After the Fire (3 page)

Melissa watched her mother tuck the fishing license in the visor. She frowned. “Why did you pretend you're interested in fishing when you're not?”

“How do you know what I'm interested in?” Sharlene waved out the window as she headed down the gravel road. “I like Marge,” she said.

“You just met her,” Melissa pointed out.

“I know that, Miss Precise,” said Sharlene. “But I still like her. We'll be using the store a lot, and I think we're going to become good friends.”

“You say that about everybody,” said Melissa. “I suppose you also liked the man with the tattoo.”

“Melissa!” Sharlene exploded suddenly, and Melissa cringed. “You're pushing it, young lady.”

“Okay. I'm sorry,” muttered Melissa. She stared out the window at the forest that crowded both sides of the road. She would ignore her mother and concentrate instead on making sure they didn't get lost.

Three

S
harlene drove past the grassy road three times before they figured out that it even
was
a road. “This has got to be it,” she said, turning onto a narrow track that disappeared into the forest. She fiddled for a moment with a lever near the floor and the truck jerked into four-wheel drive.

For the next ten minutes they bounced over ruts and through potholes. Branches swiped the sides of the truck, and Melissa closed the window so she wouldn't get hit. Then the trees parted and a meadow shimmered like a golden sea on the right side of the road. A deer with pricked ears stood in the long grass, watching them pass. “Lovely,” breathed Sharlene, while Cody nearly climbed on top of Melissa screaming, “Let me see!”

They drove back into the shady forest. “We should pass three other cabins before we get to ours,” said Sharlene. “We're at the very end of the road.”

The truck lurched over a deep pothole, and Melissa grabbed the door handle to steady herself. She glimpsed water glinting between the trees. “There's the first one,” she said, staring at a small cabin made of weathered gray boards. It was their first proper view of the lake and Sharlene slowed the truck so they could have a good look. In front of the cabin the water was a dark emerald green, but farther out it was speckled with bright sunlight.

They passed two more cabins. One was tall and thin with an upper story, and the other had a shiny tin roof. The road veered away from the lake for a few minutes and then turned back toward the water, coming to a sudden end at a grassy clearing beside a log cabin.

“This must be it,” said Sharlene. She pulled up beside a tree and turned off the truck. “Okay, everybody out!”

They climbed stiffly out of the truck. Sharlene gave a huge stretch. Melissa's heart thudded as she looked around. They were going to spend a whole month here?

The cabin was long and narrow. Tall pine trees sheltered the back and sides. At the front was a porch and below that an expanse of dry brown grass that sloped right to the edge of the lake. A dock jutted out into the water, with an overturned red canoe resting on the end. Straight across from them on the other side of the lake, the sun blazed low in the sky, ready to dip behind a steep forested hillside. Melissa used her hands to shade her eyes from the glare on the water. A little way down the lake, she could see a small island covered in trees.

A squirrel chattered shrilly in the branches above her, making her jump. She hugged her arms to her chest while Sharlene opened the screen door on the side of the cabin and fiddled with a key. Silently she followed Sharlene and Cody inside.

Melissa had a first impression of dark log walls, a big black woodstove that she had to step around and a thick musty smell. Then Sharlene pulled back the curtains on the two big front windows and opened a door in between that led out to the porch. The setting sun streamed in.

The room was filled with furniture: a kitchen table with chairs, an old saggy couch with a plaid blanket draped over the back, a rocking chair and a couple of armchairs. There was a brown counter with wooden cupboards above and below. Assorted raincoats and thick fleeces hung on hooks beside the door. In one corner there was a rubber mat with a pair of boots on it, and under the windows were shelves with rows of paperback books, board games and jigsaw puzzles. At the end were two small bedrooms, their doors open. Melissa spotted bunk beds in one and a double bed in the other.

“It smells in here,” said Cody. His face puckered in a frown.

“I don't think so,” said Sharlene.

“Yes, it does,” said Cody. “It stinks.”

Sharlene gave an exaggerated sniff. “Oh, that. That's cabin smell. All cabins smell like this. My grandpa's cabin in Ontario smelled just the same.”

