She remembered the day it happened, waking up to a creaking noise, the sound of someone coming up the stairs. She was in her bedroom at the lodge, varnished log walls and a cathedral ceiling with interlocking oak beams. The clock on the bedside table said 5:07 a.m. There was a log smoldering in the fireplace, giving off the faint smell of wood smoke. She got up, crossed the room and opened the top drawer of her dresser, took out the Smith & Wesson.357 Airweight and went into the hall. She saw a man in mossy oak camouflage come up the stairs and head for Luke’s room. She snuck up behind him and aimed the pistol at his back.
He heard her and turned.
“Hey, Rambo,” Kate said, “better take this. Del Keane said he saw a bear last week.” She handed the automatic to Owen, and he slipped it in his pants pocket.
“Del doesn’t need a gun. Bear probably smelled him and ran away. What’re you doing up?”
“I’ve got to see my men off,” Kate said.
Luke came out of his room, rubbing sleep from his eyes. They went downstairs and Kate made coffee, carrying steaming mugs into the room. A backlog burned in the big fieldstone fireplace. Owen was kneeling on the oriental rug, putting gear in his backpack. He closed the top and laid it next to his compound bow that had a built-in quiver of arrows. She handed Owen his coffee, pulled her robe closed, and stood over by the fireplace to get warm.
Luke came in the room now, a skinny teenager dressed in Skyline Apparition 3-D camo, an iPod dangling from his neck like white plastic bling.
Owen said, “What’re you listening to?”
Luke pulled the earplug out and said, “White Stripes.”
Kate said, “I don’t know that bucks are partial to Motor City garage bands.”
Owen said, “Maybe he’s on to something. Rock instead of doe scent, the new deer lure.”
Luke picked up his dad’s bow and tried to pull the string with its seventy pounds of draw, face straining. He couldn’t do it.
“Lock your arms,” Owen said. “Use your shoulders.”
Luke took a breath and tried again, and this time, drew it about three quarters.
“You’re close, almost there,” Owen said. “Couple of months…”
Kate put her arms around Owen. “Be careful. You don’t know who’s out there drunk with a bow or a rifle. Man has enough bourbon, I’d look like a whitetail.”
“A cute one, too,” Owen said. “I’ll tell you that.”
Now Kate hugged Luke and kissed his cheek. She could see sparse, blondish fuzz on his chin and upper lip. He squirmed and tried to pull away from her, a look of pain on his face.
He said, “Mom…”
She let him go. His voice had changed in the past few weeks. It was deeper now and she wasn’t used to it. “I’ll bet you don’t mind if Lauren kisses you.”
Luke said, “We broke up.”
Kate said, “Why didn’t you say something?”
“I don’t know,” Luke said. He seemed embarrassed, eyes looking down at the rug.
“Give him a break,” Owen said and winked.
Luke walked out of the room. Owen grinned now and said, “I’ll get all the details, tell you about it later, okay?”
Owen picked up his gear and Kate put her arm around him and walked him to the door. Luke was outside in the dark with Leon. Luke threw a stick and Leon charged after it and brought it back, looking up at Luke, ready to go again.
Owen bent down and kissed Kate. She held his big stubbly face in her hands and said, “Be careful.”
“What’re you worried about?”
“Keep an eye on Luke, will you?”
“You don’t do this,” Owen said. “What’s the matter?”
Kate didn’t explain it, the feeling she had, because she couldn’t.
Owen opened the door and said, “Leon, get in here.”
The dog came running, banged into Owen, hit the rug, a Persian, slid across it, regained his balance and moved toward Kate, slobbering and pressing himself against her.
Owen had been hunting since he was a kid, loved the woods and streams and wanted to pass the thrill on to Luke. For Owen, there was nothing like it, getting away from the shop, the track, the bullshit. He also loved it because it was the only place on earth you didn’t hear cell phones.
Kate didn’t care much for hunting, but she didn’t impose her point of view too strenuously. What bothered her were all the bonehead stories about hunters getting hurt or killed. She’d just read one in the Traverse City Record Eagle about a man who was shot while he was going number two. The article said he answered a call to nature and was nearly done with his business, wiping himself with a white Kleenex, when another member of his hunting party shot the man in his backside, thinking he was a whitetail deer.
“That didn’t really happen,” Owen said.
“Want to bet?” Kate said. “I’ve got the article right here.”
Another story told about a hunter who was gored by a deer and had to go to the hospital. The man had no hard feelings, though, and said he’d be ready with a load of double aught next time him and the deer’s paths crossed.
Kate said, “If that isn’t proof of the stupidity of hunting, nothing is.”
Owen said, “Most hunting accidents-fifty percent-involve falling out of a tree stand, either climbing up or down.” He looked at her and grinned.
Kate shook her head. “Oh my God.” Leon moved in close and bumped her. “Listen, if you guys aren’t home by dinner, I’m going to Big Buck Night at the casino.”
Owen said, “What’s that all about?”
“Roman Brady, a soap star from Days of Our Lives, is going to be there.”
“He’s the big-buck stud, huh?”
Kate said, “Ever seen him?”
“Not that I recall.”
“You’re not missing a whole lot,” Kate said, “but the ladies love him because he’s on TV.”
Owen said, “So you’re not going?”
“I’m just warning you,” Kate said. “That’s what hunting widows do-get their picture taken with Roman and play blackjack.”
She stood at the window, listening to Leon’s wet irregular breathing, watching Owen and Luke cross the yard, two contrasting shapes in the dim light of a half moon-like Lenny and George in Of Mice and Men, a book Kate had just read again. They moved toward the tree line, disappearing into the thick foliage like they’d entered another dimension.
That was the last time she saw Owen alive.