The pile of brush flinched as I walked toward it. I imagined a wolf crouching beneath it, its hungry, amber eyes glowing from behind a tangle of gnarled branches. Slowly, I poked it with the head of my ax. Nothing happened. I took a step closer and pushed some of the branches out of the way, holding my breath as I waited for the wolf to pounce.
But there was no wolf. Beneath the brush was a fresh, green sapling, not much taller than my knees. “What are you doing under there?” I said and bent down to take a closer look. As I did so, a green bud burst open and a glossy, new leaf unfurled right in front of my nose. I had never seen anything like it. It was as if time had momentarily sprinted forward, a short spike in an otherwise steady current. I touched the leaf, and as I did, the sapling trembled and spat out another one.
I need to quit drinking, I thought. I walked back to the truck, popped two aspirin I found sitting in the cup holder, and returned to work.
* * *
Cutters was the best and worst bar in town. It had been converted from a nineteenth-century log cabin into a place where loggers could come in out of the cold and drink themselves warm. Like at any good dive bar, the floor was perpetually sticky, and every square inch of the wooden booths was carved with people’s names or their favorite curse words. In the back corner sat one sorry-looking, ripped pool table that most people used as a coffee table as evidenced by the dozens of ring marks on its rails.
I grabbed my usual seat at the corner of the bar next to the jukebox and ordered a pitcher of Coors. The rest of the guys filled in the seats around me, groaning about their bad backs and the snow they’d have to shovel when they got home. Weylyn was the last to wander in. He tentatively looked around the room for a place to sit, so I flagged him over and gestured to the empty seat next to me.
“The first one’s on me,” I said as he hopped onto the wobbly stool. “What’re you having?”
Weylyn stared thoughtfully at the liquor bottles lined up behind the bar. “What do you suggest?” he asked.
“Two Jim Beams, neat,” I told Al, the bartender, who nodded and pulled out a couple of highballs. I turned back to Weylyn. His expression torqued as something over my shoulder caught his eye. I turned to see what he was looking at and saw Gus glowering in our direction.
“Don’t worry about him,” I reassured. “He’s just mad ’cause he only shits once a week.”
Weylyn laughed. “And here I thought it had something to do with me.”
“Well, you definitely got under his skin today, that’s for sure.”
Al passed us our drinks. Weylyn took a cautious sip and shivered slightly as he swallowed. “It’s good,” he said, unsuccessfully masking his disgust. The kid didn’t smoke, and he clearly didn’t drink, either.
“So, how’d you end up here in Shitsville, Montana?” I asked.
“Mary got a job here, and I decided to come with her.”
“Mary, huh?” I said. “That the old lady?”
He looked mildly perturbed. “She’s not old. It’s her thirtieth birthday tomorrow.”
“Oh, yeah? What you got planned?”
A worried look crossed Weylyn’s face. “Well … I hadn’t really thought about it.”
“You’re telling me you didn’t plan anything?” You’d think the kid had never had a girlfriend before. “Man, she’ll expect you to do something. Take her out to dinner. Buy her the fanciest thing on the menu, and don’t forget the flowers. What’s her favorite flower?”
Weylyn thought for a moment. “I know she likes daffodils.”
“Daffodils. Perfect. Get her a big bouquet of daffodils while she’s at work and leave them somewhere where she can see them as she walks in the front door. Trust me. She’ll think it’s super romantic.”
“Okay,” he said awkwardly. I may have overstepped a bit. It was clear he liked this Mary girl, although I got the impression that he hadn’t told her yet. I knew exactly how he felt.
“So,” I said, changing the subject. “Is it just you and Mary out here, or do you know anyone else in town?”
“Well, there’s Merlin.”
“Merlin?”
“My pig.”
“You have a pet pig?” Of course he did. I couldn’t imagine Weylyn with a normal pet like a dog or a cat. A pig was just weird enough to make sense. “I have a cow.”
Weylyn’s face lit up. “Really? What’s his name?”
“Her name is Rosie. She just might be my best friend,” I said. “Is that pathetic? That my best friend is a cow?”
