Chapter 4 #2
“My ex, the second one, runs a small zoo. So when we got married, I sort of did that, too. I ran the place with him. Played the loving wife while he played with alligators all day. Apparently, I’m talented at conforming myself to someone else’s life.”
“A zoo? Really?”
“Really. The divorce is recent. I don’t have many skills. Before I met Finn, I wasted half my life in another bad marriage that was worse in different ways. Now, it almost feels too late.”
“It’s never too late. You don’t have one foot in the grave yet.”
She shrugs. “Yet. I’ll have to decide soon.
Alimony only pays for so much, and I don’t want to depend on him anymore.
Every time I cash a check, it’s just a reminder that that part of my life isn’t over.
I wish it was. I was hoping that coming here would…
show me the way. Make things clear somehow.
Gwen says I’m looking for something in all the wrong places, so I may as well start looking in Alaska.
It’s not working out quite like I hoped so far. ”
He’s curious what caused her divorce. Her first husband died, but her second marriage is a mystery beyond the zoo life.
He can’t imagine having someone like her and not fighting with everything he’s got to keep her, which is a crazy thought when he’s known her for all of a few days.
It’s not like he’s got any sort of grasp on how she would rank as a partner.
She seems kind, though. Patient. A little lost, just like he feels.
It’s not his place to ask, but he’s been doing a lot of shoving his nose where it doesn’t belong lately. “What happened with you and him. If you ah, you know, don’t mind me asking.”
“Not supposed to talk about the ex on a date,” she teases, pursing her lips.
He rolls his eyes. “This is a pretty shit date if that’s what’s going on.”
“What, you don’t enjoy being in life-threatening situations with someone you just met?
Spoil sport.” He levels her with a pointed stare, and she sighs.
“He couldn’t handle all the baggage I brought with me from the first marriage.
Not that it was his fault. It wasn’t. It was mine.
The foundation wasn’t very solid for us to begin with.
The rest is another story. Maybe we save it for our next trade? ”
“Alright. That’s fair. Is this a thing now? Story for a story?”
“Why not, and now you owe me one.” It’s a light comment that sounds like she wouldn’t push to collect on that if he doesn’t want to contribute again, but he already knows he’ll participate. “But for now, what do you do for a living? Farming, or something else, too?”
Fuck. He supposes fair is fair. He wasn’t exactly thinking ahead when he asked her the same question, and now he’s in an awkward position. May as well get it over with. She will find out eventually. “My family owns Omnivar International.”
“I dunno what that is.”
“It’s everything. Well, almost everything. The tech in your phone, the fabric in your sheets, the fertilizer feeding your crops. Omnivar is a parent company of a hundred other smaller companies. We’ve got our sticky hands in every fucking cookie jar.”
“Oh. You don’t sound like a happy participant in the family business.”
He has only given her a brief overview. To get into all the reasons he’s a disgruntled member of the family would take far longer than they’ll be out here. “I’m not. Never have been. But that….”
She raises a brow at his dramatic pause, finishing his sentence for him. “Is a story for another time?”
“Exactly.”
He’s grateful that she seems unbothered by his minor revelation.
Neither impressed nor disgusted. Her only response was to question his happiness with the situation.
He should tell her right now that he gave up his inheritance in favor of growing peaches and raising goats on his little plot of land.
That he really is only a farmer now. He probably should have led with that to begin with and left out the rest, but when she meets Oliver she would have found out exactly who he is, since his brother is and always has been, very proud of the family name.
“Not that any of that matters now because I bought a farm and—”
“Wait a second….” Her head tilts, and her expression changes from one that he’s grown fond of into one that everyone else he’s met since the incident fixes him with. “I think I saw a story about you.”
He rubs the bridge of his nose. Here it comes.
“Did you…are you the one who…did you cheat on your fiancée?”
“Those accusations are false. There’s a lawsuit pending between me and the tabloids.”
“Oh my god. Fuck. I’m so fucking stupid. Here I was, thinking I finally met a man who seems decent and—”
“Hey now, I’m decent!”
“Your former fiancée might say otherwise.”
“None of that happened how you think it did.”
Her nose wrinkles in disgust.
He huffs, his voice irritated. “Oh, were you there? Sorry, I must have missed you among the paparazzi.”
“Whatever. Doesn’t matter anyway. You being a cheating cheater who cheats has no bearing on our survival odds.”
