Noses Are Red (6 page)

“Hey, I get one!” I cry.

–
Thank you!
says Norbert.

“Yes, thank you!” says Victor.

Don’t leave me, I plead silently.

She nods good-bye, closes the door behind her. A moment later we see her down by the water, climbing into her kayak. She wobbles, getting her feet in, and drops the paddle again. When she finally pushes off, she’s surprisingly graceful. Her stroke is smooth and circular, propelling the boat quickly. The broad blades flash across the water like a dream of flying.

“What’s wrong? Why is she moving so slowly?” Victor and I are at the window. I’ve been staring at the same pointy boat shape for five minutes now, and it hasn’t moved.

“What?” Victor has the binoculars. I repeat my question.

“Her? The kayak went behind the land there a while ago. I’m looking at a duck now.”

I take the binoculars from him, and, with a little trouble, find what I was staring at. What I thought was our artist lady is really a sunken tree, with dead branches sticking out of the water. I’ve been urging it onward, wishing it all sorts of good luck, for the past five minutes.

I turn the glasses, trying to find Victor’s duck.

“When do you think she’ll get back?” he asks.

“Soon, I hope. I’m hungry.”

“Me too.”

I put down the glasses. We stare at each other.

–
You know, that picture doesn’t show the constellation of The Microphone very well. The Big Boot is good, but a bit too far below the East Star.

“Norbert, that isn’t a picture at all,” I tell him. “It’s just drips on the wall.”

–
Oh, yeah? Look at the spur on the Little Boot. I’d like to see you do better!

“Alan, why do you talk about crazy stuff? The Microphone and Little Boot are not constellations.”

I’ve given up trying to explain about Norbert. “Sorry,” I say. “I can’t help it.”

Neither of us mentions the pictures of naked people. I think we’re both embarrassed. All that naked flesh. Fronts and backs, tops and bottoms. It’s safer to stare at the drips on the wall.

“How about going outside for some blueberries?” says Victor.

“Good idea.”

We make sure to leave the door open. Don’t want to be locked out if it starts to rain. And it looks as if it might. It’s still sunny, but there’s a huge thunderhead sailing towards us.

“She said the blueberry bushes were down the rapids,” says Victor. “This way.” He leads; I follow.

The cabin is built near a rocky point. On one side of the rocks is a pebble beach. The open lake laps gently at
the shore. Actually, the wind is picking up and the water is lapping hard now. The artist lady launched her kayak from here. I peer into the distance, but of course I can’t see her. There’s another thunderhead sailing past. That makes three I can see. They’re tall tall clouds, with flattened tops. I know they’re the kind that bring storms, but they don’t look dangerous. They float silent and serene, like balloons.

It occurs to me that I have no idea what blueberry bushes look like. The only blueberries I have ever seen were inside muffins. Somehow, I do not think I am going to find a dozen muffins growing wild.

The rapids start on the other side of the point. The lake narrows down, so that it looks like a river, and the land falls away. There’s a bit of a waterfall, and some big rocks. The water moves fast. The rapids look scary to me – the water runs white, and the spray splashes high in the air. I pick up a twig and throw it in the water, watch it smash against a boulder and disappear into the spray.

“Hey, Alan. Come here!”

Victor is down the rapids, waving.

“What is it?”

“Blueberries!”

I hurry towards him.

They say there’s nothing to beat the taste of fresh-picked fruit. Whoever
they
are. Well, they’re wrong – at least about blueberries. I pick and pick and pick, and end up with a handful of dirty dark pills. They taste okay, but I’d rather have a muffin any day.

And it’s hard work. The bushes are low to the ground, so the berries are tough to get at. This late in the year, there aren’t that many. Victor and I clamber farther and farther downstream, leaning way out from the top of the bank. The water looks deep, and it’s moving quickly. Boulders, eddies, lots of spray. A big piece of a tree floats past me, hits one of the boulders, flips over, and disappears underwater.

“Do you think we’re in the right place?” I ask.

Victor points to some damp mud beside a nearby pine tree. There’s a footprint the size of a tennis racket. Doris has been here.

When we hear the shouts, we both jump and stare upstream. Is it her?

No.

“What the…,” Victor says.

A silver bullet heads towards us. It’s not really a bullet, of course – it’s a canoe. With a single paddler, working like fury, aiming right for the heart of the rapids.

Not Doris. Not Christopher, either. The paddler is wearing a helmet, and a yellow life jacket.

