Josh carried him over the snow that would melt first in the next day or two with the rains and forty degree temperatures. He walked right in their footprints they had made coming up the hill. He belted the body in his truck and trussed him up. He took a moving blanket from the bed of the truck and wrapped Gabe in it. He put sunglasses and an oversized wool hat on him. Gabe looked as if he was sleeping.
Josh drove out, bucking and spinning the way he came in. He would return to this spot at dawn and, with any luck, no one would be the wiser till then.
Josh kayaked with the lifeless form across the river. His strokes were methodical and consistent. The body in front sat hunched over, unmoving. Almost frozen.
Josh’s cousins were waiting for them on the Canadian side. The fog was barely lifting in the early morning hours. Josh tried to keep his mind on the task at hand and not worry about Tessa. She was in good hands now. She was strong and he had to trust she would survive.
The cousins pulled the kayak in. They helped Josh move the limp form from the front and treat his body carefully, like an elder, like glass.
They made a strange contingent of men with long hair in Levi jackets and jeans, muddied work boots, a small parade in the thicket of swamp cedars. Silently they walked, carrying a gurney. Two Ford trucks waited for them, indistinguishable from all the other logging work trucks and crew cabs in that part of Ontario. Chainsaws, fuel cans, bar oil. They rumbled down the two track and eventually to a deserted hard-top road.
No cars for miles. The lead truck turned right and a hand waved. The truck the elder’s body was in turned left and began its journey. First to Sudbury, and a small shack a mile off the train tracks and eventually to the original clan; the caribou followers.
Josh was already halfway across the river with one final task to finish. After stowing the kayak on the ladder rails of his truck, Josh drove the three hours back. This time he came in from the east on the Rayle Road. Just as he thought, half the snow had melted in the several hours he had been away. He parked, found a barely discernable path, and hiked to a deer blind left over from the fall. Gabe’s deer blind.
He climbed the stand and waited. As the sun rose higher and higher, he believed his relatives had deserted him. Then he heard a crack. A step. Another step. Turkey?
Josh dared not move. He waited. The young doe came in. He steeled his heart. He couldn’t feel right now. He slowly moved the crossbow to sight. Her nose twitched. But she was here. For him. For Tessa. For Eli. Yes, even for Gabriel. He pressed the release. Just behind her right shoulder. She stumbled and went down.
Josh was on the ground and over her. His breath fogged over her neck as he held her and slit her throat. She bled out and still he did not allow himself any emotion. He placed the plastic over his shoulders and carried her over his back, forelegs in his right hand, and back legs in his left. And he placed her over the blood pile from yesterday.
He field dressed her here, from neck to anus, and was thankful she was too young to be carrying fawn. He prayed over her, he called her and asked for forgiveness. And smeared her blood over Tessa’s blood and Gabriel’s blood and he prayed that this was enough to keep everyone safe.
Then he carried her again to his truck and covered her with the same moving blanket from the day before.
Once he was on the road toward Peshawbestown, then and only then did he let himself cry.
Chapter 10
TESSA WORRIES HOW she will make up Lake Superior, The St. Lawrence Seaway, and Bay of Fundy, way north and east. Would she do it at the end of her trip? All she knows now is she is heading to Stone Mountain Georgia and then on to Florida and the Keys.
She’s listening to iTunes with her ear buds. But as she flips her visor down to block the rising eastern sun, she sees a variety of CDs in a flap.
She pulls one out. It’s unmarked save for “Good Driving Music” printed neatly from something like a Sharpie.
She pops it in and is instantly greeted with blaring lyrics from “Kryptonite.”
Tessa fumbles for volume, eject, anything. She ends up jumping a track to Bon Jovi’s, “It’s My Life.”
“Lord. Auntie. Scare me ’bout half to death.” It’s quite a switch from Lana Del Ray and Taylor Swift.
She tries another “Good driving CD” this time, making sure the volume is lower. “White Rabbit” rumbles through the speakers. This song is definitely about drugs, popping pills that make people smaller, or taller, or something.
