2. Luke
2
LUKE
I'm glad to be home. By home, I mean my cabin up in the mountains. It's a wooden cabin that I built when I came out of the military. I'm not good at being in the town all the time. I come here to have space, quietness and just to be alone. When you're serving your country, you’re thrown in with other men. You live together, you work together, and sometimes I just need some time on my own. My dad helped me to build it. We needed a helicopter to drop the wood in for us and some of the larger equipment because it's a forty-five minute walk from the nearest car drop-off to the cabin. Now you understand what I mean when I say it's remote.
I close the door, lock it, and put my bag in the bedroom so I can unpack it later. I haven't been here for a few weeks and there's a lot that needs doing before I rest tonight. I hear there's a storm coming, and I want to make sure I have enough of everything to just bunk in for the next few days without worrying if I have enough wood or not.
Opening the back door, I grab my axe from behind the door and step outside. It's fresh. I'm not going to lie, but I know that in a few minutes of swinging the axe, I’m going to be sweating and hot.
It's hard swinging the axe and getting the wood to split in two and it takes a few goes, but after ten minutes I’m on a roll. Another half an hour, my T-shirt comes off. The sweat is dripping from my forehead. It's a great workout, but I still need to get more so that I can last a few days without cutting the wood. I'm lucky that I got more wood from the timber yard the last time I was here, so I have plenty to cut.
After an hour of cutting the wood, I go inside for a drink, grabbing a towel at the door to wipe the sweat off me. My breathing is labored, and my heart is racing, but I feel alive at this moment in time, and that's not been something I've felt for a long time. Since I left the military, in fact. I would’ve stayed in the military until I retired. That had been my plan. But unfortunately, fate has other plans. I was involved in an IED explosion with my teammates. We lost one, Peter, three were injured but could walk away, then there was me. I was left with one of my legs hanging on by a blood vessel. One wrong move and I could’ve bled to death. The medics were great as they got me on the Medivac, who took me to Germany. I was there for over eight months. They amputated my leg, but at least I got there without tearing the blood vessel. Thank God, although there were days when I wish I had died.
Mom and Dad have been great, but sometimes it gets too much for me and that's why I built the cabin. I'd live here permanently, but I have to have physio every week and it's a pain in the ass walking the forty-five minutes to the car and back again when I'm finished. So, I stay for a few days and then head back into town for a couple of weeks.
I bring some of the wood into the cabin, stacking it carefully by the wood burner, and some on the shelf at the back door. I know when the snow comes, it might be so deep that I can't open the back door, so I need to make sure to get as much of the wood in that I can.
I put a few logs into the log burner, light it, and then close the door. The log burner heats the whole of the cabin, including the water, so that I can shower and cook. Finally, I take a seat and look out the floor to ceiling windows I have in the sitting room. I can sit here and watch the surrounding nature. I notice when the trees have grown or the animals have been nearby, there are usually nose prints on the windows from the bears and wolves.
When the place is heated enough, I go into the bedroom and unpack my stuff. I don't have to bring enough, because every time I come here, I add to the collection so that I don't need to bring anything in the future. My wardrobe is now full, so next time it will be just food I bring. Walking into the kitchen, I unpack the food that I brought with me. Being in the Army, I've learned to cook and feed myself, however if I was stuck on the mountain or in the forest, then I’d know how to survive with no food in my backpack. My survival skills are second to none, so I don't fret about being out here alone.
I can see the weather changing when I sit down with some food that I made. The wind is picking up, and the snow has started to fall. I smile. It's so beautiful and I love to watch as the snow piles up on the ground and moves up to my window. The highest it’s ever been is about six feet, but that was after an enormous snow storm. It was the first time I thought I shouldn't be here. But I knew it was going to go down again after a few days and I could get out and home.
I check in with base control. There is a place in town where they run the radio for anyone hiking in the mountains. They advise to check in with them when you go up the mountains and they give special radios that are satellite and not telephone network.
"Hey Frank, just letting you know I'm up at the cabin. I'm here for a few days. I see the weather is changing quickly, I should be okay but if I'm not then I can let you know."
"Hey Luke. This is the beginning of the storm. It looks to be lasting three days with no let up. Keep yourself safe out there."
"Will do. Let me know if anyone is in trouble or you need my help up here. You know I like to help when I can."
