Sowing on the Mountain

≈ 18 ≈

Slim was more concerned than she thought he'd be. She didn't have to ask him to come down with her to Pinedale— he volunteered. He'd worked with Headley on an investigation: horn poachers were stealing shed elk antlers off the Game and Fish feedgrounds and the Refuge in Jackson and selling them by the truckload to the Chinese. Big money involved. "But we nailed 'em," he said.

They had a nice time at the yurt, lolling in the sun naked and playing Scrabble, while Gris yawned and snapped at flies. The ski slope was deserted in summer and the yurt was hidden by leaves. She rode her bike down to check the answering machine. The second day there was a message. Headley had a high, twangy voice, like a bluegrass singer. He said he'd gotten her message and asked her to stop in before she went back to Big Sandy. That was all.

She hung out with Krista and worked on some songs, but Gin and Lulu were in Salt Lake so they didn't practice. Compared to the big peaks and high lakes filling her thoughts, the band seemed small. She wondered which self she would choose, if she had to: the wilderness ranger or the punk musician?

It was good that she didn't have to choose. Sometimes she wondered what her Mom would make of her life. She'd probably hate it. Despite her drinking and unemployment and the succession of loser boyfriends, Mom had high standards. That's why I got beaten up so often.

She had to stop and lower her head and weep for a few minutes. The pain could surprise her. Mostly it was under control, deeply buried. Krista asked her, once, if she'd ever seen a therapist. "Of course not," she snapped. But why not? Would that help? To have a stranger rummage through the bloodsoaked bandages and trash of your life? What happened couldn't be taken back. Cuts left scars.

But, dammit, here I am, despite the shit and suffering.

She started working on a new song, beating the crap out of her old guitar and screaming, then stopping to write down words.

The door eased open, on her froggy sweetheart. Gris peered at her, upset.

"If I'm interrupting anything, I can hang out in the woods for a while."

She dumped her guitar on the bed and embraced him, dragging him in and pulling at his buttons and belt.

He reached out and set her guitar aside.

"Okay. Take me," he said. "I'm yours."

One of Slim's best qualities, besides honesty and kindness, was that he never asked her to explain. She knew that if she wanted to talk, or for that matter scream, he would listen. She wondered if that was a genetic thing or if he'd learned it growing up. How would it be to have two parents who actually cared for each other?

But he was a lousy cook, so she got out of bed and into her sweats to cook dinner. In summer, the yurt kitchen was a two-burner propane stove, so she started a pot of rice and then stir-fried handfuls of what she found in the cooler— onion, mushrooms, bell pepper, spinach—and added some canned tuna and chili powder: not exactly fine cuisine, but adequate. Slim's idea of dinner might be ground beef, onions, and ketchup, with white bread and margarine on the side. He even brought canned spaghetti to the yurt and expected her to heat it up.

"I'm not eating that mushy sweet crap," she'd said. "Spaghetti is noodles boiled in water with the sauce cooked in a separate pot. I grew up with Italians and they were always taking pity on me and inviting me for dinner— men around the table with glasses of red wine and women in the kitchen. So I learned a thing or two."

He thought she was a genius at cooking when she was barely adequate. Krista's mom, Louisa, was usually testing a recipe for the cafe she owned, and Mary scheduled band practice for the hours preceding dinner. She didn't mind being a lab rat for fine cuisine. She'd worked at the Park Cafe waiting tables, and hated it. Not a service-oriented person, to put it mildly. But the free food was grand.