“Holy crap. I’m gonna get an education.”
Finally she settles on one marked Allman Brothers and listens to that. Nothing too excitable there. The opening guitar licks to “Midnight Rider” begin playing, and she turns up the volume and opens the windows, directing the rig from the middle part of Illinois toward Tennessee. With any luck, she’ll be in Stone Mountain tonight.
MR. FORSYTHE’S REVISED directions takes her beyond the actual park entrance by about a mile. Curious, she pulls into the trailer park and asks at the office if they have a reservation for her. It’s after nine p.m. She really needs to quit driving like it’s a job.
“You’re Tessa Wiliams?” the woman asks doubtfully.
“Yes.”
“Mmmmhmmm,” the woman intones. She doesn’t wear a name tag. Obviously everyone knows everyone else. She’s middle aged, and has frizzy fine fake red hair. Her lip gloss is purple and it’s smudged a little.
“And how long you staying?”
“One night, maybe two.”
“Mmmmmm-hmmm. Says here, a week.” Tessa can hear a loud television behind the thin walls of the office. There’s a lot of shooting and sirens on TV.
“A week?”
What the hell could Forsythe be thinking?
“Mmmmmhmmm. Says you want a quiet lot. You gotta dog?” the woman asks suddenly.
“Yes.”
The woman crosses Tessa off one lot and puts her way in the back. Instead of five lots around her she’ll have one neighbor next to her.
“Yeah, okay. License, license plate number, no dogs off leash. Pick up after them.” The woman pushes back from the desk and waits for Tessa to hand print her information.
“Got kids?”
“No.” Tessa’s head is bent over the paperwork and she glances up to see the woman smirking. “Oh . . . that was a joke?”
The woman shrugs, looking over Tessa’s brown, blonde-pink hair.
“Site’s paid for a week. If you leave early, let us know.”
Tessa sighs and goes to find the lot circled on her hand-held map. Guessing from the crude diagram and the fine print she heads straight in and all the way to the back. She veers left and follows this drive a short distance. She can see the bottoms of very large trees here. In the morning she’ll look over the site and make sure no dead limbs are about ready to fall on her.
The next morning she’s out stretching with Murphy before their run. An older guy wanders over from the camper next door with a cup of coffee in his hand.
“Name’s Brett.” He holds out his hand. He has no drawl to his voice, like the woman the night before. “In town for long?”
“Not really,” Tessa says, retightening a shoe lace.
“Nice dog.”
“Thanks.”
“I’m here working on a movie set,” Brett offers. “Union painter.”
“Really? I didn’t know they used painters on movie sets.”
“Oh yeah. It’s a good gig, especially when they wreck one by accident.”
“So you just travel all over?”
“Pretty much.”
“What’s the movie?”
“Well, I’d have to kill ya if I told ya,” he jokes.
She laughs.
He leans over and whispers, “ ‘Don’t Talk to Strangers.’ It’s a murder mystery set in Atlanta.”
“I thought you were giving me advice.” Tessa can tell by Murphy’s reaction to her neighbor, he’s unconcerned. He wanders to a pile of junk and lifts his leg.
She
looks up at the trees. They are fine. She looks over to her left and breathes in a little.
“That’s a cemetery.”
“Yup,” Brett says, wandering over with her.
“Well, why is it so . . . I dunno, trashed?” The stones are every which way, and a blue plastic cup blows over the weedy tan grass. She goes to a stone and wipes the long grass from the face. These are very old graves. 1886.
“I believe it’s a black cemetery.”
Mystified, Tessa turns to him.
“From the slave days.”
“Yeah but these should be cleaned up . . .”
“Did you meet the owners last night?”
“Red hair?”
Brett nods.
“Mmmmhmmm,” he intones.
They both laugh.
“Perhaps this is one of those situations where the folks operated it with care and the kids . . .” He wags his head. “Not so much.”
They regard the stones silently as Tessa removes the blue cup and some other debris.
