Cruel World(82)

All at once the leader lunged down the embankment beside the road and closed on the hay bale.

Quinn shrunk down, aiming the rifle up, a split second from pulling the trigger.

The stilt slowed and stopped on the opposite side of the bale. The wind gusted, ripping across the field. The creature reached out and nudged the bale with one hand. It rocked slightly and settled. The stilt huffed once and then turned, letting out a loud grunt. The other nine turned their heads and looked at it before lumbering away down the road. The tallest remained where it was for an agonizing second and then followed the herd.

He waited until they meandered off the highway and then counted to one hundred before sliding from behind the hay bale. The road was deserted once again. The birds chirped, and the wind slid between dead brambles in the ditch. He returned his strewn belongings to his bag and stowed it in the backseat. With a roar, the Raptor started, and he sped down the highway doing over eighty. In an hour Newton, Pennsylvania, appeared before him.

The town was tiny and built into the side of a small mountain that rose above it in a tree-studded mound. A bald swath cut down its side, the center strung with massive power lines. The highway he drove on became Newton’s main street, stores numbering not more than five. A dozen houses were scattered beyond the business district, their fronts peeling paint and several open doors gaped like frozen screams. He cruised past the barren side streets and was out of the city limits in under a minute. The GPS informed him to turn right in half a mile. A dirt road appeared where the screen said it would, and he swung onto it, climbing in switchback curves through the budding trees. Every so often a driveway would branch off of the track even as it narrowed, the ditches closing in with each mile. Near the crest of the mountain, a mailbox appeared bearing a last name so familiar it took his breath away. Until then he’d been intent on the road, the destination his only focus. But now, now his hands trembled.

He turned onto the driveway, its path clear and well maintained. He searched the dirt for wheel tracks and saw nothing, but the rain could have washed those away.

One turn.

Two.

Three.

Then he saw it.

The cabin emerged in a clearing surrounded by birch trees. It was small but solid, composed of huge logs interlocked at each corner, reminding him immensely of Foster’s home on his father’s land. It was one level but had wide windows gracing its front, and a steep drop fell away on its opposite side that revealed the north face of the mountain. He pulled to a stop before a low lean-to that was blaringly empty, ricks of firewood stacked against its side.

The yard was silent when he stepped out, cradling the rifle in one arm. He watched the front door of the cabin, but it didn’t ease open and no faces appeared in the windows. Quinn approached the house, the magnificent view of the mountainside trying to steal his attention, but he continued to the covered doorway. He knocked once, hard.

“Foster? Mallory? It’s Quinn.”

Nothing. No answer.

He tried the knob, but it remained solid as his hand turned around it. Quinn lifted his leg and aimed a kick at the door. Wood splintered but the lock held. One more blast from his foot and it flew inward, rebounding away from the interior wall. He moved inside to a narrow living room. The walls were adorned with pictures of mountains: McKinley, The Matterhorn, Everest. Beside each of them were smaller photos of a much younger Foster amidst groups of people, everyone adorned in climbing gear. He was smiling, his arms around others’ shoulders.

Beyond the living room was a kitchen, everything in its place. In the rear of the cabin was a bedroom, bed neatly made, attached bathroom spotless, and a covered porch looking out over the vista dropping steeply away. Quinn stood beside an Adirondack chair and then sat in it, leaning his rifle against the nearby wall.

They weren’t here. Had never been.

The hope that had been unconsciously building inside him crumbled, demolished by the silence and crushing knowledge that everyone he had ever known was dead.

Their faces came to him and went. They were ghosts now, nothing more. Tears clouded his eyes. Before they could fall, he rose from the chair, picking a small coffee table up as he moved, and whipped it through one of the porch windows.

The glass shattered, and the table soared out of sight, its passage echoing through the trees. He stood there, chest heaving, muscles thrumming power lines, and all the while Alice’s words repeated in his mind.

That’s what separates you and I.

~

He spent the night in the cabin, the air cool from the broken window. As the sun set, the valley below came alive with croaks and bellows, the cries deep and reverberating, but far away. Quinn fell asleep on the floor of Foster’s bedroom with the moon gazing in through the single window.