I am here because I choose to be here. I am where I want to be.
It is not by any force other than my own free will that the actions dictating my state are what they are.
I do not believe in a singular event or circumstance taking on weight so dense that it changes the course of one’s path. Call it destiny, call it fate. It is mere fact that any one person can enter your life with such impact that they forever remain just a simple thought away.
By that reasoning, whichever path I end up taking, it will always be the one I am meant to be on.
I am where I am because I choose to be.
I am here.
~*~
“Good. Now, release your inner energy with a deep breath out. Find your center, your core. Feel it anchor you. Let everything else be a weightless ribbon flowing in the breeze in any direction it chooses, but let it always be tethered to your core.”
She opened her eyes. The dimly lit studio held a solemn peaceful somberness, heady with the faint smell of incense and perspiration. Twelve women and one man sat facing her on neatly-laid yoga mats, legs crossed, eyes closed. Breathing in accordance to how she had been instructing them to breathe. She settled for a moment in the silence until she felt them. Until their energy affected hers.
“Take all the time you need coming back to your center.” She stood. “I will be in the front with waters when you are ready.”
She was drawing open the reception area window shades when she felt fingers gently squeeze her shoulder.
“We are going to miss you, Lainey.”
“Oh, Kat, and I will miss you too. As you know, this decision is one I have been struggling with for some time now. But who knows, maybe I won’t be able to manage out there on my own and I’ll come limping back here before the winter’s thaw.”
“No offense, but I’m rooting for that.” Kat offered an awkward smile. “I know you, Lainey. Christ, we’ve been in each other’s lives in some way since grade school. You’re passionate and no matter what challenge you are facing, you will not quit.”
“Well, I may have appeared strong on the outside, but I had always had Tom behind the scenes pushing me. Helping me. He was the outdoorsman, not me. I mostly went along with it all because his machismo was such a damn turn-on.” She paused and stared past Kat. “I never really thought that, at forty-five, the running joke of me being a hunter’s widow every fall would become permanent.”
“I am so sorry, Lainey.”
“No, no. Please, Kat. I have gotten through the mourning process. Tom and I had a wonderful life together. Trust me, I am at peace with his passing. I think that is why I have to do this. In some strange way, the cabin was like his mistress. Even though I’ve been to it several times, I have yet to meet her in an intimate way. Oddly enough, I’m looking forward to it.”
“Well, Shilo, Idaho isn’t that far, so if you need anything, I’m just a phone call away.”
“And a six-hour drive…”
“I’ll bet I can do it in four!”
“You’re a treasure, Katherine Barkley. Once I get settled out there, please promise me you’ll come for a visit. And not just a weekend, I want you for a whole week at the very least.”
“I’ve already been planning on it.”
~~*~~
The moving van was already parked out front as she drove up. It was much larger than anticipated for the small amount she felt like she still owned. A bustle of young men in well-worked jeans and sleeveless button-down shirts were already carrying boxes out the propped open front door. Raucous music playing from a Bluetooth speaker.
She paused with a sigh, leaning her butt against the front of her Land Rover; a flurry of emotions all battling for superiority inside her mind. The one inside her heart was winning out.
Lainey and Tom were fresh out of college and not even engaged when they bought the house.
He was the traditional one, wanting to use the small amount of savings they had each scraped together to buy a ring, make it official. But she was the practical one. With housing prices on the rise, she had suggested that they use what little they had for a downpayment to get in before the soaring costs passed them by.
They moved in a few months later and lived out their romantic fantasy in sin. Temporarily. Once a week she’d get a reminder from her mother; the old saying about not having to buy the cow when the milk was being offered for free. It took them the better part of a year but they managed to replenish the kitty, saving enough for a modest diamond.
Tom was so proud the day he finally carried her across the threshold and into a world they would build together. But pancreatic cancer cut him short and the unfinished portion of their world was now being carried out the front door, one box at a time.
“Lainey! Oh, thank goodness you are here.” The shrill voice of Lainey’s elderly neighbor Ethel Saddleman startled her back to the present. The sweet old woman was making her way down the sidewalk, one hand raised and shaking a wave over her head. She lived alone and was always around. Always with her nose to the front windows keeping an eye on the goings-on. A blessing in disguise.