The canoe is surrounded by foaming water. Looks like it’s heading for the same rock the log hit earlier, but at the last minute the canoeist leans back hard on the paddle, and the boat shoots up away from the rock and across to the side of the river. Our side. I can see the paddler clearly. It’s a girl, not much older than I am. The silver canoe is marked with a sign I’ve seen before – like an
upside-down horseshoe. I can’t remember what it means.

She sees us, gives a fierce grin. Her teeth are very white in her tanned face. She waves her paddle at us. “Wahoo!” she shrieks, skimming off down the rapids. I crane forward to follow her through the rising spray. She fends off one boulder with her paddle, and swings the canoe around behind another one, using it as a breakwater. She sits in still water a moment, then darts away, negotiating the rest of the rapids with ease and emerging from the splash and spray into a stretch of gentle current farther downstream. She turns in her seat to look back, waves her paddle one more time before another set of rapids carries her around the next bend. I stare after her. It’s as if she is a mythical creature, a force of the wilderness, part girl, part canoe, as the centaurs were part human and part horse.

–
Ahem
, says Norbert.

“Wow,” I say. “Isn’t she something!”

“I’ll say,” says Victor.

–
Yeah, yeah
, says Norbert.
Girl in a boat. Big deal Say, don’t look now, but there’s a fly in the cabin. A couple of flies, actually. Big ones.

“Something in the cabin?” says Victor. “It couldn’t be her, could it?”

–
It’s flies, I tell you.

Could Doris be back yet?

“Let’s go,” says Victor.

We scramble back the way we came. I almost fall in. “Careful!” says Victor. “You don’t have a life jacket on.”

As if that would save me from the rocks! I imagine myself bobbing downstream in perfect, supported comfort, safe except for a completely crushed skull.

The cabin is in view, and…can it be? “Look in the window!” I cry. “It’s her!”

There’s certainly someone there. I can see them moving around. “Hello!” I say. “Come on!”

We run right up to the fairy-tale red front door of the cabin. It’s still open. I’m in the lead. I charge inside, and stop dead.

Victor stumbles in after me, bumping into me. “Hello!” he pants. “Thanks for…” His words crumble and blow away like ashes.

Two intruders. I recognize one of them.

“Carlo?” I whisper. My voice catches in my throat. Oh, yes, it’s Carlo. He cocks his head and ambles towards me. He must have come to find more of the health bars. They
are
tasty.

I guess I’d be happy to see him if he were alone. But he’s not. He’s brought his mom with him. Her I can do without. She’s busy ripping the emergency pack to shreds.

Next thing I know, Victor and I are running through the woods. “That was close, back there!” he gasps. “Good thing you remembered to close the door. You’re so smart, Alan. Brave, too!”

“Aw, shucks,” I say.

No, wait. I’m ahead of myself again.

Next thing I know I’m frozen in place. I can’t move. I can’t talk.

“This is not good,” Victor says, in a throttled whisper. “It is not good at all.” He sounds like the fish in
The Cat in the Hat.

The big bear makes a deep snuffing grunt, and opens her mouth wide in a yawn. This is not a cute bear. She’s not wearing a hat. She’s not going to make jokes, or sing songs. Her eyes are crossed. One of her ears is hanging down in bloody strips. Her fur is dirty and matted.

Carlo keeps rubbing against me. His mother growls. Is she mad? I hope not. She’s terrifying. Big as a small horse, and – I don’t know how else to put it –
old.
Not old like your very first pair of shoes, or old like your granny, but
old like the biggest tree in the park. I get the impression that she and her kind have been around this part of the world – the wild part: forest, swamp, and river – almost forever. That she belongs here, and the log cabin doesn’t. Victor and I certainly don’t.

“Don’t run!” hisses Victor. “Whatever you do, don’t run. Bears can run as fast as a racehorse.”

I have a momentary image of bear racing, with the winner eating the jockey. I shiver. The big bear stares at her cub and then at me. Her head is on one side. Her mouth is open. Her teeth are as long as my fingers, and needle-sharp at the end.

I still can’t move. That’s what happens to me when I panic. I stay still.

“Don’t make her mad. Don’t get between the cub and the mother,” whispers Victor. He’s got lots of advice about what not to do. I can’t even nod to say I understand. I feel like that prehistoric guy they found in the ice.

–
On Jupiter we call them flies.

Oh, no. Quiet, Norbert, I think to myself. Just be quiet about bears and flies.

