Chapter 40
“Julian’s asked if I want to go hunting with him tomorrow.”
I pause, fork of spaghetti lifted halfway to my mouth. We are having our one dinner of the week together, on his night off.
“Oh. Well, obviously, you can’t.”
He looks at me quizzically, while sipping his beer. “Why not?”
“Work,” I say simply.
“I have an extra day off, remember?” His eyes hold mine, almost challenging me.
I rack my brain. Shit. That’s right. He had mentioned something about it, some days ago. Everything is blurring together lately.
“Oh. Right. Okay, I forgot.”
“It’s okay. I did text and ask if you wanted to plan something special, but you never replied, so I told Julian yes.”
I feel an unpleasantness in my stomach. So he’d already said yes.
To hunting. With Julian. But what can I say?
I did space on trying to plan something special.
I’ve been so preoccupied, so obsessed with Lydia.
And I want Topher to be happy here. I need him to be happy here.
So I force a smile onto my face, even though the thought of it makes me sick.
“Sure, okay. That’s great, babe. We can do something nice for dinner. Have fun.”
“Great.” He squeezes my hand and continues eating, a look that I can’t quite read masking a face I thought I knew so well.
* * *
Hunting starts early in the morning. Apparently, it’s the best time to get whitetails.
Though he tries not to disturb me, I hear Topher creep out of bed when it’s still dark.
I lay in bed awake, for a while, listening to him in the bathroom.
Listening to the mundane movements of a man getting ready for the day.
Water slapping the tiles as he showers. The soft shushing as he brushes his teeth.
The gurgle of the toilet. His telltale throat clearing.
The sounds are so familiar, though I haven’t heard them nearly so much since we’ve moved here and night shifts have taken over our life.
I wonder if that’s why there’s a strange foreignness to them now.
Or if it’s something else. When he’s done, he creeps over to my side of the bed and kisses me softly on the cheek.
All of this should be comforting. The return of old routines, the loving husband.
But when his lips graze my cheek, instead of turning in for a kiss, I keep my eyes shut and pray he doesn’t hear the erratic thudding of my heart.
When I fall back asleep, I dream of Lydia.
This time I can see her and I’m following her through the woods.
Sometimes she has the face of my mother.
Sometimes it’s my grandmother’s face. Sometimes it’s cousin Anna.
But I know it’s Lydia. She is focused and carries a basket tucked under her arm.
She bends down every now and then, brown-stained fingers digging gently around the forest floor.
She picks something up and inspects it. It’s a charcoal-colored mushroom, its cap almost blooming like a flower.
She places it in her basket and gathers some more before standing up.
It is now that I see she is pregnant, as she carefully braces herself against the tree as she stands.
She moves off farther into the forest, walking deliberately, following invisible paths she’s walked before.
Lydia’s basket fills with mushrooms. Black trumpets.
Some that look like cauliflower. Some that are fat and brown.
I swear I can smell them, the scent of dirt and fungus.
As she walks, it’s almost as though I can hear her thoughts.
Gather the mushrooms. Stack the firewood.
James. Elias. Jacob? Must not forget to check the traps.
She has my mother’s face now. It’s lovely, this dream.
And I don’t want it to end. I feel like I could stay like this forever, watching my mother gathering mushrooms in the forest. But as time goes on, I feel a sense of dread beginning to creep at the edges of my vision.
There’s a darkness encroaching on us. Me.
My mother. Lydia. Some animal stalking her.
A bear? The serpent? But it’s coming for her and there’s nothing I can do to protect her. My heart is pounding. Run.
* * *
Topher’s jacket is bloodstained when he arrives home that afternoon.
“I got a deer.” His face is triumphant.
“What?” I look up from my cup of tea. The dark red splatters make my heart stop.
He pulls off his jacket, which I don’t recognize, and realize it must be one of Julian’s. He drapes it lazily on one of the antique kitchen chairs.
