The Beautiful Thing That Awaits Us All

by Laird Barron

  Bruce wouldn't find them here in the catbird's seat overlooking nowhere.

  ***

  Lorna arrived home a few minutes before nightfall. Miranda came to the porch and waved. She was tall; her hair long and burnished auburn, her skin dusky and unblemished. Lorna thought her beautiful; lush and ripe, vaguely Rubenesque. A contrast to Lorna's own paleness, her angular, sinewy build. She thought it amusing that their personalities reflected their physiognomies-Miranda tended to be placid and yielding and sweetly melancholy, while Lorna was all sharp edges.

  Miranda helped bring in the groceries-she'd volunteered to drive into town and fetch them herself, but Lorna refused and the reason why went unspoken, although it loomed large. A lot more than her leg needed healing. Bruce had done the shopping, paid the bills, made every decision for thirteen, tortuous years. Not all at once, but gradually, until he crushed her, smothered her, with his so-called love. That was over. A little more pain and suffering in the service of emancipation-figuratively and literally-following a lost decade seemed appropriate.

  The Haugstad Cabin was practically a fossil and possessed of a dark history that Miranda hinted at, but coyly refused to disclose. It was in solid repair for a building constructed in the 1920s; on the cozy side, even: thick, slab walls and a mossy shake roof. Two bedrooms, a pantry, a loft, a cramped toilet and bath, and a living room with a kitchenette tucked in the corner. The cellar's trapdoor was concealed inside the pantry. She had no intention of going down there. She hated spiders and all the other creepy-crawlies sure to infest that wet and lightless space. Nor did she like the tattered bearskin rug before the fireplace, nor the oil painting of a hunter in buckskins stalking along a ridge beneath a twilit sky, nor a smaller portrait of a stag with jagged horns in menacing silhouette atop a cliff, also at sunset. Lorna detested the idea of hunting, preferred not to ponder where the chicken in chicken soup came from, much less the fate of cattle. These artifacts of minds and philosophies so divergent from her own were disquieting.

  There were a few modern renovations-a portable generator provided electricity to power the plumbing and lights. No phone, however. Not that it mattered as her cell reception was passable despite the rugged terrain. The elevation and eastern exposure also enabled the transistor radio to capture a decent signal.

  Miranda raised an eyebrow when she came across the bottles of Old Crow. She stuck them in a cabinet without comment. They made a simple pasta together with peaches on the side and a glass or three of wine for dessert. Later, they relaxed near the fire. Conversation lapsed into a comfortable silence until Lorna chuckled upon recalling the bartender's portentous question, which seemed inane rather than sinister now that she was half- drunk and drowsing in her lover's arms. Miranda asked what was so funny and Lorna told her about the tavern incident.

  "Man alive, I found something weird today," Miranda said. She'd stiffened when Lorna described shooting tequila. Lorna's drinking was a bone of contention. She'd hit the bottle when Orillia went into first grade, leaving her alone at the house for the majority of too many lonely days. At first it'd been innocent enough: a nip or two of cooking sherry, the occasional glass of wine during the soaps, then the occasional bottle of wine, then the occasional bottle of Maker's Mark or Johnny Walker, and finally, the bottle was open and in her hand five minutes after Orillia skipped to the bus and the cork didn't go back in until five minutes before her little girl came home. Since she and Miranda became an item, she'd striven to restrict her boozing to social occasions, dinner, and the like. But sweet Jesus, fuck. At least she hadn't broken down and started smoking again.

  "Where'd you go?" Lorna said.

  "That trail behind the woodshed. I wanted some photographs. Being cooped up in here is driving me a teensy bit bonkers."

  "So, how weird was it?"

  "Maybe weird isn't quite the word. Gross. Gross is more accurate."

  "You're killing me."

  "That trail goes a long way. I think deer use it as a path because it's really narrow but well-beaten. We should hike to the end one of these days, see how far it goes. I'm curious where it ends."

  "Trails don't end; they just peter out. We'll get lost and spend the winter gnawing bark like the Donners."

