Authors: David Vann
Irene turned away from the waves, facing back toward Gary, but he was looking backward, also, steering by reference to the shore they had left, slowly receding into the distance. The truck still visible through patchy trees. No one else parked in the campground. Usually a few boats and campers were here, but today, if anything happened, it was just them, the thud and blast of water every few seconds, the logs humped up dark and soaked, the gunwales low, the steady stream from the bilge pump. A new kind of covered wagon, almost, heading to a new land, the making of a new home.
Rhoda’s beaten-up Datsun B210 didn’t belong off pavement. She was careful to keep momentum up hills but could feel her tires slipping in the mud. And she couldn’t see a thing, just the rain hitting her windshield hard, blur of green trees beyond, the brown dirt and gravel road curving away. She’d been in dealerships for years now looking for the right new truck but never seemed to have enough money when they sat down to make it all final. What she wanted, anyway, was an SUV, not a truck. And since she was expecting a raise, and expecting also to marry a dentist, she didn’t think she’d have to wait very long.
Which put Rhoda in mind of Jim, who probably was eating pancakes right now for dinner, his usual, wondering where she was. Pulling peach halves from a can to put on these pancakes, and clicking the sides of the can unnecessarily with his fork. But Rhoda was feeling a good mood come over her and didn’t want to wreck it by thinking of Jim.
By the time she pulled up to her parents’ house, she could see the truck was gone. She was late to help them move logs. She got out anyway and ran past the flower beds to the door.
Rhoda’s parents lived in a small, one-story wooden house that had been added on to in several places over the years so that it bulged oddly now and the parts did not all match. Rhoda’s father had been dreaming of frontier life and mountain men when he moved up from California in his mid-twenties, and by now he had all the Alaskan accoutrements. Antlers of elk, moose, caribou, deer, mountain goats, and Dall’s rams hung from nails along the edge of the roof and along the outside walls. The raised flower bed to the right of the door featured an old hand pump, a small sluice, and various other rusted pans, picks, pails, old boards and such from the mining days, dragged down mostly from the Hatcher Pass Mine northeast of Anchorage but purchased also from other collectors and the odd garage sale. Farther down the wall to the left of the door, he had stacked wood for the fireplace and the antique cast-iron and nickel stove, and between the wood stack and the door, an old dogsled, its hide straps and wood rotting away a little more each year in all the rain, snow, wind, and occasional sun. The place had always seemed a junkyard and an embarrassment to Rhoda. What she did like were the flowers and the moss garden. Twelve kinds of moss and all the varieties of Alaskan wildflowers, even the rare ones. Whole beds of chocolate lilies and every color of fireweed and lupine, from white and pink to the deepest purple-blues, though only the fireweed was in bloom now.
Rhoda banged on the door again, but they were gone. She drove on toward the campground and launch ramp. Maybe she’d catch them there, though she had no idea why they’d persist on a day like this. Why not stay home?
Her tires slid a bit coming down the hill to the campground. She saw their truck parked, drove to the ramp at the water’s edge. No boat. No one around. Her parents were nuts to go out in this. Why not wait for a better day? Even if it was the cabin to end all cabins, the dream of a lifetime and all that crap. What Rhoda didn’t understand at all was why her mother would allow this.
Whatever, she said, and headed back to town.
Rhoda and Jim lived in a large peaked house overlooking the mouth of the Kenai River. One of the pluses about being with Jim. The steeply pitched A-frame roof reminded her of Wienerschnitzel franchises but shed snow easily and created a twenty-foot vaulted ceiling in the living room out front and the master bedroom in back. The double-paned windows, nearly fifteen feet high, caught sunsets over the Cook Inlet, and the exposed beams were stained dark as a mead hall’s, the furniture all Scandinavian wood and leather. It was the kind of house Rhoda had once dreamed of.
And now I just live here, she was thinking as she stood at the kitchen counter and squeezed small samples of beagle poop into glass vials for testing.