“Hi, Ms Saddleman. Sorry for all of the commotion.”
“It’s fine, dear. I mean, that truck there did make quite a rumble as I was grooming Prince Peabody. He’s such an ornery cat if his fur gets tangled up in knots. I swear I don’t know how he does it. Anyway, I was just about finished when I felt the ground begin to shake. At first, I thought maybe it was one of those jumbo airliners they’ve been test-flying over in Tacoma. A plane that big isn’t meant to be airborne. You mark my words, dear, one day there will be a tragedy unlike any we have ever seen.”
Lainey interjected as congenially as she could, “Well, the men here should be finished in a few hours.”
Ms Saddleman went on unphased. “So, I set Prince down and hurried to the picture window. That’s when I saw that monstrosity. Good Lord, you could fit the whole neighborhood in that thing.”
“It is quite big, yes.”
“Then I remembered you saying that today was the day you would be leaving. I didn’t see your truck in the driveway where you usually park it, so I figured it probably slipped your mind.”
“Didn’t slip my mind, Ms. Saddleman. My yoga class just ran a bit la—”
“It’s a good thing I still have your front door key. These boys were rooting about the neighborhood like kids on Halloween looking for tasty treats.”
“I’m sure they were just stretching their legs, Ms Saddleman. They have a lot of work to d—”
“I tracked down the one I thought was in charge and told him I had a key. Man of few words, that one. And he stinks of body odor. If I were you, I would write to the company and tell them they have a real hygiene problem on their hands.”
“I’ll be sure to note that, Ms Saddleman. That reminds me, the new owners are going to need that key. They will most likely change the locks, but I should probably return that one to be safe.”
“Change the locks? Don’t they trust us? I know the crime rates are out of control right now, what with all you hear about on the news. It’s awful, just awful. But this neighborhood is safe. Has been the entire time I’ve lived here.”
“Be that as it may, Ms Saddleman, I really should take the key back. I will miss you, though. I’ll try and email you some pictures from the cabin once I get everything hooked up.”
“Oh, my. I’m not very good with that interweb mail, dear. Why folks can’t be bothered to take a picture and get it developed is beyond me. You know they used to give you double prints of all your pictures and some places wouldn’t even charge you extra for it. I used to think it was just the young clerk trying to butter me up until Janet Cranston told me it was standard practice...”
Ethel Saddleman was still talking as Lainey pulled her in for a long hug goodbye, making a mental note to contact the buyer’s agent to task him with retrieving the spare key.
~~~*~~~
Winters in Shilo seemed to arrive all at once, a solid white veil being pulled over the once-green hills like a blanket bidding the countryside goodnight. Its monochromatic drab would last, colorless for months. A mellow, stoic vibe that would pull and peck at Lainey’s resolve. She told herself she needed it, a cathartic release of the spirit that, regardless of her tough exterior, continually haunted her.
The cold air of the cabin seemed to preserve his smell, locking it in, a stale mixture of his cologne and burned wood.
Only a few boxes remained unpacked, now pushed aside into the corner atop a warren of wood-plank floors, threadbare carpets, and steeply pitched open-beamed ceilings. She had removed all the hunting trophies from the walls and gathered them into one stall in the three-car garage. Tom’s pride had shown through them but, in her mind, there was no need for the constant reminder of death.
Time was passing. For better or worse, life in the cabin was becoming routine.
She was midway through a steaming hot shower when her water turned tepid, then lukewarm and quickly frigidly cold. “Shit!” She danced through a rinse of any remaining suds and killed the torturous sprinkling of icy droplets.
Wrapping herself in a full-body fleece robe, Lainey made her way down to the basement where the boiler was housed. A smell of oil hit her nose as she descended.
“Pilot must’ve gone out,” she mumbled to herself.
Peering around, she found some instructions that had been scribbled on the side of some unfinished sheetrock. In her mind she pictured herself hovering over a vision of Tom as he scrawled them down:
Step One, turn control knob to pilot position.
