by Garth Stein
“What happened to him?” Jenna asked.
“Well, if you believe all of this, the spirits didn’t like what he was doing so they broke him down. They taught him a lesson.”
“How?”
“His wife had a baby, a son, and it was born dead. He told everyone that it was his punishment and he would only work for his people from then on.”
Click, click, click. Jenna heard the tumblers fall into place in her head. A baby born dead. Ferguson had said that. He was delirious when he said it and Jenna didn’t really understand at that point. But this made it clear. Something was going on.
“So why do you want to find him?”
They all looked at Jenna. She had almost avoided an answer, but they weren’t going to let her get away. It was getting darker and people’s faces were beginning to fade, so Jenna cleared her throat and answered the question.
“My son drowned at a resort and I think he may know something about it.”
A big silent hole opened up, filled only by the crackling of the fire and the cool air. Jenna looked over to Eddie to see what his reaction was, but he just stared into the fire. One of the men started laying fresh pieces of driftwood across the flames.
“Thunder Bay?” he asked.
Jenna nodded.
“Welp,” he said, “Livingstone knows something about it, all right.”
Mom produced a brown paper bag from nowhere and started digging inside. The kids knew what she was doing, and they immediately gathered around her. She took out a bag of marshmallows and started feeding them onto the roasting sticks, which the children carefully held near the flames.
“Do you believe?” Dad asked the question. He had a deep voice and had been quiet until then. It was hard for Jenna to make out the generational lines at this party. She couldn’t tell if it was one immediate family or cousins or what. But Mom and Dad were obviously the ones in charge.
“Do I believe what?”
“Well, you said you came to find out if he knew anything about what happened. What do you figure he’s going to tell you?”
“About the kushtaka,” Jenna answered, softly.
One of the kids stuck his marshmallow too far into the fire and it lit up, turning into a flaming ball of sugar. The other kids laughed, and the one with the flames said he wanted it that way.
“Kushtaka!” One of the young men snorted. “How about try using a life jacket.”
“Samuel!” Mom snapped, reaching out and slapping the young man hard across his face. “Show some respect!”
“Hell, Mom, we all had jobs there before it happened, before Livingstone scared everyone off with his evil spirit crap.”
“Samuel!” Now it was Dad. “You stop using that language or you can leave right now.”
The young man stood up quickly. “Fine, I’ll leave. I’m the only one who’ll tell the truth around here, and you all don’t want to hear it. Go ahead, butter each other up with your bullshit. It’s still just bullshit.” He stormed off into the darkness, toward the trees.
Mom fed another three marshmallows onto a stick and handed it to Michael while pointing to Jenna. Michael brought Jenna the stick, which she halfheartedly held in the fire. Try using a life jacket, Samuel said, as if Jenna had never thought of that before. Everyone uses a life jacket. Bobby had a life jacket, until he took it off.
“Don’t beat yourself up about it now, honey,” Mom said. “What’s done is done and you have to do whatever you can to put it behind you.”
“I never thought about all the jobs,” Jenna said.
“That place was bad luck from the beginning,” Mom went on. “It was doomed to fail. Everybody here got excited about it, and they were disappointed when it didn’t happen. But that’s how it works sometimes.”
“All the time,” Dad corrected. “That’s how it works all the time. When people start thinking the world exists for their own comfort and pleasure, that’s when the end is coming. Nature takes its course, and we’ve got to accept everything we get, good and bad. That’s all.”
And that was all. The darkness fell as hard as it could, but a full moon soon rose above the trees and lit up the sky with a blue light. The kids stuffed themselves with marshmallows until they fell asleep by the fire, and the older people sat quietly watching the flames and passing around the Jack Daniel’s. Jenna tried to hold her watch at an angle toward the flames so she could see the time, but she couldn’t tell. She didn’t want to leave these people, they were so warm, but she wanted to get to her next destination. She was anxious to move on.
Eddie saw Jenna check her watch.
“Want to go?”
Jenna nodded and they stood up.
