Gun Lake (33 page)

Paul could still remember the terrifying, awful fear that came over him. This was an animal he had grown to love, an animal that had suddenly grown dripping fangs and was intent on destroying anything that came near it.

His father had taken one look at the bite marks on Paul’s arm and then at the dog himself, still lunging on the chain, then had gotten his giant hunting rifle and put two rounds in Bow’s head. Paul hadn’t been there to witness it, but he had heard those shots.
That was when Paul knew he could never kill an animal. He’d refused to go hunting, and he’d never wanted to use a firearm. Even though he owned a gun for a while—the forty-five that Sean had managed to find somewhere—Paul had never shot the gun.

Would that change?

Paul was different from his father. He knew that. And obviously, he was different from his son too.

Perhaps Sean took more after his mother.

Paul walked down to the shore of Gun Lake and looked out at the placid water. It was a Sunday afternoon, and he had been waiting all day to see Sean again. A thousand thoughts tossed around in his mind. None of them were good.

SHE HAD BEEN HERE BEFORE. Several times, in fact. But the last time she came had been seven years ago.

Norah stepped onto the dry grass edging the tiny plot of land and thought how much the trees had grown since the last time. It was a small hill, almost a lump in the ground, with an L-shaped driveway surrounding it from the other intersecting avenues. It was off the main road and only had maybe a hundred stones in it. For some reason, her mother had gotten permission to be buried in this quaint little cemetery among farms and country houses, minutes away from the lake.

It had been seven years since she last visited her mother. Some people would see that as a lack of caring, but Norah knew better. Her mother was dead and long gone, and that was the brutal yet honest truth. Visiting a little headstone carved with the name Solana Britt was just another way of remembering her mother. Nothing more. It wasn’t “paying her respects.” She had always respected her mother and still did, and visiting a sunny country cemetery didn’t change that.

She walked across soft grass that needed mowing and found the tombstone. The name, the hyphenated years, and the Bible verse were just as she remembered them.

Her mother’s maiden name,
Rafael
, meant “God has healed.” Solana had told her that when she was a little girl. But God must’ve been sleeping on the job because Solana Rafael Britt hadn’t been healed at all. She had died a terrible, lingering death, still believing in the God who supposedly could heal her.

Norah missed her mother. She wished she could talk with her as an adult, ask her a few things about running around with wild men. The man Lana Britt had married, the man she’d loved and borne a child to, was a wild man, and he had died being a wild man. Jerry Britt had never been a physically abusive man—at least, not that Norah knew—but still, the two of them could have compared notes. As a teenager, wrapped up in her own life and world, she’d missed out on getting to know her mother. And then Lana had gotten sick. And was suddenly gone.

Norah wished she could apologize. She’d been there to the very end, helping to care for her mother, and she was glad about that. But there were things she’d never taken time to know about her mother, and now it was too late.

Seven years too late.

A stretch of shadow from a large oak tree covered the tombstone. Norah looked around and still felt that odd sensation that she was being watched, that Harlan might be studying her with binoculars from far off. She couldn’t shake the feeling that he was going to show up unannounced and grab her and take her back. She still didn’t feel on her own entirely. She still didn’t feel free.

Her mother had been forty-two when she died. Forty-two years old. That was all she’d been given, all her body had in its batteries. Forty-two.

Norah wondered if her mother could see her now—if all that stuff she’d told Norah about heaven was true and she was up there looking down. What would she think of Norah looking down on the grave as casually as she might look at a house or a passing car from the sidewalk. She was pretty sure, actually, that Lana Britt wasn’t thinking anything at all. Norah missed her
mother, but she was a realist. She knew her mother wasn’t watching her from the clouds. Her mother was gone. And Norah would never get a chance to ask the questions that kept running through her mind.

She wanted to know what to do and where to go and how to keep from feeling like this is all you get. Was her one big chance for a good life blown now that she had left Harlan? Was she just going to end up working for nothing and eventually dying just like Lana had done? And if that was true, how could she possibly stand it?

