The Pages of Her Life Page 11

  “Maybe.”

  The man lifted the shotgun a few inches. “Maybe?”

  The fire shot to the surface.

  “Yeah. Maybe. You didn’t hear me, huh? What’s your problem? You deaf?”

  The tiniest hint of a smile played at the corner of his mouth. She narrowed her eyes and lowered her hands and stepped toward him.

  “I know you’re not blind, so you must be deaf. Huh, old man! Are you?”

  Allison took another step toward him. “You want to shoot me? Go ahead, tough guy.”

  The man’s smile burst into a grin and he pulled back the shotgun, then dropped it to his side. “Same eyes, you and him.”

  Allison glared at the man.

  “Who’s older?”

  “I am.” The familiar voice floated up from behind her. Allison whipped her head around. Parker!

  Her brother stood ten feet away. Hands on hips. A bandanna around his head. Green pants. Flannel shirt. Work boots. He stepped toward the man in the cap and raised his voice a notch.

  “You don’t put that shotgun behind your back in less than a second, I’m going to take it outta your hands and knock you to the ground and then hit you again to make sure you’re out cold.”

  The man grinned at Parker and slowly put the gun behind his back. “Hey, Parker.”

  “Nathan.” Parker nodded.

  Nathan jabbed toward Allison with a calloused finger. “Says she knows you. That she’s your sister.”

  “That’s what she says, huh?” Parker eased forward slowly.

  Allison studied him. Couldn’t tell if his eyes were playful or ticked off.

  “What are you doing here, Allison?”

  “Nice to see you too.”

  “Congrats on not getting shot before I got here.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You must not have tried anything stupid.”

  “Must not have.” She glared at Nathan, whose smile threatened to break out into laughter.

  “Not many people make Nathan smile,” Parker said. “How’d you win him over?”

  “The only way it’s done,” Nathan said. “Show a little backbone.”

  Parker smiled as if recalling a number of similar scenes involving himself, then turned to Allison. “He likes people who assert themselves.”

  Nathan hacked out a laugh. “Was just having fun.”

  Parker nodded and focused on Nathan. “Thanks for looking out for me, but you do that again to Allison, you’ll be eating dinner through a straw for a long time.”

  “Understood.”

  Seconds later Nathan vanished, and Allison and Parker stood alone together for the first time in ages. They stared at each other. She brimmed with so much she wanted to say, but had no clue where to begin. He finally grabbed her for a long hug. She buried her head on his shoulder.

  “It’s good to see you, Al.”

  “You too.”

  After they pulled apart, Parker asked, “You hungry?”

  “Famished. It took me longer to get here than I thought it would.”

  He gave a thin smile that hinted at the way he used to be before Joel died. “It feels longer the first time you hike it.”

  “It gets shorter the more you do it?”

  “Yes. Absolutely it does,” Parker said.

  “You want to explain that?”

  He turned and tramped down the narrow, rock-strewn trail, his legs chewing up the path fast enough that Allison had to jog for a few paces to catch up. Parker glanced at her as she pulled alongside.

  “It’s the way our minds work. It will feel like a shorter hike on the way out. Simply the way our synapses process data.”

  Allison waited for him to elaborate, but Parker didn’t say any more. No doubt he could have given her a detailed explanation. He graduated from the University of Washington with a degree in engineering even though he’d never used it. If Parker said that’s the way the mind worked, she believed him.

  They walked the rest of the way to Parker’s camp in silence, though she guessed he had as much to say as she did. Couldn’t have that much conversation with Nathan or the others who might live out here.

  In under five minutes they came to an oval clearing, a little more than an acre. A half ring of trees stood to the north. To the west a slice of the mountains poked above a line of clouds. In the middle of the clearing was a small log cabin made from what looked like aspen trees. Two large windows flanked the front door. On the side Allison saw another window. Smoke curled up from a chimney in the back corner of the roof.

