“I just checked his temperature. It’s looking much better. First time it dipped below one hundred.” A long pause. “Yup, we’ve been doing that. Little sips as much as he can manage. Can you swing by and take another look at him?” Another pause. “Alrighty, Doc. We’ll be seeing you then. Thanks so much for everything. Take care now. Bye.”
Ethan heard the words. First, they seemed to come from a long distance. By the end of the phone call, they had become more defined and clearer. Ethan struggled to get his bearings. It was Kevin Burrow speaking, that much he knew for certain. But how’d Kevin get here to the hospital? Ethan’s eyelids fluttered open. His hands rested on a blanket of bright-colored yarn. He fingered the soft material. The hospital didn’t have blankets like this.
“Oh! Well … hello.” Kevin tiptoed close to the bedside, lowering his voice and peering at Ethan over his glasses. “How’re you feeling?”
Ethan raised his left hand, puzzled. His ring finger was gone. He probed the stump with the fingers of his other hand. The wound was healed. How … what …
Kevin must have noticed his confusion. “You’ve had a pretty rough time of it, I’m afraid to tell you. The doctor said you had a terrible case of withdrawal.”
Ethan rubbed his eyes. “I took a pill almost every day in the city.”
“Your body didn’t know what to do without it. It kind of crashed. The doctor said you had one foot in the ER and, if you didn’t improve by today, we’d have to call an ambulance.”
Now his memory began to clear. That’s right: Chiara found him in the city. He came back here to Amanda’s house. “What day is it?”
“Wednesday.”
“Is that when I got here?”
“Oh, no. That was … let me see … uh, that was Saturday. Yeah, it had to have been because I wasn’t working that afternoon when the train arrived.”
“I’ve been sick for four days?”
Kevin nodded. “It’s been a long haul.”
Ethan swallowed. He pressed his dry lips together. He felt so weak he didn’t know if he could even get out of bed.
“Here, why don’t you have some juice?” Kevin offered him a glass.
Ethan reached out to grasp it but even that small effort seemed too much for him.
Kevin stood up, leaning over, and held the cup to Ethan’s lips. Ethan drank cold, sugary, zesty juice. It refreshed his parched mouth.
“That’s good, huh?” Kevin smiled, nodding. “You keep sipping that. Not too much at a time—we don’t want to put too much into your system at once. Little steps, okay?”
“Okay.”
“Here, I’ll pull my chair over to the bed and we’ll keep each other company.”
“You said it’s Wednesday?”
“Yup, that’s right.”
“Don’t you have to go to work?”
“Oh.” Kevin scratched his head. “Don’t worry about that. I got some time off.”
“Is this a slow time of year?”
“Nooo. Not exactly. Business is booming right now, with people settling down after all of last year’s craziness. People are trying to rebuild, set things straight again. Oh no, it’s plenty busy.”
Ethan frowned. “Shouldn’t you be working then?”
Kevin chuckled. “And you tell me: who’s going to look after you if I do that?”
Ethan’s cheeks grew warm; it was an unfamiliar sensation. It never occurred to him that Kevin would request time off just to take care of him. “I—I didn’t know.”
“It’s no problem. You just focus on getting better. That’s all you need to worry about.”
“Have you been taking care of me this whole time?”
“Joe, Chiara, me. We take turns.”
“Chiara.” Ethan rubbed his beard. That was the woman’s voice he heard. He had mistaken Chiara for Amanda.
“Here, take some more juice.”
Ethan acquiesced, wiping his chin where some drops of juice had spilled. “I didn’t mean to burden all of you so much. I—”
“Nah.” Kevin waved his hand. “It’s no burden. We were just worried about you, that’s all. We’ve wanted to help you this whole time, so it’s nice we finally have the chance. You know we looked for you for the past year, right?”
“Yeah … I heard that …”
Kevin leaned back in the wooden chair, its seat groaning a little. “I figured you might be in the same prison as me. Soon as I got out, I started looking for you and Amanda. But, of course, everyone had someone they were trying to find.”
“You were in prison too?”
“Yup. Same one as you and Amanda, it turns out. I learned that much later though, when I went through the records.”