I wish you wouldn’t do that while I’m eating, Jim said. He was having his pancakes and canned peaches on the other side of the counter.
Get over it, Rhoda said. It’s just dog shit.
Jim laughed. You’re the best.
No, you, Rhoda said. They had only been living together a year, so what the hell. Rhoda’s former boyfriend had been a different story, a fisherman who whined and complained daily about the forces of nature, industry, and government, all equally inscrutable and heartless. The price for halibut was too low one year, licensing fees too high to enter another fishery the next year, the sea out to get him personally every year. Boring to listen to, and the payoff had been a small trailer home with a few free halibut steaks. Whereas with Jim she had unlimited canned peaches and all the Krusteaz pancake mix anyone could ever want.
Rhoda smiled. She was happy, she realized. Or happy enough, anyway. She put down the plastic syringe, circled behind Jim, and breathed a little in his ear.
On the shore of Skilak Lake, less than a mile from where his parents were slamming into waves with their load of logs, Mark was just taking off his clothes with his partner Karen and a couple friends from the Coffee Bus. He stoked the fire and they all hopped into the sauna, then banged the door shut behind them. The sauna was right at the edge of the lake with a narrow pier straight out the door, and it was hot and dark, windowless, insulated with tar paper behind the wood, the sitting bench and foot bench so high his head brushed the ceiling and taller people had to duck. Mark always brought along a branch or two of hemlock with the leaves still on for whipping, and as soon as they had broken a good sweat and the steam was so thick that in the red light they could see each other only faintly, Karen bent over with her head between her knees and her arms locked around her calves and Mark started whipping her. This was to bring the blood to the surface and get the circulation going. It woke a person up, too, and seemed faintly medicinal and purifying. It made a loud rustling slapping sound and left Mark in a deep sweat, Karen in pain, both of them gasping.
Then it was Mark’s turn to bend over. His skin so slick and salty now he couldn’t grab his calves or grip his hands together, so he held on to the boards beneath his feet as Karen began whipping. She got a rhythm going, swinging as hard as she could, and incorporated her voice, too, after a while, until she was yelling deep from her gut with every whip. She grabbed the back of his neck with her other hand and whipped him hard until most the leaves and side branches had been ripped off and she collapsed on him and he was whimpering.
Then Carl and Monique wanted to try. Mark stumbled out for some new branches and offered to whip Monique when he returned, but she grabbed one of the branches and said, in her low, sexy voice, No, I want to do Carl. So Carl bent over, perhaps a little hesitantly, and Monique whipped him once hard and he yelped.
Hey, he said. That really fucking hurts.
Bend over, Monique said. Grab your ankles. Then she started with a few soft slaps and worked up gradually to the harder ones. In the end, Mark assisted at Monique’s request by holding Carl’s head down until Monique said, God, I can’t breathe, and dropped the tattered whip and stumbled out the door and down the pier, where she dove headfirst into the lake.
The others piled out after. Again, Carl was a bummer. He dove in last, then got a stricken look on his face, the silent scream thing, and dog-paddled in a panic back to the pier. He lay on the wood gasping and swearing, saying how he couldn’t believe this and how cold it was, how it was ice and glaciers and such, which was true in a way, since a glacier did in fact feed into the lake.
The others ignored him and swam out a few hundred feet, remarking on the beauty of the heavy rain, the constant wind, and the mountain towering invisibly above them.
I’m alive, Monique said. Even the most stupid things are true. I don’t want to be dead ever again.
But then they all had to get out of the water or they would in fact die. They had already gone numb. They piled back into the sauna and decided to get high before the second round.
Best weed in the world, Mark said, exhaling finally. Highest THC content.
Karen went semi-catatonic, her usual. She had been raised on much weaker pot, and the Alaskan stuff hit her hard. So Mark felt free to check out Monique as much as he liked. She was tall and had short dark hair in a kind of European-looking bob, like the woman who modeled for Clinique. This got Mark hard, the fact that this woman beside him, her nipples hard and skin deserving of comparisons to alabaster and marble and such, looked like a model. He reached out to touch her neck.
