A Bear Tale
by Christi Killien
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All rights reserved
Copyright 2011 Christi Killien
Cover photo copyright 1997 Dennis Widman
All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
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Chapter 1
Diana O'Neil walked very fast up Berry Road, and not only because it was four in the afternoon and getting dark, but because she always walked fast. Even when she didn't know exactly where she was going.
She was tall, just under five-eight, with long legs, fingers, and hair, the latter which she straightened with expensive products, and at this extremely casual moment had pulled into a high ponytail. Her ensemble -- gray sweatpants from Seattle's Roosevelt High School class of 2005, saggy lime green chenille sweater, hot pink neck scarf and running shoes -- she would wear only here in the backwoods of Salal, Washington where she would never be recognized, much less meet her long-awaited true love.
Salal is halfway between heaven and hell, a glorious retreat in the Cascadia forest, Snow Falling on Cedars territory, as well as a solitary outpost in a deep valley with one bar of cell phone reception and no cable. Weather people call it the Convergent Zone, and several neighbors agreed that the O'Neil property seemed to be at the center. The clouds never blew in one direction and it was always chillier.
The summer had been the coolest in decades. Just fifteen days above eighty degrees and every growing thing had been stunted, from the blackberry, huckleberry and salal lining the road to the potatoes, carrots, strawberries and beans in the O'Neil's gardens. Early rains had brought the potholes back before the annual grading and graveling; there was one in front of the O'Neil's place the size of a tire, right in the middle of the 3/4-mile-long road. Like a navel.
Diana reached the dead end, checked her pulse, and waited while Jake the golden retriever left several pee-mails. Then she slapped her thigh and said, "Come on, Jake! Let's go home!"
Jake looked up and gazed at Diana, his true love. He was getting old and couldn't hear as well as a pup could, but his nose still told him everything he needed to know. He bolted past her, heading north, winding his way up through the dark forest tunnel.
An evening fog began to gather. It was dusky, a car would have turned on its lights. Diana saw a huge, red maple leaf, as big as she had ever seen, picked it up by its stem-tail, and swished it as she walked.
It was not too wet, not too dry, not too cold, not too hot. Swish. Swish. There was the big white house where the dog Chester lived. What she knew of households out here was mainly the dogs. If Diana's parents had come on this walk, there would be talk about all the neighbors, stories of the Great Paving War which had ended just three years earlier. Diana did not care. She was here in the backwoods for one month doing her nursing practicum at Providence Hospital, fifteen minutes away on Highway 16. Then she would graduate, land a fabulous well-paying job, and meet Mr. Right. She was almost 25-years-old. The big picture was clear. The little day-to-day picture was what needed fine tuning, for the next 20 days to be exact. Her parents didn't even have a DVD player. Being here in no-man's land, she thought optimistically, she could hide out, fortify herself, and focus on the beauty of her future in some exotic, life-affirming, boy-heavy place.
Jake was far enough up the road now that Diana couldn't see him. Normally he'd keep her in sight, but a smell had invaded him. It was thick and he sucked it into his brain. His tongue swelled, his eyes glazed, and he wanted more of the scent than he could ever take in. He began to bark. He howled from deep in his chest.
Diana had heard Jake howl like that only once before. Jake's sister Ruby got to go on a walk when he was hurt and couldn’t. His brokenhearted cry could be heard in the tribal village of Suquamish where he was born and raised, five miles north by canoe, forty-five minutes by car. Diana strained to see Jake but couldn't. She called his name and clapped, but the sound echoed back to her off the fog. Were there two dogs barking now? Dang, Diana muttered, and she began to jog.
And then the racket stopped; Jake appeared, running toward her, his back hair bristled; and car lights suddenly shown through the mist up the road.
"Jake! CAR! COME!"
Protocol with cars was to return and sit by the side of the road, Jake knew this and was very very good at it. His job now, he thought, was to return to Diana, even though he couldn't bring her the bear.
The bear had her protocol, too, and had taken off back through the ten rough uphill acres of woods adjoining the O'Neil's five acres as soon as she heard Diana's call and clap, and then the car had turned onto the road. She normally didn't forage this far east, but times were hard, and that dog was lucky. She was pregnant and hungry. Next time...
Jake got to Diana and she made him sit and stay. He was panting and looked particularly cute although he smelled musky and he yawned in between pants, which meant he was nervous. "Where were you?"
The car approached slowly and stopped. It was the neighbor named Ben who lived in the white house, a retired lineman with bushy gray hair and a baseball cap. Ben rolled down his window and the white bulldog Chester leaned out, sniffing and whining. Jake whined back, and the two of them exchanged the bear news.
"Chester, get back in here!" said Ben, shoving Chester out of his way.
"Hi, Chester," Diana said and smiled. Her parents had a picture of Chester on their refrigerator. Seriously. Last year's Christmas card.
"Crazy dog," said Ben, and then focused back on Diana through his bifocals. "Hi, Diana. Your dad told me you were here. Welcome back!"
Ben was the one neighbor who knew her name. He also knew that Alan Peterson was her stepfather, married to her mother Janie O'Neil, but the distinction wasn't important to Ben or to Diana. Alan was a fine stepdad, as natural as pie dad to Diana since she was ten. "Thanks, but it's just for a month," she said.
"Well, your folks are great neighbors.”
Jake was calmer now. Diana stroked his head. "Jakie just went crazy about something up the road," she said.
Ben looked over at Chester, who still whined, but Chester always whined. "Something got 'em all riled up." He petted Chester's 14-year-old head. "Oh, I just remembered. Tell your dad something for me, okay? I saw Old Man Johnson this morning -- he's back from his hunting trip -- and he said the road crew was coming tomorrow. Finally. They've been backed up with the weird rain."
Diana's parents filled the potholes on Berry, and they had been putting it off because of the scheduled grading. "I'll tell him," Diana said.
"Thanks." Ben smiled. Diana remembered her mother talking about Ben hurting his foot and taking yoga and walking Chester less, but she didn't want to continue the conversation. The exhaust from Ben's SUV was getting to her, blowing away any hint of the odor Jake had brought back, and it was getting full-on dark fast.
"See ya," Diana said. She was still holding the red leaf by its stem, and she waved it as a good-bye.
"See ya," Ben said. Slowly he rolled up his window and eased away into the fog.
"Okay!" Diana said, releasing Jake, but before he could shoot away she said, "Heel!" and then clapped and repeated the command.
Jake was only marginally good at heeling. He had been sharper wi
th all the commands before Ruby -- his sister, life companion, and chief rival -- died last year. Without her, his reason to snap-to had faded. Ruby had made everything work better. Now Jake trotted beside Diana as she half-jogged down the hill part of the road, as eager to get home as she was.
They ran down through the fog, Jake’s tail cork-screwing madly to help him keep his back end from passing his front, down the hill to lower Berry Road, and across an ancient stream bed that cut through the forest and the O'Neil's property to make a perfect black bear travel lane.
Chapter 2