Ethan’s still-fuzzy mind labored to make sense of it all. “So many times, I wished they would’ve just killed us all right then and there outside the hotel.”
“The JPD had special orders to take anyone at the hotel prisoner. It was a public relations effort: they wanted to make a big display of executing all the most notorious criminals.”
“So you, Amanda, and I were all arrested.” Ethan paused. “And Jade?”
Kevin’s face dropped. “Poor girl didn’t make it. She died outside the hotel. So young too … breaks my heart every time I think about it.”
“I was the one who told her to leave the hotel.”
Kevin cast him a sharp glance. “You stop right there. It’s not your fault, you hear? She would’ve died in the hotel too. It was a bloodbath out there. The NCP did the murdering, not you.”
“But you and I didn’t die.”
“No.” Kevin pursed his lips, looking past Ethan out the window. “Guess it wasn’t our time yet. We still have some work to do.”
“Right—and I’ve been so productive since then.” Ethan’s words dripped with bitter sarcasm.
“Well, begin again now. Here, take some more juice.” As Ethan drank, Kevin continued, “So, I actually don’t remember much from that time. I remember running outside the hotel. Then I heard the missiles screaming everywhere. After that—nothing. I woke up in a prison cell, pretty banged up. It took me a long time to heal. I still feel it actually. Probably always will, not that I’m complaining. I kept asking the jailers about Amanda … they never said a word. I later found out that she was just one floor above me, all that time.” He frowned and looked down at his hands. “That’s one of the hardest things … I didn’t even know the day that she died. They killed my daughter and they couldn’t even tell me. And it wrecks me if I think about her, all alone, no one she knew around her as she took her final breath …” His voice began to crack with pain.
“She wasn’t alone.” Ethan stared at Kevin, now very alert, the sharpness of the memory stinging him. “I was there. They made me watch it. I saw her die.” He clenched his jaw. “I hate the NCP for that. I hate those bastards for doing that to me.”
“There’s no leadership in the NCP left to hate. You were right: they destroyed themselves in the end because they couldn’t work together. Their ambition made them blind; they didn’t even see the JPD attack coming. With the whole Cabinet but one dead, the NCP itself was dead.”
“I can still hate the countless people who did the NCP leaders’ dirty work.” I can hate the JPD officer who set Amanda on fire.
“Hatred only destroys the one who hates. It tears you up inside. Hatred won’t bring Amanda back.” Kevin exhaled. “I can’t imagine how it felt for you to witness Amanda’s death. But to tell you the truth, knowing that you were there makes me feel better. There was at least one person in the crowd who loved her. She wasn’t alone after all.”
Ethan fingered the blanket, avoiding Kevin’s gaze. “I never thought about that.” He took a deep breath. “There have been many times I’ve thought about how I loved Amanda. And every time I came to the conclusion that … I failed her. I keep replaying in my mind things I said or did. I was trying at the end, but even that wasn’t the best way of loving her. The truth is: I didn’t love her well at all. She deserved so much more.”
“Hmm, well here’s what I say: Love her better now.”
“I can’t. She’s dead.”
“Do you still love her?”
“Of course.”
“Then she’s not dead.” Kevin gave a half-smile. “If you ask me, she’s looking down on us right now and she’s so darn happy you’re here.” Kevin leaned closer. “You love her better now. Show her you love her by living the life she’d want you to live. If your feelings for her mean anything, show it. Let your love be more than sweet words. Let it transform your life.”
Ethan narrowed his eyes. “Is that what you did when your wife died?”
Kevin gave a low whistle. “You’re a quick one, aren’t you?” He laughed. “It took me a while, I won’t lie to you. But in the end—yes, I believe I did. I could’ve done things better, looking back on it. I could’ve been a better father—”
“No!” Ethan sat up in bed, perching on one elbow. “No. That’s ridiculous to think you weren’t a good father or that you could’ve been better.”
“Well, I appreciate that vote of confidence, I do. But you don’t know the whole story. After Amanda’s mom died, I knew Amanda was hurting inside. I didn’t know how to help her. I—”
“You gave her the paint set. You started her whole art career.”
