“Aaron, where are you at?” Larry rasped, and the effort of raising his voice sent him into a coughing fit.

“I’m over in the shed, Larry!” I hollered back.

I could hear the old guy hacking his way across the yard, and he was wheezing as he dropped his spent cigarette in the snow outside the shed. His bulky coat looked like it weighed more than he did these days, and he wore his pom-pom hat so low that his wiry eyebrows hung down over his eyes. He reminded me of a rugged Einstein, but it didn’t matter how old or ornery he got, he still had the same toothy smile under his bushy moustache.

“How’d it go at the lake?” Larry coughed.

“Not bad.” I grinned. “I’ve got a caribou I need you to hang up and butcher in about a week. You want some trout?”

“I’ll take a few, sure,” he said with a hoarse chuckle. “Wish I coulda gone out with you boys. Been too long.”

“It has,” I agreed, and I led the way to the truck while Larry shuffled behind. “How are you holding up?”

“God damn cold’s gettin’ to my lungs real bad,” the old man rasped as he pulled out a fresh cigarette.

I eyed the bud as he lit it. “Oh, yeah? Does this mean you’re taking your son’s offer to move down to Florida and--”

“Shit, no!” Larry coughed. “The hell am I gonna do in a swamp?”

I smirked at the scolding look on the man’s wrinkly face, and I grabbed the cooler from the truck and let him bring his cloud of smoke along with me to my entryway. We passed my grandfather’s shop along the way, and I knew what was coming next before Larry even finished his next coughing fit.

“You know, you don’t wanna let that equipment sit and go all to hell in there,” he rasped. “Burt didn’t teach you everything he knows just so you could build a damn smokehouse and let his equipment go all to hell. Them two boys you sold the store to are alright, they’ll do him proud, but you always had the special knack for the work. Burt knew it, too. Said it all the time. He’d come over and say you had the special knack for it. You leave all that equipment untouched, and it’ll go all to he--”

“I’ve been working on a couple things,” I interrupted, and I dropped the cooler beside one of my freezers so I could unpack the wrapped trout I’d brought back.

Larry raised his wiry eyebrows. “You have?”

“Sure, I made Jimmy a hunting knife for his birthday. He’s been complaining about how bulky the blade is on his other one.”

“Yeah, that Rambo shit doesn’t serve no purpose,” Larry snickered as he wiped the snow from his moustache. “I told him that when he bought it too, but he wanted to look like a jackass. What kinda steel did you go for?”

“S30V,” I said with a shrug. “Eight and half inches with a drop point. Put a gut hook further back on the spine, elk antler handle.”

“Antler?” Larry scoffed. “Boy, you know that handle’s got no grip on it. Once all the skinnin’ starts, he’ll be dropping the damn thing all over the snow.”

“I know, I know,” I chuckled. “I didn’t intend for it to be his only hunting knife or anything. It’s just a gift. Thought he’d appreciate it, but he didn’t have any trouble with it slipping while we were out at the lake.”

Larry nodded, and his eyes dropped to the bone-handled knife on my belt. Of anyone in this area, he knew I always carried the same knife my grandfather made fifty years ago, and when I handed over an armful of wrapped trout, Larry jolted in surprise and tore his eyes off the knife.

He looked even older all of a sudden as he propped his cigarette between his teeth and took the packs in his arms, and I clapped him lightly on the shoulder before I led the way back to his snow machine.

Larry and my grandfather had grown up here in Talkeetna together, and sometimes I really did wonder if he missed Burt even more than I did. He talked about him every chance he got whereas I preferred to move on, but there were twenty other old guys exactly like him in these woods who did the same thing every time they saw me.

They asked about the shop, reminded me how much Burt taught me, and tossed a dash of guilt on the conversation to make sure I didn’t miss the point that I fucked up by selling his business.

“You need help getting all this back home?” I asked as I dragged a couple game bags out of the truck bed.

“Nah, I’m good,” Larry coughed. “Throw it on the rack back there. I’ll let him cure about eight days, how’s that sound?”

“That’d be great, thanks,” I replied. “Why don’t you just hang onto it all once he’s cut up? I’ve got plenty stored away.”