He has half a mind to tell her all the gory details of that breakup and how absolutely nothing printed in that story was accurate, but he clamps his mouth shut. If she wants to believe he’s just another asshole, then she’s welcome to. He was getting far too comfortable around her anyway.
She pauses as they crest the top of a small ridge, staring out past sparsely scattered trees, her tone flat and her words thankfully void of any further scolding. “It’s so beautiful out here. I’d appreciate it a lot more if I weren’t so damn afraid of never making it out.”
“I get that feeling.”
“It’s almost enough to convince me all of this isn’t pointless.”
He tilts his head in her direction. “What do you mean?”
“All of it. Everything we do, everything we say, feel, think, dream. All of it means nothing. We are just ants doing busy work. I didn’t expect someone to topple the whole cage yet, though.”
The resigned matter-of-factness in her tone catches him off guard. Still, he’s grateful she’s even speaking to him now. “This is getting deep real fast. I dunno if I believe that.”
“Religious?”
“No. Not at all. I just have to hope that there’s meaning to be found somewhere eventually, otherwise it’s too damn depressing, and there’s already enough reasons to be depressed.” He gestures to the vast nothingness with no rescue in sight. “Case in point.”
“Fair enough, I suppose.”
“Then again, we could all just be computer code. Bunch of ones and zeros knocking around.”
“A simulation? My pessimism is rubbing off on you already.” He can hear the faint smile in her tone and considers that a point in his favor.
“Who knows. I figure the odds of that are as good as anything else.”
She shrugs. “It might almost be comforting if that were true.”
“Well, I’m not sure we’ll find out today, but if I see any wildlife start to glitch, I’ll let ya know.”
She only nods, ending their impromptu conversation about the meaning of life and turning their attention back to what lies ahead. There’s no town in the distance yet, but neither one of them points out the obvious before continuing their journey. Something will come up. It has to.
* * *
They trudge on for a few more hours. He has no watch and can only go by the sun in the sky and how quickly it seems to fade. It isn’t the only thing fading. He isn’t twenty anymore. All the smokes he’s been packing away have given him the lungs of someone twice his age.
Nora is doing better than he is, far more suited to all this than she seems to think.
“So what do you have on this fancy farm you apparently bought?” she asks suddenly, perhaps only to break the awkward silence.
“It’s not fancy. Peaches. Apples.”
“That’s it?”
“Some goats.”
She perks up at that, one brow raising hopefully. “Do you have fainting goats?”
“Fainting? No, I sure don’t.”
“What’s the point then?”
“Is this a trick question?”
“Have you seen them? The entertainment factor can’t be beat. How could you pass that up?” she replies with an obvious scowl, as if the fact that he didn’t purchase the correct type of goat has downgraded him even further than her memory of that tabloid story.
“So what I’m hearing is that you’d scare those poor animals for your own amusement.”
“I didn’t say that. It’s a natural behavior, and should I happen to be around when it naturally occurs, I would absolutely laugh.”
“Your favorite hobby would be toppling goats. Got it,” he says evenly. “That’s what I thought. Feels on brand for you, to be honest.”
“Please continue so I can topple you over the edge of this mountain without remorse. It won’t be as entertaining as a herd of fainting goats, but it’ll have to do.”
How quickly she’s shut him out and decided that he isn’t worth her time is throwing him, and he tries like hell not to let it get under his skin and convince him that she’s right.
“We should find somewhere to rest for the night,” her gaze flickers to the horizon, teeth chattering.
She’s barely a few feet away. Seems to have drifted closer and closer the colder it got, and if she wasn’t completely offended by him now, he might skip all this bullshit and pull her in.
Let her leech off some of his body heat while he warms himself on hers, but they aren’t those people, and they never will be.
At least not until death looms a little bit closer.
The wind groans low between the trees, carrying snow flurries that bite any exposed skin like little teeth. He can see her breath fog in the air. See how her eyelashes are crusted with frost and how she keeps rubbing her gloved hands together like it might help.
She’s mid-sentence about starting a fire, asking if he can manage to be somewhat useful, when the ground gives way under her feet. One moment she’s there and the next she’s gone. Sucked straight down as the earth gives way into a sinkhole.
The sound she makes isn’t quite a scream. It’s sharper and shorter, sucked out of her as she vanishes from view.