A Time in Heaven (11 page)

Katie
watched the drama in the sky while
seated
cross legged on the dock.  Jesse sat with his feet over the dock
.  Late in the morning, they situated themselves
on the end of the dock together
,
just watching over the water for the expected plane.
Katie wrapped an assuring arm around Jesse’s waist, but she was scared.

It suddenly popped
into Katie’s head that Smith hadn’t said
someone else would pick them up.  What he did say was that he wasn’t coming back to get them.  At the time it didn’t
make much difference how he had phrased
it, but now she thought that he actually meant that he was not co
ming back to get them, nor was anybody else
.

With
alarm
in her eyes, Katie looked at Jesse, “Smi
th is not coming back.  Jesse, h
e told me he would not be coming back to get us.  I just assumed it would be someone else.  I was wrong. There will be no plane.”

“Now wait a minute, even if Smith doesn’t come, people know where we are.  Your family knows that you came to Heaven
to go
fishing, don’t they?  And
a couple of
dozen people know where I am.  Katie, there will be a plane when all these people realize we didn’t come
back. S
omeone will come and get us.
There will be a plane
”

“OK,”
Katie paused,
“but
why aren’t they here?”

Jesse thought
for
a moment, trying to come up with an answer.  Then Katie said, “We aren’t even due back yet.  Didn’t you say that you were staying in Seattle last night?   So was I.  My plane home wasn’t even leaving until noon today.”

The comment startled Jesse.
“But you weren’t goin
g to be on it, were you?”  He
wanted to make sure Katie hadn’t changed her mind about touring with him.
It seemed he wasn’t as confident in Katie as he thought.

“No Jesse. I was staying with you.  I have no plans of ever l
eaving you out of my sight again,”
Katie told Jesse.

He leaned over and kissed her, then said
reassuringly
, “So no one has had time to miss us.  We shouldn’t even expect a plane to be here before
this
evening.”

“Any ideas on how
to pass the time until then?”
Jesse said to Katie
with the familiar sparkle in his eyes.
They left the gear on the dock.  Katie grabbed Sadie’s leash and they all headed back to the cabin.
  They
ended up not making
love
. The two of them just
lay
on the bed together making plans for the future.  It passed the time, but neither of them was sure what the future would bring for them if they didn’t get off the island.
They both knew that it was a definite possibility.

Late in the afternoon,
Jesse and Katie were back at the dock.  They were in better spirits, since they fully expected to be picked up by a float plane before sun down.

As the day faded,
so did the hope of a plane coming for them
. 
With the sun setting,
Katie was sitting on the ground holding on to Sadie and crying. Jesse walked away from Katie and headed toward the fish cleaning shed.
He was out of sight when Katie heard a tremendous crash.  Both she and Sadie jumped up from where they were sitting.
Katie yelled for Jesse, but there was no answer.  She ran for where she saw him disappear.  Sadie was right behind her. 

She arrived at the shed just in time to see Jesse throwing a rock through another window in the shed. He picked up a large branch from the ground and swung back to smash it against the side of the building, when Katie screamed for him to stop.

Jesse dropped the branch and just stood there starring at the ground.  Katie ran to him, and looked at his face.  He looked like he had just lost the most important thing in the world to him.  And in a way he
had
.  If he didn’t get off this island, there would be no tour, no record contract.  His music career would be over.

Katie knew what he was
thinking.
  She put her arms around him and tried to comfort him.  “Jesse, don’t give up yet.  They could still come
.
”

Jesse broke free of her.  She could see that there was anger in his eyes now.  “Don’t you see?!  No one is coming for us!  I don’t know why. It makes no sense, but they are not coming.  We are stranded on this
damn
island they call Heaven. 
Well Katie, it’s
not heaven, it
s hell!”
This time he went to Katie
to be consoled
.  They stood together hugging for a long time.
“I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t have you
right now
.” He told her.

It was
dark now, and with the cloud cover, they couldn’t really see
much of
the path back to the cabin.  Jes
se had left the flashlight on the table
.  He hadn’t planned on having to use it again.  He took Katie
by the hand and they slowly started to make
their way back to the cabin.  Sadie bumped against Jesse’s leg so he was able to find her lea
sh. They all inched their way back
.

At the cabin Je
sse found the flashlight. It gave him
enough light to
ignite
the lantern and to
start the fire in the fireplace.  Katie gave Sadie something to eat and a fresh drink of water. The mood was pretty glum as they got ready for bed. Katie kissed Jesse and curled up in his arms.

Jess
e couldn’t sleep.  He
lay
in bed
with Katie in his arms.  The clouds had gone so that the full moon illum
inated the cabin now.  The moon
light made her look like an angel. He gently touched her face.

He couldn’t help think how fortunate he was to have found Katie on this trip
, He
hadn’t expected to ever fall in love again
, but he had – to the
remarkable woma
n lying in his arms.
  He quietly
watched her breathing for the longest time.
He finally fell into a peaceful sleep.