Frank's radio cuts in and out. The service must be getting hazy with the amount of snow that’s falling.
"There's a woman who has gone up there for a couple of days, she's up there trying to find the Blue Wolves. I think it's a myth myself, but she was all wound up about it. She rang just there to say she's fine and staying overnight in her tent. I'm worrying about her, Luke."
"You know I'll go and see where she is if she needs help. Just let me know."
"Will do. Keep safe, Luke."
"You too, Frank."
I sit back on the chair in the sitting room and watch as the snow falls, throwing more logs on an hour later. The peace of the cabin and the surrounding area calms me down. Since I only have one leg, I guess mountain hiking is probably not the best sport to be in, but I'm not normal. Not anymore, anyway. I can feel the stump of my amputated leg throbbing with the surrounding cold, so I throw more logs on and then make sure there’s enough on until the morning.
Sometimes I don't get into the bed but fall asleep here in front of the fire. It's warm, and comfortable. What more do I want?
Waking up, the first thing I do is look out of the window.
"Holy fuck, that snow was heavy."
It's a couple of feet up the window, but some of it looks like it drifted with the wind. Even so, it's not a good place to be. I think about the woman who is in a tent. Hopefully she's okay and Frank talked her into going home and trying another time to find the illusive Blue Wolves. I'm not sure why she’d even want to find them. They are the rarest wolf pack, but only one person has ever seen them. For all we know, it could be an old wives' tale, so who is she and why would she risk her life to see them?
I make myself some breakfast and then sit down to watch the snow. I have a book to read if I want to later, but I'm content watching the snow. Some animals move past the cabin, and they always look in the window, which I love.
I hear the crackle of the radio. "Luke, are you there Luke?"
It's midday, and the snow is still falling. I grab the radio. "Frank, what's going on?"
"Luke, you know that woman I told you about?"
"Yeah, the one who thought it was a good idea to stay in a tent on the mountain in a snowstorm?"
"Yeah, that one." The radio crackles again.
"What about her?"
"She hasn't checked in. I asked her to check in every morning, just so that we know she's okay and we don't need to rescue her. She said she would, but she hasn't. I'm worried about her being in a tent in the cold. Any chance if I can get her coordinates, can you go and find her and make sure she's okay?"
"Sure, give me the coordinates and I'll go and see if she's okay. I'll help her back down to safety."
"Keep safe and thanks, Luke. I know you're okay up in your cabin." It crackles some more, and I lose the signal.
"Shit he didn't give me the coordinates."
I put on my snow gear, so that I can stay warm when I'm out in the cold.
The radio crackles and the coordinates come through. I write them down and then check which direction I need to go.
Once I'm out in the snow, I take a deep breath of the cold air. It's not letting up. The snow is swirling around me, making it hard to see where the paths are. The further I get away from the cabin, the more adrenaline rushes through my body. I need this so much. I need to be out there helping people survive.
I get further and further into the forest. She had made it a good way up the mountain if the coordinates were correct. I get there and don't find anything. There were signs that someone pitched a tent, there's a section that doesn't have a lot of snow on it, and there has been some snowfall on the blank ground too.
"Where the fuck has she gone?" I can only assume she packed up today and went back down the mountain. That's when I see the tracks leading further up the mountain.
"God she's a stubborn bitch, that's for sure." I follow the tracks as long as I can. They've been covered with more snowfall.
Shit, what am I going to do? I use the radio and contact Frank.
"Frank, it's Luke. I can't find the woman. It looks like she packed up this morning and continued up the mountain."
"Stubborn woman," he says.
"All I can do is wait to see where she is. Let me see if there are new coordinates." I can hear him shuffling away from the radio, then he comes back two minutes later.
"I've lost service because of the snowfall. You can keep trying if you want, I don't want you to be in danger though, Luke, your mom would kill me." He laughs and I do too. He knows my mom well.
"I'll keep going up in the direction that I think she was going and see if I can find her. I'll keep in touch, Frank." I turn the radio off and stick it in my back pocket. I need to find this woman before she freezes to death.
An hour later, there's still no sign of her. I need to go back to the cabin to warm up and eat and then I'll try again.
This is why I never date. If there are stubborn women around who like to take risks like this one does, then I don't want one. Ever.