Yeah, she said, pushing his hand away. You’re a prince.
Hey, Carl said.
Shut up, Monique said. We don’t need a male thing now. I’m enjoying this.
I’m so high, Karen said, raising her arms and falling back against the wall, her head thumping.
So Mark helped her sit up again, threw water on the hot rocks, and in an explosion of steam, they began the second of three rounds of Scandinavian custom.
Irene shivered, her teeth chattering, her wet clothing a kind of wick, something to chill and guide the wind, nothing more. And the water was very nearly freezing, a new shock every time it hit.
Their property came into view, three-quarters of an acre of waterfront looking toward the mountain and head of the lake, where the Kenai River fed from the glacier. Forest at the back of the property but also smaller growth in front, blueberry and alder thickets, wildflowers and grasses.
Gary aimed for the rocky shore. No beach, no sand or small pebbles. Big rounded rocks. Snags of wood on either side, waves breaking, and Gary didn’t slow at all, came in at full speed. Irene yelled out for him to slow down, but then she just held on, braced a foot against the ramp, and they hit. The logs on top slid forward and Irene moved her foot just in time. Jesus, Gary, she said.
But Gary wasn’t paying her any attention. He tilted the engine up, climbed forward over logs, and hopped into shallow water, about ten feet from shore. Help me lower the gate, he said. The rain and wind dying down, so at least she could hear. She climbed over the front, sank to her knees, over the tops of her boots, cold water, the rocks very slick beneath, and helped him undo the latches.
As she released the final one, the gate sprung at them, under pressure from the logs. Whoa, Gary said, but neither of them was hurt and they caught the ramp and lowered it, the waves breaking against their thighs and flooding the boat now from the open bow. They weren’t far enough onto the shore.
We have to unload fast, Gary said, and I need to get the engine running for the bilge pump. So he climbed over logs to the stern, tilted the motor down, pulled the cord, switched on the pump. Time to hustle, he said, as he rushed to the bow. He grabbed a log and walked backward. Just grab your own log and drag it ashore.
So Irene grabbed a log and pulled hard. Her feet cold in the water and her entire body chilled, her stomach starting to hurt from being cold and then going to work.
The boat’s already sinking, she yelled to Gary. The bilge pump wasn’t keeping up. The boat was flooding too quickly from the bow, slogging back and forth in the waves.
Shit, Gary said. Let’s put the gate up.
They latched the gate in a hurry, then he hopped aboard, the back end sitting very low, every third or fourth breaking wave dumping in some water from its crest, and he gunned the motor full throttle to jam the boat closer to shore. Irene could hear the bow scrape over rocks. It moved about a foot and then stopped. The stern tipped lower, though, too, because of the angle, and more water came in. Damn it, Gary yelled, and he grabbed the bailing bucket, throwing fast to get ahead of the waves, bending and springing up and bending again, throwing gallons at a time. Irene didn’t know what to do except watch. No second bucket or room enough back there. But she climbed onto the bow, in case her weight in front might help tip the boat forward.
Gary dark and drenched, breathing hard and yelling out on the full buckets from the strain. The smoke from the outboard blowing over him, bilge pump spitting, waves breaking over the back. Irene knew he was frightened now, and she wanted to help him, but she could see, also, that he was making it, that the stern was rising higher, the waves dumping less water each time. You’re doing it, Gary, she yelled. The stern’s coming up. You’re going to make it.
He was exhausted, she knew. The bucketfuls slowing, and sometimes his throw was short and some would land in the boat. I can take a turn, she yelled, but he just shook his head and kept dipping the bucket and throwing until finally the waves were slapping against the transom but not breaking over. He stopped then, dropped the bucket and bent over the outboard to vomit into the lake.