“We’re going to head back,” Eddie announced, shaking hands with the men and calling Oscar to his side.
Jenna went up to Mom.
“Thanks for the food, it was great.”
“Sure, honey, anytime. And don’t worry, you’ll find what you want to find if you look hard enough.”
She kissed Jenna on the cheek, and Jenna knew that Mom was right.
Dad told Jenna and Eddie to take the road back to town, it would be faster than the beach, so they left the family by the fire and walked quickly up a narrow path in the woods until they found a dirt road. They turned left and started back toward town with the full moon providing enough light so they could see the way in front of them.
Jenna put her arm around Eddie’s waist and leaned her head against his shoulder as they walked, and Eddie wrapped his good arm around her. It felt good to be under Eddie’s protection. The woods were cold and dark, and Jenna was glad she had someone to be with. She was glad he was there.
“So, do you regret coming with me yet?” Jenna asked.
Eddie pulled away slightly.
“Why would you ask that?”
Jenna tightened her grip on him.
“I don’t know. I know you think this whole thing is crazy.”
“So?”
“So you don’t hate me?”
He laughed to himself.
“Yeah, I hate you.”
“You do?”
“No, I’m kidding, I don’t hate you. I wish I hated you.”
Jenna stopped and turned to Eddie, but she could only see the outline of his face.
“Why would you say that?”
“I guess I don’t, really. But if I did, this would all be easier.”
“Poor Eddie,” Jenna said. He was so sweet, standing in front of her like a ghost, a dark shadow in the woods, stripped of distracting details like his blue eyes and his little ears, he was just a voice and a body, and Jenna wanted to be with him now. She wanted to be within him, to climb into his shell and find out what it felt like to walk around inside him and to think his thoughts. She moved closer to him until they touched, and then she moved closer still. Their legs, their hips, their chests were pressed together, and Jenna lifted her head and kissed him. And that kiss grew, became deeper and deeper, until Jenna felt as if some of her was getting inside of him, that he was letting her in, and she wanted to be inside, to climb into his mouth and slide down his throat and curl up into a little ball deep down inside.
But then he closed the door. He pulled away from her, retreating into the darkness. “It’s not fair,” he said.
“What’s not fair?”
“This. This whole thing. I don’t know. You’ve got something going on; you’re here on a mission, right? Find the shaman, whatever, it doesn’t matter, that’s why you’re here. And when you’re done, you’re going to go back to the life that you left to come here. But I’m not. This is my life. When you leave, you’re going someplace with a house and a car and a husband and all of that, and I’m staying right here with nothing. It’s not fair, that’s all.”
“I’ll leave you Oscar,” Jenna offered hopefully.
“It’s not funny. I’m serious. You’ve been playing with me for days now, being all flirty and everything, and I don’t know what to do, because I really lik
e you. I mean really. More than like you. If I had my choice of anybody in the world, you’d be my choice. But I know you’re leaving, so why should I let myself get sucked in so I can be disappointed in the end?”
He stood in the darkness looking at her. Jenna hadn’t realized. She hadn’t thought ahead. Her life had not been about thinking ahead lately. It had been about acting. Eddie wanted to know, he had a right to know. But know what? What could Jenna tell him?
“Do you understand what I’m saying?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“And?”
“And what? You’re right.”
“So I shouldn’t let myself get sucked in?”
“What do you want me to say, Eddie, that I’ll marry you and we’ll live in Wrangell happily ever after?”
Eddie dropped his shoulders and started walking toward town, and Jenna immediately cursed herself. Why did she say that? God damn it. How did Eddie manage to make the whole thing so complicated? Why couldn’t it all be easy?
“Eddie, wait,” Jenna called out, following Eddie with Oscar. “I’m . . . I’m not . . . I don’t know what I’m doing about anything, so I don’t know where that leaves us.”
“It leaves us about a mile from town, that’s where it leaves us.”
