Hebgen Lake, Montana
Kyle Stone turned six the night the mountain fell.
In later years, she would treasure the last perfect hours, seeking comfort in the simple details. Sunlight dazzling on water, the way the Madison River shot quicksilver past Rock Creek Campground. Dappled shade and a secret pool where she caught her first trout with only a little help from Dad. Mingled aromas, pine and campfire smoke, while Kyle’s fish sautéed in an iron skillet. She even got to help stir German chocolate cake batter.
While the sun sank on her birthday, Kyle watched her mother light the Coleman lantern and suspend it from a branch above the picnic table.
“Mom?” Sitting on a rough bench with her legs dangling, she tried to imagine being able to reach the lamp. “When I grow up will I be tall like you?”
“We’ll find out together.” Rachel Stone, with the graceful body of a willow sapling, snugged an arm around Kyle. The sleeves of her flower-sprigged cardigan did not quite cover her fine-boned wrists.
Daniel Stone, a rugged carpenter whose hands could span his daughter’s waist, marched into camp and dropped an armload of firewood next to the tent. Max, the family Golden Retriever, followed with his plumed tail high.
After Kyle’s ceremonial dinner, buttery trout and potatoes baked in the coals, Dad lit the candles on her cake. He and Mom joined in an off-key rendition of “Happy Birthday” while Max yodeled along. People in a nearby campsite took up the refrain; someone strummed a guitar.
Amid applause, Kyle stared at her flickering symbols. Then she drew a big breath, blew out the flames atop five wax tapers and paused to study the one that was new this year.
She pursed her lips but stopped when Max jumped up and bared his teeth. With his ruff standing on end, he stared out beyond the circle of lantern light.
“What’s out there, boy?” Dad set his mug on the ground and pushed up from his camp chair. “Smell a bear?”
Goose bumps raised on Kyle’s thin arms. She looked for telltale eyes, a bear or the big bad wolf, though Dad had told her there were no wolves here anymore. Max paced the camp perimeter with a wary eye while her sixth candle guttered out.
Though Dad relit it, and Mom served cake topped by the piercing sweet of coconut caramel, the dog’s continued disquiet made Kyle uneasy. After a bit, Dad ordered Max to a place near the fire and gathered her into his lap.
Gradually, the campground quieted. The guitar player put aside his instrument and everyone succumbed to the effect of the diamond-clear evening. The moon sailed from behind a shoulder of mountain. First, a crescent edge, then half a coin; finally a faultless disk emerged to shine upon the forest glen.
Kyle pressed her cheek against the comforting scratchiness of Dad’s wool shirt and struggled to stay awake for all of her birthday. Yet, she must have dozed, for when she opened her eyes the fire had reduced to translucent crimson fragments. The moon rode cold and high amidst a sprinkling of heaven’s brightest stars.
Her father followed her gaze to the sky. “I make it around eleven-thirty.”
“Time for bed.” Mom’s lips pressed warm on Kyle’s cheek, a hint of Breck shampoo wafting from burnished dark hair that matched her daughter’s.
“Can’t I stay up until midnight?” Kyle entreated.
Mom wagged a slender finger adorned with a turquoise-and-silver ring. “You’ve already been asleep for over an hour.”
“But I just …”
Swinging Kyle to his shoulders with a chuckle, Dad carried her toward the Rambler station wagon where she
and Max slept. Moonlight cast shadows at odds with the lantern, making her feel like she did when she twirled around too much.
Dad placed her on the blankets, and she smiled up into eyes the same green-blue as hers, turned down a bit at the outer edges. His soft brown beard brushed her cheek and he whispered, “Happy Birthday.”
Frozen forever in memory, that was the last perfect moment.
A hard jolt struck. It brought her father to his knees behind the Rambler’s tailgate.
Impossibly, the car seemed to drop, while Kyle’s stomach swooped like she was on a Ferris wheel. The sensation was of a long fall, but it couldn’t have been a second before the wagon bottomed with a jerk. It no sooner landed than it leaped and started jouncing as if a pair of giants jumped on the bumpers.
Max crouched but lost his balance. Dad made it up only to stagger and fall again. The lantern’s wild arc threw erratic shifting shadows.
Kyle didn’t know how to pray, only the ones that started ‘Now I Lay Me …’ and ‘Our Father …’ She cried into the night, “God, make it stop.”
The ground rolled in waves. Braced in the back of the Rambler, she cracked her head on the side window and started to sob.
Dad was back on his feet, arms extended for her. She scrabbled toward the tailgate.
A rough wall of dirt heaved between them, a black ditch opening at the base of the scarp, deeper and wider than she was tall.
“Daddy!” she shouted into the rising thunder coming from earth rather than sky. The bucking ground threatened to throw her off the tailgate into the crevasse.
Pines as thick as Kyle began to whip as though their trunks would snap. The motion added an eerie howl to the din. Down the canyon, a grinding roar increased.
She looked for the place she’d last seen her mother.
“Mommy,” she screamed, a raw ripping in her throat.
The lantern went out.
“Please, God.” She prayed to wake in warm arms by the fire. They’d eat birthday cake and laugh because she’d dreamed this world turned upside down.
In the next instant, a great banshee howl struck and extinguished the brave blazes in the campground. At the same time, something black, immense and terrible bore down from the mountain. Kyle watched in horror as it blotted out the moon, leaving the most profound darkness she had ever known.