Page 61 of Big & Lily

We all make a detour around the mud puddle, and I decide to lay off searching for a glimpse of my fox. He is probably staying out of the way to remind me I’d better watch where I’m walking.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Lily holds up a red bikini. “Well, didn’t get much use  out of this.”

“Why on earth did you bring a bathing suit to a wilderness trip?”

“I pictured a hot tub. I wanted to be prepared.”

Lily has everything that was once stuffed into her suitcase strewn around the yurt. She is packing, and I am shuffling around my mostly unused clothes. We leave tomorrow. After a morning hike to the lake and one last view of Denali, Frank is coming to pick us up in his jalopy of a van and drive us back to Anchorage, where Lily and I will fly into Newark International Airport and land back in reality.

I’m not sure I’m done with Alaska.

Sure, I relish a long, hot shower and a Venti cappuccino, but I found something here I never expected to. Truth be told, all I’d hoped for was to make it through the trip and get home in one piece. Now, at the risk of sounding like Wizard Ven Tarion, I’m starting to feel whole here. Or I’ve finally had a breather long enough to realize what whole feels like. I came into this vacation for someone else. To save my sister. That’s what’s changed. The understanding that I can also be here for myself.

But now we must go home.

It’s time for Lily to face her husband. The guy who blew up herworld. She must decide what kind of life she wants from here on in. It’s not going to be easy. She will need her family with her. Which is why I can’t stop thinking about what she said when she pulled me aside after dinner this evening.

Supper had been cold sandwiches acquired in Talkeetna and packed into a cooler with fruit, bottles of beer and soda, and, delightfully, moose-dropping cookies. I’d given mine to Dane at the bar in an attempt to lure him from his whiskey, and I don’t regret it, but I’d been looking forward to having something sweet as a reward after that hike.

The wood for the campfire was damp and the fire smoky. Jace poked at it with a long stick, which sent embers flying but did nothing to clear the air. I couldn’t see the person sitting opposite me, and I’m sure I’ll never wash the smell of campfire out of my hair and clothes. Still, we were warm enough and our bellies were full.

The group was subdued for once, no laughing and joke telling. Everyone realizing it was our last night together. It’s hard to believe how close we’d gotten in a week. How our world became a bubble. We’d exchanged numbers, and social media handles, and promised to keep in touch—there was even talk of a reunion tour. I’m sure that was just talk. We’re spread all over the country. We have lives and people at home. We needed to take what Alaska had offered us and get back to them.

After we finished our sandwiches and repositioned ourselves out of the line of drifting smoke, Brick pulled a book out from inside his jacket. “I save this for the last night of every trip. It’s from Robert Service, poet of the Yukon. He wrote over a thousand poems about the wilderness. I highly recommend you read a few now that you’ve experienced some of what he saw. The emotions haven’t changed in a hundred years. But I’m going to leave you with thisone.” He stood with the book open in front of him, although I suspected he had memorized the page long ago.

“Ye who know the Lone Trail fain would follow it,

Though it lead to glory or the darkness of the pit.

Ye who take the Lone Trail, bid your love good-by;

The Lone Trail, the Lone Trail follow till you die.

The trails of the world be countless, and most of the trails be tried;

You tread on the heels of the many, till you come where the ways divide;”

As he continued to read, we all leaned in. I saw my sister’s eyes widen as he spoke about trails not taken.

“Bid good-by to sweetheart, bid good-by to friend;

The Lone Trail, the Lone Trail follow to the end.

Tarry not, and fear not, chosen of the true;

Lover of the Lone Trail, the Lone Trail waits for you.”

He closed the book with a flourish, and we clapped and cheered. Brick smiled and bowed.I’ll miss you most of all, Scarecrow, I thought to myself.

“Here’s to the Lone Trail,” shouted Dane.

“To the Lone Trail!” replied the audience.

Luna had been brought to tears. “Oh, this darn smoke,” she’d said, wiping her eyes. I knew their lone trail had miles to go.

“Hey, can I talk to you?” asked Lily when everyone had turned their attention away from Brick and back to the fire and the beer.