by TJ Klune
Big Eddie shook his hand again. It was a little tighter this time, like he was trying to tell Nate something without actually saying the words. “You need anything, you give me a holler, you hear? Those supplies won’t last you forever. You need something, let me know, and we can meet halfway. Save you a bit of a trip.”
“You don’t have to—”
“Nate, just take it for what it is. Kindness. Sometimes people need it, even if they don’t know how to ask for it.”
Looking away, Nate cleared his throat. “Thanks. I will.” He turned for his truck.
Before he pulled out, he glanced back into the gas station. Big Eddie was bent over the counter next to his son, frowning down at the paper. Benji was doing the same. It was strange how obvious it was they were related. Like father, like son.
Nate pulled out and left Roseland behind.
There was a sign, barely visible behind a gnarl of greenery, trees and bushes growing wild. If you didn’t know it was there, you wouldn’t even see it, or the turnoff. Nate almost passed it by accident, distracted by a deer moving off in the trees to the left. He hit the brakes a little sharper than he meant to, the seat belt digging into his hips. The tires squealed against the pavement, and he looked in the rearview mirror to make sure he hadn’t just pulled that asshole move in front of another car.
There wasn’t one. He hadn’t seen another vehicle since he’d left Roseland.
HERSCHEL LAKE, the sign said. 15 MILES.
An arrow pointed toward a dirt road.
He sat there on the road, in the middle of the forest in the mountains, for far longer than he should have.
And then he hit the blinker and turned the truck onto the dirt road.
It was smoother than he expected, which meant Big Eddie had been right about the mild winter. If it’d been normal, there would have still been snow on the ground. It wasn’t surprising to see spring snowstorms come ripping through, the air different than the winter squalls. It always felt more electric in the spring, the snow falling on blooming flowers, the reds and violets almost shocking against the white.
But it was easier this way. He hadn’t thought to put chains on the truck’s tires when he’d set out from Eugene after meeting with the estate attorney. He’d flown in from DC. The attorney had picked him up from the airport, given that his brother had been busy. Or so he’d said. Nate knew better, and he could tell the attorney wanted to ask questions (whywhywhy), but somehow, he’d minded his own business. He’d been balding and talkative, saying how sorry he was about Nate’s parents in one breath, and then talking about the Trailblazers in the next.
“Didn’t see you at the funeral,” he’d said at one point.
“Don’t expect you did,” Nate had replied, staring out the window.
“No money,” the attorney said later. “People always want to know how much money they’re getting. Just be up front with you about that now. Everything went to your brother’s family. His kids. College ain’t cheap.”
He didn’t want their money.
He didn’t even want the cabin or the truck.
But he’d taken them anyway because there was nothing else left for him.
“Sign here,” the attorney had said. “Sign here, initial here, and here, and here, and would you look at that, you’re the proud owner of a 1974 Ford F100 and a cabin on four acres in the middle of nowhere. Congrats. Shelly, would you make copies for Mr. Cartwright.”
His secretary had popped her gum loudly and done exactly that.
He’d been given keys. Front door. Back door. Shed. Two for the truck.
He’d been given copies of all the paperwork.
He’d been shown the door.
“Let me know if you need anything,” the attorney had said, both of them knowing this would be the last time they’d ever speak to each other.
The truck had been sitting in the parking lot, dropped off by his brother a couple of days before.
It was white with green trim. The tires looked a little bald. There was a gun rack against the rear window, the same one that had held the shotgun his father had used on his mother and then on himself. Nate had stood in that strip mall parking lot, staring at the gun rack for a long time.
He’d stayed in Eugene for a few days, making phone calls from the room he’d rented at the Motel 6. Calling for the water to be turned on. Paying for a few more months at the storage locker back in DC. His mail was forwarded to a PO Box that he could check monthly.
And just like that, Nate Cartwright’s life was all wrapped up in a neat little bow.
He’d stayed one more night in the Motel 6, staring up at the ceiling, listening to the trucks out on the highway passing by at three in the morning.
The next morning, he’d been at Walmart as soon as it’d opened, buying everything he needed to stay away for a long while. He hadn’t even winced at the amount he’d spent when it was read to him. It didn’t matter.
He hit a pothole.
The truck’s frame shuddered.
He slowed. He didn’t want to get a flat tire this far up in the mountains. He didn’t have a spare.
Herschel Lake had once been a popular tourist destination in the fifties and sixties. Where there’d once only been a handful of cabins, there suddenly were dozens. Vacation rentals, second homes, all set far enough away from each other to feel just out of sight from the rest of the world, Herschel Lake and the forest around it would echo with people on picnics or kids in the lake, jumping off docks or rope swings.
It’d fallen off in the late seventies, the company that owned most of the cabins going under. Things had fallen apart. The BLM had come in and purchased most of the land, but nothing had been done with the rental cabins. They’d been left to rot.
Nate’s parents had come up in 1980. They’d fallen in love with the area and found a cabin for sale, farther away from all the others. An elderly man was being moved into a retirement home by his kids, and they wanted the cabin sold. A couple of months later, the Cartwrights had a cabin in the woods.