She thought of her tiny, bare apartment. She thought about her two jobs, which together paid barely enough to live on. And then she thought of David. She wished she could talk to her mother about him. And then she realized she wanted to tell
him
about her mother, about Harlan, about everything. He had soft, sad eyes that listened and almost gave her hope. It was weird that she felt like that, but it was true.

She knew that opening up to another man right now was not a good idea. She was vulnerable. Her judgment wasn’t all that good, especially where men were concerned. She needed to stand on her own feet and learn to take care of herself and not risk another bad relationship.

But the vibes she got from David weren’t bad. They were good. Somehow she felt she knew him, that he and she were a lot alike, even though she knew almost nothing about him. He seemed to be running like she was, and looking for answers, and needing a temporary break from his troubles.

She wanted to see him again.

KURT AND CRAIG DECIDED to take a hike in the woods surrounding the cabin that Sunday afternoon. Spending too much time in or around the cabin reminded Kurt of the same cooped-up feelings he had back in Stagworth.

You’ll never be free
.

The weather was nice, and they wanted to get some exercise. To do something. Anything.

Craig couldn’t stop talking about the movie he’d gone to see last night with Wes. They had gone to see
Terminator III
—a “decent flick,” as Craig put it, and just spending over two hours in a movie theater had brought a new excitement and eagerness in his disposition.

“I think we should get a TV And a VCR.”

Kurt laughed at the thought. “You know, we’re not here for very long.”

“Well, down the road then. You know the cost of those things nowadays? Did you see in the paper? At Best Buy you can get a television with a built-in VCR
and
DVD player for a hundred bucks. It’s unbelievable.”

“It is,” Kurt agreed.

They walked along a trail that started just behind their cabin and led uphill deep into the woods. The surrounding area was full of trails for hikers and campers, though they had seen neither during their time here.

“We might go see another film tonight,” Craig said.

“What are you going to see?”

“Maybe this movie called
28 Days Later
. Have you seen the poster? It looks like a horror flick. Or science fiction. Haven’t seen one of those for a while.”

“Wonder why,” Kurt said, half as a joke.

They trudged slowly up the hill, looking around them at trees and bushes that had been growing for many years. The ground under their feet was cushiony with layers of old leaves and pine needles.

“What’s your favorite Arnold Schwarzenegger movie?” Craig asked him.

Kurt laughed. “Do you ever run out of ideas for movie lists?”

“Never.”

“Good. I wouldn’t want you to get bored or anything.”

Craig grinned, and his round cheeks almost looked clownish. “Wanna know what I’d like to do one day?”

“What?”

“Write a movie list book. Top movie lists of all time. The best everything.”

“There’s a title,” Kurt said. “The
Best Everything.”

“In the movies,” Craig added.

“The
Best Everything in the Movies
. By Craig Ellis.”

“I like it.”

“A sure best seller.”

“So?” Craig asked, not forgetting about his movie question.

“Well,
Terminator
, of course. And the second
Terminator.”

“You can’t forget
Predator,”
Craig added hastily

Kurt slowed down for a minute. “You never let me finish my lists, you know.”

Craig smiled and nodded. He took out his forty-five automatic and pretended like he was shooting something.

“Would you put that thing away?” Kurt said.

“What?”

“Someone’s going to be a little freaked if they suddenly come across the two of us with you holding a gun.”

“They wouldn’t think it was real.”

“Maybe not if you were a ten-year-old kid.”

“Predator
was one my favorite Schwarzenegger flicks,” Craig said, making a firing sound as he pretended to mow people down in the woods. “I liked
Commando
too.”

“I forget that one.”

Craig nodded as he put the forty-five back in his belt and positioned it for comfort.

“That’s one of those where—”

The deafening shot rang out and echoed in trees. Kurt and Craig stopped, frozen. Then Craig gave a muffled gasp as he
looked down. His hand still rested on the handle of the forty-five in his pants.

Kurt looked at Craig in disbelief.

no

“Oh, man,” Craig said as he dropped to his knees, looking at his gut in disbelief.

Kurt let out a curse and then another and then another as he dropped to his knees next to Craig.

