Is it really possible, Gary? Can we bring back the dead?
He responded with soft laughter.Isn’t that why you’ve come?he asked.
And then, then she understood. She knew why she’d come, why she’d been led here. She felt his hand take hers. He was beside her now.
Shh, he whispered.Do you hear it?
She closed her eyes, heard the music play in some far-off part of her mind, an old jazz song they’d once danced to. She felt Gary’s lips brush her cheek. She and Gary moved together, doing a few awkward, shuffling dance steps in the snow.
We can be together again, he told her.We can bring Austin back.
The idea of it hit her like a cannonball in the chest, so heavy and unexpected that she lost her balance and fell over in the snow. She looked desperately around for Gary, but he was gone.
She lay on her back, looked up at the dark sky, the swirling snowthat fell down on her like a million falling stars. She let herself imagine it: having Gary and Austin back with her, even if it was only for seven days. The three of them snuggled together under the covers. “Did you dream while you were gone?” she’d ask Austin. “Oh yes, I dreamed,” he would say. “It was all one big dream.”
“All right back there?” Candace called.
“Fine!” she said, struggling to get up again, but it was absurdly difficult with the huge snowshoes hitting her legs and refusing to let her right herself. Ruthie turned around, came back, and offered her mittened hand to help pull Katherine up.
“Thanks,” Katherine said, slapping the snow off her jeans. It was no good—they were soaked through.
“The snowshoes take a little getting used to,” Ruthie said.
“I don’t think I’ll be running a marathon in them anytime soon,” Katherine said. Ruthie gave her a tense smile, then moved back beside her sister. She leaned in and whispered something to Fawn. Fawn shook her head and pulled her doll tighter against her chest.
They moved through the grove of bent and twisted trees, and the climb got steeper, the trees larger, more looming. She had the directions. They were going to the portal. She had a candle, Gary’s camera. All she needed was…
“Jesus!” Candace yelped up ahead. There, just off the path, her headlamp illuminated a gruesome sight. A fox had just captured a snowshoe hare, and had the hare by its throat. The animal struggled for a few short seconds before going still and limp in the fox’s mouth.
Candace pulled out her gun, pointed it at the fox.
“Don’t!” Katherine shouted. The animal was beautiful—the way its rusty fur shimmered and glistened, its eyes seeming to look right at her, to say,We know each other, you and I. We understand hunger, desperation.
The gun went off, and Katherine jumped. Startled, the fox dropped the rabbit and hurried off into the trees—Candace had missed. The fox ran with such grace, such quick sureness, that it took Katherine’s breath away. And she was sure that, just for one brief second, it turned its sleek head back and looked at her.
See what I left you.
It all felt so impossibly meant to be.
“Can we save the bunny?” Fawn asked, going over to the small white animal, which lay unmoving in the snow.
“No,” Ruthie told her. “It’s past saving. Don’t touch it, okay?”
“Come on, I think we’re about halfway there,” Candace said, tucking the gun away, turning her headlamp back to the path before them. If they looked carefully, they could make out the barely discernible impressions of tracks from Candace’s trip down the hill, hours ago. The hillside was much steeper now, and the walk was more of a climb. Katherine thought of photos she’d seen of climbers on Mount Everest, all strung together with rope so that they would not lose one another, so that no one would fall and be left behind. They began to trudge on, Candace picking up the pace, the girls struggling to keep up. But Katherine slowed down, stopping at the place where the fox had been. Fortunately, there was no rope binding her to the others, and they did not seem to notice she was no longer right behind them. She bent down, took off her glove, and touched the white snowshoe hare. It was still warm, its fur soft.
Quickly she scooped the rabbit up, surprised by how very light it was. Then she slid Gary’s backpack off her shoulders, carefully laid the animal inside, and zipped it up tight.
She ran to catch up with the others, heart pounding, ears buzzing.
The rabbit was small. It couldn’t be too hard, she imagined, to feel for its ribs, open it up, and remove its heart.
Ruthie
“It’s got to be here somewhere,” Candace said as she scrabbled around at the base of the Devil’s Hand.
“I can’t believe how big the rocks are,” Katherine said, looking up at them. “The tallest one’s got to be twenty feet at least. They don’t look that big in the pictures.”
“The Devil must be a giant,” Fawn said, clinging tight to Mimi. Mimi was still swaddled in the blanket that held the gun.
