As You Were (21 page)

26

“I‘M HUNGRY.” BRITTANY APPROACHED TRU, who sat on the bed gazing out the bedroom

window, her guitar next to her. The snow fell hard and fast, and she had stopped her composing to
consider it.

“Me, too. Why don’t you go pick something out of the freezer?”

Brittany shuffled out of the room and returned moments later, interrupting the song Tru

tinkered with, “It’s empty.”

She looked up at her in disbelief. “Are you sure?”

“What do you mean ‘am I sure’? I can see the bottom. It’s empty.”

“That’s impossible. I would have noticed it the last time I was digging around in there.”

“I’d hate to think you’re calling me a liar.” Brittany stood with her hands on her hips.

Tru huffed, and put the guitar down on the bed and got up.

“I’d also hate to think you’re going to go look after I already told you—“

Tru halted, thinking.

Brittany dragged the nail of her index finger over the strings of the Ovation, absently. “So now what?”

Tru hovered by the doorway, frowning, and pushed her hands into her pockets. “I don’t understand it. Are you pulling a fast one? Remember, that five-second rule.”

Brittany strummed once, loudly, and glared at her. “I’m hungry. Why would I hide the food?”

“So you could eat it later?” Tru could see by her expression that the empty freezer was not Brittany’s doing. “Okay, I believe you...
I still don’t understand how I could have overlooked it—”

“So let’s go to the store.”

Tru cocked an eyebrow at her. “Right. You speak to God. I’m sure he’ll stop the snow and fix that low bridge for us.”

She glanced outside. “It’s not even snowing very hard.”

“In case you haven’t noticed, there’s already snow on the ground, and sleet on top of that, and the temperature has dropped below freezing and it’s going to sleet and snow all night.” Tru crossed to plop on the bed next to her. She gathered the notebook and pen, and tossed them aside, picking up the guitar and strumming through a newly devised progression.

Brittany got up, then perched back on the edge of the bed. “Your Jeep won’t make it?”

“It probably could, but it’s too dangerous.” She plucked a string and adjusted the tuning. “We’re on top of a mountain. When that bridge gets covered by the water from the tributary, and then it freezes, it’s too dangerous to cross. I’ve seen all kinds of Jeeps and trucks end up in the river—” Tru realized the insensitivity of the image she had provided, quickly confirmed by a sudden shudder and grimace from the other woman. “Sorry.”

“When’s it supposed to clear?” Brittany got up and moved to the window, examining the overwhelming whiteness that covered everything. The trees had almost disappeared under the blankets held by straining limbs.

Tru had a drink of her iced tea from the night stand, and looked beyond Brittany’s shoulder to the snow outside, still mesmerized by its beauty after five years of living with it for most of the year. “The weather channel has been predicting another storm right after this one. I could call the mayor and ask when he’ll get started on fulfilling his campaign promise to fix these things, but I doubt it’ll happen very quickly. It will be the end of the week before we can drive anywhere.”

Alarmed, Brit turned. “How are we going to survive without food?”

“Usually, we have stock in the pantry, but as I say, that’s been let go lately, since I found you and brought you home.”

“So it’s my fault now?”

Tru stilled the strings abruptly. “That’s not what I said. That’s how it is. I knew better. I let it go. I was blinded by your beauty.”

Brittany made a noise of derision, and stood again, came around to sit on the other side of Tru. She took Tru’s glass of tea away from her and helped herself to a sip. “What about the horses?”

Tru feigned alarm. “You want to eat the horses?”

“No, dumb-dumb. Can’t we ride them down to—wherever?”

“Sure, we’d get there tomorrow sometime, and be frozen to the saddles.” Tru took her tea back, and replaced it on the coaster, leaning on one elbow to check a chord written on the paper behind her.

Brittany put a hand over her stomach as it grumbled. “I don’t think I can wait ‘til the end of the week.”

“We’ve got crackers and old moldy lettuce—”

“Yummy,” Brittany crinkled her nose.