“Just stay away from that branch of the trailer park over there.” Brett waves his coffee cup, indicating a drive that is across the way. Tessa can see four or five mobile homes. Like permanent renters. “Cops are there every week.”
“Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it. Have a good run. You might just wanna take your truck and run at the park. It’s a lot quieter over there.”
TESSA FOLLOWS BRETT’S advice. She drives in the park, curious about the giant piece of granite that gives the area its name. She reads the information marker. “Second largest piece of exposed granite in the world.”
People are hiking up and down on it.
“Whaddya say, Murphy? Wanna try?”
They follow a younger couple and get started up the slope. According to the info it’s eight-hundred-and-fifty feet high. As they climb and course their way around the rock, Tessa is tempted to jog at certain intervals. To her right she notices someone running a little faster—a guy, a few years older than her, running up the mountain with one leg and a crutch. Her jaw drops. He looks back and winks.
She gets to the top and settles on a private rock protrusion and Murphy circles it and lies behind her. Above them she hears a weird sound and looks up.
Flocks of huge birds are circling and calling and wending their way through each other, like threads in the sky.
“Sandhill cranes,” the guy with one leg says to her. “They migrate twice a year here.”
“That’s so awesome.”
“Sure, if you wear a hat,” he jokes. He’s not wearing one either, but he pulls a lime green cycle cap from the back of his shorts. “Have one on me.”
“Seriously?” She puts it on.
“Looks good with the pink.”
“You’re amazing.” Tessa looks at his crutch.
“Nah.” The guy smiles. “I just don’t let anything stop me. Not even my own stupidity. Motorcycle accident. So now I’m healthier than I’ve ever been. Blessings.”
He cranes his neck up to regard the birds.
“Why do they come?” Tessa asks.
“Maybe to watch the Hawks play.”
“Hawks?”
“The basketball team.”
Tessa feels ridiculous.
“Actually I’m unsure why. Some say there’s a magnetic force in the granite and the birds know where to go from here. They meet up and separate into four different directions, spring and fall. To me, that’s amazing.”
Tessa watches with him.
“Well, I have to get back down,” he says after a moment. “Enjoy Atlanta.”
Tessa marvels at the way she’s meeting so many good people just by putting herself out there, by traveling. By willing to be available to the moment. And the sights she’s seeing opens her eyes to the fact that almost wherever she goes, where other people call home, each place seems to have something unique and special. Just like people. Maybe this is why Madeline Sweet is so addicted to adventuring.
Later in the afternoon, Tessa locates the thing called a carillon. A little old lady sits as erect as she can and plays an organ inside a room that is surrounded by glass. Behind her, the music she’s playing on the organ breathes through an elaborate series of dampers to produce bell sounds in the tall bronze-looking pipes outside.
Tessa wanders down with Murphy to the walkway. This early on a weekday, very few people are around and she gently and quietly drops some of Aunt Sadie here, with Murphy witnessing. She takes a quick movie so Dan Forsythe can hear the Carillon playing “My Blue Heaven.”
Chapter 11
TESSA IS MAKING miles for Port St. Lucie, and Mark and Dolly’s airpark home. She’s anxious, and if she admits it to herself, to be closer to when Dina joins her. If Dina joins her. She looks forward to their semiweekly FaceTimes.
She suddenly realizes, this is probably the way Mom feels every Wednesday.
Tessa and Murphy have quickly formed a routine. She tries driving no longer than six hours a day and she tries getting into a campsite no later than four p.m. They always run or walk in the morning. In the evening they investigate where they are staying. She’s managed to only have to do laundry three times so far. The first time, thanks to Joe and Marissa.
Mark and Dolly will let her do laundry. Their voices are manic on the phone, each talking over the other, and Tessa is excited to see them too. Mark tells her he’s contacted Junior, his son, who’s also a pilot. Junior knows the Keys pretty well. Looking at the long drive down to them, Tessa is hopeful Mark or Junior will give her a plane ride, and she can dispose of Aunt Sadie’s ashes out to sea.
