“The artist.”
“Yeah.”
“Okay.”
I looked at him. “That's it?”
“No.” He scratched Biscuit's ear and took another pull. “What else?”
“There's a thing in Maine. Starts in September and goes for six months.”
“Is she taking it?”
“I don't know.”
“You didn’t ask?”
“No.”
Bison nodded slowly, like he was working through something in his head he didn't need to say out loud yet. “When'd you pull back?”
I didn't answer.
“Berg.”
“Two weeks ago.”
“And you've been not talking about it since.”
It wasn't a question, so I didn't treat it like one.
Bison leaned back in the chair and looked out at the ridge. “You're doing the thing.”
“What thing?”
“The thing you always do. You pulled back and you've been letting the distance get bigger every day since.” He turned his head and looked at me dead-on. “You're going to let it get so big she’ll walk out and you’ll spend the next forty years telling yourself she chose to leave.”
I didn't say anything, but my hand tightened around the bottle.
“Mama Mae's been asking about you every Sunday,” Bison said. “I'm running out of ways to say you’re still hiding out on a mountain.”
“What does she say?”
He thought about it. “Tell Berg his bones know what to do. He's just refusing to listen to them.”
“Tell her I'm fine.”
“I do. She didn't buy it when you were fourteen, and she doesn't buy it now.”
I looked at the valley. The light was golden now, the kind that made everything look like it was already a memory.
“There's a thing tonight,” I said, after a while. “An art unveiling at the lodge. Soleil is showing the book she's been working on.”
“Are you going?”
“No.”
“Berg.”
