Wilderness

by Roddy Doyle

  “Come on,” said Johnny.

  They went down the steps. They ran across the snow. They didn’t slide or skid.

  They took Kalle’s dogs. They were quick. They untied four of them and brought them over to the sleds. They kept looking over at the hut. The adults were still in there, being like adults – busy and nice, but kind of stupid.

  They tied the dogs to two sleds, two dogs for each sled. They didn’t have time to get the other four. Johnny thought the dogs would be strong enough to pull them.

  The dogs were tied. They were ready to go.

  It had been easy.

  “I’ll go on this one,” said Johnny.

  Rock, the leader, was at the front.

  “OK,” said Tom.

  He didn’t mind. It was Johnny’s idea. He stood on the brake, at the back of the second sled.

  “But how will you get Rock to go?” he said. “You’re not Kalle.”

  “Easy,” said Johnny.

  He held up something. Tom couldn’t see what it was. Then it was nearer, and Tom could see that it was Kalle’s hat and that Johnny was holding it on the end of a long stick.

  “Brilliant,” said Tom.

  “Ready?” said Johnny.

  “Yeah,” said Tom. “But hurry.”

  He could see people coming out on to the veranda. He felt bad, and a bit disloyal. He liked Kalle and Aki; he thought they were great. But everything in Tom – his brain, his blood, everything that made him Tom – everything told him that what he was doing was right. He’d find his mother – him and Johnny – quicker than anyone else.

  He saw Johnny hold out the stick with the hat stuck to it, over the dogs’ backs and heads. He held the stick, so the hat was just in front of Rock’s nose.

  Rock sniffed. And he started to move. He pulled, to get at the hat. Johnny rested the stick against the handle of the sled. He was able to hold the sled and the stick with one hand.

  Rock pulled. Bruno, beside him, pulled too. Tom watched Johnny’s sled move slowly away, down the tree-lined path. He looked behind him, and felt his own sled move. Hupö and Pomp were pulling him.

  People were running across the snow. Aki and Kalle. He heard shouts, but they boomed and made no sense.

  Tom was moving.

  Fast.

  He turned forward, and saw Johnny turn a bend. Tom was right behind him, holding on to his sled. His feet were wide apart. His balance was good. It felt good, natural. They flew into the cold, and the cold stopped him from crying.

  He was going to find his mother. They were going to find her. Him and Johnny. They were going to find her.

  He looked behind. There was no sign of the hut, or lights. They were back in the wilderness.

  He went over a bump. The sled was off the ground, and back. His feet stayed on the foot plates. He could feel his hands sweat in the gloves. He kept his eyes on Johnny.

  Johnny’s hand was already sore, the one holding the stick. But he didn’t mind; he didn’t let it matter. He had to concentrate on what was ahead. There was no light, and the trees were close. The snow was huge and heavy. He had to watch the dogs. He could tell what was coming by looking at their backs and ears. Their eyes were his. He’d learned this over the past two days, watching them as they pulled him across the land and ice.

  They were going to find her. He knew it. The cold didn’t matter. And the dark didn’t matter. They were going to find her. He had to keep thinking that.

  He looked behind him, quickly. Tom was there. He even waved.

  Johnny wiped the snow off his face. The sled jumped before he got his hand back to the handle. He stayed on – it was easy. He held on to the stick. He had to push his palm down on it, to trap it between the handle and his hand. He had to use the weight of his wrist and arm to keep the stick in the air, above Rock’s snout.

  He listened. He couldn’t hear the snowmobile. Just his dogs and Tom’s dogs. Their breath, their steady pace.

  They were going to find her. Johnny looked at the dogs’ backs. They were straight, and the ears were up. They knew where they were going.

  They were going to find her. Johnny could think that – he could feel it and know it – as long as they kept moving.

  They charged through the dark. They went under high, thick trees. They felt them, right over their heads, and it was even darker. Tom could see nothing. He could hear the dogs, but he couldn’t see them.

  The Kitchen

  It was dark now. It was cold. Gráinne heard the click, the central heating coming on. But it would be ages before the radiator was warm enough. She rubbed her arms.

  She was at the window, looking at the light outside. The light moved as her mother moved. She was looking at the plants and flowers she’d planted there, years ago. She was trying to find them with a torch.

  She’d seen the torch on top of one of the shelves.

  “Oh, look.”

  It had seemed funny, when her mother decided to go out and look for her flowers in the dark. But she’d been gone too long, or something. It wasn’t funny now.

  Gráinne couldn’t see her mother properly. The light was on in the kitchen, so the window was like a mirror. She could see herself and things behind her. She could have gone across to the switch and turned off the light. But she didn’t want to do that. She wasn’t sure why not. It would have looked too much like she was spying. Something like that; she wasn’t sure. It just seemed better to leave the light on.

  Then she thought: She can see me. She couldn’t see her mother, but her mother could see Gráinne, at the window, staring out.

  She sat down at the table. She shouldn’t have stood there for so long. Like a little girl looking for her mammy.

