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The first three nights after Kali and Theo left, the silent apartment pressed in on Lincoln. He'd open the window, aching for the sounds of the neighbourhood to pierce through, but, despite the shouts of children playing, cars revving, and mothers hollering, the silence lingered. On the fourth night he stayed in the woods. The silence there less hostile. He worked until his muscles ached. Day after day, after day. He constructed sheaves. Hammered and cut and hauled. Came up with the idea of a dumbwaiter, not only to lift items from the ground, but to use once the multiple floors were built. He considered the idea of a turret, reaching above the highest branches, to survey the land as far as his eyes could see. He decided on rain gutters made of cut copper pipes that he'd shine to glint in the sunlight. With Kali's suggestion of marketing his plans, his ideas seemed endless. Not that he'd necessarily need them all for himself. But to try them out, to make sure they worked—why not?
The tree house, almost as if it had a life of its own, grew. On the tenth day, the seventh of living in the woods, he stopped. He wasn't done, not even close, but to do more would require material he couldn't access for several more days. He'd checked the shipment two days before, during a trip into town to restock his food supply.
Lincoln climbed down from the tree he'd called home for almost the past two weeks and took several steps back. The tree house was bare, free of the intricate woodwork he'd add before he called the project complete, and smaller than the finished design would be. But it was beautiful. Livable, even, at least until the weather cooled.
With the shipment, the most important component being the solar panels he'd ordered custom made from a German facility, he could get started on the electrical work, heating, and insulation. The plumbing would take some more experimentation. Not that it was necessary, of course—but if he planned to live here all winter, during a week with the cold or flu it'd be pretty awful having to climb down the ladder to squat in the snow, which, eventually, would create its own problem. He was thinking some sort of pipe system along the base of the tree, behind the ladder, to not be an eyesore, and directed to a composting toilet perhaps. The technical aspects still needed work. He'd already figured out a water collection and filtration system so he didn't have to always trek to the lake. He considered pumping it in, but that seemed too easy, too modern. He wanted a different kind of life, a life with as little impact on the world around him as possible, not one merely an adapted version of the life he'd left. Still, figuring it out would be interesting, and he might, if he followed Kali’s suggestion, find an alternate way to support himself while helping others’ dreams of solitude (if only as a retreat) come true.
Each day and night he'd worked until exhaustion hit, then fell into his hammock and woke with the sun. Tonight, though, he had hours until the sun would set, and even more until sleep would find him. Already, in the few minutes since he'd stepped back from his work, thoughts of Kali, and of Theo, flooded over him.
Lincoln went to his pack and pulled out the book Kali had given him for his birthday. Walden. He knew little about it beyond the fact that it was about some writer from the mid-1800s who'd decided to build a cabin in the woods and live there, away from society. He'd leafed through the introduction the night Kali gave him the book, as she stood watching, and through those few snippets he gathered the endeavour was about a man determined to meet himself face to face. Lincoln liked that. Could see himself in that.
His 'cabin' was in the sky, and now that his first level was built, he had a view of a lake, not more than a two-minute walk through the woods. He'd barely thought about the book since that night, always reaching for one of the texts that would help make his tree house exactly what he envisioned it to be, but now it called to him.
He walked toward the lake and sat in one of those tree limbs that curve out over the water, as if the sun and the lake and the tree itself had conspired to make the perfect resting place. He put his back against the trunk of the tree and his legs straight out in front of him. Eyes closed, he savoured the exhaustion that settled over him. He could sleep. Maybe he should sleep. The breeze danced over the hairs on his arms and legs, birds chattered in the boughs above. This is what he wanted. This is what he missed, what he'd loved as a child after a day of racing through the woods with Andrew, the way they'd sit at the end of it, if only for a few minutes before heading back home. Tired, but content.
He opened his eyes and flipped through the book's introduction, choosing instead, to dive right into the author's words. Lincoln read as if those words were consuming him, and not the other way around. The words seemed written for him.
Part of the machine, Thoreau insisted, that's what so many men were. Crunching numbers, greasing the gears, while the part within them that was still human lived a life of quiet desperation.
Is that why he hadn't known Lucy was cheating on him? Why he never knew his brother, every day, with every word of encouragement and clap on the shoulder, had been lying to his face? Lincoln had been desperate, chasing a life that never could have given him the satisfaction he wanted.
He read on. And on.
I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately ... and not, when I come to die, discover that I had not lived ...