Cody stuck his thumb in his mouth. Sharlene surveyed the room calmly. “The windows have screens, thank goodness. Let's get some air in here. It's like an oven.”

Melissa watched while Sharlene opened windows. She felt stuck to the floor, unable to move. The cabin was even smaller than their apartment. They would be living on top of each other.

Sharlene had disappeared into one of the bedrooms. “I haven't slept in a bunk bed since Grandpa's,” she called out. “If you don't mind, Mel, Cody and I will take this room.”

For a second, Melissa thought she hadn't heard right. Cody was going to share with their mother? Ever since he was two, he had slept in Melissa's room.

“You can think about fixing up your room tomorrow,” said Sharlene.

“Fix it up with what?” said Melissa. She tried to wrap her mind around the amazing news that she had her very own room.

“Maybe some of your drawings. You're the artist— Oh!” Sharlene said suddenly.

“What is it?” said Melissa. She stood in the doorway.

“There's a broken window in here. Look! It looks like someone smashed it with a rock. There's glass all over the floor.” Sharlene peered outside. “The screen's lying out there on the ground. What on earth would have caused that?”

“The mosquitoes are coming in,” said Melissa. She tried to grab a mosquito that drifted near her cheek.

Sharlene pushed back a strand of hair. She looked tired. “I'll pop that screen back on. Then let's get our stuff out of the truck. We'll just bring it in. We don't have to unpack everything tonight. And we can sweep up this glass later.”

Sharlene retrieved the screen and snapped it back into place, and then they made trips back and forth from the truck to the cabin until everything was stacked inside. Sharlene made a halfhearted attempt at organizing. “Kitchen stuff and food against that wall, duffel bags in the bedrooms…”

Melissa set a box labeled
Cody
in the room with the bunk beds and then carried a box that said
Melissa
into her bedroom. Sharlene had gone on and on about taking enough things to the lake so they didn't get bored and had instructed them each to fill a box with stuff to do. Cody's box was full of his Duplo building set, action figures, a marble game and other toys. Melissa had packed mostly art supplies, library books and a needlepoint kit of a wolf that she had bought at a flea market.

Melissa pushed her box against the wall. She shut the door and stood for a minute in the middle of the room. Her own space. Cody was definitely not allowed in.

She checked it out thoroughly. The bed, which looked soft and lumpy, was covered by a faded yellow and orange quilt. The only other furniture was a blue dresser with four empty drawers that stuck when you pulled them. A cupboard with folding doors contained a bunch of coat hangers, a life jacket, an extra blanket and a pair of worn slippers. A pale orange curtain covered the one small window. Two of the walls were log and the other two were made out of brown boards. A calendar, open to July, with a photograph of a bald eagle, hung beside the bed.

Melissa took the calendar down and stuck it on the shelf in the cupboard. She wanted to start from the beginning with her room, like a piece of fresh drawing paper. She pulled back the curtain and gazed out at the lake and the dock with the red canoe. She opened the window wide to let in some air, and a sweet pine smell drifted inside. She was just thinking about putting some of her stuff in the drawers when Sharlene called from the other room, “Mel, I need you to get some water for supper.”

What was that about? Then Melissa remembered that Jill had explained that there was no running water in the cabin. Water for dishes and washing up came from an outside well with a hand pump. Melissa hadn't really thought about it at the time but she did now. No water in the cabin also meant an outhouse. Yuck.

Sharlene gave Melissa a plastic water container and she went out the side door, the screen door banging behind her. The sun had disappeared behind the hill, and the lake was as dark and smooth as a pane of glass. She found the pump behind the cabin, near a lean-to shed filled with firewood. She studied it for a minute, trying to figure out how it worked. She gave the handle an experimental tug. It was stiff and she pulled harder, yanking it up and down half a dozen times before the water finally splashed out of the pipe, soaking her runners.

The problem was, the water gushed out in spurts, going everywhere except into the narrow opening of the container. When the container was finally half full, Melissa quit pumping, her arms aching, and carried it back to the cabin.

Cody was stretched out on the couch, sucking his thumb. “It's far too hot to light the woodstove,” said Sharlene. She set up the campstove on the counter.