“Huh? Oh, yeah, I guess that’s true. But she still sat with so much sadness all the time, for so long. I could’ve taken her to see someone or get help. I always thought those people were phonies, you know? Head doctors—who needs them?” Kevin shrugged. “Then I lost my Amanda and I needed someone to talk to. I brought Chiara along too. It doesn’t make the sadness go away, but it helps.”
“You have no idea what kinds of horrible fathers are out there. You compared to them? …” Compared to my father …
“Perhaps. But, well, love can always grow. We can always build upon it, right?” Kevin tapped his chin. “That reminds me. I’ve been wanting to ask you something. What do you say about working with me?”
Ethan cocked an eyebrow. “You mean—in construction?”
“Yeah, that’s exactly what I mean. Not right now—when you’re better, of course.”
Ethan held up his left hand. “I’m missing a finger.”
“I’m missing my strength. I can’t do as much as I used to. But I figure that together, we can do something.”
“I don’t know anything about building things.”
“That’s alright. I’ll teach you.”
Ethan hesitated.
“You don’t have other plans, do you?”
An image of Linx rose in Ethan’s mind.
Kevin must have guessed the source of his indecision. “Now, come on. Don’t tell me you’re missing those drugs of yours. Look what they did to you already! They almost killed you!” Kevin sat back a moment, his eyes widening. “You weren’t … that’s not what you were aiming to do, was it?”
Unwanted tears rose to Ethan’s eyes. He wasn’t accustomed to this kind of attention, care, or concern. It evoked a weakness in him. That, coupled with his physical collapse, made him susceptible to raw emotion.
“Hey, listen to me.” Kevin put a hand on Ethan’s arm. “I know things are tough right now. It’s not always going to be this way though.”
Ethan pressed his lips together, taking deep, shaky breaths.
“You and I are going to do some building together. We’re getting out into that fresh air. We’ll put some tools in your hands. You’ll see—you’ll feel better. But for now, you rest. I’ll bring you some food. You look like someone who could use something to eat.”
So began the first day of Ethan’s new life.
His appetite returned and his fever broke. The first day or two he depended upon someone else to help him out of bed to use the bathroom. His legs shook and he still felt dizzy. Chiara kept checking his vitals and making sure he got his medicine on time. She washed his face and brought him new, clean clothes to wear. Joe teased him good-naturedly, keeping him company. They cooked him food and, even through the night, someone always sat by his bedside. Ethan insisted that he felt fine and such a drastic measure was over the top, but no one paid any attention to his protests. Maybe they think I’ll hurt myself. They don’t trust me.
The whole experience humbled him in a way he’d never experienced before. He had nothing to hide behind now. These people cleaned up his vomit, they walked him to the toilet, they even spoon fed him. He felt like an infant, completely reliant on someone else. In a way, it felt good to be cared for. But he also sensed a growing debt to Kevin, Joe, and Chiara. He resolved to pay them back by working with Kevin. It was the least he could do in appreciation for saving his life—as little as his life meant.
After a week, Ethan shuffled out of the spare bedroom for the first time. He and Kevin settled in a sunny spot on the unfinished deck, books, puzzles, and a deck of cards to keep them busy. Kevin liked strategy games best, which suited Ethan as well, and they developed quite a rivalry between them. Then, when Chiara came home from her job at the farm down the street, Ethan joined her in the kitchen, sitting at the kitchen table peeling carrots or potatoes for her. After dinner, Joe and Chiara often went for a walk in the spring twilight. Ethan joined Kevin in the living room, watching old reruns of game shows, the windows open and crickets chirping.
Three weeks later Ethan felt strong enough to join Kevin for his first day of work. Ethan sat in the passenger seat of the truck as Kevin revved the diesel engine. Kevin grinned at him. “Let’s hop to it!” He pushed the audio dial on the truck’s dashboard and a hit song from at least three decades ago began to blast through the stereo. Kevin hummed along as he did a three-point turn and drove down the steep, gravel driveway.
“We’re working on putting up a three-season room. It’s the first day at this site, so you’ll get a glimpse of things right from the start.”
Kevin drove through Sippin’ Coffee, the nearby location of the national chain. “Got to start the morning right.” He smiled, passed Ethan a cup, and took a swig of his own coffee. “Piping hot, just the way I like it.”