Step Two, insert lit fireplace match into access hole.
Step Three, don’t blow the fuckin’ place up.
If steps one and two fail to work, call Marley to ensure step three.
Marley Richardson. She had completely slipped through Lainey’s thoughts. A handsome woman with long slender legs and shortly cropped hair, she was the local taxidermist. One that Tom had used on occasion for the prized captures that now resided in the unlit garage stall.
Marley had apparently also doubled as a handywoman for the odd job around the cabin. Lainey dialed the phone number that had been scratched into the sheetrock alongside Marley’s name.
“Yup,” her breath floated like a small cloud in the now cold basement. “Looks like the pilot injector is gummed up. If you’ll fetch me a Q-tip and some rubbing alcohol, I’ll have this place warmed up in no time.”
As she waited, Lainey huddled over her stove; four blue flames were trying desperately to warm the kitchen. Marley entered wringing her hands in an old dishcloth.
“I sure was sorry to hear about Mr. Fowler.”
It was a simple statement made with the sincerest of intentions and one Lainey had heard hundreds of times over the past eighteen months since Tom’s passing. But this time it hit her like a gust of Arctic air tumbling over snow-covered earth to careen into her chest. She felt heavy and her legs went weak. Silence wrapped the kitchen. Only the gentle shush of the stove’s smokeless burners filled the air. It was soon joined by the snap and ping of the baseboard pipes as heated water rushed in to expand the metal.
“Sounds like the heat’s back on.” Marley smiled demurely.
“You knew Tom.”
“Of course. Most folks in this town know one another.”
“How well?”
“Depends on the folks I guess.”
“No. How well did you know my husband?”
The words had a bite, unintentional. The emotion was still stabbing at Lainey’s chest.
“Well, I did some work for him. He was a master huntsman. Judging by the now-bare walls, I take it you were not a fan?”
“Did you and he ever…?”
Marley leaned back into the kitchen counter, a confident ease washing over her stature.
“All due respect, Mrs Fowler—”
“Lainey.”
“All due respect, Lainey, but the only interest I had in Tom was his ability to take out a pronghorn with a single arrow from a longbow.”
Lainey took in a breath and blew it in to warm the gathered palms of her hands. “Of course, I apologize. It’s just...you’re a beautiful young woman and he spent a lot of time up here, alone, away from me.”
“I’m a beautiful woman who is only attracted to other beautiful women.” She smiled and let the words register.
“Oh...OH!”
“Yeah. Anyway, I won’t charge you for this visit. I was just happy at the chance to finally meet you.”
“I’m embarrassed.”
“Don’t be. Tell you what.” She stepped closer to where Lainey was still standing by the stove. “I’ll let you make it up to me sometime...over dinner.”
That night Lainey lay awake in her bed. Restless. The pale light of a full moon cast blue-like shadows around the room. Her thoughts were rampant, almost uncontrollable. She missed Tom. She missed his warmth and the way his hulking body took up most of the space in their bed. She missed his breath, his affection, his manhood, his cock.
She slipped her left hand down her stomach and under the waistband of her not-so-flattering thermals. Her pussy was wet, needy. She let a finger nestle in the heat; such a divergence from the cold air that settled on top of the duvet. The upper pad of skin along the top of her palm pressed firmly onto her clit. She closed her eyes and let the tip of her finger slowly curl inward.
It felt good. She slid another in to join, spreading her open more, alternating in motion to walk over the sensitive sponge-like button along her pelvic bone. She moaned, subdued at first as if purposely trying not to disturb anyone else in the house. The feel of her presence in the cabin was still new, like a vacation.
She pushed her fingers deeper, pressing them down into her lower wall. She cried out louder now; it was her fucking room, it was time she took control.
Harder. Faster. Fingers plunged in and out sloshing in her growing arousal. Her teeth pinched her bottom lip as she felt her climax approach. It fluttered in her stomach like a thousand butterfly wings being released all at once. She screamed to the ceiling, arched her back, and came.