Near dawn, Katie’s stirrings woke Jesse up. He softly kissed her and she settled back to sleep. As he watched her,
his thoughts went
back to the fact that they had
somehow been abandoned here, and he wasn’t going to make his comeback in the music world.  He had waited so long and had worked so hard to make it happen. Now all of it was going to be gone.
  He looked back at the woman beside him.  Maybe things aren’t so bad, he thought to himself.  He ever so lightly kissed her.

Although the possibility of his music career being lost
was devastating, Jesse soon came
back
to the real
ization that this situation he and Katie
have found themselves in
,
was a real threat to their lives. Food was going to be a problem.  There was still some food here in the cabin, but not enough to last but a few days.  Jesse wondered if maybe there was food in the other cabins.  They would have to check it out tomorrow.  He thought that most of the food probably was in the pantry at the lodge.

Keeping warm was another big concern. Winter was comi
ng soon to Alaska.  The cabin
had a fireplace for warmth but not much cut wood. Beside the fireplace there was
only a small
propane
stove that made
any
heat.  Although there were four more tanks at the other cabins, there certainly wasn’t enough propane to last long.  Again his thoughts went back to the lodge, and the huge fireplace with plenty of fire wood. He had also seen a huge pile of wood in the back when they left the building with Smith
that first day
.

Oh, but the lodge!  He’d almost forgotten about the body in the upstairs hall. How would he ever get Katie to go back there? God, he didn’t want to go back inside the lodge either. But, they needed to go b
ack in if they had any hopes of surviving until spring
.

Jesse looked toward the window and saw t
hat the sun was coming up.  He had gotten some sleep last night but with all this thinking and worrying,
he was still tired.  He decided to lie still and let Katie sleep a little longer.   “Hell, we c
an sleep all day if we want to,”
Jesse said barely loud enough so that he could hear himself. “We have no place to go today.”
He closed his eyes and let sleep come to him.

Katie woke up about an hour later when Sadie started moving around and whining to go outside.  “What time is it Jesse?” Katie asked rather frantically
as she shook him
. “Shouldn’t we be at the
dock?
A plane could come any time!”

Jesse grabbed her and looked into her eyes, “Katie.  We need to come to terms with the
reality
that a plane is
not
coming.  It would have been here yesterday. We need to figure out how we are going to survive here.”

“NO!”  Katie screamed at Jesse as she pushed him away. “The plane
will
come!”
  She paused when she had a flashback
, “
Jesse, do you remember when we
were cleaning the lodge and I
told you that I had heard something on that old radio.
Something
about there being a memorial service for Jesse Danvers?” She stopped and stared at Jesse.

“What if that is what I truly heard? What if they were having a memorial service for,” she paused again. “For you.”

“Everyone thinks we’re dead?  How coul
d that be?  What did Smith do?”
Jesse asked angrily.

Katie had an idea. “Maybe Smith did kill that person in the lodge.
He had to know we would find the body
.
So he decided not to come back.
”

“But how did he convince our family and friends that we were dead? It just doesn’t add up. There would have been an investigation.”
Jesse just shook his head trying to make sense of their situation.

There was no time for speculation right now. H
e was determined to try to explain to Katie how important it was going to be that they go back to the lodge.  “Katie we have to gather as much food as w
e can find in the other cabins.”
Jesse paused, “and in the lodge.”

Katie almost
immediately
responded, “NO!
I am not setting foot back in that lodge.” She glared at Jesse
for a second then headed toward the bathroom
. “I want to take a shower now.”

“I’ll go get our bags from the dock” Jesse told her.  “You can take your shower,
and then
we have to talk.”
Jesse put the leash on Sadie and they headed out the door.

Katie called after them with, “We can talk all you want, I am not going back to the lodge and that dead guy!”

Jesse brought Katie’s things back first.  Katie grabbed a towel, her toiletries and a change of clothes from her backpack without saying a word to Jesse, and went into the bathroom. He took the dog back with him to the dock to get the rest of their gear.  “Well, girl, this isn’t going to be easy, is it? Are you as
worried
as I am?  Let me tell you something. Do you promise not to tell Katie?” He reached down and pet
ted Sadie down her
back. “I am terrified.  If the world thinks we are dead, there won’t be anyone coming to this camp until next spring
when the camp opens up again
.  We are going to have to survive the winter
by ourselves
. I don’t think we have enough food or warm clothes.  And if I can’t get Katie to move into the lodge, we won’t have to worry about the other
things;
we’ll just freeze
in the cabin
without heat.”

When Jesse and Sadie returned to the cabin,
the bathroom door was still closed
.
Jesse could h
ear Katie crying. He took the leash off
Sadie,
and then
he
knocked on the bathroom door.  There was no answer, but the sobbing stopped. He knocked again.

Katie slowly opened the door and collapsed into Jesse’s arms. He sat her down on
a chair, and then crouched
down beside her.

“Jesse,”
she sobbed, “How could something as beautiful as you and I finding each other
, and falling in love
, suddenly turn into this
horrid
nightmare
we are in?”