Page 36 of Mazywood

SATURDAY

2:45 P.M.

THE SNOW WASN’T BEAUTIFUL TO any of them after twenty minutes on Route 89.

The wipers whimpered with the sound of panic, losing ground against the wet flakes flying across the windshield, obscuring Johnny’s view of the two-lane road. The road was white, almost an optical illusion. When Johnny blinked, he had to reorient to discern the road from the shoulder. His vehicle’s touchscreen map confirmed that they were a blue dot in a sea of white.

Route 89 was bordered on both sides by pine trees pointing toward the sky like whitewashed spears. Three-foot snowbanks attested to the previous plowing being undone by new snowfall. He couldn’t remember concentrating this hard to drive before, and at nineteen he’d been foolish enough to drive home during a summer tropical storm with sheeting rain. Now the tire chains rumbled on the snow-packed road with a rhythmic clanking like a ghost dragging shackles beneath them. What the fuck had he been thinking?

The chatter in the car had faded to silence. Sharise was no longer narrating their journey, Imani had stopped playing videos she’d saved on her phone, and Tasha was sitting frozen beside him, her eyes on the road like she was the one driving. No one had said anything, but they knew he wasn’t used to driving in this much snow. He wished he’d paid more attention to the forecast back at the mini-mart, but he didn’t dare turn on his radio. The noise from the chains was already a grating distraction.

Tasha let out a slow exhalation that told him she was breathing consciously to bring down her stress level, or her nausea. “Maybe we…” she began, her voice sad.

Johnny nearly let out a laugh. Too late to turn back now. He’d reached the point where he would rather make it to the lodge than return to town. He wouldn’t want to drive again until Monday, when they were ready to go home.

“We’re good,” Johnny assured her. “The turnoff is close.”

Unless he had already passed it. Unless he wouldn’t see it in the flurries.

“Is that it?” Sharise asked, her voice shrill with hope. She pointed over Johnny’s shoulder, toward the left. Johnny hadn’t realized how far Sharise had scooched herself up behind the front seat to be a third pair of eyes.

“Is your seat belt on—?” Tasha said.

“Where, Sharise?” Johnny interrupted Tasha. He didn’t see a break in the trees.

“Right after that tree that’s bent funny?” Sharise said.

Yes, Johnny realized. In rows of straight trunks, one ahead was twisted in a strange S shape he remembered from childhood. At the time, he’d never seen a tree grow that way. The turnoff was ten yards beyond it, a white trail in a narrow gap. A portion of long-rotted wooden fencing dangling from its post confirmed that there was, indeed, a road. When he first visited here, the fence had stretched a long way down. How had Sharise seen the turn coming from such a distance? He liked to think he wouldn’t have missed it, but he wasn’t sure.

“Thanks,” he said. “Your mom’s right—seat belt.”

Sharise slid back in her seat. Johnny slowed, but waited to hear her seat belt click before he made the turn. He remembered ditches on either side of this road, and he didn’t want to make it this far only to get stuck—or worse, flip over. The RAV’s rear tugged against the chains as he turned, wanting to go its own way, but his tires stayed gripped far clear of the road’s edge.

“Great job, Daddy!” Imani said. Warm relief was growing in the car. Tasha patted his knee, echoing Imani’s praise.

“Should be less than a mile from here,” Johnny said. “I walked to this road from the lodge once.” He had run to this road, actually, before Uncle Ricky drove to catch him in his VW Beetle. Johnny could still see the cold exhaust pluming from his uncle’s car, painted red from the taillights, wreathed around Uncle Ricky like mist when he climbed out to try to coax Johnny back. Johnny shook away that memory like the wipers shoving aside the snow.

“A sign!” Imani said. Her face was close to her window behind Tasha.

There it was, same as ever, his grandmother’s wooden sign: BEAR CREEK LODGE. And the new sign Johnny had asked Dick Hollman to put up reminding drivers that the road was private. The snowfall was slowing, the lodge was close, and relief resurrected the chatter.

“We’re in the real woods!” Imani said. “No more fake woods.”

“What do you mean ‘fake’?” Tasha said. “We’ve been to the woods—”

“She really lived out here?” Sharise asked. “Why, though?”

“Hey—guys?” Johnny said. “I’m still trying to stay on the road. Save it, please.”

They fell silent again, barely restrained. Imani rocked in her seat, eager. “Yes, yes, yes…” she whispered to herself, her voice softer than the chains’ rattle.

Johnny was the first one to see the Jeep.

Instinct made him nudge his brake to slow their approach. The white Jeep seemed randomly parked at first, until he noticed the fencing just beyond it with the welcome sign. Someone had beaten them to the lodge. Could it be Dick Hollman after a change in plans?

But Hollman drove a red pickup truck, not a white Jeep. It wasn’t Hollman.

“Are we here?” Imani asked.