The airpark is like a golf course. Everyone has a hangar. The lawns are green and wide and open. Little ornamental trees are planted close up to the houses. Tessa sees a silver bullet camping trailer sitting outside their home. It looks brand new.
Mark still has his familiar moustache, but it’s gone all white. Dolly seems even shorter than Tessa remembers. She’s Sadie size.
“Let’s look at you.” Mark hugs her and scrubs her hair. “What’s this pink and blonde stuff?” He ruffles it.
The head massage feels good. “You can keep doing that.”
Dolly turns her and hugs her and then looks her up and down. “Oh good. You don’t have any of those piercings. What’s that about anyway, the nose things, and the eyebrow things? Wait, open your mouth.”
Tessa does.
Dolly dramatically breathes a sigh of relief. “No tongue piecing. Hallelujah!” Her right hand is on her breast and her left hand is up in the air as she talks to the heavens.
Murphy is prancing all around them, his flag-like tail up, waving happily. He noses each of their hands for some attention and then runs, searching the ground.
“Sorry, champ,” Mark calls out to him. “If you’re looking for a stick, the only trees we have here are the short ones.” He suddenly grins. “Loop de loop?”
“Mark!” Dolly slaps him. “Let her settle. My gosh, she just got here. She looks exhausted.”
“I drove ten hours.” Florida is longer than she thought.
“Oh well, where are my manners?” Mark rolls his eyes. “Maybe a Scotch then? Or a bourbon?”
“Oh for God’s sakes, don’t mind him. He drives me crazy.” Dolly leads them to the house and Mark pairs up with Tessa, walking funny from side to side, making googly eyes, and circling his finger by his temple. He sticks his tongue out sideways, toward Dolly.
“I know what you’re doing Mark Tanner, just stop it,” Dolly says without turning around.
After dinner the Tanners ply her with all sorts of questions.
“How’s Uncle Chuck, the chunk?” Mark asks, lifting his second glass of whiskey to his lips.
Tessa makes a face.
“I figured he’d be a horse’s ass.”
“Mark!”
“Oh c’mon, Dolly. That guy’s been throwing his weight around since the best part of him ran down his father’s leg . . .”
“Ma
rk Tanner, behave.”
Tessa is laughing at Uncle Marks quips.
“Don’t egg him on.” Aunt Dolly smiles.
“Your mom holding up okay?” Uncle Mark asks.
Tessa nods.
“She works a lot, doesn’t she? I want you to know, if you need anything, anything, you call us.”
“Thank you.”
She looks out the window. Above all the windows and the doorways are little ledges with Dolly’s prized blue plate collections.
The house is immaculate with blues and whites and soft pinks. Lots of windows. Light and airy. And the sound from airplanes occasionally landing and taking off is muffled.
“Eli?”
“He might be out before I get home.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah, the estate lawyer guy hooked Mom up with another lawyer.”
“Well, that was all trumped up bullshit egged on by Chuck. Eli no sooner stole your dad’s truck as . . .”
Dolly shoots Mark a look of pure whoop ass to shut the hell up.
“I’m just saying, Chuck used his bullshit two-bit county fire chief position to stick it to Eli. Corn pone country bumpkin justice. That’s all I’m going to say.”
“Well, thank the Christ on that one, Mark Tanner.”
Dolly’s lips are a thin line as she starts gathering dishes, and Tessa jumps up to help.
“It’s okay. I trust you guys. If you want to talk.”
“No, honey,” Mark says softly as she walks behind him, he puts his hand on her forearm. “I just want you to know how much you are loved.”
Tears spring to Tessa’s eyes and she sets the dishes down. She hugs him fiercely from behind. “Thank you.”
Tessa stays longer than she intends with Mark and Dolly. Although she’s enjoyed meeting new folks, there’s nothing like family and home.
She realizes how homesick she is now.
MARK IS OUT at the vomit comet, doing a pre-flight check. His iPod is sitting on the cement and playing old rock and roll.
“Isn’t Junior coming today?”
Mark scowls. “Well, he was supposed to.”
Tessa watches Mark check the pitot tube in the wing.
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