“This is never going to stop cracking me up,” I snort, poking at the already yellowing piece of newsprint cut out and stuck to the cooler that acts as our refrigerator the few months out of the year it’s not cold enough to just toss food out into the snow.
Daniel looks up from the table he’s hewing. Is hewing the word? I don’t know. We’ve been out here for almost a year now, and there are still so many things I have to learn. Remote Alaska is a far cry from my little city apartment; out here we have plains and forests and mountains and rivers, what feels like an entire little world to ourselves.
The massive dose we took to escape took almost three months to wear off. In that time, we shambled around the place, grunting and fucking like rabbits. Good times were had by all. We’ve done a lot for the Bigfoot myth, so much that we had to keep heading ever deeper into the wilds to avoid the camera people who came to snap our pictures whenever someone spotted our furry selves. Whenever we make the long thirty-hour journey into the nearest town, I insist on snapping up all the related articles and pictures, much to Daniel’s despair.
Slowly, we regained our civilized nature, our humanity. Though some people would probably argue that, if they found us. We built the little cabin we now live in with our own two hands. It’s a log cabin front that sits over the mouth of a small cave, which holds heat in winter and keeps us cool in summer. I call it our Hobbit hole. Daniel calls it something scientific with ‘icarum’ at the end.
“Shouldn’t you be bottling those preserves?” he says dryly.
The man has become a real taskmaster. The one thing the Regenermax did leave in its wake was the dominant, possessive, sexy as hell streak.
“None of us like pickled carrots anyway,” I point out.
“We need vegetables to get us through winter.”
“I know, Daniel. I understand the concept of eating food to live. I may not be a big science genius, but I know what hole food goes in.”
His brows draw together as he stands up to lecture me. The man needs to be at full height to really get the full effect of his scolding. Unfortunately, the cabin isn’t quite tall enough to allow that. The Regenermax has left him at 7′2 in height. Basically a giant.
“Do you know what hole I’m going to go in if you keep talking like that?”
I smirk at him. It’s not the right thing to do, but that’s why I do it.
“You think this is funny, brat? You want me to bend you over and show you?”
“Well, if it’s the table you’re going to bend me over, you have to finish it first,” I point out. “It only has two legs.”
He growls and reaches for me. I let out a giggle of glee as he pulls me close and kisses me roughly, the thick pelt of his beard rough against my cheek and chin.
“I should fuck your little ass until you scream how sorry you are,” he rumbles. “I should whip your rear until you can’t sit down. I should…”
“Mama!”
Our little man calls from his cot in the cave. He’s nine months old, bright-eyed like me, smart just like his daddy—and he has an impeccable sense of timing.
Daniel lets me go with a stinging warning slap. I skip back in the cave to pick the baby up. His little face lights up as he sees me, and I feel my heart swell with love. Our little boy, who would never have existed if not for the trials we underwent, has made every hardship, every fight, every bullet worthwhile. We called him Max. It seemed fitting.
He snuggles into me, super content to be held until I carry him out to the cabin and he sees the other person he loves most in the world.
“Dada!” he screams at Daniel, reaching chubby little hands out for the big man who softens immediately. I hand the baby over and watch them together. It’s the most precious sight in the world as Daniel holds Max in one massive arm and starts showing him the table he’s making.
“Now, what you want is a good right angle between the table leg and the table top. What’s a right angle?”
“Gah!” Max declares.
“Ninety degrees, that’s right,” Daniel beams.
They get down to work, and so do I. Survival out here means pulling together, getting jobs done, and only occasionally teasing Daniel to the point he makes good on all those dirty, filthy threats he so loves to throw my way.
As I work, I glance back over at the article about the Bigfoot baby. If only they knew.
The End