Rogue watched them for a while and then flopped down in the sun outside the open cabin door, evidently concluding that nothing interesting was going to happen.
Luke came in, brushing off his hands. “Wow, the place looks great.”
“It’s needed a good spring cleaning for a while.” Inga hopped down from a chair, on which she had been standing to get to the backs of some of the shelves, and pointed at the table. “I found a few things.”
Luke went to inspect her finds. Over the years the cabin had picked up a variety of clutter. She had put everything that was truly junk—tattered and water-warped magazines long out of date, filled-in crossword puzzles, old tide tables, empty bottles, ancient receipts—into a box by the stove to be used for fire-starting or any other purpose they needed. The table held the more interesting items. There were a few books, including a couple of kids’ chapter books (adventure stories about animals) that she hadn’t seen in years; a travel chess set; a D&D roleplaying game book; an old radio.
“I tried that, but it doesn’t work. I think we used to use it to pick up marine weather broadcasts and stuff like that. It might need new batteries.”
“At least we won’t be completely bored if we’re here for a while. Oh hey, I found something too, actually.” Luke reached into his pocket and took out a few plastic figures, which he held out to her. “Look familiar?”
“Oh gosh, I think I do remember these.” She took them from him. They were little plastic farm people and a couple of animals. Aside from the colors being faded and one of them clearly having had its leg chewed on by sharp rodent teeth, they were still in pretty good shape. “Where did you find them?”
“Tucked under one of those old homemade shingles.”
Inga laughed. She put them with her other finds. “My brothers and I used to play on the roof. Our parents didn’t mind because at least they knew where we were. We had a bunch of toys up there. I can’t believe any of them are still here.” Running her fingers lightly over the heads of the toy figures, she added softly, “This must have been a long time ago, maybe even when Mom was still with us.”
The words just slipped out. She hastily pressed the back of her hand to her eyes.
“Sorry, Luke. I didn’t mean to get maudlin.”
His hand touched her shoulder gently. “Look, I opened up all over you yesterday. Don’t worry about it. Your mom’s gone?”
“Yeah, we lost her in a car accident when I was just a little kid. Toddler age. I barely remember her.” She ran her fingertips over the top of the animals’ plastic heads. “Even after all these years, we still call this place Mom’s Cabin sometimes, or well, Dad uses her name, but the whole family thinks of it that way. Her parents built it before she and Dad were married, and she really loved it out here.”
Luke looked wistful, and she recalled that he’d lost his mom too, and his dad as well. “Do you feel closer to her here?” he asked.
“Sometimes.” Inga took a deep breath, started to wipe her eyes, and realized her hands were covered with dust. “Darn. Look, I was thinking about running down to the harbor, cleaning up, and catching some fish for a late lunch. Want to come?”
Luke accepted the change of topic agreeably. He brought the fishing pole that she had also found during her explorations, now leaning in a corner of the cabin along with an equally long-unused fishing dip net. It was only once they were at the water’s edge that she remembered part of this was going to involve stripping.
Oh well, it wasn’t as if she actually minded if he saw her naked ...
She shed her clothes, very pointedly not looking at Luke, and dove cleanly into the water. The shock of the cold was sudden and acute, vanishing as she shifted underwater and broke the surface as a bear.
Rogue joined her a moment later, paddling alongside. Bears didn’t bother him at all, it was clear, and neither did the cold water.
She swam around for a while, enjoying the clean glide, while Luke sat on the end of the broken dock and attempted to fish. After a few laps of the bay, Inga got into business mode and started diving. It had been a while since she had fished as a bear, and they were faster than her underwater, so it took some time before one of her attempts connected. Triumphant, she surfaced with a fish gripped in her powerful jaws.
She swam over to Luke, still sitting on the dock with his limp fishing line hanging in the water, ignored by the fish, and tossed the fish on the shore with a flip of her powerful neck.
Immediately Rogue, who she had stopped paying much attention to, shot past her and clampedhisjaws on the fish.
Inga barked out a bear equivalent of “Hey!” as Rogue went running off down the rocky shoreline, the fish flopping out both sides of his mouth. She charged onto the shore, spraying water in all directions from her soaking wet pelt, and made another gruff bark-like sound in an attempt to say “Drop it!”
Rogue ignored her and kept running. She took off after him.
Luke was absolutely no help, laughing so hard that he nearly fell over.
Inga finally thought to shift back so she could speak with a human mouth. “Rogue! Drop it! Put that down right now!” The wind was chilly on her damp skin, a day that had seemed almost uncomfortably warm to her as a bear becoming suddenly cool.
Rather than dropping the fish where he stood, or trying to wolf it down, Rogue pranced up to her with his tail wagging. He dropped it at her feet.
“Oh, what, like I’m supposed to think it was there all along? Ridiculous dog.” She reached for it, then belatedly realized that she was standing here naked and she had no towel. If she left the fish there, the dog was likely to get it, but going to fetch her clothes with her hands full of slippery, slimy fish seemed absurd. She hadn’t realized quite how big it was; it had seemed much smaller to her as a bear.
“I’ll take care of that,” Luke said, coming up at her elbow. He was not quite looking—but she could see that he was peeking a little, and he looked as if he liked what he saw. “I do know how to clean a fish.”
“Do you really want a fish that was in a dog’s mouth? I can catch another.”