Well, that was a conversation-ender if Jenna had ever heard one. They walked the rest of the way in silence. Jenna didn’t know how they got from kissing warmly to marching icily, but the transition had been made. Jenna couldn’t blame Eddie for trying to see the future, but how was that possible? What if they ended up not liking each other? Just because you have a romance doesn’t mean you’re going to get married. Sometimes, the best romances are those with a finite ending. They exist as a hot flame and then they burn out. Why did Eddie have to expect more from Jenna? Why did Jenna have to commit to Eddie before they had even slept together?
They got back to the bar and went inside. The place was about half full of drinkers having a good time. An older guy was behind the bar this time, probably the day kid’s father, and he waved to Jenna as she walked across the room. Eddie didn’t stop. He said good night over his shoulder and went up the stairs.
Jenna went over to the bartender.
“Tom from the store said he spoke to Livingstone, and he’ll run you out there tomorrow morning. Go on over to the store and he’ll take you out.”
“That’s it?”
“Yep, that’s it.”
“Well, thanks for the message.”
“No problem. And don’t worry about the noise. I’ll clear these yahoos out in a little while.”
Jenna thanked the man and went up to her room with Oscar. She sat on the bed and took off her boots, and then she got herself pretty worked up over the scene that Eddie had pulled in the woods. How dare he lay a trip on her like that? Like Jenna’s supposed to offer him some kind of security. Jenna just wanted to be close to him. What made him think that that would lead to a fantasy life together?
She knew she wouldn’t be able to fall asleep with all this raging through her mind, so she left her room and knocked on Eddie’s door.
“What?” he called out from inside.
“I need to talk to you for a minute.”
Jenna heard his footsteps and then the door opened.
“What?”
He leaned against the doorjamb with a bored look on his face.
“Look,” Jenna started, “if you think I’ve been playing with you, I feel real bad about that, okay? But I’ve got a lot of problems that I’m trying to work out and a lot of things I’m trying to deal with. I don’t know where I’ll be tomorrow or next week or next year. I can’t guarantee anything, I can’t make any commitments, I can’t promise you anything. But I want to be with you now because that’s what I want. If you want to be with me, then great. If you don’t, because you’ve got other issues with me or whatever, then I’ll have to live with that.”
His expression didn’t change one bit, which made Jenna mad. She wanted some kind of reaction. But it didn’t happen.
“Fine,” Jenna said, “Good night.”
Eddie closed his door.
Back in her room, Jenna lay on top of her bed for a good twenty minutes listening to the jukebox through the floor before she realized he wasn’t coming. She thought he had understood, finally, but she knew now that even though he talked big, he was only in it for himself. He didn’t have the ability to see past his own needs and to offer himself to her. He was a grudger, like all men. A grudger and a lesson teacher. Cut off their noses to spite their faces. And they’re all too dumb to know it.
She undressed to her T-shirt, brushed her teeth, and got in bed. The music had stopped and there were only a few voices and the smell of cigarettes coming up from the ground floor. She turned off the lights, leaving the bathroom light on as a night light, and rolled over on her side, alone again.
She woke up, thinking she had heard something, and looked at her watch. It was midnight and the light from the moon was still outside her window. Then she heard it again. A soft knocking. Tap, tap, tap. She slid out of bed and went to the door. Tap, tap. She opened it a crack and saw Eddie standing in the hall. They looked at each other silently through the small slit the door made and there was a hesitation, a decision hanging in the balance. Each could retreat if he or she wanted, but unless preventive action were taken, the momentum of his knocking on the door would carry the situation to its final conclusion.
Without a word, Eddie put his hand flat against the door and pushed it open. He stepped into the dark room and closed the door behind him. Jenna stood before him, seeming almost childish with her bare feet and messy hair, her T-shirt stopping just above her navel, innocently exposed below. She stood before him and waited as he moved to her, placing one hand in the small of her back and pulling her toward him. He smelled like cigarettes and he felt like a man, heavy, with thick, almost damp clothes, a protective layer men need to fend off the elements. He moved slowly, sliding his hand up her back and under her hair. He pulled her head close and they kissed, and she could smell the alcohol on his breath. He had been downstairs. He went down for a drink and ended up having a few. He talked with the locals. The kid was there. The one that ran off when Jenna started talking about the kushtaka at the cookout. He and Eddie talked about Jenna, and they felt they both understood her better now.