  "You're so morbid!" Miranda laughed and kissed Lorna's ear. She described crossing a small clearing about a quarter mile along the trail. At the far end was a stand of Douglas Fir and she didn't notice the tree house until she stopped to snap a few pictures. The tree house was probably as old as the cabin; its wooden planks were bone yellow where they peeked through moss and branches. The platform perched about fifteen feet off the ground, and a ladder was nailed to the backside of tree…

  "You didn't climb the tree," Lorna said.

  Miranda flexed her scraped and bruised knuckles. "Yes, I climbed that tree, all right." The ladder was very precarious and the platform itself so rotted, sections of it had fallen away. Apparently, for no stronger reason than boredom, she risked life and limb to clamber atop the platform and investigate.

  "It's not a tree house," Lorna said. "You found a hunter's blind. The hunter sits on the platform, camouflaged by the branches. Eventually, some poor hapless critter comes by, and blammo! Sadly, I've learned a lot from Bruce's favorite cable television shows. What in the heck compelled you to scamper around in a deathtrap in the middle of the woods? You could've gotten yourself in a real fix."

  "That occurred to me. My foot went through in one spot and I almost crapped my pants. If I got stuck I could scream all day and nobody would hear me. The danger was worth it, though."

  "Well, what did you find? Some moonshine in mason jars? D.B. Cooper's skeleton?"

  "Time for the reveal!" Miranda extricated herself from Lorna and went and opened the door, letting in a rush of cold night air. She returned with what appeared to be a bundle of filthy rags and proceeded to unroll them.

  Lorna realized her girlfriend was presenting an animal hide. The fur had been sewn into a crude cape or cloak; beaten and weathered from great age, and shriveled along the hem. The head was that of some indeterminate predator-possibly a wolf or coyote. Whatever the species, the creature was a prize specimen. Despite the cloak's deteriorated condition, she could imagine it draped across the broad shoulders of a Viking berserker or an Indian warrior. She said, "You realize that you just introduced several colonies of fleas, ticks, and lice into our habitat with that wretched thing."

  "Way ahead of you, baby. I sprayed it with bleach. Cooties were crawling all over. Isn't it neat?"

  "It's horrifying," Lorna said. Yet, she couldn't look away as Miranda held it at arm's length so the pelt gleamed dully in the firelight. What was it? Who'd worn it and why? Was it a garment to provide mere warmth, or to blend with the surroundings? The painting of the hunter was obscured by shadows, but she thought of the man in buckskin sneaking along, looking for something to kill, a throat to slice. Her hand went to her throat.

  "This was hanging from a peg. I'm kinda surprised it's not completely ruined, what with the elements. Funky, huh? A Daniel Boone era accessory."

  "Gives me the creeps."

  "The creeps? It's just a fur."

  "I don't dig fur. Fur is dead. Man."

  "You're a riot. I wonder if it's worth money."

  "I really doubt that. Who cares? It's not ours."

  "Finders keepers," Miranda said. She held the cloak against her bosom as if she were measuring a dress. "Rowr! I'm a wild-woman. Better watch yourself tonight!" She'd drunk enough wine to be in the mood for theater. "Scandinavian legends say to wear the skin of beast is to become the beast. Haugstad fled to America in 1910, cast out from his community. There was a series of unexplained murders back in the homeland, and other unsavory deeds, all of which pointed to his doorstep. People in his village swore he kept a bundle of hides in a storehouse, that he donned them and became something other than a man, that it was he who tore apart a family's cattle, that it was he who slaughtered a couple of boys hunting rabbits in the field,
that it was he who desecrated graves and ate of the flesh of the dead during lean times. So, he left just ahead of a pitchfork-wielding mob. He built this cabin and lived a hermit's life. Alas, his dark past followed. Some of the locals in Poger Rock got wind of the old scandals. One of the town drunks claimed he saw the trapper turn into a wolf and nobody laughed as hard as one might expect. Haugstad got blamed whenever a cow disappeared, when the milk went sour, you name it. Then, over the course of ten years or so a long string of loggers and ranchers vanished. The natives grew restless and it was the scene in Norway all over again."

  "What happened to him?"

  "He wandered into the mountains one winter and never returned. Distant kin took over this place, lived here off and on the last thirty or forty years. Folks still remember, though." Miranda made an exaggerated face and waggled her fingers. "Booga-booga!"