“Merlin’s my best friend, too. Although I’ve always gotten along better with animals than people,” he said, eyeing Gus, who was now heckling a group of people playing darts. “Animals are more honest. You never have to second-guess their motives.”
He had a point. I also preferred animals to most of the jerks I worked with. However, with Weylyn, I got the impression that the company of animals wasn’t so much a preference for him as it was a way of life. I wasn’t sure what made me think that. Maybe it was the way he checked for squirrels before felling a tree or how he would sit by himself during his lunch break and watch birds flying overhead. Whatever it was, there was something not quite human about him, like he belonged outside in the forest instead of sitting at a bar drinking shitty whiskey with me. I had the urge to White Fang him—shout, Go on! Get outta here! as I threw bar nuts at his back—so he could go be with his “own kind.”
Then I thought, Maybe that’s the problem. Maybe Weylyn had had enough people in his life telling him to “go on” instead of helping him to fit in. Maybe all he really wanted was someone he could have a drink with.
“Well, I guess we have that in common,” I said, raising my glass. Weylyn raised his, too, and we toasted to not quite fitting in.
40
MARY PENLORE
Spring was here, although it was hard to tell. Based on the amount of snow that fell that morning, it might as well have been the middle of January. Both Griffin and I decided to stay at base camp that day and type up our notes from the previous week, while Dobbs cut his toenails and listened to a hockey game on the radio. It was distracting, to say the least.
“Come on, Orlowski, you pussy!” he shouted at the radio. I didn’t know who Orlowski was or what made him a pussy, and I didn’t care. I just wanted Dobbs to shut his mouth so I could get some work done. “Hey, Kurt?” I said.
Griffin shot me a wary look and shook his head, but Dobbs didn’t even look up. He clipped his big toe, and I could hear a soft tink as the nail bounced off the glass of the coffeemaker we all shared.
“Kurt!” I said, louder this time.
Dobbs’s attention snapped to me like a shark spotting a seal. “What is it, Lobo?”
“Do you think you could turn the radio down? I’m finding it hard to concentrate.” A quick gasp escaped Griffin’s mouth. I kept my eyes locked on Dobbs, who was silently calculating his next move. Then he smiled wide and said, “How are you and Widow getting along?”
“Fine.” The smile unnerved me. I had never even seen Dobbs’s teeth since I started working there.
He stood up and turned off the radio. “Do me a favor, Lobo, and clean that up, will ya?” he said, pointing to the pile of nail clippings he had left on the floor. He pulled on his shoes and coat.
“Why was he asking about Widow?” I asked Griffin after he had left.
“You don’t know?”
I shook my head.
“Dobbs’ hand was Widow’s handiwork.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah. The Nomads were his pack before the attack. That was the last time he was seriously out in the field.”
“Have you ever gotten close to her?”
“I keep my distance,” he said and went back to his notes. “Can’t play baseball without my hands.”
“Good thing I don’t play baseball.”
Griffin shot me a warning look. “There are two kinds of people who get themselves killed out there: stupid people and eager people
. Don’t let your eagerness make you do stupid things.”
He was right. I almost drowned the last time I acted impulsively, and I liked my hands. I’d earn Widow’s trust, I thought. But I’d have to be careful.
* * *
I finished work early that day, just in time to catch what was left of the sun setting behind the cabin. Weylyn cut me off outside the front door. “We’re going out!”
“Tonight? Why?”
He looked at me like I had gone mad. “Because it’s your birthday.”
My birthday! I had completely forgotten. “Wow. You’re right. I guess I’m just not used to snow in April, yet.”
“Well, we shouldn’t let a little snow stop us from celebrating,” he said. “But first, I have a surprise for you. Close your eyes. No peeking,” he said as he led me by the arm around the side of the building. When we had stopped, Weylyn said, “You can look now, Mary Jane.”
I opened my eyes and saw yellow, a whole garden of daffodils. There must have been hundreds of them nestled in the white snow, their necks craned forward under the weight of their golden crowns. It was beautiful, but impossible. “But … how?” I stammered. “The ground is frozen.”