“No shit?” the old guy asked in disbelief. “That’s a lot of meat… you boys done all the work out there.”

“We like to work,” I said with a grin. “Do you need some more wood before I leave town?”

“Should be alright for a while,” Larry sighed.

“Well, there’s three cords out back if you need any,” I assured him, but when I looked over, Larry was pulling out a fresh cigarette with another one still propped between his teeth.

“Uh… Larry,” I muttered, and I pointed to the lit bud.

“Damnit,” he snickered. “There it is, thought I dropped the damn thing.”

Larry took a few relieved puffs as he stowed the fresh cigarette, and he sent me a nod of thanks before he climbed onto his snow machine and restarted the engine. Then he reversed from my bumper and drove off in the wrong direction, and I chuckled as I watched him realize this too late and narrowly miss a line of logs. Eventually, he got back on track and whizzed by with a determined glower under his bushy brow, and I was still keeping an eye on his headlights when his cigarette went flying from his mouth over a bump.

Larry’s stream of raspy curses didn’t end until he made it to the floodlights of his cabin, and I guessed he’d gotten a fresh cigarette out by then.

I sighed as I grabbed my rifle and engine block heater from the truck, and after I popped the hood, I plugged it in and set the timer for around four in the morning. That’d be plenty of time to warm her up before I left for Nelchina at six, and I gave the black truck a pat on the fender on my way to the twelve-pack I’d bought.

Once I locked up my hunting shed, I trudged up my deck steps again, and I finished packing the last of my trout in the freezer before I stored my grandfather’s Remington 700 on the shelf above.

The snow was coming down hard outside, but inside the cabin it was the perfect temperature by now, and even though I’d emptied out my fridge for Nelchina, I was set for the evening. I had a variety of salted jerkies still stashed in the cupboards, and beer and jerky always hit the spot in my opinion.

I let out a heavy sigh as I dropped into my armchair and popped open a beer, and I was fully prepared to embrace the peace and quiet tonight before I roughed it for the next couple weeks. Six swigs in, I laid my head back and let my eyes fall shut, but after about one minute of nothing but crackling flames filling the air, I sat up again.

I didn’t know what it was, but the same sinking feeling always seemed to show up in the center of my chest whenever I settled in lately. Not when I was working, or hunting, or listening to Vicky say nothing worth hearing, but the second I really paused to rest, the sinking feeling would start up again.

I used to sit around for hours in the winter and not feel restless for a single minute, but now that it was only me way out here in the cabin, it was like I couldn’t sit still. There had to be something for me to do, or at least some project I should focus on. Something forgotten that left the center of my chest hollowed out.

But this was horse shit. I had everything I needed and no inclination to change a thing about the place. I’d gotten along just fine out here my whole life, and while some people couldn’t make it through half an Alaskan winter without losing their minds, I never had a problem with the season.

It was cold and dark and fucking quiet. What’s not to like?

I ground my jaw at the question while I got up, and I strolled past a rack of hatchets and knives on my way to the lofty bookshelf on the southern wall. Then I grabbed the book I wanted to finish before I drained the rest of my beer in three long swigs, and after I got a fresh one from the fridge, I decided to sit in a different armchair, just for a change of scenery.

A cloud of dust wafted up from my grandfather’s timber wolf hide along with the smell of cigars, and I coughed through my grin as I opened the book. Two hours later, I was six beers and one tub of venison jerky in with only two chapters left to go, and the sinking feeling was mostly gone.

The guy I was reading about had finally managed to trap the tiger who’d been hunting him through the jungle for three weeks, but the words blurred on the page as I started to doze off before the end.

I didn’t feel like climbing the ladder to my loft tonight, so I let the book fall shut as I groped around to turn off the table lamp, and I must have passed out immediately after because I didn’t even remember to set my last beer aside.

Somewhere between that moment and the next morning, I had a dream for the first time in longer than I could remember. I saw my brother walking ahead of me, and he didn’t turn around, but I guessed it was him because he had his fatigues on.

