I'm not sure where to start.
Something about my time spent with that man did me good somehow.
Funny, the way things happen. Accidents aren't really accidents. It's just a way of Life throwing us where we need to go, at the right moment. Sometimes it hurts. Sometimes it's frightening. Most times, actually.
A rainy, muddy summer it's been. Heavy air. The earth loved it. I'd go to sleep at night and wake up to new, green, wild things creeping into my camp that weren't there the day before. It felt like a message to my heart. To my soul.
I think there was some purpose in coming into the company of a mute. Though he's not exactly mute, he can grunt and sigh and chuckle when he wants to. It started out with a visit once a week, just to make sure he was getting on all right after the blow to his head. Learning how to understand him was no easy thing. I had to learn to watch his eyes and the way he moves his mouth and his brow. He'd point and gesture. Huff and sputter when he was frustrated or tired. I wonder how long he's been out here in this old cabin, all by himself. But I haven't asked. He doesn't seem like a person who's used to other people.
After a while, I didn't talk so much when I'd visit. I thought it would be easier for me to talk or ask questions and then try to finagle out his gestures and grunts, but it wasn't until I stopped talking and just watched and listened. Now I know what he's thinking just by the way his eyes move over me, or around the room, or through the trees if we're walking in the forest. I'm trying to do the same thing. To tell him what I think or feel without saying anything. It didn't work so well at first. It took practice and time and a lot of getting it wrong. Sometimes he'd shoo me away with a wave, done being around me and my clumsy efforts for the day. But little by little, I learned. And he learned.
I would say he started smiling when he'd see me coming along through the wood to his cottage, but that isn't quite right. He never smiled. Least not with his mouth. But there was a morning where he looked over and saw me, and his back suddenly went straight and tall, and his eyebrows were high, and his hands fiddled at his pockets. It was a smile without a smile, if ever I saw one.
Gods, I'm babbling on like a right fool now. Oh, well. May as well keep going.
He had a little hunting bow. Pitiful thing, it was. Made of pine, too soft, too small for his big arms. I had sworn I’d never make a bow again. Why did I ever swear that? I didn’t want to be “the old me”, that’s why. I’d made so many mistakes and trusted all the wrong people. I stayed put when I should have gone south. I went north when I should have stayed put. A slow learner. I thought I could just become someone else. Or at least a smarter, better version of myself.
I told him I could make him a proper bow.
He sat with me every day while I worked on it. He wanted to learn how to do it himself. I showed him everything, I explained what I needed to, and the rest of the time I kept my yap shut and he just watched. His eyes were glued to my hands and I knew he was taking it all in. I only hid the bow from him for the final touches. I wanted it to be something special. I couldn’t tell him what his company had meant to me all those weeks. How it felt to be welcomed and accepted, to be challenged and taught, to be allowed to give something back without any strings attached.
Oi. Strings attached. Bow-making jokes!
It’s been a long while since I laughed.
Anyway, I made some carvings on the bow, like I used to do with my own. Nothing fancy, I’m no woodcutter. A few oak leaves, since his cabin has oak trees all about it. An antler, as he liked to stand by the window and watch the red bucks grazing on the acorns. When I brought it to him and handed it over, I swear his eyes got a little shiny. He looked at it like a lad seeing his first love, and I knew I’d done well and right.
I really didn’t mean to jabber on forever about this. But what’s the harm in it? Who’s going to mind?
Then summer was over. The nights had a chill to them. Crickets were singing day and night. And when they start singing during the day, you know autumn’s come.
I’d come to a decision, but I hadn’t told him yet. I had started working on another bow, but I kept it at my camp. It was one of those decisions that comes slowly, like a drop of water every now and then, sneakily filling up a bowl when you aren’t looking. I realized that the bowl was almost full, and I hadn’t realized it had been happening all that time.
You see, I’d been thinking about everything. And everyone. Even those faces that used to drive me to rage so sharp and vile it was like a madness. And those that have been gone so long, my heart hurts to even remember they exist. There was some reason to all those quiet hours sitting with my silent friend. It gave me a chance to...I don’t know. Not “heal”. To accept, maybe.
I used to dream of tracking him down and putting a slow cut on his throat. Stare into his eyes and let the last thing he sees be the hot bitterness I felt. I’d wake up from nightmares and be grabbing at the air like it was his neck, frothing and spitting like a wild animal. Why? Why was I so mad with rage?
Anger is never the real reason, Pa used to tell me. We get angry because we’re covering up something else. Hurt. Shame. Fear. We get angry to protect ourselves from them.
Pa was right. It was hurt that I felt. Betrayal. Humiliation. I’d trusted, and been abandoned.
But the past is done. There’s no use in letting old wounds keep festering. My hermit friend had taught me a new depth of patience, and just being quiet, and accepting what’s been. Look at all he’s been through, after all. And he’s not a hateful, vicious beast for what he suffered.
I started to feel new wishes and desires in my heart. I started picturing other places, with myself there. Old places. Familiar places. It’s funny when something’s been so long ago that “old” becomes “new”.
Autumn is prime hunting season. And it may be the end of summer, but it always feels like something starting to me. It seemed the right time to do what I’d been thinking of doing.
I packed up my camp. That’s why I found this damned journal. I have a bad habit of forgetting them, losing them. Burning them.
I went to the cottage one last time. He came out onto the little stoop when he heard my boots on the leaves. His shoulders were square and his head up proud. No smile on his lips, but his eyes were bright. Then he saw the new bow on my back, and the pack hanging there. He hadn’t smiled, but I saw the light go out of his eyes a little.
I said a few things. Just what I needed to say. I shook his hand. I promised him I’d come back to visit.
I started walking away, but something didn’t feel finished about it all.
I ran back and kissed him on the cheek.
Now I’m halfway to Bree, camped under an old rock, writing this stupidly long novel with a charcoal nub.
And I’m happy.
