True Places(2)

She crossed to the north into a hemlock grove. The breeze swirled behind her—more wind than usual, a change in weather—and sent the tang of blood to the back of her throat. There, in the middle distance, a dark shape on the ground broke the pattern of the ferns. She approached and saw it was a turkey, one wing splayed across its body as if to cover itself in the shame of death.

The girl scanned around her, skin prickling, eyes narrowed, nostrils flared. “Mama!”

She listened through the wind sighing in the branches overhead, through the creaking of old wood, through the stirrings in the underbrush.

“Mama!”

A sound. An echo of something she hadn’t heard. She moved toward it, around an outcropping, into denser wood for a short distance, then out into a glittering stand of saplings, tulip poplars, not what she would have expected here.

“Mama! Mama!”

She heard the muffled reply and stared at her feet, for the sound seemed to come from beneath her. She strode in a careful circle, ducking among the saplings, eyes upon the ground. She stepped over a deadfall and stopped short. A hole gaped directly before her, a void where the cloth of the earth had been ripped open. If she had not been scouting the ground, she might have fallen in. It was big enough to swallow her.

Her heart beat in her ears. She shook her head roughly and climbed back over the downed tree to the far side of the hole, giving it a wide berth. There, caught in a tangle of twigs, was the rifle with its familiar burnished walnut stock. She picked it up, checked the safety, and stood the rifle against a tree. Her stomach knotted. Mama would never abandon the rifle like that.

The girl approached the hole. Boulders big as children hunkered over the other side, with solid stone below lining the shaft as far down as she could see. On her side, freshly uprooted plants dangled into the void.

“Mama?”

A low moan rose from below.

“Mama!”

“I’m here.” Mama’s voice was a faint, wet echo. “Be careful.”

The girl took a step back.

A gravelly scraping. Mama said, “My leg’s broken.”

Dropping onto her stomach, the girl crept to the edge, unsure of its stability. She grabbed a sturdy branch with one arm and shouted into the blackness. “How far is it? How far down are you?”

She thought she could hear Mama’s ragged breathing, but it might have been the blood roaring in her ears, or the wind.

“Twenty feet.” A long pause. A crow cawed high above. Another answered. “My ribs are broken.”

The girl imagined her mother on cold wet stone, a hand on her rib cage, staring up at a brilliant, ragged circle. Twenty feet. Her mouth went dry. She pursed her lips. Study the problem. That’s what Daddy always told her. Use all your resources.

“I’m going to get a rope, Mama. And some water and food.” She waited, but there was no answer. “I’ll be quick.” She sprang to her feet and pushed her way through the brush at the end of the deadfall. She stopped abruptly and wagged her finger. “You stay here, Ash. You stay with Mama, okay? Do what I tell you for once.”

She retrieved the turkey, not thinking of her hunger but only of what she was certain Mama would want her to do. The turkey had cost a bullet, and meat could never be wasted. At first she held the bird by the feet, but its head bounced on the ground, which seemed disrespectful, so she arranged its wings and tucked it under one arm, cradling its small, naked head, loose on its neck, in the palm of her hand.



By the time she returned, daylight was slipping away. She threw the backpack to the ground and knelt to unpack it. A blanket, a jacket, a nylon rope, a plastic jug of water, and two cloth bundles of jerky and the last of the hickory nuts. She fastened the rope to the handle of the water jug. Lying prone, she pushed the jug out in front of her and lowered it slowly.

“Water’s coming!” She played out the rope until it went slack in her hands. “You got that now, Mama?”

“Yes.” Her voice was throaty and seemed farther away than before.

The girl sat up and waited a few moments for Mama to untie the slipknot, then gathered the rope. “I’m throwing the food down.” She tossed a bundle into the hole.

She moved a short distance away to where she’d left the pack and spoke in a low voice. “I don’t think she can hold herself on a rope, Ash. Not with broken ribs.” The girl coiled the rope in a loop, tied a bowline, and did the same with the next length. She worked for several minutes more, fingers deft and sure. Holding it aloft, she turned it from side to side and pulled on the knots to set them. “You know what it is. It’s a harness. That’s what I’ve figured out. Mama needs a harness so I can help her climb out. If she could slip her legs into it, that would be best, but if she can’t manage that, then her arms will have to do.”

She secured the end of the rope to the trunk of a maple and returned to the edge of the hole.

“Mama? Did you drink some water?”

Mama grunted.

“I’m gonna throw down the rope. I made a harness for your legs.”

The silence from the hole was thick. The girl felt a shiver race down her arms. Since Daddy left, Mama hardly ever spoke, but this was a different species of silence.

“I can’t climb,” Mama said.

“I know you’re hurt, and I can’t just pull you out, but if you try climbing, I can take some of your weight. I can help you.”