The Fall of Never(28)

What do you think of me, Becky?

“God,” she muttered. “Little Baby Roundabout.”

She went to the window to pull it closed and saw someone down below, standing half-hidden beneath the edge of the woods: there and then gone, too quick for her to make out any detail. But someone.




It was cold outside. The second Kelly stepped from the house, the frigid air attacked her, slammed into her like a speeding car into a brick wall. At this rate, the winter was going to be brutal, even worse than in the city. Up here, a brutal winter was practically a death sentence—families jailed up for what could potentially be months while the snow outside accumulated with no apparent end in sight. Sometimes three, four, five feet. And not just against the doors and windows and siding, but heavy on the roof, on skylights and chimneys and spires and porches. A snapping sound in the night could be a section of roof giving up the fight. Skylights splintered and cracked, and that was a problem, particularly when the weather started to warm up and the snow would start melting. The sleet and hail that had attacked the airport was nothing; Spires understood the power of winter, understood that it was something to be respected and feared. And it would be a fearful winter this year, Kelly knew.

She stepped around the side of the house, her breath billowing out of her mouth in plumes. The forest was densest to the east, and as she crept around that side of the house, she looked down upon the great woodland with a similar sense of respect and fear she afforded each and every winter.

“Dad?”

Had he come out here to take his morning walk around the compound as her mother had mentioned? Thinking of her father, she was accosted by a barrage of moth-bitten memories of the man, spliced and not fully whole, like cut loaves of bread. He was a big man, a strong man, and—oddly—a pathetic man. That was something it had taken Kelly a while to see, yet something that had been so clear all along.

No one wants to believe their father is weak, that their father has emotions and can cry and feel pain, she thought. It’s safer to pretend fathers are invincible robots, and feel no pain.

She walked around the east side of the house, heedful of where she stepped. Here, the ground gave way to a sharp slope, where the grass and flowerbeds were no more, and where sharp slate crags and leafless candelabra-shaped bushes sprung up from nowhere. A careless step and she could break her ankle, and wouldn’t that just be terrific?

Again she saw someone move within the woods, beyond the first veil of trees.

“Hello!” she called out, now not so certain this person was her father.

Carefully, she eased herself down the face of the cliff, grabbing onto the bare stalks of small trees and bushes as she went. With each footstep, a tumble of stones was loosened and rolled down the side of the hill and disappeared into the woods. Further down, patches of wildflowers sprung up in scattered wedges, and Kelly thought, That’s odd. I would think it was too cold for flowers to grow out here.

She entered the woods, and it was somehow warmer. Like the woods closed arms around her, blocking out the cold. Unmoving, she stood among the trees, peering into the darkness ahead. So dense. Even in midday it was like the throes of night just up ahead. She took a few steps in, not so much interested in finding her father anymore (or whoever that had been), but now just relishing what warmth the place offered. It was like a living thing, this woods—dry and breathing all around her. A carpet of orange pine needles beneath her feet. The sounds of birds, not yet migrated, off in the distance. Squirrels plodding from branch to branch high above her head.

Don’t be fooled. There is no peace here, no rest here, she thought for some reason, not understanding any of it.

Something moved off to her right, and she turned to look at it.

A dog. A large white and gray dog stumbling along with a severe limp. Or a wolf. It could be a wolf.

She felt her throat tighten, her lungs constrict. The overwhelming need to urinate hit her like a thousand pounds of pressure on her bladder, and she was nearly crippled by the pain. In that second, she doubled over and fell against the sap-covered trunk of a tree. Still, she could not take her eyes from the dog that could be a wolf…

It continued to limp through the woods, slowly working its way deeper into the blackness of the forest. It moved with its head down, its tongue out, its pyramid-shaped shoulder blades pumping in mechanical succession. It was in obvious agony, unwilling to put any pressure on its right front paw.

“God,” Kelly moaned, clasping her hands to her groin, but it was no good—the dam was about the break. “God-God-God…”

The pain intensified, blossomed like a flower, then exploded like a punctured balloon. Before she even realized what was happening, she was aware of a wet heat at her crotch, coursing down the legs of her jeans and soaking her buttocks. The flood seemed to have no end. Sickened and ashamed, she collapsed to her hands and knees on the pine needle carpet, finally able to recapture her breath, her lungs opening, her throat becoming unstuck.

Oh Christ…

She’d wet herself. Like a f*cking child, she’d wet herself. And despite her solitude, her sense of shame was nearly overwhelming.

An anguished howl rang through the air and she looked up. The dog was hardly visible now, having maneuvered its way deeper into the forest, but she could still just make it out. Limping and hurt.

“God,” she breathed, and fought back tears.