“I know. I wish I wasn’t the one who had to break this to him. When I was there with him, I just couldn’t say anything. I didn’t want to be another person in his life forcing him into something he doesn’t want to do.”
“Are you serious? You went all that way and then talked about what? The weather?” she asked. She was being sarcastic but had hit the nail right on the head.
“We just talked. I told him about the storm that’s supposed to blow in from the mountains. Offered to take him into town to stock up because the snow’s going to be at least a couple feet deep. He might be trying to prove something, but dying during a snowstorm isn’t how he’s going to do it.”
“Snowstorm? And he’s alone up there?” she asked.
“Alone and determined he can take it.”
“He might not want to come back to Salt Lake, but he’s gotta be a lot more useful to you alive than he could ever be dead.”
“Well, tell him that,” I said, looking listlessly at a makeup display. I had been thinking about him a lot since I had been to his cabin the day before. The storm was scheduled to blow through the mountains today. He didn’t have his phone with him, or any phone with him, so he was fucking unreachable unless I wanted to make that damn drive again.
"Nat," Kasey said, "could he die up there alone?"
"It wouldn’t be hard," I scoffed. “He has all the ingredients for disaster.” Isolation. Limited access to resources and emergency services, and foolhardy stubbornness. He was looking at at least severe bodily injury, if not death.
"And you're just going to leave him?"
"I don't know why you think I have control over what he does; I clearly don't," I said. But I have control over what I do, I realized. I couldn't make him listen to me. He didn't have to listen to me when I told him he had to prepare for a storm, but he couldn't stop me from going back up there. "Kase?" I asked her suddenly.
"What?" I had an idea, and it was her fault. I hoped she wasn't going to abandon me because I wouldn't be able to do it alone. I told her. Technically, I couldn't make Cameron take care of himself. If he had decided his week of wilderness living meant he knew his shit, then I'd just have to step in where his good sense had failed him.
My car wasn't that big, and the number of things I believed he'd need in general might have been too long to get up there on this one trip. We started with a few emergency items: candles, a lighter, matches and a flashlight with batteries in case of a power outage. His cabin seemed to have electricity, but I wasn't sure whether his lights were solar powered, gas, or whether he was attached to the grid. We had lived pretty remotely on the ranch growing up, but we had always had electricity. We hadn't been total savages.
Unless a week had been long enough for him to have learned to hunt, he needed food. I got a mix of fresh and non-perishable food to be safe. If he didn't like canned corned beef, he was about to start. He had a fireplace, and the cabin had been pretty toasty when we had gone inside, but I remembered winters back home when we'd do everything short of setting the house on fire to heat it up. I took a chance and got an electric heater, hoping I was right that he'd be able to use it.
I picked up some kitchen and general items like paper towels and aluminum foil, even some extra blankets. Kasey helped but hadn't had that many ideas on what he'd need. The closest she had gotten to wilderness living in the past was dating a guy who liked to hike. Finally satisfied with the haul and running out of time before Kasey had to be at her salon, I dropped her off before I started for the mountains.
"Are you heading out there now? What time is the storm coming through?" she asked, talking to me through the open window of my car where we were in front of her salon.
"Afternoon, hopefully later than earlier," I said.
"Are you going to be able to make it back?"
"Maybe," I said. I hadn’t really thought about how I would be getting back. I had mostly been thinking about getting there first.
"Natalie, this is serious. You won't be able to drive through that."
"If worst comes to worst, I'll get a hotel or something," I said distractedly. "I just need to get up there."
"Just be careful," she said. I nodded. I had my phone and had splurged on a satellite phone too, just in case of any emergencies. It was the most expensive purchase of the haul, and I cursed Cameron silently for not bothering to get one himself. I left, and taking my own hasty advice, stopped at a store and got a stock of clothes and toiletries in case I really did end up having to stop at a hotel.
I drove as fast as I dared because the snow was already falling by the time I turned off the paved road to the all-weather mountain trail. The sky was obscured by clouds. It was windy, just how windy I didn't wa
nt to check. Kasey had been right. If the snow only got heavier, I wouldn't be making it back down. I concentrated on just making it up. You know what you should have gotten? I thought darkly. A snowmobile. No, what was I thinking? He should have gotten one. He should have done some fucking research and chosen a better time of year to abandon the comforts he had never had to live without. What kind of fool...
I stopped because it was no use. Concentrating on staying on the road, I finally got to his cabin. The trip that had taken me under three hours the first time had taken over four. The property was already covered in snow. The tarp over his car was completely carpeted. The wind whistled violently when I opened my door. I had dressed for winter that morning, but not winter in the mountains. My open coat whipped around me as I went over to the trunk and opened it to get the things out.
I grabbed a bag full of food and hurried to the porch, rushing up and sitting it on the highest step so it didn't get covered in snow before going back for another one. My second trip, I heard the door unlock as I came up the steps. Cameron came out looking confused. See, now, nobody would come out of their cabin emptyhanded like that if they heard a commotion outside. Maybe it was just your coworker, but maybe it was a bear. He was so green. It had only been a week that he had been out here, but it showed. How had he not broken his leg trying to get across a snowbank yet?
"Natalie?" he said, coming up to me.
"There's more in the car," I said shortly, walking back for more. He followed me.
"What is all this stuff?"
"It's for you," I said, hauling another bag out of the car. He helped me, grabbing the last bag and the heater and taking them up. I locked my car and hurried up to the porch.