  She didn’t like this. The good feeling was slipping away. The confidence she’d felt when she’d listened to her mother, when she’d known when to nod and listen. She didn’t think that feeling was there now in her. She wished her mother would come back in, before it became too hard to start again.

  She thought about looking for her father. But then her mother would come back in and think she had to go.

  She felt stuck, between her mother and her father. One bad move would let one of them down. It wasn’t fair. She hated the way she was always on trial. She could feel the anger now. She tried to remember the good feeling she’d had a few minutes before; she tried to feel it. But it was disappearing, and now she didn’t want it. She wanted to be angry. It was something she could actually trust. Something she knew and recognized. She could feel it rising through her.

  She heard steps on the path outside. Her mother was coming back in.

  Gráinne tried to stop it. She rubbed her arms, hard. She tried to rub the anger away, like sand off her skin. The door opened. She felt the cold from outside slither around the kitchen. She rubbed her arms.

  CHAPTER TEN

  The trees weren’t as thick here. Tom could see Johnny, just ahead of him. He could see the tracks of Johnny’s sled. He could see his own dogs run along the tracks. He kept his knees bent. It was easier to stay on that way.

  He looked back quickly, and saw the light. It was far behind them, among the trees, and gone, and there again.

  He shouted.

  “They’re behind us.”

  He heard Johnny.

  “OK.”

  They were still on the main path. Johnny could make out where the sleds and snowmobile tracks had flattened the snow. It was the way they’d come earlier, on their way to the hut.

  “Where are we going?” Tom shouted.

  “
This way,” Johnny shouted back.

  “Where?” Tom shouted.

  “Following Rock,” Johnny shouted back.

  That made sense. Rock was the leader. He’d know where they were, and where they were going.

  But Rock followed Kalle. That was why they were moving now, through the darkness. Rock was running after Kalle’s hat. Johnny had tricked him so easily. But that didn’t worry Tom. It was one of the interesting and complicated things about people and dogs and how they lived together. The boys were following a dog that was stupid enough to think that the hat was Kalle, but the dog was a brilliant dog, and they were right to be following him.

  The ground was still mostly flat. The trees were close again, on either side of the path, so the snow wasn’t too bad, because the trees were like a roof. It was darker again, but Tom could see.

  Johnny tried to see ahead, to see if he recognized anything they were passing. This might have been another path that other sleds and snowmobiles used all the time. He was flying into the dark, and really quickly. He just had the dogs’ backs; they were the only things he had to navigate with. There were no stars. Anyway, he didn’t know much about stars. His dad had started to explain it to him once, about the stars and how sailors could cross the oceans just by looking at them. But it had been boring, the way his dad had tried to tell him.

  He hoped he’d see something soon. Something that could tell him how far they’d come. He rubbed more snow from his face. The stick with the hat shifted, but he didn’t let it slide from under his hand. His hand hurt a bit, where he had to push down the stick. But it wasn’t bad.

  He looked behind. He adjusted his weight; he bent his left knee. He looked, and saw the lights that Tom had seen. The snowmobile. He wasn’t worried. It wasn’t a race. He wasn’t afraid of being caught. If Aki caught up with them, fine. There’d be more people to find their mother. That was what it was about. It wasn’t a game or adventure. They were going to find their mother.

  He heard Tom.

  “How far?”

  He shouted back.

  “Don’t know.”

  Then he thought of something else. He shouted it.

  “Are we there yet?”

  He did it in the whiny voice that drove their dad mad when they were going anywhere in the car.

  He heard Tom laugh. And Tom shouted back.

  “Are we there yet?”

  “Are we there yet?”

  “Are we there yet?”

  “Wil-derness!”

  A huge rock went past Johnny’s face. He saw it; then it was gone. He’d been moving, not the rock, but it felt like the rock had shot past him. He gripped the sled. He went over a bump, and ducked under a very low branch; he felt the snow on his shoulders.

  Tom didn’t know where he was; he hadn’t a clue. There was nothing he thought he’d seen before. But he wasn’t lost; it didn’t feel like that. Because of the dogs. He would never have walked through darkness like this. Or cycled. Not for money, or anything. It wasn’t the dark; he wasn’t afraid of the dark. It was what was in the dark. What was waiting. Holes, rats, crooked fingers, teeth. Not seeing; not being able to see. That was what frightened him.

  But he wasn’t really frightened now. The dogs were with him and he was going to find his mother.

  A branch shot out at him. It slashed his face. He could feel the sting. He thought he could feel the blood on his cheek. The trees were close; they were trying to grab him.

  But he wasn’t really scared.

  He looked behind again. He held on extra tight; he tried to make his legs heavy. He couldn’t see anything. Then a branch brushed his back. He heard it before he felt it – another tree trying to grab him. He turned back again, and looked straight ahead.