Minutes passed and her hand still held snuggly to her mound, middle two fingers motionless inside her throbbing pussy. Her breath was ragged. One bent leg moved to curl over the top of the other as she shifted to lie on her side pinning her hand in place. The modest diamond she still wore dug its points into the inside of her thigh.
~~~~*~~~~
A mechanical buzzing woke Lainey the next morning. Like a chainsaw, but instead of shorts bursts, it was one long BRAAAAP and getting louder as if it were approaching. She pushed the pile of blankets off with her feet and made her way to the bedroom window, peering down from the second floor. It was mid-morning. She’d slept late.
The sun was already bright, made brighter with its reflection off the thickly settled snow. She squinted until her sleepy eyes could adjust. A red snowmobile bounded over a layer of pristine white powder kicking up a sparkling, diamond-like trail of frozen dust in its wake. The figure atop the machine, dressed in a bright blue snowsuit, was waving as they pulled into the cabin’s front yard.
“You’re gonna need one of these if you wanna get around!” Marley called out as she flipped up her helmet’s tinted visor.
Lainey now stood in the opened front door, arms pinning her robe tightly shut as cold air shoved itself against her face.
Hopping off the mechanical steed, Marley trudged the few feet to the door, stomped her boots against the threshold, and pushed past Lainey.
“You have a snowsuit, yes?” she asked.
“I should. I mean...I think I saw one...in the mudroom.” Lainey’s mind was still trying to process the unannounced intrusion.
“Good. Layer up and put it on. I’m taking you out.”
“Out? Where? I’m still in my pajamas. I haven’t even had coffee yet.”
“You go get dressed and I’ll fix us a couple of thermoses to go. It’s only gonna get colder out there the longer we wait.”
The day was carefree. Freezing cold, even in the strong rays of the sun, but Lainey hardly felt it. The exhilaration of being pulled over the top of snow-covered fields, holding tightly to the waist of Marley as she navigated the way, and the buzz of the machine’s engine vibrating her crotch, all worked to distract her thoughts from the cold. A fluster momentarily dragging her away from what her mind had been conditioned to feel for the past year and a half.
Soon it was dark, the snow machine resting quietly in the front. Clouds had swiftly moved in and began to drop more snow, a slowly thickening eruption into a full-blown storm. It was as unexpected as Marley’s impromptu snowmobile tour of the acreage that surrounded Lainey. An area that was vast and beautiful and made her feel small. Insignificant and vulnerable.
Marley was adding wood to a fire that was working to warm the living room. Flames danced across the bridge of aged wood, crackling and sending hot orange licks up into the flu.
“You should think about getting a dog,” she called over to Lainey who was busy in the kitchen. “The winter months here are brutal and lonely.”
“I hope you like ravioli and jarred red sauce.” The reply came back. “It’s the fanciest food I have that would suit the dinner I owe you for fixing the heat last night.”
“I’m not picky.” Marley moved to join Lainey in the kitchen. There was an awkward pause in the conversation.
“Does it bother you?”
“The ravioli and jarred sauce? I told you I’m not pi—”
“What you do...for a living. Those animals. The death.”
Their eyes met in the low light. Steam rose from a pot of water off to Lainey’s left, a torn-open box of frozen ravioli sitting alongside waiting to be doused. Marley took another step toward her, only the four-foot granite countertop of the island separated them.
“Is that what you see, Lainey? Death?”
“I’ve never really thought about what I see, I just know it gives me an uneasy feeling.”
“My father taught me the craft. His taxidermy shop was in our basement. I was just a curious little girl and would hide under the stairs where he couldn’t see me and I’d watch him work. At certain points in the process, he would pause. He would take a step back and just stand there silent and motionless. I thought maybe it was because he was tired, or his hands ached. I would later learn that that wasn’t it at all. What halted him was reverence.”
“Reverence?”
“Even in their inanimate state, he could see the life within them. He could feel the cold of each winter they had endured as he ran his hands over their thick, coarse pelts. He could read the breadth of their arduous journeys embedded in each sinuous muscle. What most people cannot see, blinded behind a veil of fear, he could bring forward to a place of eternal beauty.” Marley paused and listened to the pot of water gurgling in a rolling boil.