  “You built this?”

  “Most of it, yeah. I had help.”

  “Nathan and friends?”

  “No. I sold my company. Didn’t clear much, but enough to hire a company out of Mazama. And it doesn’t take a lot to live out here. So I’m getting by fine.”

  He led her inside. It wasn’t more than twenty by twenty. But for one person it was plenty. Two thick, dark brown rugs covered the wood plank floor. Parker’s kitchen was in one corner, his bed and a simple dresser opposite. A woodstove sat on the same side of the cabin as the kitchen. Two bookshelves stood on either side of the front door.

  “You want to stay in here and talk while I cook us dinner, or would you rather walk around the property while you still have a little light left?”

  He wasn’t asking. He was telling.

  “I think I’ll do some exploring.”

  “Sounds good.”

  She slipped outside and walked through the meadow to the hay bales. She studied the hay at the height of a man’s chest and knew immediately what they were there for. Target practice. After all these years, it had never left him. The need to please their dad. A burning passion. No, not passion, more like a soul-sucking obsession.

  She’d tried to talk to him about it after their father died. But Parker had closed it off, bottled it up inside. The cork needed to come out. Maybe that’s why God had sent her out here. To find the hay bales peppered with bullets, to have her ask what he was doing. Maybe.

  After another fifteen minutes she wandered back to the cabin, stepped inside, and studied her brother. He’d lost weight. Looked strong. Lean. His hair was longer—not a shock that he hadn’t cut it. He probably didn’t care how he looked. Allison strolled over to the stove.

  “Why Mazama, Parker?”

  “I like it here.” He stirred the potatoes and didn’t look up.

  “Why?”

  “Lots of reasons.”

  “Like?”

  “It’s only twenty-eight miles from the Canadian border.” One corner of his mouth turned up. “I could get across on my quad in a few hours if I needed to.”

  “What’re you doing that might make you need to get across the border?”

  “I’m just saying.” A soft smile.

  “That’s why you came here? Get across quick when you pull off the perfect crime?”

  “It’s an interesting area. Mazama was the launching point for the mining towns in the Harts Pass area. For a long time it’s been little more than a crossroads, but it’s growing. People are putting it on their maps for vacations. Getaways. You think you’re in the middle of nowhere, and in one sense, you are. But in another, you’re in a hidden paradise. A lot of summer weddings here. It’s home to one of the world’s longest cross-country skiing trails, plus heli-skiing and mountaineering. Plenty of rock climbers wind their way up Goat Peak. A few high-end lodges too. But it’s largely unknown, even to people who live in the state.”

  “You’re not going to tell me why you came here.”

  “You know why.”

  “To practice. To become the son you thought you never were. To go on your crazy adventures where you try to kill yourself using the stupidest extreme sports ever created.”

  “Good. We got that over with. Now can we get on to other things?”

  “Dad loved you.”

  “I’m not saying he didn’t.” Parker scowled. “Just loved Joel a thousand tons more. Then he went and got him
self killed in the line of duty, which made him even more of a god in Dad’s mind.”

  “You have to let it go.”

  “Oh really? Like you have?”

  “Yes, like I have.”

  “Have you? Or have you just buried it better than I have?”

  He was right. She hadn’t let it go, just pushed it deep down where she could ignore it most of the time, but not so deep down she couldn’t feel the ache. Like on late spring days like this one. They never failed to remind her of what it had been like at track meets growing up.

  A championship meet from her freshman year of high school flashed into her mind. Parker was a sophomore, Joel a senior. All three were on the team. Allison ran long distance. Parker did the shot put and discus. And Joel sprinted. The 100, the 200, and the 4x100 relay.

  Their mom and dad sat in the stands, ready to see how their sons and daughter would fare in the district championships. Allison came in fourth, the first time a freshman had placed in the top five in the history of the school. Parker? He took second against a slew of acclaimed juniors and seniors.