  Lorna smiled, but she was repulsed by the hide, and unsettled by Miranda's flushed cheeks, her loopy grin. Her lover's playfulness wasn't amusing her as it might've on another night. She said, "Toss that wretched skin outside, would you? Let's hit the rack. I'm exhausted."

  "Exhausted, eh? Now is my chance to take full advantage of you." Miranda winked as she stroked the hide. Instead of heading for the front door she took her prize to the spare bedroom and left it there. She came back and embraced Lorna. Her eyes were too bright. The wine was strong on her breath. "Told you it was cool. God knows what else we'll find if we look sharp."

  ***

  They made fierce love. Miranda was much more aggressive than her custom. The pain in Lorna's knee built from a small flame to a white blaze of agony and her orgasm only registered as spasms in her thighs and shortness of breath, pleasure eclipsed entirely by suffering. Miranda didn't notice the tears on Lorna's cheeks, the frantic nature of her moans. When it ended, she kissed Lorna on the mouth, tasting of musk and salt, and something indefinably bitter. She collapsed and was asleep within seconds.

  Lorna lay propped by pillows, her hand tangled in Miranda's hair. The faint yellow shine of a three-quarter moon peeked over the ridgeline across the valley and beamed through the window at the foot of the bed. She could tell it was cold because their breaths misted the glass. A wolf howled and she flinched, the cry arousing a flutter of primordial dread in her breast. She waited until Miranda's breathing steadied, then crept away. She put on Miranda's robe and grabbed a bottle of Old Crow and a glass and poured herself a dose and sipped it before the main window in the living room.

  Thin, fast moving clouds occasionally crossed the face of the moon and its light pulsed and shadows reached like claws across the silvery landscape of rocky hillocks and canyons, and stands of firs and pine. The stars burned a finger-width above the crowns of the adjacent peaks. The land fell away into deeper shadow, a rift of darkness uninterrupted by a solitary flicker of manmade light. She and Miranda weren't welcome; the cabin and its former inhabitants hadn't been either, despite persisting like ticks bored into the flank of a dog. The immensity of the void intimidated her, and for a moment she almost missed Bruce and the comparative safety of her suburban home, the gilded cage, even the bondage. She blinked, angry at this lapse into the bad old way of thinking, and drank the whiskey. "I'm not a damned whipped dog." She didn't bother pouring, but had another pull directly from the bottle.

  The wolf howled again and another answered. The beasts sounded close and she wondered if they were circling the cabin, wondered if they smelled her and Miranda, or whether their night vision was so acute they could see her in the window-she half in the bag, a bottle dangling from her hand, favoring her left leg, weak and cut from the herd. She considered the cautionary tale of Sven Haugstad and drank some more. Her head spun. She waited for another howl, determined to answer with her own.

  Miranda's arms encircled her. She cupped Lorna's breasts and licked her earlobe, nibbled her neck. Lorna cried out and grabbed Miranda's wrist before she registered who it was, and relaxed. "Holy crap, you almost gave me a heart attack!" The floor creaked horribly, they'd even played a game of chopsticks by rhythmically pressing alternating sections with their shoes, but she hadn't heard her lover cross the room. Not a whisper.

  Something metallic snicked and an orange flame reflected in the window and sweet, sharp smoke filled Lorna's nostrils. Miranda gently pressed a cigarette to Lorna's lips. Miranda said, "I needed this earlier, except I was too damned lazy to leave the covers. Better late than never."

  "Gawd, you read my mind." Lorna took a drag, then exhaled contentedly. The nicotine mixed with the alcohol did its magic. Her fear of the night land and its creatures receded. "I guess I can forgive you for sneaking up on me since you've offered me the peace pipe. Ahhh, I've fallen off the wagon. You're evil. Did you hear the wolves?"

  "Those aren't wolves," Miranda said. She reclaimed the cigarette. She inhaled and the cigarette's cherry floated in the window as her face floated in the window, a blur over Lorna's shoulder. "Those are coyotes."

  "No shit?"

  "Is that why you're so jumpy? You thought the wolves were gonna get you?"

  "I'm not jumpy. Well, sheesh-an almost full moon, wolves howling on the moor, er, in the woods. Gotta admit it's all kinda spooky."