“What—did you—where—let me see—”

Craig grimaced and looked up at Kurt, and the look on his face shook Kurt more than the shot had.

stop it don’t give me that don’t stare at me like that you’re not going to

“Where’d you get hit?”

“Oh, man, oh, no, man, I shot myself, Kurt. Man, I shot myself.”

Craig kept on, his voice wavering and moaning. Kurt suddenly realized that the shot probably had been heard by others as well.

“Craig, we gotta get you out of here.”

“I shot myself!” Craig said in horror and shock.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Come on, can you stand?”

“Aaaahhh!” He let out a volley of curses as he stood. He couldn’t stand all the way up. Kurt helped him and put an arm around his shoulder.

“We’re gonna go back to the cabin, and then we’re gonna get you some help.”

“No. I don’t think—”

“Craig, come on, walk now.”

Craig looked up at Kurt, tears streaming down his chubby face. “I—shot myself. Oh, man. What’d I do? I shot myself in the gut.”

They walked for a few minutes, Craig hobbling along and sweating and squeezing out tears and scowling in pain.

“I shot myself,” Craig kept saying, coloring his thoughts with curses.

“You’re gonna be okay.”

“I’m not gonna be—I shot myself in the gut! I SHOT MYSELF!”

“Come on, all right. Craig, come on. Let’s keep going.”

Kurt heard steps coming and reached for the gun in his pocket. He made out a familiar figure approaching. It was Ossie.

“What happened?”

“Craig got shot.”

Ossie looked at them, looked behind them, trying to figure out what happened.

“Who—”

“We’ve gotta get him back to the cabin,” Kurt said.

“Yeah, okay. Come on, Craig. Here—” and Ossie went to his other side to help him walk faster.

It took them ten minutes to make it to the cabin.

“Oh, man, it hurts bad.” Then Craig let out a gasping shriek as he squinted.

“You’re going to be fine,” Kurt told him, holding the towel against Craig’s side.

“I really did it this time,” Craig said, his words out of breath, hushed. “I’m gonna die. I know it.”

“You’re not going to die.”

“I kinda think he is.”

Kurt shot a look at Wes, hulking over them, and ordered him out of the cabin.

“What?”

“Just get out. Go somewhere and do anything; just get out.”

Kurt held the warm and sticky towel against Craig’s side and felt it getting wetter, heavier. Sean was nowhere to be found.

“Man, I’m scared,” Craig said.

“There’s nothing to be scared about.”

“I’m gonna die.”

“Don’t say that.”

“You know it’s true. I’m the guy. I’m the one that gets it. I knew I’d be the one to get it.”

“Craig, why don’t you just pray with—”

“Shut up,” Kurt said to Ossie, kneeling next to the bed.

“I’m just asking to—”

“No. No prayers and no death talk. This man is not dying, and you guys aren’t going to make him think he is. So if you can’t help, then just get out of here.”

Kurt cursed and asked for a fresh towel.

“How could you?” he said under his breath, shaking his head, replacing the towel with another fresh one.

“We gotta get him to a hospital,” Ossie said.

“I’m not going. I’m not going anywhere. If I have to die, I’m still not going back.”

“Craig.”

“What?” He looked up at Kurt.

“Listen to me. You’re going to be fine.”

“It hurts.”

“I know it hurts. Look, here, sip on this.”

“It’s kinda like the death scenes—where the man gets his last sip of booze.”

“This is water,” Kurt said, holding up the glass for Craig to sip. He winced, his pudgy cheeks bunching up, his eyes like a frightened teenager’s.

“Tell me … something,” Craig said.

“What?”

“Your all-time favorite … death scenes.”

“Come on,” Kurt said.

“No. I’m serious. Come on.”

“Craig, shut up. I’m not doing it.”

Kurt looked up at Ossie, who gave him a stern, hopeless look. Ossie then closed his eyes, probably praying another unheard prayer.

“When Russell Crowe dies in
Gladiator,”
Craig said. “That’s gotta be one.”

“Craig, come on—”

“No,” Craig gasped. “If you’re not going to … then let me.”

He grimaced again and thought of another movie.
“Citizen Kane
, of course. ‘Rosebud’ and all that. Definitely has to—you know—”