  But of course Joel blew everyone away. First place in the 100. First in the 200. And the only reason his team didn’t win the 400 was that he had too much time to make up running the anchor leg of the relay. He nearly did that too. Five-tenths of a second short.

  After the meet, as the three of them meandered out of the stadium and searched for their parents, Joel said, “Both of you, outstanding performance. Well done.”

  They thanked him and a minute later found their parents. Both of them beamed. Their dad strode up and looked at Allison first.

  “Hey, Al, that was a good run. Nice.” He patted her on the back, then focused on Parker.

  “You too, Parker. Good job.” Their dad flashed her brother a thumbs-up.

  Then he turned to Joel. “Come here, kid.”

  Joel stepped forward, and their father grabbed Joel in a huge bear hug. “You’re not a kid. You’re a man. And today out there on the track, you ran like a man. Ran like a Spartan. Ran like a god!”

  “Thanks, Dad.” Joel grinned. “Parker and Al were pretty amazing too.”

  “Sure,” he said, never taking his eyes off Joel. “What are we going to have to do with you? Bronze you? The 100 and the 200, those are the glory races. The ones people love. And you crushed them.”

  He threw his arm around Joel’s shoulder and strode off, the two of them silhouetted against the darkening sky.

  Their mom said, “You two were terrific. What wonderful performances! I’m so proud of you.”

  And of course they thanked her and smiled, and Allison tried to ignore the ache inside for her dad to speak the same kind of words to her that he’d said to Joel.

  A similar scene played out again and again throughout their childhoods. She and Parker always did “fine.” Their dad often said, “Good job.” But they were never a god or a goddess in their dad’s eyes.

  “Let’s not do this,” Allison said as she pulled herself from the memory.

  “That’s what I was saying. Let’s be done with it.”

  Allison sighed, and they ate in silence for the next few minutes. Parker filled her water glass and said, “Lots for you to do here if you’re staying for a few days.”

  “I’m staying tomorrow. But I’ll head back on Monday. I have to work on Tuesday.”

  “I was hoping you were here to hang out for a while.”

  “I’m here because I need your help with something weird that’s going on.”

  “Not because you wanted to see me.”

  “I do.” She grabbed his forearm and squeezed. “You’ve been gone too long.”

  “It works for me out here.”

  “It doesn’t work for me.” Allison took his hand. “I miss you.”

  “I know, Al. I know.”

  They lapsed once more into silence and finished their meal before either spoke again. Parker got up and loaded the woodstove with another three logs. “Probably don’t need the heat, but I like it.”

  “Me too. It feels good.” Allison cleared the plates to the kitchen counter. “Are you the only one that lives like this out here?”

  Parker grinned. “Are you kidding? Lots of us.”

  “Like your pal Nathan?”

  “Yep.”

  She started scrubbing the plates, glasses, and silverware, but out of the corner of her eye she could see Parker staring at her.

  “What?”

  “Nathan had the shotgun pointed at your chest.”

  “What about it?”

  “Why aren’t you like that with other people?”

  “Like what?” Allison kept her head down, dropped it a few inches closer to the sink.

  “You stood up to him.” Parker pushed his hip into the counter and leaned over till she glanced at him. “Called his bluff. Backed him down. Whatever you want to call it. Why did you stand up to him? Why aren’t you like that around everyone?”

  “Because most people don’t scare me like he did.”

  “That’s my point. Most people would cower if a lunatic backwoodsman pointed a shotgun in their face. They’d start begging. Or panic. Not you.”

  “Whatever.”

  “No, not whatever.” Parker took her shoulders and turned her toward him. “Tell me. Why don’t you do that with other people?”

  “You mean like you do? Picking fights with people all the time?”

  “They’re not fights. They’re heated discussions. Fights mean fists. I’ve gotten much better at not doing that,” Parker said. “Back to you. Why don’t you do what you did with Nathan with other people?”

  “I do that with other people.”