“Well, there’s still some Ramen noodles and some canned goods in the pantry...but no main course.” Tru set the guitar down on the comforter and pushed off the bed. When she revealed a . 22 rifle from the closet, Brittany folded her arms and smirked, “You’re going to shoot me, aren’t you?”

“Should I?” Tru lifted an eyebrow. “I think you’re safe for now, but don’t tempt me.” She headed for the kitchen, Brittany following close behind. Tru took her coat from the hook and shrugged into it, along with gloves and a garrison cap. “A hunting I will go!” she sang.

“You mean, shoot an animal?” Brittany’s face contorted in disgust.

“We’ve done it before.” Tru slid the bolt back on the weapon and placed a long-rifle shell in the chamber, replacing the bolt, and switching it to safety.

Brittany looked down at the gun. “I shot something?”

“Well, no. You came along. I shot it.” She took a box of shells from the shelf in the closet and tapped a few into her pocket.

“Happy to hear it.” She turned. “See you when you get back.”

“Oh uh-uh. Wrong answer,” Tru informed her. “ I’m not the man of the house. We do things like this as a team. Get your coat.”

Brittany groaned.

“You were ready to ride the horses down the mountain a few minutes ago,” she pointed out.

Brit put her coat on.

At the back door, Tru stepped out onto the patio to retrieve their boots. Unable to resist, she opened the freezer and looked inside. Brittany peeked out the kitchen door and said, “You had to look, didn’t you?”

Tru closed the lid. “Put on your boots.”

Brittany put them on reluctantly, her garrison cap Velcro’d across her chin. Tru secured her own cap, leaving the tongues unfastened, and they stepped outside.

“How many guns do you have, anyway?” Brittany almost growled.

“Enough,” she answered. “There’s one in almost every room of the house. Haven’t you snooped?”

When the wind and snow hit them, Brittany muttered something inaudible to Tru. “I was really in the Army, huh?”

Tru settled the rifle into the crook of her arm and started trudging. “Yep. Don’t worry. It’ll be like old times. Stomping through the snow, freezing our asses off wanting to kill something.”

Brittany recalled the dream she’d had in the hospital of marching boots in the snow and that presence of someone she felt something very strong for—”Was it really like that?”

“Actually, yes.” They started around the barn near the tree line. “The cadre used to take us on field trips out past the firing ranges. They’d make us dig foxholes and then we’d defend our sector when they invaded.” Tru moved a low limb out of their path. “Sometimes they’d even get into full camo and hide in the woods and have us try to find and capture them. Sometimes we shot them in the head.”

“We did what?”

Tru laughed. “Not really. We used a BFA—a blank firing attachment on the flash deflector.”

“That sounds like loads of fun.”

“That’s the only part you liked.” Tru caught Brittany’s arm as she started to slide on an incline. “You and I found Drill Sergeant Sharp once, and you made him do P.T. He had to play along, because that was one of the rules of the game. It was so funny: him down there doing push-ups and you saying,
come on, you wimp! Faster! Faster
!”

Brittany smiled to herself. “I must have enjoyed myself more than I thought.”

“Sometimes,” Tru blew a cloud of fog from her mouth. “You hated the cold then, too.”

“Then why did I end up moving out here to the top of a cold mountain?”

“Me,” she answered simply.

Together they tramped into the woods, thankful that the snow-packed trees blocked most of the icy wind. Brittany grumbled frequently about the terrain, the cold, the wind, her protesting stomach, and the fact that Tru walked too fast. “How are you going to see them, walking so fast?”

“I know where they live.”

“So we’re going to Thumper’s house, and you’re just going to knock on the door?”

Tru grinned. “Sort of. They hide out in certain ground cover. I know where all of
those
spots are.”