“What are you doing, Alan?” whispers Victor.

–
Because, of course, that’s what we do when you run into them. Do you understand, Dingwall? Hey, Dingwall? Are you listening?

Oh, dear. “Yes, I’m listening,” I whisper. “You
fly
from them. The way you
bear
the flies. Yes, I get it.”

“Shut up, Alan. Shut up and let’s get out of here.”

The mother bear peers in our direction. She’s fifteen feet away. I can smell her. Not pretty, let me tell you. She begins to rub her back against the wall.

I can move now. Talking to Norbert broke the spell.

The bear comes down on all fours again. The cabin shakes. My heart is racing. I’m trembling, breathing quickly, ready to…I don’t know what.

–
Run!!! Run! Run!!!

That’s it. Victor screams, and runs through the door. I turn tail and follow. The floor shakes. The bear is coming after us.

Next thing I know, we’re running through the woods. Fast as we can. I hear crashing behind us. Bears? I hope not. I don’t look. The river is on our right. The path is very uneven. I stumble, pick myself up, and keep running. My legs are wet from the river spray.

“That was close, back there!” gasps Victor. “Did you remember to close the door, Alan?”

“Um,” I say.

“You’re so…”

“Smart?” I offer. “Brave?”

He trips over a root, and grabs on to me. We teeter on the edge of the riverbank.

“So idiotic,” he says.

We fall into the river together.

I was hot, and now I’m not. But I don’t feel relieved. The water moves swiftly, carrying me along with it. I use my
feet to push off one rock, only to bash into another one going backward. I bounce off awkwardly, so that I end up sliding downstream feetfirst. After I bump into three rocks in a row, I’m glad I’m going feetfirst. I’d hate to be fending them off with my head.

I spot Victor, slightly ahead of me. He’s swimming easily, with slow steady strokes, letting the current take him downstream. He’s okay. I’m okay. Our moms would think we were in danger, but we’re way better off than we were just a few minutes ago.

Now I have time to feel relieved.

–
Whee!
cries Norbert.
This reminds me of rides on Jupiter. Only, of course, our water is a different color.

Not my first dip today – I fell in, loading the canoe. Was it only this morning? I feel years older.

“Was that all your idea?” I ask Norbert. We slide down a tiny waterfall. Kind of fun. “Screaming like that to get us to run?”

–
Well
…

“Thanks. I think.”

The dark green treetops make an interesting pattern against the blue sky. We slide by quicker than I could run. The water bends to the right, and widens out. We slow to a walking pace. I put my foot down, to try and stand up, but the current is still strong enough to knock me off my feet. I do a somersault, and end up with my feet out in front of me again. Just as well – a boulder looms. I fend it off.

The sun is shining directly on my face. It’s been on my face a lot today. I wish I’d brought sunblock. And I’m not the only one.

–
Whew, I’m getting hot
, says Norbert.
Do you have air-conditioning?

“I really don’t know,” I say. “Look around in there. Whatever you can find.”

The water is really slowing down now. The trees on my right slide by in a relaxed, leisurely style. Lots of little eddies and ripples. The bank on my left is lower, and the ground is flatter. Fewer trees, more reeds.

The water is a different color. I’m sure it’s the same water as before, but when it was splashing over rocks and boulders it looked clean and clear. Now it looks green and dirty.

Victor is staggering through the shallows, towards the left bank.

–
Careful
, calls Norbert.
I saw a shiver over there.

Victor pauses. “A shiver?”

–
We call it a shiver on Jupiter. You know, one of those long thin things. Hisses at you. Alan fell asleep near one just a while ago.

“A snake? You saw a snake on the bank over there?” He draws back.

–
Actually, it was in the water.

Victor hurries out on the right bank. I catch up to him and start to clamber out.

“Careful,” he says. “It’s slippery.”

“Yes, if I fell that would be horrible, wouldn’t it? I might get…wet.”

“Shut up.” He almost smiles.

The land slopes upwards towards the pine woods. I don’t want to climb the hill. My clothes hang wet and heavy on me. I’m hungry. “Now, what?” I say.

“I don’t know. I wish Mr. Leech was here. Or the old lady. They could tell us which way to go.”

“I thought you were a camper,” I say. “Don’t you know what to do on your own?”

“I’ve always had someone tell me what to do.”

“Oh.”

–
Go to the right
, says Norbert.
And do it now!

