Dream Sweet

by Terence Matedero

“Daddy, help me. Help me!”

  As I broke through the willows between Brandon and myself, I saw a mother grizzly and her cub across the river from where Brandon was. Somewhat relieved, in the midst of my head pounding from the stress and running, I knew that the bear wasn’t going to cross the rapids, so I gave my complete attention to Brandon. Apparently in his agitated state, he’d stepped into a hole between two large rocks and gotten his foot stuck.

  “It’s okay, Brand. I’m here,” I said as I reached him.

  “Dad, hurry up, help me.” he cried.

  “It’s okay, Brand, we’ll get you out, don’t worry. That bear isn’t going to cross the river with the rapids being so fast with her cub; she’s going to stay right where she is.”

  “Oh, Daddy, are you sure? Get me out of here, please.”

  I had Brandon stand up and I bent his left knee forward and freed his foot. He was only stuck because he was trying to free himself by pulling in the wrong direction. By doing so, however, he did scrap his ankle quite a bit and blood was soaking into his sock and shoe.

  “Can you walk, buddy?” I asked.

  He put his weight onto his left leg and tested it. “Ow, that hurts.”

  “That’s okay, Brand, I’ll help you back to camp and I’ll come back and get your stuff, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “Let’s go. Hold on,” I said as I wrapped his arm around my neck and supported him with my right arm. We hobbled back up to camp as best we could. The further we got from the river, the calmer Brandon became.

  We met Kate halfway up the last hill. She was holding the camp hatchet in her right hand.

  “Oh my God, Dad, what happened? What’s wrong with Brandon?” she asked. “I heard Brandon scream and I didn’t know what to do, so I grabbed the hatchet and I was going to come and find you, but I was too scared.”

  “Everything is fine, Kate. Everything is fine. Brandon got his foot stuck in between some rocks and couldn’t get it free,” I said as I struggled to get Brandon into the hammock, outside the screen tent.

  “Yeah, we saw a…”

  “Shhh, Brand, it’s okay,” I interrupted as I shook my head the slightest bit and winked at him. There was no sense frightening Kate about it. She would want to go home and I saw no reason to do that just yet. Brandon got my hint.

  “You saw what?” Kate asked. She was hopping from one foot to the other. I wasn’t sure if she was getting more agitated or Brandon’s scream interrupted her from using the luggable loo.

  “We saw some animals. Nothing to be concerned about, Kate. Really. Can we talk about it later?”

  “What do you mean? What kind of animals?”

  “I’ll tell you about it later, okay? Now, please go and get the first aid kit out of the Montero so we can fix Brandon right up. And, put that hatchet down before you hurt yourself.”

  She looked down at her right hand and knitted her brow. “Hmm, I forgot I had this.”

  “My point exactly,” I tried to smile at her.

  ~

  Kate went to get the first aid kit. We bandaged Brandon’s ankle and made him comfortable on the hammock with a diet Pepsi and a bag of chips by his side. Before Kate could bombard me with questions about the accident, I told her that I had to go back down to the river and get our stuff, and asked her if she wouldn’t mind staying at camp with Brandon.

  “You’re going to leave us here alone?” Kate asked.

  “Sure, you’re safe. I just need to run down there really quick and I’ll be back before you know it. There’s nothing to worry about, Kate. Really,” I shook my head. “Really.”

  When I got back down to the area where Brandon had been, the grizzly and her cub were gone. There was no sign of them on my side of the river, so I was correct in presuming that they wouldn’t cross. As I walked back up the river, I thought I heard a bear grunting nearby, but there was so much noise from the rapids that I wasn’t sure.

  When I got back to camp, everything was as I had left it. The kids were subdued. Kate was in the screen house and Brandon was still on the hammock. I asked Brandon how he was and went to the screen house and unzipped the door. Kate looked at me with squinted eyes and drawn eyebrows.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked her.

  “Brandon isn’t telling me what happened either and I think I have the right to know, don’t I?”

