Bear

Chapter 21

Elena made dinner for their mother that evening but Sam had to excuse herself to lie down. She felt ill, she told them. It was true, she did. The day had sickened her. Lying in bed, she kept seeing her sister—the animal focusing on her. Those round eyes glowing. Lit yellow from within. The thick shag of its fur, so deep you could lose your hand in it. Elena, defenseless, in front.

Sam opened up a survey. Tapped her way through two pages.

The questions weren’t settling her. She had done variations of them a million times before—age, gender, race, ethnicity, zip code, household income, favorite breakfast foods—but they weren’t numbing quickly enough now. While picking her answers, she saw Elena. The bear’s claws, horrifically long, gripping the dirt, and Elena’s sneakered feet on the forest floor.

The phone buzzed with a text from Ben. Sam couldn’t take his banter in this moment. She swiped her way over to her browser instead. Looking up humans and animals, she found an article about a man who had kept a full-grown alligator in his bathtub. He ended up in prison for reckless endangerment. One woman who tried to befriend a chimpanzee had her arms and face ripped off. Elephants trampled a woman in India, then showed up at her funeral to trample her casket again. The man from the movie trailer who’d moved north to live with grizzlies had been mauled, along with his girlfriend, to death.

Was she going to throw up? Her mouth was wet and sour. Beyond her door, she could hear her family’s voices. Why, why, had Sam gone along with what Elena told her about this situation? In the kitchen, in the bathroom, in the car. Why had Sam let herself be convinced? Did she have to agree with absolutely every word Elena ever said?

Before any allegiance to her older sister could interfere, Sam thumbed over to her email and brought up the thread with Madeline. She typed fast: Hi. What’s the best way for us to make sure we’re safe from the bear coming near us? Thanks. Sent.

As soon as the email was off, the guilt flooded in. Sam pressed her phone to her chest and stared at the cracked ceiling. She’d had to do it, she told herself. This had become a matter of survival. She couldn’t hesitate because she thought Elena might be mad. And besides, Elena had only made her promise not to bring Madeline to the house, which Sam wasn’t, so she wasn’t making more problems, she wasn’t doing anything wrong. She had only asked a question, the answer to which they needed to know.

This reasoning wasn’t helping. Out in the hall, a door shut. Footsteps. Elena was humming. Sam still felt sick. She had to calm herself, so she lay there, shut her eyes, and thought her favorite thoughts: the ones of a future where there was nothing to fear.

Five hundred thousand dollars. Once they got themselves and the car off the island, they’d have all that money to do what they liked. First, from the port, they’d drive south along I-5. They would cross the Skagit River, thick with evergreens on both shores. The radio would be loud, and the smell of pine would be everywhere. They’d pass the Skagit Wildlife Area, where thousands of snow geese stood shoulder to shoulder in the winter, and Possession Sound, where gray whales fed every spring.

They’d get a hotel in Seattle and stay there for a few days, or a week, or, if they really liked it, housekeeping and continental breakfasts, forever. If not, they could rent a luxury apartment. Someplace glass-walled, with a doorman and a parking garage. Each of them would have her own bathroom, so Sam could leave her eyeliner pencils scattered on her vanity and Elena could drape a used washcloth over her sink faucet, and it wouldn’t matter, there’d be no cause to bicker. In the evening, from their sofa, they’d look out onto a new horizon as a million lights flickered on.

Or if they didn’t like the city, that packed urban lifestyle, they could keep driving. South to Tacoma? East to Yakima? West to the Olympic Peninsula? They would hike the Hoh Rain Forest, summit Mount Rainier, soak at the Sol Duc Hot Springs. For once, they would be the tourists, and someone else would fetch them coffee—Sam and Elena would tip a hundred percent on every check. If they got tired of Washington, they would go to Idaho. California. Up to mainland Canada, where their mother had traveled as a child, but the sisters themselves had never been. Sam and Elena would go dancing and drink cocktails and get passports. They would have no connection but each other to who they used to be.

Sam didn’t have every step of the plan decided, but she was sure of one thing: how good they would feel. The bear would be nothing to Elena once they got out of here. The lines under her eyes would go away. They’d wake up late, they wouldn’t work. When they were hungry, they’d eat at restaurants, order multiple courses, taste things without the obligation to clear their plates. Whenever their rooms got dirty, they’d hire a cleaner. Someone else would grocery shop on their behalf. Sam would go on dates. Elena would take up skiing. They would do whatever they wanted every second for the rest of their lives.

Sam’s breathing slowed. The house was quiet. Outside her bedroom window, the sky was deep dark blue. She got up.

Their mother’s door was closed. Her oxygen was on. In the velvet black of the hallway, Sam traced her fingers along the walls. The bathroom door was ajar, and light from the rising moon trickled in through the window. Sam moved in shadow toward the front of the house.

Wood eased under her feet. One step creaked. Another. She went as quietly as she could toward the living room, which was bled through with night. The glass in the windows caught thin starlight. The curtain around where her sister slept hung motionless.

Elena had told Sam that the bear was special. But what Elena didn’t seem to understand was that she, herself, was the special thing.

If Elena were awake right now, Sam would kneel next to her and plead with her to see that. She would say, Elena, we’re so close to what we’ve waited for. I know it’s been too long—years longer than we thought—and it’s been hard on you, all this responsibility, it’s too much. It’s exhausting, you said; you’re exhausted. I know that. Me too. But, Elena, we’re almost there. Hold on.

We don’t need this animal. It’s not worth the risk. If you crave quick relief, get it elsewhere—eat candy or get drunk or drive fast. Cut your hair short, if you like; I love your hair, it’s perfect, but you can change it, dye it purple, Mom would do it for you, it’d be fun. Indulge yourself. But don’t go into the woods for this thing anymore.

Don’t do this. That’s what Sam would say. Bent in the dark, in their home, face-to-face with her sister. Cracking open with fear and with faith. Elena. Please. We have each other. We’ll make it through this. Elena, can’t you hold on to that, and let the bear go?