Weylyn smiled. “I guess they were just sick of waiting.”
I looked at him, hoping to find an answer somewhere in the gray pools of his eyes, but I couldn’t detect a single ripple.
“Thank you,” I said. Then I saw the tiniest splash, like the flick of a minnow’s tail on the surface of a pond, and suddenly I knew there was a lot more hiding beneath the surface of those waters than I was ever likely to know.
* * *
There were only two restaurants in town—Mr. Pig’s, a barbecue joint, and Glacier Lodge, a swanky restaurant that was part of the hotel. We decided on Glacier Lodge because even the mention of Mr. Pig’s seemed to distress Merlin. I pulled on a clean pair of jeans and a sweater and was about to leave the bedroom when I had a sudden realization. Weylyn asked me out. To dinner. I looked at myself in the mirror, at my messy hair and old sweater that had pearled from too many washes, and decided I couldn’t possibly let him see me like this, not if there was a chance that this night was going to be our first official date.
I opened my wardrobe and pulled out the only somewhat nice piece of clothing I had brought with me to Montana, a yellow cotton dress with tiny white flowers. I threw on some mascara and a pearl drop necklace and opened the door.
When Weylyn saw me, he looked at me in a way that felt entirely new. “You look exceedingly pretty, Mary.”
My skin bloomed with reds and pinks. “Thanks. You look nice, too.”
Nice wasn’t the right word. He looked positively handsome in his gray slacks and royal-blue button-up. His hair was clean and slicked back. Even his teeth seemed a little whiter.
But something didn’t feel right. It all seemed too … normal. I imagined Weylyn and me walking into that fancy restaurant and no one noticing. No one gawking or shaking their heads. No one whispering things like “Did you see that couple?” or “What are folks like that doing in a place like this?” Instead, we would place napkins on our laps and order a bottle of the house red without attracting so much as a glance in our direction. No one in that restaurant would have any idea just how special Weylyn really was.
I wanted us to throw a hunk of meat over a fire and watch the juices fizzle in the flame. I wanted us to eat with our hands and throw the bones in the fire and laugh as loud as we felt like laughing and howl at the stars.
Weylyn must have read my mind. “You don’t want to go out.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I want to have dinner with you. It’s just everyone else I’m not so crazy about.”
“Good. Then we’ll make our own,” he said, pulling at his cuffs. “I haven’t worn an outfit like this since Mrs. Kramer made me sing in the church choir.”
“It looks pretty uncomfortable,” I said as I helped him unbutton his sleeves. As I did so, his gaze rolled down my neck like beads of sweat. “Mary…,” he began.
“Yeah?”
“I’d still like this to be a date, if that’s okay with you.”
I nodded. “It’s okay with me.”
* * *
We built a bonfire outside, emptied everything from the refrigerator into a cast-iron pot—beef, potatoes, onion, black beans, tomatoes, garlic, rice—and let it stew over the open flame. We crouched over our stew like Vikings, hair falling into our bowls, scooping it up with chunks of bread and slurping the rest. When we had had our fill, we crawled closer to the flame and drank coffee spiked with rum. The fire spat, catching the ends of our hair like they were wicks, and we took turns pinching them out with our fingers.
“I’m not afraid of fire,” Weylyn said as he wet his fingers and extinguished the flame that had caught the end of my scarf. “I should be. I know that. But there are things I’m more afraid of.” A shadow crossed over his face.
“What things?” I asked tentatively.
Weylyn reached down and grabbed a fistful of snow.
“You’re afraid of snow?”
“I’m afraid of what it could be,” he said and tossed the flakes into the fire.
Then I remembered something he told me years earlier. “Your parents died in a blizzard.”
He nodded solemnly, flickering fire reflecting in his eyes. “I have this dream that I’m conjuring a huge storm. Blinding snow. Ice shooting from the clouds like bolts of lightning. Someone, a woman, is shouting my name, begging me to stop, but I can’t. I’m both powerful and powerless.” His voice sounded thin and torn like snakeskin.
I touched his cheek, drawing his gaze away from the dying fire. “You aren’t powerless.”
