Page 5

Seeing the inside of the main cabin wasn’t something I thought would happen, considering all the stuff I’d learned about Hardin. He had strict rules on having shoes off at the door, coats on hooks, and I even witnessed him take his Stetson hat off. He had a thick head of jet hair and slithers of silver slicked back.

I felt like I was on a ride at an amusement park, hands and feet had to stay inside at all times and not to veer of the track. He had a stack of old books, the type I would’ve seen in my grandma’s upstairs bathroom, they all had that off-white cream coloring to them and swirling fonts.

One of his dogs went ahead and followed closely behind him, while the other was laid on its bed, barely looking up to even register I was walking through the house.

“You live alone?” I asked as I sat at the dining table with a cloth lining the length of it.

“I do, but this isn’t my house,” he said. “This place belongs to the owners. A sweet older couple who own businesses and such in California. They bring their employees here on retreats, so it’s big.”

“Too big for one person.”

He hummed. “I only get it to myself for one month out of the year. And it’s nice.” He turned to the stove and placed a pan over it.

I knew I was ruining his plans, and he was very obvious about it. “I actually got you something.” I fished a hand into my pocket. “Wait. Oh. It’s at the cabin.”

“You don’t have to give me anything,”

“It’s just a—” And the moment I was about to say it, I saw the refrigerator door covered in those same magnets I’d bought one of for him. “Oh.”

He caught my eyeline and smiled. “You should keep it,” he said. “A keepsake. I usually offer the ones right off the fridge to guests, so you can happily take another.”

It was embarrassing, even June had told me not to do it, but it didn’t even cross my mind that he would’ve had an entire collection of them already. “I’ll get you something else,” I said. “It’s the least I can do for you sacrificing your time.”

“Please, you don’t have to do that,” he said.

After a little back and forth, he wasn’t going to accept anything. The soup had warmed, he made two bowls up, providing freshly warmed bread rolls, and salted butter.

“I made the bread rolls and butter myself,” he said. “Help yourself.”

“Do you say grace or anything?” I didn’t want to offend him any further than ignoring any customs he might’ve had.

He shook his head. “I know some people will, but if you want to thank anyone, you can thank me.”

“Of course, I was gonna, thank you for offering it to me.”

He kept me on my toes, almost like treading around glass not to say the wrong thing to him. But at least while I was worried about that, I wasn’t beating myself up over not getting any illustrations or storylines written.

“Listen,” he said, tucking a napkin into the collar of his shirt. “I might be a lot of things. I’m not egotistical, you don’t have to thank me, I have a bit of a dry sense of humor, obviously.”

“Then I take my thanks back,” I giggled, copying the motion of tucking the napkin into my t-shirt neckline. “But I am grateful.” I spooned soup to my lips and blew on it. The first mouthful was spicy, I sucked air in immediately to cool my tongue. “It’s a little—oo—um—hot.”

“If you think that’s hot, you’ll have to wait to try my chili.”

For someone who was reminding me about how he liked to be alone, he was already inviting me for another meal. “I like spice, it caught me off guars because it’s supposed to be a tomato soup.”

Hardin shrugged. “It’s surface level spice.” He sucked on a spoonful of soup and smacked a hand down on the table. I nearly jumped out of my seat. “Damn, that’s good.”

“It is nice.” I grabbed at a bread roll, still warm. I pulled it apart to see the steam.

“Put a little butter on that and it’ll melt in like a dream,” he said. “I’ll give you a couple to take back with you as well.”

The food was amazing, and took away some of the impending choice paralysis I was about to go through considering I didn’t have the faintest idea of what I was going to make for myself, and I highly doubt there were pizza delivery services to the area, or that my phone would even work to schedule it.

I also noticed that Hardin had a view of my cabin, while only in the distance, there my cabin was from the view of the window. At least that meant I’d have a view of this place too, and could even potentially get a jump on the day and show him I was prepared.

After dinner, I took some of the eggs, cheese, and bread rolls. He told me that the fridge at the cabin is on generator power, and if I needed to, I could plug my phone in to the outlet. He mentioned there being an additional outlet one and not that I would have to unplug the fridge. We must’ve caught him at a bad time earlier when he seemed annoyed.

Back at the cabin, greeted by a hit of warmth, I undressed down to my teddy bear briefs and only then made sure to close the curtains. The idea of being watched or seen by Hardin nearly naked was exciting, but I wasn’t going to make it weird on purpose.

I danced around in my briefs as I finished unpacking and grabbing my teddy friends from the suitcase. It was the first time in a while that I’d had a dance party to the music in my mind. That way, nobody could say I was dancing off beat.

“Figgle, I thought this was going to be a nightmare,” I told my large green and purple teddy bear with yellow buttons for eyes. “But I don’t think he hates me, so that’s a win.

Figgle was an older teddy and had been fixed and restitched more times than I could count. There was a teddy bear store in New York, only a couple blocks from my apartment. They had inspired the first instalment of Teddy Wars , right when I could still find inspiration from anything, it seemed. The idea of teddies raging war on other teddies to be the number one gift at Christmas, and the ones that were bought as gifts were on a mission to murder all the other teddies they encountered. They weren’t books for kids, they had gore in them, or as much gore as equating stuffing to blood as you could imagine.

That night, I slept in my teddy bear onesie surrounded by the teddies I’d brought. The bed was surprisingly comfy and I’d cocooned myself in a swaddle of the duvet. I almost didn’t want to wake up when the mechanical alarm rang from the bedside table. It was pre-set for six in the morning, and I nearly threw it across the room, if I could pull my hands out of the duvet fast enough.

