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There was a knock on the studio door and Sophie pushed away from the drawing board and hurried across the room to open it.
“Hi,” Annie said.
“Hi.”
“You thought it was Wolf.”
“Come on in,” Sophie stepped back as Annie entered. “I did.”
“I think it’ll be a couple more days.”
“Do you know what he’s doing?”
Annie smiled. “I don’t but he sent me to teach you how to shoot a gun.”
Sophie nodded.
“Have you ever shot a gun before?”
“No.”
“Have you ever touched one?”
“No.”
Erica thought guns were obscene. Pornography was fine since there was no victim involved, but guns were disgusting because guns could kill people. Guns were an open invitation to violence. It was Erica’s deeply held belief that no one needed guns and she had long supported every anti-gun law that was proposed.
Without guns, there would be no hunting and Sophie was always ready to point out that tofu didn’t grow on trees. Soybeans weren’t a crop in this part of the country.
“Everyone here knows how to use a gun.”
“Then I’ll learn.”
Annie opened her duffle bag, took out a manual and handed it to Sophie. “You can study until I come back.”
Sophie shook her head. “I don’t read very well.”
Annie smiled. “That’s fine. We’ll go over it until you remember and it becomes second nature. Okay?”
“Thank you.”
“This is a nine millimeter pistol.” Annie held out a black handgun. “Take it. It’s not loaded.” Annie showed her there was no magazine with bullets.
Sophie reached for the gun. It weighed less than she expected.
“It’s made of a polymer, that’s why it’s light. We’ll break it down and put it back together a couple times so you feel comfortable with it.”
***
THERE WAS A KNOCK AT the door.
“Go away,” Sophie called.
She’d been arguing with her mother for two days and the studio was the only place to have some peace.
The door opened a few inches.
“Didn’t you hear me? Go away!”
“Sophie?”
She dropped the pencil, ran to the door and threw her arms around him. “Are you okay?”
“In danger of being strangled.”
She kissed him. “Don’t do that again. Please.”
“I wish I could make that promise.”
“What promise can you make me?”
“I promise I will never go away and not think about you so often it hurts.”
Sophie kissed him again. “No, don’t promise that. I don’t want you to be hurt because of me.”
Not taking his arms from around her, Wolf kicked the door shut. “There are rules? Don’t we have enough of them?”
“Not between us.”
“That’s the only place where there should be rules.”
She took his hand, led him to the settle by the woodburning stove and helped him take off his jacket.
“I missed you so much,” she sat as they sat together.
“You’ve gone without seeing me for as many days before.”
“But you were in town.”
“I thought about you. I had an idea.”
“Just one? I had a lot of ideas.”
“About?”
“What to do with you.”
“An idea or a promise?”
“Oh, I promise.” She leaned up against his arm.
“Let’s hold off on that for just a little bit.”
“Wolf,” Sophie teased.
“Do you know anything about art and art history?”
“Sure. That was my focus in school. They didn’t know what else to do with me. Why?”
“Do you think you could teach at the school?”
“Teach kids?”
“Yes. We still have school a few days a week. It’s not like before but we can’t go uneducated. If you could go to town once a week and spend the day teaching each class about drawing and why art is important to civilization, that would be a help to the people of Owl Head. Not your mother’s kind of art. Real art. There are books in the library.”
“We have books here,” Sophie replied. “Ones with illustrations.”
“If you need help with the text, I’ll read it to you.
Sophie closed her eyes for a moment and willed herself to keep the tears from welling up. “Yes. I could do that.”
“I’ll talk to the council about it, then we can make all the arrangements to provide for you this winter.”
“Okay.”
“Any news up here on the Purchase?”
“Yes.”
“I was kidding.”
“I’m not. And I need help.”
“Whatever I can do.”
“Get my mother back to the city.”
“What?”
“She wants to go back and I want her to go back.”
Wolf scratched his head after removing his hat. “Are you going with her?”
“No. I’m staying here. I don’t belong there. I couldn’t...” Sophie paused. “I couldn’t bear to be that far away from you.”
“Is this serious? This is what she really wants?”
“We fight all the time. She won’t shut up with the thinky thoughts.”
“Excuse me?”
“That’s what I call the Lucianisms she spouts. We had it out. She resents the town, or that she’s stuck here. There’s no one like her; all her friends are there. I don’t know what the future holds and if there’s more bottom below this, but she’s miserable here and making me miserable, so she should go be with her kind. All that’s preventing the move is transportation.”
“I think this is as bottom as we get.”
“That’s good news.”
“Sophie?”
She smiled. “I don’t think this is so bad. It’s a little bit of a shock to be thrown a hundred years into the past but people did it before and without electricity or motor vehicles. I’m okay with this.”
“Are you sure?”
Sophie squeezed his hand. “I’m so sure.”
Wolf pulled her closer to him and she rested her head on his shoulder.
“I’ll find a ride for her back to the city.”
***
ERICA ZIPPED HER DUFFLE bag shut. She was told she could take two carry bags with her so she took the best of her clothes in one and what portable art would fit into the other.
“You’ll be happier in the city,” Sophie said as she watched this process.
“I feel like I’m starting all over.”
“Everyone is starting all over. Everyone has suffered losses.”
Erica pulled out a kitchen chair and sat.
“Not everyone,” Sophie corrected herself as she was reminded of the elites who were skating through this downfall.
“I have less than when I graduated from college.”
“You have professional experience in the art world. You’ll be fine. You’ll find something.”