The river bends that way. We won’t be climbing. Sounds as good as anything else. Victor brightens. “Okay,” he says, marching away.

“Do you have any idea where we’re going, Norbert?” I ask in a whisper.

–
Shhh. Just keep going.

Funny thing. I feel better too. I like having someone else do the directing.

“Careful here,” Victor calls to me. “The ground is uneven. You might twist your ankle.”

“Yes, Mom,” I say. Just before he smiles, I catch a glimpse of longing on his face. He misses his mom.

“Look, up ahead!” Victor points. Something is glinting on the rocks.

“Is it a bird? A plane? Christopher?” Not, you understand, that I think he’s Superman.

We run towards it. The glinting becomes clearer. It’s a canoe.

Actually, it’s half a canoe, scarred and dented. It sits on top of a stump, like an aluminum hood. Someone has nailed a sign to the stump: BEARCLAW RAPIDS it says. Underneath is the horseshoe symbol, like the one on the canoe-girl’s boat.

Scary, to think of the water being that violent, that strong. I think how lucky we are to have come down the rapids uninjured.

“Is it –
hers?”
Victor clasps his hands together on the word. “Please let it not be…
hers!”
Great galloping gophers, the boy’s in love.

–
Oh, for heaven’s sake
, says Norbert.

It’s sunny, but some gray clouds are moving in, like a gang of bullies trying to take over the sky. Sometime soon there’s going to be one heck of a storm.

I feel an overwhelming sense of the size of the wilderness. I see hills and river and rock and mud; I see trees, and more trees, and more trees, rising all around me. Beyond them, the hills and sky. My footprints in the mud, like the broken canoe, are faint and fragile symbols of human intrusion. They are my link with my own kind. I begin to climb. Mud gives way to rock, and the footprints disappear.

“I’m really hungry,” says Victor, limping after me. “And I have a blister. And it’s getting later and later. We should make camp.”

“What do you mean, ‘make camp’?”

“Well, we should stop, and set up our tent and light our fire and cook dinner.”

I stare at him. “Victor, we don’t have any of those things.”

Is that a rumble of thunder, off to the right? It’s still sunny.

“No food,” I say. “No tent. No fire. No dry clothes.”

“I know.” He sits down, and bows his head. At least he’s not delusional. “I wish I was back home,” he says.

“Me too, but that isn’t going to help us now.”

“Wish I hadn’t come at all. It’s…5:30. Dinnertime. Mom’ll be cooking pot roast, or something.”

Yes, definitely thunder. “I wish I knew what to do now,” I say.

“Me too.” Victor starts to cry. His face puckers up, and his shoulders start to move.

Not good. Can it get worse? Yes, it can always get worse. But it doesn’t – not this time. It gets better.

–
Look
, says Norbert.

“Where?”

–
Over there. I’m pointing.

“Norbert, I can’t see you. Where are you pointing?”

–
Over there. Come on, Dingwall. You can’t miss it.

Victor doesn’t look. He probably thinks I’ve cracked up – talking to myself. I scan the horizon…and I see it. My heart jumps a beat. “That’s smoke!” I shout.

A thin trickle, wafting above the trees. It’s downstream from us, not very far away.

–
Yup.

I can’t tell you how it feels to realize that I’m not alone in the middle of the wilderness. Someone out there – someone nearby – can make fire. May not sound like much, making fire, but it’s more than I can do right now. Fire is a powerful and positive achievement. I know – I
know
– that the person responsible for the fire is a good person.

“Come on, Victor – this way.” I pull my friend to his feet, and drag him over mud and rocks, following the riverbed. The smoke is whitish in color – distinct against the dark bank of clouds.

The ground is very uneven. We have to jump over a deep cut made by – I don’t know what. Groundwater, maybe.

I can see the campfire now. The flames are yellow and vibrant. We struggle closer, closer. Victor’s blister makes him hobble. I help him along. He hangs on to my arm.

“Hello!” I call. “Hello!” No one responds. There doesn’t seem to be anyone around the campfire.

“Help!” calls Victor. “We need –”

He trips, pitching forward and carrying me with him. We tumble together down a muddy gully. I end up on my back. A little stream runs down the gully, right underneath me. In fact, I am lying in the little streambed. It’s very uncomfortable.

“You okay?” I ask Victor. He’s beside me. I shake his arm.

He groans.

“Yeah. Me too.”

That’s when I hear the laughter. Peal after peal, coming from above.