Gary, Irene said, and she wanted to comfort him but didn’t want to add weight to the stern. The bilge pump clearing out the remaining water but taking some time. Gary, she said again, are you all right, honey?
I’m okay, he finally said. I’m okay. I’m sorry. This was a stupid idea.
It’s okay, she said. We’ll be okay. We’ll just unload the rest of these and then go home.
Gary slumped over the motor a while, then turned the engine and pump off, climbed forward slowly, and kneeled on logs next to her in the bow. She gave him a hug and they stayed like that a few minutes, holding each other as the wind picked up and rain came down heavier again. They had not held each other like this for a very long time.
I love you, Gary said.
I love you too.
Well, Gary said, meaning time to move on. Irene had hoped the moment might extend. She didn’t know how everything had changed. In the beginning, she had slept with an arm and a leg over him, every night. They had spent Sundays in bed. They had hunted together, footsteps in sync, bows held ready, listening for moose, watching for movement. The forest a living presence then, and they a part of it, never alone. But Gary had stopped bowhunting. Too worried about money, using the weekends to work, no more Sundays in bed. In the beginning, Irene thought. There is no such thing as in the beginning.
They left the gate latched and each grabbed another log, pulled it over the bow. The wind accelerating, coming in blasts, the rain spiking into their eyes if they looked toward the lake. Irene sneezed, then blew her nose by holding a finger to one nostril, wiped off with the back of her hand. Getting sick already.
A long time to finish the logs, moving slowly now, both tired. Gary dragged some of Irene’s logs a bit farther from the water. But finally the boat was unloaded and light enough they could pull it ashore. They leaned against the bow, their backs to the wind and lake, and looked at their land.
We should have done this thirty years ago, Gary said. Should have moved out here.
We were on the shore, Irene said. On the lake, and easier to get to town, easier for the kids and school. It wouldn’t be possible to have kids out here.
It would have been possible, Gary said. But whatever.
Gary was a champion at regret. Every day there was something, and this was perhaps what Irene liked least. Their entire lives second-guessed. The regret a living thing, a pool inside him.
Well, we’re out here now, Irene said. We’ve brought the logs, and we’ll be building the cabin.
My point is that we could have been here thirty years ago.
I get your point, Irene said.
Well, Gary said. His lips tight, and he was staring ahead into an alder thicket, stuck in there, unable to work his way out of the sense that his life could have been something else, and Irene knew she was a part of this great regret.
Irene tried to rise above, tried not to get caught in this. She looked at the property, and it really was beautiful. Slender white birch along the back portion, bigger Sitka spruce, a cottonwood and several aspen. The land had some contour, several rises, and she could see where the cabin would go. They’d put a deck out front, and on nice evenings, they’d watch the sun set on the mountain, golden light. This could all work out.
We can do this, Irene said. We can build a nice cabin here.
Yeah, Gary finally said. Then he turned away from the property, looked into the wind and rain. Let’s push off.
So they pushed the boat free and climbed over the bow. Gary at the engine and Irene in the bottom of the boat, hugging her knees, trying to get warm. The way back not as bad, the waves behind them, the square gate in the bow above the waterline now, the boat no longer a barge. They rolled a bit on each wave, but no slamming, no spray. Irene’s teeth chattering again.
A long way from the island to the campground. Gary going slow, the bilge pump working. The campground and truck came into view finally and he cut the motor, landed on the beach beside the ramp. The waves pushing the stern up and down and slewing it to the side.
We could skip the trailer, Gary said. The waves are too big here. It’ll be a nightmare. We could just pull the boat onto the beach a ways and tie it to a tree.
So they did that and were home in minutes. So close, and they’d been freezing for so long. Pointless, Irene thought.
Gary took a quick hot shower, and then Irene ran a hot bath. Painful to sit down into it, her fingers and toes, especially, gone partially numb. The heat delicious, though, surrounding her. She sank into it and closed her eyes, found herself crying carefully, without sound, her mouth underwater. Stupid, she told herself. You can’t have what no longer exists.