The Returners (4 page)

Emily heard five muffled gunshots while she waited in the cabin. The shots were spread out except for the last two, which were one behind the other. It had been about fifteen minutes since the last one.

She was beginning to get nervous, her mom was never gone this long unless she was hunting, and she always took her when she did that. Something had been bothering her mom. She knew it when she'd left, but didn't want to worry her by letting her know that.

She clutched the shotgun in her hand even tighter now and looked out the window of the loft impatiently waiting for her mother to return. Even though her mother told her to stay put, Emily was considering leaving the cabin. What if her mother needed help? Her fears were soon quelled as she saw her come from the forest into the small clearing where the cabin sat.

Jessica could see the cabin now and peered up to the loft window where Emily would be. She saw her daughter's face, it then disappeared from the window, moments later she came out the front door.

"Is everything alright? I heard gunshots. What happened?" Her voice anxious, curious and excited.

"Everything's fine. Can you go grab the shovel for me?"

Emily was confused. Why was her mother asking her for a shovel? "Mom, what happened? Why the hell do you need a shovel? Where's the rifle?" 

Jessica suddenly realizing she had left the .22 back in the woods. It had slipped her mind in her haste to get back here.

"Young lady watch your mouth. I'll explain on the way to the stream. Give me the shotgun then run and get the shovel please."

Emily handed her the shotgun and ran towards the cabin. Returning a moment later with a shovel.

"Now stay close to me and I'll tell you what happened." For some reason Jessica felt safer having her daughter by her side instead of in the cabin by herself. The whole incident unnerving her.

Emily moved to her mother’s side, anxiously awaiting what she had to tell her as the two women entered the forest and headed towards the stream.

It had only been a few minutes since the woman had gone into the woods. In that short time Jacob's mind had finally calmed down and begun to process the situation better. What the hell was this woman doing out in the middle of the woods? She could have easily taken him out while he was sleeping, yet she hadn't. Instead she had saved him.

As he looked down at Flash wrapped in his shirt, anger began to fill his mind for falling asleep and not taking better precautions. None of this would have happened if he hadn't been so careless. He slammed his fist down upon the log in frustration. Stupidity and carelessness could get you killed out here and it almost had this time.

He shook his head, disgusted with himself. He needed to do something other than sit here tormenting himself for his screw up. Standing up and pulling his knife from its sheath he walked towards the bear. 

Jessica and Emily were almost to the stream, along the way Jessica had explained what happened to her daughter. Surprisingly Emily didn't ask a lot of questions and seemed to understand what her mother had told her. Even though Emily was only eleven Jessica didn't feel it was right to sugar coat things and had told her everything that had happened.

With all craziness that had happened over the last few years, there wasn't much point in doing that. It was better to tell it like it was, unfortunately that was a sad necessity of the time they lived in. She could see the man kneeling next to the bear as they entered the clearing.

"We got your shovel," Jessica said as they moved towards him. She could see he was skinning the bear.

Jacob stood up at the sound of the woman's voice and turned towards her. He was surprised to see she wasn't alone.

"Thank you. I figured the meat could be put to good use and I needed to stay busy." He looked at both her and her daughter. "My name’s Jacob Constantine, didn't get a chance to tell you before."

"Jacob, I'm Jessica Alberts and this is my daughter Emily."

He extended his hand to shake hers before realizing it was covered with blood and goo from skinning the bear. To his surprise she extended her hand and took it anyway.

"Thank you for saving my life. If you hadn't come along I'd be a dead man. I don't have the words to express my gratitude."

Jessica handed him the shovel. "That's okay, any decent person would have done the same thing."

Jacob took the shovel. "I don't think there's many of them left ma'am. These days people have a tendency to shoot first and ask questions later."

She couldn't agree with him more on that one, but now really wasn't the time or place for that discussion. "Go take care of your dog, Emily and I will finish taking care of the bear."

Jacob moved towards the log and began digging a spot near the campfire. Jessica and Emily took over where he'd left off and continued cutting up the bear. After a few minutes of digging he looked up to see both women had obviously taken care of game before. It was strange, but for some reason he felt a sense of relief. He couldn't explain why, he just did.

It took Jacob roughly thirty minutes to dig the hole for Flash. When he finished he placed the dog in it and removed the shirt from the dog’s head, patting him one last time.

"Goodbye old friend," He said, his voice beginning to crack.

Flash was just a puppy when he got him, a present from his father when he graduated college. Since then they'd been inseparable and now his best friend was gone. Through this entire ordeal, he'd always had Flash by his side. It felt like someone had ripped out his heart as he placed the shirt back over the dog and began filling in the hole. He'd found a large flat stone at the edge of the stream and placed it at the head of Flash's grave. Jessica and Emily walked over to him and stood by his side as he placed it.

"I'm really sorry about your dog Mister," Emily said.

"Thanks kid.” It was the first time she had spoken to him since they'd arrived. “He and I went through a lot together. This was the least I could do for him, he was my best friend." He looked over at Jessica and could see sympathy for what he was going through in her eyes.

"Do you want us to leave you alone for a minute?" Jessica figured he may want a few moments to himself.

"If you don't mind, I'd like you to stay while I say a few words?" Right now he didn't want to be alone. Even though he didn't know these women he already felt comfortable around them.

Both Jessica and Emily remained silent and lowered their heads. Jacob looked down at the mound of dirt at his feet. Trying to come up with the right words.