We had identical gaits when we walked though, and his hair wasn’t cropped anymore. He wore it in the same shaggy black way I always did, so for a minute, I wondered if it was me wearing the fatigues this time. This made absolutely no sense to me since the Army was his thing, not mine, but then Brandon told me to watch my step, and I knew it was him I was following.

It wasn’t long before gunfire surrounded the two of us as we strolled across a stormy battlefield, and just as I registered how many fallen soldiers littered the ground, I reached out to grab his shoulder.

Then a bullet struck my brother’s back, and he dropped down and vanished on the spot.

That’s when I woke up, and my hand shot to my phone so fast, I dropped the half-empty beer can on the floor. I didn’t bother picking it up as I desperately checked the time, and I just tried to even out my heartrate while my palms stayed cold and clammy.

It was only five in the morning, and I didn’t need to leave for Nelchina yet, but I had my truck cleaned off, loaded up, and driving back down the snowy lane within ten minutes.

I didn’t register anything while I made my way north to grab a coffee before I left town, and I wouldn’t have been surprised if I ended up in Fairbanks without noticing. My eyes were stuck wide, and my jaw was locked tight while I white-knuckled the steering wheel, but at least I was reliable in autopilot because eventually, I was staring at the snow through a shop window instead of a windshield.

“Here’s your coffee, Aaron.”

I blinked and turned around, and the tiny barista had bright red cheeks as she giggled up at me. I couldn’t remember her name, but I was pretty sure she was someone’s little sister. She was also wearing a pair of purple slippers with her apron, but she did have a shitty shift to work.

“Thanks,” I mumbled.

“I hope you have fun with the wolves,” the barista said as she awkwardly tugged on the sleeves of her sweatshirt. “Vicky says you got the lead position for the study out in Unit 13.”

“Oh,” I said as I reconsidered the chipmunk quality of her cheeks, and I realized the blushy girl was Vicky’s younger, teenage sister. “Yeah. Thanks for the coffee.”

“I’m sorry about Jimmy,” the girl tried just as I turned away, and I furrowed my brow as I stopped in my tracks.

“What happened?” I asked. “Is he alright?”

The barista giggled again and covered her mouth like she was embarrassed, but I could tell she wasn’t. She was just like her sister, and her blue eyes crinkled the same way whenever she was trying to cause trouble.

“Sorry, I thought you knew,” the girl muttered. “It’s just… Vicky spent the night at Jimmy’s place. Her car was still there with Shawna’s when I left for work.”

“Is that right?” An instant grin spread across my face at the news, and a throaty chuckle slipped out along with it. “Well, that’s pretty cool.”

“What?” the barista snorted.

I didn’t bother elaborating. I just left the shop and climbed back in my truck, and I’d already pulled out of the parking lot before I realized Vicky’s sister had put about a pound of sugar in my black coffee.

“God damnit,” I spluttered as I let it all stream back into the cup.

Then I left the coffee in the cupholder for the next hour and a half instead, and I ended up stopping off in Palmer to get a fresh one. By now, my eyes were burning from how tired I was, and the snow picked up again ten minutes outside the town to make matters more difficult. Luckily, there was nobody out on highway one except me and my truck, and after chugging most of my coffee, I felt clear-headed again. My grip on the wheel relaxed, and I finally unclenched my jaw, but I was still glaring at the halo of my headlights.

Then I took another swig of coffee, and I wondered if I should have gone out and fucked Vicky last night.

I really had no problem with beer at Latitude or mindless sex. Both got the job done to some extent, but I’d just been worn out on her for ages. Unless she was moaning under me, there wasn’t much to do with a woman like her, and even that part wasn’t as entertaining as I would have liked.

But I was proud of Jimmy, and part of me knew I made the right call skipping drinks last night. There was always that flicker of disappointment whenever I woke up with Vicky anyways, and for months, I’d actually been sneaking out of her apartment a few minutes after she passed out. The disappointment was still there, but it didn’t smell like a toxic level of perfume, at least.

So her and I had been done for a while now, and Jimmy would always remember this birthday with pride. It was for the best, and hunting for a new girl to pass the time might keep my mind preoccupied for a while.

Hopefully.

