by Rob Smales
I peruse my tiny pile of supplies: one roll of peppermint Certs, eighteen small pills in a clamshell case, and one rose-colored Maybelline lipstick. I shake my head without thinking, sending a sharp spike of pain through my temple and into my eye, my whole head throbbing in sympathy. I’m not sure when I last took any of that Pain Away, but it seems to be wearing off. I open the first-aid kit again and take four more pills, which leaves just four in the kit. I add them to the supply pile.
Suddenly exhausted, I crawl out to the fireside and throw on one of the thicker branches I found this morning. That’s all I manage before I slump onto the woodpile for a rest.
It’s not as if I have an axe, or hatchet, so this isn’t one of those tidy woodpiles you see in images of hearth and home, all cut to length and neatly stacked. This is broken branches I found on the ground—every broken branch I’ve found on the ground—and just dragged here to the pile, an intertwined, springy mass about the size of a large couch, though shaped more like a nest. I only sit here because if I don’t sit I’m going to fall, and it’s a spot near the fire where I won’t be in snow . . . but the shapeless springiness of it allows me to lean back, my three shirts and winter coat padding me pretty well. The fire is warm, and this is actually the most comfortable I’ve been since the airport yesterday. I’m exhausted. My head is throbbing. I close my eyes. Just for a minute, I tell myself.
Just for a minute.
I open my eyes to darkness.
No, that’s not quite right. It’s only dusk, but the difference between that and the sun-brightened snowscape I closed my eyes to is striking. Confused, I look down to the fire, wincing at my stiff neck and the whomp of headache the motion gives me, expecting the same blaze I’d last seen. Instead I find the thick log I threw on right before I took a seat is nearly gone, its thin, blackened remains lying in a bed of softly glowing coals.
Jesus Christ, how long have I been out?
I grab a long, thin branch from the edge of the pile under my ass and sit up, squinting at the even bigger whomp this causes, and start snapping it into smaller sections over my knee. It’s from the end of a limb, thin, with lots of smaller branches and twigs coming out of it this way and that, and I know it’ll make great kindling—which is good, because I have to stoke this fire up again. I’ve already used two of the six fire-starter plugs from the survival kit; keeping the fire going would be a lot better than having to start it again. As I lean forward, however, motion in the clearing catches my eye. I change my focus without turning my head, looking over the bed of coals rather than into it.
A wolf gazes calmly back.
I freeze, staring stupidly, feeling the cold spot in my chest where my heart has stopped. I can’t remember ever seeing a real wolf, not even in the zoo. It took me a minute to spot it, its gray and white coat matching the snow well in the dusky light, but now that I’ve seen it I know it for exactly what it is, and even from thirty feet away it’s bigger than they ever looked on television and in movies. From beneath my lowered brow the thing looks huge, a Shetland pony with long lean limbs and golden eyes. I’ve read that all animals have an instinctive fear of man, but this animal can’t read, apparently: head up, ears erect, it watches me with an expression I choose to interpret as curiosity, because whatever it is, it ain’t fear.
I drop my fistful of kindling onto the coals and, like the wolf itself might have done in a child’s storybook, huff and puff, blowing the soft glow into a sharp red one, until the kindling flares, shooting out waves of heat and light.
The wolf watches all this without moving until I sit up from the fire, dizzy and surprisingly out of breath for such a small amount of work. When I sit up tall the wolf wheels about and trots off into the trees without a sound, a gray shadow fading into the darker shadows between the trunks. But it doesn’t fade before I get a good look at it broadside: at the ribs, sharply defined in the light of the rising moon, even through the coat of fur; at the tiny waist, a thing worthy of a racing grayhound, not a beast with this one’s obvious muscular bulk.
That wasn’t curiosity in the thing’s eyes. That great canine was looking at me with hunger—at this thought, part of my mind makes a quick count of everything left in my small supply pile: twelve Certs, eighteen of one pill, four of another, and a rose-colored lipstick—and it’s not alone. As it disappears into the shadows, I make out motion here and there under the trees. I don’t see another one clearly, and I have no idea how many there are, but my curious, hungry visitor brought friends. The whole pack is out there, all lean and hungry from the harsh winter.
