When Mountains Move

by Julie Cantrell

  I am awakened by Bump’s kiss, as I have been each morning since the wedding. He’s already dressed and ready to work. “How do you do it?” I mumble, closing my eyes and rolling into my soft pillow. “I always thought I was a hard worker. Then I met you.”

  He laughs and says, “Sleep as long as you want.”

  I pull the pillow over my face and try to will myself out of bed. Like me, Bump’s a doer. We’ve both worked ourselves to the bone and already the windows have been repaired and the doorknobs all function as they should. The house is clean from top to bottom, and except for a few spiders, nearly all the critters who made our house their home have realized they’re being booted out, including the coons in the chicken coop and a colony of bats in the barn who had no desire to leave and caused quite a fuss. Now Bump rattles dishes in the kitchen, and I can’t ignore the day any longer. The smell of fresh coffee moves into the bedroom and guilts me out of bed. I don’t know if it’s the thin air or the endless work, but I am tired beyond belief.

  “It’s not like me to feel this way. I can’t keep up with you.” I smile, shuffling into the kitchen with lazy feet. “What’s your plan today?” I’m certain he has a long list of tasks to accomplish before we even break for lunch.

  “Prep the cistern and the water pump. Hope to run pipes into this house before winter. But first I gotta clear that back corner where the fence has gone missin’.” He grabs a day-old biscuit from the bread bin and heads outside, taking his coffee with him.

  “I admit, I look forward to tearing down that outhouse,” I say behind him. “Think we could tackle the water pipes first?”

  Bump laughs again but doesn’t stop walking. “It’s on my list,” he yells back. “I promise.”

  Before moving outside, I clean the kitchen, make the bed, and find the book I was reading as the sun slipped away, Tender is the Night. I open to chapter four for one last taste: “You’re the only girl I’ve seen for a long time that actually did look like something blooming.”

  I can’t help myself. I think of River. If he were here, we’d likely spend the entire day in this new bed. He’d play his harmonica and quote Fitzgerald. We’d read aloud—poetry, classics, the Bible, it wouldn’t matter. The words would warm our blood, and we’d tumble back together between verses, and the sun would leave without us ever greeting the day.

  Bump walks by the window, carrying a roll of barbed wire. He’s already worked up a sweat. I mark my page and save the book for later.

  By ten, the sun is hot and I am covered in dirt, a pile of weeds to my right and a hoe in my hand. I look up to see Katherine Fitch Garner riding a copper sorrel—her son, Henry, managing his own chestnut a few steps behind. I squint to get a better look and wave hello. They ride closer before halting the horses. “Hi there,” I say. “It’s Kat, right? And Henry?”

  “That’s right. Hope we haven’t caught you at a bad time.” Kat reaches for her son’s reins.

  “No, not at all.” I remove my work gloves and dust my hands on my jeans. While tying my hair back in a knot, I offer them a drink of water from the well pump.

  Kat holds up a canteen and declines the offer. “Think I can tear you away from your Victory Garden long enough for a ride?”

  My heart sinks. I can’t begin to explain to her how much I want to join them on the trails, but our horses are still in Mississippi and we haven’t purchased any new stock. “No horses yet.”

  Kat’s lips spread into a bright smile. “Why do you think Henry rode this one over here?”

  She couldn’t have said anything better. I throw the hoe in the yard and try to keep myself from running, startling the horses. I help Henry move from his saddle to his mom’s. Then I lead my mount to the river. Kat and Henry follow.

  “Had any time to get to know the area yet?” Kat asks.

  “Not even a second,” I admit. “The work never ends.”

  “Looks like you’ve already accomplished a lot.” Kat glances around the ranch and seems impressed.

  I give them a quick tour by pointing. “We’ve got the coop finished, and the milking stand too. Now we just need some chickens and a milker.”

  “How in the world are you making do without them?” Kat asks.

  “You can go a long way on powdered milk and dried eggs. I stocked up.”

  Kat wrinkles her nose.

  “They’re not so bad.” I laugh, although I wonder if our poor diet might be contributing to my stomach troubles. “The fuel rations limit our trips into town. Without our horses here yet, we’re kind of stuck.” I search the distance for Bump as I lengthen the stirrups. The horses drink from the river, sipping around their bits.