  "Not wolves. Coyotes. Come to bed… It's chilly."

  "Right. Coyotes," Lorna said. "I'm embarrassed. That's like peeing myself over dingoes or raccoons."

  Snug under a pile of blankets, Lorna was drifting off to sleep when Miranda said in a dreamy voice, "Actually, coyotes are much scarier than wolves. Sneaky, sneaky little suckers. Eat you up. Lick the blood all up."

  "What?" Lorna said. Miranda didn't answer. She snored.

  ***

  One morning, a woman who resembled Vivian Leigh at the flowering of her glory knocked on the door. She wore a green jacket and a green and yellow kerchief and yellow sunglasses. Her purse was shiny red plastic with a red plastic strap. Her gloves were white. Her skirt was black and her shoes were also black. She smiled when Lorna opened the door and her lipstick was blood red like the leaves. "Oh, I'm very sorry to disturb you, Ma'am. I seem to be a trifle lost." The woman introduced herself as Beth. She'd gone for a drive in the hills, searching for the Muskrat Creek Campground. "Apparently, I zigged when I should've zagged," she said, and laughed a laugh worthy of the stage. "Speaking of zigzags, do you mind?" She opened an enamel case and extracted a cigarette and inserted it into a silver holder and lighted up with a stick match. It was all very mesmerizing.

  Lorna had nearly panicked upon hearing the knock, convinced Bruce had tracked her down. She recovered and invited the woman inside and gave her a cup of coffee. Miranda had gone on her morning walk, which left Lorna with the task of entertaining the stranger while deflecting any awkward questions. She unpacked the road map from her Subaru and spread it across the table. She used a pencil to mark the campgrounds, which were twenty-odd miles from the cabin. Beth had wandered far off course, indeed.

  "Thank goodness I came across you. These roads go on forever." Beth sipped her coffee and puffed on her fancy cigarette. She slipped her sunglasses into her purse and glanced around the cabin. Her gaze traveled slowly, weighing everything it crossed. "You are certainly off the beaten path."

  "We're private people," Lorna said. "Where's your car?"

  Beth gestured toward the road. "Parked around the corner. I didn't know if I could turn around in here, so I walked. Silly me, I broke a heel." She raised her calf to show that indeed yes, the heel of her left pump was wobbly.

  "Are you alone?"

  "Yes. I was supposed to meet friends at the campgrounds, but I can't reach anybody. No bars. I'm rather cross with them and their directions."

  Lorna blinked, taking a moment to realize the woman meant she couldn't get proper phone reception. "Mine works fine. I'd be happy to let you place a call-"

  "Thanks anyway, sweetie." Beth had sketched directions inside a notebook. "It'll be a cinch now that I've got my bearings." She finished her coffee, said thanks and goodbye, waving jau
ntily as she picked her way down the rutted lane.

  Lorna started the generator to get hot water for a quick shower. After the shower she made toast and more coffee and sat at the table relaxing with a nice paperback romance, one of several she'd had the foresight to bring along. Out the window, she glimpsed movement among the trees, a low and heavy shape that she recognized as a large dog-no, not a dog, a wolf. The animal almost blended with the rotten leaves and wet brush, and it nosed the earth, moving disjointedly, as if crippled. When it reared on its hind legs, Lorna gasped. Miranda pulled back the cowl of the hide cloak, and leaned against a tree. Her expression was strange; she did not quite appear to be herself. She shuddered in the manner of a person emerging from a trance and walked to where the driveway curved and left three paper plates pressed into the bank. She spaced the plates about three feet apart. Each bore a bull's-eye drawn in magic marker.

  Miranda came inside. She'd removed the hide. Her hair was messy and tangled with twigs and leaves. "Who was here?" Her voice rasped like she'd been shouting.

  "Some woman looking for a campground." Lorna recounted the brief visit, too unnerved to mention what she'd witnessed. Her heart raced and she was overcome by dizziness that turned the floor to a trampoline. Miranda didn't say anything. She opened a duffel bag and brandished a revolver. She examined the pistol, snapping its cylinder open, then shut. Lorna wasn't particularly conversant with guns, but she'd watched Bruce enough to know this one was loaded. "I thought we were going to discuss it before you bought one," she said.