“Fuck that,” said Tom. “It’s too cold and too dark.” He turned his back on Blaze and faced the wall. “Turn off my flashlight, will you?”
Blaze clicked Tom’s flashlight off and placed it on its side. Then he rifled through his gear till he found the toothbrush, brand new, and a cute little tube of toothpaste.
“I’ll be back,” he said, then grabbed his flashlight and trudged off into the darkness.
Which right away felt like a mistake, because without a bonfire, without Gabe, even, his puny little flashlight barely showed him the way. All around him, the darkness felt alive, with the wind in the trees, and the smell of woodsmoke weaving among the pine tree trunks. Somewhere, insects were making a small racket, and was that an owl hooting?
Doing his best to focus, he thought that the facilities were a straight shot from tent #4 through the trees. Or it should have been, but he bumbled around a little bit and ended up in the clearing that was the parking lot.
At least, at that point, he knew he needed to go left, so he did, only to hear a sharp branch breaking behind him, and when he turned, it was Gabe, carrying a huge flashlight, and dressed in a thick flannel bathrobe.
“Are you barefoot?” asked Blaze, coming to a stop, completely forgetting to put a smile in his voice, to be disarming because, frankly, he was simply too tired and on the verge of freaking out. “Is that a bathrobe? Aren’t you freezing?”
“Did you get lost?” asked Gabe, coming up beside him. “And no, I’m not barefoot, I’m wearing flip flops, and yes, it’s a bathrobe. I hate taking a shower and getting dressed back in the day’s clothes. Where are you headed?”
Blaze debated whether to tell the truth or not about the fact that he was lost.
“I’m going to brush my teeth,” he said, instead of anything else.
“We can go together.”
They walked through the dark woods, and Blaze paid attention extra hard as to where they were, and about how many steps it took to get to the facilities. Then, as Gabe disappeared into the shower area, Blaze went to the row of porcelain sinks in structure with the fancy outhouses and brushed his teeth, wincing as the toothpaste stung the cut on his lower lip.
Leaning close to the mirror, better arranged and better lit than any in any bathroom that convicts used, he ran his tongue along the cut, then, with his free hand, gently touched the bruise along his eye, his temple.
His ribs on one side, his right side, ached, but that awareness had faded in and out during the transfer, during the excitement of being in a new place.
Giving himself a good shrug, he finished brushing his teeth, slowly, listening to the sounds coming from the shower area. How Gabe seemed to be humming under his breath. The clunk-clunk sounds as he arranged his toiletries in the little dressing area of his shower stall.
Noises were crisp in the cool air and seemed to float over the top wood railing to land in Blaze’s ears. Of course, every man showered, didn’t they. And Blaze was used to showering with up to ten other guys, all naked, with various levels of hardness of dick and the lack of compunction to keep them from staring at another man’s junk.
Somehow, though, with Gabe hidden beyond the wall, the sounds he made came to Blaze, secret and intimate. Blaze had to shake his head to keep the ridiculous, exhaustion-inspired thoughts at bay.
He finished at the sink, quickly peed, washed his hands, and then tiptoed out of the facilities and slunk through the darkness back to his tent, not wanting Gabe to think he had to escort Blaze everywhere he went.
When he got there, Tom was fast asleep in the darkness beyond Blaze’s small circle of flashlight, snoring slightly. There was a rustle in the woods, and Blaze stepped out, his heart hammering, thinking it was either a wild animal or it was Gabe. Either way, he was unprepared to battle or do small talk. After a moment, the woods seemed to settle down except for the ever-present breeze across the top of the pine trees.
Standing on the edge of the little wooden platform, he clicked off his flashlight and gripped it in his hand. And looked up at the arc of stars, silver and more silver, so bright and brilliant they were almost a solid mass against the blackness of the sky.
Was he looking at the Milky Way? It was hard to tell, since he’d never really seen it before, until, that is, he’d been sitting in front of the bonfire with Gabe and the others. All the events and carnivals he and his family had traveled to had been in the city or in well-lit Wal-Mart parking lots and stars had been faded to nothing against that.
The stars were beautiful now, though, even if the night was very cold.
Blaze stepped back into the tent, propped his flashlight sideways and stripped out of his clothes, shivering as he put a sweatshirt on over his t-shirt. He pulled down the end canvas and zipped it shut, then, for good measure, zipped the screen shut, too, cause who knew what bugs would be at them in the morning.
He barely remembered crawling into his cot, but he felt wide awake the second he opened his eyes. The tent felt warm and seemed to glow with sunlight. Tom was already up and dressed, and was unzipping the screen, and rolling back one flap of the tent.
Chapter7
Gabe
When Gabe finished with his shower, the day’s clothes beneath his arm, his flannel robe warm around him, he stepped out of the shower, telling himself he wasn’t looking for Blaze. Except he was. After sweeping his flashlight around the darkness to be sure Blaze wasn’t waiting for help getting back to his tent, Gabe made his way to his own tent in the dark, silent and still beneath the starlit sky.
Turning on the overhead light, he pulled out his Coleman lantern, pumped air into the chamber, and lit the mantle. When the light was glowing and bright, a comforting little hiss in the background, he turned off the overhead light, and pulled out the file folders and laid them on the cot next to him, in a row. He figured now that he’d made his own impressions of the parolees, it was time to read the files to see what the prison system had to say about each man on his team.
Kurt had been arrested for stealing hubcaps and for using local 7-11s in Cheyenne as his own personal pantry. It had not been the first time he’d been caught, but it had been the first time he’d been arrested. Evidently Kurt’d had an attitude problem in jail, but that mostly amounted to him being mouthy with the guards and complaining a lot.
Tom had stolen diapers and baby supplies for his newly pregnant girlfriend, who, as Gabe read, was currently on her own with a six-month-old baby. This got to him because he could understand the theft of baby supplies in a case like that, though he hoped someone in the prison system had talked some sense into Tom about getting supplies a different way in the future. He also read that Tom had no visitors during his short time in prison, and that his sentence had been cut back for good behavior.
