Eileen Gunn - Stable Strategies and Others

They’d have to start back to the lodge soon, but maybe they’d have time to check out the pond. It would be a nice place to hike to later in the spring, but, like the woods along the trail, it was sad and decayed now. The death of winter is the first sign of spring in the Sierras, but winter here doesn’t die easy.

Mia felt a small death in her, too: the first indication, perhaps, of a rebirth. Skiing, solitary, ahead of Zeb, she had come to a decision. Her anger of last night had dissipated, but like the alcohol that had fed it, it had left her feeling sick. They had fought so many times before, over such insignificant matters. It was time to put an end to it.

Zeb skied up beside her. Brown, bearded, not unfriendly in spite of their fight, he was a welcome sight, but Mia hardened her resolve.

“Porcupine tracks back there,” he said, slightly out of breath. “Like someone dragged a broom across the snow.”

“I’ve made a decision,” said Mia. “I’m getting out of LA. Maybe go to Oregon.” She looked away from him, between two scraggly lodgepole pines, toward the pond.

Zeb stared at her warily. “It wasn’t that bad a fight,” he said. “I’m sure the staff at the lodge has forgotten all about it. There’s no need to leave the state.”

Mia smiled slightly, against her will. “I’m serious.”

“We shouldn’t throw away our time together so casually.”

“You mean we should stick it out like a cat and dog tied tail-to-tail?” Mia didn’t want to face him. Her eyes sought the distance, the dark woods beyond the far edge of the pond.

“We don’t have to fight,” said Zeb. He was still looking at her. “I don’t even understand what we fought about last night.”

Mia forced herself to turn to him, and the courage of honesty came to her. “I don’t know, either. There’s just something in me that lashes out at you. That’s why I want to go. There’s something in me that fears and hates and fights, and I have no control over it with you. It’s happened before, too, with other people.”

Now Zeb searched the forest, refused to meet her eyes. “This is no place to have a serious conversation. We’ve got to get going anyway, if we’re going to make it back to the lodge before dark.”

“I want to get a closer look at the pond,” said Mia, relieved to drop the subject. She pushed forward on her skis. The corner of the pond that had been hidden by the pines came into view. The surface of the ice was broken, and there was a jagged circle of brown water, as though someone had fallen in. She called out to Zeb.

He came up beside her, and gave a puzzled grunt. “No footprints, no ski tracks. No sign of an animal. Kind of far from the trees for a limb to have fallen in.”

The air coming up from the pond was wet and clinging. Mia shivered again. “Maybe something’s breaking out,” she said. Zeb looked at her blankly; that didn’t make sense. “Let’s go,” she said. “It’s getting cold and dark.” As she turned to go down the slope the way they’d come, she thought she saw something move in the dark gap of the pond. “Wait.” She swung back to see what it was. In the dark brown water, something was bobbing slowly, just under the surface. It was pale and bulky, like a badly wrapped package. A body?

“If it happened before the last snow, there’d be no tracks,” said Zeb.

As they watched, the package broke the surface slowly and gently, like a bubble rising in oil. It bobbed uncertainly and rotated. A bare foot, white as chalk, appeared from underneath. The stench of rotting flesh drifted like mist up the slope. There was someone in there, past any help they could give.

“My god,” whispered Mia. But Zeb was already heading down the hill to the pond. “What are you going to do?” she shouted. He didn’t answer, and she pushed off after him, their argument already far in the past.

She caught up to him quickly. They stopped at the bottom of the hill, by the edge of the pond. They couldn’t see the body any better than they had from the hill. Was it wearing a tan parka? The foot had sunk back down below the water: it wasn’t visible. The smell of putrefaction was stronger now, almost overwhelming.

“We can’t possibly drag it back to the lodge,” Mia said.

“I know,” said Zeb. “The shape it’s in, it would fall apart anyway. But if we can get a look at the clothing, see if there’s any identification on it, maybe the rangers will be able to figure out who it was.”

“God, this is gruesome.”

“Eh. Good an end as any. Bottom of a quiet pond in the Sierras.” He was edging out onto the ice.

“Be careful. I couldn’t drag you back, either.” Now that she was down by the pond, the air felt even wetter, almost slimy. The hole was close to the edge of the pond, only about eight feet away. From close up, it looked larger and somehow hungry. Zeb’s skis were leaving long, brown-soaked tracks.

“Give me the tip of your pole to hold on to,” he said.

Mia did. “I don’t like this,” she said. “How can you go out there?”

“If you were in there, you’d want somebody to find out who you were.” Zeb’s voice was calm, the voice of a man who didn’t believe he’d fall in. He was gingerly testing the ice. As he moved, the body bobbed. His weight was bouncing the ice on the water like a raft. Mia winced.

Zeb moved further out onto the ice, still holding onto Mia’s pole, and she moved up behind him. Her skis were resting mostly on the land, with about two feet of the tips out on the ice. Zeb was all the way out, his weight distributed by his skis.

“I can almost reach it with my pole,” he said. “Maybe I can pull it over and grab it.”

“I don’t like this, Zeb.” Fear welled in her throat like vomit.

“There’s something else in there!” Another light-colored mass was moving in the brown water, coming out from under the shelf of ice.

Mia pulled back, the hair bristling coldly at the nape of her neck.

“Don’t do that!” shouted Zeb angrily.

Ashamed — they were dead bodies, after all — Mia moved out again onto the ice.

Zeb was redistributing his weight, extending his pole to snag the body on the top. There was a sudden splash, and something whipped out of the water and grabbed the pole, just above the round plastic basket at the end. Zeb let go of Mia’s pole and without even a yell was pulled into the water.

Mia froze as Zeb disappeared under the surface. She could see more bodies below. Huge and pale, they rose like feeding fish from under the ice. The water began to ripple, then to boil furiously.

Mia yelled. She moved out onto the ice towards the hole, striking at the shapes in the churning water. A long thin hand reached like a tentacle out of the water and grabbed her pole. It was dead white, the skin wrinkled and sloughing off the wet bones. Mia pulled back, but it was too strong. She was losing her balance. She let her hand go limp, and her pole and globe were ripped away. Without thinking, Mia scrambled back for the bank, and landed heavily on her side. The hole in the pond was getting wider; brown patches appeared in the snow-covered ice and sank away into open water. There were more things trying to get out.

At the edge of the pond, she hesitated, stunned. It had happened so quickly. Zeb was still in there. Could he still be alive?

More holes opened in the ice and more claw-like hands grasped toward her. The water in the pond lapped at her skis. It was rising.

Faster than her brain, her body acted. When she snapped to, she was already half-way up the hillside, with no idea of how she’d gotten that far. She kept going, moving almost straight up the slope.

When she got to the top, she stopped, but didn’t look back. Were there sounds behind her? She was paralyzed momentarily: her need to get away fought with a sense of duty. She should go back down to the pond and find Zeb.