Melissa watched silently while her mother attached the propane tank and lit the burner with a match. “How did you know how to do that?” she asked.

“Jill gave me a lesson.” Sharlene poured water into a big pot and set it on the burner. “How does macaroni and cheese sound? You can set out the dishes. And maybe open up a can of peaches for dessert.”

Melissa rummaged through the cupboards. There were all sorts of mismatched plates, bowls and mugs. She put out three plates and three mugs, two made of blue pottery with loons on the sides and a red plastic mug for Cody. Then she hunted for a can opener.

“There's no can opener,” she announced after digging through the drawers.

“How could a cabin like this not have a can opener?” mused Sharlene. “Luckily we brought one of our own.” With one eye on the campstove, she produced a can opener from the top of a cardboard box.

Macaroni and cheese was Cody's favorite meal, but when it was ready he flipped macaroni out of his bowl and yelled that the only thing he could eat was a hot dog. Then he burst into tears when Sharlene said she had forgotten to bring ketchup.

Cody said he hated peaches because they were too slimy. Sharlene made him a piece of bread and jam, which he promptly threw on the floor. “Someone is exhausted,” she said. She put down her fork, got up from the table and scooped Cody up in her arms. He stiffened and kicked her legs with his feet, then went as limp as a rag doll. “Come on, buddy boy, we'll find this outhouse and then it's time to crash.”

Melissa frowned. She couldn't understand why Sharlene let Cody act like such a baby. In the old days, Sharlene was mad at Cody all the time. Melissa could remember Sharlene screaming at him and Cody throwing himself on the floor, shrieking at the top of his lungs. It was like Sharlene was trying to be the perfect mother now.

With a sigh, Melissa got up and scraped Cody's macaroni off the table and into a plastic bag. Then she picked up the piece of bread and jam and threw it on top. Jill had warned them about not letting the bears get into the garbage, but she couldn't remember what they were supposed to do with it, so she left it on the counter.

The cabin was filling with shadows and pretty soon they wouldn't be able to see a thing. Melissa heard Sharlene's and Cody's voices outside the window, and in a moment they were back inside. Sharlene said the mosquitoes were out in droves, and Cody announced sleepily that he had almost fallen into the outhouse hole. He insisted on being carried into the bedroom.

A moment later Melissa heard Cody scream “No! Go away! GO AWAY!” and then Sharlene was back. “He wants you,” she said.

Melissa avoided the wounded look in her mother's eyes. For the first few years of his life, Melissa had been the one to put Cody to bed at night while Sharlene and Darren drank beer in front of the tv or partied with their friends in the trailer next door. Right after the fire, he had clung to Melissa tighter than ever until sometimes the only way she could get him to sleep was to rock him like a baby. Lately he had been better, allowing Sharlene to tuck him in most nights, but when he was overtired he demanded Melissa.

Melissa had heard Sharlene and Jill talking about it one night. “They push me away,” Sharlene had said, her voice tight, “both of them. My god, it's been two years. Sometimes this whole motherhood thing feels as fragile as a piece of glass.”

“It
is
fragile,” Jill had replied in the no-nonsense tone that Melissa remembered from grade four. “Melissa and Cody have some legitimate reasons not to trust you. Don't expect miracles overnight.”

Melissa went into the bedroom. Cody was lying on the bottom bunk in his underpants, with a sheet crumpled around his feet. Sharlene had put a small red flashlight on the dresser beside him. Melissa turned it on and gave it to him. “Everyone gets their own flashlight. This is yours.” She let him shine it on the walls for a few minutes and then switched it off. He rolled over on his side, his chest rising and falling with his soft breath.

Melissa stayed until she was sure he was asleep before she left, shutting the bedroom door quietly behind her. “You shouldn't carry him places,” she said to Sharlene. She could hear the criticism in her voice, as sharp as a knife, but she couldn't stop herself. “He's four years old. He's big enough to walk.”

“He does walk,” said Sharlene. “Just not tonight.”

“And I don't think you should have got him the bread. He's always loved macaroni and cheese.”