He’d been thirteen the first time he’d come to Herschel Lake.
The quiet had scared him.
He’d gotten used to it after the first week.
Going home after had always seemed so loud.
It’s what he wanted now. Quiet. Room to think. To figure shit out. He needed to decide what was going to happen next.
His first glimpse of the lake came twenty minutes later, a flash of sun on the water. He blinked away the afterimages that burned in his eyes.
He thought about stopping. About taking off his old pair of Chucks and putting his feet in the water. It’d be cold. The lake was fed from streams that came from farther up the mountains. The air was already considerably cooler than it’d been even in Roseland. Maybe it would shock him. Cause his brain to reboot.
But the sun was getting lower, and the sky was starting to streak. He wanted to make it to the cabin by dark. He still needed to get to the other side of the lake.
He drove on.
The first stars had appeared overhead by the time he reached the long driveway to the cabin. He’d turned on the truck’s headlights ten minutes before, the thick trees blocking out much of the dying sun. He’d rolled up the window too, telling himself the chill on his skin had only to do with the mountain air.
He used the signal again as he turned onto the road to the cabin. Force of habit. There was no one else out here.
The driveway was a little rougher than the main road. The truck rattled and groaned. The beam cast by his headlights jumped, bouncing through the trees. He kept the speed low, listening to his meager belongings bounce around the bed of the truck, the gas canisters scraping loudly.
And there, as it had been fourteen years ago when he’d first laid eyes on it, was the cabin.
It wasn’t anything grand. Single story. A small porch. Two bedrooms, one slightly larger than the other. Two bathrooms, both of which had s
howers where the water was either scalding or ice. A perfunctory kitchen with a stove and an ancient refrigerator. A living room with a couch his mother had insisted upon, saying they weren’t going to live like savages out in the middle of the woods, could you imagine? And that had been an ordeal, having that thing tied down to the back of the truck with bungee cords, bringing it up the mountain only to find it didn’t fit through the front door. There’d been a moment of panic, his parents getting those looks on their faces, the ones that said someone was going to start yelling, but then Nate’s brother had pointed out the rear doorway was larger, and they’d made it work. A cushion had torn and the paneling around the doorway chipped, but they’d finally made it in, all of them laughing, sweat dripping down their faces.
Nate’s favorite part of the cabin, however, had been the books.
The cabin had been sold as is. The elderly man’s children had taken everything of sentimental value but had left other things that Nate couldn’t believe. The head of a deer—an eight-point buck—mounted on the wall in the living room, its eyes shiny and black. (“Take it down,” his mother demanded almost immediately.) Dozens of cans of Spam. (“I don’t think it ever expires,” his father muttered, squinting at the pantry.) Two packs of cigarettes, both opened and missing a few. (“Don’t tell Mom,” his older brother warned. “I’m going to smoke the shit out of these.”)
And the books. So many books.
They lined the old set of shelves on the far wall in the living room. Hundreds of them, most of them Westerns by Louis L’Amour (The Burning Hills and High Lonesome and Hanging Woman Creek and Under the Sweetwater Rim). There were a few books he’d barely gotten to look at before his mother had snatched them away from him (Teacher’s Pet and Perversity and Anything Goes), the women on the covers half-dressed and posed salaciously, the covers promising to tell the story of how Judy stayed after class and earned her diploma through special tutoring or how a love-starved temptress gave in to her insatiable desires. Those books were gone quickly.
But the rest were fair game. And his summers became Westerns, frontier stories of cowboys and Indians and red plateaus under the scorching sun. He’d take a book or two and disappear into the trees for the day, eating blackberries for lunch, his fingers and lips a tacky purple, the pages stained by the time he headed back toward the cabin.
He’d been happy here. He’d been free.
And maybe that’s why he was here again. Maybe that’s why he’d come back. Nate Cartwright hadn’t been happy in a long time. Things had been simpler when he’d been thirteen or fourteen or fifteen years old, his body changing, zits on his forehead, voice cracking, hair sprouting in places where it hadn’t before. He’d been an awkward kid, all gangly arms and legs, perpetually pushing his glasses back up his nose. His brother had bitched and moaned about being away from his friends and girlfriend again, his parents were already checked out mentally, but Nate had just grabbed the books and gone away for hours, sitting at the base of a tree, sometimes reading, sometimes pretending he was a settler on the frontier, that he was in the wilds, the cabin he’d built somewhere behind him, and he was alone, truly alone, just the way he liked it.
Maybe that’s why he’d come back here. To be alone.
It wasn’t because he was trying to find some last connection with the two people who had cut him out of their lives. Of course not. He’d gotten over that a while ago. The fact that they’d left him the cabin and the truck hadn’t meant a damn thing. Maybe their guilt had gotten the better of them. It didn’t matter. Not now. Not anymore.
The cabin was dark.
He was exhausted.
If his mother had been here in September, it wouldn’t be too bad inside. He’d open a couple of windows to air it out, maybe wipe down the thin layer of dust that had settled. But it wouldn’t be much. For that, he was thankful.
He turned off the truck. The headlights went dark.
The stars blinked above as he opened the door.