“Why is the world punishing me?” I called out in a groan before finally peeling a hand away from the warmth to the cold still air of the room. “Eugh.” A stretch, followed by a groan people might’ve mistaken for another sound if they heard it. “I guess all of that was real then.”

Part of me believed I would wake up at home in my apartment and get to re-do my day. I’d have definitely prepared better footwear choices and worn an actual winter coat. The serious part of my brain was on vacation, I didn’t want to have serious thoughts while already in a spiral of doubt and shame.

“Let’s get up,” I told the teddies, but they were not in the mood to wake up so early. After getting out of bed, grouchy, I walked out into the main cabin where it was cooler. The fire was almost out, a couple of flames existed amongst the charred and red hot pieces of wood.

I wondered which of my ancestors had to go through this, because they had my upmost respect for going through with it. All the manual work, and not even a coffee pot to get them started on their day. My eye twitched, knowing I would have to bring a piece of fire wood alight to the stove, just to boil water. It was at that moment, I wondered if my agent hated me.

After a lot of uncredited hard work, I had the fire lit again and the stove working with a teakettle full of water bubbling. The instant coffee was going to hit like a sharp nail to the head, but I’d been an instant coffee drinker for a long time when I had little money. And masked with plenty of sugar, it wasn’t that bad, definitely enough to see me through getting dressed and anticipating Hardin’s heavy-handed knock at the door.

“Are you awake?” his deep voice asked behind the door, following by a tap at the window.

“I’m coming!” I pulled the curtains open to see him stood, looking through. He readjusted the hat on his head and nodded. “I don’t know how you do it, every single morning.”

He smirked, gesturing to the door. “I guess the alarm woke you, I forgot it’s programmed for six. But shuts itself off after three minutes.”

“So, everyone who stays here just wakes up at six?” I asked, opening the door to see both of the dogs running around in the snow. There was a shovel by the porch fence and the work it had done, cutting out a path for me in the house.

He shrugged, a big smile forming on his lips. “Or they throw it in the drawer to drown out the sound.”

“This might be the first time I’ve been up this early on purpose in years,” I admitted, rubbing my hands. There were plenty of times when I had stayed awake through the night to times like this, but I hadn’t set an alarm so early since I was in school. “I’m guessing your body just wakes you up at six.”

“Not a chance. I need an alarm too, especially in these colder months.”

I put my gloves and a knit hat over my head, something I’d found inside of the coat June had given me. Nothing was warm when you were out in the snow, even the sun in the sky was chilly.”Do you get used to the cold too?” I asked.

“Not at all, you just learn to look forward to getting back into the house,” he said. “Speaking of, are you stocked up on kindling? If not, you best do it while I’m around to help. I don’t want you accidentally chopping at a limb with the axe.”

This was my first time using a real wood fire, so I had used maybe a little more wood than I should have. I gave him a single nod. “To be on the safe side, I should get more.”

The wood shed was only a couple paces away, and I thought he had been offering to chop and make a neat stack for me. He just meant he would supervise the action. He helped pull wood from the pile, which was nice, and collect it when I slammed the axe right through it on the large chopping stump. Hardin changed somewhat from last night, cracking jokes. “I might have to hide that thing with the way you’re slicing through this firewood,” he said.

“This is my first time using an axe,” I told him. “Except for yesterday.”

“So many firsts,” he said. “You got enough wood?”

I wanted to make a dick joke so bad, but I held off and giggled to myself about it. I’ve never got enough wood , was the potential zing. This was also all a surprise to me as well, I didn’t think I’d have been good at chopping wood or milking goats, even if I was good at milking wood—in a different context.

As Hardin pulled the sled of firewood to the cabin and stored it in the house, I just watched, cementing the fact he was acting differently today.

“I hope you’re prepared for what’s about to happen,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

“Those chickens are about to be feral.”

“What?”

He nodded, flashing that cheeky grin again. “They’ll peck at you.”

“Oh, balls.”

Hardin laughed. “Not your balls, don’t worry, they won’t reach those.”

Both the dogs had gone ahead to the large red barn, and I was nervous. My palms red hot inside the gloves. I’d had an encounter with the cats and their hissing, the goats and their head butts, and now I’d be going inside the chicken coop to get pecked while picking their eggs.

“Relax,” he said as we were at the barn door. “If they cut ya, I’ve got a first aid kit.”

The moment the small door opened, the entire barn erupted with sound. The chickens clucked and attempted to flap their wings like they could ever fly. Chickens chased goats and cats chased chickens, all of it to be disrupted by the dogs jumping up at the fencing.

Hardin tapped me on the shoulder. “You do the honors,” he said.

I stared up at him, a single brow raised. “Uh—”

“There’s a fence in the way, they’re not gonna get you—” he paused, tapping me once more, “yet.”

In the barn, the dogs acted like negative magnets repelling the animals from them, while the fence I approached was swarmed.

“How do you even get anything done?” I asked, raising my voice over the animals.

“We feed them,” he said. “Once the chickens have their feed, they’re occupied. Then we milk the goats, we feed them, then collect the eggs. Then we go check on the horses, the snow isn’t too bad today, so I might take them out later, depending on how it is in the afternoon.”

I thought I’d have more time to prepare my crotch area to ride a horse, but I also wasn’t going to give him any reason to be annoyed at me. So, I put my biggest smile forth and nodded. “Sounds like a plan.” A plan, I was going to regret.