SmokeLong Quarterly

Owen is building a canoe in the living room. Mom has informed us that she’s giving up. So Owen has dragged a fallen birch in through the front door and is using Dad’s old hunting knife to hollow out the center. The shag carpet around us is accumulating layers of curlicue bark strips and brittle leaves. Nature crunches under my feet. Upstairs, I hear Mom still crying.

I’m not sure what I’m going to do with my freedom yet. I could pull Grandpa’s boat out of the shed and go floating away down the St. Lawrence River, stopping to collect a handful of soil from each of the Thousand Islands in succession as I go. I could tether my craft to a strong catfish and he could pull me along the gliding current. I could leave this cottage and go live in the forgiving silence of the woods. I could learn to mimic bird calls and speak the language of bears. I could train a raccoon to obey my commands. I could send him on a mission south, towards Charlottesville, to see if he could spot Dad’s old Ford F-250 Highboy. Or, better, I could send him on a mission into Mom’s room, where he could retrieve all the things she’s taken from me over the years. Bang Snaps and Playboys and that half-finished bottle of Maker’s Mark and the swiss army knife with a magnifying glass Dad gave me and the Boner Place street sign.

One thing we will not do with our newfound freedom is apologize. A catfish will become a steed and a racoon will burgle homes before we apologize. An entire forest will grow in this house before we apologize.