Leni waved. “I’m here, Dad. Just dropped the TP.” She cast a desperate glance back at Matthew. He hid behind a tree.
Leni walked over to the outhouse, disappeared inside of it. Ernt waited for her on the porch, herded her back inside as soon as she was done. The door lock latched with a click behind them.
Matthew retrieved his bicycle and rode home as fast as he could. He found Large Marge and his dad standing together in the yard, beside Marge’s truck.
“H-he’s building a wall,” Matthew said, his breath coming in gasps. He jumped off his bike and dropped it in the grass by the smokehouse.
“What do you mean?” Dad said.
“Ernt. You know how their land is a bottleneck and then flares out over the water? He’s skinned two logs and laid them across the driveway. Leni says he’s building a wall.”
“Jesus,” Dad said. “He’ll cut them off from the world.”
*
LENI WOKE TO THE high-pitched whirring of the chain saw and the occasional whack of a hatchet splitting wood. Dad had been up for hours, all weekend, building his wall.
The only bright spot was that she had survived the weekend and now it was Monday again, a school day.
Matthew.
Joy pushed aside the cramped, hopeless feeling of loss this weekend had birthed. She dressed for school and climbed down the ladder.
The cabin was quiet.
Mama came out of her bedroom dressed in a turtleneck and baggy jeans. “Morning.”
Leni went to her mother. “We have to do something before the wall is finished.”
“He won’t really do it. He was just crazed. He’ll see reason.”
“That’s what you’re going to rely on?”
Leni saw for the first time how old her mother looked, how drawn and defeated. There was no light in her eyes anymore, no ready smile.
“I’ll get you coffee.”
Before Leni made it to the kitchen, a knock rattled the cabin door. Almost simultaneously the door swung open. “Hullo, the house!”
Large Marge strode forward. A dozen bracelets clattered on her fleshy wrists, earrings bobbed up and down like fishing lures, catching the light. Her hair was growing out again. She’d parted it down the middle and tied it into two pom-pom balls that flopped as she moved.
Dad pushed in behind the black woman, put his hands on his bony hips. “I said you couldn’t go in, g-damn it.”
Large Marge grinned and handed Mama a bottle of lotion. She pressed it into her hands, closed her big hands over Mama’s small ones. “Thelma made this from the lavender growing in her backyard. She thought you’d love it.”
Leni could see what this small kindness meant to her mother.
“We don’t want your charity,” Dad said. “She smells just fine without putting on that shit.”
“Girlfriends give each other gifts, Ernt. And Cora and I are friends. That’s why I’m here, in fact. I thought I’d have coffee with my neighbors.”
“Would you get Marge some coffee, Leni?” Mama said. “And maybe a piece of cranberry bread.”
Dad crossed his arms, standing with his back to the door.
Large Marge led Mama to the sofa, helped her to sit, then sat beside her. The cushion popped beneath the woman’s weight. “Really, I wanted to talk to you about my diarrhea.”
“Good Christ,” Dad said.
“It’s been explosive. I wondered if you’d come across any home remedies. Good Lord, the cramping has been awful.”
Dad muttered an expletive and left the cabin, slamming the door shut behind him.
Large Marge smiled. “Men are so easy to outthink. So, now it’s just us.”
Leni handed out coffees and then sat down in the old Naugahyde recliner they’d bought at a junk store in Soldotna last year.
Large Marge’s gaze moved from Cora, to Leni, and back to Cora. Leni was sure that it missed nothing. “I don’t imagine Ernt was pleased about Thelma’s decision at Earl’s funeral.”
“Oh. That,” Mama said.
“I see the posts he’s dug out on the main road. Looks like he’s building a wall around this place.”
Mama shook her head. “He won’t.”
“You know what walls do?” Large Marge said. “They hide what happens behind them. They trap people inside.” She put her cup down on the coffee table, leaned toward Mama. “He could put a lock on that gate and keep the key and how would you escape?”
“H-he wouldn’t do that,” Mama said.
“Oh, really?” Large Marge said. “That’s what my sister said the last time I talked to her. I would do anything to go back in time and change what happened. She’d finally left him, but it was too late.”
“She left him,” Mama said quietly. For once, she didn’t look away. “That’s what got her killed. Men like that … they don’t stop looking for you until they find you.”
“We can protect you,” Large Marge said.
“‘We’?”
“Tom Walker and me. The Harlans. Tica. Everyone in Kaneq. You’re one of us, Cora, you and Leni. He’s the outsider. Trust us. Let us help.”
Leni thought about it for real, seriously; they could leave him.
It would mean leaving Kaneq and probably Alaska.
Leaving Matthew.
And, what? Would they have to be on the run forever, hiding out, changing their names? How did that work? Mama had no money, no credit card. She didn’t even have a valid driver’s license. Neither of them did. On paper, did she and Mama even exist?
And what if he found them anyway?
“I can’t,” Mama finally said, and Leni thought they were the saddest, most pathetic words she’d ever heard.
Large Marge stared at Mama a long time, disappointment etched in the lines of her face. “Well. These things take time. Just know that we are here. We’ll help you. All you have to do is ask. I don’t care if it’s the middle of the night in January. You come to me, okay? I don’t care what you’ve done or what he’s done. You come to me and I’ll help.”
Leni couldn’t help herself. She launched herself around the coffee table and into Large Marge’s arms. The woman’s comforting bulk enfolded her, made her feel safe. “Come on,” Large Marge said. “Let’s get you to school. There aren’t many days left before you graduate.”
Leni grabbed her backpack and slung it over her shoulder. After a fierce hug for her mother, a whispered, “We need to talk about this,” Leni followed Large Marge outside. They were halfway to the truck when Dad appeared, holding a five-gallon jug of gasoline.
“Leaving so soon?” he said.
“Just a cup of coffee, Ernt. I’ll drive Leni to school. I’m heading to the store.”
He dropped the plastic jug. It sloshed beside him. “No.”
Large Marge frowned. “No, what?”
“No one leaves this place without me anymore. There’s nothing out there for us.”
“She’s five days away from graduating. Of course she’s going to finish.”
“Fat chance, fat lady,” Dad said. “I need her at the homestead. Five days is nothing. They’ll give her the damned piece of paper.”
“You want to fight this battle?” Large Marge advanced, bracelets clattering. “If this young woman misses a single day of school, I will call the state and turn you in, Ernt Allbright. Don’t think for one second I won’t. You can be as batshit crazy and mean as you want, but you are not going to stop this beautiful girl from finishing high school. You got it?”
“The state won’t care.”
“Oh. They will. Trust me. You want me talking to the authorities about what goes on here, Ernt?”
“You don’t know shit.”
“Yeah, but I’m a big woman with a big mouth. You want to push me?”
“Go ahead. Take her to school, if it means so damned much to you.” He looked at Leni. “I’ll pick you up at three. Don’t keep me waiting.”
Leni nodded and climbed into the old International Harvester, with its ragtag cloth-covered seats. They drove down the bumpy driveway, past the newly skinned log poles. Out on the main road, rambling through a cloud of dust, Leni realized she was crying.
It felt overwhelming suddenly. The stakes were too high. What if Mama ran and Dad really did find her and kill her?
Large Marge pulled up in front of the school and parked. “It’s not fair that you have to deal with this. But life ain’t fair, kid. You know that, I guess. You could call the police.”