A couple girls I knew in college were easier to be around, but nothing really stood out as a reason to call them up these days. And damn it if I wasn’t always on top with every one of them.

Honestly, even if the sex was boring, I’d be happy if I could just take a decent girl out hunting for once and not have her complain through the entire field dressing process. I happened to enjoy all aspects of the hunt, and how some of these women expected to snap their fingers and have moose steaks appear was beyond me.

Still, I had to figure out some way to get by for the time being because it looked like this winter might finally be the one that broke me.

I hadn’t thought about my brother in years, and I damn sure didn’t want to dream about him getting shot down in the middle of the night. I’d imagined it enough times ever since we got word he’d been killed in action, and at this point, I’d be willing to waste countless nights on women like Vicky if it meant I could sleep more soundly.

For now, I had work to distract me.

I was always curious what might come from my next assignment, and as cut and dried as tracking our collared breeding pairs was, something unexpected usually came up with my job. That was why I enjoyed it so much, especially this time of year. The conditions were rougher, and being out and working in the elements was fundamentally invigorating. It didn’t matter if we were flying to observe individual prey kills, or darting recently established breeding pairs for new packs, the environment was almost always ready to throw us a wild card.

Hunting in the tundra or fishing the lakes was invigorating too, but my job completed the picture. It gave me the opportunity to study the balance between all the predator and ungulate species on a larger scale, and weighing this against their impact on the habitat put things in a different perspective for me.

This was partly why I didn’t feel guilty about avoiding my grandfather’s shop. Burt always respected that my brother and I had our own directions we wanted to go. The eight-inch buck knife I made Jimmy was actually the first one I worked on in over a year, but I had to admit, it felt good to get back in the swing of things again.

Halfway through carving the bone handle, I decided I’d make a new hatchet when I got back from this next assignment, and if this went over alright, I wouldn’t mind making a few custom skinning blades to add to my collection, too. With all that could lead to, I’d end up spending more time in the shop than I did by the smokehouse, and I already knew I’d basically mapped out my next three months.

“Plus, women like Vicky,” I sighed to myself, and I was mid eye roll when my phone rang.

I was so startled I slammed my coffee cup into the wrong holder, and the sugary mess I’d spit out in Talkeetna got knocked to the passenger floor. I cursed as I clamped the phone between my shoulder and ear so I could try and reach it, but there was no chance at this range.

“Yeah?” I growled into the phone, and the connection cut out repeatedly while Jimmy’s voice barely made it through. “I’m already driving along the Matanuska, and I can’t hear a damn thing you’re saying, man.”

More garbled words followed, and I caught the phrase “two hours late” but not much more than that.

“I’ll let them know!” I hollered. “Proud of you!”

Then I hung up so I could lurch sideways and get the coffee cup, but it was just out of reach while it steadily gurgled onto my truck floor. I cursed a few more times and tore my seatbelt off, and I checked the snowy road real quick before I half-dived to snatch the cup. When I finally got hold of it, I sat back up with my hand drenched in syrupy coffee, and it dribbled into the sleeve of my jacket while the stench of sweetener filled the cab.

I didn’t give a flying fuck though, because my entire body went numb in a millisecond from the sight of what laid ahead.

The moose standing in the road was a good seven feet tall and had to weigh fourteen hundred pounds, and I was going sixty miles an hour when I swerved hard. I managed to miss the moose, but the ridge I hit on the roadside sent me crashing back the other way, and the studs on my tires did nothing to stop me from spinning out.

“Son of a bitch!” I growled while I tried to regain control of the truck, but the road was too slick, and I hit the guard rail so hard that I flipped over the edge.

After that, I lost track of how many rolls I took into the valley, and all the windows shattered while my body smashed around inside the cab. I regained some sense of what was happening once I was thrown from the window, and I caught a few boulders to the back before I suddenly dropped over a cliff.

Then everything was cold and silent, and while I spiraled in the snowy air, I had a fleeting thought that no one would ever find my remains down here. The frozen Matanuska river was getting larger every time I turned, and I could have sworn I saw my battered truck falling after me along with a sheet of snow.

Then the world around me seemed to fade into black as the frigid air continued rushing past, and I landed with a sickening crunch.