D Carpenter - Infertile Grounds

“He’s upstairs,” Stu replied.

Sarah stepped past Seth and stood in front of Stu. She was tall for a woman and since learning at an early age to ignore the other kid’s wicked comments – the least of which were about her then beanpole physique – she had figured out how to use her height to her advantage. Now, at five feet eleven inches tall with proportional, womanly shapeliness, she could have used her body to manipulate men – but that would be too… typical. Her one personally allowed physical influencer was looking eye to eye or preferably eye to top of the head. She looked down at the wiry, visibly trembling man. “Let’s go,” she said.

“Which side of the room is the bed on,” Seth asked as he pulled out his pistol in the dark hall.

“The right,” Stu answered.

Seth grasped the knob and swung the door open. Each of the three booming shots that followed made Stu jump.

After a moment, Seth appeared at the door. “He’s not here,” he spat.

“That’s impossible,” Stu replied as he flicked on the hall light and walked into the room to check for himself. “I’ve been watching the room all night.”

Stu walked over to the window. The latch was undone. He lifted it up and stuck out his head. Chris Foster was long gone.

“He must’ve climbed out the window,” Stu said, pulling his head back inside.

Sarah loomed in the doorway, casting a shadow across the floor that climbed to Stu’s shaky chest. “I thought you had him locked up?”

“I did. I don’t understand how he could have known that something was up?”

Seth and Sarah exchanged glances.

“Search the grounds,” she said and left the room.

After ten minutes of looking in the outbuildings and around the property, they congregated on the porch and concluded that he had gotten away.

“You better call Bert, Seth. Tell him to find this guy. Now,” Sarah said. Seth ran into the lodge as she turned and glared at Stu, locking her grey eyes on his with a predator’s unblinking intensity. Then she stormed off to the Scout.

Annie emerged from the lodge and stood next to her husband. “How’d he get away?” She asked.

“Out the window,” Stu replied.

“I told you from day one not to get involved with them. It was bad news from the start,” Annie said.

“Damn it, Annie. Now’s not the time for this. And besides, you didn’t have a hard time spending the cash, did you?”

“That’s not fair, Stewart! I’ve been doing—”

Seth came out of the lodge. “This isn’t good,” he said as he ran past them to the truck.

“Let them get inside,” Sarah said as Seth climbed into the cab of the truck.

Seth drove the truck across the dew covered lawn and up onto the road. As they hit the tar, Annie and Stu disappeared into the lodge. Seth popped the vehicle into second gear and slammed his fist onto the detonator on the dash causing a massive fireball to erupt from the building, hurling thirty-foot logs into the air like flaming Popsicle sticks. They drove down the road in silence.

“We’ll find him, Sarah,” he said as he picked up his two-way radio transmitter and radioed back to the base camp for help.

Sarah stared at the dark woods whizzing by her window in the hopes that Chris might be stupid enough to be walking along the main road. Probably not, though. If he was smart enough to get out of the Wild Bear, they weren’t going to find him sauntering down the street.

Chris let out a long, slow exhalation as the heavily loaded lumber truck ground to a halt at a truck stop. It had been a nerve racking two-hour drive. Every car they passed could have contained people looking for him and he had inspected each with appropriate fear and concern.

“This is where I go to the mill,” the truck driver said, pointing up a road. “You can find a ride to Bangor inside.”

Chris thanked him for the ride, climbed out, and walked toward the diner. He scanned the parking lot for suspicious vehicles or people, convinced that whoever these people were, they were everywhere. He could feel the tension in his neck and shoulders and the dull throbs of a headache began thumping in the recesses of his brain.

Once inside, he sat down in a booth facing the door and a waitress came over. She looked tough, hardened by life – probably from a few too many men, a few too many kids and too few breaks.

“What can I get you?” She asked as she munched on a wad of gum.

Chris felt sick to his stomach with worry and panic but the intense breakfast aromas threw him back to the Sunday mornings of his childhood. Mom had her one day off a week and she loved to cook for her men – five sons and a husband. She always doted on Chris. A few extra strips of bacon, the last sausage – it was a perk of being the baby of the family. A melancholy fell over him as it always did when he thought about his now long dead family.

“You want me to come back,” the waitress said as she tapped a pencil on her order pad.

“No, I’ll have three sunny side up eggs, bacon, toast, orange juice and coffee,” he said, knowing he should try to eat something, if he could keep it down.

She must have seen some hint of his sullen reminiscence and offered him a small, understanding smile before turning and going about her business.

For a little past five a.m. this place was swinging. Most of the blue-collar logging crowd sat alone at their tables. Apart from the truckers, there were those that probably worked at the mill or in the woods – looked like a couple a farmers were in the mix for good country measure. A friendly air permeated the place, even though little talking occurred – as if they all knew each other well enough that a simple look or nod said it all. Chris studied each face, trying to decide if anyone was paying particular attention to him.

He picked at his breakfast, in no mood for eating after the events of the night. The waitress refilled his coffee cup as he pushed his plate away half-eaten. “Can I get you anything else?”

“No thanks,” he mumbled.

She started to walk away when he said, “Excuse me.”

She turned and raised her penciled eyebrows. “Yes.”

“I need a ride to Bangor. Do you know if any of these guys are going that way?”

She gave him another quick little smile and said, “Let’s find out.” Then she said in a much louder voice, “Any of you boys heading south today?”

Some heads lifted to look at her. Finally, a stocky man wearing suspenders on the other side of the room said, “I’ll go anywhere with you, darling.”

“I’ll tell your wife that, Sid.” This brought out a few chuckles.

“I’m going to Portland as soon as I finish breakfast,” a bearded man two tables over said.

The waitress looked at Chris. “There you go.”

Chris walked over to his table. “Do you think you could give me a lift to Bangor?”

He slowly ran a napkin through his gnarly beard, silently studying Chris. “You don’t have a car?”

“It broke down in the woods up near Masardis.”

The man nodded, obviously sensing a bullshit story. After a minute of awkward silence, he asked Chris to sit down.

Chris tried to ignore the noxious stench of the unwashed man and his soiled clothes. The man continued to eat without paying him much attention.

“So what are you going to do in Bangor?” He finally asked as he reached for his wallet.

“Let me pick up your meal,” Chris said as he snatched up the tab, threw enough money down to cover it and his own and give the waitress the best tip she would get all day.

“Thanks,” he said. His eyes narrowed as he looked from the money on the table to Chris.

“My brother lives there. I’m going to borrow his pickup,” Chris said. A lie, of course, but what did it matter? All he wanted was to put some miles between himself and the people back at the Wild Bear.