  ‘Well, yeah, I suppose, but it would be better if you just knew that there was nothing to worry about and left it at that.”

  “Brandon’s ankle was all scratched and bleeding when you came back with him and he was acting like he’d seen a bunch of zombies, and you’re telling me that I don’t have anything to worry about?” she spat at me.

  “Did I ever tell you that you are becoming more and more like your mother every day?” I asked with a smile in my tone.

  “Dad, that’s not funny and I’m being serious. We’re up here in the middle of the mountains, no cell phone service, no Ranger Rick in the next cabin over, and I just want to know what happened to Brandon. If you won’t tell me, I’m going to walk out to the highway and start hitchhiking home.” She crossed her arms and gave no indication of backing down.

  “Kate, you’re right, as usual, but if I come right out and tell you what happened, even though the situation as it stands leaves nothing to be concerned about, you’ll blow it out of proportion and want to go home.” It was a standoff.

  “You don’t know that.”

  “Well, actually, I do. I think I know you pretty well, Kate, having lived with you for 16 years, but I might as well tell you and get on with convincing you that we don’t need to go home instead of arguing with you about whether or not you’re going to want to.”

  “Whatever,” she replied.

  “Please don’t whatever me, Kate.”

  “But, you’re just being, well, not very nice,” she said and turned away from me slightly.

  “I’m sorry, Kate. I don’t want to go home. I haven’t felt this good in weeks. The fresh air is helping my headaches, the hiking is helping my disposition, and I just know that if we just leave what happened today in the past that we will enjoy the rest of our stay.” I nodded.

  She made no reply.

  “Come on, Kate. If I tell you, will you promise not to get all upset about it?”

  She made no reply.

  “Is that a yes?”

  Silence.

  “Okay, but I’m not leaving. You’ll have more fun not knowing than you will knowing. I’m warning you one last time.”

  I hesitated. She turned to face me again.

  “Well,” I began, “Brandon was fishing and he spotted a bear and her cub across the river bank.”

  I didn’t know that her eyes could open that far. “What kind of bear, Dad?” she asked.

  I told her the rest of what happened and she was polite enough not to rant and rave until the very end.

  “Well, you’re right. I want to go home.”

  “But, the…oh, for crying out loud. Can we just sit down and have a nice meal and think about this before we get all upset and start walking out of here? Please, Kate?” The lack of sleep was grinding a definite edge to my temper.

  For a teenager, Kate was a very easy-going girl. She hardly ever gave me or Donna any trouble. She usually accepted things when they didn’t go her way and almost always appreciated things that we did for her and allowed her to do. Except when she was scared. She was relentless. She would not take no for an answer. She wanted things her way and no other, and I knew that I was going to spend the next couple of hours trying to convince her that nothing was going to happen to any of us because bears were just as afraid of us as we were of them. If we locked up the food and the garbage, we wouldn’t have any trouble.

  The argument, discussion, debate, whatever, ended with Kate moving her sleeping bag into the back of the Montero. I believe her exact words right before she did were, “If you guys want to get eaten by a bear, fine, I’m going to sleep in Mom’s car and stay
there until it’s time to go home on Sunday, since you’re not going to leave right now.”

  I looked at Brandon and rolled my eyes and shrugged my shoulders.

  He smiled and said, “Maybe we should just go home, Dad. Huh?”

  I didn’t admit to him that I thought it was a good idea, but I also didn’t tell him that the last thing I wanted to do was to pack up everything and head right back down the mountain. I was tired, and I was going to get some sleep.

  Right then, I needed a drink.

  ~

  Brandon and I relaxed by the fire pit after the sun went down while we toasted marshmallows and made s’mores. He told me a couple of lame ghost stories, and I did my best to tell him stories that didn’t involve bears or other deadly encounters with animals. I was working on my third seven and seven when Brandon decided that it was time for bed.

  “A little early isn’t it? It’s your turn.” I asked.

  “I know, Dad, but I’m tired,” he said, then added, “And a little cold.”