They pulled up in front of a colonial home. Ethan followed Kevin around to the rear of the house, where they found four other men assembled.
“Here’s the crew!” Kevin gestured to the group. “Fellas, here’s Ethan. He’s recovering from a little illness, so he’ll mostly be watching and doing some smaller jobs for now.” Kevin nodded to one of the men. “Alright, Paul, let’s get the excavator going. Ethan, follow me over here and I’ll tell you what we’re planning.”
Kevin took Ethan closer to the house and spread his arms out wide. “We’re constructing a three-season room right here where we’re standing. The owners are hoping to let some more natural light into the home, so we’re putting windows on every side of the room. It’ll go from the corner of the house to about … here.” Kevin brushed his work boot over the grass in a certain spot. “So, the first step is clearing the construction site of any obstruction and making sure the grade slopes away from the house. Here, while they’re getting the excavator started, why don’t you hammer some wooden stakes in for me to mark the corners of the new room?” Kevin pulled a hammer from his tool belt and gave it to Ethan.
Ethan grasped it in his hand, turning it over and studying it. In this new world where he felt like a helpless child, even a little challenge like this seemed as insurmountable as Kilimanjaro—and he would know because he saw that mountain in person on a tour of Tanzania when he was seventeen. Ethan handed the hammer back to Kevin. “You should have one of your men do it. I’ll probably mess it up.”
“Mess it up?” Kevin started laughing. “If you do that, just pull it back out and try again! Come on, give it a try.” Using a tape measure and taking a quick glance at his blueprint, Kevin indicated a place with his right boot. “Go on! Grab one of those stakes over there and hammer it on in.”
Crouching, Ethan took the stake and, casting another dubious glance at Kevin, began tapping the stake.
“That’s right. Keep going!”
Ethan put some more force into the swings and soon the stake stood up straight and proud. He stood, brushing off his jeans.
“You got it. Now do the other three. Follow the plans.” Kevin clapped him on the back and went to check on the other crew members.
Ethan took a deep breath and got to work. Afterwards, he took a seat on a large tree root a few yards from the work site, already exhausted. He studied the plans, trying to make sense of them. He spent most of the morning watching the excavator at work, sometimes even dozing a little despite his best efforts not to. He wasn’t accustomed to leaving the house and still felt weak from his withdrawal.
As the days passed, his stamina improved, and Kevin found more ways to put him to work. The crew began laying support beams the very next day. “You see,” Kevin explained, yelling over the sounds of sawing, “this room’s going to have a cathedral ceiling. We’ve got to put a support post at the edge, along with two additional rows of three support posts—one at the outside edge of the new room and one two feet from the existing structure. I’m going to put you on measuring to make sure everything’s square.”
But halfway through his measuring job, Kevin circled around and frowned. “Hold on there.” He took the tape measuring, examining a few angles and sides. “Are you using 3-4-5?”
Ethan gave him a blank stare.
“You know, good ol’ Pythagoras?”
“I know who that is.”
“Well, have you actually used what he taught?”
“What did I screw up?”
Kevin chuckled. “You’ve got to remember: any error at the base is going to carry through the whole project and just get worse. We’ve got to lay a solid foundation, right? We want to build something that’s going to last and a storm won’t tear apart. Keep your angles with sides of 3, 4, and 5 feet and you’ll have a ninety-degree angle every time.”
“I didn’t know—”
“It’s alright! Don’t worry about it. That’s how you learn! You’ll never make this mistake again.”
Kevin was right: he didn’t repeat that error … though he made plenty others. Ethan swallowed his pride over and over as he slouched up to one of the blue-collar workers, asking them to show him how to do something again or how to start a particular tool. Yet they all helped him with the same patience that Kevin showed. The days passed from spring to summer. They visited several work sites. The owners of the three-season room didn’t need it finished by a certain date, so Kevin balanced work on that with other, more pressing jobs. But Ethan liked the three-season room the best. They framed the floor and then installed the subfloor. Ethan attached it to joists with flooring screws as the noon sun beat down on him, making his t-shirt cling to his back. Then came walls and rafters for the gabled roof.
