Between Octobers

The Search

Evan—The Search

Deadman's Canyon has a body in it. The old grave of a sheep herder—that's how it got the name.

Near dawn, as I'm making my case against being forced to stay behind to answer phones, a call comes over the radio. Two hikers camping inside the eight-mile-wide canyon have found a body.

The room of bleeding hearts collectively stops. Mine just breaks.

John takes my arm and makes for the helipad, double-time. He points to a seat facing the back, instructs me to buckle up, and keep quiet. I put on the huge headphones corded to a box on the ceiling.

When the rotors start up, the wind is enormous. Great evergreens sway and shrink as we sail up into the sky.

Helicopters are bloody noisy. You have to wear headphones to hear anything; and the others, John, a ranger whose name I forget, the pilot, and co-pilot are having a conversation I'm not allowed in on. Their lips exchange silent words while I stare out at the snow-capped peaks not far off and the groupings of trees below. Someone hands me binoculars.

"We're nearing Elizabeth Pass," says the voice in my headset. "The canyon's beyond that. When I set her down, I need you to stay put, Mr. Matthews."

John nods in agreement.

I can't consider what I may or may not do. Trying to think about anything beyond this second is like hitting a wall. I resume my inspection of the forest floor and meadow. The appropriately named canyon is probably something to look at in spring, but right now it looks desperate, lonely, and dangerous.  

People—three women and two men—come out from a patch of trees, waving their arms. Every bit of vegetation looks as if it's trying to bolt as we land. The canyon's huge, surrounded by steep granite walls and traversed by a stream. Patches of trees sprinkle the edges of a line that I guess is a hiking trail. As the noise of the blades dissipates, everyone unbuckles. Everyone except John and me.

I guess he's decided to make sure I do what I'm told. Obedience has nothing to do with it. I'm scared shitless.

"You should start on the other side. Keep'em even." John removes his headset.

"I hadn't noticed," I say, taking my fingers from my brow.

"We'll wait for them to call us. They have pictures of her."

Pictures may be all I have, as well. "They aren't enough."

The boxy radio on the wall of the craft starts squawking. John's quick to grab it. The voice is loud, fuzzy. I can't understand what they're saying.

I don't even know what she's wearing. Lily and Noah told the police what she had on when they left and I couldn't picture it. My pregnant wife in maternity clothes. My unborn son's picture was posted on the ice box and I couldn't look at it. I can't understand any of this. Why is this happening?

"Mr. Matthews?"

"Yes?" I take a deep breath.

"Your wife, sir, what was she wearing?"

"Um, blue, button-down maternity top and jeans," I'm just repeating Noah's description to the police.

"Does she have any distinguishing marks? Tattoos or birthmark?" John's hand holds the radio beside his mouth. His index finger hovers over a red, oblong button.

"Tattoo." I want to vomit. "A circle of four small rosebuds end to end. Three red and one white." I can see her sitting on the bar stool at The Hard Rock that night, talking and smiling. Covering it up at my mention.

"Where?"

"Right side, on her hip bone." I used to kiss it.

He relays the information to the radio. And waits.   

My throat suddenly bulges. I leap from the seat in time to chuck my coffee out the door. As I gag, the garbled voice blares from the radio.

 "They've got her!"

I dart from the doorway, stumbling on numb legs until John's forearm pins me against the side of a Sequoia. My shirt's in his fist, his elbow near my jaw.

"Not in there. Up there," he points.

I follow his direction to the rocky ledge and up the wall of the canyon. High overhead is a white helicopter with a large red cross painted on the bottom.

Once, Grace and I walked Caleb to the park down the road. She sat on one end of a bench while I lay across it with my head in her lap. She pointed up at a passing helicopter. "That's a Medivac 'copter," she'd said, and went on describing how they could be any color, but the large red symbol on the bottom gave it away. She said they were used for transporting patients in the gravest conditions. 

I'm under the waves again—drowning, lost in that black seawater. The clock was against me. That much I know. I also know it was my own fault for lying so close to the water when the tide was out. I was too drunk to notice the proximity and got pulled into a rip tide. I was lucky to have surfaced at all.

 "Who's in there?" I ask John, pointing to the woods of the canyon.

"Let the police worry about that. We gotta get you out of here. She's heading for Kaweah Delta." He breaks into the trees to relay the information to our pilot while I put together the pieces of what's happened.

The radio call didn't come from anyone I'm with, as I assumed. It had to have come from the other helicopter. And they asked for description because they've found her and now she's bound for the nearest hospital.

"Shit."