I make the mental count again.
I wake in the plane.
I’m confused. I was out by the fire—I saw a wolf, for Christ’s sake!—and now here I am, one of the dome lights, or whatever they’re called in a plane, digging into my back. I open my eyes, though it barely makes a difference: it’s night, and inside the Piper it’s pretty damn dark. I sit up—then sag to the side as my head swims. My shoulder butts up against one of the hanging seat backs and I realize I’m in the center of the upside down cabin, below the narrow aisle between the left and right seats—lying next to Maggie, in effect, though I can’t see her in the dark. The pain in my head is back, and strong, though not as strong as it’s been in the past. I lie back, as gently as I’m able, and gaze through the low windows, at the moonlight on the snow: a soft glow in the night. Is my head getting better? Or am I just used to the pain?
I hear a sound, recognizing it as the thing that woke me—I’d heard it in my sleep. A wet, snuffling snort. I wonder for a moment what it might be—then remember that I’m alone here, and there shouldn’t be a sound if I’m not making it . . . and I’m not making it. I roll gently onto my side, taking my weight on one elbow, turning my attention toward the sound. Toward the cockpit.
Moonlight shines faintly silver on the snow, coming in through the unbroken side of the windshield . . . and there are shadows moving. Shapes in the night, passing back and forth on the other side of the glass, like fish in a tank. I roll further, squirm a little closer, peering at the shapes outside, curious—and then my curiosity becomes fear: not all of the shapes are outside the glass. A growl, low and rumbling, burbles out of the darkened side of the cockpit, where shadows roil strangely, all movement and no detail, like shapes under a blanket.
It’s pure reflex, but I’m scrabbling for some way to beat back the darkness and see what’s right in front of me. The cell phone fumbles out of my pocket, the screen coming to life. The artificial illumination, so meager back in civilization as to be almost laughable, is bright enough in this setting to cause me to squint against the glare.
The wolf, however, does not squint, crouching as it is, not five feet away, half in and half out of the plane, peeking at me around Bill’s seat back, its eyes golden dinner plates at this distance. Its hindquarters protrude out through the broken windshield, and I can see where the snow I’d piled there to keep out the cold wind has been cleared away. For an instant my fear is drowned out by a flood of anger: just who the hell does it think it is, coming into my plane—my home—uninvited like this, tracking in snow and letting in the cold?
Then I focus on the dark muzzle, at the bared teeth splitting it in a savage grin, and fear shoulders its way back to center stage. Christ, from this close those teeth look as long as my fingers, though much, much sharper, and . . . and as I watch, some of the darkness around those teeth drips off. It’s just a single drop, but I watch it fall with amazing clarity, a droplet in high-def, tumbling through the air to strike the ceiling which is now our floor with a tiny, soundless splash. Around it I see more darkness on the floor, drips and drabs and spatters, and all but that last drop is beneath the shape of Bill, hanging in his seat.
Blood.
They’re eating the pilot. They found the hole, smelled Bill through the snow or something, and dug their way in. That’s what woke me: the wet sound of tearing fabric, or maybe the wetter sound of tearing flesh. Did they stop there because Bil
l was easy, hanging right in the entrance so they didn’t have to come in any further? Or had they not even noticed me sleeping a half-dozen feet away, so intent had they been on this dangling buffet? And would Bill be enough to feed them all? Part of me considers all the shadows I saw through the windshield, the rest of the pack waiting its turn, and doesn’t think so.
Before the thought is finished I’m struggling with the phone in my hand, rolling clumsily to my knees. From the corner of my eye I register the wolf flinching back at this sudden move. The icons on the phone’s screen look tiny, and the one I’m searching for seems to hide among the rest like some insane Where’s Waldo game. The wolf recovers, head lowering slightly, the rumble in its chest rising as it places one foot forward, the first move it’s made toward me. Oh, why the fuck do I have so many goddamn applications on this thing? It has to be here, I know it’s here—and then it is.