Ethan sat in the passenger seat of Kevin’s truck one evening, headed home as the sun began to set in the western sky, their windows wide open and a warm breeze hitting their faces. Ethan studied the blisters that dotted his hands, so unaccustomed to physical labor. He winced as one of them burst and clear liquid oozed out.
“See that?” Kevin raised his eyebrows. “Those blisters are marks of a good job.”
Ethan snickered. “You mean they’re a mark of inexperience.”
“It’s how we all start. Listen: if it doesn’t hurt a little, it means you aren’t doing it right.”
Then they began roof sheeting, shingles, and flashing. The room started coming together, especially once they installed the windows and put on the cedar ceiling. Ethan even got to operate the circular saw to cut some of the pieces of vinyl siding. As he worked, Ethan pondered Kevin’s words. This job physically hurt. But he worked through the pain and, through the process, he became stronger.
The pill had done the opposite: it masked his pain and hid it deep beneath its hallucinatory effects. It comforted Ethan for a brief time, but it never lasted and it always made him weaker and more dependent in the end. No … what he needed now was to lean into the pain. He needed to let the pain make him stronger: to bring it on.
So Ethan looked at the images of Amanda throughout the house. He purposely sought them out and, in his mind, greeted her as though she could see him. He measured, nailed, painted, sawed, drilled, trimmed, and installed while remembering her voice, the way she would bite her lower lip, her laughter, and the way she would look at him right before they kissed.
He asked Joe and Chiara about Amanda’s favorite things and they spent the summer eating her favorite ice cream, listening to her favorite songs, and visiting the lake where their grandma used to live. Ethan jumped off the dock into the water and then floated, staring up at the vast blue, summer sky. This is a day Amanda would’ve loved. Ethan kicked underwater, spotting a swimming fish and some floating seaweed. He swam toward shore, his strong muscles propelling him smoothly through the water. Pulling himself onto the dock, he sat with his feet dangling in the water, the wooden boards beneath him warm from the sun.
She’s still here. She has to be. If not, why do I feel her now?
He leaned into the pain. It hurt. But it strengthened him.
As August came, Kevin and his crew put the finishing touches on the three-season room. The room looked strong and aesthetically pleasing. The owners gushed about the end result, and Kevin, blushing, thanked them for the opportunity to build it. As Ethan helped Kevin load up their remaining tools and sawhorses, he glanced over at Kevin.
“You and your guys do great work. This room turned out really well.”
“You were part of it too. We did it together, don’t forget.”
“Do you have more projects lined up?”
Kevin chuckled. “Oh, there’s no end to projects. I’ve got to turn people away. I can only do so much, you know.”
Ethan loaded the last sawhorse onto the bed of the truck, closing and locking the tailgate. “I’ve been thinking about that. You’ve got a good brand. That’s more than half the battle.”
“What do you mean?’
“People around Fort Christopher know you. They know your work, they know you’re dependable, that you’re honest. You should capitalize on that reputation. If you increase the size of your crew, you could take on more jobs. You could delegate the work among them and then supervise the different construction sites, as opposed to doing a lot of the grunt work yourself. It would be less taxing for you and you’d make so much more money. Plus, you should raise your prices. You could be charging way more for the quality of work you’re doing.”
Kevin leaned against his truck. “Don’t you start making work your new addiction. I could do all those things you mention; I’m content with my business though. It’s paying the bills. What more do I need?”
“Doesn’t it bother you that you could be doing more?”
“Why can’t I be happy where I am right now?”
Ethan paused for a moment, furrowing his brow. “I’ve spent my whole life always wanting more. Whatever I did, I wanted to do better. And when I excelled at that, I moved onto something else. That’s how I actually ended up meeting Amanda. I had a great job at the NCP. I didn’t need any more money. But I wasn’t content. I wanted something else. So I took on this side job of tracking people … I guess the point is that I’ve never been content with the status quo. I’ve always looked for something more or something new.”
“Let me give you a piece of advice. You see that room we just built? Don’t make your life a three-season room. It’s nice but only for a time. After a while, winter comes and it gets too cold. You can’t stay there; you have to move inside. For all that money and effort, it’s only temporary! Build somewhere you can stay forever. Build a place where you can be content.”