  “No, you don’t. Not like you should. Around people you know really well, sure, you take a stand, but everyone else? Nah, not so much.”

  “So you were there watching me with Nathan longer than I thought.”

  “I was there for a few seconds before I spoke, yeah.”

  “Why?”

  “Because something told me to watch you for a few. So I did. And I liked what I saw. I think you liked what you saw inside yourself. And I think you like that it didn’t stay inside.”

  Allison pulled away and went back to the dishes.

  “You need to talk about this.”

  “Yes, I probably do.” Allison wiped her hands on the checkered terry-cloth towel that hung next to the sink. “And you need to talk about why you’ve done a vanishing act. I want to know why you left. I want to know—”

  “You know why I left!” Parker slammed his hand down on the counter.

  “Then let’s talk about it.” She stepped toward him and narrowed her eyes.

  “Fine. You talk about why you can’t stand up to most people, and I’ll talk about what I’m doing in the middle of the middle of nowhere.”

  Allison nodded. “Someday.”

  “Now.”

  “No.” She glared at him. “I said someday.”

  “Nice.” He grinned. “You just stood up for yourself again. Well done, sis.”

  “Thank you. If only I didn’t know you. Then you’d really be impressed.”

  After they finished cleaning up, they sat on either side of the woodstove listening to Van Morrison, an album Allison hadn’t heard in years, and for those moments she and Parker were back in their Bothell home growing up, sneaking out together during high school nights, pranking their friends, and getting into more trouble than their mom and dad could have imagined.

  When the album finished, Allison said, “That brought back some good memories.”

  “Yeah, indeed.”

  In the morning they had target practice together, then sat outside and talked about nothing and everything. Time had reversed itself and they were in their teen years again, being closer than most brothers and sisters ever were.

  “You still shoot well,” Parker said. “Do you still take your gun with you everywhere?”

  “I think Dad would come back from the dead if I stopped l
ugging my gun around.” She laughed. “Kind of drilled it into my head when he trained me. Plus, it’s a way to feel like he’s still here.”

  “Yeah, I get that.”

  “Or a way to make him proud of me.”

  “I get that too.”

  Again, a peaceful silence.

  “Do me a favor, Parker.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Think about coming over. Seeing Mom for a few days. She misses you.”

  He stared at her for a long time before saying, “Okay, Al. I’ll think about it.”

  Over a late breakfast on the cabin’s small porch, she said, “I want to talk to you about that weird thing I mentioned last night. Something you might be able to help me out with.”

  “Right!” Parker popped his forehead with the heel of his hand. “I spaced. Talk to me.”

  Allison went inside the cabin to the small sofa she’d slept on—she refused to let Parker give her his bed, even though he’d pushed her—and grabbed her backpack. When she returned to the porch out front, she pulled out the journal and handed it to him.

  “Wow,” he said after studying it. “Nice work. Where’d you get this?”

  “That’s a story.”

  “Beautiful leather.” Parker ran his finger over the engraving of the tree. “That is crazy good work. Look at the detail.”

  “What can you tell me about it?”

  Parker studied it again, taking more time this go-through, and when he finished, asked, “Can I open it?”

  “Sure.”

  He looked at the first page. “Your name, but it doesn’t look like your handwriting.”

  “It’s not.”

  “Whose is it?”

  “That I would love to know.”

  Parker gave her a curious look, then turned back to the journal. As he studied it, Allison studied the trees and then the mountains in the distance. Sporadic clouds rested among the peaks. Beautiful. Peaceful. No wonder Parker loved it here.

  “I’m guessing you’re going to tell me you didn’t write the poem either.”

  “You guessed right.”

  “What’s the story, morning glory?”

  She smiled at his pet name for her. She loved getting up early and he loved sleeping in. As kids she couldn’t resist waking him up at sunrise to go off on adventures together. He said he hated her for it, but she knew deep down he’d always loved it.