“You’re not sorry to see me leave.”
“No, I’m happy for you. Don’t blab about the town.”
“I don’t know anything. All I know is that there is next to nothing here.”
“Good. That’s exactly right.”
“So, if I may be so curious, how are you going to make it through the winter?”
“You know what, Mom? No one knows that they’ll make it through the winter. No one knows that they’ll make it to tomorrow. If I have to burn the barn one piece of wood at a time to keep warm, I will.”
“I hope it doesn’t come to that because I paid good money for this place.”
“And we’re lucky you did. Unfortunately, you hate it here.”
“I didn’t think it was going to be permanent. I thought it would be a rustic weekend retreat where my friends would come up for visits with bottles of wine and wedges of ripe cheese.”
“That would have been very nice, I’m sure. That’s not how it worked out and you are not very flexible. You can’t seem to adapt to change.”
“This isn’t change.”
“No, it’s more like to total destruction and the creation of a Frankenstein monster of a country.”
“Let’s not start again.”
“I am starting again because that’s the only choice there is.”
Erica fiddled with the buttons on her coat. It had been a good coat. Now it was worn and the moths had gotten into it a couple years ago. She didn’t expect to ever have a new coat to replace it. She wasn’t expecting the situation to miraculously improve any longer as she did in the beginning. She wasn’t quite that deep in denial about what had happened. “Where did you get that kind of determination?”
“You don’t know me very well, Mom.”
Sophie saw Wolf’s truck pull into the driveway.
“Do you think you can be polite to him on the way to your drop-off point?”
“Yes.”
“He’s doing you a favor.”
“I understand. Why? No one likes me here.”
Sophie stood and walked across the room. “He’s a good Christian.”
Erica shook her head.
“I know it doesn’t mean anything to you but it’s who he is. It gives him a template to live by. It teaches him to be generous and charitable to everyone he meets. Including you.”
There was a knock at the door and Sophie opened it. “Hi,” she said and felt something in her go out to him just like every time she saw him.
“Hi.” Wolf stepped into the kitchen and nodded to Erica. “Are you ready?”
She rose and pulled on her coat. “Yes.”
“Good. You have a long trip ahead of you. You’ll be changing rides a couple of times but you should make it to the city sometime tonight.”
Sophie opened the door for them. “Have a good trip, Mom, and I hope you find what you’re looking for there.”
Erica shrugged and made a step toward her daughter but stopped. “You, too,” she said and, carrying her bags, left the house.
Wolf shook his head at the exchange. In the same position, if he wasn’t certain he would ever see his mother again, the goodbye would have meant more than hopes for a speedy trip. “Are you going to be okay?”
“Sure. Don’t think twice about me.”
“Do you have your gun?”
“Yes.”
“You’re confident you can use it?”
“Annie’s a good teacher.”
“I’ll get back as soon as I can but...”
“Yeah, I know. You don’t have to say anything. I’ll see you when you get here.”
Wolf leaned over and kissed her cheek. “I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you.”
She waved a final goodbye to her mother and closed the door.
The house seemed empty.
***
THE NEXT DAY, MID-MORNING, Wolf’s truck came up the driveway.
“Hi.”
“Hi. I didn’t think I’d be gone that long, I had something else to do.”
“Yeah, it’s fine. Did she make the connection okay?”
“I’m sure she’s in the city by now. Did some of her friends really want to take her in?”
“It’s like the old days. Sleeping on the floor, waking up early to stumble around trying to shake off whatever happened the night before. Have a cup of coffee. Make it out onto the street where you protest injustice until lunchtime. Grab a quick bite at a café, have some more coffee. Go to an art gallery. Have dinner at a sidewalk restaurant. Come back to the pad, get stoned and get laid.”
“Sophie,” Wolf protested.
“I’m sorry. No, I really am. I shouldn’t have said it like that.”
“No. She gave you life, you owe her some respect.”
“You’re too kind to her.”
“She kept you in a good school. It must have cost a lot of money.”
“Yes, but was she doing it for me or for her? I felt...she got rid of me and there was community approval. All her friends could see she was doing what they considered to be the right thing. Send the learning disabled child to a special school where it’ll be taken care of for you without the mess of dealing with it so you can concentrate on important issues like preventing people from drinking a large soda with their hot dog.”
“I looked at that metal crap in the yard, she’s a good welder.”
Sophie laughed. “I’m just so offended by the way she lived her life. How vapid, how meaningless. She could have been making food to serve hungry people in homeless shelters; instead she was preoccupied by getting a law passed to dictate how much salt could be served in swanky restaurants.”
“It’s over.”
Sophie grinned. “I’m a free woman.”
“That’s what you think,” Wolf countered and kissed her.
She wrapped her arms tightly around him.
“I wish I could spend the day with you but I have to meet up with Reilly. Do you want me to try to get back tonight or will you be okay here on your own?”
“I’ll be fine. Really. I’ve got the gun. I’m not a good shot yet but I know where the bullet comes out.”
“Okay. Think about teaching and for sure I’ll be back tomorrow morning to bring you to my house for Thanksgiving.”
Sophie nodded. “Do you think your mother will like me?”
“Of course, why wouldn’t she?”
“My mother didn’t make herself very popular in town. People are judging me based on her.”
“My mother’s not like that.”
“Will your father like me?”
“My father will be crazy about you.”
“He’ll come home, Wolf,” Sophie said giving his hand a squeeze.
“Just holding down the fort for him until he does.”
Wolf never heard of anyone who came home again.