The weeks and months passed. Ethan filled them with work. He grew in skill and confidence in construction. He poured himself into his labor, through the long mornings on ladders and scaffolding, afternoons with the droning roar of the drill, and early evenings sweeping messes and organizing tools in preparation for the next workday. The normalized routine gave Ethan a very necessary structure. He liked the dependability of his work, and his camaraderie with Kevin grew with each passing day as they labored side by side.
One day in October, Kevin suddenly announced that they were taking the next day off from work.
Ethan looked up sharply from his dinner plate. “What?”
“You heard me right.” Kevin took a bite of his steak and smiled. “No work tomorrow.”
“Me too.” Joe pointed to the salt shaker. “Can you pass the salt?”
Ethan handed it to him. “Why are you off?”
“Then that makes four of us.” Chiara grinned.
Ethan looked from face to face. “What’s going on?”
“We figured it’s high time that you’re initiated into one of the Burrow family’s annual fall traditions.” Kevin raised his eyebrows. “The weather looks perfect! Tomorrow we’re going hunting!”
Ethan stopped with his fork in mid-air. “With a gun?”
“Nah. It’s bow season right now.”
“We have a tree stand for you,” Chiara said.
“Yum.” Joe patted his stomach. “I can already taste the venison!”
“Amanda loved bow hunting.” Kevin looked down. “Some of my favorite memories are of hunting with her.”
That decided it. “I’m in,” Ethan said.
That night, they left their hunting clothes outside to help remove any human scent. They woke up a couple of hours before dawn and got ready quickly, then piled into the truck.
“Hunting’s like a game of chess,” Kevin explained as he drove down the deserted mountain road.
“Except it makes you hungry.” From the back seat Joe opened his book bag and leaned forward, passing Ethan some snacks. “Stick those in your pockets. You’ll thank me after a couple hours up in the tree.”
Chiara began to laugh. “That’s why you never get a deer. You’re always eating and the rustling of the candy wrappers scares any animal away. Not to mention the smell!”
Joe shrugged. “Eh. What am I supposed to do? Go hungry?”
“Do I need anything else?” Ethan asked.
“I’ve got some rope,” Kevin said. “Just in case we get lucky and shoot a deer.”
“I don’t know how to use a bow.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that.” Kevin winked at him. “We’re starting it nice and easy. All you need to do today is sit in the tree stand and keep an eye on us—we’ll try to get a tree close to yours. Observation is a powerful teaching tool. Listen. Watch. We’ll do some target practice back home and maybe next time you can have a bow with you.”
A little later, Kevin pulled into a small parking lot and they prepared to enter the woods.
Kevin waved them onward. “No more talking. And try to pick up your feet when you walk so you don’t crunch too many leaves. We don’t want to let any deer know we’re here.”
In a single file they crossed the wooded landscape, still shadowy in the moments before dawn. Kevin studied a certain tree and nodded his head. He and Joe prepared the tree stand while Chiara passed Ethan some binoculars. They gave him a boost and, scrambling up the trunk, Ethan took his position, high in the tree.
Then the three of them moved on and Ethan watched their progress through the woods. After a short time, he could locate Kevin, Chiara, and Joe through the binoculars. They each had a bow and arrows. Ethan sat back, ready to learn.
Such deep silence filled these woods. He leaned his head back against the rough bark. Nearby, a bird took flight, its wings flapping as it ascended. A leaf floated down to the ground from a branch to his right. Each second the world around him became a shade lighter as the sun began to rise. A squirrel dashed up a tree in front of him with an acorn in its mouth.
He huddled down a little further in the coat Kevin had lent him. The October chill made the tip of his nose cold and he buried it in his upturned collar. Time seemed to pass—how long or how fast he couldn’t say. Every once in a while, he’d check on the others. Mostly he sat in the silence … imagining Amanda up in a tree stand … wishing she could be here this morning.
Why did you have to die? Why couldn’t you have survived like Kevin and I did? Why did your God allow it? Why did God take you from me?
Ethan stared up through the roof of leaves above him. A flock of geese passed overhead, noisily honking and encouraging each other onward.
If there is a God, I have a lot of questions for Him.
But all I hear is silence.