  “I’m so sick of this war,” Kat sighs. “Too many rations and rules. Plus all those posters in town pressuring every man to enlist. Uncle Sam expecting the women left behind to buckle up in overalls and buy a wrench. And now they’ve got me questioning every foreign face I see. POW camps and internment centers. It’s as if we can’t trust anybody anymore. I’m patriotic, Millie, I am. But I’m ready for everything to get back to normal.”

  “I’m sure it’ll end soon.” I test the stirrups and then pull myself into the saddle. Without a newspaper or radio here on the ranch, the war seems very far away to me.

  “Let’s hope,” Kat says.

  “I just need to tell Bump we’re leaving. I don’t want him to worry.” I press my heels softly into the horse’s side and pull the reins to the left, leading the chestnut in front of Kat’s sorrel.

  We keep our mounts at a slow pace, navigating the property in hopes of tracking Bump. I call out his name and confirm he’s not in any of the outbuildings. The truck is parked in the back corner of the pasture where he’s gone to repair the fence. Even squinting, I can’t see him. I’m just about to call out again when Henry yells, “There he is!”

  Beneath the truck, Bump is lying on the grass. Two bony blue-jean knees jut up between blooms of wild scarlet paintbrush and orange sneezeweed. “How on earth did you see him there, Henry?” I ask. “Maybe I should change your name to Eagle Eye.”

  Henry giggles. Bump hears us and slides himself out from under the truck’s carriage. His hat has fallen off, revealing a disheveled head of hair. A smudge of grease marks his chin, and his loose white shirt is stained with dirt. He greets us holding a wrench in one hand, a bolt in the other, as sweat makes him shine in the sun. How proud I am to call him mine. I’m not the only one to notice how handsome he looks. Kat holds her stare a second too long.

  “Truck finally quit on me,” Bump says.

  “Good thing you know how to fix it.” I smile. “Bump, you remember Kat and Henry.”

  Bump nods as they both say hello.

  “I figured it wouldn’t take you long to hit the trails.” He gives my mount a few strong strokes and checks the straps, tightens the latigo.

  Kat peaks her eyebrows, perhaps worried Bump won’t like our leaving without him. I smile to let her know there’s nothing to worry about.

  “Sure you can handle it?” Bump asks. “Different from the trails you’re used to.”

  “Are you worried?” I ask, surprised.

  “A little. But you are a trick rider, I suppose.” He turns to Kat. “I’ve seen Millie do things on a horse most people can’t do on the ground.”

  I blush. “I’ll be careful. You’re the one who taught me to do this, after all.”

  “Just remember, this ain’t Firefly.” He rubs my leg through my jeans. I lean down to offer a kiss. Henry covers his eyes and Kat laughs. Then I follow Kat’s horse to the trailhead by the river, the spot where we’ll begin our climb.

  “Watch out for lions!” Bump yells. He’s teasing, but the memory of Sheriff Halpin’s stuffed mountain lion keeps my eyes open as we head for the woods.

  “I can’t adjust to how dry it is,” I admit to Kat. “Thank goodness you packed me a cantee
n.” Barely gone a mile, and I’ve already downed half of my water.

  “You’ll never get used to it,” Kat says. “I’m always thirsty, and I’ve lived here all my life.”

  “Never lived anywhere else?” I ask. The air smells sweet, like vanilla.

  Kat pulls her horse to a stop, and Henry leans in to snap a piece of sap that has oozed and hardened through the bark of a giant pine. Then he pops the amber sap into his mouth and starts to chew.

  “What’s that?” I ask.

  “It’s a pitch tube,” Kat says. “Henry likes the sweetness in it. We’ve got a bad beetle outbreak. Killing all the pines. When you see the sap oozing through like this, the tree has beetles.”

  I move my horse closer and break a sticky bulge of sap from the tree. I smell it, then the tree.

  Kat laughs, so I explain. “Trying to figure out what smells like sugar cookies.” Every smell seems so intense.

  This makes Henry laugh. “Cookies?” Kat rubs his back and smiles.

  “Everything is so different here.”

  “How?” Kat asks, smiling down at Henry.