  The temperature dropped rapidly at that time of year and would get down to the upper 30’s. We all had down-filled sleeping bags, so there wasn’t a problem keeping warm in the tent. A slight breeze started to blow and I was getting a little chilly myself.

  “Do you need some help?”

  “Nah, I’m good.”

  “I’ll be right there, ‘kay? I just need to put the food away and make sure the fire is out.”

  I mostly wanted to finish my drink before I went to bed. I was starting to feel like I might be able to sleep. I was certainly hoping that I could sleep without nightmares.

  18

  I was wrapped in my sleeping bag lying in the tent with Brandon half on top of me. There was an owl not too distant from us voicing his opinion into the night.

  I laid down after I put the food in the front seat of the Montero and checked up on Kate. On the way back to the tent, I doused the fire pit with water.

  As I reach up to pull my ski mask down over my chilled face, I heard a twig snap nearby on the forest floor. I held my breath as I listened. Something was moving around in the night close by and the faint sound of heavy breathing and the vibration of heavy footsteps on the earth supported my fears that it was a very large animal. In fact, I was certain that a bear was wandering around the edge of the camp. Perhaps the same bear we saw earlier in the day.

  As I lay there, I remembered that I had failed to put the garbage in the SUV, too.

  “Shit,” I said to myself. “I have to go get it, I can’t just sit here and let that bear roam around the campsite. If it gets any closer it’s going to wake up Brandon and Kate. I sure don’t want Kate to wake up. I’ll never hear the end of it. Maybe if I hurry I can secure the garbage and if the bear sees me with my light wandering around, she may just leave.” Those thoughts rushed through my mind.

  I grabbed my flashlight and unzipped my sleeping bag. I took care not to wake Brandon unzipping the tent door, and crept out into the night. As I shined my flashlight around the immediate area, I couldn’t see any sign of bear within the range of my light.

  I hurried to the garbage and grabbed it, tying the bag as I headed toward the Montero.

  My heart stopped when I heard Brandon unzipping the tent.

  I turned and whispered “Brandon, what are you doing?”

  He answered, "I gotta pee, Dad."

  “Wait, don’t, stay in…”

  A brown mass of hair and muscle appeared out of the darkness before I could finish my sentence. I saw the light reflecting deep in the bear’s eyes before Brandon heard movement and turned to face it. The next few moments clicked off in front of me frame by frame.

  The bear raised her left hand and swiped Brandon down across his face and chest from left to right. I heard his flesh tear as he flailed backwards, screaming. He hit the ground and began to scoot away on his butt, but the bear was so much quicker, she grabbed Brandon’s leg with her right arm and pulled him toward her. Brandon flipped over just enough for me to see blood squirting from his neck and a flap of skin hanging down what used to be the right side of his face.

  “Get the fuck away from him,” I screamed, as I ran toward the attacker.

  The bear had plunged her teeth into Brandon’s hip and started to drag him off.

  The scream that Brandon produced from the bite was unfathomable. In my worst nightmares, in the worst horror movie I’ve watched on the big screen, I’ve never heard such pain and fear come forth from a child’s scream.

  I jumped on the bear’s neck and she dropped Brandon to take care of me. She stood up and threw me off her neck, head first, into the tent. One of the tent poles broke as I landed and the fractured end of it rammed straight into my eye.

  I heard both Kate’s and Brandon’s screams mingling as the bear dragged him off into the woods, before I opened my eyes to the dark, still night.

  The tent was intact. My eye was not punctured. But Brandon was not half on top of me. I reached over to feel for him and found an empty sleeping bag. I grabbed my flashlight, unzipped my bag and made haste getting out of the tent.

  There were no signs of a struggle, no signs of blood, and no signs of Brandon within the radius of my light.

  “BRANDON!” I screamed and ran toward the river. A dozen feet from where I started, I tripped over a boulder, tumbled partway down the slope, and felt a blinding pain in my temple when my body came to rest. I reached up to grab my head and discovered that my right arm was now broken, also. I passed out from the combined pain radiating from both my arm and my head just as I heard Brandon scream.

