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I remember the heron Jud shot yesterday. I don’t know why he killed it, but I remember him muttering something about that type of bird not belonging here. This bird reminds me of that one. I don’t think it’s a heron—not that I’m a bird expert or anything, but it seems like a coastal type of bird with its white feathers tipped with gray and its beady eyes rimmed with the same pink on its beak. I’ve never seen a bird like this in Idaho. The closest thing would be a seagull when my family would vacation at the lake, but this thing is four times the size of a seagull. It has to weigh twenty pounds. And seagulls don’t have long necks.
In a quiet voice, like I don’t want the bird above to hear, I tell Doc about the heron and Jud’s reaction to it.
Our kissing is forgotten as Doc rushes me back to the kitchen. He leaves me there with our full basket and disappears into Jud’s office. Shrugging off the strange encounter with the bird, I start slicing tomatoes at Shep’s instruction.
After breakfast, Jud tells me to help Shep in the kitchen again. I’m happy to take his direction, because Shep seems to have more work to do than any of the others. He keeps me busy with canning the season’s last tomatoes and flash freezing fresh greens from the garden. It’s well into the afternoon when I start to think about who I’ll spend the night with.
I’m hungry for more of what I know Doc can give me, and I miss Grim with an ache in my middle after seeing him only briefly at breakfast. I long to snuggle up to Shep again and maybe explore him the way I’ve gotten to explore Jud and Doc. Speaking of Jud, I even reluctantly acknowledge an urge to seek him out and ask to play with what’s mine. But I can’t spend the night with any of the men I’m becoming familiar with. No. Tonight, I have to choose a stranger. Either Rev, Scrap, or Brawn.
Rev of the crazy eyes, Scrap the flirt, or Brawn the sullen giant.
How am I supposed to choose? They all make me slightly uncomfortable. Rev has an intensity about him that sets my teeth on edge. Plus, at fifty-two, he’s the oldest one here, older, even, than my father. Scrap, though he’s the smallest of the men here at an even six feet, has this larger-than-life way of dominating the discussions at mealtimes with his irreverent and often crass humor. But I can’t help thinking his outgoing nature is an act. Once, when he wasn’t aware I was watching him, I noticed his hazel gaze turn inward with a haunted look. The only other person who seemed to pick up on it was Rev, who squeezed Scrap’s shoulder and whispered something in the younger man’s ear before stalking away on his long, lean legs. Then there’s Brawn, the strong man of the group, who takes up a whole sofa with his impressive breadth and glowers from beneath the bill of his faded ballcap. I try not to take it personally that he barely acknowledges me, since he barely acknowledges anybody, but the thought of spending time alone with him is intimidating. He’s the only one here I’ve never seen smile.
They’re all interesting to me in that way I’m beginning to understand as attraction, but they’re also all a little frightening. Maybe I’m just frightened by them because I haven’t spent any time with them, like I have with the others.
I’m wiping down counters to get ready for dinner prep when Shep tells me I can be done for the day.
“You’ve worked hard, today,” he says with a hand on my back. He nudges me toward the common room. “Go relax until dinner, ya?”
“I don’t mind helping.”
“I like when you help,” he says with a smile. “But I also know you’re still healing. Go. Rest. Or Jud will skin me alive for working you too hard.”
He honest-to-goodness pats my bottom as he angles me into the common room, and I find myself relishing the warm handprint that remains even after he’s dismissed me.
I wish I didn’t have to wait a whole week to spend time alone with him again.
I decide to relax by exploring the storage cabins situated along paths that spider-web out from the lodge. The small buildings that housed campers when Eagle Peak used to be a youth camp are now packed floor-to-ceiling with all kinds of supplies. One whole path of cabins is filled with furniture and home goods. A pair of cabins lying far out from the lodge holds racks and racks of clothing in all sizes and for all weather. One cabin close to the lodge is home to supplies you’d find in a grocery store, like batteries, lightbulbs, power cords, toilet paper, paper towels, and cleaners. Another cabin is home to every type of tool and bit of hardware you can imagine. One cabin is for home electronics, like boxed televisions, clock radios, blenders, and irons. The last cabin I explore is filled with canned goods and bags of rice and flour and other baking stuff. It must be the overflow for Shep’s pantry.