My thumb stabs down on the screen.
If the background glow from my screen seemed bright, the flashlight app explodes. Brilliant light, the colorless white of a lightning strike, bursts from the little machine. My eyes and head nearly rupture with pain, and I cry out, falling forward, catching myself with one stiff arm before I crash headlong. The impact with the floor ratchets the torment in my head even higher, but through teary eyes I see the wolf take a step back, then retreat another, head dropping, ears folding back sleek against the skull. Those golden orbs squint nearly shut, and the head droops lower as I kneel up tall, raising the light up by my ear to aim the blinding beam directly into the beast’s eyes, like a cop making a traffic stop.
Despite the situation, I nearly giggle at the thought of a cop pulling over the Big Bad Wolf. The words run through my head, Do you know why I stopped you?, but what pours from my mouth are inarticulate sounds: part fear, part anger, but loud. Loud enough that it, combined with all the sudden movement, makes my world go swimmy. I fall forward again, still trying to catch myself one-handed so I can keep the light trained on my intruder.
The sudden light, the shout, my falling toward it—it’s too much for the wolf. It backs away with a yip, just as the jolt of landing stiff-armed once again makes everything roll, like the world’s lost its vertical hold. There’s a flurry of movement, the flash of a bushy tail, and it’s gone.
I lie on the floor, breathing hard, stomach kicking from all the fear and activity, though I don’t think I’m going to actually be sick: there’s nothing in there to come out anyway. I lower my forehead to the floor and close my eyes for a moment—and when I raise my head I notice my breathing is normal, my heart no longer thudding in my skull. Even my stomach seems to have settled in an instant, no longer dancing like a tap artist but offering a nice, steady, “feed me” rumble. Did I pass out? I glance around, unable to tell for sure, though I suspect that I did. How long? Are the wolves still about? My phone is in my hand, though the light is out, the screen dark: yet another indication that more time has passed than I was aware of. I touch the screen and the backlight glow fills the plane once more.
I immediately see the uncovered hole in the windshield, suddenly become aware of the cold, much more intense than when I’d woken and discovered the intruder, and know I have to do something about it. But I’m not going out into the snow, into the night, not with the pack out there, probably waiting to get back at Bill again.
Or start on me.
I crawl back and forth, towing suitcases, but they aren’t enough to fill the gap. I drag myself back, trying not to look at Bill, though I’m working right in front of him. I try not to see the stumps where his left arm is missing from the elbow, his right from the shoulder, or his torn face tipped back with its mouth open wide as if he’d screamed in agony while the wolves took their treats. I simply pull myself past him to the passenger seats, jerking the cushions free.
In the event of a water landing, singsongs a flight attendant in my brain, your seat cushion may be used as a flotation device.
“How about keeping out the Big Bad Wolf?” I say, stretching my arm through to pull what snow I can reach back to cover the hole, then spread the cushions and cases across the gap in the glass to shore things up. “What do you think about that, Bill? Is it enough to keep out the Big Bad Wolf?” No. No way. But it’s the best I can do for the moment. I slump down, my back against the cases, still trying to avoid eye contact with Bill. I want to go to my supply pile, thoughts of the hungry pack reminding me of my own shrinking, growling, howling belly, but I’m just too tir—
I open my eyes to daylight, and I’m out by the fire. This is where I fell asleep, sitting on the woodpile, and for a moment I suspect my nocturnal visitation was all a dream. Then I look through the open plane door. I can’t see Bill from where I sit, but I can make out the edge of the stain on the floor, splashes of what I know to be blood, and I realize everything was real. The wolves were here, feeding, and they’ll be back. They know they can get into the plane, and they know there’s food in there—some of it so fresh it’s still moving, albeit slowly.
I can’t believe I may have survived a plane crash, and then the deadly cold of Canadian winter nights, only to wind up a walking take-out meal. That thought begets a short fit of giggles, but the laughter hurts my head so much I sober quickly. I know I have to do something to keep the wolves out, I have to, but just the thought of them feeding is enough to send me scuttle-crawling back into the plane looking for breakfast. Applying such a lofty title to my miniscule pile of supplies makes me grin—almost makes me giggle again, despite the pain—until I reach the spot where I left that tiny pile, and find it gone.