“I got a deer. On my first time out. I know it’s beginner’s luck, but Julian seemed genuinely impressed with how quickly I picked it up.” He opens up the fridge and grabs a beer. “Isn’t that incredible?”
I’m speechless. I didn’t expect him to actually get anything. And I’m still mildly irked that on one of his rare days off, he decided to get up before dawn to hunt with Julian.
“That’s great,” I say finally and can hear the lack of enthusiasm in my own voice. His neck flexes slightly as he watches me, and I almost see an internal sigh.
“I wouldn’t have thought you’d get so covered with blood though.” I have zero basis for this statement. Why can’t I just say something nice?
“Well, the blood’s from processing the animal. I helped Julian a bit, back at their house. He’s gonna finish it and then he’ll give me most of the meat.”
Topher is pacing around the room now, giving off an almost giddy male energy.
Whatever deflation he felt at my reaction is gone and he’s babbling on about the thrill of the hunt.
The feel of the gun. The appreciation of the animal.
It makes me seethe and I almost tune it out, unable to hear it.
It’s not that I oppose hunting. But my husband is not a hunter.
Who is this man pacing about my kitchen, blood in his fingernails?
Then he says something that snaps me back into focus.
“And man, Madeline, she’s something. She almost gave me better advice than Julian. She’s an incredible hunter. Apparently, she’s got several bucks herself.” His face is almost radiant.
“Madeline was there?”
“Yeah, she was on the hunt too. Didn’t I tell you?” Again, something in his face that I don’t recognize.
“No. You didn’t.”
“Oh. Well, I didn’t think it was a problem,” he says simply.
I force myself to smile, though my insides shake. “It’s not a problem.”
“Good.” Topher smiles and I notice a fresh beer has appeared in his hands. “Madeline asked me something interesting. She was wondering if we might be willing to sell them some of our property. Said they’ve always wanted some land right on the Ompompanoosuc River.”
The pounding is so loud, it seems impossible he can’t hear it.
“What did you say?” I speak slowly, willing my heartbeats to soften.
He shrugs. “I said we’d consider it.”
“Why would we do that?” The words escape through clenched teeth. She’s still after my land.
“Why do we need two hundred acres? Think about how that money will set us up for the baby.”
“Why do they need two THOUSAND acres?? This is my family’s land.” I feel a savage protectiveness over Wildwood, the familial link suddenly ironclad.
“Oh, for god’s sake, forget it.” Topher shakes his head, looking at me like I’m completely irrational. “I’ll tell her it’s a no. I’m taking a shower.” He turns and jogs up the stairs, eager apparently, to be rid of my presence.
A few moments later, I walk upstairs and into the bedroom.
The steam from Topher’s shower is already permeating through the room.
I open the closet and rifle through Topher’s clothes.
Toward the back is the suit jacket he’d worn to the harvest festival.
I pat it down, unsure of what I’m looking for.
Then I check the pockets. At first, I feel nothing, but then my fingers graze something thin and reedy.
I pull it out and instantly drop it to the floor, as though it had burned me.
Staring at the floor, I can see that it is a piece of wheat.
Exactly like the one on Madeline’s crown.
Exactly like the one she’d placed between her lips as she rode my husband in the field under a full moon.
The breath that escapes my lips is shaky.
Both with sadness and with rage. With great effort, I unclench my fists and storm over to my dresser.
I grab the red sweater and march back downstairs.
I then pick up Julian’s blood-spattered coat, holding it with two fingers, as though it’s a dead animal itself.
I go outside and head straight to the tree line.
Once I’m there, I hurl both items into the woods.
Madeline’s crimson sweater lands on top of Julian’s jacket and when I step back, it looks as though there’s a pool of blood in the forest, like some dark fairy tale.
As I march back to the house, a satisfied smile on my face, I think of predators in the forest and hope they pick up the scent of blood. I hope that they’ll come and tear everything to shreds.