There was a felled pine to my left and I crawled behind it and put my chest in the snow. I thought it was possible Shelton was dead and that if he was I could find his cell phone and finally call for help, but he might just be passed out and what if I walked up there and roused him?
All things being even I might have waited him out a little longer, but I did not like Jenna being so far away in the house and I did not like leaving her with Carletta. Her fever had me scared and we needed a phone so I lifted myself into a crouch and eased toward the Silverado.
I got close enough to see the gas cylinder beside his body. The fool had been sucking from a nitrous tank, and there was a bottle of whiskey between his legs that somehow stood unbroken from the crash. Then I saw his cell on the driver’s-side floor—a black, blood-splattered rectangle sitting in a pile of glass shards.
I took another step and then Shelton stirred at the wheel and let out a groan. I froze and when he started to bring his shoulders up off the wheel I turned and ran. I leapt for my pine and then made myself small behind it, wriggling as far as I could into the snow and burying my head into my arms.
I heard Shelton whispering to himself, talking hurriedly, and then the clomp of his boots on the snow. I pushed my eyes more tightly closed and held my breath.
I have had nightmares where I realize I am sleeping and try to will myself awake and cannot. In those dreams I am trapped and my last hope is to somehow force myself from my body, to rise above whatever horror is happening and view it from some place that is neither sleep nor being fully awake—but this was not a dream and I could not remove myself from my body but was fully locked inside it instead. I was all cold fear and hammering heart and when I heard the shotgun blast I thought I had been shot until I noticed that the buck’s screams were silenced.
I looked up over my pine to see Shelton walking back to the truck. He had the shotgun slung over his shoulder and he was wearing some sort of crash helmet with a black visor and when he turned his head to scan the woods I swear he looked right through me.
I dropped back into the snow and listened to the opening and closing of the truck door. I heard the engine rev and then the Silverado shifted into gear and headed back down the trail.
I watched over the pine until the taillights disappeared into the black and then I stood and ran for the trailer. I ran until my legs caught fire, and when I slipped in the snow I stood quickly and ran harder. I ran and as I neared the trailer I could hear Jenna screaming.
I came in the back. I called out for Jenna and for Mama and then turned toward the sound of the shrieks. The bathroom was locked but I could hear them inside and shook the handle.
“Mama!” I shouted, and pounded the door. “Open up, Mama!”
Carletta mumbled something but I could not make it out over Jenna. I kicked the door and yelled for her to open up, but Mama did not respond.
I ran down the hall toward the bedroom. The light was on and there was a collapsing recliner in the corner of the room where stuffing came through the fabric like cotton bolls. Beside the recliner was a nightstand and on the nightstand was a glass pipe. The papoose had been left but the blanket had gone with Jenna.
Mama would not hurt a baby on purpose, but when she was on a bad one she could slip right into delirium. She could be holding Jenna and squeezing her to death without knowing any different. She could have her pressed to her chest so hard she snapped a rib, or think she was rocking her gently while she was really shaking her out like a rag doll.
There were hangers in the closet, and I took one and untwisted the hook. I looped the papoose over my shoulder and took the straightened wire to the bathroom door. I called out for Mama. I asked her to open up, though I knew she would not. I began to feel for the lever through the pinhead opening in the handle and talked to Jenna through the wall. I told her everything was going to be fine.
“I’m right out here, baby girl,” I said.
Jenna screamed and I squatted outside the door and punched with the wire.
“One second, sweet pea,” I said. “I’m right here.”
The lever finally caught and I opened the door to find Jenna in Carletta’s lap. Mama was sitting in the empty tub, her hair falling across her face in strings and partly shielding Jenna from my view. Carletta rocked back and forth and squeezed Jenna as she wailed.
“Shh,” Carletta said. “I’m trying to get this baby to sleep.”
“Mama,” I said. “It’s me.”
“I said, hush,” Carletta said.
“Can I hold the baby for a minute?”
“Tanner is fine right where he is.”
“This is Jenna,” I said, and lilted my voice hopefully.
I stepped closer and Mama looked up with her gone-away eyes. She looked at some point in the distance, beyond me, and kissed Jenna hard on the forehead.
“He’s a good boy,” she said. “But he won’t stop crying.”
“Her name is Jenna,” I said.
“He’s as sweet as he can be,” Mama whispered.
“She’s a good baby,” I said.