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Six bullets.
FINALLY IT’S TIME to go back around the lake.
I have to get the crate. The hatchet is there, too. The shovel, my clothes. I know I won’t be able to carry them all by myself, and I don’t want to waste energy tramping around again and again.
I find a grease pencil in one of the drawers, and write on the cabin wall.
TAKE ITSLOW, I write. And under it, SMART, NOT STRONG.
One trip. One trip for everything.
I sit down with the paper where I wrote my list, and I sketch. When I’m satisfied, I get to work.
I find two wooden poles in the tool shed—they look like the handles to brooms or some other tools. I find new rope, too. With the rope and the belt I make a harness for Bo. The belt will buckle around his big barrel chest if I punch a new hole for it. I use the strap for the rifle to make a collar, and attach it to the belt with the rope. Then I make loops so I can secure the poles to the harness.
I fit a crossbar across the bottom of the poles, and then build up a kind of shelf with sticks. Now it’s a litter that I can strap things down to, and Bo can drag it. If I can convince him. Given the things he’ll do for food, and given how hungry he is, I think we’ll manage.
I train him with it empty for a good while, getting him used to the way it tugs on his shoulders. Then I load it up with random stuff from the cabin so he can get used to that. He’s not happy about it, but since I toss bits of fish at him every few feet, he goes along with it.
It’s only when I go to take it off that I realize how difficult it is—I practically have to disassemble the whole thing to get it off him. No good if I have to get it off in a hurry.
More rope, then, threaded up through the loops that secured the poles to the harness, held at the top with the carabiner. If I undo the carabiner, the rope slithers free, the poles drop off, and Bo is left with just the harness. I can get him free quickly if he gets stuck, if we have to run.
I take a long moment to look at what I’ve made. It’s ungainly, ugly. But out here, good enough is fantastic.
And now it’s time to go.
THE WALK SEEMS to take longer this time. Maybe because I’m actually conscious, instead of plodding along like a zombie. Maybe because the litter slows Bo down, gets stuck now and again.
After days of rest, my leg feels as good as it has in a long time. My feet are still tender, but I’ve made better wraps for them, using the thick leather gloves from the shed as soles.
I feel like I could run a marathon, but I know it’s an illusion. Adrenaline, relief. Overconfidence. One of my many enemies out here, one of the small voices I have to ignore. Take it slow. I mutter it to myself on repeat as we go. People would probably cross the street to avoid me in the city, but here there’s only Bo to mind, and he already knows I’m crazy.
We go all the way to the rock, resting only once for a brief meal.
I step out into the clearing and halt. The rock stands as tall and unmoved as ever. It has stood here since it dropped from the belly of a glacier, and it will stand here long after I am dead and gone, but for a while it was home.
The remains of my shelter lie heaped beside it. Sooty. Rain-logged.
I gather what I can. So much is worthless. Still I clear it away, scattering it into the woods. No reason for Raph to come this far, but if he does I don’t want to give him any information about me. My only advantage is that he has no idea who I am or that I’m here. Once I lose that, things get trickier.
I bundle up my clothes, the jars that survived, the remains of the tarp. I load them on the litter and give the clearing one last look.
“Thank you,” I tell the rock, laying my hand on its damp flank. Funny the things you miss. Funny the things that keep you alive. I whistle to Bo.
Back to the cabin, then. Bo is getting anxious, so when we break free of the trees I unclip the carabiner, let him run. He rockets down the shore, churning up pebbles and dirt, tongue lolling. I laugh, shake my head.
And then I look past him. Look to the canoe, still floating in the water. Not thirty feet out now but fifteen. Tantalizingly close.
I look south. It’s a straight shot across the water. Hours less than plodding through the woods, along the shore, dodging roots and fallen logs.
I could swim out—if I went close—
No.
I sit on the shore, bad leg out in front of me, the other tucked up. Take it slow. Smart, not strong.
I’m not going to swim out. It’s colder today than it was when I went in, and I barely survived then. I don’t have a shelter to retreat to on this side of the lake. No swimming.