After a few more minutes of trudging, Tru tried to sing cadence like they did in their enlisted days: “
I gotta pee...
like a Russian race horse...
I married the Army...
now I want a divorce...
” but Brittany kept criticizing the lyrics, even though Tru was proud of the little ditty she’d made up at the time. “Look for Thumper,” Tru told her, receiving an expressive response from Brittany’s eyes.

“I can’t believe you’re going to kill a precious little bunny.”

Tru cast her a taunting look. “Tomorrow I’ll kill a deer. The rabbit is for tonight.” She turned into a copse of low limbs and brush. “You know, the rabbit was a sacred animal.”

Brittany lifted her eyebrows expectantly. “Oh?”

“To Artemis. You remember her...the Goddess of the moon AND the Hunt.”

She didn’t miss a reciprocal rolling of the eyes from Brittany. “Yeah, yeah. You’re cute.”

Tru began to survey the area around them. She enjoyed the crisp mountain air. Before her family moved to Colorado, she had spent her younger years in Arizona, and had learned to hate that perpetual sticky feeling in her underarms. Here, in this temperature, she couldn’t even feel her underarms. Unfortunate though that thought was to her, the snow still made her feel clean and new.

After several false alarms caused by birds and falling snow, Tru’s stomach began to growl as audibly as Brit’s. But hunger always made one a better hunter, she knew. This fact made her certain they’d go home with at least one fat, white cottontail.

They came to a slope covered with a thick film of glassy-looking ice and paused. Tru studied the area for a way around.

Boldly, Brittany began to sing, “Over the river and through the woods, to grandmother’s house we go...the horse knows the way—hey!”

“You skipped a part.”

Brittany shook her head frantically. “No. I have an idea. Let’s go get the horses.”

“They aren’t good shots.”

Brittany swept an arm at Tru, striking her shoulder and knocking her off balance. She lost footing on the icy ground and fell backward, her head cracking a small round place on the ice. She groaned, pressing a hand to the back of her head. “Dammit, Brit!”

“I’m sorry!” She knelt beside her. “Are you okay?”

The garrison cap had helped cushion the blow, and Tru sat up, rescuing the rifle from the snow and wiping the melting flakes away from the bolt. “I’m fine. But I’m the one with the headache, now.”

Brittany smiled wickedly. “Good. Maybe you’ll get my memory back.”

Tru’s lip went back in a sarcastic snarl. “Oh, ha. Ten thousand comedians out of work, and you’re trying to be funny.”

Brittany giggled and offered to help Tru to her feet. “Give me your hand.”

“Get away from me.” Tru snapped.

Brit laughed. “Let me help you up—”

“No. You’re a lethal weapon.”

“C’mon—” Brit continued her amusement at Tru’s expense. Tru pushed her away, and Brittany then lost her balance, grasping Tru’s arm as Tru half-stood. Brittany began to slide perilously close to the edge of the icy slope, dragging Tru with her. They struggled against the Law of Inertia, and knew as bodies in motion, they would tend to stay in motion—doomed to have a swift ride down an unforgiving, rocky hillside.

Footing gone, they were on their way to the bottom. The trip was short and not very sweet. They gathered branches, rocks and sodden leaves like human rakes, thankfully missing an impact with tree trunks, and both were bruised and battered when they landed at the bottom in a heap. This time, though, the groans were mixed with laughter.

Tru tossed a handful of snow down Brit’s collar. Brit tried to retrieve the part that had oozed down her chest.

Tru watched her fish for it. “You want me to get that?” she teased.

“No!” Brittany giggled. “You horny homo—”

A moment later, they were helping each other up gingerly, knocking the debris and slush from their clothes.

“Okay,” Brittany clenched her arm. “Now I think I reinjured my arm.”

“Oh no...” Tru said. “Really? Maybe I should have let you stay inside.”

“No, you’re right. It should be a team effort.”

“Look. Why don’t you go back to the house and—“

“No, I don’t need my arm to walk. And it’s cold enough that it probably won’t swell.”

Tru looked at her arm and back up at her. “You sure?”

“Yeah, let’s just get this over with.”