  I look at the dry southward-facing slope and try to describe Mississippi to a six-year-old. “Well,” I say, “the trees, for starters. See how they grow far apart? Not much covering the ground between them.”

  Henry nods and looks at the trees as if he’s seeing them for the first time, the bland gray tones of the young trees contrasting with the cinnamon bark of the older, more stately pines.

  “In Mississippi, the trees stand close together, and there’s hardly room to run through them.” I smile, remembering the little girl who ran barefoot through the forests, slipping and sliding into deep ravines, chasing squirrels and gypsies and thunder.

  “And the bugs,” I continue. “Mosquitoes big as butterflies, and fire ants that sting the living daylights out of you. Not to mention snakes. Lots of snakes. Cottonmouths and copperheads. Mean ones.”

  Henry’s eyes are as wide as silver dollars. Kat laughs. “Can’t be that bad.”

  “Oh, but it is.” Then I sigh. “And I miss it like crazy.” I look around at the scrub brush and the big, gray boulders that project out from the mountain’s side. “You know what these are, don’t you, Henry?” I point to the boulders that line the trail. “These are warts on the giant’s toes. If we don’t hurry, he’ll raise his foot and stomp us to bits!”

  With that I squeeze my heels into my horse’s side and lead the charge up the mountain, keeping a steady pace up the rocky incline. Kat and Henry stay behind, laughing and yelling for me to wait. But I’m having fun for the first time in a long time, and I don’t slow down until the route ends at an overlook about two-thirds of the way up the mountain. I climb down from the saddle and drain the last of my water, noticing a ring of rocks that marks the trail. A smaller circle of stones forms its center.

  “That was incredible,” I say when Kat and Henry finally reach me.

  “You scared me, Millie.” Kat knocks back her long red hair. “You can’t be too careful here. So many things could happen.” She speaks with short, heated breaths. “Loose rocks. Cliffs. Plus the lions. You won’t see them, but believe me, they see you.”

  I’m surprised she’s so upset. “Do we really have lions?”

  “Mountain lions.” Kat nods. Henry tightens his grip on his mom and wrinkles his face with worry. “It’s not just that. Anything could have spooked the horse and thrown you. Or us.” Kat brushes her hand through her son’s red hair with much more tenderness than she’s dealt her own.

  I move to the lookout and let Kat calm down. Soon she and Henry dismount and join me at the edge. The trees have become shorter as we climbed to higher elevations. We’re surrounded now by spruce and fir, with a few mangled pines struggling to survive the harsher winds. Kat points to the peaks in the distance and gives each a name. “There’s Estes Cone. Longs Peak. Mount Meeker.” The softness returns to her voice, and I wonder if these might be the landmarks I spotted when we first stopped to see the mountains. They sure look more impressive from here. “Folks call Longs and Meeker the twin peaks,” Kat explains, reminding me of my dream. “And if you look closely, you can see the profile of a beaver climbing the south side of Longs. See?”

  I trace the outline of the beaver’s tail and follow the shape up to the tip of his nose. She’s right. The mountain really does look like a beaver. In the distance, a thick smoke rises.

  “Fire,” Kat says, following my gaze to the purple plume.

  “Wildfire?” I take a closer look, remembering the spread of burned acreage on our own property. I worry we may lose the ranch to the fiery blaze.

  “It’s farther away than it seems,” Kat says. Then she adds, “I’m sorry I snapped at you, Millie. I wish I could still be carefree. Like you. Wait until you become a mother. You’ll see.” She steps behind Henry as he tries to climb a boulder. “It’s not easy. Especially by myself.”

  “I can’t imagine.” I track the large ring of rocks and wonder what happened to Henry’s father. It seems rude to ask, so I focus on the stone circle and wait for Kat to continue. A few columbines work their way through the ring, a stunning mix of delicate purple and white petals climbing against the jagged rocks.

  “It’s a prayer circle,” Kat says, following my steps. “Old Indian site. Some kind of sacred spot.”

  I look out at the magnificent view. “Perfect place for that.”

  Kat shrugs, and Henry slides down the boulder. We stay a while and watch the smoke curling into thick, gray clouds. The columns rise, swirl, and spread across the horizon, bowing to the higher mountains that are still crowned with snow. Occasionally, a bird streaks across the blue, but otherwise, the scene is still, except for the smoke. Nothing but wilderness, as far as the eye can see.