Apparently, these cabins represent just a fraction of what the men here have collected on their scavenges. Warehouses in Bozeman, the closest big town to Eagle Peak, hold vast collections of supplies for distribution when some kind of economy re-emerges. From what I’ve overheard, they even have secured lots filled with vehicles of all sizes and types that are gassed up and ready to be sold or traded to the highest bidder. Whole buildings in town are filled with generators and tanks of propane.
If anyone wants to get their hands on vital supplies anywhere around Yellowstone, they better be willing to barter for them, because Jud and the guys have every conceivable market cornered for miles around.
After checking out each cabin, I go back to the one filled with clothing. I take my time searching for winter-appropriate gear for myself, since the weather is turning colder. Fingering a sweater with snowflakes on it, I make it a point to add yarn and knitting needles to the next scavenge list. Oh, and a book on knitting, so I can remind myself how to do it. I learned years ago and want to pick it up again. Without Netflix or YouTube to entertain me, knitting seems like the next best way to relax. And bonus: I can hopefully get good enough at it to make things the guys can actually use, like socks and sweaters and stuff. Clothing isn’t hard to find with so few people left alive, but the men here are all huge. I can’t imagine there are many big-and-tall stores in the area.
I smile to myself as I imagine Brawn wearing a hand-knit fisherman-style sweater and Jud wearing a thermal-type hat and scarf set. Shep definitely needs a Norwegian-looking hat with ear flaps. And Rev? I can see him wearing a cardigan on a cold night while reading by the fire. Oh, yes. I plan to clothe these men and have fun doing it.
But, at the moment, no one is in more desperate need of clothing than me. Most of what I find in the cabins are Carhart pants and jeans, flannel shirts, camouflage vests, warm socks, and undershirts. Lots of undershirts. Footwear is limited to work boots, rain boots, cowboy boots, and waders, all in sizes appropriate for a basketball team. It looks like the men have cleaned out entire racks from hunting and fishing stores. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be a lot in my size, even on the shelf labelled,Kid Stuff.
I’m not surprised. Doc looked through all this stuff for me when I first arrived and came away with the denim shorts, hoodie, and Converse All-Stars I’m wearing now and apologized he couldn’t find more to fit me. But he promised he’d go on the next scavenge himself and find me plenty of things to wear.
I’m just happy to beallowedto wear clothes again. For a while, there, having anything covering my chilled skin was a luxury. I shudder as painful memories try to suck me back to that black place where I don’t have to feel.
It’s okay to feel, now. I’m safe. No one here is going to hurt me. Try my patience, yes. Annoy me, yes. Boss me around, yes. But not hurt. This much, I’m beginning to trust.
I manage to come away from the cabin with a pair of black big-kid jeans, a red hoodie with a Nike symbol on the front, and a six-pack of white socks. For underwear, I settle for a package of men’s boxers in sizeSmall.
I’m putting my finds in the dresser in my bedroom when I realize I could use this free time to learn more about Rev, Scrap, and Brawn. What better way to decide whom to invite into my bed tonight?
I start with Scrap, because he’s the only one who has a set location where he works: the shop, formerly the camp gymnasium. I follow the path through the forest until the huge building comes into sight. With a smile, I look up at the zip line, where Doc let me taste the wind my second day here. That was a fun day—the best day of my last two years, by a lot.
I can just glimpse the roof of the shop through the trees when I see Rev stalking toward me on the path. He’s coming from the shop, and he looks surprised to see me.
“Well, if it isn’t our heart,” he says, eyes intent on me. “Heard you had a run-in with a pelican this morning.”
“That’s what it was, huh?” I’d never seen a pelican in real life before and hadn’t been sure what species it was. “Yeah, saw it while I was in the garden.” I smile and keep walking, not wanting to prolong the interaction with Rev since those eyes of his always make me feel too exposed.
He catches me with a hand around my bicep. His touch is gentle but commanding.