“What blinds you, Lainey? What do you fear?”
~~~~~*~~~~~
Dinner was mostly small talk. Stories of Ms Saddleman and her unending tangles with the HOA and frivolous neighborhood politics. Lainey opened herself up, sharing her love for yoga and mindfulness. She suddenly felt drawn to try and impress this young taxidermist, to prove herself. She needed Marley to know that she was not the only one who could feel the connection with nature.
“Storm seems to be getting worse, at best it hasn’t let up.” Marley was standing by the picture window her fingers pressed to the glass, drapes pushed to one side, her breath cascading into the panes. Dirty dinner plates sat unattended on the table. “I want to stay here, Lainey.”
Lainey paused where she was crouched, pulling another log from the bin to place on the fire. She looked up. The words felt queer in her ears. They were light and heavy at the same time; mundane and pragmatic but overtly meaningful.
She reasoned.
It was late in the evening and far too dangerous for Marley to venture out. She only had a snow machine with limited range, and in the storm, the visibility would be too low. It made sense for her to stay. Then why did the statement, posed as somewhat of a declaration, garble the thoughts in Lainey’s mind?
“Of course,” she finally answered. “I can make up the spare room. The sheets might be a bit musty, I haven’t had the time to launder them.” She stopped herself and chuckled a breath out of her nose. “I guess that’s not true. Christ, I’ve had nothing but time. Maybe, I didn’t think I would ever have the need.”
Marley joined her on the floor to kneel in front of the hearth. The heat from the fire enveloped them. The storm outside raged against the windows, whistling through tiny gaps in the sills.
“What do you see, Lainey?”
“What do you mean?” she responded with a nervous smile.
“You’ve been out here for a while now. When you look around you, what do you see?”
“I don’t know. I see you. I see this cabin. I see a fire. I see the storm.”
“Deeper, Lainey. What are you so afraid of?”
“Life, I suppose...without him?” She shrugged.
“Bullshit. He’s gone. You said so yourself not more than thirty minutes ago that you are through the mourning process. Or was that just a well-rehearsed line?”
“What the fuck do you want from me, Marley? I hardly even know who you are?”
“I want the life inside you to show through. I can see it. I don’t think you can.”
~~~~~~*~~~~~~
For the second consecutive night, Lainey lay awake. And for the second consecutive night, thoughts ran rampant through her mind. Maybe this was a mistake. Maybe she wasn’t strong enough. Maybe abandoning her dream and her world to dive headfirst into Tom’s was de trop.
“It wasn’t.” The voice carried softly into the room, the silhouetted frame of Marley leaning against that of the doorframe.
Lainey had been so wrapped up inside her head she hadn’t been aware of Marley’s presence.
“Huh?”
“You were thinking about it, weren’t you? What I said earlier, I can tell.”
“And how can you know what I’m thinking?”
“For one, you’re awake and staring blankly at the ceiling.” She slowly made her way to the edge of the bed and knelt in a crouch. “It wasn’t a mistake, Lainey. Any of this. I know this sounds silly and somewhat cliche, but we are all meant to be wherever we are. Whatever our arduous journey is, it is meant to happen.”
She gently slid a tendril of hair from Lainey’s cheek.
“What are you doing?”
“What I know you want. Now, slide over.”
“Oh no...I don’t know, Marley. I’ve never—”
“—been with a woman?”
“Been with anyone other than Tom.”
“A virgin of sorts, my lucky day.” Marley stood and walked to the foot of the bed. “You’re just scared, Lainey. Jesus, you are so fucking rooted in fear that you are even too afraid to admit to it.” She kept moving until she reached the opposite side of the bed; now just a featureless shadow, backlit by the ambient light bleeding in from the unshaded window behind her.
“I’m entitled to that, to feel the way I feel.”
“You are an independent woman, Lainey. You wouldn’t have come here, to an unfamiliar place in the middle of winter, alone, if you weren’t strong. The problem is, it seems as though you need someone to show that to you. And that person is gone. Isn’t he?”
