanks.” Charlie took a bite and his eyes half closed as he chewed it. “I’m glad you found these.”
“I’ll run over and get some more later on, so we don’t run out.”
Charlie studied my face. “Are you hot?”
I shook my head. “I’m actually freezing.”
“Your face is red.”
Charlie walked over and reached a hand toward my face,
but I brushed it away.
“What’re you doing?” I wanted to know.
“Checking to see if you have a fever.” Charlie touched the back of his hand to my forehead. “You feel hot.”
“I’m fine, Mother.”
Charlie went to the river and filled my bottle of water, dug a Tylenol out of the first aid kit, and handed them to me. “Take this. It’ll help keep your fever under control.”
I tossed the pill into my mouth and swallowed it down with a gulp of cold river water. I then sat patiently while Charlie changed my bandage.
“We have to get you to a hospital,” Charlie said. “You really need some stitches.”
“Sure, I’ll just call nine-one-one.” I laughed and waved him off. “I’ll be fine.”
Charlie stuffed a couple of pears and a bottle of water into his rucksack. “I’ll be back in a few hours. If the chills don’t go away, take another Tylenol.”
“I’ve got it, Nurse Charlie.” I watched Charlie walk out the cave and disappear around the left corner. When the crunching of his footsteps had faded away, I crept back to my rucksack and sank onto it. I felt weak, tired, and cold.
* * *
I didn’t know how long I’d slept, but when I woke up, I was sweating. The fires had burned down again. A gentle breeze was blowing and had found its way into the cave. I stretched—winced when I was reminded of my wounds—and dragged myself to my feet. The Tylenol had definitely helped because I no longer felt as weak. Deciding not to deplete our supply of firewood, I ventured out into the forest around the cave and gathered up some dry branches and tossed them into both fires. When they were roaring again, I grabbed my spear and rucksack and headed downriver toward what I’d dubbed Pear Meadow.
When I arrived, the bears were everywhere. There must’ve been a dozen of them. Some were grazing on berries in the tall grass and some were feeding on the pear trees. I leaned against a tall hardwood and tried to decide what to do. We needed more pears. There were only about five or six left and they would be gone by that evening. I thought about screaming and throwing rocks at the bears, but my last encounter had given me a healthy fear for those wild creatures.