Ashes, Ashes

14 - Back at the Cabin

We got a fire going, finally, and huddled close around it, none of us saying much for a long time. For a little while, it was enough to rub my hands and slap feeling back into my thighs, wiggling toes that had begun to go numb from standing in the cold. 

But the silence wouldn't last. There was no peace without my mind drift back to the pool of blood, the glistening entrails, the missing axe, the...

"We need to find Parker." 

I jerked myself back into the moment, surprised that it was Richard who said it. Dawn had gone quiet, huddled on the floor with her arms around her knees, staring into the fire. She looked up at Richard's words, expression pained and hopeful but distant as if with pain. She looked like someone who had broken a limb and was trying to hide it, agony turned inward. 

Richard continued. "The way I figure it, there's no way this is a coincidence. Either he..." he faltered, looking guiltily at Dawn, and then lowered his voice, as if speaking quieter would make up for having this conversation in front of her. 

"Let's not make any assumptions," I said.  "We have to be rational about this." 

I started to pace around the cabin, willing the throbbing in my head to go away so I could concentrate. I felt panic rising up in my chest like a frightened bird and tried to swallow it back down. 

"Here's what we know. Liza is dead. Parker is missing. So are the axe, our phones, and the car." I swallowed back the acid that rose in my throat, closed my eyes against a sudden wave of dizziness. "Dawn, do you have any idea when Parker might have left?" 

It took her so long to answer I wondered whether she'd gone mute from shock. When she finally did speak, her tone was flat. "He came to bed with me. Whatever time it was when we all went to sleep. I woke up, and he...he was...I got you up as soon as I knew he was missing." 

Without a phone, there was no way to check the time. Who wears watches anymore? But judging from the way the light was shining, it was mid-morning, closer to noon than dawn. When had Liza died? I didn't even know how to begin answering that question. 

"It could have been hours ago," I said, wishing I didn't sound so defeated. "If he took the car, he's probably a hundred miles away. We're not going to catch up with him on foot." And if he took the axe, I thought but did not say, We probably don't want to run into him. 

Richard's expression suggested he hadn't thought of that. He looked at the floor. 

"We have to find Parker," Dawn said, like a track on repeat. I wondered how much of any of this was sinking in. "We have to look for him. We can't just...not." 

"More importantly," Abby spoke up, "we have to get the fuck out of here." 

I pulled away from the wall, resumed pacing. "Okay. There's...there's got to be an office to this place, right? Somebody works here during the on-season? So they've probably got a phone. Let's go see if we can get it working and call for help." 

"Fine." Dawn made a throaty, frustrated noise and jerked violently to her feet, making for the door. Like a switch had been flicked,  instantly jumping from her almost catatonic shock to a manic sort of energy. "Fuck all of you. If nobody else is going to go look for him, I will." 

"Dawn, wait -- " I called after her, but she was already out the door, hands shoved deep in her pockets. 

"I'll go with her," Richard said, running a hand back through the short bristles of his hair. "You guys stay and try to figure out the phone thing. I'll see if I can talk some sense into her. Or figure out what's up with the car. Maybe we'll run into somebody who can help." 

"We have no way of getting hold of you if something happens," I protested. "We need to stick together." 

"We'll come right back," he said, and flashed a classic Richard smile, baring a crooked tooth like a sheepish kid. "I think once she realizes he's not, like, hiding just around the corner, I can get her to calm down." 

"What if he is hiding right around the corner?" Abby asked, darkly. "You know. Maybe with an axe?" 

Something inscrutable passed over Richard's features, and he bent to drag his beat-up duffel bag from under the bunk, digging through it. He emerged not long after with a gun, which he slid into the waistband of his pants. 

"Richard what the fuck." I actually felt my mouth gape open as I stared at him. The pulse in my head throbbed. "Why would you bring that here?" 

He shrugged. "Wasn't a lot of point in getting the concealed carry license if I wasn't going to use it, right?" He grinned crookedly in a way that didn't quite touch his eyes. He hesitated, like he was planning to say something and then changed his mind. "Dawn! Wait up! I'm coming with you!" 

He yelled after her and then scrambled out the door, leaving Abby and me together alone in the cabin, shuddering against the draft wafting in through the doorway. 

I watched him go with the uneasy feeling that he was hoping he'd run into Parker, gun in hand.