Marley moved again, crawling onto the bed. Lainey felt her world spinning. It seemed dream-like. As if Marley were just a ghost, an apparition, a figment of her own lust-filled imagination. Her heart thumped in her chest, raging against her breastbone like the swirls of snowy wind pounding the side of the cabin.
She laid silent, frozen. Unsure of what to do, what to say, how to feel.
“It’s okay, Lainey. It is all okay. Listen to me, I am here.”
She felt Marley’s breath before she felt her lips, as soft and pillowy as the top layer of snow. She didn’t fight it. She wasn’t sure she wanted it, but at least something other than her own fingers were causing her to feel.
“Close your eyes,” Marley whispered, lips grazing against Lainey’s heated cheek. “Let this happen. I promise you, we will exorcise that spirit inside.”
Marley’s words offered Lainey a frisson of amelioration annunciated with a deeply expelled sigh.
“Good girl.”
Lainey’s body surrendered even though her mind was still cloudy. She focused on Marley’s touch, gentle fingers tracing lightly over what little skin was exposed. The side of her cheek, down to the edge of her earlobe, then circling back across her collarbone to the nape of her neck. It was soothing, lulling, caring.
Conversely, she had always liked it when Tom had been rough, laying his hand across her throat and squeezing, claiming her as his. She would shudder under his grip, blood coursing to every erogenous nerve-ending, swelling her labia, her clit, as his thick calloused fingers would explore. She would goad him on, whisper in his ear how she wanted him to fuck her. She’d scream out for him to push harder and it turned her on to feel how stiff his cock would get when she did. She would dig her nails into the flesh of his ass and expose the cleft of her neck to his teeth. Body and soul, she was his.
Marley, on the other hand, was taking her time, an exact contrast to what Lainey had been accustomed to. As foreign as reaching out to feel the absence of a stubbled jaw. Soft womanly features replaced thick bulbous shoulders, breasts appeared where she was used to palming swollen pectorals.
A whisper tickled her ear, void of any baritone intonation. “I’m going to fuck you, Lainey. I am going to take you to a place where your mind will not remember anything other than a feeling of pure bliss. You may not think you are ready, but when I am done, you will realize what you have been missing.”
Lainey closed her eyes and focused on the stinging pinch of teeth on her earlobe. She felt Marley’s tongue dart in and out, then drag across her neck, up under her chin, across her lips. A breath escaped her nose as she slightly parted, letting Marley push into her mouth. Soft lips pressed into hers, sweet gentle stabs as she kissed back, letting all apprehension carry away.
“That’s it, Lainey.” The words were mumbled into the kiss as she felt more of Marley’s weight shift closer. One leg draped over to rest on top of hers which was still covered under the protective warmth of blankets.
The complexities that fragmented her mind were now beginning to compartmentalize. Fall into place. Uncloud her mind and steady her breathing.
Marley was not just a woman who was now removing her clothes to join Lainey under the covers. She was energy. Physical, unadulterated, sexual energy.
“Take me…” Lainey whispered the words into the darkness and waited.
The room, the cabin, the stormy world outside, anything other than the bed they were in seemed to fade from relevance.
Marley’s warm soft palm glided across Lainey’s abdomen, hitching into the tight-fitting thermal top and pushing it up to expose her tits. Nipples like tiny hardened beads sat atop each mound. They were quickly enveloped by the suckle of Marley’s hungry mouth.
Lainey’s need quickly burgeoned as she was being taken down this unfamiliar path of arousal. Her pulsating clit was now pumping her mind into overdrive. She seized the opportunity to verbalize her excitement, testing out the sound of it with her tongue. “Wet your fingers, Marley. Let me taste you.”
The suckling stopped and Marley’s smiling face rose from under the covers.
“Someone is waking up.”
Marley rolled to her back, her body invisible under the shroud of blankets, but by the expression on her face, Lainey knew Marley’s fingers were already inside. She could see the slow methodical rise and fall of a tiny bump in the bedspread. She listened to the soft low moans emanate from Marley’s lips. She ran a hand over Marley’s taught young stomach feeling her heat, her passion; trailing her fingertips until they met the side of Marley’s arm.
It was as if Marley was lost in her own world.