  Tom liked Aki. And he really liked Kalle. But they’d let him down. That was how it felt. They’d gone off, and come back without his mother. But that wasn’t it. He didn’t blame them for that, even though it was their wilderness and they were supposed to know everything about it. But he didn’t blame them. It was more about the feeling he’d had when he watched them getting ready to leave the hut the second time, when Kalle was checking his belt and Aki was checking the first-aid box. They should have been faster. And they should have looked worried. But they’d been more interested in not upsetting Tom and Johnny. They’d pretended that it wasn’t really an emergency. They’d treated Tom and Johnny like kids. Tom and Johnny were kids. But that was where lots of adults got it wrong. Kids didn’t need to be treated like kids, or how most adults thought kids were – stupid. Your mother is missing. It is very dangerous. We must find her. Quickly. That was what they should have said. Tom and Johnny would have agreed with them, because Tom and Johnny already knew it. But, instead, they’d smiled and offered them hot chocolate.

  Tom could feel the hot chocolate in his stomach. It was sloshing around as the sled bounced and turned. He tried not to think of it.

  The dogs were different. The dogs were honest. The dogs weren’t looking around and thinking, He’s too young. They weren’t slowing down because he was only ten. The dogs were doing what they were supposed to do.

  They’d find her.

  Johnny lifted his arm, but it was too late. The branch had already hit him. It felt like a screech, across the side of his face, just under his eye. It was black for a minute – he couldn’t open his eyes. The pain was chopping at him. He put his hand back on the sled. And opened his eyes.

  He could see.

  But the pain was horrible. It was much stronger, sharper than the cold. It burst out of the cold. He closed his eyes. The pain was right above them.

  He waited for it to fade.

  The dogs kept going.

  It was like the times he’d eaten ice cream too fast and got brain freeze. The worst pain ever, until it began to fade, and it became a joke. This pain started to fade, but it wasn’t going to be a joke.

  He opened his eyes again.

  He knew where he was. It was the way the trees spread out, and the tops of the stones he could see jutting out of the snow, around the trunks of some of the trees. They’d been there earlier. It was where they’d fallen out of the sled, where Rock had picked up Kalle’s cap.

  Johnny lifted the stick, and the cap. He put his foot on the brake. The dogs stopped. Johnny looked around. It was definitely the same place.

  Tom’s dogs stopped.

  “What?” said Tom.

  “This is where we fell off,” said Johnny.

  “Is it?”

  He looked around.

  “Yeah,” said Johnny.

  “But Mam fell off after us,” said Tom.

  “Yeah,” said Johnny.

  Tom rubbed the snow from his face.

  “So we should have passed her back there,” he said.

  He looked behind, where they’d just come from.

  “Ages ago.”

  “I know,” said Johnny.

  “Will we go back?” said Tom.

  They could hear Aki’s engine. They could see the lights.

  “No,” said Johnny.

  “Why not?” said Tom.

  “She’s not back there,” said Johnny. “We didn’t see her.”

  He pointed back, at Aki’s light.

  “And they haven’t seen her either.”

  “Where is she?” said Tom.

  It was hard saying the words; he was afraid he’d cry. He wasn’t sure if Johnny had heard him. It took him ages to answer.

  “Don’t know,” said Johnny. “But I bet I know what happened.”

  “What?
”

  “She didn’t fall off,” said Johnny.

  “What happened then?” said Tom.

  Aki’s engine was getting nearer.

  “Hastro did something,” said Johnny.

  “What?”

  “He decided he was the leader, or something,” said Johnny. “And he ran off, with Mam still on the sled.”

  Tom could see it in his head. The rogue dog waiting until Rock was far ahead, then making a break for it, pulling his mother’s sled down a narrower path, away from Rock and Kalle, making the other dogs go with him. He could easily see it. But –

  “Why didn’t she jump off?” he said.

  “Don’t know,” said Johnny. “Maybe she didn’t know.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Maybe she just thought she was way behind everyone else.”

  They heard the engine. They saw the lights behind them, jumping along the trees.

  “Will we wait for Aki and Kalle?” said Tom.

  “No,” said Johnny.

  Tom would have liked the adults with him now. He knew they wouldn’t be angry. But he knew that Johnny was right.

  “Yeah,” he said. “They’ll just stop searching for Mam, because they’ll think they’ve found us and that’s enough. They’ll bring us back to the hut first. And it’ll have to start all over again.”

  “Yeah,” said Johnny. “Let’s go.”

  The pain wasn’t bad now. There was no blood going into his eyes. And it was much colder when they weren’t moving. His arm ached as he held up the stick and hat, over Rock’s snout. But it didn’t matter.

  The dogs began to move.

  “Where will we go?” said Tom.

  “Just follow the dogs,” said Johnny.

  Johnny was right, Tom thought. Follow the dogs. That was enough. Tom took his feet off the brake. And his dogs began to pull. They began to pick up speed.

  The snow was falling thick. Johnny could feel more of it than he could see. He didn’t mind. The flakes landed on his face, where the branch had hit him. It smothered the stinging feeling.