"Flash, you were my friend. You saved me more than once, in more ways than one. You kept me sane through all this and never left my side, even when things got bad. I never would have made it this long if it wasn't for you." He paused as a tear ran down his face. Kneeling down he placed his hand in the dirt of the grave. "I hope you're chasing rabbits and running free wherever you are. Good-bye ol' buddy, I love you."

As Jacob stood up both Jessica and Emily wiped tears from their eyes. None of them spoke for a moment as they stood there in awkward silence, each unsure of what to say.

Jessica became aware the sky was starting to darken as night quickly began to move in on them. Jessica knew they'd have to head back to the cabin soon. They didn't want to be out roaming far from it after dark.

Emily turned to her Mother. "Mom, can he come stay with us tonight? We have plenty of room."

              Jessica was caught off guard by her daughters question. She hadn't even thought of asking Jacob to come back to the cabin with them. With the chaos and unexpected nature of the situation, that though hadn't even crossed her mind. Even though she didn't think he would do anything to either of them, but there was still a twinge of doubt in the back of her mind. It put her in a precarious situation.

"If he wants to hon. That's up to him." Her eyes locked with his as she spoke.

"I don't want to impose on you, if it's a problem I can be on my way. I'm used to being alone out here, I'll be fine," Jacob said.

He could see the apprehension on Jessica's face. After what she'd done for him he didn't want to impose on her any further. Deep in his mind he though about how nice it would be to have some human company for a change and maybe even get to sleep in a real bed.

Jessica looked up at the quickly darkening skyline. "Well it’s getting dark and it doesn't make much sense for you to stay out here in the cold. We have a nice warm fire, food and a bed you can sleep in. We've got to do something about that bear meat though, we're gonna lose it to the coyotes if we don't. Our cabin isn't far from here." All three of them were looking at the meat they had taken off the bear.

Jacob thought of something his father had told him about a long time ago. Those old stories had come in useful more than once since all this began. Now it looked like they would again.

"We can take some with us and put the rest in the stream. Weigh it down with rocks, the water will keep it cool and the smell out of the air. My dad told me stories about how they did that when they'd stay at the hunting camp when he was growing up." 

That was a brilliant idea, Jessica wasn't sure why she hadn't though of doing that herself. It made perfect sense.

"Okay, we'll do that. We better get a move on if we want to get back to the cabin before dark."

The three of them quickly got to work. Emily brought the slabs of meat over while Jessica and Jacob got rocks to weigh them down. Darkness arrived, and by the time they finished up you could barely see ten feet in front of you. Jacob gathered his things and Jessica retrieved the .22 she had left in the woods.

They were able to take one of the bear’s hindquarters with them. There was no talking as they worked their way through the forest. Jacob followed closely behind Jessica and Emily, not wanting them to get too far ahead. The forest was pitch black and made it nearly impossible to see where they were going. Luckily Jessica and Emily had made this trip enough they could easily navigate the path in the darkness. It wasn't long before they reached their cabin.

Before they reached the door to the cabin Jessica handed Emily the .22. "Go inside and put this where it belongs, we're going to put the meat away."

Emily nodded her head, took the gun and headed inside.

Jessica turned towards Jacob who was carrying the hindquarter. "Come with me, I'll show you where we store our meat."

Jessica grabbed a lantern that hung on the edge of the cabin and lit it. The soft white glow lighting up the area around them and enabling them to see where they were going. Jessica led him around the corner of the cabin and then came to a stop. Reaching down she grabbed a set of handles that stuck up out of the ground. Two doors swung upward when she pulled.

"That's our fridge," She said as she grabbed the hindquarter and tossed it down into the hole.

"Aren't you worried about it getting dirty?" He thought it was a bit unusual to just throw meat into a hole in the ground.

Jessica laughed as she closed the doors up and slid a bolt through the handles. "Well it’s lined with plastic and there isn't anything else down there. The depth of the hole keeps anything we store in it cool for short periods of time. We've actually only used it once when I shot a deer earlier in the winter, but that meats all been used up. What we didn't eat right off we smoked so we could have it when we needed it."

This woman seemed to know what she was doing and wasn't a stranger to the woods, at least from what he could tell.

"It's just different I guess. I've never heard of anyone doing that before." He came from a family of hunters and never once could he remember hearing of anything like this.             

"It's something my dad and uncles did when they used the camp a lot. I wouldn't have known about it otherwise. Let’s get inside and get something to eat."

Jacob followed Jessica inside. The cabin wasn't huge and didn't have a ton of furnishings. It had a big queen size bed, a set of bunk beds and a dinner table with stools carved out of an old Oak tree. A few other random chairs were scattered about the cabin. There were several old wildlife paintings adorning the walls as well as a NAPA auto-parts calender that had run out back in 1997.

Jacob noticed there was also a loft above the wood stove in the kitchen. He noticed the few windows in the cabin had boards across them. They were almost completely blocked except for a small slit to see out of. Besides the boards across the windows It was a typical hunting cabin from what he had seen.

Emily walked up to him as he was looking around and handed him a glass of water.

"Thanks Emily." Jacob put the glass to his lips and took a drink. The water was surprisingly cold.

"You’re welcome." Emily turned and went back to the kitchen.

Jessica came over to him as he stood there drinking the water Emily had given him. "Feel free to put your things down and make yourself comfortable. Emily is quite the chef. She'll have dinner ready for us soon."