  ~

  I regained consciousness as the sun peeked through the tall pines. Before I opened my eyes I felt the throbbing pain in my arm and the pounding in my head. I could hear the river in the distance. It sounded like laughter. It sounded like Mr. Evans was laughing at me.

  “Oh, shit. Brandon,” was my first thought as I tried to get up. It wasn’t easy with one arm in a cast, and the other newly broken, but I managed to stand and walked over to the SUV.

  Kate was not inside. Nor was she anywhere within sight.

  “Kate! Brandon!” I shouted.

  Nothing but the sound of the birds waking up and the laughing river in the distance answered my shout.

  I began to go toward the river, the last place I saw Brandon when the bear dragged him away. I continued to shout, “Kate! Brandon!” as I half-walked, half-ran.

  The trail of Brandon’s blood veered to my right and I followed it uphill. I noticed broken twigs and low hanging branches and found a piece of Brandon’s flannel shirt caught on one.

  “Oh my God, look at all of this!” I said to myself. The trail of blood was almost a steady stream into the woods. My God, if he’s lost that much blood. Shit, I don’t want to find him dead. Please don’t be dead. Brandon, my baby boy, please don’t make him be dead, God. I don’t know what I will do if I find my Brandon dead. What the fuck am I going to do? What the fuck happened? Please, God, let Brandon be alive. Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God,” my thoughts raced.

  I kneeled down for a moment because my heart was battling to stay inside my chest, my arm was throbbing, my head was pounding, and I started to feel light headed.

  “What kind of a father am I? I can’t even take care of my children. Hell, I can’t even stand up right now. Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me. What an idiot I am. Let my children get eaten alive by a bear when I knew we should have left last night. Me and my fucking lazy ass. Kate probably went after Brandon and got eaten, too. What the fuck am I going to do if I find both of them dead? Oh, my God.”

  I started to cry. Deep and heavy sobs. Each time I took a breath I thought my head was going to explode. I slouched forward and sobbed into the cold wet earth. My broken right arm gently lying on the ground as I tried to support myself with my cast.

  I crouched that way sobbing lower and quieter until the only sounds from me were deep and distressed breaths. I listened to the sounds of the river. At some point, it ha
d stopped laughing.

  Somewhere in the distance, I could hear someone else sobbing. “My God, that’s Kate,” I said, as I stumbled into a standing position and started to move forward before my head caught up with my body. I fell forward and managed to keep myself from falling by supporting my weight with my cast. There was pain, but nothing like the sharp throbbing in my other arm.

  I galloped as hard as I could toward the sobs. When I crested the hill, I saw Kate leaning over Brandon. She didn’t hear me coming or didn’t care because I came up to her without her raising her head.

  “Kate, is Brandon still alive? Look out. Let me down there.” I said, in broken breaths.

  “I can’t, I’m pinching. Pinching his artery. Artery with my fingers. My fingers are numb. Come around. Come around the other side,” she said between sobs and motioned with her head.

  I did not see her hands on Brandon’s neck until I moved around him. I threw myself to my knees and tried to see where Kate’s fingers were. Her hands were caked with blood from the wrists down. It was hard to tell where Brandon’s neck ended and Kate’s hands began. It was obvious that the wound was to his carotid artery and if Kate would have used any kind of tourniquet around his neck, she would have stopped all blood flow to his head. Even in a nightmare situation like that, she never ceased to amaze me.

  Kate had placed the flap of skin back where it belonged, Brandon’s eyes were open but he was staring straight up. I felt the other side of his neck for a pulse and thought I felt a faint heartbeat. His chest was not moving, but the heartbeat was enough for me to hope.

  “Okay, Kate, we need to move him back to the car. Can you hold onto his artery with just one hand?”

  “No, it’s too slippery.”

  “Okay, well, I need to pick him up, and shit, we need to move him.” I removed my shirt and ripped it as much in half as I could manage. Then crumpled up one half and pressed it against Kate’s hand. “Okay, you move your hands while I push this shirt into his neck.”