Jenna felt so small and vulnerable. She wanted to be engulfed by Eddie. She wanted to be smaller still, so she stepped back and pulled her shirt off over her head. Now she was naked and his eyes swept over her and she hoped he liked her more now that she was before him with nothing to protect her. He was so big, tall, and covered all over, and she was a little thing with nothing on. They kissed again and he ran his hand down her back, cupping it under her buttocks. She pulled his shirt out of his pants and slid her arms underneath, encircling his waist. He was so warm. She felt his sling under his shirt and she remembered that he was injured, only one arm working, and even though he tried to be a man with his bigness and all of his clothes, he was still just a boy. So she took his hand and led him over to the bed, sitting him down. She kneeled at his feet and untied his laces, pulling off his boots and socks, and she was happy to see his feet, such beautiful feet, with toes that looked like toes, not super long fingers stuck on the end of a foot. She reached up, unbuckled his belt, and unbuttoned his jeans, pulling them off as he held his weight with one arm, sliding them down his legs and off, onto the floor. Then she slipped off his boxer shorts. White with blue stripes. She stood and took off his flannel shirt and then pulled his T-shirt off. He was almost as naked as she. Only his sling remained, which Jenna unbuckled and slipped off.
Now Eddie was as vulnerable as Jenna. He was no longer large and remote. Jenna stood before him, now, and looked down on him, sitting on the bed. He waited for her to tell him what he could have. He wanted her, she knew, but having been stripped down by her, he was afraid to do anything without her consent. She took his head in her hands and held it to her
breast as he lightly sucked on her nipple and she stroked his hair. He reached his arms around her to hold her but pulled back suddenly, wincing in pain. It was his arm. He had moved his bad arm in the wrong way and a searing pain shot into his neck. Jenna laid him back down on the bed and looked at the scar, a dark line in the dim light. She reached out and ran her fingers softly down the length of the scar.
“Is it okay?” she asked.
He nodded. She bent her head down and kissed the scar. It made her feel strange to be this close to what was once Eddie’s open artery. This was a place from where his lifeblood had poured. This raised line of scar tissue held together a wound that almost killed him. She ran her tongue along the scar and he moaned.
“Does it hurt?”
“No, it feels good,” he said.
She moved up to his mouth, kissing him deeply and pressing her body to his. She had seen him several times without his shirt, but still, the feeling of his hairless chest surprised her. It was cool and soft and it felt good to rub against.
“There’s a thing in my jacket,” he said between kisses.
“A thing?”
Jenna smiled and climbed off the bed. She picked up his jacket from the floor and found a condom in one of the pockets.
“So, you planned this all along?” she asked, tearing open the package.
“Wishful thinking.”
She straddled him and sat back, feeling him inside of her and reveling in the sensation. It had been so long. They made love quietly, softly. The light that trickled out of the bathroom caused a sparkle in Eddie’s eyes, and emotion filled Jenna’s chest. She had thought of Eddie practically every waking instant in the past week. She had wanted this. This moment in which there were no barriers, no pretenses, none of the little jokes people make to hide their emotions. And now she had it. They were open to each other, naked in mind and body, not having sex but experiencing each other, and she liked it, she wanted more. In this moment, as Eddie clenched his fists and leaned his head back, emitting a short grunt of satisfaction and resolution, Jenna fell in love with him. It was now that she knew she would stay with him. She knew that they both wanted each other the same way, stripped of everything. No past, no future, just the present seconds ticking by, one by one, and the two of them together, alone in the wilderness, safe from any kind of danger. She didn’t have an orgasm, but that hadn’t been her objective. She had opened herself and let him inside her. That was all she needed. This is it, she thought. There is nothing else. This is it.