Heart Spring Mountain by Robin MacArthur

Author:Robin MacArthur
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2017-11-17T00:00:00+00:00

Stephen

DECEMBER 14, 1986

How long has he been here, in the cabin? The snow falling in deep drifts around him. The cold, bone deep.

He can make out, on the moonlit windowsill, an animal skull, the size of his fist, and a blue jar full of feathers.

One day when he was a kid—six? Seven?—he walked up here, skipping, ready to find Lena, and heard voices. Laughter. He knelt by a tree ten feet away, not breathing. Who could Lena have here?

And then, from within these walls, these very walls, a familiar whistle. His father’s.

He’d recognize it anywhere.

Lena’s laughter again. Then silence. Just squirrel, wind, distant highway.

Stephen stood up, crept to the window, looked in, and saw the naked body of Lena, rising, her breasts loosened, nipple, waist, long hair, and from below, heard his father’s laughter.

A beast, Lena looked like. A terrifying half human, her eyes turned inward in a way he had never seen before.

Stephen tiptoed away and ran down the hill. He ran into the barn, climbed up the ladder to the hayloft and made a bed there, amid the bales. Lay there for hours, filling his fists with hay.

He’s never told a soul.

Not Hazel. Not Deb. Not Bonnie. Not Danny. The holding of that secret is part of what makes him, he is sure, a good father, a good partner. The not-burdening of others.

This cabin—where Lena and his father lay. The woman who married an owl. Christ, he is cold. He should go home, but his legs won’t move. So cold. He should go back to Deb and Danny.

His family. When he thinks of them, asleep now in the loft of the cabin below, he feels proud, generous, and thinks how tomorrow morning he will wake before Deb and get the fire going early, make her coffee and bring it to her, like he used to do, and when he does he will bend down and kiss the soft skin of her forehead. Maybe, if Danny’s still sleeping, they will even make love. He would like that. He would not be afraid to make love in the daylight. He will not be afraid to let her undress him, like she used to do. And he wants to undress her, too. Slip that nightgown up and over her shoulders. Kiss the soft skin between her breasts. Hold them in his hands. Be still there. Put his breath into her ear. Say something. What would he say? I love your body. I love your arms and your hands and your neck and your hair. I’m so glad you are here. He will do it. In the morning he will say the words, and then, if she wants, they could make love, and he would wait for her to come, wait for that tender and quiet release that he loved to feel, that ripple below his body, and then he would come inside her, too.

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