My head throbs as my gaze flicks this way and that, but I’m barely aware of it. It can’t be gone! It was barely anything, but anything is better than nothing. Someone is repeating “No, no, no,” in a rusty voice, and it’s me, of course it’s me, and I can’t understand how the wolves got past me, slunk right past without my even seeing, to eat my food—and why would they do that when they had their own food hanging right there, in front of their entrance?
“Why would they do that, Bill?” I say, turning to him for a response before remembering his shredded flesh and missing limbs. “Why?” I say again, seriously wanting an answer. Bill says nothing, merely hangs there in his seat, his back to me.
Bill, it seems, is in a mood. Then, in a flash of inspiration, I turn to Maggie.
“You must know something, hon,” I say. “You must.” I look, just to make sure, and I was right: her eyes remain open, even the squinty one, keeping a lopsided watch. She must have seen what happened.
Unless it was in the night, says that fucking annoying, rational voice in my head, the one that remembers French tips and pilots’ names. In the dark, she may have seen nothing more than shadows, maybe not even that, and—
“Oh, shut up!” My head pounds, hurting more with every movement, every shouted word, but this is important, damn it! I force myself calm, and scoot under the seats ’til I’m looking up at my wife, who stares on impassively.
“Sweetheart. You . . . must have seen something.” I point to the curve in the bulkhead where I left the pile. “It was right there in front of you, and I see you watching all the time. Every time I’m in here you’re looking at me. You must have seen something. Please, if you could just tell—”
I’m squirming in my urgency when my hand strikes something small that rolls a few inches before fetching up against the dome light housing. I grab for it blindly, then hold it up in front of my face, peering closely in the shadows beneath the hanging seats.
A small black tube, maybe the size of my thumb, white lettering along the side catching what light from the windows filters past me.
(Maybelline)
It’s empty.
I look up at Maggie in shock. “You bitch! You took it? You ate it? But . . . but what about me? I needed that. You don’t! You don’t need it at all, so why would you do that? You’re already dead.”
I half-turn, twisting my neck savagely to look toward the cockpit, ig
noring the pain in my anger.
“You’re both dead. Why would you—”
I break off as something occurs to me, something so basic I’m surprised I hadn’t thought of it before. I ratchet my head back and forth, trying to take them both in with the same gaze, though it’s impossible from this angle.
“Oh, I get it. I get it now. You’re both dead, and here I am, still moving around and breathing. And eating. I’m the odd man out, right? You two, you’ve been talking behind my back, haven’t you? Deciding it’s not right? Deciding, maybe, I shouldn’t be alive? That it’s not fair? Well fuck you! Fuck you both! You think you’re going to turn on me behind my back, maybe do something about it? Fuck. You. Both.”
I back toward the open door, wanting to get away from this place, not willing to be in the same room with them, but not wanting to let them out of my sight, either. Maggie watches me go, silent and impassive. I meet her gaze, my eyes flat and stinging despite the cold air; hers wonky, bloody, and expressionless.
“You know, you’re my wife. I might have expected this kind of thing from him—he’s a stranger, just the pilot, just the fucking help, after all—but from you? I expected better from you, Maggie. I expected better.”
The back of my head strikes the top of the doorframe. It’s not a hard hit, but what is now the top used to be the bottom, and there is still a small step built into the bulkhead right there. The step-edge catches me across the back of the skull, the sharp edge magnifying the impact. I stumble through the doorway, spinning away from the two of them. Rage fills me as, just for an instant, I think about the way they’ve teamed up against me, the way they’ve tricked me, even going so far as to distract me so I’d hit my head yet again. But I only have an instant, as the white wintery world outside goes watery, and then dim, and then black. I know that I’m falling, though I don’t even have time to feel the snow’s bitter-cold kiss on my face before everything slips away and is gone.