The sky was red and pink and orange.
The surface of the lake looked as if it were on fire.
He heard birds in the trees, the lap of waves against the shore.
He stepped out of the truck.
Gravel crunched under his feet.
The door creaked as he closed it behind him, the sound echoing slightly.
He went to the back of the truck and grabbed his duffel bag. In the side pocket was a flashlight that he’d put there earlier after his shopping spree. He clicked the button on the side, and the beam flashed on. He shined it in the bed of the truck until he found one of the canisters Big Eddie had filled for him. He reached in and grabbed it too, shirt lifting slightly, a line of thin skin pressing against the cold metal of the truck. He shivered as he pulled the canister out of the truck.
He walked toward the cabin, trying hard not to think about the last time he’d been here. The guy had been sucking on his neck as they stumbled toward the porch, one hand in Nate’s back pocket, the other under his shirt and rubbing against the hair on his chest. He’d always been on the lean side, but at twenty-one, he’d been making daily trips to the gym. He’d been harder then, more defined. His dark hair had been newly cut, tight against his skull. He’d been groaning at the teeth sinking into his neck, the tongue dragging along his skin. They’d lost most of their clothes as soon as they got inside, the guy on his knees, Nate’s pants around his ankles, his cock being swallowed down into wet heat as he leaned against the door, head back and eyes closed.
His parents had shown up unexpectedly two days later.
“Give me the key,” his father had snapped, eyes blazing. “Give me the key, and don’t let me catch you here again.”
He was a shadow now. Thinner, his hair shaggy. His shoulders were a little bony, sharp. He was softer, too. He hadn’t had time for the gym like he’d had before. It’d all been cups of coffee and sitting in front of a computer, working the phones or shouting questions at some senator who tried to walk as fast as he could, a thin smile fixed on his face as if thinking that affair he’d had or the money he’d embezzled would just fade away if he ignored the kid demanding to know why, an electronic recorder held toward his face, cameras flashing again and again.
Nate had caught his reflection in a store window not that long ago and wondered who the man staring back at him was. The man with the sharp cheekbones, slightly sunken cheeks. The man whose blue eyes looked faded and cold. The man sporting three-day-old stubble on his face that made him look dirty and tired. The man with the wrinkled shirt and purple lines under his eyes and no job because he’d fucked up big-time and did something he never thought he was capable of, and here he was, a useless degree and six years on the street beat, chasing down stories that didn’t matter while daydreaming of breaking something wide open, a scandal that would rock the city to its very core. He had Pulitzer dreams on a lower-middle-class salary that barely kept him afloat in a city that bled red, white, and blue, oozing in time with the beat of a diseased heart.
It had been killing him.
So yeah. His brother had called him again. He’d been spinning his wheels. He’d heard cabin and truck and thought why the fuck not. He had some savings, enough to get by for a little while. He broke his lease on his tiny apartment, packed up his shit and sent most of it to storage, and headed west.
Best damn idea he’d had in a long time.
He’d figure things out. He’d take a few days, clear his head, and then he’d sit down and figure things out. He always did. He was good at it when he allowed himself to be.
He walked to the side of the cabin, heading toward the back where the generator sat inside a small storage shed. He fumbled with the keys, the flashlight slipping slightly, the beam pointing at his feet. The gas canister sloshed against his leg. His footsteps were soft in the grass.
He found the key he needed for the shed, thankfully marked S in the tape that wrapped around the top. There was FD for front door, BD for the back.
There was one marked BH for boathouse, the wooden structure next to the dock on the lake. They’d never had a boat and had ended up only using it for storage. He’d have to take time to clean it out later. To see what had been left behind.
The shed was—
He stopped.
The metal of the gas canister’s handle dug into the skin of his folded fingers.
The padlock hung open on the shed door.
The door was open slightly. Just a sliver, really.
That wasn’t—
He shook his head.
It was fine. His mother had forgotten to latch it all the way when she’d been here last. An honest mistake. Hopefully nothing had happened to the generator in the interim. The winter had been mild, but there had been snow. And rain.
He went to the shed door, setting the canister in the grass.
He reached, and just to be sure, he closed the padlock. It clicked. Locked. He slid the key into the keyhole and turned it. The padlock popped open.
Honest mistake. She probably had been distracted. Maybe Joy had been calling for her and she just hadn’t slid it closed before turning back toward the cabin.
Except when he opened the shed door, he was hit with a wave of warm air. As if the generator had been running. Recently.
He frowned.
He stepped inside the shed. Reached out and touched the generator. The metal was hot to the touch. Not a fluke.
Had she left it on this whole time?
But that couldn’t be right. Even if she had, it would have run out of gas months ago. Even with all the lights off in the cabin. It wouldn’t have—
There was the unmistakable click of a gun being cocked.
Something hard pressed against the back of his head, digging into his scalp.
A voice said, “You’re going to set the flashlight on the ground. And then you’re going to bring your hands up slowly. Lace your fingers on the back of your neck. If you try anything, if you reach for something I cannot see, or if you don’t do exactly as I’ve said, I will put a bullet in your head. Without question.”