Lincoln lowered the book. For the first time in as long as he could remember, he felt connected. Understood. Like his need, his yearning to escape finally made sense to someone other than himself.
But was this living—deliberately or otherwise? These past days he'd spent labouring with nothing but him and the birds and the wind and the howling wolves at night. He was alive. He was creating something. Building something. And once it was made he'd have more time for moments like this. As much time as he wanted. He could read all the books he'd wondered about—both the classics and the blockbusters. He would start woodworking again—the entire tree house would be a work of art. And maybe, with Kali's suggestion, he'd help others create their own works of art. He liked the idea of manuals better than contracting: that felt too much like business. Like what he'd been doing before.
But beyond that? Would it be enough? Without Kali's smile? Her eyes when angry, unsure, laughing? Or without Theo's silent grin?
Thoreau wasn't alone. Not really. Not as much as Lincoln planned to be. They both had the animals, though with Romper gone, Lincoln didn't have the one animal he wanted.
And Thoreau had visitors. He walked to the village or a neighbour's almost every day. Lincoln could have visitors. He could make that work. The edges of a smile crept across his face. Theo would love it here. Love climbing the ladder. Love swimming in the lake. Lincoln looked to a nearby tree whose branches stretched out over the water. He could tie a rope there, or even a big rubber tire, and Theo could swing. Kali could relax. Really relax, without mindlessly streaming Netflix shows. Not that he didn't understand that. He'd done it too, on late evenings after work when Lucy wanted to go out and all he'd wanted to do was lie down and disconnect his mind.
And he could have other visitors too. One day. Maybe. His mother. Rachel. Perhaps even Linda and her kids. Though he couldn't imagine Linda climbing up that tree, not ever. She'd probably tell her husband to buy an RV for the sole purpose of a visit. He shuddered at the tracks that thing would make, at the trees that would need to be cleared to get it close enough. No, maybe not Linda.
His imagination travelled. The design as it was now was about one-hundred and twenty square feet with a fifty square foot loft for his bedroom area. But he could expand up. Build a whole second floor and even a third, or half a third, if Theo ever moved in. He'd want his own space and Lincoln could build it ... and a turret. He'd decided, a turret was a must.
Lincoln returned to the pages. He read until he couldn't see the words clearly, then returned to his house in the sky.
He woke with the sun the next morning and went for a swim in the lake, another habit he'd started. After lying in the morning sun to dry, he gathered some water, a compass, the survey to his land, the book, a lunch, and hefted his pack over his shoulder. He hadn't explored since Romper was with him, and that was never more than twenty or thirty minutes away from his site. But he had a lot more land to discover. Sixty acres of this wilderness was his. He wouldn't mark his territory with fences or keep-out signs, but he wanted to know it.
After about thirty minutes of walking, Lincoln stepped out into a large field flooded with wildflowers. Pinks, purples, yellows, and whites. As the sun beat down, sending up the scent of warm honey, a breeze ruffled the blossoms, making the flowers dance. Fat and fuzzy bees flitted from bright coloured blossom to bright coloured blossom. A large boulder sat on the opposite side of the field.
Lincoln crossed to it and sat, transfixed by the waving colours. Kali would love this. He sat straighter. But would she? Did he know her enough to know? She'd scoffed at his endeavour. Well, maybe not scoffed, but hadn't seen the beauty in it, had looked at him like he might be crazy. At first. That last day she'd had respect, had encouraged him to make something of it—saw that others had similar dreams to his own. And she'd bought him the book.
He reached into his pack and flipped to the last page he'd read. The hours passed, and when he came to the end he looked up, for probably the fortieth time since he'd started. He was travelling in the direction of his dreams, he had literally begun work on his castle in the air, just like Thoreau.
He flipped several pages back to read those lines again. Was it ludicrous to take Thoreau's words as gospel? Did this obscure man who lived over a hundred and fifty years ago know something the rest of society didn't? And what did it mean when he said the castle he built needed a foundation? I left the woods for as good a reason as I went there. Perhaps it seemed to me that I had several more lives to live, and could not spare any more time for that one.
Lincoln read the words once, twice, three times. He wasn't ready to leave the woods. He didn't know that he needed to in any kind of concrete way. But as good as these past few days had been, as much as he felt he could breathe in a whole new way, free from the noise and the machinery and the smell of all that life in the city, he also needed more. He needed her. His life didn't have to be the woods and nothing else. He could live parallel lives. One here. One there ... whatever that would mean.
Theo needed someone. She needed someone. And so did he.