  One thing is for sure. I’m far, far away from Mississippi. From all the pain I wanted to leave behind. I stare out into the great beyond and offer a silent prayer. I thank God for this beautiful place. For Bump. For my new life. My new friend. For the mountains.

  The three of us ride back down the trail at a slow, measured pace. I follow Kat’s lead, and my horse thanks me by swishing her tail and relaxing her neck. The slow return is made sweeter by the songs of thrushes and warblers.

  “I’m glad I met you, Millie,” Kat says. “There aren’t many women in this town who care much about getting to know me. And the men … well … most are off at war. All that’s left are old, worn-out ranchers and the lucky few who were excused. I guess what I’m trying to say is, it’s just nice to have a new friend.”

  I smile and don’t admit how happy I am to have a friend too. I’m guessing the other women are jealous of Kat, and I hope my insecurities never get in the way of our friendship.

  “Have you found the chokecherries yet?” Kat asks.

  “Never heard of such.”

  “Follow me. Only a few places to find them this high.” We steer the horses toward the river where Henry pulls a handful of small pink berries from the tree. “Don’t eat them,” Kat warns. Then she turns to me and explains, “They aren’t ready until they turn dark. Then, if you spread some across a hot biscuit or bake them in a cobbler, they’re divine.”

  The bubbling river tempts Henry, and before Kat can protest, he bounces into the shallow water. He wastes no time at all, climbing over rocks, and dipping his head beneath the surface, until he loses his hat in the current. Then he pounds the water, sending a hard splash. “The bad man’s gonna get it,” Henry shouts.

  “I haven’t seen any bad guys,” I tease.

  Kat eyes Henry, and he ducks under water. “He’s talking about that guy in the store.”

  “Fortner?” I ask.

  Kat nods. “Just keep your distance, and you’ll be fine.” With that, she turns to ready her horse. “I better get Henry home. He’ll be a beast if his stomach growls more than twice.”
r />   I get the hint and don’t bring up Fortner again, but all the way home I think of this “bad man,” the one who seems so eager to help us work the ranch.

  Chapter 8

  “Don’t forget, Kat has invited us to supper tonight,” I remind Bump over breakfast.

  “Aw, boy. I did forget,” he says. “What time, again?”

  “Six,” I laugh. I’ve told him many times since Kat invited us Monday.

  “Can’t we push it back a bit? I need every minute of daylight I can get.”

  “No, we can’t push it back a bit.” I break my smile to take a sip of coffee. “She’s the only friend I’ve got in this place.”

  Bump shovels in another bite of oatmeal. “Well, in that case, I better get to work.” He kisses me one more time. Then, he steps into his boots and heads out for the day.

  It doesn’t take me long to wash and put away two bowls, two spoons, and two mugs. I cover the pot of oatmeal for tomorrow’s breakfast and begin to list items needed from Sheriff Halpin’s store. Then I pull on my boots and join Bump in the barn.

  I spend most of the day knocking down wasp nests, creating a burn pile with old debris, and holding boards so Bump can nail them in place. We work together as a team, efficiently and effectively as we have each day. Today we fill the hours sawing, nailing, clearing, and scrubbing. We develop such a natural rhythm, we work straight through lunch. It’s nearly four before I realize the time.

  “I’ve still got to bake something for tonight,” I announce, half panicked.

  Bump doesn’t blink. “Just bring cheese.”

  “Cheese?” I laugh and walk back to the house, hoping I can make something decent with the few provisions left in the kitchen. I decide to make biscuits and bring a jar of Oka’s fig preserves, a wedding gift we haven’t yet opened.

  I turn a pie plate upside down inside a large black iron pot to make an oven, the way Sloth taught me. Then I load two new cuts of wood and light a fire inside the stove, careful to sweep up any ashes that escape. Blue smoke trails out the window as I roll dough on the table, my fingers coated in flour to prevent sticking. I cut round circles of dough with a glass, coat a second pie pan with butter, and place the raw biscuits around the pan before sealing the homemade oven with the pot lid and placing it on the warm burner. Sloth would be proud.