Before the cold had a chance to grab us, I pressed my lips against his and felt warm sand fill the spaces between my toes. Soon, we were miles away in a place that never snowed.
41
DUANE FORDHAM
“Duane, you gotta see this!”
It was 6:00 A.M. “What is it, Gus?” I grumbled, in no mood to talk.
“Just get over here!”
I grabbed my thermos of coffee from the truck and followed him, wishing I were still home, asleep. It was a particularly cold morning, too, the kind you feel in your bones. A group of guys were all standing at the edge of the landing, looking downhill and mumbling among themselves. Gus and I joined them.
“Mornin’, fellas,” I croaked. None of them acknowledged me. They were all too engrossed in whatever lay at the bottom of the hill. I followed their gaze, and it didn’t take long to see what was wrong with the picture: trees. The hillside was thick with them, the hillside we had left mostly barren the day before.
“I don’t understand,” I said, bewildered. “Are we in the wrong spot?”
One of the men, Bruce, shook his head. “That Yarder is right where I left it.” The Yarder is a monstrous machine built for hauling in logs. The skyline cable runs from the top of the Yarder to a point at the bottom of the hill. It’s a logger’s north star.
“You sure someone else didn’t move it?”
Bruce pulled a set of keys from his jeans pocket. “Unless someone broke into my house, stole the keys, then put ’em back in my pants without me noticing, I’d say no.”
I remembered the sapling I had found the day before, the one that had sprouted leaves like magic. “Trees don’t just grow back overnight,” I said, faltering a little.
“Well, then, we all must be batshit crazy.” Bruce slapped his helmet on his head. “All right, boys! Let’s try this again.”
The men dispersed, most heading to grab chainsaws so the trees could be felled for a second time. It had to be bad luck, I thought, to cut down trees that magically grew overnight, but none of us could afford to be superstitious, not in this economy.
Out the corner of my eye, I saw Weylyn walk to the edge of the hill and peer over.
“Got any theories?” I said.
Weylyn shrugged casually like I had just asked him the tim
e and he wasn’t wearing a watch, then hoisted his ax and made his way down the hillside.
“It all started after that kid showed up.”
I turned around to see Gus still standing next to me.
“And just what do you think he’s doing? Sneaking out here in the middle of the night with a hose and some Miracle-Gro?” I scoffed.
Gus lowered his voice and leaned in so I could smell his hot tar breath. “I saw him.”
“Saw him do what?”
“Yesterday, we were felling together. I made a cut, then stepped off to piss. When I got back, the cut I made was gone.”
“Sounds like you forgot which tree you cut.”
“No. I knew it was the same one ’cause there was a green scar where I’d made the cut. The kid said the same thing as you, that it was different. I told him I’ve been in this business for twenty goddamn years, and I never forget a tree.”
“So, what are you saying?”
“I’m saying that tree got fixed somehow, and he’s got something to do with it.”
I waved him off. “Sounds like you’ve been watching too much Twilight Zone.”
“I’m telling you, man,” Gus said, jaw set. “Something’s not right about that kid.”
I hated to say it, but he might have been right. Weylyn didn’t even flinch when he saw those trees. He just went to work as if it was business as usual, and maybe for him, it was.
42
MARY PENLORE
Weylyn was all I could think about over the next few days. He kept me warm on my long treks out in the snow and kept me feeling safe as I trailed the Nomad pack on their caribou hunt. I didn’t even care when Dobbs used my coffee mug as a spittoon for his sunflower seed shells. I was so happy that I rinsed out the mug myself and did everyone else’s dishes for them, too. Dobbs watched me warily, as if I might snap at any moment.
Widow was not quite so lucky as I was when it came to her love life. A week after Amarok’s death, the pack was visited by a lone male I called Dorian. He was a handsome wolf with cast-iron eyes and a honey-colored snout. He was bold, too, strutting right into the pack’s camp without so much as an investigative sniff. Needless to say, Widow had little tolerance for the intruder. She gnashed her diamond-cut teeth and chased Dorian off, his tail between his legs.
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