She remembered to bring toilet paper. She digs a pit for thembeneath a stand of briar and fills it in after. After she’s disinfected Oliver’s hands and given him water and another Powerbar. They eat as they walk. The moon turns their walking shadows into spindly giants.
‘You still not talking to me?’ They are climbing again and their breath shows white on the air. Oliver shakes his head, but maybe he’s just breathless. Anyway, he will forgive her in the end. He must. They only have each other.
When Riley looks upwards she sees it sharply like a shock: the sleek form moving dark against the night. The mountain lion slinks along the ridge, keeping pace with them as they make their slow way along the trail. A single small pebble clatters from the heights above onto the path ahead, echoing through the canyon. Riley’s insides are liquid now; she can almost see it, gold eyes glassy in the moonlight, coat slivered, barred with light and dark. Jaws licked by a long tongue. She catches that distinct scent of dried grass and bitterness. She caught it occasionally on hikes with Mom, back in the day – the trace of savagery on the air.
She swallows and it makes a clicking sound. ‘Oliver. Stay close to me.’ He mumbles something defiant but she grabs his arm hard and drags him in close. She takes the gun out slowly, trains it on the ridge. The skyline is bare. Nothing stirs.
‘We have to hurry,’ she says. She hopes she’s right – that they’re near the old trapper cabin in the directions.
Cousin whispers in her ear,‘You nitwit. You’re both going to die in blood and jaws and bone and—’
Shut up.
‘Riley?’
‘It’s ok, Oliver Olive, talking to myself.’
Walk, don’t run.She read that somewhere: running triggers the predator instinct. She pulls Oliver behind her at a brisk walk. She can feel the lion out there, she and the lion are focused on each other so tight that they seem to blaze like beacons in the night.
‘Riley, don’t go so fast,’ Oliver says. ‘My legs hurt.’
‘Keep up.’
‘Riley …’
‘One foot in front of the other,’ Riley tells him. ‘Breathe slow.’
Something gleams ahead on the trail. Riley thinks,eyes? But it’s moonlight on glass. The trapper’s cabin comes into view around the bend, night sky gleaming in the windows.
Something stirs in the boulders above, a squat shape detaches from the rocks. It moves with a tiny disturbance of air, a tail lashing.
Riley runs with her heart in her throat, half carrying, half dragging Oliver.
The hut has timbered uppers above granite walls, shingle roof, windows showing wooden shutters on the inside.Be open, she thinks,that’s all I ask. Let the door be open and I’ll never wish for anything else again.The latch doesn’t budge when she tries and she screams, rattling it.
The door gives abruptly and they fall into the hut. Riley slams the door shut. Oliver is crying and she takes a second to hug him tight. He hugs her back this time. ‘Are they here?’ he whispers through his tears. ‘The demons?’
‘They can’t get in,’ she tells him. Riley drags a heavy steamer trunk from the corner of the room and rests it front of the door. She can hear her pulse in her ears.
They wait, listening. There is only the wind outside. Slowly Riley’s heart settles. Maybe it wasn’t even a mountain lion. Maybe it was a curious deer. Maybe it was nothing at all, just pictures in her mind, on the dark.
Or maybe it was Cousin stumbling towards them on the trail, arms swinging, white face crawling with flies, red strawberry spilling from the corner of his mouth.
No.
Riley knows that she must never think about that part. People carry their thoughts in their eyes.
Riley and Oliver roll out their packs. The canvas is waxy-smelling, good as new. Cousin talked about being a survival expert and close to nature. But he never left the city in all the time Riley and Oliver stayed with him. The packs stayed in the store cupboard.
‘Oliver Olive,’ Riley says, ‘come over and share.’
Oliver crawls into her arms and she zips them both up. He wriggles until his body fits her contours. He’s trembling. Riley breathes, draws the air down deep, so he can take the relaxation from her body.
‘Remember how I tickled your toes when you were born?’ she asks.
‘Yes.’ He always says he remembers things that happened just after he was born.
‘I was sitting with you both in the hospital room. Mom was sleeping. You were awake, though. You were looking right at me. And you were confused.’
